#especially if your character would have to source those materials??

[doomdoomofdoom]

Some more from the notes because this is the funniest shit I've ever seen

from @fennel-tea:

from @peachcat14:

from @aierie--dragonslayer:

from @thelealinhypehouse:

[shelleysmary]

lots of fans have made valid points and written well-thought-out posts about the trop ai drama, so i'm not gonna rehash them, but i do want to bring up something that no one seems to be talking about and it's the impulse that leads people to plug these things into ai generators in the first place.

fandom over the last year especially has become increasingly toxic to the point that actual billion-dollar corporations are afraid it. the result is subpar, pandering films, books, and television shows that break no new ground, recycle old tropes, and sacrifice story integrity to avoid catching heat from the loudest, most entitled people in the room. i'm calling this an issue of entitlement first and foremost because the idea that the audience should have any say over a non-crowd-created media project is preposterous. deciding that the cons outweigh the pros of watching something and choosing to walk away without making a fuss is a lost discipline now because everyone with an internet connection and a social media account believes that their vision reigns supreme. "how dare this show downplay my favorite ship! they were supposed to kiss! that was the whole point! the absence of this one thing i had on my wishlist is a crime against me personally!" so they turn to ai and click some buttons and now these gifs exist and are being circulated with an air of "i've righted a wrong." worse, the use of ai in this way is being conflated with the creation of fanworks???

there are reasons why i don't believe the ai saurondiel kiss is on the same raft as, say, making them kiss in a drawing or a published fanfic, but my main concern is with the spirit behind each. fanworks are made in homage to the source material, even the fix-it fics. there is an acknowledgment, a separation even, between the television show and the fanwork. this separation is necessary and i would say even integral to the nature of fan creation, while ai closes that gap until it no longer exists. the elimination of space between creator and audience also happens on social media, when disgruntled fans who have taken umbrage with a fictional character or creative decision directly harass the writers or the actors involved. more and more, fans are demanding to be in the rooms, in the minds, and to exert control over the people who tell their stories, and it has only ever worked to our collective detriment. now i'm not saying that if you liked and shared the saurondiel ai kiss that you're the same as the internet trolls who harass (mostly) women and people of color online. but i'm begging you to do some self-reflection and ask yourself why you feel entitled to seeing what you want on your screen.

what has changed in the last few years that would make you dissatisfied with, say, reading someone's fic or making your own drawing? is it a matter of "the tool is there, so why not use it?" is it "i believe it should have happened and it didn't and i feel cheated?" or maybe there's been a pattern you've noticed in your recent media "consumption" (god, i hate that word) where, unless a show or television series goes the exact way you want it to, it feels like you've been defrauded somehow? i'm not being facetious. i'm inviting you to notice that what you're feeling is probably discomfort, disappointment, maybe even cognitive dissonance because you imagined it going one way, and now you're at a loss because it didn't. you built it up in your head, you had something to look forward to, you were convinced that it would happen, it was exciting and you were so eager to get to that point, and then.... and then...

we've all been there. and it sucks. but i also want to remind you of how important it is to preserve the separation. this space is ours. the writer's room, the filming set, the editing room, those spaces are theirs. the actors' likenesses are theirs. thinking beyond trop, the separation is how we get creative works that challenge us politically, emotionally, that make us uncomfortable and tell us important truths. writers shouldn't have to - and shouldn't FULL STOP - do what we want them to do. sometimes that means knowing when to walk away, when to say "i no longer enjoy this show, i will no longer support it" or "i will continue to watch but pretend things went differently," the latter of which has been the spark that has moved so many online fans to draw, paint, write, or sew. it's a type of creation that allows "canon" and "fanon" to exist parallel to one another. moreover, the effort it takes to make anything with your own two hands, with your own time, and with your own energy increases your appreciation for the creative impulse. films and books and television stop being "products" for your "consumption" because you're aware of what goes into them, and it becomes easier to look at things you don't like or disagree with and say, "you know what, i'm gonna pass," or "not in my headcanon."

oh, and by the way plugging things into an ai generator? is theft. the same way that it's generally frowned upon for people to use ai to, say, write the rest of an unfinished fic without the express permission of the fanwork creator, using the actors' likenesses to make them kiss goes against everything the actors' union fought for last year. i'll also add that it's incredibly creepy. almost all of us are in agreement that intimacy coordinators are a good thing because they act - again! - as a separation between what's "real" and what isn't, the same way going on ao3 and reading a fic that very clearly says on the tin that it's a fanfic, unaffiliated with the official ip, is a separation. it's another beast entirely to normalize fan-use of ai, to say you support creatives, support actors, support unions, and then do this in your personal life. i repeat the question: what impulse leads anyone to believe that this is okay other than a feeling of misplaced ownership?

tl;dr: ai nonsense does not belong in fandom spaces. (in my home state of california, it is illegal to use digital replicas of an actor's voice or likeness in place of their actual services without their informed consent [which, in spirit, is what you're doing by using ai to make your gifs]). we all just need to mind our own business and go back to writing our fix-it fics and complaining to our friends in relative peace. if you're finding it impossible to do so, ask yourself why. remember that fanart is our longstanding tradition. stop outsourcing it to an unregulated technology just because your two faves didn't kiss.

[perseidlion]

So there's this character in Dead Boy Detectives.

He's:

Attractive

Flirts shamelessly with Edwin

Makes physical advances toward Edwin

Makes Charles jealous and "gets in the way of the main ship"

Is of indeterminate age but is possibly decades or centuries old

Can transform into an animal.

And it's this guy:

AND YET I have never seen any discourse calling Monty a creep and a predator.

Unlike The Cat King, he even kissed Edwin suddenly and without explicit consent. He also lied, manipulated and betrayed all of them and nearly got them killed. Yes, he said he didn't know Esther was planning on destroying them. But c'mon, it's Esther.

Somehow though, the fandom vilifies The Cat King more than Monty. I think the reason why is worth a long, hard look in the mirror.

The biggest difference between the two is TCK's sexual nature and his in-your-face queerness. Those are two things that have been historically vilified and othered about gay/queer men.

Even these days, through the whole "no kink at pride" discourse, this argument continues through respectability politics.

Simply put, a short little twink with a crush is a non-threatening gay man, while TCK with his overt sensuality and gender non-conforming clothing represents a threat. Monty's advances are seen as cute, while TCK's are predatory, even though Monty propositioned Edwin with a kiss as surely as TCK overtly propositioned him.

If TCK's sexually-charged flirting bothered you in a way that Monty's advances didn't (despite the fact the audience knew that at least at first, Monty's advances were a big old lie) ask yourself why that is. The reason is probably that you were taught to fear and vilify overt displays of queer sexuality . Even queer people need to unlearn this particular bias.

And just to cover all the bases, I will shout again that The Cat King is a fae/trickster and that Edwin's punishment was proportionate in that context. Edwin used magic and confined a creature he knew to be as intelligent as a human and was punished for it with a very long leash and a (totally doable) task. It was a task designed to make Edwin see the cats as individuals instead of tools to help him close a case. The sort of fiction that DBD has its roots in (and the source material) is full of these sort of eye-for-an-eye type of punishments with magical creatures.

Just to be clear, I don't think we should be vilifying Monty, either. You can't 1:1 fictional scenarios onto real life and apply our standards of morality to them, especially not in a setting with man-eating mushrooms, ghosts, and transforming animals. All the conflict these two characters brought to the plot was necessary. If everyone acted with perfect morality all the time, fiction would be incredibly boring.

And IF you did apply RL standards to fiction, you would have to acknowledge that Edwin's crime of binding and forcing a fully sentient being to give him information violated just as much consent as TCK putting that bracelet on Edwin. And that Monty was just as "predatory" as The Cat King, if not more so. The Cat King, at least, never lied to Edwin, while everything about Monty was a lie from the start.

[ceaselesswatchersspecialboy]

This definitely leans more into personal opinion, but I truly think Arcane suffered by making Warwick stray so far from his original canon.

For anyone unaware of League lore, Warwick is known as the Wrath of Zaun, a wolfish beast lurking the streets, driven by the scent of blood and a past he wishes to forget. Genuinely, I’d recommend reading his biography and short story, as it gives an insight into how he views himself as like the people he kills.

Because Vander was initially based on the league lore — a former gangster who abandoned his old, violent ways in hopes of a new life, but he could never escape his past, no matter how hard he tried — he already bleeds into Warwick smoothly, and not much needed to be changed.

This part of his bio in particular is so interesting in context of Vander, in both how he personally sees himself, and how others see him, as the supposed Hound of the Undercity. Already, they set up allusions to this inner beast, the darkness everyone has but tries to hide, only ever showing itself in our worst actions, like drowning your own brother, let’s say, or, trying to.

Vander is, at his core, guilty. Not the perfect father, not the perfect man, but still a man who tries to do what he sees as right. Warwick is the perfect reflection of that, and is also the perfect tragedy.

