#even if i like a male character i always think about how much more id love them

[fairytwles]

you know what i love about yellowjackets?? there’s barely ANY men

[waterberry-strawmelon]

i know a thousand other people have said this already, but im so tired of the fact that people just dont write good fanfiction about female characters or female relationships. all the 100k-word epics on ao3 are about m/m or m/f pairings, and i just mourn for all the life-changing stories we could have about female characters, the ones that fundamentally re-frame your way of thinking, the ones where the romance is slow burn that's hot and heavy and so, so achingly intimate that the page is bleeding with it.

where are those stories?

[in-act-ive]

Yo can I request the Gallagher boys (not Liam) and Mickey headcanons if U do them (all separately) with a male reader who's more domimant and taller (sorry I can't spell) in the relationship like they also have to be the big spoon or whatever reader always pulls them in to his lap or something nothing sexual

Thank you if U can't do multiple characters can U do lip or Mickey

I'm real sick of the fics where the male reader it still feminine y'know

Have a nice day sorry for the long request

I had so many ides for this the moment you asked!

Request : yes

Type : headcanon

A / N : hope this is what you wanted!! Sorry it took so long btw, I got sick really fast and couldn't write!

Carl Gallagher

At first he's very confused by whats going on

After a few times he gets used to sitting in your lap and does it instinctively

Carl hates that you're taller in every way

He's probably a brat to you

He insists on getting stuff he can't reach even if you've offered to help

Carl is very independent and says he doesn't need your help

When he does need your help he's such a bitch about it

He does like having his scary dog privileges though to be honest

If he's about to go do shady shit he drags you along to scare anyone off who may try and fuck with him

When he's a police officer he insists on protecting you

Oh how the tables have turned

When you spoon him he definitely pulls your hands up to his chest so he can hold your hands

After a while he just lets you lay your hands wherever you'd like

He's comfy with whatever

Lip Gallagher

He won't admit it but he kinda likes that you're taller than he is

The first time he sits in your lap he's flustered as hell but continues to flirt with you

After a few times its still a little awkward but he won't admit it

He just insists on not doing it

He uses your height to his advantage

The moment he doesn't feel like reaching something he bothers you to grab it for him

He finds it hilarious that you are too tall for the Gallagher house

He likes to tease you when you hit your head on stuff or trip on something

His love language is most definitely teasing

When you both go out he kinda acts like you're not there

When he gets into fights you have to save him half the time

When he confronts bitches of men he almost always has you standing around incase it doesn't go his way

The moment you two cuddle and you spoon him he gets kinda pissed off

He'd much rather face you

He does feel protected in your arms but won't say that

Ian Gallagher

Ian is already the tallest Gallagher and is too tall for their house but having you around makes him jealous

He is confused when you pulled him into your lap

He's not opposed to the idea of sitting with you but he also really doesn't seem to know what to do with himself

Once he's used to it and knows a comfortable way to sit its one of his favorites

He won't admit it

He insists on getting everything himself no matter if you can reach it or not

He probably warns you before you run into a doorway cause he knows what its like

He hates PDA

Especially holding hands

Mainly because he hates feeling like the shorter guy in any relationship

Even if he is

The moment you spoon him he says something dumb

"No. No we're not doing this."

He wants to be the big spoon but you object to that idea

Finally you compromise on you both facing each other

Mickey Milkovich

He doesn't mind your height at all

Everyone is always taller than him anyways ao your height is just something about you

He thinks its attractive but obviously wont say his feelings

The moment you pulled him into your lap he immediately was fine with it

When he sat in your lap he sat like a king on his throne

Mickey gets so used to it and does it absentmindedly

He will push you into a chair just to sit in your lap no matter how busy you may be

When you guys go out of the house he loves having his "scary dog privileges"

He knows when it comes down to a fight he'd probably kick someones ass for you though

He loves when you hold him or touch him in public

Then he knows that your his and he's yours no matter what

Plus he finds it fucking hilarious when you have to tell people to go away cause you're together

When it comes to cuddling he loves when you spoon him

Its his favorite thing ever

When you don't he makes you no questions ask

Note: This was not spell checked nor grammer checked! I apologize in advance for the mistakes

[heartfullofleeches]

dude abby is so fire can we get more hcs or a snippet i beg

It's been a hot minute since I've done HCs and they give me excuse to flesh out my characters so we'll do with that-

Abby [Rental Zombie Spouse HC]

Warnings: Dismemberment, Mentions of death

-

Abby doesn't remember much about himself before he died. Everything predating the night he woke up in the back alley behind a restaurant witu a hole in his head is a blur to him. All he had to his person was a wallet, his phone, and the keys to an apartment - none of which helped jog his memory as the man the ID inside the wallet couldn't possibly be him.

As recently established, Abby earns money by hosting services where he will be the customer's partner- There are a handful of male options, but he prefers to pose as females in his disguises because those usually pay more and he likes the dress up.

While Abby doesn't require human flesh as his only food source, he can eat chunks of it to repair rotting or damaged tissue. He can also swap out parts that are no longer useful with fresh ones which is a major factor to how successful his business is since changing a few features makes him a completely new person. He has a deep freezer in his apartment where he keeps his "accessories" until they expire.

When it comes to what he likes in a Darling not even Abby knows. He's very easily distracted by things and an encounter with him trying to cut out a part of you he likes can instantly switch to yout first date of many just by him seeing you like that peeks his interest as well.

"Hey, You! Cute eyes you got... Mind if I borrow them?.... Oh! What are you listening to?... I love this band! I think.... Maybe the old me did. Let's listening to more songs together and find out!"

Since you would probably like to keep all your limbs, Abby steals physical objects that belong to you to feel closer to you. He would insist on something like matching tattoos or piercings since if you can't share the same flesh - you can at least have the same branding. Do not leave any jewelry or clothing that may fit him unattended.

Any body part that was at one tethered to him will still be usable even if it's separate from him as long as it's functional. There's a reason he always knows what you're thinking- he's got eyes and ears everywhere. Please don't throw them out if you happen to find any. :(

You'll almost never meet him when he isn't "Abby". When he doesn't care about his appearance or how bad the state of his decay is and just slaps on a hoodie and a face mask to get around. It's how he keeps watch on you without use of his spare eyes and sorta feels like how some people without their makeup.

He/him, but doesn't care about whatever pronouns his clients use for him.

Spends his money on brand new items for you, but goes broke buying second hand goods from yard sales and thrift stores because he loves older furniture and giving things a new home... Will pawn his junk off on you when he has strength in your relationship that you won't leave or make fun of him for his odd purchases.

"Why do you mean "why did I buy twenty cassette players"?? If you use the one I bought you already are a diary, I wouldn't have to stalk you as frequently!"

