#but ye! i've loved six of crows for years so i know how to draw a wy

[disabilityshowdown]

expected when i started running this tournament to learn a lot about disabled characters i'd never heard of before, did not expect to get so attached to quirks of numbers that my brain would make up whole crossovers with fandoms i just learned about through this poll?

anyway they are friends now i have decided and are talking about science

(wylan and cinder poll backstory)

[ID: Fanart of Wylan Van Eck from Six of Crows and Linh Cinder from Lunar Chronicles, sitting next to each other and chatting. Wylan is a pale skinned teenager with haphazardly curly red hair and freckles. He has old fashioned scientific goggles pushed up into his hair, and is wearing a red shirt, navy blue jacket, brown pants, shoes, and fingerless gloves, and a blue scarf tucked into his shirt. There is a brown leather satchel beside him. Cinder is a tan skinned asian girl with dark brown hair tied up in a ponytail. She is wearing a grey tank top, khaki green pants, and white shoes. One hand has a fingerless leather glove on it, her other hand is instead a metal prosthetic, with burn scars where it connects at the wrist. Visible at her ankle is another metal prosthetic, this time for her left leg. The background is absent of detail and filled with multicoloured paint splatters in a way that suggests a 3d space.]

[aquitainequeen]

Aside from news on how things possibly stand for a Shadow and Bone/Six Of Crows renewal (basically no news is good news, keep going with the campaign!) there's also a short interview with Eric Heisserer, which sheds some interesting light indeed on the writing and making of Season Two, and it explains a lot of things:

Here are the questions posed for Eric's interview: 

"I'd like to know if there's a way to liberate the pre-written scripts if Netflix doesn't plan on using them" - Christian Thalmann (creator of the Fjerdan language)

"In my view, 'The Crows' have the potential to revitalize the Grishaverse. Unlike "Shadow and Bone", this new show could rely less on elaborate visual effects and offer a fresh narrative angle. Heist-themed shows are currently in high demand, adding to its appeal. Am I mistaken in thinking that our focus should primarily be on 'The Crows'? The likelihood of 'Shadow and Bone' returning seems slim, but I've always believed that 'The Crows' had a greater change of success." - Joleen

"If/when the spinoff is back (finger crossed) was there anything he had planned that would completely surprised, for good reasons obviously, the audience? And we should hold our breath for that twist/turn??" - Rti

"What are the difficulties you mentioned about filming S2 in that Reddit comment? Don't want to sound negative, but what went wrong?!" - Mitra

"How long was the sizzle reel ready to go but he had to keep it secret?" - Discord Team

"I would love to know his perspective on the impact of streaming on storytelling. Would we have had to launch a campaign like this 10-15 years ago for a show like this? What are the main points when it comes to streaming models and telling unique, diverse stories?" - Acorn_Bri

Eric's Responses: 

1) "There is a way to liberate the Crows scripts from Netflix, yes, and in fact that would be part of the buyout for another streamer when acquiring the rights to Leigh's novels. It would be a package deal." 

2) "The focus on the Crows is helpful in two ways -- first, those scripts were written, which lets us get a running start at production, and second, just from casual analysis of book sales, it's far more popular worldwide than other Grishaverse titles. So it will be a bigger draw for viewers. The trap though is the cost. It's more grounded than S&B, sure, but the Ice Court is a unique location that either requires a really costly set build, or set extensions and VFX work to make it look authentic, which means nearly every shot of the heist once our crew gets there could be a VFX shot. My guess is the budget would be on par with S2 of S&B.

3) "Yes, there is a surprise or two in the Crows spinoff season, but overall it's as close to the novel as we could make it. And Leigh's novel is such an amazing story with natural cliffhangers that work as episode "out" moments, etc. I think the biggest move we made was to feature every single Crow's backstory to go with their episode. So that was fun/sad/exciting." 

4) S2 kept throwing challenges at us, and it started long before we got to production. Like months earlier, when we learned the location we needed for the Little Palace in S1 was closed to us due to the pandemic. So right there we lost out on a ton of S&S scenes, because it wouldn't be a match. But we also had written a compelling side arc for Ivan and Fedyor in S2, these two Grisha trapped on either side of the civil war. Each of them played a big role in the story, but Simon (Ivan) had a feature film that overlapped with our schedule and couldn't move, which meant we lost him. So Daegan worked to revise the season keeping Fedyor and leaving Ivan like dead from the end of S1. He was Kirigan's right-hand man for the season. But poor Julian caught COVID just when we were to shoot out most of his scenes, and after tyring to ake the schedule work, we had to come to the brutal truth that there wasn't a way to keep Fedyor in the story. Our only option was to bring him in at like episode 8, which would've been too little, too late. 