I can see why they wanted to change it up, but they didn’t really know what to do with him, and his ending feels anti-climactic with very little build up. You’re left asking yourself what was the point of even bringing him back, as it didn’t actually add anything interesting narratively, besides bringing the sisters back together. In the end, the emotional beats they set up cultivate into nothing clear. And It doesn’t feel at all like Warwick, despite how they set him up.

There’s no in depth exploration of Warwick’s perspective either, which may be why it feels emptier. He doesn’t feel like his own character anymore, only a prop to further the sisters’ story, and then die. It’s a choice to be sure, especially considering we again have a whole short story exploring Warwick’s psyche to go off of.

Sometimes trying to change the source material heavily isn’t for the better, and this is one of those cases to me. I think the loss of Vander would have been more impactful if there was more focus on Warwick becoming Warwick and him rejecting the sisters, because the memories are too painful for him, and his ending being him left roaming the streets of Zaun, hunting criminal, cycling back to the violence he wanted so desperately to free himself from.

[alittlebitofloveliness]

In defence of Steve Randle

Listen guys, Steve Randle gets a lot of hate in this fandom and as much as it pains me, it's valid. Everyone has their own interpretation of the source material, and fandom is supposed to be fun, so it is absolutely valid and ok to hate or love any character you want. You can hate Steve for many reasons or for no reason at all! This is fandom! That's ok! The story is for you interpret and love and play with and hate on to your hearts content. HOWEVER, to say that Steve Randle isn't an important character to the novel is simply not true, and to say that he hates Ponyboy requires ignoring or downplaying some pretty key moments of the book. This is especially true for those of you who love Dally but hate Steve, because Steve gets a lot of hate for being kind of a dickhead (which lbr, a lot of seventeen years old are, especially to their friend's little siblings) while Dally gets less for doing a lot worse (harassing Cherry, jumping kids, etc). This isn't to say that either character is better- they're both great, nuanced characters who have done bad things, but the fandoms attitudes towards them when they share a lot of characteristics is really telling. Even Ponyboy's narration about them is pretty similar- Pony doesn't particularly like Steve, and he was canonically scared of Dally, but they're both members of his gang and he doesn't hate either of them. You don't have to like Steve as a character, just like you don't have to like Dally or Darry or Tim Shepard or even Ponyboy, but he is important- and he doesn't hate Ponyboy, nor does Ponyboy hate him.

A really important moment in the book is when Ponyboy and Johnny defend Dally after he harasses Cherry and Marcia.

"Dally's okay," Johnny said defensively, and I nodded. You take up for your buddies, no matter what they do. When you're a gang, you stick up for the members. If you don't stickup for them, stick together, make like brothers, it isn't a gang any more. It's a pack. A snarling, distrustful, bickering pack like the Socs in their social clubs or the street gangs in New York or the wolves in the timber."

This line here is super important. Pony and Johnny were willing to defend Dally after he sexually harrassed Cherry and Marcia- soc girls who they clearly liked and were intimidated by- in the name of being a good friend, because that is what's important to them and their gang. If they're willing to do it in this context for Dally, you'd best believe they'd do the same for Steve, and him for them. Steve can and will rag on Ponyboy within the gang, but he'd never dream of bad mouthing him to anyone else. Dependability is important to the gang, and Steve would never publicly shit talk Pony, and vice verca. Regardless of their squabbles within the gang, at the end of the day they've got each others backs. They're buddies. We see evidence of this at the end of the book, when Pony grabs the bottle and threatens the socs with it.

"You really would have used that bottle, wouldn't you?" Two-Bit had been watching from the storedoorway. "Steve and me were backing you, but I guess we didn't need to. You'd have really cut them up, huh?"

The important thing here is that along with Two-bit, Steve was backing Ponyboy, no questions asked. Sure most of it boils down to Pony being a member of the gang and that deep rooted loyalty to one another, but the context for this scene is that Ponyboy was sitting on Steve's car waiting for Steve and Two to stop flirting with some girls. The three of them were hanging out- without Darry, without Sodapop. It's their school lunch break. We know Ponyboy has middle class friend's at school, or that he could've spent time in the school library. It was a deliberate choice to hang out with Two and Steve. He wasn't forced into it. Canonically, Steve and Ponyboy hang out. Never alone, but they're decent enough friends to hang out together in a group. Doesn't everyone have friends like that? I do. This isn't the only textual instance either where they hang out without the entire gang being present. Early on, Pony offhandedly mentions that sometimes Steve and Soda will buy him pop and teach him about cars if he hangs around the DX.

"I had walked down to the DX station to get a bottle of pop and to see Steve and Soda, because they'll always buy me a couple of bottles and let me help work on the cars."

He could've just said Soda's name here but he didn't. Steve buys Pony pepsi and teaches him about cars, even though he gets annoyed with him when Soda invites him to hang around with them too often. And honestly, who wouldn't? I'd be annoyed if my best friend always invited her little brother along with us, even if I liked the kid. Wouldn't you?

Now, we do need to address the elephant in the room. I'm talking of course, about this quote;

"I'd never tell Soda, because he really likes Steve a lot, but sometimes I can't stand Steve Randle. I mean it. Sometimes I hate him."

I feel like very often people forget the context this quote comes from, and so it's magnitude is blown way out of proportion. Ponyboy has just been jumped and then immediately scolded by his brother who constantly makes him feel foolish and unwanted. He's already scared, embarassed, and defensive and then Steve goes and makes him feel even more unwanted. Of course he wants to lash out. Of COURSE he feels like he hates Steve in that moment. I did even reading it. But Ponyboy doesn't truly hate Steve. This moment is PEAK fourteen year old having a rough night energy, it's not truly representative of Steve as a character or of Ponyboy's feelings towards him. In truth, Steve actually kind of likes Ponyboy and is at very least protective over him. This is evidence by the previous quotes, but also when Ponyboy comes back from Windrixville, and is worried about the state placing him in foster care;

"'No, [Ponyboy said] 'they ain't goin' to put us in a boys' home.' 'Don't worry about it,' Steve said, cocksure that he and Sodapop could handle anything that came up. 'They don't do things like that to heroes.'"

It's subtle, and not immediately obvious to the traumatized fourteen year old who is used to Steve's cocky nature, but this is both a reassurance and a very bold claim. Not only is Steve trying to look out for Ponyboy the way the rest of the gang models- by treating him like a kid, letting the 'adults' worry about grown up issues in a misguided attempt to protect Pony- he is also throwing in his lot to make sure nothing does happen. Based on this quote and the rest of Steve's characterization throughout the book its not hard to infer that Steve would fight tooth and nail to make sure Ponyboy stays safe with his family. Sure, part of it is gang loyalty, part of it is his devotion to soda, but part of it is because he and Ponyboy are buddies in their own right, no matter how much they fight. They are friends- and Steve is an incredibly important character for many reasons, but particularly to add depth to Pony's character, to the bond between the Curtis gang, and to highlight how the Curtis gang differs from the other gangs in Tulsa. Steve is just as much an outsider as the rest of the gang, and it's disingenuous to say otherwise no matter how much you may hate him as a character.

[ask-whitepearl-and-steven]

Um, hi! Regarding that other anonymous asker wondering about the comic's enjoyability, I actually WAS one of the people who voted "I've never watched the show but I do read the comic" in that poll; all my prior knowledge about Steven Universe was from passive osmosis. I don't know anyone personally who likes it either, my baseline is limited to, like, the premise and 'hey I think that one's a major character?' every now and then (this was most recently Lapis Lazuli. Peridot I'm prettttty sure is canon, but I didn't recognise her right off. Betting that Sea Glass isn't. No clue about Jasper).

So if it's of any help, from my experience I do think that your comic is fairly accessible to folks outwith the Steven Universe fandom! I read long-form fanfiction for media I know nothing about on a regular basis, and it does a good job of explaining the core concepts required for the plot to hold water; it makes it much harder to spot foreshadowing that I feel may have been more obvious to experienced readers (e.g. I didn't get anywhere near working out Earl's issue because I didn't know that A. White Diamond could do mind control, or B. what societal role Pearl-class gems (is that the term?) hold relative to the Diamonds), but the actual narrative itself holds up well so long as you're willing to put the thought in. Actively following your blog helps a bit too, I've gotten extra context clues from the FAQ and asks you've answered.

My one warning would be that reading a long-form story for a fandom you don't know is a very different experience. The best way I could describe it is akin to reading Arthurian stories or folkloric retellings without studying the source material: while the main narrative is comprehensible, you become distinctly aware that certain parts are name-checking their original culture in a way that the author expects to be apparent but isn't, not to you. I spend a lot of time faintly baffled when I'm not cross-referencing between multiple fics for commonalities to reverse-engineer (also do that regularly, would recommend), which is fine! It's fun! Might not be for everyone, though.

I just want you to know I love this ask, and I was enraptured reading this. It's a very cool insight! Especially as someone with the exact opposite reading philosophy, this is extremely valuable.