[ganondoodle]

okay, bc i have seen this argument alot now (and it also seems to be the view point of aonuma himself..) is that "zelda cant do everything link does bc whats the point then"

and i take personal offense on that bc its a stupid argument (in. my. very. personal. opinion.- not judging people for liking it. its a ME thing)

whats the point? its that its her. its still a different character, different in story, background, personality, but i WANT to play zelda and she can do everything link does, why does she have to be so restricted and be bend over backwards to find some new way to make her 'useful' when link gets to do basically everything no questions asked (the only thing thats hers is like .. sealing power and sacrificial maiden, which i find a little underwhelming to say the least), if theres no point to it why are there always modders that model swap link with someone else, and in that case it has even less impact bc its an artificial model swap with no changes to the story (which can and should still be different when its the vanilla game with a different protagonist... its still a different character), clearly theres joy in just the model being a different one- and that isnt even to mention the story possibilities, since, again, its stil a different character

if we ever (never ... i know who we are talking about here) get to play as ganondorf i want to him to be just as versatile and active as link is, if we got a point and click adventure game for him instead bc 'whats the point' id be disappointed too- you can find any sort of excuse/explanation for zelda to be singled out but the fact remains it tracks with how female characters are often treated, and that hits a very sore spot for me

i guess i am unfortunately one of those annoying people that want to see female characters be treated exactly the same as male characters, possibly bc i am myself afab but identify as agender and have a deeply personal dislike for anything 'traditional' feminine bc i cannot and never will be able to truly live as myself in real life, it influences all of my work, my work is as just as much as my opinion on this, very personal

and in line with my point about modding, i see theres joy in just beign able to play as her even if its like this, i get that, i also get it for the creative aspect (though that mechanic worries me even more for the future bc it really seems to be the path now that -freedom = good, linear anything = bad-) it is a different idea and its not like i cant see that value- im not trying be "right" either, just bc i have that opinion doesnt mean i need everyone to agree, its a very personal thing, if you like it good for you! not for me though, and i think both of that is equally valid

i just personally wish she was allowed to be just like link, fight just like him but be different bc its still her and not him in the end- to be physically/playstyle like jsut like him, but you know ... as her, i dont think shed stop being zelda if she could wield a sword just like him

i dont really know how to get my point/feelings across, i dont want to step too much into personal stuff nor spam people with something that ultimately doesnt interest me alot, im just saddened by it really

(EDIT: bc i forgot to add this on here again; this isnt as much of a problem as it might sound like here, just the main topic i wanted to talk about; why im so uninterested in it is MAINLY bc i dont trust them to write anything interesting/care about lore anymore after totk, im always on the more pessimistic side that thinks its most likely worse than id hope and i know even the past games arent perfect or super interestingly written, but now its much more just a general distrust, together with everything like the price ... im just much less hopeful and cant get excited until i see more of it, like im waiting for the game to get out and reveal that its just as much of a mess and money i regret spending- kind of fear)

[olderthannetfic]

Re: ‘most big fandoms are dominated by male characters so there’s less f/f’ - I think the conclusion that there’s so much more m/m and m/f out there because media with big fandoms include fewer women as characters and we are ‘just writing about the characters [we] connect with in the media [we] enjoy’ removes some of the agency involved in how we choose the media that we potentially end up fannishly enjoying. Yes, if there were more characters who are women in media with huge existing fandoms, we might see more f/f, but I think that many of us gravitate toward new media (and if we click with that new media, then new fandoms) based on our established interests from prior media/fandoms. I’ve been in online fandom in various capacities for over 20 years and in the first decade of my fannish ‘career’ I largely shipped m/m and wrote m/m. I was therefore, unsurprisingly, often drawn toward new media with m/m potential.

About a decade ago my personal interests began to shift and I found myself more drawn toward women characters and f/f. If I’m interested in women and f/f, I’m not going to keep focusing on new-to-me media with a whole slew of men and a couple women who barely interact. I’m keeping an eye out for media with several prominent female characters, media with lots of women, media with f/f potential. Luckily, that isn’t as hard to find across a variety of genres and formats as it used to be. It doesn’t always click — I enjoyed watching She-Ra and Ahsoka, for instance, and saw the f/f potential, but neither were id matches that sparked fannish creativity for me personally — but if I’m not checking out media with women and am instead continuing to watch/read/play media where the characters are largely men, then yeah, I’m going to get frustrated by the lack of f/f i those fandoms pretty quickly. That’s on me though, not on the fandom at large. If I’m not looking at what’s out there, trying to find the media that hits those iddy places and sparks the fannishness I crave, then am I really that interested in f/f in the first place? I don’t think fandom ‘hates women’, but I do think a lot of fandom just isn’t that fannishly interested in women for a plethora of reasons, and that’s fine! I do wish we could just admit that though.

There’s also…look, there are assholes in every corner of fandom. There are plenty of people out there who write posts that criticize unrealistic m/m smut, but that doesn’t seem to drive away the m/m fans from writing that super unrealistic m/m smut they want to read. Why then do a few jerks criticizing what they believe to be unrealistic f/f smut get blamed for driving people away from f/f? Did you really want to write that f/f smut to begin with? It’s okay if you didn’t really want to write it! But also, there is fantastically unrealistic f/f smut out there on ao3 with an appreciative audience. Unrealistic smut always has its place.

--

Yuuup.

I do think the few loud jerks on whatever topic have a disproportionate effect on things that people are already insecure about or that there's already less content about. Criticism from inside the house also seems to hit harder than from outside, for various definitions thereof. But I agree that there are bullies or just loud assholes everywhere, and it doesn't stop the juggernaut ships and fandoms. I think "the meanies made me not write f/f" is not a good analysis of the overall trend even if some specific people really did get bullied quite badly.

I do see people acting surprised that they don't like any f/f, yet not checking out media with multiple female leads. This is silly and we should move away from this along with ditching "There are no interesting female characters".

But another pattern I see is that, for the most part, really big fic fandoms come from things a ton of people consumed in the world overall. (The reverse isn't necessarily true: something can have mass mainstream popularity and no fic.) So even aside from willful blindness on the part of individual fans or personal reactions to gender, the overall lopsidedness of media does still matter for the big meta discussions that look at the ratio of stuff on AO3. If someone isn't really into small fandoms, they're going to have to go where the crowd is already going.

