#but to say that max has none at all. nonsense

[caprifiles]

not people disagreeing with liam under his mini interview that was posted on espn where he said that max has the most aura around the whole f1 grid. guys, i'm asking you once again, are you blind?

[shares-a-vest]

cw: smoking. also the brief contemplation of drinking and driving (Steve and Eddie would be like this, but don't do it kiddos!!)

Ever since Dustin made the mistake of begging one of his older male friends to help him find the other, his life has been reduced to, well...

Shit like this.

Standing in the middle of Hawkins High's parking lot like a lost puppy, lingering like a wet, rotten fart in Mike's basement as he waits for Steve and Eddie to finish up their conversation. A little chat that must be oh-so-hilarious this evening judging by all the chuckling Steve is doing.

And the fact that Eddie is allowing this new friendship to encroach on Hellfire? Well, that part is just plain weird.

He cut the night off early and pushed ahead of all the boys to skip on his merry way to the Beemer, where Steve was waiting with a big stupid smile that Dustin quickly discovered was for Eddie and Eddie only.

Dustin must have been a fool to ever think it was a good idea for Steve and Eddie to become friends. Oh, how he regrets that crisp spring morning!

Well, maybe he doesn't regret the whole thing. Y'know, saving the world and keeping Max and Eddie alive, and all that.

Dustin purses his lips. Because screw this. Eddie should be more grateful.

He steps forward, narrowing his eyes as he hopes to grab the attention of his traitorous, rude friends.

"Can I help you with something?" Eddie asks after a long moment of nothing but dead-eyed staring back at him like he's the idiot.

"I thought you were driving me home?" Dustin raises a brow to Steve.

But Steve doesn't notice or say anything as Eddie reaches into his jacket pocket to retrieve a lighter and a pack of smokes.

Dustin scrubs a hand over his face. Jesus Christ, he is going to be standing here for hours now!

He should have just taken a chance with Ted Wheeler's snoozefest talk-back radio. Or risked his precious life in Grant's car. Maybe he should have found better friends in the first place. Maybe he should have stopped this friendship from blossoming months ago when Eddie was still half-dead in the hospital.

"I thought you quit smoking?" he says, folding his arms with a disapproving huff.

Eddie makes a face at him as if such a suggestion is utter nonsense. Steve meanwhile, plucks a cigarette from the pack, pauses and glares.

"Was your mom within earshot when I said that?"

"Yes!"

Eddie lights up his own cigarette and then reaches for Steve's. Steve meets him halfway, smirking with a look in his eyes that Dustin cannot help but think is some kind of knowing glance. Great – they must be doing this on purpose!

"Tell your mom we smoke and I'll kick your ass, Henderson," Eddie mumbles around a puff, "We have reputations to uphold."

Steve nods, "Respectable."

Ironically, that oxymoron is when Dustin catches the streetlight reflecting off a can. A beer can. One of a six-pack sitting on the hood of Steve's car. His friend must notice (or more likely, Steve's pea-brain remembers the existence of the beverages) because he quickly straightens up, snaps one free and offers it to Eddie.

Eddie giggles and twirls a lock of his hair before taking the beer. Goddamnit, these two are so irritating!

"What is this, a fucking tailgate?" Dustin shrieks.

"Shut it," Eddie shoots back before he takes – probably too many – desperate slurps.

"Relax, worry wort. I'll get you home before I drink anything."

Eddie holds up his beer and jingles it in Steve's face, taunting him. Steve stops to ponder the temptation – he truly is operating at a snail's pace here! – as he glances between Eddie, the Beemer and the now-five pack. So much for being 'respectable'.

Eddie takes another sip and belches, "Come on, Stevie, let's get the kiddo home."

Steve sighs and pushes himself up from the hood of his car.

"Finally! Thank you!" Dustin sighs, exasperated, "Y'know, none of this was supposed to happen!"

But Steve just pushes past him, spinning his keys on his finger as Eddie scoops up the beers, cradling them like they are his babies.

"Watch your shoes when you get in the car."

"And I'm picking the music."

[rex-rambles]

➤ How F1 Drivers Would React to You Being Lightning McQueen and Sally for Halloween

featuring: liam lawson, lando norris, max verstappen, logan sargeant, oscar piastri, daniel ricciardo, and charles leclerc

wc: 1.1 k

warnings: none :)

➤ MASTERLIST

➤ Liam Lawson: 

↳ Obviously very, very down with the idea. Probably has already planned it at some point, hell, you might have just barely beaten him to bringing it up.

↳ This man will not skimp out on some Spirit Halloween nonsense, he is going all out, from a professionally made rust-eze jacket (that he may or may not have had already on hand for this exact situation), picked out the right shade of blue for your outfit, and got the hats done professionally.

↳ When it comes to actual Halloween? Will not leave your side so everyone can see that you are, in fact, Lightning McQueen and Sally, and will force you to take a hundred pictures of him and then the two of you together to post everywhere and show everyone.

↳ It's going to be hard to get him to take off that jacket once all the fun is over, but he will keep it tucked away until the next costume party or the next Halloween, in which he will beg you to repeat it. 

➤  Max Verstappen: 

↳ Reluctant but a good sport. He's not a big Halloween guy, nor does he understand the need to dress up as an adult, but for you, he'll do it, with a few exceptions. It's just a red t-shirt and the hat with the eyes, no extra logos or anything flashy. He wears the hat backwards all night, so people only really see him walk away get the outfit.

↳ He'd picked out some nice little blue dress for you to wear as Sally, something practical that you could wear out again, because if Max is paying good money for something like this, he wants you to be able to wear it more than once. 

↳ Would probably get drunk enough that he'd start saying 'Kachow', or make fast car noises. 

➤  Logan Sargeant:

↳ Seeing as he's one of the few drivers who probably grew up celebrating Halloween, Logan would go all out. Much like Liam, he'd get you both proper costumes, plan a Cars movie night, and load up on Halloween candy to hand out for the actual 31st. 

↳ Now, if he was back on an F1 team (I miss him on the track), he would hesitate to wear a costume to a race. Being the only American has already made for some difficulties, so he'd feel a bit silly about going in costume, even if the race was in America. If you really pushed him, he would and play it off, but he'd rather not. 

↳ I also feel like he'd be a great Halloween party host. He'd decorate, he'd get great snacks, and he would curate a great Halloween playlist for everyone. Cozy night-in vibes, but still happy to have people around. If this occurred during his F1 days, he would absolutely enforce a costume rule, and encourage everyone to show up in costume, or get the teams to come in group costumes.

➤  Oscar Piastri: 

↳ Into it. As one of the younger guys on the grid, he not only grew up watching Cars, but he also has absolutely no qualms with dressing up for Halloween. Would, however, probably just DIY it rather than pay for the costume. He'd help you find printouts for the eyes on the hats and the different logos, all while watching the different Cars movies. 

↳ If a race ended up being on Halloween? I can guarantee he would walk into the paddock in costume, and he would play it up all day, much to Liam's jealousy. If he were to win said race? You would never hear the end of it, and he would probably refer to his trophy as his Piston Cup.

 

➤  Lando Norris:

↳ Less enthusiastic, but still more than happy to go along. His couple costume ideas I feel would be a bit basic, so when you suggest Lightning McQueen and Sally, he's happy to play along. 

