#don't even get me started on how much stuff is off model in this comic

[drill-teeth-art]

A late night, slight retrospective on the tiny amount of Tumblr fame I've gathered that also might be slightly annoying for my audience to read so feel free to skip it if you want.

I started sharing Transformers fanart on here back in 2022, around October. I had been posting art on here for a while before actually but people really started following me and asking about my work and actually reblogging my stuff when I started posting Transformers fanart in 2022. I was in a really low place then, and I really welcomed the attention. My art was and still is something I take a lot of pride in. It's my own. There's quite a few years of my life where the fact I could still draw was the only thing stopping me from attempting suicide. It's something that has always meant a lot to me, so the attention on one of the only things I really liked about myself was nice. It was nice for a while.

But I've gotta say the slight Tumblr fame (and I do mean slight, I've only got around 3k followers which is a lot of people and more than I ever thought I'd have following me and more than a lot of folks will ever have but not like A Ton Of Fame) has wreaked havoc on my mental health. Which is already pretty rough as is. Suddenly I wasn't just some guy making Transformers fanart while desperately saving up to get out of my parents' house. Suddenly I was some people's FAVORITE Transformers artist. Suddenly I was a role model to people and I had people in my DMs clambering for my attention and I had an audience that would cheer or boo or go awkwardly silent at my every post depending on how much they liked it. And it was Not Good For Me. I had and still do have people all over my inbox, excited about how I drew fat and disabled and trans characters asking me over and over to draw some specific representation that I don't want to draw right away. I had and still have people begging me to draw their favorite Transformers character who I happen to not really care about and not want to draw at all. And I am painfully aware how often people take personal offense to my polite "no I'm not drawing that unless it's a commission" and my not answering their ask because I'm not in the mood. I've had people send in asks asking for a specific drawing and then follow up asks when I don't answer in a timely manner. And it's really uncomfortable! And it's almost more uncomfortable that it feels like a lot of people don't even notice that they're making me uncomfortable.

And I like learning how to draw bodies I've never drawn before. I like looking at a character who I think is meh and being like "well actually how can I make them interesting to me...". But it really felt and still feels like my art was getting away from me, like I was drawing more what people were asking me to make instead of what I wanted to because people would take it so badly when I'd say no. I was getting commissions though and I was saving up money to move out so I ignored that bad feeling of getting distanced from my own craft because I was trying so hard to save money and I was actually making some. And I still wanted the attention. Plenty of people were still kind to me despite everything.

Things got weirder for me after I released my Good Bi Gender comic. Which I do still recommend people read I think it's some of my best work. But that comic became a huge hit. And it made things really complicated for a while. I got anon hate. I was told to kill myself by strangers online more than once while I was already deeply suicidal. Something I thought I stated very clearly in the comic itself, that I didn't want strangers calling me "she" though I did and do let my close trusted people call me "she", was immediately ignored by my regular audience and people reading the comic. I got a lot of "you go girl!" kind of messages in response to my comic, and I didn't say anything at the time but it made me deeply uncomfortable. The comic was partly about how the she/her part of my identity is off limits to strangers. How I don't let just anyone she/her me because I work so hard to have the he/him aspect identity acknowledged at all. And it was like what Tumblr decided for me was to go against my wishes. Was to be like "we'll accept your identity for you!" when that's not what I wanted. I did NOT want to be she/her'd by thousands of strangers at the time. And though I'm grateful to have heard the understanding stories of other folks with nonbinary gender identities in the notes, it was deeply humiliating and invalidating to watch as others decided for me to accept the Girl part of my identity. The opening lines of the comic are explicitly a plea to the reader to listen and understand why they're not allowed to use she/her for me even though I'm opening up about the complexities of my identity.

And like. I don't care anymore if people online she/her me. At least I don't care right now that's why she/her is in my bio right now maybe I'll change that. But at the time it was awful. It was something I asked people not to do. And between that and the constant clambering for my attention from people I didn't want to talk to (because I was severely depressed and wasn't looking to make a ton of new friends) and the alienation from my own work I felt like shit. I felt like garbage. I still do. I hate my art sometimes. I really hate it. And for a while, I considered breaking my own fingers just so people would stop acting so entitled to my art and I would have a reason not to post. And honestly the only thing that stopped me was just trying to get by financially. Just watching my follower count and regular notes steadily trend upward so I could do more commissions so I could move out.

And doing things for the numbers, even for a relatively short time, only made things worse. It sounds a little silly even to me, but I get so stressed out when my posts flop, especially if it's art I was really proud of. I'm struggling to detangle my sense of worth in my art from the online numbers game. And I'm proud of the progress I'm making, but it does really suck and it's really hard. And I really wish I was still the same person back in early 2022 who could say "I don't care about the numbers!" and actually mean it because god I WISH I didn't care about the numbers now. Especially now. I dunno if it's me posting more art people don't wanna see or people leaving Tumblr or a shift in the culture of Tumblr but fewer and fewer people interact with my posts despite my follower count ticking up slowly but surely and it kind of bums me the fuck out. But. I am very proud of myself for still drawing the ocs that I want to draw even if they get less notes every time. And even if I'm slightly frustrated they get less notes every time.

I don't really have a neat bow to tie on my personal story right now. I'm still healing and sometimes I backslide and it's hard and it sucks. I don't want to sound ungrateful or to sound like I'm trying to shoo people off my blog because I'm not. I'm really grateful for the attention and interest and I'm not trying to turn people off my art blog. But it's been a rough few years on here. And don't be surprised if you see me take more and more breaks from this website. I do sincerely hope y'all will stick around and watch me continue to post whatever art and say kind things because I do appreciate that a lot. I'm trying really hard to mend my relationship with my own art. To not be so hard on myself. And for the record I don't want any asks telling me to take breaks when necessary or reminding me to draw for me. I appreciate the sentiment, but I already know all that and I personally don't find it helpful to be reminded of things I already know. But anyway. I hope that I will draw more and more of whatever I want to, even if that means I fade back into obscurity.

If you stuck around to read me reflect on the stresses and occasional humiliation of my small amount of online notoriety, then thank you. I appreciate that. And really I do like people looking at my art on here and sharing it and sending asks about my work. And the person I expect to be responsible for my mental health and how much social media is impacting it is Me first and foremost. But sometimes I think that it's important to remember there's a person behind your favorite art blog. And sometimes when you get swept up in parasocial attachment and hype, you kind of treat that person really fucking weirdly. And no that doesn't make you a bad person or a monster. But it does mean you have to learn to deal with it when someone who you might even idolize is like "back off me you're making me uncomfortable".

Anyway. I shouldn't be up as late as I am. A headache has been keeping me up all night. I'm gonna try to rest though. Goodnight.

[genericpuff]

The Kiss Bet Episode 172 - Hot Pot and Venting About How I Want My 70 Cents Back

Okay, look, this isn't a post I was expecting to make today but it's something that just happened and I have to fucking talk about, so let me preface this with some context.

I had to buy coins recently and because I switched to using my iPad for reading comics on, I got a "new reader" type deal from Webtoons for a coin bundle that got me like 100 coins for $5; because technically it was a 'new account' as Webtoons operates their in-game currency model on apps, not on actual emails (meaning if you use the app on an Android phone and then switch to an Apple iOS device, they're technically two separate accounts which you sync the reading data between via the account info linked via the email, therefore they have two separate coin wallets).

So with more coins than I knew what to do with, I decided to start FastPassing The Kiss Bet again, which I had recently stopped FP'ing around the S3 mark, as it's recently devolved back into the "will they won't they" trope, but instead of between Sara-Lin and Joe, it's between Sara-Lin and Joe's younger brother (the "true endgame") Oliver.

Now I don't mind the ship in essence. Joe was definitely not gonna be endgame, it was always gonna be Oliver, anyone who's read any amount of romance before - especially high school romances - knows how this shit tends to go, and The Kiss Bet isn't exactly trying to be groundbreaking or subversive in any way, it knows exactly what it's about and what it's trying to accomplish.

But it's almost become a little too good at this. Because in playing the "will they won't they" game for so long with a character that we know is endgame, it's basically been weeks and weeks and weeks of-

That said, after I caught up on the recent FP episodes, it seemed like stuff was finally moving a little bit. We were finally meeting Oliver's mom and his stepdad who he has a fractured relationship with, Joe was finally getting with his true endgame girl, Vicky (who's totally not an exact genderbent version of Joe lmao) and Sara-Lin was finally realizing she had feelings for Oliver.

And then the newest episode came out, Episode 172 - Hot Pot and Venting.

CAUTION: FASTPASS SPOILERS FOR THE KISS BET OFFICIALLY BEGIN HERE!

Already I was a little petty over the title like "lmao ok clunky title but whatever". I swept it off as not a genuine criticism, just me being a nitpicking asshole over what's essentially Fluff: The Comic.

The episode cost 7 coins, which is about roughly 70 cents, albeit closer to a dollar for Canadian readers (here's something they don't tell you about Canada - our Monopoly game currency is just as fucked as it looks) and that's where I'm gonna get into my second disclaimer that I need to be perfectly clear about (and it'll be what we get more into later on in this post).

I understand the principle of paying for art. I understand fully that many of these webtoons are being produced on tight deadlines by creators who often can only afford 1-2 assistants, if any at all. I understand and fully agree that creators deserve to be paid for their skills, time, and efforts, not just as creators working on the hellsite that is Webtoons, but as artists in general who deserve to make a living the same as anyone else. Anyone who follows my stuff here knows I'm an artist myself so I would never debate the ethical necessity of paying artists for their work.

However.

I can say that, and also agree with the people who have stated in discussion circles such as on /r/webtoons that a lot of the comics that have started charging 7 coins have been suspiciously delivering less comic since. And it's not even so much in the literal panel count, the liquid volume of these comics have remained the same, but the calorie count has dropped significantly. Food metaphors aside, what I mean is that despite many of these comics maintaining their 40-60 minimum panel count requirement, they have in fact reduced the actual amount of content that happens in them, and The Kiss Bet's newest episode is a stark example of what I mean.

I am going to start by posting only post three panels - three panels that literally sum up the entirety of Episode 172 and what it chooses to spend its time on.

