#don't erase character issues bc of a love interest!!

[pocketedxoxo]

"The problem is, love doesn't solve everything. Love isn't going to fix what's wrong with the world. Love won't stop Regulus' nightmares, or heal James' pain. Love can't change their past, and it refuses to solidify their future. Love only makes this harder. It's something they'll have to choose to work on together" - bizarrestars on ao3, from crimson rivers

[spiderpussinc]

are the 2099 comics THAT bad in terms of racism plus other weird writing choices??? i'm starved for miguel content and would like to read the original comic run but i keep seeing the debate of the original comics being problematic and/or downright just BAD bad (not to mention miguel is supposed to have mexican heritage but he's straight up a white redhead lol)

Some people may disagree but speaking as a latinx writer; it's bad because it is racist, yes! On multiple fronts!! And beyond that, it's also bad as a complete failure of comics structure and compelling narrative.

Longpost, on readmore;

I say this as a long-time capeshit reader, as politely as possible: Miguel's comics are a *paycheck* book. As in; a series a writer does monthly to be paid for it, but with middling aspirations and downright negative characterization depending on where their mood is.

The first few issues of his 1992 run are relatively complete and well-balanced, may even trick you into thinking this story is going somewhere; but that's only because they're the /character pitch./ Ill skip to the end and tell you upfront. That 1992 series ends with the implosion of the whole "2099" line of comics (an universe that included other books, like ghost rider, doom, etc, by other writers) due to dwindling public interest and mass cancellations. The end of that run is basically meaningless, since the whole thing got retconned - and even before that a guest writer had came in and made mistaken character reveals pdavid wasnt happy with and wanted to erase before the finale. The event book that wrapped up that universe was unironically, literally called -- "2099: Manifest Destiny."

Now, I don't like Peter David's writing. I think he's obsessed with the idea of building harems out of his female characters (when he's not fridging them, or making them act ~crazy~ to further alienate them from the protagonist) and it is the kind of grueling, joyless reading experience I can only describe as making you feel Oily Inside. This goes as far as multiple stalking plotlines, the inclusion of a guest appearance from AU s/x slaver Hulk in later years, Miguel's mother being strongly implied to have been forced into conceiving him by his real dad who's the evil CEO of alchemax, general torture painporn. His broader supporting cast is so interchangeable and disposable that they were literally disposed of.

In terms of the racism; I have mentioned how he uses cultures as tokens and does 0 research whatsoever. The way it feels and the way it is deployed is through a lens of Exoticism - tourism. Miguels suit is allegedly "a dia de los muertos costume" b/c pdavid seems to think that holiday is mexican halloween. In the orig book, you'll see plenty of broken japanese and stereotypical orientalist caricatures - after killing his first love interest, pdavid introduces a japanese girl who is unironically, literally named "Xina" (that pretends to be chinese on occasion) to fill in the vacant role. Miguel himself falls right into all the usual latino stereotypes — short tempered, drug addict, sex magnet "latin lover" (this last one also applied to his brother Gabriel, who for the longest time is characterized by just Going Through A Lot Of Girlfriends). And it's kind of insane bc he's still being drawn as a deeply deeply white man, but not even that takes off the burden of the racial microagressions!!! They're the only times pdavid seems to remember that heritage! Then there's the commemorative hanging page. Since you mention the redheadedness; thats another insane thing to me. He has 0% of irish in him. His dad is Blond. Who is this man?

Most of the info in the 2099 run is either revealed to be a lie midway thru (miguel is not mr o'hara's son, nor addicted to rapture) or completely retconned away to be rewritten in new runs. Different writers have tried to come in and do miguel in other team/event books but frankly nothing stands out and most of them get marked as alternate-miguels. Unfortunately, every time marvel decided to give another shot at spider-man 2099 they also brought pdavid back. The newer books were never a success, and theyre just as filled w/ the garbage i mentioned earlier (wow! Steampunk spider-woman is given to pdavid for *ONE* issue and instantly tonguekisses gabriel before leaving, so novel. More fridging ensues. Stalking. Etc.) 2099 as an *universe* has been retconned so many times Nothing is consistent and Nothing is set on stone and frankly i think they should make it an AU separate from main canon and build a whole new world already.

The art in the 2015 + runs consists mostly of tracing, and more of that oily weird feeling applied to fem chars. Perhaps you have noticed in this entire hate review have never once spoken about Miguel's heroic plots and memorable villains --- he has none. At least nothing I can remember or distinguish. (Interchangeable, disposable, etc) There is a vague inkling of "this is an anti-stabilishment spiderman, he fights against The Public Eye, the Corporation Cops!" at the start but much like his cultural illiteracy pdavid has no real insightful politics commentary, so that dissolves into the background in time. Its all buzzwords. All of his plotlines are solved in circuitous or soap operaish extradrama ways; and while some of this is present in other superhero comics, what stands out to me MOST is how utterly fucking joyless Miguel's comics are. It's like going through a slog on obligation. They genuinely gave me a headache every time.

ATSV does a great job of reinventing Miguel and rebuilding the parts of him that showed real promise. Being a different tone-swapped spiderman, futuristic, being more on the tech-science side of crime fighting. Him being a single dad with a daughter is also new. (And he is single! There is no singular mention of marriage or a wife anywhere, he's a geneticist, multiple spider-men we see in this movie were literal clones made in tubes - i am fond of the idea he's a transmasc dad but even if you think he's cis he could have made that baby himself. Adoption is also always there.) I think its very clear ATSV didn't want to bring any of pdavids major weird shit w fem chars to the big screen on the hopes that miguel gets rebooted eventually. I think he's gay. Nobody can prove me wrong.

On that note, Steve Orlando (queer writer, also wrote for DC's midnighter/apollo) did some of the latest 2022/2023 Miguel miniseries. Another reboot! Those were "2099: Exodus" and "Spider-man 2099: Dark Genesis" - i think its campier/trying to tackle superhero plots more head on and trying to do something wide wacky cast focused at Marvel's personal request, but Miguel's future is very up in the air rn. I do really hope they reboot him into something closer to ATSV with latines at the center soon.

What I always reccomend for people curious abt miguel: read his first 3ish 1992 issues, get a general feel and close the book as soon as you feel annoyed. It won't get better. Remember none of it is canon nor has been relevant in over two decades. If you want to know the wider context of his messy chronology, check out some of the 2099 "all comics" type of youtube videos, theres some pretty easy to digest summarizations if u dont wanna waste ur time reading stuff that just got retconned again lol. Most writers now are operating on vibes and that is a freedom you should also allow yourself in your own fanwork.

Putting his panels out of context can be very funny though. (For further curiosity or tangents, there's always my meta tag)

[necrotic-nephilim]

i think stephcass could have been potentially interesting if fandom let steph be herself and not ultimate uwu girl boss erasing all her negative traits. where is her jealousy? unhealthy obsession with her crush and complete lack of understanding of the concept of boundaries ESPECIALLY if that person is already dating someone? where is her almost manic urge to push away other potential love interests (and at this point i realized she would NOT have been so chill with ives if tim had come out much earlier yikes)

BIG AGREE OH MY GOD YOU PUT IT INTO WORDS.

because i love TimSteph for the reasons you listed!! there's something very unhealthy and teen girl-ish in the way Steph approaches relationships. she's angrily jealous and she thinks about Tim in a possessive way. like she is just so consumed by him and it's meant to be male comic writers writing how they think teen girls write about boys in their diaries- but it comes off as incredibly toxic. it's one of her deepest character flaws and what endears me so much to 90s Steph. she throws herself so deeply into romance when she has it, like she's afraid if she lets go of it for even a second it's going to leave her. and god forbid you be the person she falls for bc you will never maintain a healthy relationship with someone she views as competition, she *will* sabotage it. and to me these are all pros of her character. i *like* seeing how vigilantes struggle to maintain normal relationships- *especially* teenage vigilantes. Steph struggles to balance her "regular" life with being Spoiler and what things deserve a Stephanie Brown reaction and what things deserve a Spoiler reaction. and when she's dating, it's almost *always* going to be a Spoiler reaction and she shades her relationships through that lense. it's why civilian partners for Steph never really interest me. (besides the fact they always feel forced and clunky, like Steph's recent think with Maps' older brother?) it doesn't explore the way Steph loves to her fullest extent and how far she goes when she's into someone. there's no sweet puppy love for Steph, when she's all in, she's *all* in. she will do what she thinks is best for Tim oftentimes by her own will without his knowledge or approval, and sometimes massively fucks things up for him. bc she's just so wrapped up in what she believes is best, consequences are secondary.

