#but their platonic relationship is SO important

[morally-earl-gray]

we all love to talk about how the b99 characters are a bunch of chaotic bisexuals and i love that for them but can i also say that as an aroace person, they are so so so important to me. the platonic relationships? amazing. the lgbtq representation? yes please. the idea that you dont have to settle down or have kids to have a good, fulfilling life? YES ABSOLUTELY. so glad to be living in a time with characters like rosa diaz, jake peralta, and (my favorite) raymond holt. they may not be aroace but their ideas about relationships mean so much to me as an aroace person.

[izvmimi]

cw: platonic!zoro x reader. established romantic relationship with luffy. selfship-coded, reader has a devil fruit.

It’s not often that you and Zoro end up alone together, but today it really is just the two of you, him carrying the majority of the provisions you’d gone into town to collect for the next leg of your trip, and the remainder in the safekeeping of your internal storage. 

“Are you sure you don’t want me to just stow away the rest?” you ask for the third time and by this time, Zoro decides to pretend he can’t hear you. In any other scenario, you’d make a comment about him needing to get over that silly fear of being emasculated, but for now you allow it, shoving your free hands in your pockets as you continue on on your stroll.

Even if when you’re around the rest of the crew there’s a huge and frequent show of you generally disliking each other, it’s hard to bicker when it’s just the two of you, because the truth is that you appreciate him tremendously. Zoro doesn’t always talk much, but he’s honest, and that is particularly important to you, making it easy to pour out your heart to him.

Perhaps that’s why today, you feel compelled to tell him exactly how you’ve been feeling these days since your return from the last island. Luffy has been asleep for days, recovering from injury that would probably have killed you on the spot, and while he apologized upon waking up two days ago to see you saddled with huge undereye circles and an open book with tear-staged pages at the foot of his bed, the fact of the matter is that you’re not sure how much longer you can handle this.

The crew is familiar with his wanton disregard for his own life, and perhaps you should know better by now, but it’s just too hard sometimes, and you can feel your heart starting to fill with resentment, and even that adds to your guilt.

Luffy is free, and freedom means choosing to live your life however dangerously you want.

“You know I hate complaining about him, and I know you’ll just tell me that I shouldn’t expect otherwise from Luffy, but just once, I wish he would take better care of himself.”

The thought slips out in a small voice, and Zoro lets it marinate in the quiet afternoon air. Discomfort rises like bile in your throat.

“I shouldn’t have said anything,” you immediately backtrack, but Zoro looks at you and shrugs.

“I get it. It’s fine.”

You bite your lower lip, keeping the gaze at the ground before you. Zoro should know that you’re only frustrated, that you love Luffy more than anything, and don’t mean to speak ill of him, right? It’s just eating at you, the idea that only one of you is preoccupied with the idea of separating for good.

Luffy would be fine without you even in death. You, on the other hand…

You take in a deep breath.

“I trust him,” you say out loud, to which Zoro chuckles to himself for a moment, which makes your cheeks warm in embarrassment.

“What’s so funny?!”

“That you’re this worried about him.” Zoro shoots you a glance, and mercilessly adds - 

“Realistically, you’d probably croak before he does.”

“Wow!” you exclaim in dramatized offense. 

Zoro shrugs. “I mean, I guess he probably cares enough about you that he wouldn’t allow that to happen, but still, I don’t think much can put that guy down for good.”

You pout, but something about that is reassuring, and that heaviness in your chest seems to alleviate just so.

“I guess that’s a relief.”

Zoro snorts again, which has you frowning at him again.

“Is it really this funny?” you ask, indignantly, but when he finally speaks again, his tone is serious.

“I think you’re misunderstanding him a bit,” he finally adds. Stopping for a moment, he gives you his full attention, and suddenly your heart starts to thump at the change in mood. He sizes you up for a moment, as if he’s trying to decide if what he has to tell you is worth it in any way, then lets out a sigh.