It's neat to also get a confirmation about the fact that a lot of over-the-top stuff that was meant to echo the original show might not get pinged by those who aren't familiar with the original. Though to be fair, people didn't quite pick up on what was happening with Earl even when they knew what White Diamond's powers were.

I also find it hilarious to realize that Jasper might not be a recognizable original-show character to most outsiders. DEMOTED!

[inthehouseoffinwe]

Aite, female character and general inclusivity rant incoming. Hate it and want to make a post? Sure. But give me the respect I gave those who inspired this and don’t tag me in it:

People immediately bringing the ‘female character’ argument into things drives me insane. Like we know she’s a female character, but trust me, that’s got very little to do with why people dislike her.

Are some people misogynistic? Absolutely!

Are most people misogynistic? No.

When we talk about Galadriel, and Luthien, and Elwing, and Aredhel, and Nimloth, and Melian, and Nerdanel, and Ahsoka, and Padme, and *insert literally any female character from any fandom here*, being female has nothing to do with it. It barely crosses our minds.

So for the love of all that is good, stop bringing ‘but she’s a female character! Anyone who sees her as anything but perfect, or thinks the male characters made better choices than her is obviously horrible and misogynistic and would never do this to a man :(‘ Into arguments.

I don’t care how few there are in the work. You can explain why you like her without blaming people for hating on the fact she’s female when 95% don’t. There are very literally hundreds of other reasons people interpret fictional events which portray the fem char negatively.

Especially in work like the Silm which is written by a canonical in-universe historian with basic backstory. We have every right to see him as unreliable and play with what that could mean. Doesn’t make it misogynistic if we want to see female characters as more shifty than they’re outwardly portrayed. Many of us often do the same with male characters, and even if we don’t, you have no right to judge someone so harshly when you barely know a thing about them outside an online persona. 99.9% of people don’t even consider male vs female when they write these things. And it’s not because of some weird subconscious misogyny either.

This is mainly aimed at those who bring this up over. And over. And over again in some weird attempt at guilt tripping people into ‘liking’ characters.

On the topic of things people do that make no sense, if characters are stated as being white, and an artist draws them all white. You have no right to say they’re being racist or whatever else you want to come up with.

Nor do you have the right to slander anyone who casually points out the character is white if others draw them as anything else. If we can call out whitewashing, we can talk about the opposite too. As long as the person isn’t being outright rude, have a conversation.

And don’t get me started on tagging pieces of fanart and fics specifically created platonic with a ship. Like the work? Great! Now respect the intentions of the person who created it.

No one in a fandom space, especially artists and writers, owes inclusivity of any kind when running off canon source material. You want to blame someone for a boring cast, blame the author! But even in general? You don’t get to force or guilt others to create content - original work included - that fits your ideal.

Yes I’m a writer and artist of original and fan content. Yes I’ve experienced all of these directly or indirectly.

Sincerely, a young brown woman tired of all the double standards.

[ckret2]

How do you (personally) rank the validity of different canon sources?

Ex. Show, Books, Livestreams, Panels, Deleted Scenes ect.

Disclaimer ahead of time that this is solely for my own personal canon-compliant fic writing purposes and I don't expect anyone else to follow this or even think they're obligated to write canon compliantly

Tier one: the show is more canon than the books, but only 1% more canon. In defiance of Alex's decree, I do treat Little Gift Shop of Horrors as canon.

Tier two: everything in the books (plus the books' tie-in websites, like Shmeb-You-Unlocked or TINAWDC) is canon UNLESS it's contradicted in the show. If there's a contradiction, usually the show wins, but it has to be decided on a case-by-case basis. Sometimes contradicting book info take precedence over show info if the book's info is better. The best outcome is when the info can be smoothly synthesized. (Note that having to weigh a book against the show only applies to CONTRADICTIONS; if the book just ADDS ONTO our knowledge of the show in a way that doesn't actually contradict it, it's automatically canon.)

Also in defiance of Alex, I consider Time Pirates' Treasure wholly canon, with the "official" timeline being one of the ones where they get the treasure and all of the other choose-your-own-adventure branches being things that happened in neighboring parallel timelines.

Out of the books, Journal 3, TBOB (+TINAWDC), and Lost Legends (+Shmeb-You-Unlocked) are the most canon. TBOB takes precedence over Journal 3 on matters where TBOB's lore is clearly intended as an upgrade on prior ideas (ex: the shaman's portal and the pyramids). Dipper & Mabel's Guide, Time Pirates' Treasure (+ the Axolotl page), and Don't Color This Book are secondarily canon. Lazy screenshot-based novelizations of existing episodes are whatever.

I choose to selectively semi-reject some of the skeevier conspiracy theory claims in the books as "Bill's lying about these": outside of those exceptions, going "there's no evidence Bill's lying about this part but I've decided that he is just because I don't like it" is the coward's way and dishonorable.

Info in the Bill Cipher AMA is third tier canon, since it was written in-character and comes directly from Alex. (Some quotes from the AMA were recycled directly into TBOB + TINAWDC.) Gus Burnside's twitter account is also third tier.

For the first three tiers, all info is canon unless something in a higher tier contradicts it.

The Cipher Hunt is 3.5th tier.

All out-of-universe materials—livestreams, panels, interviews, DVD commentary, tweets, doodles & concept art, etc—are fourth tier. If it's contradicted by anything in the higher tiers, they take precedence; but, for lack of a conflict, out-of-universe materials fill in the gaps. But the person involved matters: show writers' statements on the characters are more canon than voice actors' statements. If fourth-tier materials contradict each other, the newer one takes precedence. Fourth-tier materials can be selectively ignored if so desired, but better to find a way to twist them to make them work.

The Gnome Gemulets game is fifth tier; all the lore from it is canon, but the events may or may not have actually happened, or else only loosely happened like that. Gnome Gemulets may occasionally rank higher than the out-of-universe materials.

Disney.com flash games and the like are semi-canon; you CAN take lore and details from them if you want but the events probably didn't literally happen unless you really want to make it work. Okay to imagine that events happened that were loosely inspired by the games.

Deleted scenes and cameos (ex: Bill in the Simpsons) are semi-semi canon. They probably didn't happen, especially if it contradicts canon; but you can freely take ideas and vibes from them and use them as examples of the kinds of things that could happen (ex: Bill would try to con people into buying crypto just for the heck of it).

Unwritten episodes are semi-semi-semi canon: they definitely didn't happen, but by god, you could MAKE them happen.

The How Not To Draw Grunkle Stan short is as yet unknown. Under normal conditions it ought to be semi-semi canon, but since TINAWDC did some stuff with the Henchmaniacs escaping to reality shortly before this clip came out about Bill escaping to reality, there's a slim possibility this is part of a budding storyline about Bill & the gang in the real world, so I'm reserving judgment for now.

[jdorian]

Do you also have the feeling a lot of great people stopped posting and especially writing? Or have they all blocked me? The tags are full but mostly with newer fans who don't seem to have actually watched the show (no offense, although..) and the writers circle seems tiny

well, dear anon, i will be very real with you, it mostly comes down to season 7 and specifically Tommy's reintroduction, the whole bucktommy of it all, or even more specifically the infighting it started.

911 was never really the 911 fandom; it was the buddie fandom with a few blurps of other (canon) ships sprinkled in there, only to get lost due to lack of interest/bad behaviour. (believe me, people were really shitty before all this too)

but now we have two main ships.

which would be okay if people could understand the difference between reality and fiction and could just pay attention to the stuff they like and not get violent and for whatever reason bigoted towards real fans over disliking a character or ship.

i talked endlessly about how all the criticism of Tommy's character basically comes down to "i don't vibe with it, so no one else should either" so i won't go into that, but unfortunately what you saw and still see on the dash is only half of the story.

lots of people ended up unfollowing and blocking people they used to talk to on the daily over this fictional ship, which... you know, if that's all it took i wouldn't necessarily call those "friendships", but it definitely changed how people interact with fan creations.

doing wip games was always about two things; to exchange exposure and to motivate each other and ourselves to write.

those pre-existing tag-chains are mostly broken now and i know that a lot of writers don't want to expose themselves to "the other side" by sharing wips and get demotivated by people being rude, so they keep writing without sharing snippets.

and some people lost the motivation/inspiration to write for the fandom altogether.

it sucks and yeah, people who didn't watch the show aside from scenes of their faves should not be monopolising the tags — as far as i'm concerned they aren't part of the fandom at all. (if you can't even be bothered to watch the source material, why are you even here, genuinely.)

anyway, this got long, but the point is that you're right in your observation and it doesn't just go for writing.

interaction on edits and gifsets and the like have drastically fallen, because so many people have blocked each other, every post has to go through a bazillion blind spots to get to at least 3 more people's dash; because one person will reblog it and then they will be blocked by 5 others who would love to see your content but the people they still follow don't follow anyone that'd reblog your stuff and so on.

TLDR: this fandom is fucked and it's sad, but it is what it is i guess.