and sure, she maintains healthy friendships. bc most fodder with StephCass is very healthy and soft. bc it's a *friendship*. and it changes radically when Steph is involved romantically. it's why there's such a difference in how Steph regards Tim when they're just friends as to when they were dating. she loves him and he's always going to be important, but that obsessive passion isn't what drives them anymore. so it's something you have to consider with *any* Steph ship in which it's a character she's had a friendship with- that how she interacts with them as a friend doesn't necessarily inform how she'd regard them as a lover. and that's the issue with StephCass. even the StephCass content that *is* comics informed (tho, a lot of it isn't and while i don't think fanon needs to be based on the comics to be good, i do think Steph and Cass are difficult characters to tackle if you aren't at least semi-familiar with their canon content bc of how warped they are in the fandom-) comes off with such a rose-colored lense that sours it for me. hell, even on Cass' side, things she's *canonically* done have been weird and obsessive about Steph. but that's never explored.

(tbh dare i say it's something to do with the phenomena in fandom that yuri is morally pure and perfect and yaoi is always dirty and bad- there's this almost sanitizing of sapphic ships sometimes to make them perfect and cute together and while i'm not here to yuck someone else's yum, i do think it's *telling* that women in fandom never get to explore the complex depths of unhealthy and toxic love in the way men do bc if you make a woman evil, it's misogyny. if you sexualize a woman too much it's misogyny. if you write her doing morally fucked up things even with the understanding it is her canon character, it's misogyny and you're villainizing her. i can sit here and say Tim is canonically shitty at relationships and ppl will not. if i say the same about Steph, then i'm critiquing a woman and holding her to an unfair standard. it's exhausting. it feels like StephCass only ever exists to depict Steph and Cass as morally pure and in love angels kissing in the background while the men get to do complex and nuanced and fun things in the foreground. this thought has probably been far more explored by others with more developed nuance on it, but i just wanted to point it out bc it's a very real thing i keep seeing *especially* in the Batfam fandom-)

and equally i think Cass' reaction to this intensity and obsession from Steph could be interesting. Cass historically has had poor reactions to knowing everyone is attracted to her and thinking about her, so that level of intensity i think could cause some negative reactions out of Cass that would add some very layered conflict to the ship. some of Steph's most negative traits *do* clash with Cass' wants and needs. it makes the ship more fun! it puts Steph's flaws on display as well as Cass' flaws and her internal issues surrounding romance. StephCass could be so weird and fucked up. but it's been defanged by this fandom in a way that turns me off to it. i love both Steph and Cass and i love exploring sapphic Batfam ships, so it *should* work for me. but the irony of it being popular in anti spaces combined with no one being able to acknowledge the flaws either of these characters have for the sake of making them kiss just. bores me and it's sucked any interest i could have out of it. bc god forbid women just be a little fucked up. </3

[woobifykamukura]

ghdsfkjghdsf is that a common thing?

I don't really get how he'd be misdiagnosed anyway; it would need brain scans, especially since it's so rare at his age, and if anything it would have been misdiagnosed as other conditions for a while. Only going off cry-stars here- I have no expertise myself- but she's said that can happen and there was a recent case in Japan where a young guy's dementia was mistaken for depression for ages.

If we doubt Komaeda's FTD it can only be via doubting his honesty imo (but I still think he's telling the truth). I also love seeing analyses of him through the lenses of other disorders as comorbid instead of alternative diagnoses- especially autism, but I've seen interesting takes wrt OCD and BPD too- but canonically I feel like bvFTD, extreme post-traumatic stress and political radicalisation adequately explain his issues.

TO BE FAIR it probably isnt As common as i think it is, i just saw one reddit post thst explicitly claimed the FTD was a misdiagnosis and that it totally makes way more sense for komaeda to have autism and bpd, and a surprisung number of people... agreed? for some reason??

which i need to state for the record a) i am autistic myself and b) have absolutely zero problems with headcanons, even if they arent ones i ascribe to personally

what i DO have a problem with is people erasing canon neurodivergencies and/or erasing traits CENTRAL to a character in order to square-peg-round-hole the headcanon THEY have as the most correct one

"nagito has ftd and was autistic before that?" cool! neat! seeing how those two disorders being comorbid with each other could be really interesting!

"nagito does NOT have ftd, the devs were wrong, they actually wrote an autistic character and didnt realize it" stop talking.

this is very like, misanthropic i guess but after SO MUCH SHIT ive seen it just speaks to an unwillingness to empathize with or relate to anyone that isnt exactly like you. and you cant just headcanon real people around you with Misdiagnosed Autistic (most.... times....) so this pops up in fiction

like. i am autistic! i also have two (2) personality disorders, and neither is bpd. this has led to a non negligible amount of autistic people completely stereotyping my other disorders as evil in order to prop themselves up ("i thought i was a narcissist/sociopath, which wouldve been awful, but really i was just autistic! phew!!" with implicit, sometimes EXPLICIT value judgements being made)

i have had a friend i had in real life, to my face, say he didn't believe i had either personality disorder and really i was secretly just autistic

...if we had been better friends, maybe he would've known me well enough to know that that's almost... comically untrue. lol

so in my opinion there do exist a certain minority of autistic people who see autism as the only neurodivergency that Matters, or at least the one that matters the most. and the only way they can feel any sympathy for anyone else is if they are also autistic

and i know this is a minority! and i just see it a lot because i am an autist in fandom and a lot of other autistic people are also in fandom! AND that this is a mindset prone to ANY minority- most people think their Problem is the Worst Problem, it just... happens. however i am just as irrational and prone to biases as anyone else and ive chosen this as my completely irrelevant hill to die on

that one reddit post made me so goddamn mad bc of All This PLUS its double insulting when someone says "i have a special interest in psychology!" as a way to say theyre extremely knowledgable, and doing genuine analysis with the lens of "i am looking at the text and trying to make an objective diagnosis" and then STILL DO THIS!!! because they have this veneer of "im just a guy asking questions" before diving right into a weirdly consspiratory subset of "everyones an idiot about mental health except for ME"

...which tbf i dont think that about myself. i am very good at writing a wide variety of mental illness due to a combination of research and life experience BUT i could really only tell you like. actual non-surface level FACTS about aspd and to a lesser extent, npd. because thats what i chose to focus on. there are far and away lots more people that know more about me about other things, and im fine wit that

i am however also aware of this extremely hyperspecific social phenominon. and thus it is my burden to bear. my mountainous molehill.

also r/danganronpa just fucking sucks like in general. every time i see a kokichi opinion there i get a little closer to pulling the trigger. i think the real moral here is reddit is garbage and should not be used for anything other than product reviews

(also fwiw i agree w ur personal take at the end, with a lil bit of ocd tendencies that like, started off manageable and nowhere near diagnostic level badness, since things he might do to manage his cycle and even the constant thinking about it are very much reminiscent of obsessions and compulsions. but ftd in of itself can cause ocd symptoms so after that it got... worse. thats my personal take on it ^^)

[blackbird-brewster]

CM Unpopular Opinions

Just a couple of weeks out from the new season, the new trailer just dropped, and people are getting hyped. For last season, I made a CME predictions post (which mostly came to pass, bc this show is so predictable) -- but this season, I'm going to post some unpopular opinions going into S17. Don't like, don't read.