The top fandoms, according to tag search, are these (counts are different from current AO3 works if you click through, but they seem inflated by roughly similar amounts):

Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling ‎(664365)

Marvel Cinematic Universe ‎(389476)

방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS ‎(289493)

Original Work ‎(273412)

Marvel ‎(233004)

Teen Wolf (TV) ‎(219504)

Haikyuu!! ‎(215127)

The Avengers (Marvel Movies) ‎(208509)

原神 | Genshin Impact (Video Game) ‎(207259)

Star Wars - All Media Types ‎(188548)

Sherlock (TV) ‎(169092)

Batman - All Media Types ‎(137281)

Captain America (Movies) ‎(118954)

Minecraft (Video Game) ‎(117892)

Stranger Things (TV 2016) ‎(117489)

Video Blogging RPF ‎(110169)

Voltron: Legendary Defender ‎(105117)

Miraculous Ladybug ‎(104003)

Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan ‎(103914)

魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù ‎(101819)

文豪ストレイドッグス | Bungou Stray Dogs ‎(95606)

Merlin (TV) ‎(88893)

僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia (Anime & Manga) ‎(86484)

NCT (Band) ‎(85868)

Dream SMP ‎(83222)

Stray Kids (Band) ‎(82711)

One Direction (Band) ‎(79490)

呪術廻戦 | Jujutsu Kaisen (Manga) ‎(78975)

Homestuck ‎(77676)

Game of Thrones (TV) ‎(77361)

Good Omens (TV) ‎(76805)

陈情令 | The Untamed (TV) ‎(73444)

DCU ‎(71054)

ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 | JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken | JoJo's Bizarre Adventure ‎(70648)

Undertale (Video Game) ‎(68959)

A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin ‎(67854)

Star Trek ‎(67221)

Doctor Who ‎(65172)

Doctor Who (2005) ‎(65166)

呪術廻戦 | Jujutsu Kaisen (Anime) ‎(65109)

Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett ‎(63727)

Once Upon a Time (TV) ‎(62211)

Avatar: The Last Airbender ‎(61743)

Hetalia: Axis Powers ‎(61343)

Star Wars Sequel Trilogy ‎(59581)

Iron Man (Movies) ‎(59158)

EXO (Band) ‎(58948)

Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types ‎(58055)

Hannibal (TV) ‎(56796)

Thor (Movies) ‎(56604)

I'm seeing some truly gargantuan franchises and their network of metatags, top Weekly Shounen Jump manga that are mega bestsellers far, far beyond how much any shojo manga sells in Japan, some of the biggest musical groups and most popular youtubers in the world, etc.

Some of these do seem a lot more popular with the AO3 crowd than the world in general, of course. It's not an exact 1:1 causal relationship between media's audience/impact and how much fic writers care or how much fic writers on AO3 care. It's certainly possible for fandom to make fetch happen with a relatively less popular canon; it's just not the default and not driving the big overall numbers.

I look at The Untamed and (often mistagged) MDZS) being on this list and I think of all those hot fanvids for f/f Chinese dramas.

I keep seeing fans watch one, go "Okay, I have got to watch that next!" only to be disappointed that the canon is a handful of 5-minute episodes, not some epic 50-episode thing like the censored m/m ones and the bromance ones and the het ones get. They want The Untamed-but-with-ladies, not the reality of those canons. I suppose there are some nominally-straight series with two female leads and not a heavy focus on a het romance with just a single female lead, but the one I'm thinking of was reportedly godawful and the people who saw potential between the women had no interest in writing fic about it.

Do any of those f/f c-novels have good translations? That's not what brings the big fic crowds (it's the adaptations that do that), but maybe I should try reading a few. I just keep getting turned off of Chinese webnovels in general by dodgy translations.

[thelesbianpoirot]

could you plz talk about your thoughts on poor things. I havent found the courage to watch it yet and id love to hear your takes on it

I like Yorgos Lanthimos films, he deals in absurd fucked up little worlds, I've seen Lobster, Dogtooth, and The killing of... and enjoyed them. They usually tackle something fucked up in society. How these characters live is deranged, we are also doing these deranged things, but we've normalized it so much that the absurdity on us is lost. Lobster - Our fixation on romantic partnership to the point people who choose not to participate in this societal arrangement as treat unfairly and left out of many areas of society. So where is an absurd situation is where this society forces you to be partnered or you are not human anymore. Killing of a sacred deer (TO ME) was about how we're at the mercy of powerful men with vices (and perversions) that can ruin our life without consequences, the drunk surgeon ruins a family by killing someone, the male doctor has a very scary fetish, assaulting unconscious women etc, when you realize the fallibility of men in charge of our lives, horrifying, so here is an absurd situation where someone has ultimate power and characters have no control. It is horrifying to be powerless to human men. I have been a woman who had to be sedated for a procedure, with a male doctor, my greatest fear was being taken advantage of, it would make me throw up to know my doctor had a fetish for having is wife pretend to be dead/unconscious while they had sex. That is what I took from that film. That is what made it powerful for me. POOR THINGS I thought when people were criticizing it they may not have gotten the satire, (I thought) it was supposed to be about how people only love women, the concept of women, if we are eternally girls, never mature, and always giving them carte blanche to exploit us and have a smile on the entire time. The prostitute who loves sex with random strangers for money, always sexual, always flirting, she just can't control herself. The stripper who loves being an exhibitionist, she's just a freak and has to share it. The woman who loves pain, it turns her on to be hurt by men. We've seen her on TV and in porn. I expected this to be an exploration of how men love this fake woman, and want to control her, because if she loves sex, they should be in control of who she has sex with or it is no longer fun for them. I thought this was going to be another "LOOK AT THE ABSURDITY" of such a woman. She doesn't exist. And if she did, she'll have to be brain dead, literally a shell of a mature adult woman who has killed herself because she cannot cope with this world. An analogy for how the sex industry takes advantage of drug using and mentally ill women. HOWEVER, director man wants to have his cake and eat it too, satirizing the exploitation of women, while exploiting a woman doesn't not make good satire. You're just doing the thing you're condemning. Satirizing sexualization of mentally unwell women, while actively eroticizing fucking someone with the mental IQ of a child is not good. Men already have a fetish of taking advantage of women with developmental issues, would loved if fuckin children was legal, and here you have talented actress Emma Watson making a fucked-stupid face right out of hentai. And she's being alluded for doing what porn actresses do every day, the voice and facial expression that makes me want to throw up. The film more goes on it stops being about (what I viewed, me personally) as a critique of the sex industry, and became about controlling a woman's sexuality, with no character there to present a feminist path that isn't BEING USED BY ANY MAN VS BEING CONTROLLED BY ONE MAN.