“He told me if something ever happened to him, there are a few things he wants to make sure happen for you, so that you’re okay.”

Your eyes widen for a moment, incredulous.

“What?”

Zoro resumes his stride.

“Can’t tell you what they are, though.”

You find yourself running to catch up to him, your heart pounding in your chest. The idea that Luffy has thought ahead, considering you even in the process, is almost too good to be true. 

“So what was the point of even telling me?!” you hiss.

“So you don’t make up some narrative about not being cared for in your head, dumbass.” Zoro says. You stick your tongue out at him which has him scoff and look away, but you’re thankful.

The ship starts to reappear along the horizon and your outlook has changed a bit.

…

By the time you make it back on the ship again, Luffy has woken up from his restorative slumber and is already asking you if you brought any meat amongst your groceries, an arm looping around your shoulders and your waist. But instead of pushing him off of you for grabbing you too quickly, you look at him for a moment, and the sudden affection in your eyes is enough that it actually catches him by surprise.

“Hey, ___, what’s up?” he asks as you really take him in, but you just smile and plant a kiss on his cheek.

“Nothing. I’m just glad you’re back.”

He grins widely. 

“Can’t get rid of me if you tried.”

[once-in-a-blue-moon-rising]

Seen a few 'maturity is realising that it's not a look of love' videos on Instagram re: 457, and while I do realise it is Not That Deep, I nonetheless have THOUGHTS

The crux of those thoughts is this: has fandom's view of shipping narrowed so far that unless two characters are mashing their faces together on-screen, it's immature to interpret the text contrary to what we assume the creator's intention was?

With this ship specifically, let's start with the obvious: the actors have insane chemistry. This is true whether you see the characters' bond as platonic, romantic, antagonistic, or something else. They are very obviously comfortable and friendly with one another in real life, and this translates into an intense on-screen relationship between Gi-hun and In-ho (and I'm sure this is exactly what the director did want, because, newsflash, this is our protagonist/antagonist duo).

I do think it's valid to ship something based purely off the actors' chemistry, but the comment is obviously referring to the characters themselves in the context of the story, so let's address that too.

There's a clear motivation for the way In-ho stares at Gi-hun, follows him around, and generally tries to insert himself into his life, and this is what these posts are referring to. He's testing his ideology, he's watching how he's affected by the horrific things that are happening around him, and to help him do this, he's ensuring that Gi-hun trusts and likes him. It's important if he wants to prove to him that the world is unchangeable, and humanity irredeemable.

And because of that, it's not the 'look of love'. Case closed?

Well, no.

Because there is so much nuance and depth that you're failing to explore, if a look can only mean one thing.

Because why does In-ho bother? Why is Gi-hun worth his time and interest? In-ho - via the games - has access to resources that far far outweigh the money Gi-hun won. He could prevent him from finding the island forever. He could just have him shot tbh. He's not really a credible threat - at most, he's a minor annoyance, because people need to be paid off every so often to prevent him getting too close.

Just through this detail, we can deduce that In-ho cares, in some way. He is interested enough to want to change Gi-hun's mind, when it would be so much easier to... not. Is it love? It's certainly fascination. And I don't think it can be argued that he brought him back for the VIPs' entertainment and not his own, because Gi-hun was searching for three years before In-ho let himself be found. And even when he's found, it's Gi-hun who suggests going back into the games.

So these stares - yes, he's testing him, but he's doing it because he wants to. They denote genuine interest. How did this guy retain his hope and faith in humanity? How can I prove to him that my view is correct?

And I'm very much not saying that a romantic interpretation is 'correct', because fiction should be interpreted however the audience sees fit, but what is love (in all its forms) if not wanting to know someone and be known by them?

This is even more compelling to me when we take into account In-ho's backstory, which we learn a bit more about in season 2. Because he and Gi-hun are so similar, except in the way they've used their trauma to interpret the world. Which just adds to the evidence that In-ho would be fascinated by this man, be determined to know him and to change his mind.