WILL. Since we know Will won't be in this season, there have been speculations that JJ/Will will be getting a divorce, or that Will is going to die. I do NOT want Will to die. I hate that guy, I've never liked his character, but you know who I do love? JJ. She has already been through SO much, I do NOT want Hotch 2.0 in S17. I don't want Will to die, because that would be like ripping half of JJ's soul out of her chest and she deserves better. What I actually think will happen -- is just that Will is going back to being an off-screen partner like he was for most of the series.

JEMILY. I've already written my thoughts on Paget's Jemily hints on social media and why I think that's simply queerbaiting. There's no way Jemily is going to be canon, and I am HAPPY about that. I don't want Jemily to be canon!! Look at how this show treats canon relationships!! How many female romantic interests have been tortured and killed???? Why would I ever want Jemily in that crossfire? Also, as a fanfic author who has been writing Jemily for the past decade -- I don't want them to become canon, because that will squander so much creative potential. Fic authors fill in the gaps and subtext of canon, that's our job, when a relationship becomes canon it really loses it's appeal. That being said, I would love to actually see Emily and JJ interacting again. S16 really ignored their decade-long friendship altogether. Shit, I would love to just see them in the same fricking scene again.

REBECCA. All I want is for Rebecca to survive this season. As mentioned above, the way this show treats romantic interests of main characters is HORRIBLE. I'm forever furious with how the show handled Tara/Rebecca's relationship last season. I know fans hated Rebecca for getting pissed at Tara, but I still don't agree. What I do hate is how as soon as Tara's queerness served it's plot point (getting the inmate to admit he's gay too) -- the show nuked Tara's relationship altogether. I seriously love Rebecca, I think she adds a lot to the show. And since we already know Rebecca is in S17, I would LOVE to see Tara/Rebecca sit down and actually talk through their issues (like real adults!). I would LOVE for them to get the happy ending they deserve.

GARCIA'S ROMANCE. For real, I do not care about any of this love triangle bullshit with Garcia between Tyler and Luke or whatever tf is happening. I seriously hated what they did to Garcia's character in S16, it felt like they completely erased the prior 15 years from her character and replaced it with the most basic hetnormative romance plot. I don't ship Garvez (nor her and Tyler), so I don't really care about that side of things. But I would LOVE to get our Garcia back. I miss her so much.

RETURNING CHARACTER RUMORS. If one of the past cast members comes back in S17 I do not want it to be MGG. CME already focused an entire season on Rossi's man-pain (literally the only reason they killed Krystal was for him to be angry 🙃). I do NOT want another season of white-male centric plot lines (even though that's clearly what's gonna happen with Voight) If anyone actually comes back to guest, I want it to either be Matt or Derek. Alternatively, I do have a crack theory that the unsub/Gold Star is actually Elle Greenaway. A trained government assassin, she became a vigilante after leaving the BAU and she's been operating for all these years without detection. Now THAT would be a good twist.

Listen, overall, I'm not looking forward to another season of Evolution. I think they're trying way too hard to turn CM into some edgy, gritty, Norwegian-type crime drama and in doing so, they've ruined some of my favourite characters irrevocably. I don't have high hopes for S17.

[tangents-within-tangents]

Local Ace overthinks headcanon and shipping culture

Happy ace week, my friends! Imma be posting some aspec hc's this week so I felt the need to overexplain my personal stance on orientation headcanons and such

To start, as with any and all fandom things: to each their own. People can do whatever they want, and (for the most part) I can choose what I do or don't engage with. I know that hc and shipping and stuff is mostly for fun, or for seeking/creating representation, no hate to anyone who does it and enjoys it.

But also sometimes things can be problematic and I can still be bothered by those things. Even things that are 'just for fun' or 'not for you' can impact and reflect our views and behaviors, so it's still worth speaking about.

Aro/ace-spec identities are really diverse and complex, and we're really underrepresented as is. We have historically and chronically been plagued by problematic misconceptions and tropes, both in canon representation (or lack thereof) and fanon mindsets. Some of the main issues to be aware of with this topic specifically:

The majority of (sometimes unintentional) representation being non-human characters (like aliens and robots) implying that sex/romance = humanity and/or a fulfilling life. (Here's some video essays that touch on this: X X)

Related stereotype issues like racist or ableist de-sexualization and infantilization of certain groups like Asian men, physically disabled people, or people with autism. (It's an intersectionality thing bc yes those people can be aro/ace as well but it's still complicated) (more video essays! X X)

Common erasure of historically aspec characters in favor of allo plotlines bc that's "more interesting/realistic". Or ignoring canonically established aspec characters in favor of allo shipping (often excused by the fact that some aro/ace people do have sex/relationships, which is true but the complexities and nuances are often ignored and there's lots of double standards) (Here's some posts that touch on this: X X X)

Amatonormativity's over emphasis on sex/romance as a fundamental and necessary part of life, which is often reflected in how media and shipping culture are generally allo-centric, and it can just get pretty pervasive at times (note: we aren't a monolith obv, some aro/ace people enjoy it and participate too, but others don't and it is hard to avoid) X X

So while I know there's lots of reasons for shipping and headcanoning, and for the most part there's nothing wrong with it and people aren't trying to do these things, there are still issues that exist. Honestly seeing posts talking about these things has been really validating for me bc it let me know like yeah this is a problem other's have noticed too and I don't have to just accept it.

So with respect and awareness of nuance, ship and headcanon however you want. The rest of this post is about my own personal preferences and such. I'm not necessarily trying to persuade anyone here, I just have some thoughts I want to put into words:

For me personally, when it comes to characters' sexualities/gender identities/etc, I prefer just to stick to whatever is established in canon (or in confirmed intentional coding), and, if nothing is specified, headcanons that are based in canon evidence (more like theories I guess, as opposed to reimaginings or straight-up projection that knowingly ignores parts of canon. Which is fine and fun if that's what you like but to me there is a distinction). This is because:

1: While fandom culture is all about freedom and creativity, I do think it's important in this day and age to recognize actual canon representation and strive towards that because that is what will reach more people and have impact (and personally I think that writers' intentions should actually be given more thought/value)

2: I think that shipping/hc/fandom culture in general tends to perpetuate amatonormativity (specifically in devaluing/erasing friendship and non-romantic love), and sometimes leads to harmful parasocial queer speculation in real life (though again, I know that's not the intention but it's still a thing).

3: Generally, unless it’s explored as a part of a reimagined fic or something, just saying a random character is aspec (or whatever identity) when they did not present that way at all in the actual media doesn't really help me feel seen.

For example, I've seen a lot of people headcanon Mabel Pines as aromantic and that really threw me off bc in the show she is obsessed with romance. Like if other's see themselves in her that is great I won't stop you (the idea is that her crushes are comphet, which is not something I personally struggled with, and maybe I could see it if I rewatched the show with that in mind) but when I watched the show, I specifically did not connect with or relate to Mabel BECAUSE of my ace identity (yeah this post was mainly about her lol) so it just doesn't do much for me to claim her as aspec, in fact it feels counterproductive.

Sometimes it can feel really tacked on too, like 'well it's not confirmed that this character has sex so they could be ace', or 'some ace people do have sex so they can still be ace.' And like sure yes they could be but often it's like a kid show or something so none of the characters' sex lives are relevant or explicitly confirmed. Just bc they aren't not ace doesn't mean that they are, or that saying they are is meaningful if the character/story doesn't actually speak to anything related to the ace identity or experience. (This can happen with canon characters too, like Sponge Bob being asexual means absolutely nothing to me, especially since I get the sense that the creator said that more in a 'sea sponges reproduce asexually' type of way :/ )

So basically, in terms of representation I prefer the theory/interpretation type of headcanons that have supporting evidence of some kind, because that evidence is what makes me see myself in a character and feel represented in some way by them. So that's the type of headcanons I'll be posting, and that's why I'll be discussing evidence and explanations, even though I know plenty of people have fun and find value in just claiming identities without any of that.

Another thing I feel the need to overexplain is kinda the reverse of that. I think it's important to recognize that a character does not have to be a certain identity for you to see yourself in them. Like that sense of relatability and representation is still valid even if they aren't, and I think it's good to leave space for that ambiguity.