HERE IS A SHORT VIDEO of how I don't like satire of objectification/sexualization that uses objectification/sexualization to say it's message. But also I don't even think poor things are anti-sexualization, it is mainly about autonomy, the autonomy of women to sexually exploited. The exploitation isn't criticized, marriage is, a child like woman with unquenchable sexual lust belongs to the world, not one man it says. It was gross to watch and I felt icky. Not the kind of grossness that Killing of a sacred deer felt like, which was necessary to feel uneasy because feeling powerlessness is not comfortable. However, it is up to you to watch the movie and make up your mind, I am just annoyed that when it came to tackling women's issues acclaimed directors always fumble the ball.

[hunterssm00n]

Ready or Not

"Are you... one of my friends playing a prank on me?" It had to be. I didn't know where any of my friends would have gotten the Ghostface voice-changer, or why they would have even wanted to do such a thing.

The voice on the other end of the phone huffed out a laugh, and those same tingles went down my spine once again.

"No, but I'd like to be your friend." | Ghostface/OC |

part 1 of 2

also on ao3: here

*cw includes explicit sexual content, unspecified male Ghostface, dirty talk, dub-con, stalking, breaking and entering, criminal behavior, explicit language, praise kink, serial killer behavior, and voice kink* MDNI - 18+

♡˚₊‧ ୨୧ ‧₊˚ ♡

hunterssm00n © All rights reserved by me. I do not allow this work to be used or adapted in any way without my permission.

Ready or not / here I come / you can't hide / I'm gonna find you...

It always begins the same, doesn't it? Young, cute woman, home alone, watching a scary movie and making a snack...

When suddenly, out of nowhere, the phone rings.

It's after eight - who could be calling at such an hour?

The number doesn't come up on caller ID; the name reads unknown. Could it be any more ominous?

It rings, and rings, and ri-

"You could just, like, not answer," I said out loud to myself, shaking my head of long, dark hair at the TV screen for what seemed like the fiftieth time. The young woman on the screen paid me no mind - the dumb bitch never did - as she tearfully answered the phone once again to plead with the killer to leave her alone; to please stop calling. I sighed, taking a sip of my vanilla Coke as I leaned back on the couch. I'd seen this movie about a hundred times, and I still was amazed at how dumb some of the characters were. The outcome was always the same, no matter how much I tried to warn them to Don't answer it! Look behind you! For fuck's sake, don't hide under the bed! And no matter how many times I knew I was just talking aloud to an empty room and my TV screen, I still continued to do it. I decidedly did not think about how that was very similar to the textbook definition of insanity.

Regardless of my annoyance about the unwise decisions some people make during horror movies, I genuinely loved watching them. My friends and family thought it was weird that I enjoyed scary movies so much, but I didn't really care what other people thought of me. Movies were my escape, and I always felt at peace when watching my favorites. 

The young woman on the screen was now running away from her patio window after a chair had been thrown through it, her tear streaked face pulled into a grimace as she ran wildly down the hallway away from the killer. I found myself wondering, not for the first time, what I would do in that situation. Would I hang up and call the police? Hide? Escape the house? Honestly, I liked to think that I'd grab the biggest fucking knife I could find in the cupboard and stand my ground. Though I was slim and athletic, and barely reached five foot six, I knew that I could put up a fight if necessary. But maybe escaping the house and running to my car would be the safest, smartest option. Who knew, though. Thinking about it didn't harm anyone, though; one couldn't be too prepared. But one definitely could be unprepared. 

I was taking another sip of my Coke when my phone rang suddenly, scaring the daylights out of me and nearly making me drop the can and spill the addictive, sugary liquid all over the place. Wiping my mouth, heart pounding in my chest from the suddenness of it, I laughed to myself at the irony of the situation: Here I was, watching a scary movie, alone in my home at night, and then, dun dun dunnn, my own phone rings in real life. Rolling my eyes, I remarked out loud, "Ooh, spooky," and made a mental note to not answer the phone. But the more it rang, the more I wondered if maybe I should. If someone was calling my landline at eight fourteen at night, it could be important. My cell was charging in the other room- maybe whoever it was had tried to reach me on there first, and when I didn't pick up, they called my home phone. Ugh, it better not be work. I decided to just let it go to voicemail- if it was something emergent, I would pick up... unless it was work. Then I would pretend that I had fallen asleep early. 

My plan failed, however, when I heard the telltale beeping of the answering machine that signaled the mailbox was full. "Shit." I muttered, leaning over the arm of the couch to look at the grey and black box, as though willing for it to share its secrets with me. It didn't help that my landline didn't have caller ID like most people's did- it was older, but since it still worked, I couldn't justify buying a new one. This was why I'd been counting on the answering machine picking up and being able to tell that way, instead.

Stop being a little bitch - man up and just answer the phone. If it's not anything important you can just hang up. Besides, who the hell else would be calling at this time of night anyways besides work or family? 

Before I got the chance to pick up, the answering machine hung up on the caller. For a moment I dumbly stared at the phone and the answering machine, and then I shrugged and turned back towards the slasher film that was still playing. The girl on the screen was now being chased by the killer, his long, black cloak flying out behind him as he ran after her, gleaming knife raised high in the air.

It was at this moment that the phone rang again, and this time I leaned over towards the end table and picked the cordless, white handheld up off of the stand. If they were calling back so soon, it had to be something important. Maybe it was my mother. And since I hadn't answered the first time, mom, if it was in fact her, was probably wondering if I had fallen and cracked my head in the clawfoot bathtub; or if I had finally decided that going to bed at eight o clock in the evening was not, in fact, too early. As if. 

Without thinking any more about it, I reached over and answered the phone. "Hello?" 

"Hello, Kail." 

The voice startled me, and it wasn't any I'd been expecting; not the voice of my mother, or of my boss wanting me to come into work. It was a man's voice; low and pleasant, almost a purr, with a hint of a rasp to it. Come to think of it, it sounded a hell of a lot like- "Um, hi. Who is this?" I asked, equally pleasant but also wary. A bill collector wouldn't have greeted me like that - definitely not. It had to be someone who knew me; knew my voice. And only people that were close to me called me Kail - most just called me Kailey. And I didn't have many close friends, and definitely none that were guys. Guys wanted to get in my pants, not be my friend. With my long, dark hair, large dark doe eyes, and womanly athletic figure, I knew how men looked at me. And, hey, I wasn't above being a little bit of a tease.

"Just an... admirer." The voice was nice- really nice. It was an exact replica of the voice from the Stab movies, and also the Ghostface killings that tended to happen throughout the years in Woodsboro. Living there had its nightmares.

I leaned back on the couch, really wishing the house phone had caller ID right about now. "An admirer, huh?" 

"Yeahh," the voice purred, and I found myself pressing the phone closer to my ear to take it in even more. It sent a chill down my spine - a good kind.