What I'm saying with all this isn't that 457 is canon, and that anyone who says otherwise is media illiterate. What I'm saying is that the real immature interpretation is one that's surface level, be that interpretation 'uwu he loves him' or 'he's PLOTTING evil things'.

[thedissonantverses]

Writing Challenge Wednesday:

Yay Wednesday! Let's write! (Btw if you sent a Rook Storytime Ask I'm still working my way through them thank you for being patient, they're actually really helping me flesh out my next story and they're a ton of fun. ) As always on these there is no time limit, tag or link or dm or reblog or comment under this post! No word count either just have fun with it that's what it's here for. I don't have standards for submission take or leave what you want, link your Ao3's, and it's all tagged writing challenge on my page! As long as it gets you writing I don't care and I will share. Let me show you off!!!

Okay I did a really fun self-imposed challenge where I turned fluffy head canons into angst cause I can turn anything into angst if you give me long enough ;) I thought it'd be fun to play with that today so I'm going to give you some fluffy head canons and some angsty head canons and I want you to flip the script and take the mood from fluff to angst or angst to fluff. (Please do platonic relationships as well as romantic if you're so inclined I'm into that)

Fluff:

Character A gives Character B a present.

Character A helps character B with their hair/makeup/outfit.

Character A and Character B want to teach Character C a skill.

Character A and Character B go dancing.

Characters A, B, and C are druuuuuuuuunk.

Angst:

Characters A and B have to go to a funeral together.

Character C has tragically gone missing and A and B have to cope.

Character A has lost someone close to them and can't stop crying. Character B and if you want Character C notices as well.

Character A has lost an important item to them or it was destroyed.

Character A and Character B are fighting for real. Real emotional or physical or both. Perhaps Character C intervenes or they work it out themselves.

Have at it and I will post mine later!!!!!

[mangionebabymama]

hi there! hope you’re well! ok real talk, lu strikes me as someone who has never been in love, but craves that intimacy with someone. i know a lot of ppl like to speculate that maybe he just wasn’t into looking for romance, and sure, maybe he wasn’t actively seeking persay, but he did seem to be someone who was actively looking for more emotional bonds. i mean, when you look at some of the things he would do for his friends (heck even acquaintances) like gift giving, buying them lunch, trying to buy 400 copies of a book, a subscription service, it’s like his act of service of gift giving as a way to connect and form bonds. and this is just with people he wanted friendship/mentorship with. imagine with a woman he truly connected with? he might actually be too intense in that respect haha but really wanting to please - I just wonder if his expectations for romance were too high because he knew the moment he fell for someone, he’d be too all in. he did mention in his notes that he has an addictive personality (which has a whole set of connotations in a romantic relationship but I won’t get into that now haha)

I completely agree with all of this. He also strikes me as someone who has never been in love, who maybe wasn’t actively seeking a romantic relationship and dating, but he likes the idea of love and what it feels like—pointing to the different ways that he emotionally connects and forms bonds with the closest people in his life, and those that he isn’t even close with, but for some reason, he feels that sort of closeness as he is a giving, compassionate person and likes to feel that gratification from making people happy and feel important. So for him, there’s more than just romantic love that feels nice and satisfying, as there’s several other types.

I wonder if he developed platonic relationships/bonds with people, those involving women. If he knew that he wasn’t necessarily ready for dating, or had that self-awareness—there’s no doubt that he was heavily self-disciplined and percipient about himself and his personality, then he could still seek out those feelings in other forms of appreciating and loving those close to him. It is, in fact, to love hard without it being romantically.