[nekropsii]

asking you this since you’re the only person who understands mituna in the entire fandom in my perception of the hs fandom

is it okay to headcanon mituna as autistic? sorry if you get this type of ask a lot/have already answered this type of ask

Instead of answering this question, I will give some food for thought: Mituna has a TBI. He has Brain Damage. This is a core element of his character. Probably the biggest one. In fact, it's so important to him that it's an injury that has remained with him in death. His TBI is a huge, huge part of what makes him... Well, him. It's why he's interesting.

So... Why is a need felt to also declare him as Autistic? Assuming this is a projection thing, since it tends to be most of the time - if you relate to him for his already canonical Neurodivergency, which is Brain Damage, why does one need to give him Autism as well?

Oftentimes when people headcanon him as Autistic, they tend to minimize or even outright erase his TBI. Oftentimes, people say he's Autistic as the reason he's canon Neurodivergent representation... Even though he's shown no real signs of it, but instead is fully written as a character with a Frontal Lobe Injury, and is constantly stated to have Brain Damage.

TBIs and other Neurodivergencies are often seen as less palatable than Autism. On Tumblr especially, it's far more "acceptable" to be Autistic or ADHD or headcanon a character as such than it is to have Brain Damage or literally any other Neurodivergency or acknowledge that a character is written with those. Autism and ADHD are seen as cute and relatable - even though they're very complex and at times devastating disabilities that do have the potential to seriously fuck up your livelihood, much like Depression and Anxiety, and I'm saying this as someone who has and struggles with all 4 - and are often used to erase the presence of other Neurodivergencies. Hell, it's to the point where people use "Neurodivergency" as a synonym for ADHD and Autism.

Again, I'm not going to answer this question for you. I think there's a way someone could potentially make the narrative of Mituna having Autism prior to the TBI compelling - the TBI has essentially stripped him of his ability to mask, after all, so one could make it be a situation where some of these symptoms are ones he already had, but is only just now really getting shit for because he's no longer able to hide it, and part of that tragedy is knowing that had he never been good at masking, his "friends" would have never accepted him. You could get some interesting questions about that. Was the repression worth it? Would it have been better if he'd just been himself the whole time? I think it's extremely valuable to ask yourself why you see any character as any specific minority - necessary, even - and how that affects not only the character's writing in its original text, but also your relationship with said character. Consider optics. Consider the way in which this character is meant to function in the source material. What purpose do they serve, and what is the driving force behind this character? Is Occam's Razor applicable? Are there other explanations as to why they are the way they are? Perhaps ones that are more succinct, and cover more ground?

Yesterday, I watched a film that has provoked a response in Tumblr that I think is applicable. I Saw The TV Glow. It's a film about a Trans Girl who never finds the strength to accept herself or come out. It's an incredibly gut-wrenching watch. It made me cry several times, and there are parts that made me feel a deep pain in my chest. I sat through 95% of the film with a pit in my stomach. I had to lay on the floor in the dark for a while after I finished. There's a scene where the main character is asked whether she likes girls or boys. She says she thinks she likes TV shows, and elaborates by saying that every time she tries to think about that kind of thing, it feels like someone's cutting her open and shoveling out her insides until there's nothing left. Not that there was anything in there to start with, of course - she says she knows there isn't, but she's too scared to look for herself and see.

That scene was about how Gender Dysphoria can completely disrupt your sexuality and repulse you from the thought of that level of connection with others, because it is, in essence, a deep disturbance with the nature of who you are as a person. Many people who are Asexual, or Aromantic, or both, related to that scene because it, on the surface, depicts discomfort with romance and sexuality. What they failed to understand by chalking it up to its own sexuality, is the fact that that scene wasn't depicting a Sex-Repulsed Asexual, or a Romance-Repulsed Aromantic, it was depicting a Trans Girl who is at such deep odds with herself and her identity that she cannot grapple with the concept of loving or being loved.

What, functionally, is the purpose of slapping an extraneous label onto a character that is meant to depict a certain thing? What is the purpose of assigning the label of "Autistic" to a character meant to depict the tragedy of a loss of support after gaining a disability, or "Aromantic" or "Asexual" to a character meant to depict a deep internal struggle with unresolved Gender Dysphoria?

Ask yourself these questions, and carry on from there. See where your mind takes you.

[lotstradamus]

i'm loving all your vampire posting lottie! if you're ever so compelled i'd love to hear what you make of the books vs the show and if there are any book things you'd especially like to see done on the show! (also, bookwise, are you a lestat girl or an armand girl or a louis/marius/david/akasha/claudia girl or or or)

as someone who tried to read Interview with the Vampire thrice (THRICE!!!) pre-AMC show revival and simply could not get through it (it is melancholy), I cannot BELIEVE how down bad I am for these books right now. I keep seeing bad reviews on goodreads and girding my loins for each new book expecting the quality to nosedive, but 1 star bitch WHERE? WHERE??? I AM HAVING THE TIME OF MY GODDAMN LIFE

in terms of books vs show, honestly after a point the books are kind of Unadaptable unless they radically change the main cast, vibe and format of the show every single season, and the changes they made to IWTV were good to the point of sending me fucking insane so they can just keep on doing whatever their little hearts desire with the source material imo!!! howmever I DO have some suggestions for the upcoming seasons:

Lestat crying twice an ep (non-negotiable)

I would kind of love it if Lestat is the only character who tells the truth. the most reliablest narrator and normal girl to ever live. and yet every time he says something like "I killed a pack of wolves single-handedly" or "I woke Those Who Must Be Kept by playing violin" or "I snog my mother with tongue" Daniel is just sitting there like "............riiiight."

Gabrielle. Gabrielle Gabrielle Gabrielle. mainly I would like to smash cut to Gabrielle in the middle of really intense Lestat/everyone else scenes and she's just like peacefully sleeping in the ground... strolling through a distant jungle... sitting on a mountain looking at the stars in silence...

EXCEPT that one scene where she pulls up to Lestat's concert like she's in 2 Fast 2 Furious

it'll be interesting to see how they adapt Queen of the Damned because so little of it is actually from Lestat's pov, and all of it is amazing and cannot be cut out: [Stefon voice] the Twins, Jesse, specifically Jesse being haunted in Louis and Lestat's old New Orleans house, everyone hanging out/playing out terrible interpersonal dramas at the Sonoma compound, NIGHT ISLAND...!

I cannot stress this enough: GHOST CLAUDIA.

I want them to do Body Thief. fuck it, why not. must haves are Mojo, a random hunk with a PhD in Sam Reid's mannerisms playing Lestat for 6/8 episodes, Lestat nearly dying 25 times cos he pilots his human body like a drunk muppet, and, most importantly, Lestat BEGGING David Talbot for some old man pussy

oh and an entire episode set on a cruise ship

my favourite scene from the whole of Body Thief was Lestat turning David at the end against his will cos it was genuinely quite awful and frightening but also. um. you know. awooga

if they include Gretchen, then I would like the opposite of my Gabrielle request for everything post-Body Thief: whenever there's a peaceful, quiet scene it smash cuts to the wilds of South America where Gretchen is absolutely stark raving mad on the floor of a chapel with stigmata

I can't even begin to think about how they'd adapt Memnoch, but regardless I want them to keep the scene where Lestat drinks someone's period blood. thanks

also his cunty little lilac-tinted sunglasses that he will not fucking stop talking about

and finally, human Armand getting drunk and falling into the Grand Canal

bookwise, I am a Lestat girl the house down boots... I love his over-dramatic idiot crybaby ass!!!!! although the final page of Memnoch the Devil made me burst into tears and cry my whole face off until I confirmed that Lestat comes back as the narrator in future books soooo maybe like calls to like. self recognition through the other, etc. I do also get a shot of pure joy every time Armand shows up, especially in Lestat's pov. 'ah, there he was, the Botticelli angel, so beautiful. I fucking hated him. we kissed.' sis THEE dopamine.

currently suffering because I want to a) stop reading the series immediately so I can go back and reread The Vampire Lestat, and yet also b) never ever stop reading the series for love nor money. please help me budget this my family is dying

[blakbonnet]

HAPPY FOX DAY TO ALL THOSE WHO CELEBRATE! Today's a special special AOTW because our featured author this week is best beloved @asneakyfox 🦊

Fox, I genuinely think you're one of the greatest fandom philosophers of our times, and what you write is so much more than regular old meta. Because we're all playing in the sandbox here and while a lot of us lose sight of canon sometimes, you have all four feet firmly planted in the lovely source material we've been provided with. And you don't stop there, you try to actively engage with the community, especially making sure you are keeping an eye on all the differing opinions. I feel like this is why your thesis resonates so thoroughly with different people--it's not trying to prove a point, it's very 'holmes saw a dead body and ejaculated'. You are just so smart that you make the rest of us smarter, but it's never intimidating to talk to you, and I love love love that I get to read your stories and your thoughts because of this show and this fandom.