That is it. That is literally all that's established in this episode. I'd tell you to go read it yourself, but honestly, this is genuinely one of those rare times I can honestly say that a 40+ panel episode is not worth 70 cents and you'd be better off, and that's saying a LOT when these episodes are only priced at the cost of a gumball. At least Lore Olympus has entertainment in how bad it is most of the time, Episode 172 of The Kiss Bet is just nothing. You will literally get more substance and flavor from an actual gumball.

Literally every other panel in this episode is either repeating the same dialogue (Sara-Lin saying the same thing multiple different times to express how Oliver is holding her hand or how his stepdad is a dick) and then Sara-Lin and Oliver staring at each other. Over. And over. Again.

I am not joking. I did not cut anything out in that sequence. That is where the episode ends. Complete nothingburger, seemingly cut off right as it was just getting started like Cait Corrain's career.

Out of the entire episode, there were 45 panels. So I can safely assume Ingrid's minimum panel requirement is at least 40 per episode, that's me assuming the best that she didn't exactly meet her panel minimum at 45 panels on the dot.

Out of those 45 panels, there were:

Two actual unique backgrounds that weren't gradients or just a single piece of furniture

4 separate panels of Sara-Lin freaking out over Oliver holding her hand and wondering if he even noticed

10 panels of Sara-Lin staring at Oliver either dumbfounded or asking him to repeat himself (or apologizing over nothing)

5 panels of the characters saying nothing

11 panels of Sara-Lin repeating information in different ways that could have been accomplished in half that time

Two separate occasions of Oliver getting Sara's attention from off-panel, literally formatted the exact same way both times (and both followed by reaction panels of Sara-Lin staring at him dumbfounded)

Way too many panels of Sara-Lin blushing in response to Oliver being an asshole tbh like literally this guy's a douchebag, Joe may have been the "out of her league" love interest but at least he was nice and didn't treat Sara-Lin like someone who just bought a Husky as a "starter pet" ???

Again, I don't usually like being a dick about the coin costs, and I definitely don't like being a hypocrite in telling people they should pay artists for their work while simultaneously posting their paywalled content like this, but I think there does come a point where it feels more irresponsible for people to not be aware of what they're about to pay for and how little they're going to be getting. This episode is literally one of the best - and worst - examples of how far the romance genre has fallen on the platform - when it's not being overtaken and oversaturated by problematic series that romanticize abuse and sexual assault, it's being dragged to death with the most boring executions of tropes that everyone has seen before and is only exciting for anyone who's never read a book or watched a romance movie, period.

And here's the thing where I do approach a bit more "hot take" territory, but every time I see this argument come up about episodes not being worth the coin cost, I see others who rightfully argue that 70 cents isn't that much to pay for what you're getting - weekly episodes of work that are usually always delivered on time, with more panels than you would ever typically see in a free to read comic.

But here's where I take issue with that argument, as much as the principle of it is sound, it misses the overall point: readers are paying for entertainment first and foremost, so can anyone who's actually paying for regular refills on their app currency step away from this and truly call it "entertainment"? Nothing was gained. The comic had 45 panels to say something, anything, and managed to not even squeak out so much of a word. Even the silent moments have no substance, they just reiterate information that we already know.

Do we really need another panel of Sara-Lin blushing at Oliver? We've known for weeks now that she has a crush on him. Do we really need another panel of Oliver getting Sara-Lin's attention? What is this actually showing of their chemistry? What is being shown here that hasn't been shown numerous times - with and without dialogue - for weeks now? What does the comic have to show for itself after four seasons?

Another point of the "it's just 70 cents, don't be an asshole" argument that people seem to miss is it's not 70 cents. It's $1. Because if you want to buy a single episode of the Kiss Bet, you can't just pay for the individual episode in isolation, you have to pay for the coins first, and $1 is the absolute bare minimum you have to pay to get 10 coins, which will only pay for one episode of a 7 coin series - of which there are many now, basically any series that's 40 panels or more will cost 7 coins and, shocker, those are the series that WT will tend to promote most, you'll rarely see the 5 coins series in the banner ads, and that's not even getting into how there are more and more series cropping up that have 5+ episodes behind FP rather than the traditional three.

So if you're someone who's (almost definitely) keeping up with more than one series? You can't just pay the $1, you have to pay at least $5 for 50 coins, and that will NOT go far anymore or cut as evenly as it used to when just about every series is now 7 coins. Webtoons knows fully well what kind of game they're playing by making the new coin cost an uneven number while still offering increments of 5/10 in their coin bundles. They undoubtedly want you to be left with an uneven number so that you'll be easily lured into buying more coins so you don't 'waste' the uneven amount you have left that isn't enough to buy the episodes for the series you want to read. Obviously this is more speculation and not fact, but it's a common business model and with the series that have adopted the 7 coin count model (rather than starting off with 7 coins outright) such as The Kiss Bet and Lore Olympus, it's becoming abundantly clear that either the creators or the platform itself is encouraging these series to meet their panel minimums with as little content as possible in order to get more money out of readers who are barely even being drip fed actual entertainment and narrative progression, let alone spoon fed.

And then there's the waiting. The goddamn waiting. So many of these series guilty of siphoning their content off through a hose that they're deliberately standing on are designed intentionally with the most egregious cliffhangers in mind to keep their audience hooked so they'll undoubtedly FP next week. Do you know what that amount of waiting does to a comic? To its readers? First off, it artificially extends the actual pacing of the comic to make it feel longer than it is, when in reality, many of these plotlines are happening in a vacuum of very short bursts of time. Case in point, Lore Olympus is commonly confused for having a plotline that takes place over the course of months, when actually when laid end to end in order of cause and effect, many of its subplots - including the romance of Hades and Persephone - takes place over the course of days. This over-inflates the plotline's actual depth and, even worse so, it makes it harder for readers to keep up with information that's being delivered, as it often takes weeks for that information to actually go anywhere - so by the time it does, many readers have straight up forgotten about it.

It's absolutely not okay that so many of these kinds of series are normalizing literal slow burning for an audience who's paying to be entertained. It's not a "slow burn". It's just slow, and deliberately so. It's absolutely NOT FUN to follow a comic that does not go anywhere week after week. It's frustrating. And before long, it starts to feel like gambler's fallacy, where readers have to essentially gaslight themselves into paying into it more and more convinced that it has to pay off eventually, based on a promise that was never actually made, only assumed in good faith. And readers should not have to fill in the bulk of the content that isn't happening with their own imaginations, which is something that happens a LOT in these series that spend so much time on the characters just staring at each other and saying nothing. It's not 'plot' to just draw characters blushing and have your audience fill in the rest of it entirely on their own. This is certainly a technique in writing, but in the case of The Kiss Bet and other comics like it, it's much less of a valid technique and more just flat out manipulating your audience into falling so hard into the sunk cost fallacy trap that they don't notice they're being robbed blind by the plot that hasn't actually happened - and they've been paying for that financial and emotional robbery out of their own pockets and brains every step of the way.

Again, I do not care about the coin cost in and of itself, seventy cents IS still an incredibly cheap price for weekly updates of a series that has to put out so many panels each week. But as a reader and a customer, I should not be leaving these updates with less information than what I started with. And I'm someone who's incredibly old school by webcomic standards, there are comics that I follow that have updated 1-2 pages a week for over a decade that manage to do more with their limited pages than Lore Olympus and The Kiss Bet manage to do after entire hiatuses filled with pre-production time.

Why does this page of Alfie manage to move both the intrinsic plot of the titular character as well as the external plot that's going on around her in one page made up of 5 panels better than what The Kiss Bet can do in 45?

Why does this page of Tamberlane manage to convey more information about the world's lore and the people in it in a way that's emotionally driven and clearly affecting the characters without outright info-dumping than what Lore Olympus has managed to spit out onto its plate since S3 started over a year ago?

How does Tales from Alderwood manage to be more entertaining and convey more meaningful storytelling through its characters in a single page consisting of zero dialogue than what The Kiss Bet can convey in its silent panels of staring, blushing, and repetitive stuttering?

Why are the creators who are relying entirely on their own efforts, resources, and ability to generate income through community interaction and support putting out better work with less panels and on slower schedules for FREE than what we're seeing from professional creators on a professional publishing platform who are being paid to do this as their job?

There's this saying in the tattooing industry: good work isn't cheap and cheap work isn't good.

At this point, 70 cents is not a 'bargain' as many people like to argue in defense of the creators. And while I do want to have good faith in the creators who don't pull this shit, the creators who clearly go above and beyond to do what they do in the pursuit of storytelling and polishing their craft to be the best piece of work that it can be - the comics that are worth paying 70 cents and beyond for - are not the comics that Webtoons is promoting to people. The creators of the works that genuinely deserve more than 70 cents per update are being left to fend for themselves without support from the platform, while those that aren't worth the price of even a flavorless gumball are consistently winning the Wonka Golden Ticket lottery.

The cost of 70 cents is relative. For some works it's a genuine bargain. For others like the The Kiss Bet and Lore Olympus, 70 cents is not a "bargain", it's not a "good deal", it's exactly the value of what you're paying for - cheap work that isn't good.

[cookinguptales]

I almost wrote a small essay in the tags of that "fanwork as content" post but realized that it would probably be better off as its own post. So now it's... a large, rambling essay. lmao

Like... to preface, AO3 is great, it's a great resource for fandom, it feels good to have a centralized location that works well. That said, there has been a steady decline in how I've felt treated as an author since we switched to an archive-only model of fic.

For people who are newer to fandom, pre-AO3 (and even in the early days of AO3), people often crossposted fic. Sometimes to websites, sometimes to journals (particularly LJ/DW), sometimes to communities, sometimes to kink memes...

AO3, while certainly one of the primary places you could upload stuff, wasn't necessarily where you would get most of your primary interaction about your fic. It was always designed to be an archive, not a social media site.

But since we moved to an archive model (and away from LJ/DW) I've noticed that fic gets almost no traction on sites that actually are intended for social interaction. I'm not saying it's easy for any creator in fandom, but god. The numbers on fic posts are just downright demoralizing.

I don't mean to sound arrogant here, but I think I'm a pretty good writer. People seem to really connect with my fic. In multiple fandoms, I've written fic that most people have read and enjoyed, to the point where people have just taken it for granted that if someone reads fic in the fandom, they've probably read something I've written.