↳ Orders everything online a week ahead of Halloween and then stresses that it won't arrive on time, even though he paid for the extra shipping. May not wear the hat on Halloween if he's having a good hair day. You'd feel weird wearing the hat when he isn't, so if you also abandon it, Lando is more than happy to be wrapped around you all night so people can still figure out what the costume is. 

↳ The Rust-Eze t-shirt would become a regular in his workout cycle, weathering it just enough by next Halloween that you'd consider repeating the costume, but Lando would argue since you picked Lightning McQueen and Sally, he gets to pick the next costume. 

➤  Daniel Ricciardo:

↳ Would make you go as Lightning McQueen, and he would be either Mater or Sally. He would argue that you'd look better in red, and he would teasingly suggest getting one of those revealing costumes online, but he'd never actually order one. You'd want to DIY it, and Daniel would try and help, though I feel like his arts and crafts skills wouldn't be as good as Oscar's.

↳ Confuses everyone with the costume, considering he's walking around in a pale blue t-shirt and a backwards hat of the same colour, like Max, until he shows you off in your red dress and Rust-Eze jacket.

↳ Would make a ridiculous amount of car jokes/puns the entire night about you 'revving his engine' and things like that. 

↳ Of the racers, would be one of the ones who wants to spend Halloween handing out candy, watching the reactions of kids at the door to both of you dressed up. You cannot tell me this man wouldn't go all out for it, either: he would be one of the full sized chocolate bar houses, and he probably would let the kids take as many as they want.

➤  Charles Leclerc:

↳ As a Ferrari driver? More than happy to dawn his red fireproofs and pretend to be Lightning McQueen, but when you tell him that it isn't a real costume, and he needs to actually dress up? Less enthusiastic. You finally settle on him in his fireproofs and a red hat that has the eyes on it, but he surprises you with a pale blue fireproof suit decorated to look like Sally, only if Sally were with Ferrari. Refuses to have you go around advertising a 'competitor', and almost calls off the costume when he finds out Sally is supposed to be a Porsche. 

↳ Wears the hat to a race if it's on Halloween, and it ends up getting passed around the Ferrari paddock for multiple photoshoots.

↳ Leo goes as Mater, because Leo obviously has to be included in the costume. 

a/n: it might be January, but there's always time to think about Halloween.

[purpledemonlilyposting]

Lorch is talking about writing again...

[Lily's Post]

Where do I even start here?

Okay first lets define what subtext is. Subtext is when a detail or meaning is conveyed indirectly through tone, dialog, character actions etc.

I talked about gay icon Gus Fring in relation to Lorch's thoughts on villains recently. Him being gay is entirely subtext. Even his final scene in Better Call Saul that practically hits people over the head who didn't pick up on him being gay is still subtext.

Gus is not the kind of man to come out and say "I'm gay", you won't see him at a Pride parade, you won't see him decking Los Pollos Hermanos in rainbow flags during June. That's just not in character for him. And yet both shows still, through subtext, communicated to us that Max was not just his friend and business partner but his lover.

(even the name of their restaurant Los Pollos Hermanos is a clue. It was not unusual for old school gays to just claim to be siblings in order to explain away why they live together)

And Gus' final scene in BCS shows him very much mooning over the sommelier he seemingly often chats with at his favorite bar. But we can also see him decide at the last moment to not get involved as his cold, dangerous drug and revenge filled lifestyle won't allow for love to spring anew. None of this needs to be stated aloud.

Okay with that out of the way lets dissect Lorch's nonsense:

So as usual Lorch's opinions on writing all absolutely come down to her not getting it and being bitter that other people do.

Whenever she talks about writing or fandom it becomes clear that the one thing Lorch absolutely can't stand is not being the smartest person in the room. But she has never been the smartest person in the room. So instead she has to decide that things other people understand that she doesn't are just worthless and overused and need to be done away with.

Subtext, worldbuilding, metaphor, lore, they're all just stupid things people use to SEEM smart, because LORCH doesn't understand them and so they must not matter.

Notice she doesn't give a single example of these things. She just starts with the assumption that people only use subtext because they think they have to or are trying to "look smart" and not because, you know, most audience members don't want to read or watch something that's basically the cliff notes of a story like you do, Lily. Subtext can aid in immersion and believability, especially when it comes to dialog.

You don't understand how to make an analogy either I see.

How the fuck is Lorch putting serialization in the same category as subtext and metaphor. Serialization is a method of story delivery, Lorch. It goes all the way back to dime novels and penny dreadfuls.

Something could be completely absent of subtext and metaphor and still be serialized. The fuck are you even talking about?

People don't "understand your point", Lorch, because you don't know what you're talking about and every single one of your opinions just comes back to your inability to understand narrative and your annoyance that other people do. But instead of expanding your understanding you try to control how people engage with and discuss narrative. You haven't deconstructed shit you just rage like a child at writing techniques that have been refined over centuries.

[sketchehm]

Lowkeyyy if you wanna like post the notes you have for dark sbi + Dream no one would complain (please please pmease lmease I'm so desperate for dark sbi content that revolves around dream 🙏)

I should....clean them up cause it's the kind of ooc that's way too indulgent, BUT. I'll describe each of them and I guess you guys can choose which one you want to hear about more :0?

None of them have like au names either, they're all just called storytime pfft

Storytime 1 - Dsmp alt timeline i guess? Techno breaking Dream out of prision but ends up keeping him trapped in his artic home to help "rehabilitate" him better than Quackity ever could. Turns more discduo centric real quick but has the rest of sbi all participating in uh..."helping" Dream get better. It actually is kinda soft if you ignore all the uh. Dark behaviors attached lmao. This one I have a beginning to end and is super self indulgent heheheh

Storytime 2 - A kind of mafia au where Dream is a dragon hybrid and ends up being tortured by Quackity so badly his mental breaks and only acts like his hybrid counterpart. After being trained like an obedient animal, he's "given" to sbi and ends up trailing Tommy around because of backstory stuff. Discduo centric again with a lot more rivals involved. Has a lot of world building kinda and I actually didn't write the most notes for this one but I remember it so clearly lmao Way less dark imo actually as sbi "want" Dream to get better but they're not really trying their best :3c Is most definitely not completed as I didn't know how I wanted to progress it at a certain point

Storytime 3 - LMAO I have no notes written for this except the premise omg. But it's a more rivals centric au where they're both part of some hybrid testing ability and are eventually rescued by Phil(and others). Phil is convinced Techno is his long lost son and wants to take him in but has to reluctantly take in Dream too as Techno refuses to leave him. Leads to rest of SBI kinda gaslighting Dream to be a "better" family member and while also trying to get Techno unattached from Dream too. It's actually pretty long and has two separate arcs I wanna say, with Phil and after Phil lmao It also has like. Way more than this and involves XD and Blood God in pretty significant ways too haha Also is completed in my head but like...super loosely..

