#but this is so the narrative for these two

[theatrevelyan]

Ok, big endgame spoilers for DAV but I need to scream into the void because I don’t think we stopped enough to talk about the fact that Lucanis literally stabbed a God, twice, and even killed her the second time.

He killed her.

Sure, he had help, and someone always dies to give him the shot, but do you understand how fucking big of a deal that is?????

Actions so important and plot relevant as that are usually reserved for the main character/protagonist of a game, especially in an rpg.

And here comes our little assassin, who we recruited to kill gods but who we all know, from a narrative standpoint, has no chance to actually deal the final blow, and he fucking deliveres.

We still get the big boss, sure, but he still got one. He defied narrative preconceptions and finished his contract.

How fucking metal is that?????

And can you imagine, once this is all over, how the other crows must see him? He was already a legend before and now he’s the crow that managed a successful contract on a freaking god.

Can you imagine the awe? The fear? The sheer terror his next target would feel knowing the man who killed a god is after them?

And if Rook is a crow the same goes for them!

The crows are already infamous, could you imagine how their reputation would skyrocket even more knowing that not just one, but possibly two of them managed to kill a god????

One might a fluke, an outlier among them (which Lucanis already is since he’s considered the best they have). But two?! It begins to be a pattern. Sign of skill and competence for the whole guild.

Caterina would love that shit. What better marketing strategy than “if need be, we can kill gods btw” could she get.

And can you imagine if crow Rook and Lucanis are romancing each other??? Who would dare to even think opposing the two assassins that literally killed gods??? Bet the usual crow shenanigans would stay clear of them.

Anyway I’m really normal about Lucanis.

[worrywrite]

This is why I keep telling people I'm not interested in the show. More than half the cast of the game exists to be porn or marketing fodder. No thought beyond aesthetics was put into essentially every character in the game. Any depth was added in post, and it's so slapshod it makes it worse.

The problem with Arcane is the general problem with prequels:

No matter how good the prequel is, if the thing that happens after is an unmitigated cash grab dumpster fire where everyone gets reduced down to a two paragraph "I'm in the death arena because..." statement that never even actually answers the question of why they're in the death arena--well, why bother.

(I'm a bit more bitter below, so continue at your own risk. I'm not adding much to my point.)

I'll be honest, Vi and Jinx were better characters on release because they meant nothing. Vi was a butch lesbian ex-con with a heart of gold that punched things and got blackmailed into worked for the police. Jinx was off brand Harley Quinn, if the joker didn't exist (yet) and she got to be him instead. The lack of detail beyond that didn't matter. Even Viktor and Jayce were better off as cyborg Hitler and off brand Tony Stark.

I'm honestly very surprised that Riot ever pushed for a wider narrative and world for the LoL IP. They'd been flattening it down for years so they could sell skins and rework characters whenever they wanted (to sell more skins) and then release more characters that made the old ones narratives not matter at all (so they could rework things again and sell more skins). They started out with a decent amount of lore and world building. They actually had lore based in-game events that mattered. But then they had decided for a long time to not do those things, they pushed for eSports and flat narrative for basically a decade. And now, now that their IP basically sucks and their player numbers are down and their skin sales are down and most of their team from when the game was good have left or been fired (for good reason) and eSports as a genre are in massive decline post nft grift--now they choose to try and have a story. And that story is still not going to affect their game at all.

At a business level, it's a good decision for them. Sure. But on a consumer level it does nothing to draw me back towards the game at all. Though I guess that is just me being aged out of their target demographic. They don't want the nostalgia money. They want the money out of kids demanding premium currency for Christmas.

Arcane is an advanced form of doomed by the narrative/doomed from the beginning because the show is trying so hard to create this serious, intricate story but the endgame of this story is everyone ending up in League of Legends

[threeacttragedy]

Entry 10: The One About the Audibly Loud Lukola FanFic

I’ll address the elephant in the room. And, no, I’m not talking about Jake Dunn’s brown suit! Or, that he’s posing with a man. Or, that Tyler commented “Bellissimo!!!!” on Jake's post.

I don’t think a lot of people understood the connection I was making this morning about “Mis-Directed,” Gwilym Lee, and Jake.  So, now I feel the need to explain because I don’t want people running with a narrative that goes in the opposite direction of where I was taking it.

Sorry, JVN, you’re getting pushed to the side again. I promise, I’ll get to you one day.

Let’s go back two months…

On September 25, Nicola posted to her Instagram stories a link to Alex Babsky’s post, which was a picture of Nicola. She had her hair and make-up done but she was wearing one of her own dresses (the black dress she wore in Australia and Brazil). Babsky captioned his post “[pink bow] @nicolacoughlan in London today for…well, never mind what for actually [laughing emoji with hand over mouth] [winking emoji] [shushing emoji].” Nicola responded, “You’re amazing it was so gorgeous to see you xxx.”

Babksy’s caption sent the fandom into hysteria wondering what the hell Nicola was up to. It didn’t help that this was the same day Luke updated his Instagram bio and used “Xx” and it didn’t help that Nicola was wearing the black dress she allegedly wore on her beach walk in Brazil with Luke.

Do you want to know what I thought the photo of Nicola was from? I’m not going to lie – I thought it was pre-wedding makeup. Seriously, not kidding. It reminded me of my own wedding day. Formal hair and makeup and my own dress that was easy to take off without messing up the hair and makeup. I never said I wasn’t a little bit delulu.

On November 5, an author named Lucy Parker announced on her Instagram feed that she had a new Audible book called “Mis-Directed” being released in February 2025. The post came with pictures of Nicola wearing the black dress and the same hair and makeup as the September 25 post. Nicola (presumably) is reading the part of Hattie Murton, and Gwilym Lee (presumably) is reading the part of Anthony Rafe.