All this is to say, I know I've written fics that people like. I know I've written fics that people connect with. And I know those posts still only get like 5 notes sometimes on Tumblr.

I'm proud of my work and I'm happy that it's gotten such a warm welcome on AO3!!! But there are times when I feel like all this means that I could write literally the best fic on earth and still no one would talk to me. People still wouldn't want to interact with me on social media sites.

I wrestled for... honestly, a long time with all this. I had a hard time putting into words why this felt so uh. Bad. Was I just self-conscious about my own writing? Yes, but that's a separate issue. Was I just jealous of others' popularity? Sort of, but it went deeper than that.

I had an issue with a fandom that I don't write in anymore. I got a lot of fanart based on my fic, which was great, which was amazing, there were even fan comics made. Visual media travels better on social media than fic. That's just a fact. And I had to watch as repeatedly, art based on the fic I wrote got thousands of notes while my fic got maybe 12. And I realized the power of social media vs. AO3 because it did get to audiences that weren't familiar with my fic and people started to give those artists credit for my ideas.

I remember watching the tags of those posts because it was occasionally the only way I'd hear feedback on what I'd written (imagine getting one comment and 5 notes on a fic, then seeing dozens of people in the tags of fanart saying that it was their favorite fic in the fandom! it was weird!) and seeing the tags gradually devolve into "oh, this is such a neat idea for an AU, artist OP" or "wow this dialogue is perfect [artist] I love it" and like

It's weird to feel so happy because so many people are enjoying your work in a transformative way but also so unhappy because you have been completely removed from the equation. No one... even knows you wrote those things anymore. You have been removed in favor of a more "marketable" version of your work.

It's uh. It's a bad feeling. I stopped writing in that fandom eventually.

So again, I felt like... idk, like there was no point in me even trying. Because I could write the best fic on earth and still somehow get erased as a person. People would want my "content," but they wouldn't want me.

I think that's what hurt my feelings so much.

What I've realized is this: what I miss is the sense of community. On LJ, you could post a fic, cross-post it to a community, and there would be comments that would become conversations that would become lasting friendships. Not always! But often. I still talk to some people daily who I met through fic on LJ over a decade ago.

In the archive model, there has almost become a death of the author. The me on social media and the me on AO3 are very different; more importantly, it's almost like it's viewed as the "me" is on social media, but the work is on AO3. I am absent. There is only the fic, not the person who created it.

And that's okay, but when you try to combine those two things on social media and it goes over like a lead balloon... idk. There's an odd sense of dehumanization. I don't mean it in like... I don't know, a dramatic human rights violation kind of way. More that I literally feel like less of a human person the way I interact with fandom these days. Like I'm no longer a person who writes fic as a way to connect with my fellow fans and more a "content creator" whose human side is separate from my creation and never the twain shall meet.

(And I'll admit it feels especially galling to be forced into the capitalistic "content creator" box when it's not even a thing I can make money off of, lmao. It's like the worst of both worlds. I feel like if I can't make money off fanfic, I should at least be exempt from capitalistic social trends during its creation.)

I'm not so much complaining about my current fandom; WWDITS has actually been one of the best fandoms for interaction I've been in since the birth of AO3. That's one of the reasons I keep writing stories for fellow fans to read -- many of those fans feel like my friends, and I want to make them happy.

I think that poster was right when they talked about how the pivot from fan to "content creator" has fucked up fandom. There is this sense that we should be treating fandom like a job, often a fast-paced one with no pay. There is this idea that we should be separated from our "content" like you might a worker from their product, and blah blah blah alienation of labor, Marx, I get it, but damn if that isn't a shitty thing to do to your fellow fans who are making art for the love of art.

There are so many things I do love about AO3. I like having a central, organized place to put my fic. I like not having to worry about my work being lost to the ages. I like having an organized comments section I can return to on bad days to cheer myself up.

But I don't like the way that fic has kind of been relegated to a portion of fandom where people aren't particularly social. I don't like the way that authors are separated from their writing. I hear people complain sometimes about A/Ns because god forbid an author leave any trace of their actual personality to distract you from their content.

I can't have DMs with someone on AO3. I can't add someone to my friends list. There are no "beloved mutuals." There is just my work and the people who are kind enough to comment on it, even if they never actually engage with me elsewhere.

It's... a weird feeling, to feel so loved and unloved at the same time. Like you keep writing trying to make something good enough that people will talk to you but like. That's really not how it works. lmao. The best fic in the world won't make you friends anymore. It won't make people see you as a fellow fan rather than a pen name under a title.

My fic is some of the most personal stuff in the entire world, but my personhood is stripped away from it. It's so fucking weird. People like my fic, but they don't like me. They remember my stories but not the person who told them. It's bizarre. It feels like having your life and experiences strip-mined for content, and then the rest of it is just... left behind.

Frankly... I work in the publishing industry IRL and I have had opportunities to write professionally. Real, tangible opportunities. But I turned them down because I've seen it, the way that trying to fit such an intensely personal art form into a capitalistic framework can be exhausting, dehumanizing, and stressful. I don't want that for my work. Fandom has always been an escape from that.

But now fandom is starting to conform to those exact same capitalistic frameworks (and ofc without any kind of capitalistic compensation) and I hate to see it. It's so stressful. I feel like we're losing a lot of what makes fandom fun for writers and we're getting pretty much nothing in return. I'm not surprised that so many writer friends I know in fandom have quit.

like damn, I just wanna have fun with a bunch of dumbshits who love to overanalyze vampires and cry over their dumbshit shenanigans, not take on a second job. one that, I reiterate, I am not being paid for.

(Note: I am not asking for payment, just that I not be treated like a worker. The tradeoff for treating someone like a worker is that they get compensated for it. If I'm not being compensated, no one gets to treat me like this is my fucking job.)

It's a weird thing, because for a lot of people, fandom has become their job. Fanartists at cons selling fanart, youtube essayists making money off videos, professional cosplayers with sponsorships, etc. And so fandom is becoming more corporate, more capitalistic, more marketable. It's frustrating for those who don't want to capitalize on our fannish output, and doubly frustrating for people who are legally unable to do so.

I'm realizing as I write this that I'm most upset about the nonconsensual capitalization of fandom, particularly when imposed on people who are unable to access the very meager benefits of capitalism. I didn't ask for any of this!

Feels like when I'd be forced to go to assemblies for the US military when I was in high school. Like I'm morally opposed to all this but I'm also not physically fit for "service" anyway, so it's doubly insulting. I feel like I've been opted into the, ah, corporatization of fandom when I'm not even eligible for employee benefits. None of this should even apply to me! ;;

Okay!! I'm all het up now so I'm gonna go eat lunch and go for a walk! No monetization of hobbies, only trees.

[pb-dot]

I was trying to get through all of Fantasy High: Sophomore Year before Junior Year dropped and I'd probably have succeeded, hadn't it been for the final episode being no shorter than 5 hours long, so I'm finishing up the final episode of SY now before getting started on the new season. As usual, I have Thoughts. SY spoilers below the cut.

First off, the format. The live stuff is fun, and it gives some of the wilder episodes like Pirate Brawl a real electric energy. The tradeoff is, of course, that combat is a bit harder to follow, but I wasn't really noticing before the final, multi-part curse-breaking apocalyptic brawl. My Dyspraxic ass had some trouble following that one, but considering how much went on that's perhaps to be expected. It'd be pretty rad with models, but I suppose the fan art artists of the world need some epic scenes to recreate apart from all the exquisite emotion in play.

Because oh boy are there a lot of fun emotional stuff. Well, I say fun, but I suppose I do mean "occasionally devastating" by that. Kristen's quest for a theology that makes any sort of sense to her continues, but it hits a bit less hard this season for me, probably because it feels very Main Quest Component-y to me. It's a good component of the main quest, even though its existence as part of the plot does perhaps make it less of a mystery than I think it could be.

Now, where the hits land and don't stop are more in the wheelhouse of Fig, Fabian, and Adaine. Fabian, in particular, goes through the wringer in the middle part of this spring break adventure. Although it is both compelling and fun, I did find myself wanting to reach through the screen and say "Brennan Leeanathan Mulligan, you stop putting that boy in Situations right this INSTANT, that goes for you too Lou." There is, however, no denying that his arc is resolved pretty dang well, and gives Fabian a bit of depth that his "comically out of touch rich swashbuckler boy"-persona might have lacked earlier on.

I'm also equal amounts impressed and intimidated by the gumption to go as deep into the "Adaine's biological parents are pretty damn bad" hole as they do, especially because it did perhaps feel like they were holding back on that a touch in season 1. Gloves are off for Sophomore Year though, these elvish assholes are abusive, and the mask comes off in a major way, perfect for punching with custom-made magic spells.

Riz also feels like he has come into his own in a major way this season. I always felt like he should've had a more leading role in S01, as the one most directly involved in the central mystery from the word go, and that there were pits of character development and anguish yet to mine. I don't know if it was a conscious choice to leave some of that unprobed, or if Riz simply drowned in the maelstrom of strong personalities that is the Bad Kids. Fortunately, Murphy and Mulligan Mining Co. brought their good pickaxes out for this particular outing. Working the season's mystery and his slight sense of alienation from his fellow Bad Kids, Riz is a nexus of cool plot threads. One of these threads even genuinely bamboozled me with a misdirect, which is easier said than done in an Actual Play show.

As for supporting characters, Fantasy High continues to be a provider of interesting folks. Garthy O'Brien and his ward Ayda Aguefort are instant favorites, and Fabian's new bogeyman Chungledown Bim is perhaps not a sterling example of characterization, but there's no denying the gravity of his scrungly presence.

Overall, I feel like the show does get a tiny little bit Days Of Our Lives with the Bad Kid's parents/guardians. It's not a terrible flaw, but I do feel that it puts me in the shoes of Riz a little bit as I go "Welp these people are NOT normal about getting their kisses in, and that's worrying" and try to keep my relationship charts up to date and accurate. Seriously, I do not care much to know who's smooching on who in the adult segment of this story, even when it raises the baffling question of who would be romantically interested in the world's (second) most divorced man, Gilear.