COVID continued to be a monster all through production, requiring us to juggle schedules and miss out on days, and it was madness for the cast, who had to pivot with almost no notice whenever someone was ill and quarantined. This isn't unique to our show of course---it happened with everyone. It's just the challenge. 

Beyond that, we had been given the go to write a special standalone story: The Demon in the Wood. This would have been released on its own around Christmas, like a BBC special but for Netflix, and would help bridge seasons 1 and 2 by showing a little of what Kirigan was doing before we seem him in S2, and also provide more character context, etc. Christina Strain wrote that and did great work adapting Leigh's short story. But it never went the distance. 

There was a lot more to S2 as well, scenes and side stories and little interactions that were lost due to budget or time restrictions. Again, not unique to our show, but agonizing all the same, since what you get is not what we had written, or in some cases even shot. I'm incredibly proud of the cast and the team, and Daegan did the heaviest lifting while I was off finishing the Crows writing room. But we had a lot more thrown at us." 

5) That sizzle reel was put together four months before the second season dropped. 

6) Streaming is a challenge to serialized storytelling in that it looks at 'content' often with a different agenda and uses metrics that can take a creative issue and exacerbate it. Like in broadcast, if viewership and thus ad revenue has slightly declined, the show will ned to find a way to make their 22 or 13 episodes on a proportionally smaller budget. What is not done is reduce episode order. But if a streaming series underperforms or doesn't meet expectations, an the streamer doesn't cancel it outright, the go-to budget reduction idea is to reduce episode order for the next season. When you just have 8 episodes and continue to deal with notes to compress, pace up, or omit for what you'd scripted for a longer season, reducing further to six or four episodes is exhausting. 

This happens due to a slide in autonomy from what the showrunner position has been. What the chatter on the picket lines revealed to us is that most showrunners today don't get to see their own show's budget, and thus don't get the freedom to make budgetary decisions that could better protect the story they're telling. More and more, showrunners not at a legacy network aren't the final say or at times even involved in hiring key roles. I don't have any ideas that aren't already in contract language, I just see how the job on this side has gotten harder and there isn't much of a way for us to make it easier for each other like we could with having writers on set or in post production, because the streaming model has made that impossible." 

[somanywords]

fic writer tag game

Thanks for the tag, @tessabennet <3

Rules: Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love 💖

This is getting harder to play now that I've got 11 fics out in the world (wooo!), but here are 5 that I really enjoyed writing--some that are really fun to reread, even by myself who spent way too long editing, some that made my brain work really hard, and my very first one ever, which still makes me smile. :)

Another Song, Another Spring (stucky, modern au)

Bucky smiles into his phone. “Yeah, thanks, Mom. Actually, I had a few questions? What age do babies start mimicking language, aka cussing? And what age do they start walking?” “Is this for your book?” his mother asks suspiciously. “Yes,” Bucky says, staring into the eyes of the baby on his couch. “Yes."

2. tryin' to talk with a fist in ya mouth (newsies, canon verse)

Jack from start to finish, a tired and kicking beast of a story. Featuring growing up, finding yourself, and finding others, although not necessarily in that order.

3. say it soft and it's almost like praying (stucky, divergence post ws)

Natasha says, “Look, whatever the truth is about you, we have no way of really knowing the Winter Soldier's intentions. He’s not all there, he’s not who you remember. He’s a hot mess, Steve.” “Why does everyone think that?” Steve says, and he’s nearly yelling, but not quite, because he doesn’t need to, not when they’re so close. “Why does everyone keep saying he’s a mess—have you seen me? ”

4. Misplaced Pencils (stucky, canon verse) (1st fic! 1st baby!)

“Ma, I’m going to start drawing,” Steve says. “Are you now?” she asks interestedly, sitting across from him. “What kinds of things will you draw?” He stares at his spoon, giving the question the full attention it deserves. “…Things every artist should know how to draw,” he starts slowly. His Ma nods. “Things that are interesting to me…and Things that are beautiful,” he finishes. Or, Steve and drawing throughout the years. Also Bucky.