Fox, brilliant as ever, agreed to answer a few questions for me:

What's your meta writing process like? Do you think in disparate strings about scenes and then write them down as they come to you OR is it usually a conversation or a thought that eats at you until you sit down and untangle it?

generally i'll be thinking about something, usually because i saw another post (or had a conversation about the show on discord; special shoutout to the crew on @figmentof and @scarrletmoon's servers, and especially to @glamaphonic, anything i've ever said you thought was really insightful probably came out of a dm conversation with glam) and some part of a post about it will start writing itself in my head, and unfortunately once that process starts the only way to stop it is to write it down.

even more unfortunately i never know whether it's all going to flow out easily into a coherent essay right away, or if it'll be one of those things where i write two really good paragraphs that ought to go in the middle section of a post that takes a while to figure out how to structure; i just have to start and see where it goes. some meta i've written that got lots of notes was written all at once the moment the thought struck me and posted as soon as it was done, but there's also a few that have been sitting in drafts for months as i keep rewriting the same section without being sure where it goes next.

Favourite themes or characterisations you like to explore while meta writing? (things like Ed's fisherman era and what led to it, etc)

i guess if there's a big theme i keep coming back to it's ed's character arc over the course of the show, his relationship with violence and how it affects his perception of himself and how he has to grow through that to be ready to commit to his relationship with stede. one of the very first things i ever said about the show on tumblr, way back in summer 2022, was that ed's absolute deepest fear was that he is fundamentally unlovable, so it was really a delight to see s2 dive so hard into addressing the exact issues i'd been looking at so explicitly. and of course there's also a lot of fandom racism that plays into some takes that go around about ed, and i think it's really important to call that out and push back against those takes.

i feel like it would be kind of silly to not call out izzy here too. izzy plays an absolutely crucial role in highlighting those exact issues in ed's arc, and i honestly just think the way their whole relationship develops in canon is deliciously meaty and a lot of fandom takes seem determined to flatten it out into something much more boring. so it's important to me to try to highlight the ways you don't have to pretend izzy was a secret good guy all along to appreciate the role he plays in the story.

finally i guess this has only developed over the last several months but i guess one of my trademarks now is speculation about what got deleted from s2. i've always been good at the game of watching a movie and guessing at scenes that were cut or changed, and my spider-sense for that was going off like crazy as i watched s2, and i didn't want to get too speculative at first, but as information has actually come out from samba and vico and other sources, a lot of it's lined up with what i thought. and i'm really interested in how the ofmd writers' room approached storybreaking, so it's worth it to me to try to understand this.

Whose head is it easier to get into - Ed or Stede? Why?

i guess i already answered this! i love them both a lot, and i'd been writing meta for a good while before i consciously realized i'd written a LOT more about ed than about stede, and the ed posts tend to be individually longer than the stede ones too. i think some of this is because ed's arc reads super clearly to me while stede, despite being the main character, gets an arc that's a lot more subtle and internal in some ways (and also i do think suffered significantly from the cuts to the second half of s2). and some of it's because people can be Wrong On The Internet about ed in ways i feel the need to push back against more than about stede. but some of it's just, you know, vibe.

it's always interesting to me that nearly all prolific fic authors in this fandom have a clear very strong preference for which POV they prefer - i don't think all fandoms are like that - but i guess my own alignment is obvious.

Your personal favourite thing you've written that you'd like more people to read

the obvious answer here is the one actual fic i have written for this fandom, "Nothing Could Touch It" which came out of thinking about how there's some post-s2 fic about ed reckoning with this relationship with izzy that i really like but none of it quite got at how i feel like canon's framing it. (don't worry it's not all about izzy! stede's there and there's a bunch of cuddling!)

as far as meta goes though i would call out this as the one i'm probably proudest of, this is the one where i most completely tried to lay out how i saw the show framing ed's relationship with violence during the s1 hiatus, and i think after s2 it holds up pretty well. but also since i was just talking about how i don't say enough about stede, this is the post where i tried to lay out the stuff i really admire in stede as a character.

What is the one word that you think you use a lot?

i've got a bunch of verbal tics i overuse but the one i'm self-conscious about in meta lately is "reading against the text," which sounds so pretentious and lit-crit i really wish there were another good phrase for it. but i think it's really useful as a way to clarify that sometimes i'm saying a particular take is clearly not how the narrative of ofmd is framing something but that doesn't mean you need to stop interpreting it that way. reading against the text is really fun and i recommend it sometimes! but you'll have more fun if you're aware that's what you're doing!

If you were writing his arc, keeping in mind that he stays largely antagonistic in line with the show, how would you have resolved the Izzy problem: would you have made the same decisions the writers made and written a redemption by death OR do you think that the spirit of the show specifically demands Izzy get a good guy (or not as bad a guy) ending where we see his muppetification

one of the predictions i was most confident of before s2 was that if izzy were redeemed, he wouldn't be able to remain in the cast as a good-guy crew muppet afterward. (for this reason i thought the likeliest possibility was a slower redemption arc that wouldn't fully complete till the end of s3.) several times i tried to game out what role a fully redeemed izzy could possibly continue to play within this story, or what personality traits that he showed in s1 he could even hang onto after a full redemption, and i couldn't come up with anything that felt plausible. not "loyalty to your captain," because his devotion to blackbeard was clearly toxic at the root and would need to be purged entirely before it could be replaced by anything healthier; not yelling at people to stop having so much fun and work harder, because that could work in a different story but would run directly counter to the core themes of ofmd - so what's left? i went looking at popular izzy redemption fic that tried to address that question, and some of it came up with answers that worked in the context of a fic focused mostly on izzy, but it was never anything that could possibly work in a tv show that already had established themes and would continue to focus primarily on other characters. and izzy wouldn't be able to just fade into the background with the other muppets after all the focus on him a believable redemption arc would require. so i knew once he was redeemed he'd be done as a character one way or another.

and s2 i think bore that out, honestly in a much more obvious way than i expected - over the course of izzy's s2 arc he's basically divested of all his s1 personality traits until all that's really left by the end is saying twat all the time, and Guy Who Says Twat is not a role the story's going to particularly need going forward. to keep him around after that you'd need to give him enough new traits that he'd be for all practical purposes a new character anyway.

i do sometimes wonder about a world where izzy's s2 arc saw him be offered a clear chance at redemption and choose to reject it and get worse instead. i kind of missed antagonist izzy by the end, and i wonder if a lot of people who'd originally wanted a redemption for him wouldn't have been happier with that even if they didn't realize it - a descent into full villainy would have kept izzy and his relationships with both ed and stede more central to the plot right up till the end, and in particular the sexual aspect of his feelings for ed could have stayed very directly relevant, where the redemption arc necessitated resolving that very firmly to clear it out of the way as early as possible in s2. i never agreed that ofmd's themes necessarily meant redemption for izzy was inevitable - ted lasso was much more overtly a show about redemption than ofmd right from the start, and even ted lasso let at least one of its antagonists make it all the way to the end as an unrepentant scumbag. if there's anything that meant izzy really had to be redeemed imo it wasn't the overall spirit of the show so much as izzy's role in ed's arc - before anything else izzy's narrative role was always to be a walking symbol of the part of ed that fears vulnerability and holds him back from committing himself to love, and for ed and stede to be happily together by the end of s2, ed had to get to a place where he could see that part of himself as something he no longer needs in his life but also doesn't hate anymore. nothing could have symbolized that like having ed embrace izzy as he dies granting ed permission to just be himself.

Why OFMD 🥹

you know, i could say a lot here about how i think ofmd is genuinely incredibly well-written in some ways that are really unusual on american tv. season 1 in particular is just incredibly tight and elegantly plotted, and s2 is messier but that just makes it all the more interesting to look at the constraints they were under that led to that. my day job's in narrative and i really do professionally admire ofmd a lot, which is one of the reasons i tend to think about creator intent more than some people do when i'm writing meta - death of the author is a super valid perspective but personally i'm really interested in trying to figure out why the writers made the choices they made and what i can learn from that for when i'm in their position.

so all of that's true. but also we all know it's kind of beside the point here, this is a hyperfixation, it's not rational. i can tell you i watched the first nine episodes of our flag means death and liked it a lot but in what i would describe as a basically normal kind of way, and then i watched the tenth and at some point during that episode a rat inside my brain hit the dopamine spigot with a wrench and now it won't turn off so here we are.

aaaand if you've made it to this point, please join us in evil ganging up on fox with love by sending a lovely letter to them over on @ofmdlovelyletters who was also kind enough to make this header <3

[cripplecharacters]

Hello! I'm in the middle of a story where my character is about to become Deaf/HoH in one ear as a result of a gun being fired right next to her ear.

I've been doing a lot of research on the effects of being deaf in one ear and was hoping for some tips on how to accurately depict it without falling into any harmful tropes if I haven't already?

Some key things to note are that this is a fanfiction about Attack on Titan, so she's fighting a lot and hearing is very important.