Oh, okay.

Turns out, I was wrong.

So, Nicola and Luke didn’t get married.

Fine.

I have always liked crows.

But, wait a minute – what the fuck is this Audible book about? A woman who stars in a romantic drama called “Leicester Square” (what the fuck?) which was adapted from a best-selling romance novel (what the fuck??). Then, in comes our antagonist, Anthony Rafe, who plays opposite of Hattie and, let me quote here, “But when very real chemistry sparks during their scripted love scenes, Hattie begins to think the industry’s legendarily heartless Bad Guy [Anthony] might just a have a pulse after all. And Anthony, for his part, is caught off-guard by the way his heart races when he’s around his aggravating onscreen lover. As reality starts to imitate art a little too close for comfort, the world’s most unlikely couple might just have more in common than they thought…” (what the fuck???).

Let’s start with Leicester Square. What the hell is Leicester Square? Oh, the name of the fake television show on which Hattie and Anthony star. Sure, Jan. Is it odd to anyone else that Leicester Square is the name of the location of where the London premiere of Bridgerton Season 3 took place? You know, the event that happened hours before Papsmear.

Then we have the make-believe show being adapted from a best-selling romance novel. Mmm hmm.

Let’s try and not make the connection between Luke and Anthony. Mmm hmm.

And, let’s add fuel to the fire and have two co-stars falling in love with each other.

Yeah, we get it. It’s a Lukola FanFic being read by none other than Nicola. I mean, the only way it could be any better is if Luke was reading the part of Anthony Rafe! But, no, that part is being read by Gwilym Lee (who is fantastic in everything he does, by the way).

Who is Gwilym Lee? Well, he’s an actor (my father calls him “Midsomer”). Ask Mr. Google about him. But, if you check out his Instagram feed, you will find that he knows Jake and has since, at least, 2022. Is it possible that Nicola met Gwilym through Jake? Yeah, it is.

Now, why do I find this situation intriguing? Specifically, why did I find the post from Jake this morning posing with Gwilym interesting (and a bit shady)? Let me explain.

The Jakholes took the “Mis-Directed” FanFic as shade towards the Lukolas. Yes, they went there because that FanFic does not (in the least) fit nicely into their Jakola narrative. I mean, if it wasn’t shade to the Lukolas, how weird the storyline must have been for Jake! The writing was audibly on the wall, in big red letters, but the Jakholes chose to spin it into something messier than my hair in the morning after sleeping on it wet.

What exactly is this theory? Well, per the Jakholes, Nicola hates the Lukola fandom so much that she sat and read (likely, for hours) this Lukola-coded FanFic just to spite us! I mean, Anthony is a bad boy in this story and “everyone loves to hate” him (don’t forget, Luke became the devil incarnate after Papsmear). And, Hattie is tired of the “brutal press, overly invested fans, and a cutthroat industry…[that] would give even Pollyanna an edge of cynicism.” The Jakholes believe this means Nicola is saying she’s really in love with Jake and she wants us all to know that by reading a Harlequin-style romance about a woman who falls in love with her costar! Oh, my God!! How could she?!

What in the actual fuck are the Jakholes drinking with this bullshit? I know, I know. I shouldn’t expect anything better from people who ship Jake with Nicola. In fact, if I was a Jakhole, I might buy into this conspiracy theory. But, I’m not a fucking Jakhole. And, guess what Jakholes? I don’t mind breaking the hearts of Lukolas by saying we’re probably never going to see sexy-hot Brazil pictures of Luke and Nicola, so I don’t mind telling Jakholes to put this theory back into Davy Jones’ locker and feed it to that bitch Kraken.

Let’s talk a bit further about the absurdity of this “Nicola is shading Lukola” subplot from Hell.

We will pretend Nicola hates Luke. She hates Lukola. She baits the Lukola fandom for shits and giggles.

What would this make Nicola?

It would make her a villain, for starters (and “villain” is me being extremely nice).

More importantly, it would make Nicola a PR nightmare.

Even if Nicola and Luke despised each other, do you believe Netflix, Bridgerton, and Shonda Land would allow Nicola to play games with the Lukola fandom? Talk about playing with fire!

The reality is the lines between Polin and Lukola are heavily blurred at this point. I hate to say it – and maybe a lot of you will view me as a complete asshole after I say this – but, if I learned Nicola was shading the Lukolas (therefore, in my opinion, trolling Luke), I would not be interested in Bridgerton Season 4. Or, Season 5. Or, any season after that. Or, in Nicola, for that matter. You’re welcome to have your own opinion about this but I would feel incredibly betrayed, and not just by Nicola. On top of that, for me, Polin has become Lukola. They’re so blurred, they don’t even resemble a line anymore. Maybe that’s a bad position to be in, but that’s where I’m at. Sorry, not sorry.

I’m not going to rehash the breadcrumbs left by Nicola that support Lukola – if you know, you know (or you can catch up by spending an afternoon on Tumblr). Even Luke, in his own way, leaves Lukola-coded crumbs. We also have damn convincing evidence that Netflix, Bridgerton, and Shonda Land support Lukola. I mean, even they’re blurring the lines with “Nicola and Luke’s Cutest Moments” and interestingly timed images of Polin. So, do you think they’re going to let Nicola fuck with that on a public forum?

That would be a cold, hard NO.

But, this Audible book – “Mis-Directed” – is loud and made louder because Nicola is reading it.