"Okay, well," I tried wracking my brain for someone, anyone, that had been super interested in me lately. Maybe someone at work - someone I talked to every day. I worked in the inventory department at the local hospital in Woodsboro, and I wasn't super friendly with any of my coworkers; we all got along, but I tended to keep to myself. I liked to think that I was pretty observant, but no recent incidents stood out to me. No strange guys, no creeps following me or watching me from afar (that I'd noticed, at least). "Do I know you, Mr. Admirer?" 

"Maybe." was his reply. His voice sounded so damn amused, even only saying one word.

'Maybe'... Okay? Well, that certainly doesn't help me.

"Are you... one of my friends playing a prank on me?" It had to be. I didn't know where any of my friends would have gotten the Ghostface voice-changer, or why they would have even wanted to do such a thing. None of my friends really watched scary movies, and most of them did not know the number for my house phone. 

The voice on the other end of the phone huffed out a laugh, and those same tingles went down my spine once again. Whoever this is, their voice is sexy as fuck.

"No, but I'd like to be your friend." came the bemused reply to my question.

...Hmm, now I was really wondering who this was.

"Well," I began, smiling to myself and letting it seep into my voice, "it's kind of a weird time to ask to be my friend, on a Friday night at eight pm."

Now the voice on the other end chuckled, the sound deep and low, and cascading over me like a warm waterfall. The feeling ended with a zap straight down between my legs, and I squirmed on the couch, eyes flicking briefly to the movie that was still playing, but at this point was nearly forgotten about.

"Is there ever really a bad time to make a new friend?" he asked, and I rolled my eyes playfully, even knowing he couldn't see it.

"I guess not. So, tell me, friend, how'd you get my number?" I reached for my drink, wracking my brain trying to figure out who this possibly could be.

"It was in the phonebook," he answered, lightly. Why did everything he said sound like he was flirting with me? And why was it so hot? 

I guessed phonebooks were still a thing (maybe for old people), but I could tell his answer was teasing, and probably not truthful. But maybe it was? It would certainly explain a lot. And it would mean that whomever this was on the other line had to at least know my name, in order to find me in the phonebook. I didn't know how many Kailey Miller's lived in Woodsboro, but it couldn't be that many. 

This speculation still wasn't getting me any closer to an actual answer, but... maybe that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Maybe some mystery was good, and also added to the attraction I was currently feeling. 

At this particular moment, the female character in the movie that was still playing gave a particularly piercing scream, and I reached for the remote in order to turn it down. 

"Are you watching a scary movie?" he asked, and I nearly laughed once again at the irony. Here was a caller with a (sexy) voice that sounded just like Ghostface, and they randomly called me while I was watching Stab. And now they were asking me about a scary movie. What the actual hell.

"Y-Yeah," I didn't know if I should answer him, or hang up the phone, lock all the doors and windows and call the police. "I am."

"Or do you normally have hysterical, screaming victims chained up in your house?" he added playfully. 

This got a laugh out of me. "Oh, yes - you've figured out my secret. Promise you won't tell the police?" I hoped I wasn't laying the flirting on too thick - it kind of made me want to gag. My normal idea of flirting was making sarcastic comments and inappropriate jokes. But understandably to some people, that could be pretty off-putting. So unfortunately more often than not, I found herself trying to dum things down for the sake of others around me. 

There was a pause, in which I could hear him breathing on the other end of the phone, and I really wondered if I had scared him off or if he was about to hang up. But then he spoke: "I won't tell if you won't." 

The words sent a chill down my spine, and the way he managed to make something like that sound so creepy and so hot at the same time was beyond me. And maybe I was crazy, but goddamn was it sexy. I'd never felt so attracted to another human being. Ever. 

And then the power flickered in my house. 

I wondered if I’d imagined it, at first. My house was on the outskirts of Woodboro, surrounded by trees and green, but it hardly ever lost power since I was still technically in town lines. My mother had been very adamant about making sure we remained in the town, for the sole purpose of being close to everything that necessitated being close to. Be that the school, jobs, the hospital, the drugstore, etc. and we hardly ever lost power. My mother had long since moved out of the area to a different town, but I had inherited the old house, and was very proud to call it my own. Right now, however, I was questioning the choice of location.

I found myself looking up at the light above, wondering if it had actually flickered, or if I was finally officially losing her mind. 

“Whatcha looking at?” 

The question didn’t quite register at first, but when it did, it felt like everything paused. I slowly reached for the remote next to me on the couch cushion and paused the movie, wondering if he’d really said what I thought he’d said - what I was certain he’d said. “What… What did you say?” 

“I said: Whatcha doin?” 

I shook my head, feeling my stomach twist uncomfortably for the first time since I’d answered the phone. “No, you didn’t.” 

Suddenly a feeling crept over me like I’d never experienced: I had never been so certain that I was being watched. And I’d also never been more aware that I was sitting in front of a clear window with my back to it. 

Cold chills washed over me like never before, and I felt like I’d been plunged into a frozen lake. Survival instincts took over, and I slowly sank down on the couch so that I was no longer visible from the window behind me - however, I could still be seen from the front door, and the side window to the left of the couch. Especially with the lights on. So naturally, maybe not the smartest thing, but my first order of business was to kill the lights. I quickly got up and ran the short distance to the front door, and flicked off the light switch, at the same time flipping the locks on the front door, as it hadn’t been locked before - but it sure as hell was now! 

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt like this - or ever feeling like this. 

“Who turned out the lights?” came the playfully sinister voice from the other end of the line. I’d nearly forgotten I was still on the phone, as silly as that sounded, for that was the whole reason for all of this current madness and fear. 

The fact that he was watching me was now quite apparent. The outside of my home was surrounded by plenty of trees and brush to hide in; lots of shadows in the dark. And aside from my porch light, there was only one street lamp outside, directly across the drive from the house. And it was inconsistent when it came to whether or not it would be working, at any given moment. Either way, as I peered out through the window that looked out across the porch, I knew that I probably wouldn't be able to tell where he was hiding. And the fact that he knew where I was, but I didn't know where he was, scared me inexplicably beyond words. 

Swallowing hard, I tried to hide the tremor in my voice as I spoke into the phone, "Listen, if this is a prank, congratulations - you've had your fun. Now, now get the fuck out of here before I call the police." 

A warm, breathy chuckle followed closely after my words, and I crept back away from the window towards the couch, "This isn't a prank, Kails. You should know that." 

I shook my head in confusion, "What do you mean? I don't understand - I should know what?" I tried to wrack my brain for anything that had happened recently that would indicate that I was deserving of a 'prank' like this. Sure, I had enemies - but so did everyone. But none that I knew of that would go this far to prove a point, or any of which that knew where I lived (that I knew of, at least). And again, I really didn't think any of my friends would want to pull a Ghostface prank on me - they were all freaked out by the murders, rightfully so, and they were all pretty straight laced for the most part. The more I tried to come up with answers, the more questions I had. 