She has had an ability that she was essentially born with that she can see memories of the past and future, and she also visits another world in her dreams and such. Would it be harmful if in this other world she could still hear? She's one of the only characters who can go into the other world and it's not as though she could rely on her hearing in the other world (shes rarely there with other ppl) or use it to hear properly again in reality (if that makes sense)

I just figured it'd make sense since she was essentially there in spirit

When she's seeing someone else's memories she's essentially seeing through their eyes/in their body so that's another instance where she'd still he able to hear assuming the person she was seeing through was hearing

It's really mostly going to affect her ability to fight, and because a big part of her motivation is gaining freedom and not letting anyone fight/die for her, it takes a toll of that makes sense.

This is the first time I'm writing someone with a disability such as this so I want to make sure I write it right, and if I can't or am causing any harm, I won't write it at all

I hope this all makes sense, and if not I apologize

Hi!

You did not write a lot about how you are treating your character’s hearing loss so I don’t know if you are falling into any tropes. Here are some tips:

Deafness in one side, especially when used to equal hearing in both ears, can make someone feel off-balance due to the uneven input. Your character will have trouble locating sounds and may find herself constantly turning her head to try and locate where noises are coming from with her hearing ear. She will also likely struggle with conversations among multiple people because of that difficulty with sound location.

In terms of accommodations: I don’t know about tech in your world, but a lot of audio these days is mixed/surround sound style, meaning there is a difference in audio to each ear. In many modern devices there is an option for mono audio so output through both ears is the same—your character will want to use that. A hearing aid may also help, but not necessarily, and hearing aids are not a cure.

You mentioned she’s a fighter. Hearing loss may affect her ability to hear commands or incoming attacks, but with assistive technology (like a hearing aid or an fm system) if those work for her, and an increased reliance on visual cues, I don’t think she would have to stop fighting because of her hearing loss. (Admittedly I don’t know the source material so if I am missing something about how fighting operates, please let me know. But deafness shouldn’t remove her fighting ability.)

As for the dreamworld, I think it best if she was not functionally hearing because that is acting as a cure. Maybe it can work sort of like a movie, where someone else’s input is received through her own senses? So even if they are hearing, she still hears with her hearing ear.

Mod Rock

[funhouse-mirror-barbie]

What “It’s Written Like a Fanfic” actually means as a criticism—

Lately, I’ve seen a lot of people use “it’s written like fan fiction” as a negative critique of stories that are poorly written.

I’ve especially seen this criticism talked about in regards to Hazbin Hotel, and honestly, it’s a criticism I agree with.

But I wanted to talk specifically about what that means, because I think there are people who hear that criticism and take it to mean that ALL fan fiction is terrible and poorly written.

I need to make it REALLY CLEAR that I am not saying all fan fiction is “bad”.

I’ve written (probably bad) fan fiction! I’m an avid reader of fan fiction! Some of my favorite stories are fan fiction or are derived from fan fiction.

So. How can I use “it’s written like a fanfic” as a negative criticism if I like it so much? Because—

To me, a story being “written like a fanfiction” is only a problem when the writers approach the characters and world of their story as if everything has been pre-established.

The reason fan fiction works, the reason it can be so deeply beloved and celebrated, is usually because fanfiction writers and audiences have already fallen in love with an existing world and characters.

For example, I really love Batman, specifically Batman: The Animated Series. When I read fan fiction about Batman, I don’t always want to, or need to, read about Bruce Wayne’s backstory and his reasons and motives for becoming Batman. That’s something that can be explored and elaborated on in many interesting ways in fan fiction, but it’s not really something I need a beat by beat explanation on.

And, in this scenario, the writer of the fic doesn’t need to spend time establishing Batman’s basic characterization and relationships. There’s an assumption that the audience and readers already have an idea of those subjects. That’s why they’re seeking out fan fic—because they’ve already delved into the source material, and want to see more of those characters and that world.

That’s not to say one CAN’T write fan fiction about origin stories and establishing lore and all that, or that those stories will always be poorly written. But it’s not necessary for someone who’s already a fan to understand what’s going on if the writer wants to elaborate on an already established character or story.

In fan fiction, the heavy lifting of establishing character relationships, backstories, and basic relationships, etc. has usually already been done by the source material.

The reason someone seeks out fan fiction is (almost always) because they already know and enjoy the characters and setting, and want to hear more stories about those characters.

However, if you’re writing your own story, you need to take the time to establish your story’s basic tone, plot, characters and so on, before you can get to the exciting and more gripping or engaging parts of your narrative.

Hazbin Hotel (the Amazon series) is very guilty of skipping over a lot of the work of building up and establishing its characters and world and how they mesh with the plot and narrative.

The most egregious examples I can think of is when (v)Aggie throws the crew into the turf war, we don’t get to SEE any of the bonding the Hazbin crew have, and are then told afterwards that they’re closer and we see them reminiscing about the fight.

The same thing happens when Husk tells everyone what their personal “issues” are because he’s the bartender and can “see through them” because of that. It would be actually nice if we got to SEE how he learned those things, but instead he just lists off characteristics that people who are already fans of the show know from following the shows development.

Brand new audiences just have a bunch of character traits told to them all at once, and don’t actually get to SEE these characterization happen naturally.

I think the main reason Hazbin is written like this is mostly because the creators publicly developed the story online over many, many years.

Anyone who was already a fan of Hazbin’s creators’ previous work probably followed Hazbin’s 10 year development. And as a result, they probably listened to a lot of livestreams, read some of the supplemental comics, went to Q/A streams, and read the creator’s blog. Due to that, they already KNOW a lot about the story and world and characters, and so they don’t notice if those basic world-building and character development ARENT in the show itself.

And obviously, this is all just my opinion, but it very much seems to me like this slow and public development of Hazbin’s characters and story may have had the negative side affect of the creator and writers forgetting that they still have to build up and develop these things in the actual show itself.

Long time fans of the story when it was just a bunch of loose concepts and early characterizations can watch the finalized series of “Hazbin Hotel”, and are able to bridge gaps in the story and characterization because they’ve probably been reading blogs about Hazbin for at least 5 years.

But when someone completely new to the series watches it, there’s a chance they’re going to find the story rushed and disjointed, because they don’t have the background information on the story’s development.

This is a problem specifically because, to write an engaging and competent story, you HAVE to take the time to establish basic things first, and then you have to take the time to BUILD UP to deeper characterization, plot points, character relationships and so on.

Hazbin Hotel the show feels like “a bad fan fic” because it’s, in my opinion, written for people who are already fans, and written by people who want to skip straight to the “fun” parts of their story. But the writers still recognize that the story needs to be accessible to people who are not familiar with it, and to compensate they have to cram in as many explanations and justifications to try and make their story make sense.

The result is that Hazbin Hotel has tons of bland exposition, rushed character arcs and introductions, tonal inconsistencies and confusing lore, and a world and characters that are half-formed and fall flat.

That’s what I personally think the criticism “written like a bad fan fic” means. That the narrative feels like it is based on a preexisting piece of media, and therefore is missing the building blocks needed to make the narrative feel like a believable and fully formed story.

As a side note—I don’t think it’s like. Objectively terrible to develop your story and characters openly. But I DO think it can end up biting you in the ass like I detailed above.

When you already know how your characters behave and where your story is going, and you share that and start to have a following that’s with you every step of the way, I think it’s easy to forget that your story still needs to be accessible to people outside of your fan base.

I mean. I guess it doesn’t NEED to. But like. That’s usually the goal. Funnily enough, that also kind of makes me think of fanfic writing.

Fan fic doesn’t need to be accessible to a general audience b/c it’s often written for the the author’s own gratification and for the gratification of a pre-existing fan base.

Interestingly, I personally don’t think the “fan fiction” criticism applies to the first season of Spindlehorse’s other show, Helluva Boss, because the story and characters were (mostly) thought out first, and the narrative took time to gradually develop the characters and story at a slower pace.

And then season 2 came out and changed the characterization so drastically from what was already established that now it does feel like a fan fiction of itself. lol.

That’s really all I have to say about that. There are other things too that show up a lot in fan fiction and have like…become their own fan fiction tropes that people sometimes expect or mock, and those play a role too. But to me this is the BIGGEST thing that makes a story feel like a bad fan fic. If it’s written as if it’s borrowing from an already established story.

Again! These are just my opinions! I know the sin of sharing one’s opinions online can never be forgiven, but I wanted to examine the reason people use that phrase as a negative criticism.

[whinlatter]

Hello 👋

I've been re-reading the last 4 chapters of Beasts (as a Xmas treat I guess 🤭) and here's some details I've picked and loved :

- Cho entering Sirius' room at Grimmauld to get a change of clothes from Ginny and stepping into Harry and Ginny's intimacy - I'm picturing clothes on the floor and those eggcups on the mantelpiece

- Neville sending his friend some bulbs to plant in Hagrid's garden 🥹🤧🤧🤧

- Ron helping Mrs Granger unpacking and keeping an eye on her, whithout telling anyone he's doing so, just because he's a generous and caring man 🙏- those little labels he put on the photo !

I hope you still have some time to write and I can't wait to read more from you. You've got a very special gift, making us dive into the world you've created with such complex and endearing characters.