This is coming mostly from the fact that I have always valued platonic relationships (between any and all genders) long before I ever knew I was ace. I've always wished that was better normalized and represented in media and real life. I think that is just as important as queer representation, and sometimes they can counteract each other.

Like yes Min and Ryan could be gay and if that's what the writers were going for despite restrictions, or if people see themselves in that, great! But I would also love for this story to give a close friendship this much narrative value for once.

Merida does not HAVE to be aro/ace (or lesbian) to not want to be forced into marriage with a stranger at the age of 16 (in fact she specially says "I'm not ready" and "not yet"). But regardless, aspects of her story are still really relatable to us and applicable to living in amatonormative society.

Mako and/or Raleigh do not NEED to be aspec for this glorious refreshing no-romo moment to happen (nor does one need to be aspec to appreciate it)

And maybe claiming them as aro/ace could even undercut the power of this platonic bond (like saying the only way they could not be interested in each other is if they are not interested in anyone (same if you said they are gay, as if that's the only possible way for a man and woman not to be attracted to each other)). But it's still a moment lots of us aspecs love because platonic relationships AND aro/ace characters do go hand in hand and BOTH are so rarely portrayed in media.

So these ideas also play into my preferences, and I want to acknowledge that my headcanons don't have to be definitive (which like I know that is normal amongst fandom culture anyway) but are more about pointing out aspects we can see ourselves in and relate to, especially in a media landscape that is so lacking in representation and understanding of our identities.

[alaynestone]

You don’t have to post this if you don’t want. I just wanted to say I was one of those curious, openminded fans willing to entertain the idea of samjohn (mostly bc deanjohn feels so congruent with canon + there’s so much interesting meta on it that managed to convert me + incestuous households usually affect all of it’s members) but just like you said I was immediately put off by the blatant character assassination that pervades everything from fics to edits to the propaganda in that incest poll lmao.

I guess that’s the major difference - deanjohn requires little to no stretching of imagination bc it already fits seamlessly into canon, whereas samjohn almost demands ooc shenanigans to work.

I also just found the way fans talk about it nauseating for some reason, though that’s likely more of a reflection of my own personal triggers. I love digesting incest narratives, but the fetishistic angle of that blog really makes my stomach turn. That’s not a moral judgement on anyone else’s enjoyment btw! Just another reason why this ship didn’t resonate with me.

thank you for sending me this. it's clear that a lot of people feel the same way.

when i first joined fandom, the few j/s fics were straightforward evil!john non-con. not my thing, but i understood why it was written that way. then came the inexplicably popular fandom creation of "sexkitten sam" which continues to pollute the entire sam/dean fandom and of course extends to other ships too. i'm not even gonna get started on why that's "problematic" because that's not the point, it's not remotely in character. even as an exaggeration sam is not the kind of person to attempt to find agency in outward submission or objectification. he's very vocally not compromising his identity to please his family and especially john. dean is more like that so when you have sam acting like a fetishized pinterest aesthetic moodboard version of dean and dean acting like an old man from wattpad i'm understandably left squinting at the screen. then it's genderswapping sam and using that as a personality eraser because women are automatically submissive and naive and trad?

who is being converted by all this when it has nothing to do with sam, john or even dean? where is dean in all this actually? a core aspect of their family is that dean is closest to both sam and john who rarely had much opportunity to bond without him. there was a distance between sam and john throughout sam's childhood and adolescence. most of his parental needs were being fulfilled by dean even if that was never enough. their situation with their father wasn't the average one where they were simply 2 kids fighting for his attention.

for the most part j/s appears to be about "envying" dean's position in the family. it's about diminishing or straight up erasing dean and more notably about feminizing sam. either directly or otherwise. people generally seem to have big issues with the fact that sam is a man and confidently so. most of the annoying tropes in wincest fandom have this at their core. and of course in order for sam to be "the woman" dean needs to genuinely and authentically be the most stereotypical of cishet men. it's very transparent because right from the start the show poked holes at dean's performance of masculinity. it was very much the point. dean's gender issues could fill a book yet any alternative interpretation of sam and gender seeks to cast dean as the oppressive bigot who would never get it? stopping here before i get off topic but to make myself clear: in theory i respect headcanons i don't understand, but not when they spitefully exist to deny dean's depth in every possible way.

to return to my point about dean's pseudo spouse and mother position being enviable, it misses the point of how harmful john's parenting was to both of them. it's no coincidence that they both view themselves as the unfavorite. dean believes he's taken for granted, only valued for what he can give, how well he can perform his roles, how successfully he could play at being an adult even before he hit double digits. dean can't just exist and be himself while sam is uncompromisingly himself. because of that he believes john doesn't like him, never liked him, rejected him, didn't have time for him, didn't trust him enough with the family secrets, even when those secrets directly concerned him. as of season 1 he still has contempt for dean for what he views as unquestioning obedience to john and letting himself be molded by john. dean had to fight for every scrap of approval and affection and sam refused to do the same if it meant sacrificing his own needs and identity. not everyone reacts to abuse the same way and both characters are very much shaped by their different reactions to their environment. and any j/s shipper argument that is built on the idea that sam was the one john loved more is not only gleefully mocking dean's parentification but ignoring that sam being comparatively sheltered and treated like a son is yet another reason why john would not cross such a line with him. dean "gets it", dean lost mary too, dean is his partner and his confidant, dean can handle adult responsibilities, dean is loving and supportive, dean isn't making him confront his parenting failures, dean can't say no to him. like you said, it doesn't at all stretch the imagination to make j/d fit into dean's backstory. "you are not a child" - "i never was".

as i have been saying, any remotely ic exploration of j/s would have to follow both j/d and s/d. i can't believe in a universe where j/s is the only incest that happens in the family. i think a theoretical plausible j/s fic would have to not only accept but embrace its adjacency to the 2 ships that are compliant with the canon. but whether sam knows for a fact about j/d or not, there's no way he isn't severely impacted by the proximity to that relationship in a number of ways and that's a very compelling dynamic in its own right.

tldr i agree with you anon. people can read and write whatever they want but there's a big difference between incest subtext that is believable and just saying things in a way that's meant to provoke.

[spider-xan]

Thinking about this excellent post by @hawkogurl about the Coney Island scene in Insomniac MSM2 and how Peter, Harry, and MJ each symbolize a different connection to and perspective of childhood, and specifically the part about how this version of Harry works better as a symbol than a fully rounded character if the writing wasn't going to commit to the latter - and I completely agree, and I don't think that's a bad thing either bc sometimes, a character does work better as just a narrative device to explore themes than being a character in their own right, if not both.

But it got me thinking again, and these are preliminary thoughts, about how I think that plays into the way the ending of the game where Harry lives instead of dying like he was originally going to in the early script outline feels off from a narrative perspective - I've already discussed how Norman's rage and revenge feels more convoluted in that context than simply wanting revenge for the Spider-Men allegedly killing his son (though Peter does very much kill Harry in the actual game, and it's frustrating people act like he didn't bc in erasing that, it weakens all three of Harry, Peter, and Miles' characters and storylines), and I understand not killing off Harry bc it's too bleak and repetitive when the first game already ended with Peter having to make a choice that leads to the death of a loved one, but if Harry does indeed symbolize childhood and how you can never return to that time, then him surviving ends up symbolizing Peter being unable to let go and move on from his past, which is an odd direction that feels kind of regressive and in opposition to his symbolic coming of age when Aunt May died last time.

And don't get me wrong - I like this version of Harry a lot, despite my writing and narrative issues, and from a character perspective, I'm glad he lived and am interested in seeing what happens with him in the next game, but from a narrative perspective, it doesn't feel right in terms of progressing Peter's character in a symbolic way; at the same time, and I have written about this before, I get that Insomniac wrote themselves into a corner after ending the first game with a major death, so there were reasons why they had to go with the ending they did and I can't really fault them for that.