Storytime 4 - Mainly discduo centric where Dream is a trapped baby god in some facility run by XD. This one is difficult to explain and kind of nonsensical but XD wants to find out how a godlings magic can be utilized to the max and is using Techno and Wilbur(not trapped in the facility and are more like....borrowed from other gods/patrons) to see how Dream reacts to "stimuli" and relations and how that affects the magic. Wilbur..."dies" at one point and leads to Dream to fall in a kind of depression(as he eventually conditioned himself to be codependent to Wilbur and Techno oops) which XD is upset at cause it's messing up his experiment. Techno ends up bringing Tommy to replace Wilbur. It's like....really weirdly complex and hard to summarize. Doesn't have an end per say as I wanted to do like a second arc but never went further. I guess it does have a conclusion to the first arc though. It's dark in the way that Dream is unintentionally affecting them to Want to be with him and not leave him which leads the others to act irrationally about and with him as well lmao

Yea that's about it! They all seem not that bad on the surface I think! And the notes I have definitely do not have everything I had in mind but thankfully I brainrotted on these for so long they're seared into my brain lmao

[semperama]

Omg ok like maxiel sensory deprivation (???) blindfold situation or however u wanna take that

cw for a very brief mention of off-screen watersports and fisting

"How will I know if I'm hurting you? Or if you want to stop?" Daniel asks, sliding the slippery satin back and forth across his palm. He'll tie the blindfold himself. The idea of Max doing it for him...Nah. Nope.

"I will pinch you," Max says. He's grinning, like none of this is a big deal. "Really hard. Right here." He taps Daniel's side, just above his hipbone. "But you will not hurt me."

Daniel wrinkles his nose, shakes his head. "You don't know that.

"Yes, I do," Max says, and pulls him in for a slow, sweet kiss that melts some of the tension between his shoulder blades.

He's not sure how he let Max talk him into this, but then again, he's felt that way about pretty much everything Max has ever asked him for in bed. Between the two of them, Max is definitely the freak. Still, Daniel rarely has complaints after the fact. Okay, he never has complaints, except for sometimes a sick-sweet shame he feels--at the sight of a red handprint on Max's ass; at the feeling of Max's hand wrapped around his dick, directing a stream of piss onto his own chest; at the sound of Max whimpering his name while he clenches around Daniel's whole fucking fist.

"Please," Max says when he pulls away, and--yeah, that's why Daniel always agrees. Always says yes.

He kisses Max one more time, then closes his eyes--nonsensically, considering what he's about to do--and lifts the scarf to tie it around the top half of his face. When he opens his eyes again, he can still see a little bit--just light and shapes--but he can't make out Max's expression, and he supposes that's the point.

"We can skip the headphones," Daniel says. "This is probably enough."

"No," Max says. Then, again, "Please, Daniel."

He can't pretend he fully grocks Max's logic in this one. Max was a little stammery when he explained it, the ends of half of his sentences bitten off. Something about wanting Daniel to worry about him less. I do not think you think so much when you are driving. I want you to be with me like that. It sounded fucking terrifying to Daniel at the time, and even now that he's had time to sit with it, his heart is pounding. What if Max doesn't end up liking whatever version of Daniel comes out when he's not trying to please Max? If Daniel worries, or if he thinks too much, it's because that's what makes it good, right?

But this is what Max wants and--and Max has never steered him wrong, so--

Daniel already queued up his pre-race playlist, so when Max slips the headphones on him and the music fills his ears, he immediately goes to that place, his anxiety morphing into that familiar adrenaline-pumping, ready-for-attack feeling he gets when he's on the starting grid, the car hot and vibrating underneath him.

It's strange, though, to have his senses so cut off. When he's in the car, his vision feels hyper-sharp, and his hearing is tuned to the radio and the sound of the engine. Now, the music fills up all the spaces inside him, every facet of his attention. It's disorienting--but only for a moment. Only until Max takes his hand, squeezes it, and then brings it up to cup his own cheek.

Daniel kisses him carefully at first, like he needs to relearn his mouth. And maybe he does, because he's never experienced it quite like this. The music recedes a little into the background, edged out by the feeling of the stubble against Daniel's lips, and of Max's tongue sliding against his, and of Max's fingers digging into his shoulders. It's tempting to focus on those fingers, to try to gain some clue from them, but as if Max is reading his mind, his grip relaxes suddenly, his fingers petting the hair at the back of Daniel's neck instead.

They got Max ready ahead of time, so when Daniel lets his hand drift down between Max's legs, he can dip two fingers inside him easily. He immediately feels a pang of regret at the lack of feedback. He knows Max will have let out a little moan just then, but he couldn't hear it.

Max wants him to follow his instincts though, so he takes a deep breath and tries to get out of his head, focusing instead on the throb of the bass in his ears and on the way Max feels around him, how hot he is inside, how he clenches when Daniel tugs a little on his rim. After a minute, he withdraws and lets his hands smooth up the inside of Max's thighs, enjoying the breadth of them, the soft hair against his palms. On impulse, he leans down a bites down gently on the meatiest part, his hips rolling against the bed. It wouldn't even take him long to come like this, he thinks. Just worshipping Max's thighs and humping the sheets.

But that isn't what Max wants. And if Daniel's being honest, it's not what he wants now either. His heart is still pounding, his hands sweaty. All this adrenaline needs somewhere to go, and if Max wants it to go into him, then Daniel's going to give him exactly that.

He can't ask Max if he's ready, and he knows--yes, he reminds himself, he knows--that Max is ready, so he lines himself up and lets himself sink into him in one smooth, unbroken motion a groan he can't even hear rumbling its way through his chest and out of his mouth.

Daniel rarely fucks with music on. He's too susceptible to getting lost in the music and forgetting to set the right pace. But this time, he doesn't have to worry about that. All he has is the music--and the flex of Max's thighs and abs under his palms, and the narrowing spiral of pleasure deep in his gut. There's something almost disturbingly primal about it, about pushing his way into Max again and again and having nothing else to set his attention on but chasing his own high. He fucking sucks at meditation, no matter how he tries, but this is the closest he's come to quieting his mind in as long as he can remember.

It's not just about him, though. It's Max. Max all around him. Knees hooked around his waist. Fingers fluttering up and down his back as they try--obviously--not to clutch too hard at him. Daniel fucking loves him so much. He loves that Max wanted this and trusted him with this. He loves that Max makes this kind of thing happen for them. Max mind works in ways Daniel will never understand, but honestly, thank fucking God for that.

He can feel it when Max comes--not just the way Max clenches around him, but the sudden wetness that first hits Daniel's chest and then his stomach. Without thinking, he swipes his fingers through the mess and then gropes for Max's mouth, getting his cheek first before pushing inside. Max sucks hard, licks him clean, and Daniel has to pull away and fall to his elbows, tucking his face into Max's neck like he can hide from the wave of pleasure that breaks over him, pulling him under.

As soon as he can breathe again, he rips the headphones off, then the blindfold, and pushes himself up to look at Max's face. What he sees there is much the same as always: Max's cheeks are red, his eyes slightly wet, his mouth slack and his lips shiny-plump. He looks happy, thank fuck, and--

"Hey," Daniel says, frowning, "are you laughing?"

A snort escapes from Max, his chest visibly vibrating with it now. Daniel supposes there are worse reactions he could have, but this isn't exactly the evaluation of his performance he was hoping for.

"You started humming, toward the end," Max says, his voice pitched high with mirth. "It must have been a good song."

Daniel groans, burying his face in Max's neck again as the blood rushes to his face. "You're a good song," he says, pure nonsense, but also maybe not. "I hate you."

"I love you too," Max says, and turns his head to press a kiss to Daniel's temple. Daniel sighs and closes his eyes and lets himself feel only Max for a little while longer.