There was a pause from the other end of the phone, a brief one, while my hand felt around on the couch cushion for the TV remote, wanting to turn the movie off to eliminate that source of light as well. I was crouched on the floor, eyes nervously darting around at all the windows and the door to make sure no one was trying to break in. And then, he said: “You want this.” 

My hand froze on the couch cushion, as did my whole body; as did my very breath. “W-What?” 

“Yeah, that’s right,” His voice was so husky and warm, and despite my fear I felt a pleasant tingling in my lower back, my heart beginning to race for a different reason. “You’ve been thinking about this for quite some time - wanting it, dreaming about it. You think nobody would ever understand. You think it’s wrong to want something so dirty. But it’s not wrong. And I understand.” 

I still hadn’t managed to grab onto the remote - I was forced to listen to what he was saying with my cheeks heating, red in shame, and… something else. What was even going on? What the hell was happening to me? 

“I don’t know what you think you know,” I began, a tremor in my voice, though I tried to make it as serious and steely as possible, “but if you’re trying to scare me, good luck. It’s you who’s gonna be fucking scared if I have to come out there with my gun.” 

He chuckled again, and the hair on the back of my neck rose once again at the sound. “Oh, sweetheart, you don’t have a gun.” 

While I internally bristled at the confidence of his statement (and at the fact that he was absolutely correct), I also preened at the pet name as well as the tone of his voice. And, not that he needed to know this, but I absolutely did not have a gun. But damn, would one be helpful right about now. “As long as you leave now you won’t have to find out.” 

“Feisty girl,” he hissed, and I heard some rustling in the background of his call for the first time. “I can’t wait to see how feisty you truly are.” 

“I can’t wait to see your fucking face when the cops show up and arrest your dumbass for trespassing and harassment.” I finally was able to turn off the TV when my hand found the remote. If this was a prank, it was long past the point of being funny. Now I was just plain pissed off - and scared. “I’m not kidding, asshole, you’d better leave, or else.” That fine tremor was still in my voice, and as much as I tried to project it to make my voice sound more aggressive, I could barely get it out at an audible octave. Right now all of my energy was being expended on thoughts of survival and on what to do next. 

This was probably a prank, though. It had to be… right? If I went into work on Monday and someone was going around talking about how they pranked me and ‘she was so scared, dude!’, I was gonna lose her effing mind, and heads were gonna roll. As soon as I found out which jackass from the hospital came here to terrorize me on a Friday night, I would make them regret it. But until then, I would feel safer with a weapon of some kind, and with the police alerted. They took these Ghostface pranks very seriously. 

“Why would I leave now?” the voice questioned, and I heard a noise that sent my pulse skyrocketing even higher than it already had been: the sound of footsteps on my front porch. “We’re just getting started.” 

I barely registered the telltale scrape of the mailbox cover being pulled down from against the outside wall of the house next to the front door - where the spare key to the house was kept - before I bolted out of the room with terror hot on my heels. Who was this person, and how did they know where I kept the spare key to my house? The exact spot? Granted, it wasn’t a very hard spot to find, but still. He had found it with no hesitation whatsoever - he’d had a preconceived idea of where it had been before he even came up onto the porch. That meant only one thing: whoever he was, had been watching me. For a while. 

And now he was coming into my house. 

♡˚₊‧ ୨୧ ‧₊˚ ♡

AN: I do not own the Scream franchise or any of it's characters, but Kailey is my own OC. I also do not own the song 'Ready or Not' by Razakel. The above photos are from Pinterest, and attached are the links to the original images.

part two coming soon

[liquidstar]

Ok so, I have only ever watched one episode of Adventure Time, and it was on a hotel room TV, in terrible hindi dub, and I barely remember it on account of being 10(?) but it horrified me.

I remember the MCs trying to get Ice King a girlfriend or something, but he keeps being a gross asshole so they take him to a lake and point at some swans to try and explain love to him. They point to two swans kissing like ':D' and he's like 'ewww' and then the male swan suCKS IN AND EATS THE FEMALE and IK's like ':)))' while the boys stare in horror.

IDR how the episode ended or how much I watched, but I remember thinking 'wow american cartoons are hardcore. I'm sticking to pirated pokemon from now on.'

And you are telling me that show had lesbians in it leter????

oh my god im so sorry but imagining you watching that swan scene as a 10 year old is so fucking funny, i can understand why you stuck with pirated pokemon LOL

adventure time is absolutely very fucked up in a lot of different ways. the early seasons leaned into that type of absurd shit you just described a lot more especially. while the later ones actually started getting more existential and building on the worlds lore.

there wasnt exactly a focused plot, per say. i mean, there was, but it wasnt something methodical and planned out, it was played by ear. and i think it really worked. the way they did it turned out a really cool magic system (based on the idea that reality is just collective perception, and magic users are aware of this and can manipulate perception ergo reality. but the more cosmic knowledge you have the more insane or depressed you become etc especially if youre mortal), and also cool world building (it takes place in a post apocalypse after a nuclear war, now far into the future the face of the earth has completely changed but the horrors unleashed still impact it today), and also a lot of really amazing themes (the world is always changing and nothing is ever permanent, but no matter how things change things also stay the same, in a different way. especially where bonds and love are concerned. everything stays.)

and YEAH there are lesbians (i mean i always hc marcy as bi but still). and they also come from the shows improvisational nature. theres a lot of genuinely really amazing relationships and plotpoints born out of that to me. like, as the show starts to get a lot more thematically dense later on it can seem like a weird shift. some ppl say it got pretentious over time bc its not as goofy (its still pretty goofy lol), but i think it worked... like... perfectly.

because its a coming of age story where the main character actually ages, it actually feels so right that the world around him begins to seem different too. it makes sense that when he was 12 we were doing stupid goofy adventures, when he was 15 we were watching him deal with a lot of really fucked up trauma, and when he was 17 we watched him learn to grow as a person who thinks beyond simple terms of good and evil.

i know im tottaaallly rambling at this point but theres really an insane amount to talk about with adventure time. the timeline alone is ridiculous. but mostly i think my passion comes down to the fact that i was also growing up with the story, always around the same age as the mc going through similar stuff... even now, the story is focusing on a depressed 20-something trying to find whimsy in her life again. and technically the last episode timeline-wise is about accepting death lol

so like idk how exactly id recommend it to a new viewer, its really possible that a lot of ppl wont be able to really tolerate the early seasons as adults (i mean, i think theyre charming, but i have nostalgia goggles lol). that being said i think that its a series totally worth a shot for everyone... eventually. if it sounds interesting you just gotta accept the goofiness at first and trust that youre in for something wild in a totally different way later on. and totally unique and cool and special in a way nothing else has really been able to capture for me since.