[logicmaru]

i love how ranmaru kageyama is doomed by the narrative from the very fucking beginning and i hope his minisode is even more miserable.

warning i'm gonna talk a lot. ranmaru is very blatantly described as a boring guy, who's underneath the average height for guys, doesn't have any notable likes or dislikes, unless you count his hatred for happy couples + people who are happy in general, which ngl comes into play later

i'm gonna try and explain this as simply as i can bc if i try to word it like an essay i'll confuse myself aha,,,,

it kind of shows us that ranmaru can get jealous pretty easily? and he's upset at the kind of trust keiji and sara share, even though he probably knows that's because they've known each other longer than sara's known ranmaru, but it probably still pisses ranmaru off idk

he wants to prove himself to sara, even though sara already sees him as something alike to an ally, but he wants something more than that. in the logic sara deleted scene, ranmaru states that he would want to be sara's best friend, and he admits how wants to go home with her and laugh casually over jokes together and treat life like nothing's wrong

i like to believe this was deleted because it would be ooc for ranmaru, that he would probably be very reluctant of sharing such an ideal with sara, and him suddenly spilling about wanting to be sara's friend in one moment would probably cause more shock factor, and not do much good for the lore, idk it just seems very "ah omg" and less "how interesting"

i really love how ranmaru is. not a good person. i know how strange that sounds, but ranmaru is, kind of, in a way, a support character for sara. And u would think, well support character, must be someone kindhearted and encouraging, right? well, in ranmaru's case, yes, but no?? he's more like "i will go to lengths for your survival, you NEED to win" instead of "you got this! i'll help you escape!" and it's somewhat refreshing? i'm not sure maybe i'm just not normal

anyway enough about evil ranmaru, emotion ranmaru is just very Sad, and again, doomed by the narrative

he doesn't get any kind of character development iirc, in the infamous ransara "win for me" scene, he just talks about how he knew this was going to be a bad idea, and how he has no right to be sara's friend, but from that point on, we don't get any remarkable moment where ranmaru gets some sort of character redemption, and instead we get a moment where ranmaru AGAIN goes through with some sort of wild plan to make sure sara escapes, which is erasing his personality / replacing it with the joe ai's personality.

gosh, if ur friends with me, u probably know how i love and hate this part of the game, mostly because of how interesting it is and how it could've fleshed out into a whole other issue, but i dislike how it's totally overshadowed by both the fandom and the game itself

sara herself doesn't seem to react too strongly by ranmaru's choice to erase himself to become a "vessel" for joe's personality, which really i'd love to explain but honestly idk,,, i definitely thought there'd be a bigger deal about it, but perhaps it was overruled since the modified maple boss fight was literally like,, moments after that

in emotion route, ranmaru shares little to no information with anyone, though he does come close when he tries to tell sara, which he does successfully tell sara about the asunaro human in the group, but i believe that is the only moment where ranmaru goes "sara, hold on" and actually tells sara about what he was actually going to say, which, on one hand, had me on the edge of my seat, but on the other hand, was nice to see since it was really showing how untrusting and reserved ranmaru is, no matter how much he trusts sara, he's not entirely sure if she trusts him in return, or if he trusts sara to not share this information with anyone else

i love ranmaru kageyama

[tonydaddingham]

i won't go so far as to say they annoy me, because everyone has their own opinions, but i just CANNOT agree with any takes saying that their entire relationship has been dysfunctional or built on solely on false premises or etc. anything else in that vein. i know we've been dissecting the issues a lot to explain the breakup, but i'm going to go out on a limb and say that as a whole there's way more love than problems and there's way more good than bad. and that doesn't erase the problems or the bad or make them any less in need of fixing, i'm just saying overall the love in their relationship and the good parts of it definitely win out. plus, PLEASE cut them a bit of slack for the constraints the Heaven&Hell rigmarole put on their relationship. and i don't mean in a trauma way, i mean in a physical threat, having to do everything secretly kinda way.

further asks and response under the cut:

hi anon!!!✨ okay won't lie, the first ask made my blood pressure rocket through the ceiling 😅 but you're good, thanks for coming back to clarify, i really appreciate it - bc tbh idk if i would have had the acuity to have answered this today otherwise!!!✨

i hear you - speaking more personally for a sec (i will actually address what you're saying in a mo!), i hope you don't mind, it is slightly exhausting when some read my ask responses or metas, and genuinely believe that im purposefully trying to find negativity in the story or the characters, especially crowley. im not at all; i truly just find the dozens of layers to them both (and the storyline - the ethics, philosophy, psychology!) really, really interesting, and i find it fun to examine. i don't take any joy in pointing out flaws or dysfunctions for the sake of it, but more that, for me, it makes the whole relationship so much more relatable, and compelling. here are two creatures that are literally as non-human as it can get, and they're making mistakes, or miscommunicating, or have 'issues' the same as a lot of us do? that's really comforting to me - to look at two characters that i treasure acutely, and be able to recognise the ways in which they're not perfect. their story, in that respect, suddenly doesn't feel inaccessible.

but braindump-that-you-didnt-ask-for over!!!✨

i agree that their relationship is ultimately rooted in love. i think that that love has taken in many incarnations over the course of their narrative, emerging from general attraction/fascination, to acquaintances, to uniquely-relatable-to-each-other-and-only-each-other colleagues, to friends, to best friends, to deeply-pining crushes, to being unrequited love interests, to being full-throttle in love with each other, to being each other's family and sanctuary... all of these at the same time, and some evolving and merging into others. i don't personally hold the belief that romantic love has been there since the beginning (but fully respect where people do see it that way!) but romantic love isn't the only love that aziraphale and crowley are built on.

there have been problems and misunderstandings amongst all of that, times where they possibly don't know each other as much as they like to think they do, where they've not been kind or gentle to each other, but that doesn't mean that none of it isn't all interwoven, in every fibre, with love (whatever form that takes). they may not be human, but they are navigating something uniquely human, and that isn't always going to be perfect.

add to that, just as you say, the literal threat that hangs over both of them where they're not allowed to acknowledge a single part of any of the above; to do so not only puts themselves at risk, but the other at risk moreso. that fear - that sword of damocles, as others way more poetically-minded than me have put it - is borne out of love, of concern, of respect, and friendship. it's not a question, again as you say (because i wholeheartedly agree with you!), of one loving the other more than the vice versa, and one always having to bend to the other until they break whilst the other doesn't get a look-in. the way i see it, sometimes you do have to bend to each other in relationships, friendships etc., but that's a mark of trust, respect, and love in and of itself; that you can feel that you can look to the other for support when you need it, feel comfortable in being vulnerable enough to do so, and be so deeply loved in return as to be the one to support when the other needs it themselves.

there are times in the narrative where one lets the other down, or hurts them, sure - but that doesn't mean that that's the nail in the coffin. it's not going to ruin them, or end them, or drive them apart irrevocably; it's causing/caused issues that they simply need to work to mend... and tbh, they're probably not even aware that some of those cracks are there! once again, i think it's fair to say that this happens in most relationships, and usually - usually - most problems such as the more human-like ones they're facing now (especially the ones borne out of wanting to protect one another!) are fixable with patience, communication, kindness, time, and continuous love!

i do think s3 is really going to upend this, though, and put it to that aforementioned breaking point; i think there is going to be stuff revealed which leaves each other completely bare for the other to see - no secrets, no smokescreen, no glamour - and prove to be the true test of that love. but let's face it (because it will happen); they will choose to love each other anyway. perhaps even because of what s3 will reveal. i don't think ive ever seen their love for each other as unconditional - like i said, i think such a 'condition'/test will be put to them both in s3 and turn their view of each other on its head - but their love for each other in, all its guise, is strong, deep, and profound enough that it will be what they choose every time✨

if you would like to come back off anon, that is entirely up to you and i'll leave that for you to decide - or message privately? - i don't mind!!! but again thank you for clarifying the tone, i find tone hard to read sometimes and i appreciate the follow-up asks!!!💕