[wakeupthemembersofbylernation]

A maladaptive daydreaming endgame would be the most boring, dry, anticlimactic, and nonsensical endgame possible. There’s no arc. There’s no stakes. There’s nothing to look forward to. There’s no pizzaz. There’s no mystery. They have no goals. They aren’t building towards anything. Plus, there’s a giant, unanswered, blue and yellow coded, bowlcut-shaped elephant standing in the middle of their storyline.

Like, push aside the minutiae of the shipping war for a second. Push aside the debate over Mike’s sexuality. Macy's Day Parade staying together and finally being a happy couple in Season 5 is a genuinely absurd concept because they have no momentum. And that in and of itself is so incriminating. Yes, on a surface level (boy protagonist makes grand confession love monologue to girl protagonist, wooo, romance go brr) level, I suppose one could think they do. But they do not. Where are they going, narratively? What do Mike and El like doing together for fun? Brodie made a whole monologue and that answer is still a giant question mark. What are their shared hopes for the future?

They have none. Even without being in the same state, it’s clear why Duzie is into each other. Lumax, Jancy, Jopper, and Rockie all are building towards something. Even a hypothetical STANCY revival has more of a raison d’être. Love them or hate them, they do fall into tropes of rekindling old sparks, and Steve’s pitch was rooted in how much he’s changed and what his hopes are for his future- which he sees Nancy in (even if Nancy’s future goals don’t actually align). And for El, it’s clear that saving Max is her priority. So even Elmax has more momentum than Mlvn.

For Migration Pattern, it’s like Mike finally did the thing, finally said ILY, finally confessed his apparently undying love for his superpowered girlfriend (in the penultimate season, I might add, which is never a good sign), only for there to be crickets. It’s like okay… and now what?

No one knows. It doesn’t feel right. Mike finally did everything El asked of him, finally (allegedly) explained why he couldn’t say it before, and it’s narratively unsatisfying in every possible way. Not only this, but this is not your imagination playing tricks on you. These aren’t Byler shipping goggles. The show goes out of its way to emphasize that Mike and El aren’t on speaking terms, which is an odd choice for a couple entering their endgame era. And everyone has lost. Nothing is in a good place. It’s all a mess. Max is in a coma. It’s a nightmare. Yeah, it’s not looking good for Minotaur Endgame.

“But you don’t get it, Bitcoin! They're saving her response to Mike’s monologue for Season 5. They do have something to look forward to. You just don’t like it.” Okay… and what do they expect her response to be? “Oh Mike, my darling loverboy, I love you so. l'm glad you see me as a superhero. And I’m so glad you fell in love with me in the woods. I love you too. Let’s make out and eat eggo waffles forever.” And then what?

They also expect Mike to just start saying I Love You a lot more often? They expect them to finally be on the same page and have meaningful heart-to-hearts? They expect him to suddenly show interest in what she likes instead of gritting his teeth and acting awkward?

They expect Mlvn to glide off into the sunset as if any of their structural problems have been resolved? Despite the fact that Will’s thinly veiled love confession/ the painting lie was the whole catalyst for the monologue in the first place? That just doesn’t make sense? Like, objectively.

But know who does have momentum? Miwi. Byler arguably has the strongest momentum going into Season 5 of any couple or would-be couple. They have romantic momentum, friendship momentum, individual character arc momentum, and narrative momentum. The cinematography makes that crystal-clear.

[fachefaucheux]

Why I Read (and write) Romance

Yes, I know, I was doing that WriteFest thing and I really need to report back on it, but, hey. This is something that has been nagging at me even more pointedly than my obligation to give a decent update. So I thought I'd write on it for a little while so that maybe I can return to the humdrum business of research afterwards and actually focus on it for more than ten minutes at a go.

One comment that I get from time to time in feedback goes something like this:

Wow! You clearly put a lot of thought into the world-building of this story! So many details! So much depth! It's just too bad about all that romance stuff, otherwise I'd love this. :(

I'd be lying if I said this didn't make me discouraged at times. I'm sort of stuck in an in-between genre -- too much fantasy/historical bullshit for romance readers, and too much romance for fantasy nerds. But I think that I'd lose my passion for writing if I wrote about anything other than my niche interests. Those being, in no particular order: historical nonsense, the strange and macabre, and idiots in love. Today, I want to talk about the idiots.

I say idiots with the deepest, most heartfelt affection. At the end of the day, aren't we all idiots, at least about one thing or another? And, at the end of the day, none of us are bigger idiots than we are when we're in love, be it with an idea, a subject, or another person.

Romance readers come to the genre for different reasons. Some like the escapism, the fantasy. Others really like in-depth exploration of characters, and a really effective way to do that is to put two people together and play them off each other. But I think one of the key drives, at the heart of it all, is being seen. Being understood, to a certain degree, even if a reader doesn't prefer to see themselves transferred 1:1 onto the page as the main character.

Which I, for one, do not. The more 1:1 the MC is to me, the more I intrinsically cringe away and want to close the book. Much like how I approach dealing with last night's dishes moldering away in the sink, I have to come to terms with relating to characters sideways, sneaking up on the places where we overlap rather than confronting them head on. Romance is a safe place where I can look at those places where I overlap with characters -- both in good and ugly ways -- and process them.

This can be accomplished in any genre, really. But I feel like it's amplified to the max in romance. I think a big part of it for me is the aspect of choice. When I read about parents and children falling away from each other then coming back together, or siblings getting into arguments and hashing things out, there's almost always this sort of air of inevitability to it: this person is my blood, I am stuck with them whether I want them or not, so here's how I'm going to deal with it. Friendship has the element of choice, but it isn't often portrayed with the same level of emotional intensity and commitment that romance is. (At least in the modern, bog standard Western imagining of it. I'm 100% here for depictions of friendship from different times and places and in different scenarios where that intensity of feeling on point! But it's regrettably hard to find.)

Romance is special in that the love interest chooses the MC. The love interest has no inducement to commit themselves fully to this big bag of jumbled up parts that is the MC -- even in the good 'ol arranged marriage trope, there's no obligation to care, even if rings are exchanged. But the love interest sees both the good parts and the bad, accepts them, and commits 100% to loving them, at least once the last page is turned in a happily-ever-after romance. (Which is all I read -- I deal with enough depressing stuff in real life to want to inflict a bad end on myself in my free time.) And it very often goes both ways -- something the MC once considered weird/unsightly about the LI suddenly becomes beautiful when viewed through the lens of knowing them. Or, at the very least, those warts become understandable. Relatable. Worth it.

That choice, that decision to take the leap and jump into a romantic relationship with all its attendant commitments, comes from that place of understanding. Of having seen enough of the MC (or LI) to understand why he must always get out of bed each morning on the left foot, or why he is suspicious of everyone, or full of shame, or why he can't ever be bothered to remember to lock the front door. Maybe these particularities are just something that need to be accepted, or maybe they're something that the character is actively working to overcome. Either way, that action, through the lens of love and romance, is at least seen by the other half of the equation. Even if full understanding sometimes remains a bit out of reach.

And by watching these people bumble through life, coming to see each other's parts and fighting to understand them, I think that readers also feel seen through them, in a secondhand way. Or even come to a new way of seeing themselves, by having that one bad habit they can never quite shake perceived not through the lens of their own self-critical thoughts, but by a lover who thinks of it as a strength rather than a fault.