TL;DR: no yeah the show was incredibly fucked up and that swan did eat that other swan. but it does have themes and also lesbians.

[ilynpilled]

Hey! So I'm from the Jaime/Lannister side of the fandom but wanted to ask your opinion on where you think GRRM is going with Dany. I don't mean spell out her endgame or anything, but what messages do you think he is trying to impart through her character? I see so much Dark!Dany! theory shaped by the show that has just never really resonated with how I read her in the books. I see her more as a figure who will try to be Queen of Westeros, but will ultimately end up abdicating or even sacrificing herself during the LN because finding "home" is more important to her than ruling... but that is not based on much other than gut feeling. What do you think?

yeah idrgaf about the show tbh. i think it fundamentally misunderstood key themes that the books were exploring. corrupted/mad dany feels so deeply cynical to me. people have been reiterating this: she is a subversive messiah figure & she is given a narrative that is so often reserved for the “male hero”. the gender commentary in that would fall flat on its face to me if she becomes mad fascist female ruler like bffr. yeah, she will get darker come winds, like everyone else she will have to make choices and will face moral dilemmas because she is resolved to continue combatting the institution of slavery. she knows she will not be able to do it without dirtying her hands in some way. i think grrm is gonna explore the concept of necessary force and the question of when it is more moral to take a stand and draw blood: is it justified to cut off and burn something at the root, especially if the alternative is allowing the cancer to exist and continue to spread? the institution of slavery is a wound that cannot just be covered up with a bandaid. like this is a very important aspect of abolition. the only way i can see the idea of “madness” be relevant is in a more subversive john brown paralleling way with how people thought that man was insane bc he wanted to end slavery lmfao. if terrible people think you are mad for attempting to make radical changes that harm them that is a good sign. also would hate her becoming an aerys parallel like in the show like that is cringe bio essentialism territory, again, antithetical to the themes prevalent in these books. d&d’s #subversive #dark #unexpected ending was unironically the equivalent of:

do not want her ‘idealism’ to be completely robbed from her at any point either really. im not opposed to tragedy but i dont think id vibe with it being too cynical in this instance. this series is about earned romanticism. its heroes are the dreamers yada yada. it is about a dream of spring. i always thought she represented hope in some way. she is gonna be the flame during TLN, literally and metaphorically imo. i do think there are thematic and more abstract aspects to lightbringer, like yeah humanity uniting over an ideal for a better future & it can be about hope or whatever, which is why multiple characters have some kind of flaming sword foreshadowing, but a main one is gonna be dany and her dragons. like on top of all the pretty overt foreshadowing, like let us think about the logistics here, what is gonna do more damage to the others?? three magic nukes or some convenient dues ex machina magical flaming toothpick we forge out of murdering a woman? i also do not want to instantly write her off as a doomed martyr either though. i see the appeal in the tragedy of the kind girl who wanted a home dying without ever getting to live in the one she created but still leaving it for millions upon millions of people present and future… but also idk i am just not crazy about martyrdom as a trope unless it is executed very well. i like when characters survive for a cause rather than die for it. dany always kept persevering, not just for herself, but others: her children and her people, so i like when altruism is framed in that way. also i might be a little bitter if she is the only one to die from the new generation or whatever like in the show

[bluegekk0]

whats fpks relationship with herrah? I know canonically, white lady doesnt really feel any ill will towards her as she likes hornet, but how do you think fpk feels towards her? And, since I can't leave grimm out of this, how does he feel about herrah? Maybe he'd feel similarly to wl, since she's basically his daughter now

while typing this out i have another question, which of the dreamers are still alive in your AU, and what are their relationships with fpk, if any? since holly is alive id assume you branched off of the embrace the void ending, and i dont believe you need to kill any dreamers for that end (if I'm wrong, do correct me!), and quirrel in your AU doesn't have monomons mask, so i can only assume ghost at least got to her.

love your stuff, stay well!

it was... not the best, admittedly. granted, they weren't hostile towards each other, i actually think that herrah warmed up to him a little bit, mostly seeing how attached he got to hornet. they certainly had a common reason to bond over, the problem is that fpk was afraid of her. among his species, it's quite common for the larger female to kill and eat the male after mating, so it's coded in his brain to expect that possibility. with wl, it was a bit different - she's more plant-like, and so her behavior is very different to that of a wyrm, or any other carnivorous species, and that comforts his mind a little bit. but with herrah, he sadly couldn't have that assurance, so he was very stressed out about it and expecting the worst

their affair was part of a bargain, so he knew it was his obligation to fullfil his side, but he was terrified throughout all of it. on top of that, since he's gay in the au, he had another reason not to enjoy it very much, though he didn't realize at the time. so all in all, it was a very unpleasant experience, and it greatly impacted his perception of herrah. i do think he have liked for it to be different, after all, she was hornet's mother and i'm sure he would love to have a more pleasant relationship with her, if only for the sake of their daughter. but his fear was too strong and so he rarely visited deepnest aside from seeing hornet (probably for the better since deepnest wasn't particularly fond of him. too bright of a light, for one haha)

as for grimm, you said herrah, but judging by the rest of that sentence i'm assuming you meant hornet, so just in case i'll go over both. i don't think he interacted with herrah much, perhaps he knew her before the whole bargain deal, but nothing more than just being aware of her existence. and with hornet, like you said, she's basically his daughter now and he most certainly sees her as such. definitely more than wl did, but her being emotionally distant is basically a given - she didn't dislike hornet but to call their relationship a mother-daughter one would be an exaggeration. grimm, however, absolutely sees her as his own child. he did that even before him and fpk became a thing - he always liked to imagine himself and fpk raising her together, but since it wasn't meant to be at the time, he instead brought her gifts and entertained her with his powers whenever he visited. these days it's a tad more complicated with hornet's refusal to admit that she sees him as a father figure and her overall bitterness, but his attitude hasn't changed at all. of course, he doesn't pamper her with gifts anymore, but he enjoys spending time with her and bonding over shared interests. their relationship is fun, they have the generally laid back, joking type dynamic of close friends, but it's clear that grimm does thinks of her as his child, meanwhile hornet seems to get upset at that idea, but secretly really cares about him

the dreamers are something i thought about before and i'm considering leaving one of them alive, since i think they're interesting characters and i'd love to explore at least one of them post-ending. as you said, monomon is a goner, and so is herrah, as hornet in the au finds there to be no reason to visit deepnest unless she has to, so it's a natural assumption that her mother is dead. that leaves lurien, and with the city of tears slowly returning to its prime over the course of the au, he would be a pretty good fit for an important figure that watches over its development. but i haven't decided yet. if i choose to keep him dead, then i think it would be a fun idea for his butler to be "promoted" to lurien's previous role, since he was his most trusted bug. we'll see, i like both of those options, and i'll have to see what i decide on

thanks a lot for the ask! i really enjoyed these questions. hope you have a great day/night!