So, what is this Audible book? Shade? Or, Nicola being cutesy? I’m going to place my bets on the latter solely because, like I said, the Corporate Office is not going to let Nicola shade Lukola because it has a direct effect on Polin.

That’s not to say that the excitement of this Lukola-coded “Mis-Directed” FanFic wasn’t attacked by the Jakholes from all sides, and the wind – for the moment – was kicked out of it. That’s a different story for a different day.

But, what I found so intriguing about Jake’s post today is that, of all the people he could have included in his photo (because there’s obviously lots of people at this event), he chose Gwilym. And, this means people will look into Gwilym. People will realize that Gwilym is the other side of “Mis-Directed.” People will realize Jake and Gwilym are friends. People will realize that Jake’s friend is reading a Lukola-themed romance novel with Nicola.

And, if we agree that the book is not shade towards the Lukolas and we agree that Jakola is not real, what is the significance of the connection between Jake and Gwilym? Maybe it’s nothing. Maybe I’m overthinking it. But, the connection – at least in my mind (and it’s been there since November 5) – is that Jake supports “Mis-Directed” because he supports Lukola and he has always been there, helping Nicola lay the breadcrumbs. He wanted people to look into Gwilym and make the connection. Jake could very well be the one who suggested Gwilym read the part of Anthony. Jake is the degree of separation.

I want to close this out by noting that Jake also liked the post Nicola has pinned on her Instagram grid – the black and white one about her Time 100 article. You know, the one where Nicola says, “A lot of people really want me to marry Luke.” Follow the links and it will take you to this article. That’s an interestingly placed like by Jake, in my opinion – as is his photo op with Gwilym.

[rose-petal123]

I love how you draw loop sm they're so prettyyyyy I need them to be REAAAALLLL I ALSO NEED TO LOOK LIKE THEEMMMMMM THEY'RE SO GENDER

THANK YOU! The funny thing about Loop is I originally had no attachment to them and then I started drawing them and putting them in my isat aus and. Okay I love that little freak now. fanart blast.

bonus messy AUs doodles.

two of them are in borderline an oc baby jail because. Well. When I first made their au they were MEANT to be Loop but they aggressively ran away from that role narratively. So. The only loop thing about them is the star on their chests. One of them tries to wish away the island blah blah blah this ain't about them rn. eat the art. hands it to you on a plate.

[taliesin-the-bored]

Tag game: tag nine people you’d like to know better.

Tagged by: @oneshoulderangel (Thank you for tagging me!)

Last song: At the moment, I have "Losing Your Memory" by Alan Star stuck in my head, which I suppose makes it my current song, not my last song. Hm. I get songs stuck in my head very easily, but the last one I had there for a significant amount of time was a mashup of different language versions of "Les Rois du Monde" for about a week. "Lehetsz Király", the Magyar version, is probably my favorite of them. It's worth a listen.

Currently watching: Normally, the answer would be "random mostly terrible old movies/shows" or "nothing much", but I currently have a hyperfixation on the musical Roméo et Juliette and have been watching it in multiple languages. (Thus, the song).

Three ships: This is hard. Maybe as a result of being on the ace and aro spectrums, I'm more likely to care about which characters are interacting than whether it's romantic or platonic. Here goes:

Kedivere/Bedikay. It can be romantic, platonic, or queerplatonic, but whichever way, I'm here for it. I probably spend too much time thinking about how in Cullwch and Olwen, when Cai gets mad at Arthur and marches out, Bedwyr stays behind, keeps acting like nothing's happened, and isn't the one to avenge Cai's death. The feeling of betrayal on both sides has a lot of unexplored potential. And the version where Bedivere dies and Kay fights to bring his body back safely while mortally wounded himself... And the version where Bedivere survives Camlann and Kay isn't said to fight in it, so they might be left together after their world has fallen apart...

Platonically or queerplatonically, Galahad and the Grail Heroine. I really like the tragic Grail Quest friendships, but I like theirs most, maybe because there's something weird and otherworldly about them both. I like it when characters are strange and endearing and doomed by the narrative.

Ever since reading John Matthews' retelling, which I read before the original, I've had a soft spot for Caradoc and Guinier. The Story of Caradoc is very disturbing, and I have some major qualms with Caradoc over a detail Matthews cut out, but all the same, there's a reason these two have the best track record with magical fidelity tests. Each of them would go to the ends of the earth for the other, and together, they're stronger than any curse.

Favorite Color: Blue, particularly royal blue and some teals.

Currently consuming: Black licorice with chocolate.

First ship: This is a hard one, since through elementary and most of middle school, I tended to go along with whatever I thought the author's intentions were and was more likely to unship something. The first non-endgame ship I got invested in was Sonya/Nikolai in War and Peace. I didn't like Nikolai, but Sonya did, and she was my favorite character, so I wanted her to be happy. The first non-canon couple I thought was meant to be together was also in War and Peace: Marya Bolkonskaya and Julie Karagina. My eighth grade self did not think their letters could be interpreted platonically. I still don't.

Last movie: If the musical doesn't count, the last movie I watched was Quest for Camelot, which was awful. Though not Robot Monster-level bad, Robot Monster has an elegance to its simplicity which Quest for Camelot lacks.

Currently working on: Various fics, most of them Arthuriana or CotRK-related (I am woefully behind on the Badfic Bingo), and (theoretically) an epic-style poem, though I haven't gotten much of it written for quite a while now.

Tagging: @gawrkin, @emperorcandy, @wildbasil, @gorewound, @knightsofsomethingorother, @ladyminaofcamelot, @tasosotaso, @amashelle, @gingersnaptaff (I have no idea who's been tagged so far, apart from the people on @oneshoulderangel's post, so I apologize for any multi-tags)

[pan-matsuri]

This post inspired me to try something new and to live in this beautiful, majestic, ever-changing, and ever-evolving world.