Of course, this is not the end-all-be-all of romance. Some things are just, you know, neat. Fun. Enjoyable. Make the good brain chemicals flow. But I think what separates the "fun to read" romances from the ones that hit me really hard are the ones where a degree of mutual understanding is achieved between the characters. Maybe I could also achieve this with something besides a romantic relationship. But...well. 

All the romance business just makes the hard work of coming to terms with each other and ourselves more fun.

[starsarefire824]

things i wish we could all stop fighting about:

1. bi mike vs. gay mike nonsense. believe what you want, but canon Mike dates El and we have not been shown anything else as of yet besides some subtext and hints towards him being queer. Until then...none of us know. until then...THEY ARE BOTH valid depending on how you read the character and the writing. i personally lean towards bi, but i generally believe in the show, if they go for mike being queer, he could most definitely be gay. if mike wheeler came out in the first episode and told me he is the gayest man to walk the planet i would be like....uhm yes. but also....if he’s a men leaning bi character or whatever other combination of bi he might be...i’ll also believe it. in the end, imo, if it’s made clear that he is queer and in love with will, his sexuality will probably not be labeled neatly with a bow on it anyway. so the entirety of the arguing is stupid.

2. the fact that teenagers may or may not have sexual desire and attraction and act on those instincts in some way makes people who discuss or explore it in writing somehow disgusting. it’s not. (ie. talking about the “hose scene” is valid, writing about teenagers feeling desire for the person they have a crush on is normal.) sex is normal. sexual desire is normal. it starting to happen as you go through puberty is normal. to deny this fact or make people feel weird about talking about is doing every teenager in this fandom that experiences sexual attraction and desire a very large disservice. there is nothing shameful about it. there is something shameful about making someone else feel disgusting for their completely normal feelings because they make you uncomfortable. and every show/film/book written about teenagers and their sexual lives has been written by someone who is mostly likely over the age of 18. so to say that fanfic writers or people who are in fandom discourse are somehow deviants is the most insane argument i have ever read in my entire life.

3. things such as pointing out how mike may have issues with food, el may be behind her peers in being able to handle a more adult romantic relationship, lucas facing racism, and will dealing with trauma that mimics sexual abuse are all legitimate and worthy of discussion. whether it makes people uncomfortable or not. these are topics that have been brought up/alluded to in the show, and they’re allowed to be talked about by the fans.

ok i lied. there are four.

4. stop shitting on people for their headcanons. if someone wants to headcanon will as asexual and homo-romantic there is nothing wrong with that. if someone wants steve harrington to be bisexual, there is nothing wrong with that. if someone wants max to be poly there’s nothing wrong with that. believe me, the people who headcanon this are usually very aware that it is not canon. we all watch the show. but if it’s fun for them to explore that with a character in writing or art or discussion then cool. it’s adding layers to the conversation around these characters and is valid. snidely saying you’ll block someone for a fucking headcanon is wild to me. i am all for blocking things that make you uncomfortable or if someone just annoys you....sure. great. but blocking every single person who disagrees with you is so silly to me because you are making your garden very small. it’s important in discourse to engage with people who have different opinions than you. as long as everyone stays respectful i encourage people with different opinions to interact with me. PLEASE. it’s the entire point of joining an online community. we bond over something we love and then have discussions about it.

[lestappenforever]

Like yeah, I was liking Fred and was saying he’s a good Team Principal.

BUT HE GOES AND SAYS MAX IS DOING MORE F1 ERRORS THIS SEASON THAN THE LAST 3 YEARS!

Fred, you watched Imola, Miami, China, Japan, Australia, Jeddah and Bahrain with us buddy?

Where Max performed by the book, especially in a race like Imola where the car was probably the 3rd or even 4th fastest car on this grid and fucking won the race by 0.7 seconds beating Lando?

Or in Quali where he was projected NOT to take pole in Australia but literally put it in times that no one expected him to do so, but a mechanical issue in the brakes, none of his own, caused him to DNF?

Or in Miami, where he outperformed the car that wasn’t the best, but took the cone because of the car characteristics, and was able to hold Charles down in p3, despite Charles having the more suited car for the track?

Or in Monaco where the car wasn’t perfect all weekend, but everyone knew that the race, had it have strategic calls, rather than the snooze fest that it was, he possibly could have been on the podium?

Fred and Zak, put some fucking respect to the man who has the number 1 on his car for a goddam reason, who currently doesn’t have the best car or is not suited for some tracks, yet is doing his everything to be on top. And is certainly not backing down or out of everything. Has he done mistakes? Yes, he’s human not a machine. But has he been able to get everything out of his races? Also yes. So some respect

Max, hunny, I need you to demolish the rest of the grid starting Canada, Okay? LAP EVERYONE FROM P2 DOWN AND FUCKING WIN BY DESTROYING THEM

(I’m angry at these statements if you can’t tell btw 😂)

I'm sorry, but statements like these from other TPs don't interest me in the slightest, regardless of how much I like Fred. Max has been getting shit from rival TPs, drivers, journalists, fans, etc. for years, and I've long since stopped wasting my energy on any of it.

Max will do his talking on the track, and the sad truth of the matter is that people will keep bashing him regardless of how well he performs. That's just the consequence of being the best F1 driver in the world that we all need to come to terms with because it's never going to change. And it’s not worth spending a single ounce of energy getting upset over. If anything, nonsense like that just spurs Max on. It should do the same for us.

[shzmluvrs]

this is so random but i feel like i need to share the mental image of 2019 freddy eating cornflakes

~ Star✨️

Freddy's Frosted Flakes

Prompt: Just your average teenage boy eating cereal. Nothing crazy going on here🥱. Well, besides saving the world. At the butt-crack of dawn. Again. Why can't the poor boy just be left to eat his cereal in peace🥲?

Timeline: Post Shazam! Pre S!:FOTG

TW/Content: None⚡️Well, probably some cursing⚡️Frosted Flakes (if you don't like Tony the Tiger, should you really even be here🤨?)⚡️Freddy being silly lol⚡️Reader is mentioned like, once, maybe twice

Reader: Non-Specified! Any Pronouns! Knows the secret!

Requested By: @anon-2019

Back to Master List

I wanna say this first real quick, if you don't know what Frosted Flakes even, are, here...

Corny, yes, but at least now you know🤷🏽‍♀️.

Anyways...

I'm not saying Frosted Flakes are his fave (yesIam), but when he requests for them every time Victor goes to the store and is one of the first to be searching through the bags the second he gets home specifically for them, it's hard to believe otherwise.

Personally, I don't think Freddy is the biggest morning person. Will he wake up? Sure. But don't expect him to be his "normal" self, all talkative and head running a mile per minute. He's probably the opposite.

Head empty, no thoughts, quiet mouth. Very much ghost activity, just wandering around his room in a daze looking for clothes that aren't just his boxers, and then downstairs with only the click of his crutch hitting the floor to be heard.

He rubs his eyes, and he finds the house empty, Rosa out shopping, Victor at work, his siblings? Who knows. Who cares. He's hungry.

He's stumbling into the kitchen, murmuring to himself about early-monring nonsense while opening the fridge door and scanning its contents.

Oh, sweet. Juice.

Knowing he shouldn't, having been told many times before, he drinks straight from the carton. He waterfalls it, at the very least, and then he spots the milk. Milk goes in a bowl along with a spoon and-

"Cereal." He mumbles again because he's still hungry💀.