[rollercoasterwords]

why are you invalidating people’s real concerns in this fandom? you’re naive if you think that “the fandom” doesn’t have opinions they all agree with that become popular. sure people have their own opinions, but honestly that’s very rare and not seen. you and i both could list popular headcanons in the fandom that people mostly take as canon. remus and sirius have turned into a straight couple, especially with the headcanon that sirius is now a girl. as a woman myself i love sirius as a girl but i hate how the fandom treats feminine sirius. sirius doesn’t have any depth anymore besides being remus’ love interest and sirius is always in the wrong and sirius is always the bad guy - just like society always blames women for everything and men always get a pass. literally look at the fanart. remus’ disabilities have been completely erased. remus is drawn as this huge super manly guy towering over little dainty feminine sirius. in fanfics remus is verbally abusive to sirius bc oh he’s a man and has anger issues. remus is a slut who everyone was in love with but eventually settles down with sirius. these are all stereotypes. idk why you’re trying to tell people this isn’t a thing in the fandom when it literally is.

assuming this is about the two anons i responded to two days ago, one of which was saying they did not like my particular characterization of r+s in a fic and asking me to rewrite it and the other of which was responding to it. both of my responses were focused around saying that my characterization didn't even fit the dynamic being complained about and saying the terms in which that complaint was being stated were odd in the first place (assuming one character being shorter than another automatically makes them feminine, calling a gay relationship heteronormative, asking to making a non-canon-compliant fic more canon compliant, etc). if someone has a real concern with my specific fic that is not premised in gender essentialism then i have yet to hear it; otherwise, i'm not sure how you want me to "validate" that concern unless you are also asking me to rewrite my fic. in which case, the answer is still no lol

and i genuinely do not think "the fandom" is monolith in which everyone agrees on everything; calling me naive is not going to change my mind. i agree that there are popular hcs, sure, but even those are not monolithic in their application and can be filtered and avoided--i know this because there are many popular hcs that i filter and avoid to the point that they are virtually nonexistent in my fandom space. i suggest others do the same with hcs they dislike because i genuinely think that's the best way to approach fandom: curate your space for your own peace of mind.

your experiences with fandom are not singular and are not representative of everyone's. from where i'm sitting, writing sirius as a girl is not a super popular hc--i've seen the hc from time to time, but overwhelmingly i've seen it in the context of r/s femslash, not people writing them as a straight couple. and even then, i still mostly see r/s written as gay men in the vast majority of fics i read and like...posts the people i follow make on tumblr.com. i don't use other platforms to interact w marauders content nor do i stray outside my small circle of mutuals' posts, so if this is some mega-popular hc elsewhere i am simply unaware. from the actual fics posted on ao3, though, gay r/s still seems to be dominating the wolfstar fandom. and to then say that sirius has no personality past being a love interest and always being blamed for everything--again, this is genuinely not something i see. i have never read a fic where sirius is a one dimensional love interest or where it's just sirius-bashing; i'm sure they exist out there somewhere, but i have not found them to make up a majority. maybe i've gotten lucky and miraculously managed to avoid the numerous fanfics where sirius is this caricature you're describing, but personally i think it's more likely that this is an extreme representation of the way people write the character. if you'd like to send me some of the many fics where this is happening to illustrate what you mean, though, feel free.

remus's canonical disability is lycanthropy. that has not been erased in any of the fics i've read that are set in the magical universe. in every non-magical au i've read, he has been written as a disabled character as well. there are plenty of people in this fandom who are not erasing disability as an aspect of his character. if you're not able to find those fics i would be happy to recommend some, and i'm sure others would as well.

i have not seen the fanart you're referring to where remus is drawn as a super manly guy towering over dainty feminine sirius. i'm sure it exists out there, but most of the fanart i personally see doesn't portray them that way--it is definitely not the only way these characters are drawn.

none of the fanfics i've read have had anything that i would characterize as verbal abuse between remus and sirius. nor have they had remus as "a slut," (not crazy about your tone here, tbh) though he is sexually active in some fics i've read with people other than sirius. personally i don't mind characterizations where the two have had or do have sex with other people before getting together. in fact, i prefer it to fics where they only ever sleep with each other, as it more accurately reflects my own experiences w the world (ie, most people are not virgins until "settling down" with one person etc).

all of the things you're describing here can be stereotypes, sure. but i personally have not seen an overwhelming number of fics characterizing r + s this way. i'm not saying it doesn't exist; i'm saying that i have curated my own space to avoid any such one-dimensional portrayals and encouraging others to do the same, because there are tons of people who are not writing the characters this way. "the fandom" is not a monolith, and if you feel like there are certain hcs that are super popular it's possible you've become stuck in a feedback loop where you're seeing them over and over again when in other parts of the fandom they are virtually nonexistent (case in point: i was blissfully unaware of all of this discourse until i started getting these asks). personally, i find it more useful to just block and unfollow people who are posting stuff i don't like, because i don't really see a way to try and police what people are or aren't allowed to write about when it comes to gender in fanfic that doesn't eventually devolve back into gender essentialism. if the concern is that you're noticing what appears to be a certain standard of femininity or masculinity elevated over others, then i personally find it more helpful to have conversations breaking down gender roles + gender essentialism more broadly (as opposed to sending people anonymous messages about how everyone is writing sirius too feminine and remus too masculine), which is something i already do pretty frequently on my blog.

this is the only ask about this whole discourse i'm going to answer; any complaints that "the fandom" as a whole is doing something are not something i'm interested in entertaining because the fandom isn't a monolith and 90% of the time the complaint in question is not even something i'm seeing based on how i've curated my space. i really don't know what to tell you beyond that--if there are things bothering you about what you're seeing in your fandom spaces, coming into my askbox is not going to fix it and will most likely just end with me blocking you, because i have better things to do with my time than deal with other people's discourse.

[donnapalude]

it's bad enough that anyone enjoying consuming or creating content about csa gets immediately flagged as 'suspicious' and basically considered a predator until proven innocent, but i see more and more people becoming strangely wary also about content that depicts sexual relationships between teenagers? it's subtle bc -while there are explicit voices against it- a lot of them don't state outright that there is anything wrong with it. but i have noticed a definite increase in distancing from these materials also through the cover of more 'neutral' justifications like "oh i am just not interested in that" "oh it's just that teenagers are boring" to the point of taking canon characters and aging them up in fanfictions in order not to be caught committing the mortal sin of sexualising a pre-pubescent/ pubescent body. and while i care comparatively more about csa having a space in media, these are clearly not separate issues just different facets of the same problem. which is the inability to understand that art sometimes is a deliberate thought experiment in representing a point of view not necessarily reflecting your own to explore a specific idea. i am not attracted to teenagers now but i can promise you i remember in detail how it was having a crush at 13 or 16. what i thought and felt seeing the naked bodies of girls i loved back then and wanting to touch them and kiss them is not something that got magically erased from my mind just because i grew up. i don't think there's anything inherently suspicious in having a fixation with the exploration of sexuality in that period of your life, even in explicit graphic details. it can serve a number of narrative purposes. it honestly baffles me that we've come to the point where this risks being a divisive statement.

[horizon-verizon]

At least, Cersei is the one to refuse to go public with their incestous relationship and isn’t out there proposing to marry Myrcella to Tommen, unlike Saint Jaime who call his sister ‘queen of whores’, treat her as his property, and victim-blame her (I tell you, he [Robert] loves me not/And whose fault is that, sweet sister ?), and never spare a thought for Tysha (or Bran for that matter), but thats normal, its because he’s a feminist and teenage girl-coded. No wonder he has some sympathy for Criston Cole, lmao. Do people genuinely believes Jaime is a victim of patriarchy and that his gender doesn’t favor him over Cersei ?? Insane. Can’t wait for him to die. It’s 2023, Jaime isn’t Adam and Cersei isn’t Eve, dude is a misogynistic, racist and hyperprivileged white man and his father’s golden boy. Funny how you all talk like Green/Criston’s stans when it comes to Cersei and Jaime.

*EDITED POST* (9/21/23)

Probably from this recent post that itself has 3 links to other posts where I talk about Cersei as a character.

Um...when did I ever either imply or directly say that Jaime was "a victim of patriarchy and that his gender doesn’t favor him over Cersei"? Or express that he was better than his sister, morally? Or express that Cersei deserved to die more than he did?