Oh, and I suppose I should talk about Gilear a bit too. He's in this considerably more than S01, as he has the dubious honor of being the players' Favorite Guy of the season. At first, his inclusion seems mostly to be to enable him to Eeyore his way through further humiliations, but honestly he ends up actually being a positive presence in the plot. Granted, he keeps getting into increasingly unlikely predicaments whose sole purpose is to inconvenience or humiliate him, but Fig putting her nose to the grindstone to help the man rediscover whatever scattered fragments of confidence he has left is honestly really sweet.

There's oodles more, I could probably talk about how incredibly sweet the romance between Fig and Ayda is for hours, and the way Brennan weaves the themes of the show in between genre mainstays and conventions with a dexterity that never ceases to surprise me, but I'm sure I'll get to that at some point. Now I gotta do what I actually started this marathon watch for and get started on Junior Year.

[toyotacorolla2008]

hi!!! i was wondering if you could do a tutorial for how you draw transformers? i can never simplify them like you can. do you have any tips?? also love your art sm <33

hi ヾ(•ω•`)o

I WILL TRY MY best to explain what i do… i don’t actually have a very structured system but this is vaguely how i got started and how i simplified the process

1. look up and compile a whole bunch of references

this will be useful for EVERYTHING– transfomos come with lots of shapes and gizmos and details and stuff so a variety of references from different angles and in different poses is really useful because you can see the shapes they’re made out of and also understand how everything connects with each other

trapezoid town! this is a mess but it’s a quick example of how by looking at everything you start to notice trends or details like what moves with what or how flexible some parts are

there are a whole bunch of resources very nice people have compiled on the web like here here here here and here (mainly MTMTE) and there is a discord server (this is a link to a tumblr post about it and not the invite link itself) for it too but you can always look through the source material and just start screenshotting and pasting shit into a folder. 

you don’t have to do humongous in-depth breakdowns if you just want to be able to quickly doodle robots (god knows i don’t!!) but having the references on-hand makes it easier for the times when you’re like This pose is going to be challenging and I’m not sure how all of the cuboids will be positioned.

references also help break you out of thinking of it as just drawing blockier humans because the proportions and shapes vary a looooooot

2. draw draw draw

at first i drew a lot using refs heavily to get an idea of the shapes then i got lazy and just started drawing anime girls and smacking rectangles and kibble on top BUT as you draw more and more you start to pick up on the Salient Features as well as their General Silhouette.

drawing from memory means that what makes them look recognisable will become more emphasised in your mind so you’ll naturally pick up on how you can simplify them without losing what makes your guy Look Like Your Guy. so if you want to simplify the robots just be incredibly lazy like me B)

i'm kind of horrible because i don't even do like Basic Shapes i literally just eyeball it

for poses i rectangle it out while thinking really hard

anyway when i first tried to draw transformers but Something Didn’t Look Right it was either a) the level of detail across the entire drawing was inconsistent and threw it off balance or b) proportions weren’t right and these things only got better with me finangling and doodling and learning by iteration.

of course sometimes i don’t give a fuck because no cops in transformers doodle land but yeahhhh i’m the kind of guy who only gets through stuff by throwing a lot of rocks at it. i don’t have a Method to offer you unfortunately but what i did do was

3. experiment and exaggerate and experiment!!

The First Rule of Gun Safety is to Have Fun and Be Yourself! i took a lot of liberties and rarely stayed on-model when i doodled and waffled around (and i still do…) but it helped me figure out how much i was willing to draw lol and consequently how i would stylise them.

i would play with how big or small or exaggerated or expressive they'd be… even my most detailed drawings are nowhere near comic-detail but my least detailed ones were. turquoise triangle that’s vaguely brainstorm-shaped. having fun with it and just doing it to make stupid jokes makes the practice seem like not practice.

so yeah tl;dr i started by reffing what bots actually look like, would trace comic panels to get an idea of the shapes and details and then start drawing side-by-side → drew billions of perceptors from my diseased mind and played around with lines → ??? → upgraded from goofy-looking rectangles to goofy-looking rectangles

that’s it for advice! (i don’t feel qualified to say that much)

below are just examples of stupid doodles i’d make on my ipad in class or in the margins of assignments lol, you can tell the last one is from when i still didn't understand brainstorm's build very well because the wings are placed wrongly... But i grew.

hope this was somewhat helpful! there are other tutorials from other artists that i can direct you to but this is how toyotacorolla2008 got to shitposting on tumblr dot com

[sanversandfriends]

One way to spark a writer's enthusiasm about a WIP is the promise of accompanying fan art. Not only is it exciting to see your story brought to life, but to paraphrase @Morganastorm24, even a small shift in perspective can inspire you to take a wildly different approach. Today, she'll share some of her inspirations along with advice on how to get started or unstuck.

Tell us a little about yourself. How long have you been creating fan art? What were some of your first subjects and what ships/characters in the SG universe have you illustrated?

I mentioned in my writing answers that I've been doing it for as long as I can remember, and the same applies with art. I'm generally a very creative person - writing, drawing, crafting - you name it, I'll happily do it. 

I inherited my creativity from my grandparents, or so I'm told. My grandfather used to drive buses back in the 50s and 60s and on his breaks he'd park up somewhere and sit and sketch his surroundings. For no reason other than he wanted to and liked doing it. He also enjoyed woodwork and crafting miniature models of things out of wood. He built me my very first dolls house and I helped him to decorate it and furnish it with miniature furniture.

My grandmother was a seamstress for the theatre and made all the costumes for various productions. She'd sketch the designs out first, and then sew all the costumes by hand. She was also a writer, though she kept her stuff very private, because it was a hobby for her but not one that she felt comfortable enough to share. Sometimes, I can understand why, because I feel the same. Growing up, I loved spending time with both of them because they shared their skills with me. 

What are your favorite mediums to work with?

Photoshop is a big favourite of mine, because you can do pretty much anything, so long as you can find the right images to merge together. I also love using pro-markers and other comic book markers.  What kinds of scenes do you enjoy illustrating? Do you have any favorite tropes or themes? Imagery that you like to work with?

I love to do anything, as long as I have a clear vision of it in my mind (when using photoshop), or I have an image I can use as a reference (when I'm drawing by hand). The only thing I can successfully draw freehand without any reference is a horse (my lifelong love of the animals showing through there). When I worked in a children's nursery, we often drew large images for the kids to decorate which would then be displayed on the walls. I was always the one who ended up drawing said images, and to be honest I loved it. When I left that job to start my current one, I was gifted two of the last things I'd drawn - the rose from Beauty and the Beast, and the Coca Cola Christmas Truck. I've kept them to this day, and they're in a protective folder in storage. 

Any advice for aspiring fan artists?

One thing I learned in art lessons when I was at school (and it has stuck with me to this day), is that if you're struggling to draw something, change the perspective. My art teacher told us the following story about a disabled man, and I've tried and tested this method myself. It really does work!

A young man in a wheelchair was asked to draw his wheelchair. He hated the thing, saw it as a hindrance that cut him off from everything that he'd been able to do before he was confined to it. It was a reminder of his past life and everything he had lost, so when he tried to draw it, he was full of anger and resentment, and eventually threw his pencil down in frustration, declaring that he couldn't do it.

Instead of giving up on him, his teacher took the wheelchair, turned it upside down and told him to try again, but don't draw it as a whole. See the individual shapes and draw those. Focus on one shape at a time. So the young man did. He drew what he could see - circles, squares, triangles, rectangles, cylinders - and when the teacher took his piece of paper and turned it round, he had drawn a wheelchair.  All because changing the perspective of the subject and breaking it down into basic shapes had made his brain approach the task differently.  So if you're ever stuck on something and you don't know how to move forward, or do what needs to be done, try looking at it from a different angle. It could be literal, like turning the chair upside down, or it could be figurative, like seeing a circle instead of a wheel, a tube instead of a handle, that sort of thing. Change the perspective and you might just surprise yourself.

Thanks for sharing with us, Morgana--and for making us continue to swoon over Alex!

And Maggie!

And Lena!

And...

[abuddyforeveryseason]

This is the Buddy for October 16th. I quite like it. It does look like a two-page spread in a manga I'd enjoy. I'm a big fan.

I am a nerd. I've always been, really, although I'm not blind to the annoying issues there are whatever it is people call nerd culture.

When I was a kid, there was a writer I read a bit of from time to time. I'm not going to name names because I don't want to insult particular people on this tumblr, especially since he doesn't seem to deserve it as far as personality goes.

He published a book, a sci fi novel with a lot of references to action movies of the time. Then he put out an RPG adaptation of the novel, which was what I got my hands on. It seemed like he was into hard science fiction, I was impressed, thought he was a smart guy. I eventually forgot about him until a few years back, when I found out what he had been doing since then.

After the books, he published some comics serving as a sequel/side story to the novel. They were pretty influenced by Rob Liefeld and Jim Lee, comics that my nerd friends usually mocked for their trashy art and horny storylines. And after that, he moved on to manga-style comics ripping off stuff like Dragon Ball, Yu Yu Hakusho and El Hazard. After that he made a set of superhero graphic novels with manga influences, and later a fantasy RPG-inspired webcomic.

So when you see the guy's body of work, it seems like he's just ripping off what's popular. He started out referencing movies of the time, then during the alternative comics boom of the nineties, he turned those hard sci fi concepts into edgy superhero stuff. When manga started really getting big, he forgot about superheroes and started doing more "mature" manga stuff (or at least what we considered to be mature back then. Manga was a lot more adult than superheroes, because of the violence, sex, book length, production model...). Then when Marvel started putting out movies, superheroes were cool again, and he's acting as if he's always been a fan. And now he's following the leader with something RPG and webtoon inspired.

So, looking at the guy, it feels like rather than being a fan who can tell when a work is quality despite it being disposable pop culture, he just looks like a drone spending money and time on whatever it is that's being published, and then scoffing at his old interests when the new stuff comes along.

Of course, even though I don't see myself that way, I am kind of the same. I got into comics during the Kurt Busiek era trade paperback boom - I wouldn't follow monthly releases, but bought the complete stories in a proper bookstore. And although I'm not from the same generation Jack Kirby's original fans are, I got really into his comics by reading reprints and digital publications - I only became a fan because someone decided to publish them.