I imagine he's the type to be very unconventional with his eating utensils if he has to be. If there are no clean spoons, he's eating that shit with a fork. Better yet, a small ladel because A) he'll be damned if he's gonna be washing any dishes this early in the day. And B) better for scooping anyway. If there's no clean bowls? He'll eat his cereal out of some tupperware🤷🏽‍♀️.

Also, sorry to disappoint, but he's a "milk first, then cereal" kinda guy. It severely threw you and Billy off when you first watched him do this, Mary said it was "illogical" and Pedro and Eugene make fun of him every time he does it.

You know what? On second thought, he's kind of glad no one's home to see him eat his cereal💀✋🏽.

Speaking of you...

"Mor-nin-g ... an-gel-....cake ... kissy sign..." He spells out under his breath, sending off the message with a smug feeling about him before placing his phone back down and scarfing down more of his cereal.

He's definitely a messy eater, milk all down his chin, food barely in his mouth because he's shoved in so much. At least he has the decency not to smack (because that drives even him, one of the messiest of eaters, nuts).

I also think he's definitely the type to have more than one bowl. Especially if there's milk left behind from the first one? He's not drinking that, he's using it for another helping💀. And he'll repeat the process until it's all gone.

But, if you didn't stop him, and you let him re-pour as much as he wanted, he'd eat (I'd say) 4-6 bowls max, depending on how hungry he is that day.

He's also the type to, when he's hungry but doesn't feel like fully cooking something for himself, or just try too hard in the kitchen in general (lazy ass😒), there he goes for those Frosted Flakes. He's convinced it's versatile, a breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, and/or dessert food. Rosa has had to stop him from proving this point on several occasions; she will not let any son of hers live off of and eat up an entire box of cereal🥴💀.

ESPECIALLY IF ITS JUST BEEN OPENED OMG!! She gets salty if a box of cereal has just been opened and it's already half gone within a day. Like, she understands she lives with seven other people, but goddamn, there's no excuse for that😭.

'Vzz-Vzz!'

Freddy smiles to himself, mouth still full, but he can't help it because he's excited to see what flirty little morning response you had come up w-

'Hey dude idk if u kno this but the world needs saving so get ur captain i-have-all-powers ass up and come help'

"Mncht..." He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. Leave it to Billy to kill his early morning groove...

He set his spoon down in order to use both hands/thumbs, fully indulging himself in having attitude with his mocking tone while he typed.

"I'm actually referred to as Captain Everypower, so get it right and maybe I'll come help."

Billy's response?

'🤓☝🏻'

Freddy groaned to himself, wanting- No, wishing nothing more than to just be able to finish his bowl of cereal. Normally, he'd be at least on his second bowl by now, but nope. Now he's gotta deal with some catastrophe on a half-empty stomach.

'Vzz-Vzz!'

"What now...?!"

'Morning Freds♡'

'Saw the news...'

Oh. It was you again. His frustration subsided for a moment, shoveling as much as he could into his mouth as he quickly sent, '🙄 so did I. Do I have to??'.

Not that he knew, but you had giggled on the other end.

Not that you knew, but upon seeing your response, he giggled, too, and the butterflies in his chest made this whole ordeal a little less miserable...

'Go save the world, Superman😘.'

This was silly, thank you sm for this lmao😭😻.

~ Star✨️

Back to Master List

Taglist:

@anon-2019

[inchidentally]

ouuhh that's not…

I swear I read it three times and looked through their blog hoping they were joking alfhaslfkh nope

BUT I do not want anyone to engage with this so I'm hiding the link - not just because it's ridiculous but because the best way to confine rpf ship drama is to leave it alone. (edit: so I lied abt this asofgsalfga I did reply to one person but only bc they put it in the main tags) I don't rly like blocking but I also don't want to have to create a million filtered tagged posts on my dash - and tbh I don't think anyone I've blocked will care anyway. this way I can still see carlando content for fun but none of the fandom nonsense.

I'm mostly posting this bc up til now I rly wanted to set aside the behavior of the fandom to continue enjoying carlando content but I just can't be bothered anymore. between the larrying and the rampant, disgusting casual misogyny - and ofc the competing with which friendship or fake ship blorbo 1 and 2 are "happier" with asgfjsalfglja. and it's not just this latest thing I get sent tweets and posts abt whole agendas to "prove" that Lando isn't "happy" with Oscar/Martin/insert man who is currently considered threatening to their concepts of Lando's relationships. some ppl even friendzone Max F and Lando and pretend Carlos means more to Lando than him so there's no limits to the insanity.

so for me atp there just isn't enough about carlando to make it worth constantly being reminded that the way too many of it's fans truly believe that these are two men are either as close to each other as they are to their real, acknowledged close friends and/or in a secret gay relationship, that their girlfriend(s) are cold-hearted PR plants/escorts rigged by an evil all-controlling PR department and once the blorbos are freed of homophobic forces (oh god Carlos' old tweets tiktokboom) they can finally have the kind of toxic heteronormative version of a queer relationship that is right with the universe.

like, rpf is only meant to be for fun and more important it is meant to be kept away from anyone involved/the general public !! but when ppl's delu results in the actual women these men choose as their partners being at best aggressively cropped out of pictures and videos* and at worst stalked, harassed, their families and employers harassed, abuse and slander left in comments sections on popular social media and team pages - yea carlando laughing together sometimes and slowed down bro hugging isn't enough lol

it’s also slightly the fact that if you picked a bunch of Lando’s reactions to Carlos and Daniel and no one knew context clues then no one would be able to tell which one he’s reacting to. Carlos/Daniel teases Lando, Lando shriek laughs and goes red, James Corden style gay innuendo, slightly tense undercurrent of men wanting to one up each other with jokes, iterations of bromance that are half sincere and half for the cameras, hashtag hashtag. Lando goes to Daniel's ranch on a whim, dando is special. Lando goes to Carlos' sister's huge society wedding, carlando is special. Lando's family likes Lando which makes carlando special. Lando and Daniel share mutual friends outside of racing which makes dando special. like, it's the same dynamic just rotated around at different times. I enjoy both ships to a certain degree but I'm kind of mystified at ppl choosing to see them as super deep and meaningful and worth fighting over.

side note g o d do I fully embrace that ppl who do these ship competitions and larrying nonsense have ZERO interest in landoscar bc we love Lily and support Lando in his many probable conquests - and bc the Lando and Oscar dynamic isn't a big bromance for the cameras and has no fake gay for fangirl consumption.

like yes pls absolutely consider landoscar inferior to carlando if it means they stay away from inventing conspiracy theories and saying they "just have a bad feeling" about Lily and start attributing everything Lando has achieved to his teammate instead of himself.

also I could be SO incredibly mean using charlos vs carlando and the difference between PR and the public trying to tear one apart but it persisting vs PR and the public being a major factor in the other persisting at all. or the fact that charlos does everything ppl want carlando to do. but there's no point spending more time on people who think that two adult men - who've both said they're as much rivals as friends and the bromance is more what the public sees - are laughing in metrically different and lesser degrees of happiness with their new teammates vs a former teammate.

like, as long as I can now not be exposed to those opinions then they have a perfect right to express them. god knows I'm not saying my blogs is worth a damn but at least I don't trash anyone's gf or try to stunt on other rpf ships for no reason

tl;dr I'm p much done trying to make carlando worthwhile for me to rb or post about. I enjoy seeing it on my dash for myself but that's it! no one will be affected by this change lafhlsahf

*I know there are a few ppl out there who do this bc they have a no-private life policy on their blogs and that's np. they aren't die hard carlando fans tho.