[eternalera]

can we please please talk about tagging properly on ao3 fics? like mostly with relationship tags when there's a minor background relationship that shows up ONCE and its put IN THE RELATIONSHIP TAGS.

there is a reason why there's a background relationship tag in the additional tagging section.

especially with platonic tags, like there is just a slew of platonic relationships that are so background to the fic itself that i dont think should be put in the relationship tagging section or should be tagged at all because throughout a 10k fic or fic with a ton of chapters have like one interaction and it clogs up searches that want to find a fic with the focus being that dynamic.

so basically if a relationship is not really all that important or prominent throughout a fic PLEASE do not put it in the relationship section. put it in the additional tags and tag it "Background [character]/[character]" then it doesnt clog up searches that badly

it just makes it easier. anyways bye ig

[sexiestpodcastcharacter]

Sexiest Podcast Character 2024 — Scripted Bracket — Round 1

Propaganda

The Obituary Writer (Death by Dying):

canonically good looking, but also a cringefail loser wet cat of a man who fails to do ninja stealth rolls and has a facial expression like he's a murderer. loves his best friend so very very much (give it up for important platonic relationships!) and is totally fine and coping well with the events of the podcast, no need to worry :)

Madge Stallion (Fawx & Stallion):

Madge Stallion was submitted without propaganda.

[calthepal]

What's so special about Destiel (to me at least), is how Dean is a man who does not feel worthy of savior, not worthy of love. He is a man that believes that he is not important and he holds so much self-hatred that he puts his whole being into helping others and that is still not enough to make him feel worthy.

So when he is saved by Castiel he is so convinced that he has ulterior motives and he stabs him.

Cas does not react and just looks at him, and sees him as Him. He sees how convinced he is that he is not a good person and says; "You don't think you deserve to be saved?"

Cas sees Dean for who he is. Still beautiful. Still Dean Winchester.

Dean is connected to Cas by his sacrifices made to pull him from hell and Cas shows to him that he is worthy of love and happiness and Dean is able to finally see past his own hard exterior.

Dean learns how to love again from Cas without either knowing it, and that changes Cas too.

Cas sees how caring Dean is for Sam, Bobby, Ben, Lisa etc and it moves him, and it is Dean's selflessness that moves Cas to change, and he learns to love from Dean. They learnt how to love others and themselves in a way they hadn't before from each other. Cas acknowledges this in his goodbye speech in 15x18;

"Knowing you has changed me."

Their love for eachother is what set them apart from the other universes. They are in the ONLY universe where Castiel went against his orders, deviated from the script. Because of DEAN.

Ultimately, Supernatural is a show about Family and Love and perseverance (friendship is magic type shit) and having their relationship being considered only platonic feels too simple. Their relationship feels so much more than that, and I don't care if it is read as romantic or not but they changed each other for the better of literally the entire universe.

They make me so ill.

[mileven11forever]

This is so fun, feel completely free to not answer this, I'm just sending an ask cause you answer lots of them, so I figured you enjoy it.

What do you think s5 has in store for mike and will? Not necessarily their relationship (whether it's platonic or romantic) but them as characters.

I've heard many theories from bylers but never from milevens. The biggest s5 byler theory is mike getting vecna'd (but not dying) and/or will having powers. There's also a bit of time travel, some say that since will's house got sold when they went to California, he'll stay with mike, others that mike + dustin will suffer lots of bullying. Another big theory is that the upside down is will's mindscape, which leads to my favourite theory https://www.tumblr.com/henry-fox-biggest-stan/767062635324833792/bringing-this-back-to-include-this-from-this?source=share

I think Mike getting Vecna'd would be interesting. I'm not really sure what will happen with them in season 5 though. I'm mostly just excited to see Mike and El together more and protecting each other. And I'm actually interested to see how they handle Will coming out and admitting his feelings for Mike, I think it will be a really powerful and important moment. But yeah, other than that I haven't thought that much about it. I'd love to hear what other people think though. :)

[ammonite-collective]

hey!! pls feel free to delete this if you don't feel comfortable answering, but i'm currently heavily questioning / researching npd for myself. i just saw your positivity post about people who are kind for selfish reasons / people who are kind bc they get supply out of it and i was wondering if you could elaborate a little more on that? i feel that i am actually very frequently kind because i know that it is the socially tactful thing to do/because it will reflect better on me to take the high road/because it will afford me more opportunities in the future and i never say that out loud bc i know it will come across weird to ppl.