This is to say, I watched Skibidi Toilet.

I'm only up through episode 59 right now but intend to watch the rest.

First impression: I am a millenial. I was there to see early flash animators shape the world in their image¹. I've seen abridged series spark a fire and run out of steam². I've witnessed goofy shitposts by talented creators get popular, and those same creators can't resist a chance, even a moment, to try to realize their vision³.

Skibidi Toilet is a shitpost that is having its moment. I don't think it's been running very long, but having watched about a half or maybe two thirds of it (the episodes seem to be getting longer so I don't know), I do hope the creator has a plan for eventually bringing it to a close before it dies limping towards an unreachable finish line.

I think there may be a theme of ageism in the series. The series has a reputation for being "gen-z/gen-alpha brain rot" which I do disagree with. But look at some of the choices in the series. The use of UwU faces? The musical choice of Depeche Mode? Just creating animations in Garry's Mod in general? With the exception of the Fortnite dances, none of this strikes me as anything that would be terribly out of place for a generation building their own relevance 20 years ago. Also, the series seems vastly more popular on Youtube than on Tiktok.

I think the series so far suffers from its short episode length. Episodes switch perspective far too frequently so it's hard to know when a character begins to be relevant. Additionally, the characters escalate the conflict in an incredibly cartoonish way at a pace that is unsustainable. In summary, Skibidi Toilet has the same narrative issues present in A Song of Ice and Fire and children playing pretend.

idk it's fine I guess. I don't think I'd ever recommend it to anyone tho.

¹ There are so many iconic flash animations, but in this moment I am thinking specifically of two: Magical Trevor; and The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny.

² Here I am thinking of YuGiOh Abridged, which I predict will never finish, and even if LittleKuriboh does, no one remains who will notice.

³ I am referring here of course to Homestuck, which became more popular than I believe Andrew Hussie ever expected, even after Problem Sleuth.

[shadow-tism]

I want to fantasize about Isha, Jinx, Sevika family and happiness just as much as the next guy. But man I think y’all are taking away the meaning of Isha’s death and how it wasn’t just a cute character dying, that was Powder dying and Vi watching, Jinx watching her was her staring into an actual mirror of what could have happened.

Shes going to blame herself she’s going to lose it and I fear so much so that she won’t ever have a chance at getting close to others again but Isha has to mean something. And if it’s her being taken away and given back I think that could still work but I don’t think that’s what the writers want, I think they wanted us to see Powder from season 1 they want us to be heartbroken because that’s the point. No one wins here, there is no “right” choice, it’s just a matter of who survives.

I don’t know what will happen, I truly hope I am wrong cuz I love Isha so much but to make her death mean nothing hurts so much.

[kurishiri]

Excerpt (and some summary) of Jude’s main story chapter 1

꒰ ִ ֺ ⊹ @ notice ⊹ ֺ ִ ꒱ any pretty translation you may see in here may not be 100% accurate or contain creative liberties due to characterization or narrative flow purposes. this is a sort of summary as well. if you enjoy, though, please consider reblogging, but please don’t repost these or claim these as your own!

ok so like the chapter starts off with jude and ellis beatin some dudes ahh bc breach of contract. ig thats sorta like the prologue so to speak.

since jude is an act 2 route, vogel is featured in here. darius is like “hmm jude jazza huh. p interesting. nica” and nica comes in like “yeah you want me to look into him? sure, im interested in him too (/p likely)”

its revealed that since her time as fairytale keeper, kate had accompanied basically everyone on a mission? except jude and ellis. ellis wants to accompany her tbf but judes like tf hell no.

needless to say, kate has…less than positive first impressions of jude.

but she finally sees some light when harry gives her a memo telling her to go to the pub at 22:00 bc there’s gonna be a mission with jude and ellis. but turns out by the time she gets there, the missions already done and rogers there at the pub lmao

kate goes to jude whos smokin in the back like “you lied to me :(“ and jude kinda doesnt get all that fazed abt it like “never told ya the mission would start at 22:00.” he reveals that basically he hates it when its all like the “lets all get along” sorta gist yk.

then they have like this back and forth thats smth like “no point in being liked bc i got no gain from that.” “does that mean youre ok with being hated?” “what, do ya wanna be liked by everyone?” you get the point. they just do not. see eye to eye. like at all.

and so, we come to this point where kate makes a promise with him like “i’ll find smth i like abt you by the time my tenure as fairytale keeper ends!” (this is around where the first cg is, which btw is called the first promise we made was wrapped in white smoke)

Jude: Hah, alright then. if ya goin’ that far then do what ya want.

After our back and forth, like walking on eggshells, i finally succeeded in getting him to say those words.

Kate: Okay! Then I’ll do just that.

I used my hand to wave off the smoke that seemed to separate us two and took a step toward him, when…

Jude, while veiled in the white smoke, laughed with scorn.

Jude: But there’s one thing ya should keep in mind, princess. …My promises don’t come cheap.

J: If ya break ‘em, I’ll make ya go through so much o’ hell you’ll be wishin’ for death.

Amid the refined scent of sandalwood, far removed from his image, and the sweet scent of tobacco that burned my chest,

Jude and I made our first promise.

other impt events? is that jude literally comes out with a contract after victors like “i heard youre gonna be judes exclusive fairytale keeper!” and kates like what. but kate signs the contract in the end.

another thing; kate thinks “theres no way i could ever like him” 📸

ko-fi☕️ ┊ comms🤍

[sodapopper]

As a fellow Sodapop Patrick Curtis fan, I would love to hear you yap about him! Tell me everything!