Even when it comes to manga, I'm not exactly only appreciating quality work - I read it on e-readers (I've had four), which work great for older manga (and for ones that have an extensive and easy to find digital library), so I read a lot of Osamu Tezuka, Shotaro Ishinomori and Jiro Kuwata. I'm surprised when I go to bookstores and find the manga I assumed was super obscure available to everyone.

I could say the big difference between me and the writer guy is that I can percieve a work's quality regardless of how much hype there is around it. But even that is a line of thought that was drilled into me by the companies that decide what to publish. I can read a pirated italian translation of an obscure Osamu Tezuka manga on my generic e-reader and pat myself on the back for being clever and getting it, but that just means when a giant corporation starts airing the anime adaptation of a manga homaging Tezuka, I'll be more likely to watch it. And, even mentioning the guy's name on Tumblr, I'm advertising it (by influencing search engines into bringing his name up).

But, despite that, I still enjoy that stuff a lot. I think there's real quality into the work people who create comics and manga put in, and that it's an underappreciated artform. I could say, be it referring to comics from ninety years ago, or from a writer my own age, that the quality's there regardless of the hype. I read the RPG world story by the writer I mentioned and I think, sure, he's just following the lead of a bunch of Isekai stories and webtoons with a similar style, but, still, he's putting a lot of himself into the story. Whether he realizes it, or not.

[northropi]

Quick Design Crisis Notes

I'll eventually have a more in-depth look into the future of these two designs when I get a little comic together about it, probably on the other blog. For now, let's go over some stuff I've been coming to terms with about the two. To catch anyone up:

Despite my PFP reflecting a now-quite-a-bit older design- I believe at this point the theme was still a zombified Pterosaur-girl with mechanical bits as prosthetics- the design I've actually been running with for a while is a zombified Dragon with mechanical bits as prosthetics. If you can't tell, not that much changed externally, except for a few details. That is, until...

After the Dragon design won out as a "quick few tweaks to the actual design but some fairly big lore changes that no one will notice," I... Kind of got dysphoric, in a way. Little features about how she looked were starting to gnaw at me, as I slowly started to interpret monstrous features as masculine- and subtly masculine aspects of her appearance started to bother me more than they did at first, driving me to want to just fold and make a flat-out fem character as, I suppose, escapism. So, the next character up, using a lot of assets and details from the previous design but with a new facial structure and an entirely different species and backstory, was a creepy doll thing.

However, this didn't go smoothly, and while I managed to put a lot together for her (granted, not outfits, both the Dragon and Doll models shown were still using placeholders), she's sort of fallen out of favor over a tweaked version of the Zombie Dragon design- now avoiding the traits I was getting in my own head over and kind of just introducing a nicer overall flavor- though the idea of somehow implementing doll traits into the character (such as wearing a porcelain mask to cover a decaying, skeletal face) were still floating around, waiting to be implemented if I decided to at the last second.

So that was it for the doll.

But not for a doll.

I had kind of joked for a while that if I inevitably rebranded enough it'd eventually lead to a robot, and the doll character... Well, she kinda accelerated that path. I really liked the idea of using a construct, mechanical character to represent myself, and while the Doll and Zombie motifs were ways to get that in while leaving in elements of Magic for me to play with, well, I guess I did always lean more towards technological aesthetics anyways. Previously I've also mused on the fact that I'd find a plain robot character unfitting because I don't know how to code, but honestly a robot character could be made to play off of that- like, she's sort of intimidated by people who are because she is code.

And with that I think I've fairly quickly arrived upon a character that ticks all the boxes I need her to, at least with some fleshing out. Still, it's not over yet. There's a lot of details about both designs that need refining. The Dragon, and especially the true form, have long needed updates- and I kind of want to pull through with those even if I don't end up keeping that character as my sona. The Robot needs special care to make sure a lot of motifs carry over organically (ironically), including a design that seems relatively grounded and utilitarian but still carries the seabird and reptile themes I like so much. And all this comes to a head with the fact that the Robot is a Robot and the Dragon is a Dragon.

I've mused with ideas like giving the Robot a full-blown walking tank form to match the Dragon's true form, but that feels a little... Weird. Like giving her multiple bodies would feel to "code-y," running into the problem I mentioned before as she becomes less "Robot" and more "AI," plus it'd kind of feel like a vehicle I guess? It feels less like a part of her than the Dragon does with its form shenanigans, and I feel would either overshadow her humanoid form (ie combat becomes relevant to the lore, which she obviously does in her walking tank mode, resulting in less time with the humanoid mode), or would be irrelevant (ie no combat, so why have a walking tank form?). So making a non-humanoid alt form for the robot is complicated, but having it without much in the way of mental gymnastics on the Dragon is kind of fun.

Like, I guess this is weird to the prevailing anti-self-insert attitude of the internet (which isn't wrong per se but VTuber and explicit Sona designs afford some room for self-indulgency), but having a character that is just Funny Scaly Woman but also Giant Three-Headed Albatross-Turtle whenever she feels like it is really... Yeah, fun. It's fun, it can be a nice gag for skits and comics, it lets me alternate between presenting as a humanoid for humanoid sorts of things and a nice pretty non-humanoid for ambient beauty shots or something, artistically treating her as an animal in nature in a way that even if I did go through with the Robot's big mode idea I'd still miss out on due to the way that form would turn out... To go over that last part a bit, yeah, ok, legged giant robot is unrealistic, sure, but it'd still be a grounded design, I just like making them that way, so I couldn't just make her a Dragon with a screen face and chrome skin and call it a day. She'd be a distinctly unnatural being, missing parts that animals have in favor of the streamlined design of a perhaps-improvised-but-still-pragmatic war machine- and maybe that could be a thing, separated from nature enough for that to work as a juxtaposition, but she likes it enough to try and associate with it, but also I don't fucking know let's talk about legs and wings and turboshafts and shit.

In true me fashion this is already a tad outdated. Rather than having a stocky tail that acts as an entire powerpack to which the wings are affixed, she'll probably have the engines powering the wings embedded in her body somewhere and the wings affixed to extensions of the hip, with the tail being a more biomimetic structure for balance and fuel storage- because I like short chonky tails. The wing itself is still more or less the same, with some slight detailing pending, and of course the color scheme will be... Something.

Her backstory is that she used to be a delivery robot for Legally Distinct Logistics Megacorp before everyone blew up everything and is now just trying to be helpful with long-distance deliveries between survivor camps, so she'll be designed with the idea of sterile alabaster corporatism in mind with a personalized scheme and hasty repairs over it.

The decidedly more normal limbs are actually where problems are cropping up. I'm not entirely sure how the arms and legs should look. The arms, true to life and in tradition for these characters, will be scrawny, metal tubes with a couple servos jammed in with distinctly rudimentary hands. I want to implement some sort of folding mechanism for them, maybe a sort of pauldron that locks to the hand as the forearm comes to lie parallel to the humerus, turning the arm into a single sort of pod thing.

The legs, however, are something that, true to life and in tradition for these characters, will be the opposite. Strong-looking, relevant to her flight controls, and I'm fond of the idea of making them look like floats on seaplanes and flying boats for the idea that she can basically kneeslide into a water landing when operating in such place. But I'm not sure exactly how that's going to work. She could go with plantigrade legs that end in nubs, or maybe some digitigrade look- recently I've been trying to feel out an idea for a digitigrade look where the "knee" mostly translates instead of rotates, allowing the leg to quickly retract and extend into and out of itself for jumping as well as reducing profile drag. This is also interesting because it sort of solves the little side debate in my head on how tall she should be by allowing her to control height on demand- in any case it's likely she could go back to older versions of the character being lanky monsters or become pretty short for the simple reason that I kinda find those ideas fun.

I'm also probably keeping the big central horn the later versions of the Dragon got- albeit as a clearly mechanical structure that contains her actual optics including a camera and LIDAR, with the eyes being mostly just aesthetic lights.

And, well, all that out of the way... I should probably follow up on this by drawing it while the ideas are still fresh in my mind, for once.

[infinitethree]

OOC::

This is gonna be a bunch of links to the Sanctuary builds, which are also linked in the doc of docs & taglist/links page on the sidebar.

I'll be adding some images I want to say something about. Also, just know that I frequently have gone back and tweaked or even completely redid parts of it.

Builds; Old-> New, save for Updates which is new-> old to show any new stuff easier.

Overall has over a thousand pics spanning from January 11th 2022 to a week or so ago. I've been working on this 1.16.5 creative world for what my launcher tells me is over 14 days of time spent entirely in-game.

There are over 150 mods used, ranging from itty bity ones ("No Potion Shift" at 3KB & "Shut Up Experimental Settings" at 5KB) to almost comically large ones ("Caves & Cliffs Backport" at 50,313 KB & "Modern XL" at 37,090 KB).

I run it on a laptop, but I do have to turn pretty much everything else off. I usually switch to my phone for music/podcasts + Discord and have just the game running. Also, I got this model specifically to handle Minecraft and for having ample space for my music. I have all of it stored on my computer and played through MusicBee, because I don't want a million ads.

You might notice that it takes a looooong time for most of the buildings to get roofs. This is because I didn't understand how those blocks worked. And also I just don't like doing them much; they're boring compared to the character detail stuff.

-Overall

-Updates (New-> Old)

-Day + Theo + Lee & Temp Refugees

-Dee + Orph + Perce & Forge

-Atlas + Quizzy & Adamantium

-KinderSofter!Crew [Perce’s friends] -Poison Farm

-Aster

-Daz + Raine

-Aleph + Khons

-Council of the Star Headquarters It's not in the actual album (since the dates don't align, because it was just a screengrab to share with Noodley vs a proper screenshot), but these were the original blocks I planned on using for the three main Summer Hills houses:

The mod with the tiles and logs got removed early on, so I had to pick something else to use. I like the end result way better, though; each house has a more distinct flavor while still being fairly cohesive.

If I had to pick a specific detail as my favorite, it'd have to be the creeper plushies. At some point, Lee decides that creepers are protectors; thus, anyone he cares about needs to have a plush version. Sentiments on the look of them are...mixed.

Theo thinks they're creepy as hell but his baby brother gave those to him-- thus, they're above his gear as an 'intimidation tactic'; Day is, uh, not super keen on waking up from a nightmare to the sight of creepers, so he has them out of his line of sight; Perce's friends think it's almost tooth-rottingly sweet but in a /pos way, etc.