Absolutely! What you’re describing are selfish reasons to be kind but that doesn’t make them bad. A selfish reason for being kind includes anything that isn’t entirely to improve another person’s mood/day/life. Most people have selfish reasons for being kind. Also, being selfish is not a bad thing. It’s really important for a person in healthy relationships (platonic/romantic/familial) to be selfish sometimes. Considering yourself and your needs over someone else’s is a perfectly healthy thing to do.

In my experience as a person with npd, my brain thinks selfishly. I am kind for many different reasons but it’s super rare for it to revolve around someone else. The honest truth is that no one actually cares why you are kind, as long as you are. Unfortunately, you will probably have to keep your reasons to yourself around most people. People who hate those with low/no empathy will find any reason to hate us.

Anyway, you keep being kind for whatever reason you choose and I hope everything goes well for you!

Edit: I’m so sorry I totally thought I posted this ages ago

[corvidsinatrenchcoat]

i nearly started crying at work because i remembered the kenhina friendship

it’s just... so pure... can you imagine a love without expectations? can you imagine someone seeing you and just... choosing you? no second thoughts? someone who, for all intents and purposes, isn’t anything like you, and yet has chosen you? for someone to see you and love you not despite but because of your faults? to meet your insecurities and boundaries with total acceptance and joy?

[tokenducks]

Charles “We’ve got literally forever to figure out what the rest means” Rowland

[mytardisisparked]

The reason Psych is the Important Show of All Time is because it said "friendship is the MOST important thing." Like, yes, the romances were good but the show spends even more time emphasizing and developing the friendships and that's why it rocks. Lassiter and Juliet love and support each other unconditionally without even the slightest whiff of romance and it is SO. REFRESHING. When Juliet almost dies, Lassie sacrifices his favorite gun to save her without any hesitation. He's the one there to hold her while she cries. She's his confidant. She leaves everything she knows behind so he can chase his dream of being chief without reprocussion. That's a deep, wholesome kind of platonic love. They also never had Shawn be jealous of how close Jules and Lassie are - instead, in the final episode, we see Shawn thanking Lassie for loving and supporting Juliet. We simply don't do that jealousy crap here. Lassie and Jules are best friends and that's an excellent thing. And then there's Shawn and Gus. Those characters are narratively and physically inseperable. The show makes it VERY clear that, without the other, neither one is complete. They balance each other and exacerbate each other's hijinks at the same time. They're closer than close and everyone around them just accepts it. It's just the way those two dumb boys are and no one is going to try to get between that. And then, of course, SO many friendships develop over the course of the show. Lassie and Shawn form a begrudging friendship eventually. Juliet and Karen end up bonding more than I think either expected. Friendship is the beating heart of this series and it's presented in a way that is unique and fun and I just don't see a lot of other shows that do it like Psych did.

[plutonicbees]

season 1 tao's "once you get into a relationship, friendships don't matter anymore" vs season 2 charlie writing "charlie ♡ tao" on the heart locket + "wait, isn't that for you and nick?" "no."

sorry yeah I'm just lil emotional over the portrayal of platonic love as something that can be just as worthy as romantic love. i'm okay.

[afurtivecake]

if andrew was a bit swayed by kevin, i cannot blame him in THE SLIGHTEST. kevin is like, specifically engineered to appeal to all of andrew's protective instincts:

fleeing horrific abuse from a grade-A asshole

thinks about going back to the abusive situation sometimes

needs him all the time

hot.

and on top of that, kevin tells him he's worth something and that he'll give him something to live for.

like idk what else andrew could have done. the man is not made of stone.

[eldritch-ace]

I need more bestie Will and Bev content so I make it myself. They are the only cool people to ever exist in the FBI.

Also the Fred(dies) whom I despise (I love them with my whole heart). They are my favorite AO3 authors.