OMG THANK YOU FOR THE OUTLET TO YAP I have so much pent-up yapping you have no idea 🙏

He’s always been my favorite character and I’m honestly shocked that he seems to be the least popular brother within the fandom. I understand that Ponyboy and Darry have more obvious conflict and character growth that people want to explore, but Sodapop! My boy Soda!

Susie Hinton had every opportunity to create the most stereotypical caricature of toxic masculinity—the handsome, firecracker flirt full of charm, confidence, and fight instinct. And on the surface, yes, he’s all of these things. But then he goes and subverts those expectations by ALSO being gentle, ALSO compassionate, ALSO the most emotionally intelligent character in the story.

I’m always amazed by how tender the outsiders manages to be, especially for a story about boys written in the ‘60s, when gender stereotypes were at their zenith. And I think Sodapop encompasses the full extent of that tenderness. His entire character HINGES on that tenderness, but it’s never put down as “feminine” or “unmanly.” He’s the favorite brother of BOTH his brothers, idolized by Ponyboy and adored by Darry, and through Ponyboy’s narrative, we’re pushed to see Soda as this sort of masculine ideal, in all his outgoing, enthusiastic kindness.

He manages to be two things simultaneously: total, complete Teenage Boy with all those annoying teenage boy traits, like forgetting laundry and revving the engine too loud—while ALSO being a nurturer and his brothers’ emotional heartbeat, bringing the warmth and sensitivity to an otherwise hopeless ending.

There are SO. MANY. cool details about his character (like the fact that he claimed Sandy’s baby even though he KNEW it was the product of cheating, because he was loyal even if she wasn’t) but sadly he often gets overlooked because his struggles are more subtle than, say, Darry’s burden as the oldest, or Ponyboy’s tension as the youngest. And when he does get attention, it’s usually within the context of romantic shipping, not his familial relationship with his brothers.

Even within fandom, Sodapop is still the forgotten middle child, desperate to be heard, and I find that really sad.

[cyber-harpie]

I was gonna put this in the tags but I changed my mind

xReader fics come in two categories (or perhaps, it would be better to say they exist on a spectrum with these two extremes as opposite poles). In which your "Reader" is somewhere between:

Described as ambiguously as possible (... within the confines of a narrative which typically requires things like dialogue and personality and character growth, all mostly unambiguous things)

OR

Essentially an OC, but told in the second person. (They have a backstory, physical descriptions, and/or come into the story with unresolved business)

Some writers are aware of the fact that they're blurring the line, and will say so by putting it in the tags or tagging as both xReader and xOC.

But a lot of writers don't make any mention of it. I can't tell if it's because there's been such a longstanding precedent of writing xReader fics as xOC fics (MGiT all tagged as xReader and not xOC, I'm looking at you) that people don't even think about it, or people assume that its nbd, or aren't fully aware they're doing it... Idk.

But it would be nice to have things tagged more clearly. If you wanna write an OC in second person, tag it that way, I'm begging.

This isn't a complaint about writing style either - I'll read xReader and xOC fics all day long and have fun doing it. But there are a ton of readers who do specifically want a blank slate, and the lack of transparency in tagging can frustrating

Reposting a comment I made on a post and adding to it

x Reader fics need to handle writing “reader” better sometimes

As a 6ft afab person who’s built like a man and has never been super feminine and has a more unique haircut that’s shorter I hate to read about “readers” petite, small, pale body and her “long flowy straight hair”, etc.

Reader is meant to be ambiguous!! And if it’s important to the plot please mention it at the beginning!!! If it’s not important to the plot why is it being included???

Some people who are reading may be tall, fat, skinny, short, or even somewhere in between. The readers could have a hijab, 4c hair, locks, braids, long hair, short hair, wavy, no hair and even more.

Stop making all readers so sweet and innocent, I want a reader who’s petty and sassy sometimes. I’ve noticed also that so many readers are either too baby to do anything or over powered.

Personally I also hate reading about obviously toxic men and relationships that the reader goes back to because they are “so in love”, like no please let me deck that sucker and leave them in the dust and be happier.

Also, if you label your post with the tag “___ x reader” or titled with “___ x reader” and then make descriptions and then ADD A NAME!!! It’s not an x reader fic and I heavily want to block you.

Edit:

Hey hello! I just wanted to add that I heavily respect and love fic writers! So many have a talent that I will never reach or have and I appreciate your content being put out at all! I made this post as a 5 am ramble and was half delirious lol

People can write as they please and I’ll ignore it if I’m not interested or I’ll make slight internal edits to fit me if I am

[lavellaned]

Actually I think one of the reasons why this game is so awful to get through is how it treats abuse, abusers, and abuse victims.

Under cut due to length of rambling:

First of all, Morrigan. Abused as a child by her mother, Flemeth aka Mythal, learned about the world and how to interact with it in a skewed way. Was treated in a way that no child should be by anyone let alone their parent.

Fast forward to Inquisition, particularly a worldstate in which Kieran is alive. The scene in the fade where Morrigan confronts Flemythal is one of the most important and special scenes in all of dragon age to me.

Growing up through abuse as a child you never think "I don't deserve this", you mainly think things like "Why is this happening to me?" and "Bad things happen to me." You know that these things are bad and make you feel bad, but when your baseline for how you should experience the world is abusive, you don't have the point of reference to think otherwise. And then you grow up. You look back on the abuse through the eyes of the child who experienced it but also through the detached, adult view that you currently have and have to reconcile the two. It's not easier nor pleasant. Getting to the age your abuser was/getting into the position of power your abuser had over you is difficult. Being at that stage and picturing yourself doing what was done to you to someone else is fucking sickening, and then you start to realize "I wasn't the problem, it WASN'T my fault, YOU are the one that's fucked up." But a lot of people can't and therefore the cycle of abuse continues.