Perhaps you have that impression because I never talked about Jaime exclusively once, or you're just going off of what you recently read and horribly misinterpreted the purpose and argument of that post. If the latter, I advise you to reread. If the first, I don't write about Jaime much simply because he doesn't interest me as much as Cersei or Tyrion, no one asked me my thoughts about him, and I'm not thinking of him apart from his relationship with Cersei or Tyrion. His knighthood and masculinity are...not "easy", but direct enough for me to not dwell as much as his other siblings' issues. (look to this post by blankwhiteshield about Jaime) I generally care more about women, children, and other marginalized people in fiction, even when I do sympathize with some white cis straight men some of the time.

I mean pre-Brienne Jaime. That's just how GRRm wrote his arc.

For me, blankwhiteshield's posts about Jaime HERE and HERE both suffice to give me a picture of who Jaime is bc they fill in some blanks I had in my pre-existing assessment of Jaime. Which actually wasn't favorable, anon. I find Jaime to actually be very annoying, and no, I do not think that he is Cersei's victim. He is deluded in some ways as much as her and is not a good person because of the abuse and emotional neglect they all get from Tywin/Westerosi society. I actually should have, since again, there were blanks. You can take a look at those links as well.

Look, Cersei is evil & abusive AS WELL AS a victim of domestic abuse woman & of misogyny since childhood. These are not mutually exclusive nor does it NOT mean that her domestic abuse only and directly caused her power-hungriness and need to control if not every, most aspect of her life and those she sees will help her get or maintain control and a good image of herself. Neither the abuse nor misogyny against her erases the fact that she develops hatred towards women, going so far as to violently and sexually objectify them like w/Taena. (Her using what she's observed men do to affirm power and copying it). Or that she pinched her baby brother's penis at a very young age, showing her classist and blase willingness to target children/one of the most vulnerable groups for her own sense of control over her husband, family, etc., and political power. She is also very willing to sacrifice/risk the entire city for her own control of power, similar to Aerys II. Cersei is complicated and there is nuance to her character, but she is unmistakably evil simultaneously. What I like about her or what I find compelling about her (if you haven't read the post about it) is that I can understand her motivations, and relate in some ways, and from practically babyhood she's been trying to be essentially "good enough" and perfect through external, social values of competency BUT also as someone has said: her need for perfection and power and total love comes across as pure in its own sort of twisted way. Her emotions are so intense and uncontrolled and she remains totally unaware of her loneliness that she comes across as childlike.

I also find it very funny how you're criticizing show!Rhaenyra for wanting to marry Jace to Helaena (I presume, you don't specify but that is the closest betrothal to the one you make b/t Myrcella and Tommen) when you say: "At least, Cersei is the one to refuse to go public with their incestous relationship and isn’t out there proposing to marry Myrcella to Tommen". Because while this would have done nothing to assuage Alicent--which was what Rhaenyra was trying to do--it was also not that bad of a deal for Helaena or Jace themselves. I personally dislike it bc, again, we're erasing Rhaenyra's relationship w/Laena and how she ever made it so that Jace married Laena's daughter...but I digress. OR you probably were referring to Jaime expressing the desire to go public with their relationship, that conversation? Again, what does this have to do with my argument in the post I recently posted and that I assume you're responding to?

[brw]

If you don't mind me asking, what do you think of cerebro podcast episode about Hank?

Hi! It's been a while since I listened to it so some of my recollections may be off but I think for the most part I didn't find it too offensive? I think it felt disingenuous to me to write a character study of Hank without taking into account his non X-Men appearances because they are so big and give a very different perspective on the character but other than that it was okay, and I found the guest interesting. But yeah, I don't think it should be taken as an actual study of Hank if Hank's big appearances in Avengers and Defenders and New Avengers aren't taken into account because those comics are really quite important to him? Just a weird decision to do an episode on Hank if you're determined to not read those core characteristion issues because you have a weird loyalist issue.

Anyway, the things I remember agreeing heavily about was stuff regarding Charles, I remember feeling that that was an interesting perspective that despite Hank being the first to leave Charles and to be independent, he hasn't really had the big breakaway from Charles' politics the other members of the O5 have had and from that perspective is probably his favoured student as the one most likely to agree with him socially and politically, which obviously is going to be in tension with the fact that he could never REALLY be Charles' favourite student because he's visibly a mutant and as we all know Charles seems to project his own issues with being visibly disabled onto visible mutants. But I also felt it should have been stressed more that Hank was literally separated from what was a loving family by Charles. Like he wiped their memories of him despite the fact that they had been loving and caring to him up til then and he had various positive relationships with his schoolmates also erased. I definitely think if we're going to talk about Hank being the most loyal to Charles ideologically it should also be stressed part of that is because Hank was literally separated from his family and peers by Charles.

I think however the way it was stated that Hank's characterisation made the most sense in IvX annoying and I think the way there was clearly a feeling that Hank was a betrayer for being a mutant was really dumb bc like . idk I just dislike when people take things so literally in universe when the real answer is literally just that they needed some use for the X-Men now that that comic had ended and Hank just so happened to be picked up by the Avengers while Bobby and Warren ended up as Champions and Scott and Jean stayed when the series was brought back. it's literally not that deep and mutants aren't real and he was literally healthier better and happier as a person when he was with them 🤷 also if you're doing a character study on Hank and you come away with "he's the straightest xman" you're doing the character study wrong.

[djemsostylist]

What went wrong...continued

bc apparently tumblr has a character limit

4. The characters--The problem with the characters is, well, everything. The issue is that the show itself operates like most terribly written things--it makes no sense, and their entire "be kind" mantra falls apart when it only seems to apply to the people they like. Regina/The Evil Queen is a terrible person. Not in a regular "ug she's mean" sort of way, but in a "she committed mass murders over a series of years, tortured people, stole 28 years of life, and continued to murder and destroy" and yet she is worthy of redemption. The Wicked Witch literally murdered a women and r*ped her husband, but she deserves redemption. Rumple has been emotionally abusing Belle for the entirety of their relationship and murdered his ex wife for leaving him, but he deserves redemption. But those people get to be redeemed and forgiven over and over again, where characters like Cruella or Hades or even the Snow Queen have to die. It's an interesting sort of morality that seems to be entirely predicated on family or love--Hook is fine because Emma loves him, Cruella is not because no one loves her. The Wicked Witch is fine because Regina is her sister, Hades is not because he is not of any relation. Look I grew up with Luke Skywalker trying to redeem Darth Vader, I'm hardly averse to the idea of heroes trying to redeem their loved ones. I also grew up in a world where Darth Vader died, because you can't always have both. Regina being redeemed is a stretch, but I think there's a world where you make it work--but there is a morality there that you have to then be super aware of with every villain, or it makes our heroes look...well, not so heroic. It makes it confusing, too, especially when you have Snow kill Cora (an arguably horrible person and abuser) and everyone is worried about it blackening her heart, but then Emma kills Cruella (who is a murderer yes, but also arguably deeply mentally ill) and everyone is just like, "well Emma you did what you had to do". Even Hook--he's a murderer by necessity of storyline, but a murderer none the less, and his redemption is a foregone conclusion the moment he and Emma make-out, but for others it's a toss up. Ursula gets a pass bc Hook and Triton were mean to her (although it's unclear what her villainous deeds were), and Maleficent sort of gets forgotten. The Snow Queen just erased some memories and trapped people, but she has to kill herself for the heroes. The issue is that nothing is consistent, which makes it hard to root for our heroes when all you have to be is family to be forgiven. Additionally, they never deal with the fall out of the redemptions--sure the Charmings forgive the Evil Queen, but we've got an entire country/community whos lives she ruined. Robin Hood lost his wife because of her, but he's like "well I guess you're different now". Where is the angst that comes from actually having to confront the impact your cruelty had on others? This show talks about happy endings, but it does nothing to make them work other than saying "oops, my bad, I did it because I thought it was right." Hell, Regina's mother gets accepted into OUAT Heaven bc she was like "my bad" despite all her evil cruelty, murdering, and abuse, but then poor Jekyll gets eternally damned for a single fuck up and the heroes are like "shrug".