It all spawned off of seeing the creepers in the "Modern XL" mod, and realized those are EXACTLY the sort weird, kinda unnerving thing a kid would latch onto.

Day, Theo

Dee, Orph, Atlas

Perce, Lee (there are just barely 5 in the shot and that's not even all of them!)

Quizzy

Oisin, Agni [Perce's friends]

Damon, Oxylos [Perce's friends

Aster, Khons + Aleph

Daz, Raine

And here's a few pics of things specifically referenced in prose:

Sibling Acceptance Rituals, chapter 1 (where they're standing near Theo's room)

Sibling Acceptance Rituals, chapter 2 (very start of the chapter)

any scene in the den of the main house

Progress is Relative, chapter 3 (referenced; Dee's lamps that "look like honey but do NOT taste like it")

Polaris Shines Above; Aster's temporary room

Polaris Shines Above, chapter 9 ([redacted], obviously VERY in progress)

Uhhh and it looks like I ran out of space. Hmm. I...will shuffle the Piccrew/Art to its own post, lmao.

I'm absolutely willing to answer questions about things anyone is curious about!! I love explaining myself, and more importantly, explaining things about my silly little blorbos. Or even just what mods I used.

[we-were-made-of-stars-once]

QUICK LIFE UPDATE:

So yesterday was a really terrible day for me. I had just gotten fired from my job and I've been moping around all day. I was already in a tight financial situation for the past few weeks (taking out multiple loans and losing more money due to commuting issues) and now I don't know how I'll be able to afford my rent, food, etc. Till I find a new job. I felt really hopeless since finding a new job is already a hurdle in and of itself and I've got bills to pay pretty damn soon.

But I've realized this could be a perfect opportunity to pursue something that only seemed like a pipe dream. Let me explain. . . At my previous jobs, my coworkers and even a few customers would always say how they liked my digital art (because I'd mention that I dabbled in drawing whenever they wanted to get to know me more and my hobbies. Y'know ✨socializing✨) and how I could probably get into making money from my art. . .of course I always doubt myself too harshly even when the compliments and praises come from my family and friends. . . But now, I think I might have a shot at honing in on my skills. Now that I have the time and I still have my art tablet and a brand new computer (that I still have to figure out how to pay off 👀. . . .)

But anyways. . . Earlier I was super depressed and stressed out the whole day. Until I randomly remembered to check my mail and got my package from a Patreon subscription that I'm subscribed to and I'm a huge fan of! The sticker above is a gift from one of my favorite extremely underrated creators. @hasaniwalker . His story of Doris Doodle and Dawn Doodle is super inspiring to me (even tho it's about silly haha cartoon characters 😅) the emotional journey and the protagonists story really resonates with me. . . and for a moment, I kinda correlated Doris' experience of losing her career with my own. The hopelessness, the despair, the fear of what's next. . .

Doris' struggles in some weird way were like my struggles. . . (Or maybe I'm just projecting and over analyzing too much pfffttttt 😅) But I digress. . . As I stared at this silly little sticker, I started contemplating the efforts and dedication he must have put into this passion project. The trials and errors of trying to bring this project up off the ground. The creator of this underrated comic is one of my many artist role models. A real life glimpse of what I could become someday. An artistic storyteller. A visionary hoping to make something meaningful to my audience. A Creator.

So this is my official notice to y'all if anybody is actually caring to read all of this lol I will try my hand at doing ART COMMISSIONS. I've still got a lot of research to do first though, like how to price stuff and all the other technical details. But I've got a lot of support from my loved ones and artist friends to help me on this journey of pursuing my dream job as a artist (even though I might not be good enough right now and it sounds naive and a bit too optimistic. . . I can at least try, right. . .?)

TLDR: LIFE SUCKS AND IM GONNA DO ART COMMISSIONS SOON TO MAKE IT POSSIBLY SUCK LESS???

@dawnanddorisqna @hasanistories @hasaniwalker

Honorable mention to my irl art mentor friend @en1gmat1c for being cool beans 😎

[noys-boise]

So tell me about beverly

are you sure you're ready for this? are you absolutely sure?

okay so Beverly Switzler otherwise known as my most beloved special girl who i would commit murder for is a character from the 1976 Howard the duck comic series who then appeared alongside I'm pretty sure every iteration of Howard except the mcu unsurprisingly :/ (and maybe some irrelevant side stuff idk). She is narratively integral to the Howard the duck story. This is undebatable, even in the one htd comic where she's not a recurring character she still appears at one point and that's honestly what i see people talk about most when they talk about the 2016 htd run. that's how important she is.

But I should probably start at the beginning. Warning, Howard the duck lore is weird to say the least.

So Bev's first appearance was in the very first issue of Howard's solo comic series (he did appear in Adventure into fear and Giant-sized Man-thing beforehand but that's a story for another day) and she started off strong with being imprisoned by a financial wizard (also known as a cosmic accountant. I'm not making any of this up, he is as over the top as you'd imagine) but Howard found her inside the wizard's tower built out of credit cards of which he was planning to jump off because idk if i mentioned before this duck was very suicidal at this point. Howard doesn't manage to save her though so instead they both get sent to this? alternate universe? i think? where they have to find a gem key or something. And they bond immediately because turns out a human woman and a duck from another world can have a lot more in common than you'd think. I'm not going to elaborate much more on their escape because this post is already going to be way too long but I'll just say they work really well together and Steve Gerber (the writer of htd) saw that and readers saw that and so Beverly stayed in these comics for the rest of the run except for the two times she got written out, more on that later.

She's incredibly tolerant, honestly to a fault like she just let Howard live with him without any conditions forever as if it's nothing, she's generally really positive which contrasts Howard's negativity well and she's just really damn adorable. She also values her agency more than anything which sucks for her because the narrative doesn't treat her very well on that regard, it is strongly implied that her parents tried to shelter her a lot and she's kind of trying to prove her maturity and she refuses to conform to any societal rules. which explains a lot imo.

Now, like i said the narrative doesn't always treat her very well. Largely because this is the 70s and these comics were written by a man (who i have a love-hate parasocial relationship with despite him being very much dead). Wait first i do have to give him one credit on this, even though Bev originally worked as a nude model she was relatively not that sexualized at all. Which good for feminism, bad for my by now very obvious crush on her. Maybe I am kind of guilty too huh. She has been harassed by creeps more than once (she did also defended herself more than once, good for her) she got kidnapped a lot especially early on and i couldn't be writing this without going into the doctor bong arc which does feature some of the most questionable decisions by Gerber. i need to start a new paragraph for this.

So doctor bong (yes that's the name he uses no it's not a drug reference actually i think I've made a post about this once) is considered Howard's arch nemesis. He wears a bell on his head that can paralyze and allegedly even kill people, he makes weird genetically mutated creatures including Fifi the sexy french maid duck who then dies (i don't want to get into it) he has a past in journalism and he just so happens to have had a crush on Beverly since college. And that's a problem because he's very much an incel. He kidnaps Beverly and threatens to kill Howard if she refuses to marry him. So she agrees reluctantly which results in her being out of the story for the majority of the original run and when she does officially return it's after Gerber has left. now the really questionable part is that my beloathed Steve Gerber actually started to imply that Bev might even be enjoying this arranged marriage which not only directly contradicts most of her previous characterization but is also just generally really not believable. I actually don't want to talk about this more right now because it always gets me worked up.

Seriously though as badly as the narrative tends to treat her she's amazing, and without a doubt the second most iconic Howard the duck character after Howard himself. marvel has actually made a few attempts to replace her for some reason but it never worked for them because why would it.

I could go into more detail about her later iterations because contrary to how i tend to act I'm not actually a Gerber purist, I'm kind of neutral on this argument (wait i think i should elaborate on this. a lot of people believe no one can write Howard the duck after Steve Gerber. Which is a statement i only half agree with. I do believe it's never been the same without him, but I do like some of the Howard stuff not written by him. Hell i even enjoy the movie in its way.) but I'm already drawing this post out too much and I'm going on unrelated side rants and i think i should just stop. Oh wait one more thing. She canonically studied theatre. As in original htd run canon. And she did do a play in the 2007 run. I just felt like that should be mentioned because theatre is my religion.

[entityneo]

... SO I KNOW I LITERALLY SENT THE MOST RECENTLY POSTED ONE but I have to fling moar wordz. Is the art of this comic actual ink on actual paper, that's then scanned into digital format and given the speech bubbles and stuff? (Also I've had such a wonderful time going through all of the older asks, there's so much I've realized thanks to them and also NapstaNEO getting to look happy absolutely sends me.)

Oh no no! Don’t feel bad for asking at all! (I’m honestly squealing with joy that people are actually interested in our comic!) :’)

I’ve actually always wanted to compile our process on the blog somewhere. Here’s the basics of doing a chapter of the comic!

After discussing concepts (and bugging Mod Migosp with messages until 2 am) Mod Migosp types out a script for the corresponding chapter. Here’s a tiny snippet. Migosp tends to be chill about letting me improv moments. (It’s pretty infamous between us that I tend to turn 5 lines of script into 20 pages. I like making my life hard I guess.)

I try to quickly crank out thumbnails for the pages and I send them to Migosp for approval, just so they get an idea of what I’m planning to show, and give me any feedback I need.

Next, I digitally sketch the pages, lower the opacity of each one, then print them to physically line each one. Lining is the most tedious part of the process for me. (Luckily I’ve gotten 43 out of the 70 pages lined for the latest chapter done so I’m hoping to get to inking soon!)

Inking is definitely the most rewarding step. I tend to map out where I want shadows and lighting to fall and I fill most of it either with brush pen, sharpie for when I’m short on nicer markers, and full acrylic ink with a brush for larger portions such as widescreen shots.

Finally, I scan the finished inks into my computer.  I actually have specific textures, layers, adjustments, and templates for the pages. I try to clean up as many scratches, smudges, and smears as I can before I start text. That’s when I add bubbles, watermarks, text, animation, color etc. Finally, I get Migosp to look over everything to correct typos, pacing, and even font alignment. I batch all the pages to lower their dpi for the web and get everything saved. The finished pages get stuffed into one of my many gigantic binders full of previous pages.