[uglyduckling339]

KY'S LIFE IS STRANGE DOUBLE EXPOSURE NONSENSE LIVEBLOG: Episode 3

(as always, spoilers ahead!! don't read unless you've played the game or watched it bc otherwise none of these will make sense)

Tutorial Episode 1 Episode 2

LETS FUCKING GOOO IM SO EXCITED i actually really like this game ngl

(fun fact: this episode alone took 103 drafts to liveblog, and i actually shortened the amount by combining some into a list. without the list, it's about 150 drafts lol)

WOLF SQUAD HOODIE 🗣🗣🗣 AND PINK TIPS 🗣🗣 BEST OUTFIT COMBO AROUND FR

bruh max is ALWAYS sleepin in the beginning of ep 3 lmao

the best part of max's dissociation is there is no way she could be 100% confident that she DIDN'T kill safi. even she is getting slightly convinced by the photo and its prolly bc she knows theres days she wakes up and she doesn't feel real; days she forgets completely. she will NEVER be certain she didn't kill safi bc she'll never know if she just forgot it and erased it from her memory.

oh um, ik i was just yapping abt dissociation but i just remembered that it could be a future version of max instead😭 so idk

if i had a nickel for every LiS game i've played where the main character is accused of murder and wears a wolf squad hoodie, i'd have 2 nickels.

highkey i forgot safi and vinh fucked. they're both so real ngl

LMFAO MY BROTHER SAID MAX IN THE PIC WITH THE GUN HAS A LEAD PAINT STARE

cheetos toes?? max?? girl??

AH EW ALDERMAN KYS I HATE U

max. the picture. girl. u forgot the picture.

why would u walk to open the door with very explicit evidence against you js chilling in plain eyesight u freak

love her "oh fuck" + the face she makes lol

YO WHAT THE FUCK??

WHAT

FUCK YOU DUDE

he mentioned arcadia bay?? holy shit

my fav draft in here is: "girl js eat the photo atp"

okay what was alderman even tryna do. piss max off??

her instant breakdown :( poor max

OH MY GOD

OH MY GOD

MAX PHOTO JUMPED AGAIN ??????

shes js hella rusty but damnnn omg

hey! so what the fuck was that.

why was the storm in the background?

was it a diff universe maybe?

istg it's like her nightmare never ended fr

also MAX IS STILL FINE AS HELLLLLLLL IN THAT STORM EVEN AFTER 9 YEARS daymn

omg :( her collapsing tryna use her powers

the music in this episode is so good btw

is this the first ep in DE where we get 'sits' back or did i just miss them all last time

now i love you max but yk DAMN WELL ur talking straight out of ur balls with that whole "disappearing" thing. we dont know if u vanish or not 😭

okay so luckily she DOES disappear. unluckily i have SO MANY COMMENTS now:

what abt the dozens of kids she vanished in front of last ep then? did they just not care? does this mean that when she time travelled she DID teleport around? and people js didn't say anything? hilarous 10/10

goddd this might be my favorite ep so far. the amount of references and stuff added is insane.

max's trauma peaking through ily

she's like edging a breakdown but thats not quite enough tbh. i need to see her js COLLAPSE. let her hit her lowest. suffer ♡

actually i think i just wanna see max have a super reasonable reaction to this chaos she lives through ngl

okay so i looked away to liveblog and when i looked back up a diff universe alderman was there?? and moses could see him??? huh??

obvi i saved him. max wouldnt let him die

"i could've saved him!!" "no, you couldn't have." OH MY GODDD

highkey, the random extras in this game fucking SUCK. why is one british. who tf is kim. why do i care abt changing "photo guy"'s grade. i miss the tiny cast in LiS 1

stupid ass game making me google words

quick shout out to my dad for playing the whole Yasmin scene for me. he didn't have to, he js insisted bc "i paided 85$ for this game; i wanna try it"

okay so i actually hate Living World! Vinh ngl

VICTORIA?? GIRL?? DAMN??

talking mad shit on my pink twt page man.

also max's glitchy hair in this is so interesting !!

i forgot in which world Vinh owes me a favor so i've decided to not use any favors ever 🤩

"my door is always open" sounds familar...

lucas is the only person to be like slightly consious of max wandering around his room lmao

yup lucas is supposed to be jeffershit coded

AHH direct jefferson mention 😰

yk what. i dislike the loading screens. why r they so often

safi :( no :( y r u so mad :(

OH MY GOD IT'S COURTNEY'S BDAY </3

MAX IS SO SAD AND LONELY I LOVE HER

i think at first these liveblogs were more detailed but now i just say words lowkey

dude shes like so sad rn its insane. ily girl

SMASH OR PASS LMAOOOOO:

pass moses, smash gwen, didnt even get a choice w amanda (i think thats fucking WEIRD btw; i'll elabrote in a min), pass lucas, Kiss vinh

OH MY GOD I FORGOT TO ADD THAT SHE NEARLY CALLED CHLOE. BAE WAS SO UPSET SHE ALMOST CALLED HER OLD BAE

guys i make Max kiss Warren and Chloe is LiS and now i wanna do that again with Vinh and Amanda. #PolyamorousMaxineCanon

amanda's scene gets bisexual lighting okk

LETS THRASH SHAKABRAH !!!!!!!!!

okay so going back to the Amanda 'no choice' thing, at first I rejected her (bc the first interaction in the game with her is the game borderline shoved us onto her??) and now i've grown to kinda like her.

I like rhat she does listen to our boundaries and doesn't push on now but I feel like we missed alot of chances to learn more abt amanda bc of the romance being cut. Like i'm almost certain if I had chosen a romance with her we could have gotten a way better conversation from it.

anyways !! max almost crying :(

all lesbians like gwen bro

OH?? OKAY B&E

MY CAT?? IS MY CAT OKAY?? IRIS?? BABY??

this is the first time idk who coulda done this. i have so many guesses but i have zero clue fs.

I FOUND THE BABY DONT WORRY GUYS

poor sweetiepie is so scared :(

oh thats a lame reveal. its js another max

MUSIC SLAPS THO 🔥🔥🔥🔥

so im hearing that alderman was just a lil bitch

so the 'dopplegangers' are actually a shapeshifter??

THE SHAPESHIFTER IS SAFI????? WHAT??

okay i'm going straight into Episode 4 rn cuz i'm hooked but that was fire. it felt more like a Life Is Strange episode then the other 2 and yall know i LOVE characters showing any emotions ever lol

[retphienix]

After a casual 2k hours our resident "Fuck Eidolons, I refuse to grind them out, no I don't care about maxing my void nonsense if it means farming stupid unfun timegated dumb Eidolons" idiot has finally learned all the waybound skills :)

I'm still a ways away from maxing out the trees, but considering I have Zenurik maxed, which is the only tree I really make use of in normal gameplay, and I have ALL the "void" related damage buffs from the Madurai tree maxed so I can kill like Angels instantly etc (none of the ability strength stuff though), I have more than enough "done" to just let it passively finish off in another 2 or 3 thousand hours of gameplay lol

I'm stoked though!