But Morrigan does. She straight up tells her abuser "I will not be the mother you were to me." To have a character who survived childhood abuse be able to reach a point in their life where they can take back their personhood from their abuser is pretty damn important, actually. To this day I get weepy just thinking about it.

And then fucking veilguard happened.

Not only does it not matter if Kieran is alive or if Morrigan drank from the well (something that would BIND HER SPIRIT TO HER ABUSER), but Morrigan straight up let Mythal hitch a ride in her. The very thing that Morrigan tried to prevent ever since the first goddamn game? And we're all just supposed to accept and be ok with this?

The only way I can see this not being a complete character assassination of Morrigan is if Mythal just straight up possessed her unwillingly/killed her. Have Mythal use Morrigan as a information receptacle for new players, but also use old players' already-implemented relationship with her as a way to manipulate them. Either way, shit sucks.

Then there's the Crows. You know, the guild who takes children from brothels, orphanages, the streets and puts them through Hunger Games levels of training in which they either die or survive to become a slave assassin for the rest of their life. Not in veilguard. We're all just one big happy family. We rule Antiva, yippee!

Finally, there's Solas. One could argue his entire existence is the product of abuse, and everything that has happened in Thedas is because of it. I think framing his regrets as physical manifestations that want to kill him is a really interesting narrative choice. Unlocking the regret murals was one of the very few parts of this game that invoked a strong emotional response from me, not just because I'm an unapologetic Solas Enjoyer but because the implications are heartbreaking.

And then the game has you sit through the most fucking unbearable CBT group therapy session to talk about them with some of the most annoying damn people in Thedas who treat the literal apocalyptic levels of abuse Solas went through for millennia as something like a joke? And we the player are not given the option to challenge this? This game makes the point to force the player to agree with the flippant attitudes brought up from this.

Then brings up the final scene with Solas. Do I think the meeting with Mythal and Solas was handled well? Yes and no, but that's for another time. Solas is so far in the trenches of the trauma of abuse that he will not stop until his abuser pretty much tells him "I'm done abusing you." I think this was good and bad, again another time.

The way Solas interacts with his abuser is the direct flipside of how Morrigan does. You see more than one way someone can heal/not heal from it.

Morrigan, someone with arguable little power in the world, stands up against her abuser unflinchingly.

Solas, described through history as a GOD, someone with unfathomable amounts of knowledge and power, cowers and offers his abuser a literal weapon to kill him with, unprompted.

If this was a good game, it would be about regret but also about survivor's guilt, something that those who survived abuse have to deal with for the rest of their lives. But it's not, because it's a a bad game.

[bambi-kinos]

Why do people perceive John's love for Paul as unrequited? I confess that I fail to grasp this perspective. Paul is absolutely infatuated with John in every sense of the word. The difference between him and John, as Paul himself has stated, is that John voices his feelings out loud, while Paul excels at self-preservation; he knows how to navigate the rules of society while also enjoying the thrill of breaking them.

For the same reasons why Hanya Yanagihara wrote her eye wateringly boring novel "A Little Life." In "A Little Life" Yanagihara writes a Stephanie Meyer-esque novel about boys being turned gay via SA perpetuated by adult men and how they eventually grow up and become super rich and also they all have vague disabilities that cause a lot of pain but never get full definition because defining them would be inconvenient to the narrative. (Disabilities are debilitating and Yanagihara wanted to write about Sad Boys Who Were Turned Gay By Child Rape But Also They Are Rich And Go On Globe Trotting Vacations Everywhere All The Time While Being Depressed.) The point of "A Little Life" is not to tell a Sad Gay Man Story about the fallout from CSA, it is to depict a sexually exploitive miseryfest that uses disability as a way to pad the word count and add a layer of fancy fondant to the masturbatory and self indulgent text that makes it look more interesting than it is.

I bring this up because I think the phenomenon are related. There has never been a good justification for why Paul is magically indifferent or blind to John being a gay simp especially when you have so many examples of Paul being a gay simp for John in return. BUT it does make for an even sadder and more exploitive miseryfest where a Sad Gay Man died Forever Alone because he was so in love with a Happy Heterosexual Man who could never Return His Love and that is what a lot of people want. That's the only reason the narrative has any steam IMO.

It's just trying to make a sad story and make it even worse: more sad, more tragic, more gay, etc. If John and Paul were mutually attracted and in love with each other than that means they may have had stretches where they were happy together and that's unacceptable to a certain kind of mind. Because the point is the emotional and sexual gratification of seeing a Sad Gay Man Suffering, not to respect the Sad Gay Man and his story and the events and decisions that lead to his predicament. If Paul reciprocates John's love then the John and Paul love story turns into a mundane tale about a first marriage that started out happy but didn't work out because the two spouses grew apart over time. The point of "A Little Life" is the same, there's nothing genuine or cathartic about the Sad Gay Men or the Sad Painful Disabilities, they only exist so the author can circlejerk with her readers about how enlightened and noble they are. Needing the misery becomes all consuming to the point that entire rest of the story, the three dimensional nature of it, gets destroyed and swept under the rug. It's too real and some people just don't want to engage with that.