I take the lead in drafting the posts while Migosp helps on their end to put all the links in and officially post everything. I mean, it’s no perfect product, but we really take care to make sure everything matches our initial integrity. (Though I’ve definitely had my ‘emergency’ situations to aggressively fix a typo we missed before too many of you see it) ;)

But yeah, that’s the studio tour! When we were starting the comic, I originally tested out drawing the comic digitally and then traditionally, but I felt like I emotionally connected to the traditional ink more. Technically it’s an amalgamation of traditional art with digital touch ups (I WISH I was skilled enough to get the inks right on one try lol). No matter how long we work on this comic, at least I can say it’s been great practice with my pens!

— Mod NEO

[brattysorcerer]

hello! I was wondering if you could maybe write about streamer!reader who is a pretty new member of nijisanji, like they joined one or two months ago and one day when collabing with one of the members of luxiem/noctyx(you can choose who you wanna write), they take a break to go to the restroom or smth and the reader just starts gushing about them like saying stuff about how cute they think the member is, or how sweet they are or smth like that? Its fine if you don't wanna write this, I understand, but if you do thank you in advance and I hope you have a lovely day!

okay this has been sitting in my drafts for a hot minute, i'm so sorry. i had a hard time deciding on which of the boys to use for this but i settled on alban.

you and alban had done quite a few collab streams in the small amount of time that you’d been with nijisanji. outside of streaming, the two of you talked a lot as well, spending some nights in calls or just back and forth in messages until late into the night. you guys just clicked and it was very obvious to everyone. 

alban had invited you to sit in on a stream with him. it wasn’t a co-op game but he’d wanted company while he’d played a scarier game and you’d had no issue giving that to him. you’d helped voice some characters within the game and the two of you had been having a really good time.

“oh! uh, hold on. the food i ordered is finally here. i’m also going to use the washroom while i’m up. keep chat company for me?” alban said to you before muting himself and running off to grab his food. you hum softly for a moment, glancing at chat and watching the messages roll in.

most of the messages were just saying hello to you and talking about how you were babysitting them, making you laugh softly. you sip of your drink and clear your throat. “i hope you guys are enjoying the stream today! i was really excited when alban invited me to sit in while he plays this game. he’d mentioned it was a bit of a scary game and so i told him i’d hold his hand while i played.” you say, referring to the hand holding asset someone had made for the two of you for the scary game collabs you guys often did.

your tone had softened and you sounded a little shy and chat gets a little faster at that. you laugh softly as you see some eye emojis roll in. “your manager is a bit of a scaredy cat at times, you know? it’s kinda cute, though.” you say. chat starts to ‘oooh’ and ‘aw’ at that and you hum.

“even if he is a big baby sometimes, he’s very sweet. he’s been so kind to me since i joined niji and i’ve enjoyed every collab and conversation i’ve been able to have with him. he’s made me feel very welcomed and supported and i don’t think i would’ve been able to do that karaoke stream without his support and how much he hyped me up.”

“i just think he’s neat, you know?” you say shyly, followed by a soft laugh as chat loses their minds. “also! don’t tell alban i said any of this.” you wink at the camera, laughing as you know he’ll find out.

“don’t tell alban what?” you hear as alban settles back into his chair.

you gasp comically, looking at your camera and then turning your model so it looks like your looking at alban. “oh, y’know. don’t tell alban that i called him a big scaredy cat baby when it comes to scary games.” you tease.

[kellykline]

sequel to the Cas eats baking soda fic for his birthday! thank you for hosting this jay!

Cas's door is open, but Dean knocks anyway to be polite. 

Attention dragged away from whatever vast concepts he was considering, Cas looks at him and grins. He's sitting straight up in his bed. 

"Hello Dean," he says, all breath and smiles, "How was the mall?"

"Well, not great, actually." Dean crosses his arms and leans against the doorframe. "Jack realized once we got to Lush that he didn't actually know what Sam would like, and when I told him he could just text and ask he said it'd be too obvious and that he'd have to conduct further investigation at home so… we didn't get anything for Sam."

"That's a shame. We only have a few weeks to finish gifts and then it'll be Jack's turn."

"Eh, it's not a big deal. Jack wants to go to the mall, we'll go to the mall. But he made me promise that neither of us would tell Sam. So, uh… Don't tell Sam." Dean cracks a weak smile which Cas returns much more fully. 

"Safe with me," Cas says, laying a hand over his heart.

Dean fidgets with the bag behind his back.

"I– um… got you something. A couple somethings. You don't have to like them, obviously, but I just thought… Well, you know–" 

Cas cuts off his babbling and says, "Are you going to give them to me?" 

Dean thrusts the paper bag at Cas and almost hits him in the face. When Cas doesn't immediately grab it, he lets it dangle off his index finger by the handle.

"I noticed that the first ingredient is sodium bicarbonate and I thought hey, maybe these'll be just as good for you as the regular stuff. They've got other ingredients in them, but maybe they'll be good?"

Cas is gazing up at him in a sort of gobsmacked way. 

"What?"

The angel shakes it off and says, "Thank you, Dean." He reaches for the bag gently, like it holds something more precious than fancy bath products.

The first one he pulls out is the milk bottle looking thing. It's a bubble bar, whatever that is. The smell reminds Dean of clean laundry. They don't have bathtubs in the bunker, so Dean couldn't try the things out even if he wanted to. Which he does. Kind of.

"Oh, it's soft…" Cas mutters to himself. He thinks for a moment then takes a chomp out of it. The gold glittery "cap" disappears in his mouth as he chews decisively. A grimace clouds his face.

"What? Is it bad?" Of course it was bad. Leave it to Dean to pick what was probably the worst thing in the store.

Cas coughs and bubbles float out of his mouth. It'd be comical if it wasn't ridiculous and somehow adorable.

"It's… not good. The sodium laureth sulfate completely overpowers the taste of the baking soda." Cas smacks his lips. There's gold glitter on his teeth. Dean almost feels faint.

"I can just take it back–" Dean lunges forward to snatch the bubble bar out of Cas's grip and Cas immediately scoots back.

"With a bite taken out of it? Dean, be reasonable." And then he takes another bite.

"Don't eat it if you don't like it! I'll… throw it away or something." Maybe they'll forget this ever happened and Dean will file this experiment under Failures.

"No. It's a gift and I get to keep it. I'll do what I want with it," Cas says. It breaks down any argument Dean had built up. 

"At least try the other one. Please?" Dean even puts his hands together in mock prayer. Cas gives him the hairy eyeball but relents, setting the bubble bar aside. 

He pulls the bath bomb out of the bag so delicately, his fingers so gentle on it. Cas could make bank as a hand model.

"I saw this one first and thought it was funny because… heh, Butterball. Like the turkey. But then I looked it up and did you know they're not called Butterball because they have butter in them? It's because they're round and yellow. Just like that is." Dean jams his hands in his pockets and stops himself speaking any further. 

Cas takes a bite just as carefully but makes a mess, as the bath bomb starts crumbling to bits between his teeth. He doesn't seem to care though because his face lights up. 

"Better?" Dean wonders if he can hear a faint fizzing sound.

"Yes! Normally, I wouldn't like the citric acid or the shea butter, but they're tempered just enough by the baking soda. The complexity is actually very enjoyable!" Cas smiles down at the bath bomb. 

"That's great, actually! Because they have a lot more there, and they have a lot of other stuff in them and I thought you probably wouldn't like all the extras but now… We could go and get you something else," Dean says, already thinking of which ones to get next. Something with the coarse salt in them, maybe. Or the flowers?

Cas nods decisively. "It's a date, then."

Dean almost asks if he heard that right, but instead bounces up on his toes and says, "Right! A date."

[primordialangels]

Howdy!

Hey there everynyan....! I just wanted to say, I'm moving accounts...!!

Yes, you read that right! I have had this tumblr for 10+ long years, and I've finally decided to live my true 90s/00s dreams and disconnect almost completely from social media, haha. Here are some reasons for this shift under the cut. Thank you for reading if you do, and peace out! ☆

I realized recently that I have never taken a real true break from tumblr, and that I've been on here now every week of my life for a literal decade-- Since I was like 13 or so! Which is just, like. Crazy. I just think my brain deserves a break, yanno what I mean?

Because while I was on this road trip away from everything online, I realized just how wonderful the world can be when you're not constantly comparing yourself to everything online-- Especially artistically!! And I wanna say this too-- even if you tell yourself, "I'm not comparing myself to all these other artists/sexy people!" Yes. Yes you are. You're doing it even right now I bet. Because it's a subconscious process human beings can't just turn on or off! It just happens on it's own wether we want it to or not! And I realized that becuz the ONLY time I felt artistically shitty on my trip was when I visited a comic book shop, lmao!! I thought "oh god I gotta get better, these guys are so fucking good" but like, I didnt even mean to! I didn't think I was comparing myself at all! But it was like, AS SOON as I saw other cartoonists. BOOM. instantly felt bad haha. So? That told me that I've been feeling that way near CONSTANTLY by being on social media ever since I was 13 years old!! That's literally insane. No wonder I can't "see myself" while others can! I've constantly been (subconsciously) putting myself down for not "being good enough" when in actuality, I'm perfectly fine just how I am! It was hugely eye-opening for me and made me really rethink my reason for using social media, and tumblr in particular since it's, ofc, been my favorite for such a long time...

And so when I started wondering what reason I have for using tumblr, n I realized that I've been telling myself, "I'm using it to gain artistic inspiration!"-- But like..... How much inspo do you need to gather until it's enough? I think I have enough inspiration on this account to use for the rest of my life, really!! lmao! So I want to actually start using the inspiration i've already gained instead of acquiring more n more n more of it, yanno? I just think it's like, lol... My head is full enough! Time to use what i've gained rather than continue to squander it! It's that sort of thing...!

And Ik we like to joke that tumblr is the anti-social media-- But... The sad truth is, it really isn't! I realized when I was meditating recently that all social media acts just like a slot machine. You pull down the screen and refresh and new fun stuff to look at pops up. And even tho yes, followers aren't a big deal here like they are elsewhere-- Tumblr is still no different, becuz it uses that same exact model, yanno? And so.... Yeah....! I just... Haha, idk. I wanna try n use the internet in a more classical way, is all.

