#doing this instead of my job <.<< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[kingofthewilderwest]

Folks who've followed me for some time may know I dislike the word "canon." That it's my constant soap box topic. That I feel it misses the point for people to be zealous about what materials do and don't fall into "canon." Discrediting officially released materials because there are an arbitrary amount of plot or tone inconsistencies, because they're for children, because they're made by X person instead of Y, etc., comes off as missing the point. Instead of trying to create an unalterable timeline and list of facts, like we're in history class, like we as adults neeeed a certain amount of "rationality" and "objectivity" to engage with fiction, I like to acknowledge:

The purpose of storytelling is storytelling.

And sometimes lore doesn't need to be consistent. Sometimes lore is better and sicker and sweeter if it's treated as additive. We don't need to determine one objective deal about it to acknowledge something came from an official source and I can expand my love and understanding of characters, theme, location, etc. without getting my panties twisted over whether it just gave me two origin stories about how Sally and Jochebed met.

I'm saying this as a meta analyst who's the biggest slut for synthesizing. But I can have a good head on my shoulders, evaluating what does and doesn't count as relevant to my specific investigation, without getting hung up on an objective "pass" and "fail" list. Maybe the materials that sync in my system are fluid pending on what I'm looking at, and maybe I can have a better appreciation of the characters, setting, themes, etc. if I'm not so caught up in My One Objective Golden Timeline. It all feels artificial and like forgetting what story is for.

Anyway. Y'all have heard that before. I'm rambling today because, like. Honestly it's fuckin' hilarious one reason my philosophy came about is because of my childhood writing chaos.

I have always been a writer. My mother was incredible and saved my earliest stories. Like we're talking four-year-old, can't even write a complete sentence, the only words on page one are "Cat cat meow meow oh no oh no no no cat" in all caps and in marker. I have things from four years old and six years old and eight years old and ten years old and twelve years old and on and on. And unlike other people who flinch at their older works, I embrace this as identity.

By the time I was six or seven, I had started introducing worlds and characters I'd keep with me forever. And when you grow up with characters, you write and rewrite and rewrite an revamp and rewrite and redo to reflect your new states of maturity, your new ideas. But, inevitably, you can't keep track of your revamps, and if you revamp the revamp to restart on a clean slate, you instead add another layer of tangles. And if you create an encyclopedia about your creative shit to keep track, you have to contend with and make arbitration over contradictions, which again creates another layer of tangles, which again opens the door for more inconsistencies, which again creates....

And by the time you're in your thirties, you've engaged with these characters 2+ decades. The same character might've been revamped, redesigned, renamed, renamed, renamed, placed into different settings, fused with other characters, interacted with other characters from previously different stories, reseparated into her own timeline, and on and on and on again. There is no "canon" by that point. There can be no canon.

But there's story, there's intent, and there's fantastic times ahead.

I'm doing a project where I take my earliest, most "iconic" collection of works, and I rewrite them. I preserve their OG intent, settings, characters, events, vibes, and themes best I can, no mind how childish—but give them the polish I'd always dreamed they could have, now that I'm an adult. Instead of worrying about whether Zahnoh and Cheacabrr are two years apart, three years apart, five years apart, or eight years apart; whether they met at a pawn shop or at a racetrack or were elementary school classmates or knew each other forever because their parents were childhood friends; whether Cheacabrr and Campriacheenia were childhood friends or met as adults as fully-fledged enemies; I don't give a flying fuck. We are past the point where I can be "consistent." I ask myself, "What would be best for this story I am currently telling?" and I tell it. I've even added more "contradictions" because storytelling is a living art, and the story would flow better and handled themes better if I changed this factor yet again.

So how did Zahnoh and Cheacabrr meet? Yes. All of these are true. All of these are very, very, very established lore. I'm not going to denigrate any to a "defunct" tier because they're important. They communicate important things about the characters and world and tone I've built. They're all stellar iterations. If my current project gets far enough, I might even create multiple revamps and swap details out again! There will never be something restricting what I want to say.

This is more awesome than making another Ultimate Canon Arbitration Encyclopedia entry sweating, "Do I make Cheacabrr born this year or that year? This year or that year??? This year or that year???? Which story is purer??? Which story is the gold standard? Which details should I retire???" Doesn't matter. In my ongoing project, Zahnoh and Cheacabrr have an unprecedented age gap to emphasize Zahnoh's manipulative side in Cheacabrr's rise to fame. In another story, they're going to be close in age to emphasize a healthy platonic spin. It's so fun. And it's a great way to embrace my identity as a storywriter from start to end. ^.^

This is, by far, not the only reason I have my soapbox about "canons". But ain't it funny how one person's own projects leak into their philosophy. XD

[thimblings]

get with the Crow-gram, Davrin

[lazylittledragon]

'i'll just do a couple of doodles of mombin™/platonic stobin parents' nevermind, borderline graphic novel

[taylachan]

A Harrowhark study Disco Elysium style

I actually had a lot of fun working on this, it's a very fun and dirty art style

[wearecrowley]

good omens crack 2 of ∞

[gunstellations]

its sonics turn! 👅

[charlesemersonwinchesteriii]

inspired by @sunlaire's tags

[anothersuperstition]

my chemical romance albums but make them (a24(ish)) film posters

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

Hey hey hey may 31th anon! How's 2024 going? ☆ヾ(*´▽｀)ﾉ This year I have for you a leaked Sherlock season 5 image. Thinking of you!! And everyone!!

[antirepurp]

little freakboy commits containment breach more at 11

[artemis-pendragon]

Crowley and Aziraphale would rather do anything than their jobs. This includes doing each other's jobs instead btw

[lazylittledragon]

i refuse to believe that boycotting is hard. my favourite thing in the world is ordering maccies after a late night at work/a concert/getting drunk. yes i do miss it sometimes. but the other night i ordered from a small place near my house instead and it was the most orgasmic burger i've ever had in my life. i very rarely say this but fucking suck it up people are DEAD

[athenasdragon]

I guess I'm not really clear on what the deal is with Treviso's defenses or lack thereof. So it's a "defenseless merchant city" with no standing army, like the rest of Antiva, because... the reputation of the Crows is enough? Maybe I missed codex entries or, god forbid, a tie-in novel, explaining how this collective of extremely wealthy city-states that grew to power because of their naval might and location as a trade hub didn't at any point establish an army. Shouldn't each city have their own army?? Especially because there was a civil war at the beginning of the Dragon Age??? And dragons have been ravaging the north for fifty years and there was a Blight 20 years ago and the Qunari have been threatening invasion for decades????????

[judgedarts]

when in doubt... draw kaibabros

[moeblob]

Nines: ... you make a solid case, Sixty.

[bacchuschucklefuck]

I know a normal amount abt waistcoats