There's a mundanity to McLennon. Yes there was all sorts of stuff happening but at the end of the day they were just another couple trying to muddle through life together. The soulmate-ness of it all didn't save them when push came to shove. There wasn't a clear path forward for them to make up and get back together even as friends. This is much harder to bear for some people because it shows how the simple act of living your life can carry you away from the person who loves you most. John and Paul found each other but they still drifted apart eventually and stopped wanting to be together. The romance novel didn't end with "happily ever after." The fact that it was so relatable and downright boring is something a lot of people don't want to know or hear about. How can they jerk off to it? It's not miserable or indulgent enough.

Reducing their dynamic to Sad Gay Man Who Is Forever Alone and his Evil Oblivious Heterosexual Partner Who is Blind To His Yearning flattens it, makes it two dimensional, and thus makes it a lot easier to cope with and masturbate to, emotionally and sexually. And look there may be some people who genuinely believe this and don't type that narrative out with one hand, but they're outliers and outliers get discarded.

[danielsarmand]

ugh yes you get it it’s not ABOUT ships being endgame i feel like ppl have come to expect that nowadays and it’s really weird. whatever happened to scraping for crumbs of interaction and running 20 miles with whatever we got?? and even if a ship does become ‘canon’ it’ll usually never happen in the way you personally want anyway. they’re NARRATIVE FOILS babe it doesn’t get much better than this i am eating it UP

i swear the new season has been EXASPERATING from a fandom standpoint. i think in retrospect it was like this with season one and the whole mel thing, too, but enough time has passed that my brain conveniently forgot about that.

i don't want to make this about age, but when i was growing up in fandom we used to have maybe a 1% canonization rate when it came to queer ships, which forced me to develop an array of skills i don't see much of anymore. queercoding and queer characters were there still, regardless of how canon or not a ship was, and everyone agreed that canon love interests mattered very little when the dynamic of two characters was the core of said characters.

i genuinely could care less about mel and jayce when they uh. got together i guess??? and i say i guess because we barely know anything about their relationship and dynamic. which is the point! we know way more about him and viktor, so that's where my thoughts go.

people were making a fuss over jayce and mel fucking, meanwhile i was going insane over their sex scene being paralleled to viktor coughing blood, and about how afterwards we see mel waking up in bed alone because viktor wakes up in bed and jayce is beside him. now, people are making a fuss about viktor and sky and i'm over here thinking of what sky is: a symbol, a representation of viktor and jayce's dream, of viktor's humanity and of his remorse. because that isn't even grief—he barely knew sky, didn't even look at her once in season one, he cannot grieve someone he didn't care for; he grieves her POTENTIAL, what she could have been had he let her, he feels guilty for being the cause of her death and he clings to his humanity through her.

arcane is all about visuals. every single frame. none of it is left to chance. and this is unfortunate when its viewers seem adamant on not turning on their brains whilst they watch.

[nimrochan]

I wouldn’t call myself an expert, but I’m more knowledgeable as someone who has lived in the Middle East and had family in the IDF vs people who couldn’t spot Gaza on the map before 10/07 🤷🏻‍♀️ and I’m also a medical expert, hence the x-ray read (which was also debunked by other medical experts - but the damage is done and now people think the IDF randomly snipes kids).

Yes, antisemitism is rooted deep into mainstream western media. Even among “good” organizations. Welcome to the Jewish struggle!

Again, it was started by Hitler’s friend Mufta Al Husseini and a group of other people who hated Jews and started spreading propaganda the moment Israel came into existence. They specifically target intellectual progressive leftists. That’s how all Israel’s “crimes” are such common knowledge. Even today, Hamas has a professional PR department. They’ve even been caught censoring Gazans for criticizing Hamas.

They do this so that other countries send Gaza aid to help them - and then Hamas leaders (who are worth billions - at least when they were all alive before the war) pocket most of the money and use the rest to build tunnels and weapons. They push a narrative so far and deep that you hear about 45,000 Gazan deaths and struggles but you don’t hear anything about 375,000 killed Yemenis or an equal number of killed Syrians in recent civil wars. You see a formula there? Why do you hear more about Gaza on social media than any other conflict? Because money

You can accuse a country of genocide all you like, but at the end of the day, genocide is a widespread and deliberately violent act that doesn’t discriminate between combatants and civilians. Again, by Hamas’s own admission, 45,000 were killed by the IDF and half of those were Hamas militants. That shows targeted attacks and an unusually low civilian mortality. Also, the IDF warning and gathering civilians out of areas they want to strike (because Hamas had built tunnels/rockets under them) is not consistent with a country that’s trying to eradicate people for the sake of it.

I don’t mean at all to dismiss real death and suffering in Gaza. But you’re not helping them by spreading misinformation. If you want to help them, be more pissed at Hamas. They dress up as civilians and recruit kids - two things the IDF does not do. And they keep sending rockets from densely populated areas.

You sent me a screen shot of an article accusing the IDF of using human shields - you know there’s mountains of evidence showing HAMAS using human shields, right?

Here they are literally firing a rocket from a refugee camp;

You know what happens when you fire a hostile rocket across a border to another country? They’re going to fire back. You know what happens when you cross a border and kill/rape/kidnap 1200 people? That military is going to respond. Israel isn’t especially more evil than other countries for putting its own citizens above foreign citizens. That’s international relations 101.

I’m truly sorry for Gazans suffering. But it’s Hamas’s fault 1000%.

And a note about calling Israel an apartheid - you know there’s 2 million Israeli-Arab citizens (20% of the population) living in Israel with equal rights and opportunities, right? You know they accepted 1000-2000 Palestinian citizens every year right? That’s not an apartheid. And you wouldn’t find 2 million Jews in any of the 57 or so Arabic countries COMBINED.

Oh and they don’t allow anyone into Gaza because there’s active warfare and security risks?? That’s a given.