So... Yeah! I just wanted to provide a bit of insight into my mindset rn idk, lol.

My new account is > AncientMachine (yes same name haha, I love it!) And on there I won't be reblogging much of anything. It'll just be text posts/my thoughts and feelings, maybe photography n doodles, manga caps, etc etc that sorta thing. A truly personal experience, I would say. So, if you don't feel like following a diary sort of blog, I totally understand, and I just wanna say thank you so much for the time you spent together with me here, especially within these past 2 years. Tumblr has been there for me when often times, no one else has. I've learned a lot by being here. And I think that's truly special, and I cherish this account with all my heart. I won't be deleting it, it'll stay up and act as my own personal archive-- but yeah...! I think it's time I finally move onto new horizons. I hope you'll join me on this brand new personal journey, but even if you don't, that's alright, and so long!! Have fun and good luck out there-- I'll see ya around! ☆

-- Lucky <3

[nevermindirah]

Do you have any thoughts on the use of AAVE for Nile (or lack thereof) in TOG fanfiction? I've been reading some Book of Nile fic and some writers seem to write her as a Millennial™ (using words like "fave" and "woke") but never acknowledge her Blackness in her patterns of speech. I know we don't see her use as much AAVE in the films, but I would argue she's in situations where code-switching would be valued (first in a "professional" environment in the army, then around a group of non-Black strangers).

Hi anon! I have many thoughts on this and I'm honored you asked me! But I should start by saying I'm white and any thoughts Black fans and especially Black American fans have on this that they want to share would be beyond lovely. (I'm not gonna tag anybody bc that feels rude but please add onto this post if any of y'all see this and want to!)

The main reason I personally avoid AAVE for Nile in my own fics is because I'm not Black. But Nile-centric fics by Black writers tend to avoid using much of it too, at least from what I've noticed/understood, and my guess is it's largely for the reason you mention, that she's in situations that encourage code-switching.

In movie canon Nile is highly competent at tailoring her language to each situation she finds herself in. This fantastic linguistics analysis meta shows how skillfully Nile chooses her vocabulary and grammar to meet her goals with different conversation partners in different contexts. In comics canon Nile had a bunch of different civilian jobs before joining the Marines, so she would've had experience code-switching in the ways that made sense for all those different contexts as well as the Marines and her family and high school and wherever else she spent her time before we met her. And now she's spending her time with a handful of immortals none of whom are native English speakers and a fellow Black American but one with a Queen's English UK accent whose professional experience is in the CIA where high-status code-switching is often an absolute must for success or even survival.

Fics featuring Nile are charged with extrapolating from that to how it might show up in her use of language that she's coping with a traumatic separation from her family and her career and pretty much everything she's ever known and now she needs to be able to make herself understood to people who seem to care about her and each other but are super duper in crisis, three (soon to be four) of whom predate Modern English entirely and the only one who's anywhere near her contemporary she's not supposed to talk to for a century. All of these people are telling her that pretty much any contact with any mortals poses an existential threat to her and the rest of the group. How the FUCK is she supposed to cope with that, like, generally? And would it be a more effective way for her to cope if she talked to Andy Joe and Nicky using the speech patterns that she used to use with her mom and brother, to at least retain that part of her identity even if it means having to do a lot of explaining, or would it meet her needs better to prioritize Andy Joe and Nicky understanding what she means with her words over using the particular words and grammar forms she used with her family?

I've seen several fics, both Nile-centric / BoN and otherwise, explore this a little bit in how/whether Nile uses Millennial™ speak. It's often a theme in Nile texting Booker despite the exile because of the popular headcanon that he as The Tech Guy is the only other immortal who understands memes. But Nile's much-younger-than-Booker mom probably uses Boomer and/or Gen X memes and Andy has been adapting to new communication styles for forever as evidenced by her canon high level of fluency with standard-American-accented English.

Which brings us back to people avoiding AAVE because they're not Black and they don't want to make mistakes (or they're not Black and they don't want to get yelled at for making mistakes, though I think many people overestimate how much they'll get yelled at while underestimating how much these mistakes can hurt). I can imagine some Black fans hold back from using much AAVE in fic because they don't want to share in-group stuff with white people who are likely to then adopt and ruin it, as white people so often do with Black cultural stuff. Some links about this including a great Khadija Mbowe video. I'm saying this gently, anon, because you might not know: woke, an example you cited as Millennial™ speak, is AAVE, and that's gotten erased by so many white people appropriating it and using it incorrectly online.

And also there's the part where fandom is a hobby and you never know when you're reading a fic that's the very first thing someone's ever written outside of a school assignment. This cultural considerations of language shit takes a level of effort and skill that not everybody puts into every fic, or even could if they wanted to because they haven't had time to build their skills yet. It's definitely easier for non-Black fans to project our millennial feels onto Nile than to do the layers of research and self-reflection it requires to depict what Blackness might mean to Nile, and it's not surprising that often people sharing their hobby creations on the internet have gone the easier route. There's not even necessarily shame in doing what's easier. It's just frustrating and often hurtful when structural white supremacy means that 3-dimensional Black characters are rare in media and thoughtful explorations of them in fandom are seen by the majority of fans as not-easy to make and therefore Nile Freeman, the main character in The Old Guard (2020) dir. Gina Prince-Bythewood, has the least fic and meta and art made about her of our 5 main immortals.

I've been active in different fandoms off and on for twenty years and I barely managed to write 5,000 words about Sam Wilson across multiple different fics in the 7 years since I fell in love with him. There's an alchemy to which characters we connect with, and on top of that which characters we connect with in a way that causes us to create stuff about them. Something about Nile Freeman finally tipped me over the edge from a voracious reader to a voracious writer. It's not for me to judge which characters speak to other individuals to the level of creating content about them, but I do think it's important for us to notice, and then work to fight, the pattern where across this fandom as a whole Nile gets way less content, and way less depth in so much of the content that's in theory about her, than any of these other characters.

Anyway, back to language. My two long fics feature Nile with several Black friends — Copley and OCs and cameos from other media — but all of those characters except Alec Hardison from Leverage aren't American. It's very possible I'm guilty of stereotyping Black British speech patterns in I See Your Eyes Seek a Distant Shore. I watched hours and hours of Black haircare YouTube videos in the research for that fic and I modeled my OCs' speech patterns on what I heard from some of those YouTubers as well as what I've heard people like John Boyega and Idris Elba saying in interviews, but the thing about doing your best is you still might fuck up.

I'm slowly making progress on my WIP where Nile and Sam Wilson are cousins, and what ways of talking with a family member might be authentic for Nile is a major question I need to figure out. For that, I'm largely modeling my writing choices on how I hear my Black friends and colleagues talking to each other. I haven't overheard colleagues talking in an office in a long-ass time, but back when that was a thing, I remember seeing a ton of nuance in the different ways many of my Black colleagues would talk to each other. Different people have different personalities! And backgrounds! And priorities! A few jobs ago my department was about 1/3 Black and we worked closely with Obama administration staff many of whom were Black and there was SO MUCH VARIETY in how Black people talked to each other, about work and workplace-appropriate personal stuff, where I and other white coworkers could hear. There are a few work friends in particular who I have in my head when I'm trying to imagine how Sam and Nile might talk to each other. From the outside looking in, God DAMN is shit complicated, intellectually and interpersonally and spiritually, for Black people who are devoting their professional lives to public service in the United States.

One more aspect of this that I have big thoughts on but I need to take extra care in talking about is the idea of acknowledging Nile's Blackness in her patterns of speech. There's no one right way to be Black, and Nile's a fictional character created by a white dude but there are plenty of real-life Black Americans who don't use much or even any AAVE, for reasons that are complicated because of white supremacy. (Highly highly recommend this video by Shanspeare on the harms of the Oreo stereotype.)

Something that's not the same but has enough similarity that I think it's worth talking about is my personal experience with authenticity and American Jewish speech patterns. My Jewish family members don't talk like they're in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and I've known lots of people who do talk that way (or the millennial version of it), some of whom have questioned my Jewishness because I don't talk that way. That hurts me. Sometimes when another Jew tells me some shit like "I've never heard a Jew say y'all'd've," I can respond with "well now you have asshole, bless your Yankee-ass heart," because the myth of Dixie is a racist lie but I will totally call white Northerners Yankees when they're being shitty to me for being Southern, and this particular Jew fucking revels in using "bless your heart" with maximum polite aggression, especially with said Yankees. But sometimes I don't have it in me to say anything and it just quietly hurts having an important part of me disbelieved by someone who shares that important part of me. The sting isn't quite the same when non-Jews disbelieve or discount my Jewishness, but that hurts too.

Who counts as authentically Jewish is a messy in-group conversation and it doesn't really make sense to explain it all here. Who counts as authentically Jewish is a matter of legal status for immigration, citizenship, and civil rights in Israel, and it's my number 2 reason after horrific treatment of Palestinians that I'm antizionist. But outside that extremely high-stakes legal situation, it can just feel really shitty to not be recognized as One Of Us, especially by your own people.

It can also feel really shitty to be The Only One of Your Kind in a group, even if that group is an immortal chosen family who all loves each other dearly. Sometimes especially in a situation like that where you know those people love you but there are certain things they don't get about you and will never quite be able to. I'm definitely projecting at least a little bit of my "lonely Jew who will be alone again for yet another Jewish holiday" stuff onto Nile when at the end of I See Your Eyes Seek a Distant Shore she's thinking about being the only Black immortal and moving away from the community she'd built with a mostly-Black group of mortals in that fic. Maybe that tracks, or maybe that's fucked up of me.

Basically, this got very long but it's complicated, writing about experiences that aren't your own takes skill which in turn takes time and practice to build, writing about experiences not your own that our society maligns can cause a lot of harm if done badly, it can also cause a lot of harm when a large enough portion of a fandom just decides to nope out of something that's difficult and risky because then there's just not much content about a character who deserves just a shit ton of loving and nuanced content, people are individuals and two people who come from the exact same cultural context might show that influence in all kinds of different ways, identity is complicated, language is complicated, writing is hard, and empathy and humility and doing our best aren't a guarantee of avoiding harm but they do go a long way in helping people create thoughtful content about a character as awesome and powerful and kind and messy and scared and curious and WORTHY as Nile Freeman.