5. the grey sea and the long black land (six of crows, post canon)

In the dream, she wakes up each morning and knows exactly who Inej Ghafa is, the churning sea inside her finally quieted. Inej sifts through the new tentative foundations of her life to learn which direction is forward--Told in fifty sentences

This one went around a while ago, so if you've already played, feel free to ignore or point me to your posts--@turtle-steverogers @its-tortle @zenaidamacrouras1 @greyhavensking @between-a-ship-and-a-hard-place @blurglesmurfklaine @aimmyarrowshigh @darter-blue and anyone else who wants to share <3

[escapeinpapers]

Book Review: SIX OF CROWS by Leigh Bardugo

"No mourners. No funerals."

Plot: Kaz Brekker, a 17 year old expert thief, was offered a very dangerous heist on the most secured place in Fjerda, the Ice Court. A huge amount of money was promised to him so he created a crew composed of people with very different abilities and prejudices. Inej, a former acrobat turned victim of sex trafficking and now an intelligent spy lurking in the shadows. Jesper, the sharpshooter addicted to gambling. Nina, a grisha (people that have unique abilities and power) who can control the physiology of a human body. Matthias, a drüskelle (people who hunt grisha) but a traitor to his own country. Wylan, a runaway child who cannot read but is great on drawings and makes bombs. Although with these complexities on their personalities, they have one thing in common, they need money and want to start a new life. So as the story goes on, it gets darker and very interesting as friendships are built, relationships blossomed, secrets and pasts are revealed, some trust are broken and people died.

Thoughts: I've always been a sucker for fantasy stories. It is one of my favorite genres of all time. This book was published 6 years ago and is very popular up to this day. The author, Leigh Bardugo had previously written a trilogy (in the same universe as six of crows) before this book and it became so big. The Grishauniverse is so popular that it was recently announced to have a Netflix adaptation! I really did not get the hype, so I gave it a try and man, this is my first Grisha novel but I would say the Grishauniverse swallowed me whole and I'm obsessed that I can't get out.

What I love:

1. Beautifully written story. The world building is just so magical. The way their world is being described is so intriguing.The author has a really great way of story telling. It is like a roller coaster ride of different emotions. From the preparation to the actual heist, I dont know how to put it into words but the twists and turns really made me crazy!!!! The actual heist would start around after 300 pages but you won't be bored. There is always something interesting happenning.

2. Multi-perspective. I love that I got to know each of the characters. Their character development as you go along the book is so flawless and amazing. I dig books that also show perspectives of other characters not just the main protagonist because I get to know what the others are feeling, their opinions and thoughts. It just makes the story have a lot more sense.

3. The backstories of the characters. They are diverse and they explore a lot themes and issues such as human and sex trafficking, racism, social classes, monopoly, addiction, slavery and corruption among others. I love that I get the reasons why the characters are acting a certain way because they've been through a lot, some even shocked me.

4. The romance. Kaz and Inej have this work only no time for love but unconcoiously shows feelings type of romance. You'll have Jesper and Wylan casually flirting and being gay. And my favorite otp, Matthias and Nina. The prey and the predator fell inlove with each other. I love them so much that their backstory is probably my favorite. Yes, you'll get a triple date through out the book.

5. It is unpredictable. Have I already told you that the twists and turns made me crazy? Yep they freaking did!!!! Kaz is just so smart. No smart is understatement. His plans are so on point. One moment you'll feel like they'll be doomed but no uh-oh. If you are a fan of money heist, he is like the professor.

What I don't love:

I think there's anything that I don't love on this book. Though there are few scenes of damsel in distress but they are bearable and also I don't get it why the author set them at ages of 14-17 because they totally don't act like their age.

Recommending to:

1. People who like fantasy with a sprinkle of romance.

2. People who are fans of book series. This is actually a duology and I'm currently reading the 2nd book (i'm loving it! i already love the level up of the characters)

3. People who love Money Heist would also probably love Six of Crows.

4. People who want to explore new genre. This will be a breath of fresh air from the typical plots.

Thanks for reading! Hope you would add Six of Crows to your TBR. 😊