A BRIEF LESSON IN COLONIALISM

SINCE IT IS SUDDENLY A TOPIC OF GREAT INTEREST.

BRITISH COLONIALISM;

SPANISH COLONIALISM;

PORTUGUESE COLONIALISM;

ITALIAN COLONIALISM;

FRENCH COLONIALISM;

JAPANESE COLONIALISM;

ARABIC COLONIALISM;

AMERICAN COLONIALISM;

ISRAEL;

WOW. SUCH COLONY. VERY SETTLE.

WORDS HAVE MEANINGS. CAN WE STOP PRETENDING THIS WAS EVER ABOUT COLONIALISM?

THANK YOU FOR COMING TO MY TED TALK.

[sgiandubh]

BBC The One Show Anon - take 2

I was finally given the right link for that interview (merci à toi, toujours ❤️❤️), and so I can answer you now with a short transcript:

Their short moment starts at the 06:55 mark and well, it is now clear *** has no qualms in pushing hard the 'couple/chemistry' motif, for shameless promo purposes - it's all about the 💷💷💷, amnesia doughnuts on top. The two hosts have no problem saying things as... 'let's say hello to our first guests this evening, a couple who love nothing more than a good drama: they are the stars of the hit time-traveling show Outlander, CB and SH'. Now imagine you have no damn idea about These Two, OL, nor the entire shitshow: you'd have no problem buying this as cute, legit information, since especially C is not very helpful in the Narrative Department. But we know the drama and the shitshow this simple detail creates every day, don't we (also, 'delusional', ROFLMAO)? It wouldn't have cost a single dime to clearly say 'a TV couple', unless... Unless (yes, I hear the Mordor drums, Fernando, let them bark).

The host in red (sorry, my knowledge of BBC's talk show hosts is below sea level) goes on to help situate C for the average viewer: 'now, C, people would know you from lots of different stuff including Belfast of Kenneth Branagh, but this [OL] is the thing, isn't it, that people really like going on about'. She then proceeds to ask her if it is true than when she got the part, she wasn't really excited about it. It took me five seconds to realize she was asking about OL, not Belfast.

The rest of it is nothing to write home about, except the brief holding hands moment. Mind you, he took her hand (so long for all the dead souls who thought he wasn't touching her in public anymore).

Also, this beatific smile. It's almost as if The Flying Scotsman would have punched her in the gut and for the life of me, I cannot find any reasonable explanation for such an extravagance (😉):

Hope that helps. Good night ;)

[theoutcastrogue]

A handful of people in Pompeii that were killed by the devastating eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 are not who experts thought they were, according to a team of researchers that recently collected DNA from the individuals’ remains. The team’s findings—published today in Current Biology—spotlight previous incorrect conclusions about relationships between the residents of Pompeii and reveals new insights about the demographics of the Ancient Roman port city. “We show that the large genetic diversity with significant influences from the Eastern Mediterranean was not only a phenomenon in the metropolis of Rome during Imperial times but extends to the much smaller city of Pompeii, which underscores the cosmopolitan and multi-ethnic nature of Roman society,” said Alissa Mittnik, an archaeogeneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and Harvard University, and co-author of the study [...] Demographically, the team found that five individuals in Pompeii weren’t so genetically associated with modern-day Italians and Imperial-period Etruscans as they were to groups from the eastern Mediterranean, the Levant, and North Africa—specifically North African Jewish populations. Pompeii was an important port in first-century Rome, so it’s not a huge surprise that it had representation from across the Mediterranean—but the genetic stories of the studied individuals verifies it. [...] “This study illustrates how unreliable narratives based on limited evidence can be, often reflecting the worldview of the researchers at the time.” One particularly famous set of remains revisited by the team is that of an adult with a golden bracelet and a child—the child being on the adult’s lap. Long interpreted as a mother and child, the remains actually belong to an unrelated male and a child.

"Unrelated." This gutted me, for some reason. Reminded me of Watchmen and what I think are some of the most memorable panels in the history of comics.

There's a catastrophe, a colossal explosion, a disaster that we know claims the lives of millions. We know it's happening, we know there's a "psychic shockwave" involved. And there's two people we've been casually following from the start of the story, ordinary people in the street, unlike all those costumed heroes running around. They're not very good and they're not very bad. They're just people. One is an old man running a news-stand, the other is a young kid who reads pirate comics. They don't like each other. They're rude to each other, generation gap and all. Two minutes ago they learned they share a name, and managed to share an almost kind word, and they're about to start fighting again. They're just people, right? And then the disaster happens. We don't see it yet. The blood and gore will be witnessed in the next issue. For now, the background fades to white, and we only see them.

They drop what they're holding, they hug, the old man puts his arms protectively around the young kid, and they fade. They fade into the shape of the Watchmen logo, ubiquitous throughout the comic, and then they fade out. White panel. There's nothing left. And off-panel, the Ozymandias quote.

Watchmen primarily aimed to evoke nuclear war, and the "psychic shockwave" clearly stands for the blast of a thermonuclear explosion. What makes the sequence gut-wrenching is the hug (so tender and so futile), the fade-to-white (a negative space so understated and so enormous), and the penultimate panel: an after-image frozen in time, declaring forever "once there were people here". Just like the plaster casts of Pompeii, just like the stones of Hiroshima.

Hiroshima, August 6th, 1945: the shadow of a person who was disintegrated at the moment of the blast. The steps and the wall were burned white, except the portion that was shielded by the person's body. (These steps were cut out and are now inside the Hiroshima Peace Park museum.) Photo by Yoshito Matsushige, whose films were confiscated and didn't get printed until the U.S. occupation ended in Japan in April 1952.