I can finally say my operator is working at peak efficiency if it's running Zenurik since I finally have all the passives running :)

Noice~

[necer0s]

So I finished my read of the 90s Superboy comic— plus Young Justice and Impulse, which I got sucked into along the way.  Definitely a fascinating read on all three counts, though obviously there were plenty of rough spots.  A few thoughts:

I love how every single member of Young Justice gets a character arc from the start to the finish.  (The middle isn’t necessarily so smooth at carrying it out, but that’s comics for you.)  No one personifies that better than Secret, who is the beginning and the end of Young Justice, but everyone gets one. Robin learns how to trust the team and show his face, Superboy learns how to open up and be emotionally honest, Wonder Girl learns how to step up and have confidence, Impulse learns a fear of consequences and empathy.  It’s very impressive.

Empress is a fantastic character, and I would love to see more of her. DC always has a good cast of magic-users, but not a lot of them are also good at actual fighting.  It’d be great to see her filling that role of magic user more often, especially in fanfic.  Just imagine— Gotham has to deal with some magical nonsense, and Batman really doesn’t want to call in Constantine. Tim has an alternative, but they have to pay for her babysitting.  It’d be great for a Danny Phantom crossover, since she specializes in contacting and contracting with spirits.  Zatanna’s a great magic-user for working with the younger heroes, but Empress has a nice touch of darkness to her that I think is essential to a DC mage.

Honestly, all the side characters in YJ are great.  Secret, Arrowette, Empress, and Slo-bo all have heartbreaking arcs, and almost all of them are self-contained to this one series.  In the world of comics, where characters tend to show up and then stick around forever, leaving and coming back and dying and resurrecting endlessly.  As much as I might like to see more of them, that’s a rare commodity and well-worth respecting.

There’s a lot of missed potential in various places among the three series, but one arc stands out to me: “A World Without Young Justice”, which follows up on the original villain that Young Justice faced together and has him use time-travel shenanigans to make the team into washed-up versions of themselves.  I really wish they had made the premise a little closer to the title, and shown us a world where none of the YJ members were ever heroes at all.  There was a great opportunity here to show us all the things that have gone wrong in a world without Young Justice— and by extension, show us all the incredible things these children have achieved— but instead they used that opportunity to sexualize Empress and make fat jokes with Cassie.

The Superboy series has a heck of a lot going on, and I’m genuinely not sure if the writers know about any of it.  Like, there are some very fascinating stories being told about child celebrities, clone rights, urban housing, identity... but they almost all feel like accidental side-effects of writers trying to tell a story about a “cool teen”. 

The Impulse series, on the other hand, frequently knows exactly what it’s trying to say and does a fantastic job saying it.  A more general read of Flash comics is definitely going on my list, because I love Bart and Max.  

All in all, an interesting and fun bit of reading.  I’m starting in on the 2003 Teen Titans, so we’ll see where things go from here.

[cacowhistle]

ask and ye shall receive. (ao3 link also)

It’s a sunnily serene kind of day (the only kind they have) in Bayview when Johnny makes the social blunder of a lifetime.

He’s started seein, uh… things. Weird little purple… shapes. Kinda like monsters. He’s been catching glimpses on and off, but they’ve gotten more consistent as time goes on, and he’s startin’ to wonder if maybe, uh, he’s allergic to something he’s eating, or like… needs to see a doctor? He’s not paying it any mind, because it takes more than a little hallucination or two to get Johnny Jhonny down, and really, he’s got more important things to do.

Like bother his two new targets for the day. Or. Well. Targets and… potential. Friend? Are they friends? Johnny doesn’t think he and Max are friends.

He also doesn’t think Max and Mr. Lightning-Legs over here are friends. At least not… like…

Johnny doesn’t know how to describe it, actually, and he doesn’t care. They’re friends but in a way that suggests more, like, friends due to the physical closeness of bein’ in the same weird club, or… what was that word Stephen used the other day?

Proximity.

Point is, Johnny doesn’t know what the hell is going on with the Activity Club and their weird friendships, and he also doesn’t care, because it’s not his business how they feel. But it is his business how they floated through the damn air and then also kicked lightning from O’Connor’s legs.

Crazy shit. But right now, Johnny isn’t worryin’ about that. Naw, the three of them are walking down to where the boardwalk is, to catch the ferry over to school, though Johnny is eyeing some of the shops and thinking about playing hooky. Although… they’ve got time, don’t they? Not that—okay, to be honest, Johnny is more an unwanted leech tagging along with the two of them, since they’ve made it clear multiple times that they want to talk on their own. But Johnny is determined, now, just to spite them, and so he keeps talkin’ and talkin’ about whatever comes to mind, and sticking nearby, and not letting them escape.

He’s really good at not letting people escape. Some kind of magnetic pull, you might say. They just have to keep listening to whatever the fuck kind of nonsense he’s spewing.

None of this is the social blunder, by the way.

We’re getting there.

At this point, Johnny has kind of trailed off and let Max and Isaac pick up wherever he left off, which was somewhere around two topics ago. He’s not quite paying attention as the three of them meander down the boardwalk, more focused on the fact that it’s so damn hot and the ocean is looking real appealing right now. Leaping in would not be the craziest thing he’s ever done. He’s done it before, even!

It’s here, staring at the water and not at all listening, that he hears, “June always wanted to show me the ocean.”

Tuning back in, Johnny asks, “Who’s June?”

Everything kind of stops. Johnny pauses, blinking, glancing back over at the other two boys. Max has gone entirely still, staring at him, eyes wide with an emotion Johnny can’t quite parse. Suddenly self-conscious, he looks to Isaac, but Isaac isn’t staring at him too, but instead staring at Max, and, unbeknownst to Johnny, the way spectral energy comes off of his shoulders in droves.

“What,” Max says, voice tight and very un-Max-like.

Johnny begins to suspect he made a mistake? “You said… ‘June liked the ocean,’ or something.” Feeling uncomfortably warm, Johnny leans back against the wooden railing, eyes darting between each of the boys in front of him. “She not like it anymore, or something?”

“Or something,” Max says, shoulders so tense Johnny thinks he just hit the nerve of a lifetime. “I didn’t say anything about—how did you—why do you know my—“

“Neither of us said anything,” Isaac adds unhelpfully, or maybe actually very helpfully, “about a June.”

He’s still staring at Max, like he’s frozen there. Max looks like he’s about ready to jump Johnny and throw him into the water, and it is suddenly a much less appealing thought than it was earlier. Johnny presses back against the railing, hands pressing into the wood. He does not hear the quiet crackle of wood burning beneath his fingers.

“Uh,” he says, “sorry? I guess I was… hearing? Things?”

“That’s my mom’s name,” Max says, looking for all the world like he’d rather not. “Was.”

Skipping over Isaac’s confused your mom’s name is Was?, Johnny realizes a few things in quick succession. Max lives with just his dad. Max never mentions his mom. Max’s mom was apparently named June.

“Oh,” Johnny says, eloquently, “shit.”

Max just stares at him, unreadable. His eyes flick slightly to his left. Johnny does not see the grey wisps he’s letting off, but he does see the way Max elbows Isaac so violently in the ribs that it makes the kid cough, but then—

“Oh, shoot.” Isaac squeaks, and the rest of it doesn’t really matter from there.

there’s a scenario out here where johnny just randomly says max’s dead mom’s name to him completely unprompted