5. The Plot--OUAT, like most network shows that are not serialized, runs in the issue of not knowing what the fuck to do once they finish the first season long arc. And, like most other terribly written network shows, they solve the problem by just doing the same thing over and over and over, in increasingly annoying ways. By the time the show closes, we have seen the same scenes about 1000 times. Snow running away in the Enchanted Forest and Regina being mean to villagers. Hook on the Jolly Roger saying pirate things and also meeting everyone somehow despite never having met anyone. Emma saying "I don't think I can do this." Henry saying "You gotta believe." Regina saying "Oh right, I'm the Evil Queen." There's a revolving door of side characters we are forced to spend endless of embarrassing moments with until they are written off or simply dropped and forgotten. There's entire seasons worth of boring storylines we endure that go literally no where. Lily is Malificent's daughter, and then she like shows up, and we have to endure endless flashbacks of them as kids, only for her present adult self to have literally 0 impact on the storyline. And every time we get a new Disney character introduced, somehow we have to have a flashback to one of our mains knowing them somehow. It's exhausting. And the McGuffins are endless. ENDLESS. This season has a wand, a crystal, a goblet, a coin, a rock, a heart, a phial...you name it, we've dealt with it. It's a neverending series of "time to defeat x evil with y mcguffin while we relieve the same character arcs from 3 seasons ago." Emma is Closed Off and Unsure, Hook is Wanting Revenge but also Wanting Love, Henry is a Believer, Snow Never Gives Up, Charming Will Always Find His Family, Rumple Is a Dark Man Who Likes Darkness, Regina Is An Evil Queen Who Can Never Find Happiness--the plots NEVER change. By the time season 6 rolled around, I'd seen the same arcs play out 100 times. Henry at 14 (lol that they expected us to believe that) still playing "Operation ______" is ridiculous. He's not 10 anymore. The story doesn't let the characters breathe and grow, it doesn't explore who they are as people. They change if the plot needs them too--sometimes Hook is a pirate who stole gold, sometimes he's a random highway robber who murders people. Sometime Snow and Charming always believe in Good, sometimes they steal a baby to be filled with Darkness. You just never know.

So. i decided on 5 instead because this getting long and I could go on forever. My point is that OUAT was BAD. Awful, terrible, no good. BUT it could have been good. It had potential, if only they had thought, just a little bit. Which leads me to...

The Changes, Part 1

[rappaccini]

There's just so much wrong with gwiles as a pairing, yeah it sucked in the comics but the movies aren't much better despite what the fans try and tell you. It's lowkey forced. Why does gwen have to be shoved back in the box of being Spiderman's love interest and why is Miles not getting his own original stories? Like there's so much to Unpack

Like one thing the movies did is completely erase the characters who are important to their respective stories? Gwens important relationships such as the maryjanes (mj especially cause hello they have so much going on), cindy, HARRY, they completely erased Harry from the story all together, are non existent. Miles's friends from the comics, Ganke, his best friend is practically a stranger, Barbara, Tiana. He also has a bunch of other superhero friends. But they had to erase them in order to push the whole "isolation from everybody but each other" thing which is gross but...sacrifice important key characters for the sake of their precious ship I guess! I just hate it!

hm i've got mixed feelings about this.

there's only so long a movie runtime can be, and given how packed atsv was, there's a limited amount of time that could've been spent on miles and gwen's social circles. gwen especially because this is still Miles's Movie. it's a movie, not an ongoing comic, so you have to condense a lot to stay efficient. and since the point of this trilogy is to be about the spiderverse and explore lots of different universes (you can't make movie one all about the spiderverse and say 'no more of that!' in movie two; once itsv was decided, it was a given that atsv and btsv would have to be multiverse movies too), the tradeoff is we only have so much time to spend in each.

and fwiw, i think gwen and miles having trouble relating to other kids and closing themselves off makes sense. they're two teenagers who've been through trauma that they think kids their age can't relate to. it's true to character for them to withdraw, and vital to the plot, so those vulnerabilities can be preyed on by the spider society.

but. there are some differences in the ways their supporting casts were cut down in the movie.

for gwen,

idk which cindy you're referring to so i'll touch on both: earth-65 cindy moon not being in gwen's backstory i'm fine with, bc that'd require diving deep into how gwen got her powers and We Don't Have Time For That. we also don't need it either, because the source of gwen's powers is irrelevant to her plotline. it gets a pass.

earth-616 cindy moon, aka the superhero gwen is friends with, being cut, is a mixed bag. it's not fucking great that gwen has no female friends anymore. it would've been so easy to swap pav out with a female hero who could've served the same purpose in the narrative.

the loss of harry osborn though, is a problem. cutting him out of gwen's backstory scrubs out the incel aspect of peter's character, which in turn removes gwen's emotional baggage about being in a relationship. removing him also gets rid of a romantic rival for miles, and the obvious path through which gwen gets her symbiote (which i bring up because gwen's comics have a whole meta subplot where a writer stand-in is angry that she's venomized because it would make her unattractive to miles. gwen not having her symbiote, and therefore her actual powerset, keeps her appealing and makes sure she can't outshine miles in a fight scene).

as for the mary janes.... gwen being cold and hostile to them at this point is true to the comics (as a result of grief and guilt, since peter was their friend too, and she was directly responsible for his death) and makes sense. a teenage girl dealing with a serious loss she can't tell people about is going to withdraw and be snappish.

em jay having a small role works for that point in gwen's arc. plus her and gwen's friendship is a rollercoaster so they didn't actually have to change anything about their dynamic.

gwen not being friends with the girls outside the band is the issue. gwen's end monologue pretty much confirms she doesn't see the mary janes as friends or feel like she could ever belong with them, and that she needs a new band that Does Understand Her. like, the shift in gwen's preference is from 'all-female band made up of alternate versions of peter's various girlfriends, who in this world get to be gay with each other and bond without a guy motivating them at all' to 'band that's almost entirely dudes and two-girls-who-are-only-here-for-a-boy, that gwen only forms for a male love interest'...

the vibe's that gwen gave up on being her own person and finding companionship with other girls and women, crawled back into the male gaze, and is relying entirely on that to give her validation. thanks i fucking hate it!

as for miles,

ganke being built up as his best friend who knows his secret at the end of itsv and then proceeding to do... nothing in atsv is just odd (like, at least bring him to the party so he can cover for you while you're stuck on the train with the cakes?). i guess there's a chance he could factor into btsv given that the spot's fucking his world up and he knows his roommate's said villain's nemesis, but who knows. either way, yeah. ganke feels underutilized so far.

however the exclusion of his superpowered friends, the champions especially, makes sense. if the central theme of this story is that miles feels lonely in his own world and wants to find other superhumans, if he has an entire team of superhumans at home, he has no need to seek out the spider society. therefore, his friends can't be here or we have to totally rework the plot.

the same applies for barbara. there's little time to spend in miles's world before he jumps universes, so she wouldn't have much of a presence, and the story's stronger if she isn't around so his isolation is consistent.

also in terms of timing, it took 5ish years to make atsv. the script was probably completed before tiana toomes was even created. she's a very new character. (just look at how gwen's still calling herself spider-woman in the movie, when she's been ghost-spider in the comics for four-ish years; there's a creative lag). so leaving tiana out gets a pass from me because the writers can't time travel or see the future.

[spiderverse miles could still have a unique love interest, but to keep the story consistent and efficient, she'd have to be a fellow spider-hero. margo kess is easily the best option here. i doubt she'll be more than a bit player in btsv, but my tinfoil hat fever dream is that she's miles's mj and that's why their spider-senses went nuts around each other.]

so the difference i'm seeing is that gwen's supporting cast was gutted to make her dependent on a romance with miles, while miles's was gutted to make him ready to engage with the plot as a whole. gwen's a part of that, but even if she weren't around, he'd still be longing to reunite with peter and find a team of heroes to join.