Do you have any future plan for Ginny and her inquiry?

Cheers ✨

mate! i really hope you are well and 2025 is being good to you, even in the dark global days... i am obsessed with you re-reading and pulling these out, pleased as punch about it (these are all the little moments and details that are most fun to add into chapters - plot, blegh, eggcups, slay - so makes my day to have them noticed. your kind words mean the world, honestly, as do the very very kind words other people have left the old inbox in the past few weeks, all of which are very much appreciated.

please be assured i have many plans for ginny and her inquiry. i'm in a weird position rn where i'm writing more than ever (o lawd she writin), churning out stuff i think is some of my best shit (fr) and thinking about beasts constantly as i try to rework these next few chapters about ginny's war (am having to write chunks of them together for complicated reasons - mostly to keep track of plot threads, but also because the next chapters are all in the past, so it requires me to write with the canon narrative/timeline, which takes ages if you are as forgetful as me and have to keep going and checking canon/calendars constantly). i am very aware that i am quiet on socials/not posting chapters yet and causing annoyance and frustration, which i feel very badly about. it will always be weird to have people ask if you have abandoned a fic you work on a little bit every day (life would be easier if the ideas for the fic would leave me alone, believe me). candidly, i have found guilt for taking more time with writing to be a real demotivator: equally i have tried not to be on tumblr too much (as people tend to get mad when i am posting on tumblr but not posting chapters), but then feeling less connected to the source material when i'm not having regularly engagement with fandom. so am trying to remember this is my hobby too and it's supposed to be fun and a source of joy, because that approach is a much deeper font of motivation and inspiration than guilt (who knew). the main thing is no-one need worry about official hiatus or abandonment - i am just taking my time and enjoying doing so, especially as i turn a corner and feel i'm writing my way out of a sticky patch. and unusually for me, i think i will be proud of the stuff i put out when i do put it out, and hope people will get a lot out of it when i do. loads of love!

[readingtoinfinity]

Jelloapocaylpse and One Piece

So, there's this thought I've been having about gigantic franchises: any criticism against them needs to be taken with two specific grains of salt. First, people who dislike the franchise will be more annoyed by its flaws because of overexposure, and second, reactions to these criticisms will be overblown because there's so many more fans. I'm of the opinion that you shouldn't respond to criticisms of your favorite things if they're enormously popular, meaning I'll be more silent on negative reviews of things like Critical Role, One Piece and Brandon Sanderson's works than I would be for smaller things like Wayward Children, Grimm or The Craft Sequence.

But when these two grains of salt come together? Oh, boy. OOOOOOOH boy.

I love So This is Basically..., and have since I discovered the channel. A good chunk of my humor comes from the jokes in those videos, and even for something like Kingdom Hearts where it's negative, I still enjoy both the video and the franchise, so I've elected to let it be. But in his recent video on One Piece, while it was funny he got so many things seriously wrong about the series that I've struggled with whether or not to say something about it. I think the artistry on display in the video can get drowned out by the negativity being poured into it, and while I don't have much of a platform I can yell into the void like the best of them, and it's bothering me enough that I want to lay some things out.

So, for your discretion: a time-stamped review of Jelloapocaylpse's So This is Basically One Piece. I will endeavor to only time-stamp things I found wrong about the series. I understand jokes aren't meant to be taken seriously, but I think humor is revealing, and if we can dissect the jokes of the anti-woke crowd to find the ugly truth within, we can do the same to ourselves. And if I can shout out a more complicated thought about One Piece from a joke then I will, and even point out moments where Jello is right.

I will not talk about Brendan Blaber's personal life nor his anime work. I am aware of what happened with Lovely★Complex but find it immaterial to the video on his YouTube channel. Perhaps his motivations were dishonest, and that could explain his rampant dislike of the source material; at this time, I don't think it factors in, but if I'm proven wrong I will make an edit with the proper updated information. And, per a beef I have with the video itself, I also want to stress that you should not harass nor send death threats to people you dislike, especially about a piece of media. THIS INCLUDES ASSHOLES.

With that, let's begin. Video is included so you can follow along. There will be spoilers freely discussed; be forewarned. If I am wrong, chime in and correct me; I am not above mistakes.

0:08: This is a fun callback to the 4Kids dub of One Piece, which is widely reviled but for some small moments of genius.

0:11: an out-of-context, raving explanation of the worldbuilding, which is entirely correct.

0:38: Incorrect. The Grand Line is specifically written to be hard to get into and out of unless you have the tech for it. This is a big deal in both the manga and the anime and I don't know why/how he missed this.

0:50: This is a fan theory. I was willing to accept it but googling it turned out it wasn't correct. The following jokes require this to be true, however, so creative license applies.

1:06: Arguably true, and I say that because, while each of these characters technically has a different power, they're all used to manipulate the environment and stone like it's water. That's a thing and a theme in the series; Luffy even gets to fight Charlotte Katakuri, who has a similar Devil Fruit. Call it lazy, call it creative, it's debatable, and funny.

1:11-1:38: the following explanation is also true, but insulting. The boundaries between each Devil Fruit are more fluid than the initial system lets on, true, but as in real life aggressive categorization is usually incorrect and uninteresting.

1:43: The description of the fights applies less to One Piece than Shounen as a whole. You could be uncharitable and say it describes all fights, but I will restrain myself. A lot of fights do have an element of unpredictability to them; sometimes it's the randomness that feels realistic and other times it's Deus Ex Machina. You could argue the fights are more about the philosophical difference between the two (Sanji vs Wanze comes to mind) but it makes for long, drawn-out fights. I think most of the pacing problems come from the anime but I've been annoyed by the manga as well.

1:55: It is true that Robin doesn't get many fights, which is disappointing as a Robin fan. And I won't deny that sexism pervades the writing of One Piece when it runs unchecked. But I don't think the two are related; Robin's fights tend to be brutal and fast, and she deals more with grunts than generals. The exception is Robin vs Black Maria, which was Very Good.

But her focus in the story is less on fighting and more about archeology and history, and in that case she often reshapes the way we see the world with her investigations. Fighting ain't all there is to a Shounen series, and the wise reader remembers this. (this point copied wholesale from Anthony Gramuglia)

Obligatory "Yes One Piece is very long and I hope it ends well".

2:02: The espionage episodes are quite good. But I think this conclusion draws from the dislike of the adventure and action, so you need to agree with the first to reach the second, and I do not.

2:08: I had not realized how many islands were circles in One Piece so that criticism applies even if it doesn't mean anything for the quality of the series. But Punk Hazard isn't about stopping Smiley (who barely features) and I would argue that "natural disaster" doesn't apply to some of the threats the crew faces, and it's definitely not every arc.

2:24: only Punk Hazard was (half) on fire. Fires do happen a lot as a way to push tension but the arcs were flattened to make this point.

2:30: "from the jungle" is the best joke in this episode.

2:37: "Hit 'em with the poison that doesn't work!" happens a lot as well. It is often because the characters have to figure out a way around it, like other protagonists do during Good Fights.

2:46: This is a weird take. I know Zoro is an asshole but sexism was something he hated in his childhood and that disdain forms a big part of his personality. You could also call him Minority Hunter like the fanbase does, given he fights mostly black people.

2:52: Nami's not gay in the series, not explicitly, anyways. Alas.

2:56: God, to be a Sanji fan is to suffer. He has some of the best and worst moments in the series and the live-action series made him a bajillion times better.

3:15: good follow-up on a joke with a bad setup.

3:16: I'm annoyed Franky was removed from this. He's a lot of fun. And I'm also annoyed that you talk about Sanji's perversions but don't bring up Brook who is arguably worse in every way. These as well as Chopper and Jinbe get flattened for the sake of this video, and considering Chopper is my favorite Straw Hat this very much annoys me.

But he does make a point about these characters: Robin through Franky don't get to do as much throughout the series. They're often rendered as side characters who react to things instead of having their own arcs. For all that Thriller Bark was Not Great, Chopper was given an arc that ties very directly into who he is, and I'm saddened we didn't get something like that again until Wano.

3:21: The characters have personality, it is just now shown in this video. Usopp is not given a description and Nami is summarized as "lesbian" with nothing else of their character depths.

3:26: again, the best joke is the jungle joke.

3:39: I am not certain we're supposed to like Aokiji. He does some pretty heinous things throughout the series. Garp is a more-interesting case, in that his loyalty to the World Government is treated as his greatest flaw, but he's also an asshole. It's almost like he's a very complicated character or something.

3:47: This is the part that I kept coming back to, the part that's most insulting. I am bad with names so I admit I had to google this fish-man's name, but his name is Macro, he was a member of the Sun Pirates and he didn't keep slaves. The Sun Pirates especially freed any and all slaves they came across because they were also enslaved. Arlong did keep slaves but he was not enslaved himself, and the continuing stain of racism and slavery washes out over the rest of the series itself almost as if it were good or something. Out of all the things to get wrong, this one was the most egregious.

4:00: The Marineford arc was VERY LONG. A lot of stuff happened and it affected the pace quite a bit. The dig at the author is unwarranted.

4:07: FROM THE JUNGLE BA-

4:15: I'm torn on this complaint. On the one hand, subtle foreshadowing is usually the way to go when it comes to announcing what is going to happen. On the other hand, you can easily forget a lot of things that happen in a single narrative so sometimes twists come out of nowhere.

However! This complaint is mitigated by the fact that the series will readily bring you up to speed on context whenever it's necessary. Take that as you will.

4:20: Localization is a Thing™ that happens and translation hasn't always been the best. I first learned the word "nakama" from Japanese because of a fansub of this series that insisted it wasn't just "family". I am also annoyed by newer chapters that insist on calling the swordsman "Zolo", and these issues extend to the fan wikis. This has nothing to do with the show or manga, however.

4:33: There are a LOT of characters, true. Whether or not that is too much is debatable; they are drip fed to the reader over the course of all the chapters, and even if there are twice as many characters as chapters (there are not) that's two characters per chapter to introduce. That's not a lot for an audience to read; if you've gotten through Wheel of Time you will be fine, but this ties into a latter issue I'm about to bring up.

4:47: I'm almost certain these characters were chosen at random. On a whim, I decided to return the favor and pick a character at random to defend its inclusion. That turned out to be Pekoms.

Pekoms is a character in Big Mom's crew, loyal but deathly afraid of her. He's defined both by this bond to Big Mom as well as to his Mink heritage, and he takes pride in both. It's only when he learns of the Straw Hats' defense and salvation of the Mink Tribe that his courage starts to grow to outweigh his fear, and he eventually turns on her in response to the sacrifice of a friend of his, demonstrating the themes of the Whole Cake Island arc: a family bound through fear is a temporary measure, and it will fall apart when something better comes along.

I bet you could make a defense of just about any character he removed, even characters that are bit players. That's the thing, too: complaining about "too many characters" ignores the fact that sometimes, the guy who gets one line also gets a name. A stage play should be stripped down to pure essentials, not so much with mediums you can edit.

And fuck, he cuts out Yamato?! The best guy around?!!

5:07: It's very strange that he says the Straw Hats don't have any meaningful dynamic with each other when the #1 thing people keep asking for is downtime so these characters can hang out and interact almost as if their dynamics are what carry them through the arcs. I mean, it has been a while since some characters interacted, true, but remember: there are 10 Straw Hats on the crew. That's 45 different interactions that are possible. There's, sadly, not gonna be enough time for Robin and Jinbe to sit down to tea with everything else going on.

(Also I know that in Wheel of Time (the closest approximation in length) Rand, Mat and Perrin have a wonderful dynamic and then don't talk for several books. Sometimes the plot happens, but I don't know if people hate this part of the series so this might just be me; I stopped reading during The Path of Daggers or The Winter's Heart, I'm not certain. I remember being annoyed by Tuon a lot)

5:26: I'm going to divide this between the two questions people asked on SBS. None of what happens with Fuckass Joe in this question is relevant to One Piece as a whole because it doesn't happen in the story proper. But the way the video frames Oda's relationship with his editors is weird.

5:47: I'm gonna be honest this is a really weird question to include in SBS. Whoever sent it in definitely has some things going on, and while Oda wasn't responsible for it (and he answers the question with annoyance and confusion) the fact it was included at all speaks to the priorities of the people writing it. Again, this is about SBS and not really relevant to the manga as a whole but I think you can absolutely be critical of this with Oda.

5:54: There's three complaints in here in rapid succession, so I'm going to go through each:

"Breasts grow larger": absolutely a thing that happens. It's a well-documented annoyance in the fandom at this point, and hard to miss.

"Negative space grows rarer": I'll be honest, I didn't notice this as a problem. So I went back to the manga and re-read chapter 1, chapter 1133 and chapter 566 (about halfway through). In the first chapter, there is a lot more negative space in the panels so you focus more on the characters, and there's a lot more characters and background details in the latter chapters, but it's not hard to follow even still. So I'm not certain this is an issue, but it could be an eyesore; adding detail is not always to the good.

"Oda doesn't credit his assistants" I didn't find the names of his assistants through Google. The fact it is hard to find is telling, either for Oda or search engine optimization. In either case it's nothing to do with the manga. It should definitely be easier to find these names.

6:07: The sketchy art had a purpose in a flashback, showing someone losing memories (and on a more-meta level I think Oda had a health emergency... correct me if I'm wrong). I don't think the artwork has changed overmuch from the beginning, and there's a conversation to be had about the changing amount and quality of the details, but given it is shown that they're specifically referencing that kind of art I wanted to respond to that directly.

And the pot-shot at the anime is more deserved. The fact it's weekly means quality can vary wildly and characters are often drawn off-model in a way that's meant to be sexy but doesn't look very good. (I couldn't find it, but there's a specific part where Nami gets injured and scuffed up, and the anime adapted it more sexually than the manga made it. Not that it was nonexistent, mind you. This part is a "trust me bro" more than the others so please keep that in mind).

6:17: The pacing in the anime can be quite bad. The joke with the water slowly turning yellow is also quite funny.

6:38: This is debatable. The story has happy and sad moments like most good stories and it's an adventure story, with a focus on fun. But the story is also willing to leave you with strong negative emotions and just deal with them, the backstories being the most notable examples of characters dealing with trauma.

6:46: This criticism is overblown but not incorrect. Pell should have died from that explosion and I stand by that, but no consequences to anything? There are whole chapters where the balance of the powers of the worlds are shifting and these consequences play out. Whole arcs are built from the consequences of of the death of Whitebeard alone and, as Anthony Gramuglia pointed out in his stream (I'm still watching it to conclude its accuracy) if the manga has intense foreshadowing and knows where it's going that goes against the "no consequences" criticism. (again, thank you Anthony Gramuglia for this note)

6:54: Uta is from a movie that is non-canon, even if she exists in-story. It would be unreasonable to note any criticism of the story from One Piece: Film Red because it's unreliable as a foundation.

Yasopp leaving Usopp is something the fans have complained about for some time now. At this moment we don't know if he had a good reason for leaving beyond heeding the call to adventure, but I know I, personally, think it was a dick move.

7:03: I find this next part disingenuous, for all the potshots Jello takes against Oda before and after. It's also unrelated to the story as a whole (mostly) so I'll be skipping through it.

7:26: I think this criticism stands. Oda is very weird about women in the story and tends to draw them a specific way (thin waist, large bust, tall and lithe). This doesn't stop almost all of them from being interesting characters, mind you, but it's something to keep in mind as you read the story.

Also, if you were going to criticize Oda for Ephebophilia (sexual interest in mid-to-late adolescents, according to le Wikipedia) in his story, that's great, but if you're going to take potshots at him why don't you also mention his friendship and defense of Nobuhiro Watsuki, writer of Rurouni Kenshin and most-known for possession of child pornography? Why drag the family into this when they have nothing to do with Oda's behavior or predilections?

And that's that. I won't be doing this too often (I am a writer and a critic, not a drama channel) but that specifically left a bad taste in my mouth I wanted to get out. Again, if there are any mistakes I will be calling them out in the edit.

One Piece means a lot to me. I've been following it since I was a tween, and it was the first series I read without my parents' permission (oddly enough, my very conservative mother also though the women were too sexualized... on episode 92, before it got so much worse) because I loved it so much. And even now as an adult I find it an old reliable that makes me happy. I try not to be blind to its flaws; I can see the sexism for female characters and character design, the way Oda writes gay people has improved but isn't perfect, and his examination of racism is hampered by not having stories to draw from about it. But it's a long, wonderful series that I can heartily recommend to anyone who enjoys adventures and themes of freedom, family and fun.

So This is Basically... is a series that always manages to make me laugh, even in episodes I dislike. I say "Sora, become a beekeeper!" to myself all the time, and the specific way Jello says "garbage" in the RWBY video sticks with me. But if you engage with the media he talks about you can see the cracks; it's the CinemaSins problem, disguising criticism as jokes and jokes as criticism, never taking a firm stand on either.

I hope both these series improve. I hope we look back on this video as a fluke rather than the standard. I'd like to continue to enjoy Jelloapocalypse in its purest form. But this whole thing has been uncomfortably revelatory to me, and I will keep my eyes open and my mind sharp.

EDIT: I finished watching Anthony Gramuglia's video on the subject. I don't 100% agree with his takes (in particular the speakers' disdain the humor, which I enjoy quite a bit) but he and his guests go into more analysis than I do, at times coming up with ideas I hadn't considered (as mentioned in my previous notes) and at times reaching a bit. I still think it's quality analysis on why Jello is a terrible reviewer in a number of key ways.

EDIT2: I did eventually get a look into what all happened with Lovely★Complex, but in the process I also found a video that more formally breaks down the flaws of Jello's arguments, even before his video was controversially-received. I'm including it here for anyone who only has 30 minutes for this kind of thing.