[solarsnapp]

[ID: A primarily reddish-pink digital art piece fashioned like a magazine cover. It features Yoo Joonghyuk as the Punisher standing close to another version of the Punisher who looks like Lee Seolhwa from Omniscient Reader. Both are looking towards the viewer with serious expressions. Pink electricity dances around them, some of it arcing in the top left into two hearts. There is big white and pink text in front of the two figures saying “The Punisher.” End ID.]

whats better than one punisher? two punishers

some punisher-related snippets under the cut:

(the terms of address for joonghyuk are masculine in the first three snippets and feminine in the fourth) 

Dokja: When you played games for competitions, you always played as female characters. Why is that?

Joonghyuk: ...Many had Femme Fatale-esque perks which significantly increased their damage against characters of the opposite sex. This was especially useful in earlier years when meta comprised mostly of male characters and the pool for viable competitive female characters was smaller. 

Dokja: But, this year it was different, no? Weren’t all those perks weakened because of how powerful they were? And even then, there was a surge of popularity for female characters because that one group made up of skilled women dominated the leaderboards the year prior. 

Dokja: It offered you no true benefit anymore. Why keep using them?

Joonghyuk: ...

Joonghyuk: I’m not sure.

— Chapter 8 of “Transfem YJH AU”

Countless handles and usernames displayed on the screen, the battle roster filled nearly top to bottom with masculine playable characters. Then, there was one with startlingly white hair, red ruby lips, and a curvy figure, looking sultry and distinct from all her stone-faced competitors. That was stuck under his own name.

As the event progressed, the roster was blacked out. Competitors dropped team by team. That woman was still up there. Joonghyuk watched the more famous players in meta throw their headsets on the ground and storm off. He had to resist the urge to cackle and tell them to ‘eat shit’ so many times, it became tortuous.

“To keep it simple, I enjoyed seeing the looks on the players’ faces after they learned some gimmicky female character they didn’t take seriously wiped the whole damn roster clean.”

— Chapter 26 of “Transfem YJH AU”

“Ah, I see. What should we call you then?”

Joonghyuk knew he didn’t have to waste any more time. He could leave them without a name. But, judging from how quickly this random person picked up on his appearance, such a decision could lead to unfavorable theories spreading around. He had to think of something quick. 

His mind went back to a time still so clear when the apocalypse was only a far-off nightmare, to national competitions and competitors.

“The Punisher.” 

Joonghyuk said the name of the character he brought to the highest ranking on the leaderboards with, then dashed towards the monsters.

— Chapter 1 (Birth of the Punisher) of “Transfem YJH AU (The Prequel)” 

“Nah. Honestly, I’m more impressed.” Namwoon then casually strode up and inspected Seolhwa with a playful hum. “Can’t believe the old hag actually found a chick who looks this much like ‘the Punisher.’”

Joonghyuk tensed up. Seolhwa recognized the strange name she really should search up later. 

“Um...that is a game character, right?” Seolhwa asked.

“Hell yeah. You fit this bitch’s type so well, it’s almost like you came from the damn game itself. I mean, except for the outfit. The Punisher would have worn something way sluttier.” Namwoon then swerved around and jabbed Joonghyuk on the side with an elbow. “Must have been really disappointing for you, eh?”

Namwoon choked on a yelp when Joonghyuk slapped him upside the head. “Don’t talk about someone like that.”

— Chapter 4 (Chill Out Or Die)* of “Sparkling Water���

*As of posting, this has not been published yet.

[thetonethetollandthethunder]

Arc of A Scythe analysis, chapter 6-10

—

Chapter 6!

-Ooo! This is the chapter we see the new order scythes!!!

-99.9 percent on-time service…stuff like this makes me wish i was in scythe—

-I find it very funny that the middle seat is just as bad as disease and government, Neal always makes this small funny bits intentionally or not

-GODDARD ID RECOGNIZE THAT ROBE ANYWHERE

-Elegy of scythes <3

-This is fucking terrifying though, imagine you’re finally on your way home, you can’t wait to see your family, they’re all waiting for you, all you want is a nice flight home, and then it’s announced you’re gonna die. Thats fucking scary man

-This scene really shows how fucked up Goddard and is Elegy are, how cruel they can be

-Yes business man, gleaning is necessary, but not in this way, this way is just despicable

-Chomsky is too excited for this PUT THE FLAMETHROWER AWAY SIR

-Oh god Goddard is using the word Alpha, do you think he considers himself an alpha male? I do NOT wanna think about that

-“Yet even in dreams I often find myself gleaning…” god almost all scythes must be so fucking traumatized man-

-Jesus what a good chapter, a great way to start the new part!

—

Chapter 7!!

-Faraday is lowkey a good professor, no wonder you high school au freaks like using him for that /hj

-I for one, CAN imagine Faraday with a mace, he’d look fucking awesome

-Banned weapons are encouraged, that is SCARY!!!

-No wonder a lot of scythes (esp young ones in the new order are bloodthirsty, it’s this cycle of encouragement and being exempt from the rules of society, sure the older scythes preach about gleaning with honor but when you’re young, especially around citra and rowan’s age, you’d be hard-pressed to listen and be much more interested in the bloodsports of Goddard. That’s how he gets you!!!

-Also as someone who has started journaling my scythe journal would be UNREADABLE I have AWFUL handwriting

-Killing 5 people a week, and 260 a year is INSANE!! Again it’s no wonder a lot of scythes are so desensitized to this shit, and even revel in it, you kind of have to, just for your own sanity

-“Good scythes don’t get days off.” *COUGH COUGH* GODDARD *COUGH COUGH*

-“The idea that not all scythes were good was something neither Rowan or Citra had ever considered. It was widely accepted that scythes adhered to the highest moral and ethical standards. Even the ones who sought celebrity were seen to deserve it.” OHH YOU FUCKERS HAVE NO IDEA I LOVE WHEN I HAVE FORESIGHT THE CHARACTERS IN THEIR CURRENT PRESENT TIME DONT!!!!

-“If you do not cry yourself to sleep on a regular basis, you are not compassionate enough to be a scythe.” OUGH THAT LINEEEEE!!!!

-“She doubted rowan cried himself to sleep.” It all happens on the inside, citra!

-“I prefer to see each person I glean as an individual deserving of an end that is unique.” I love how the first book shows how compassionate and truly worthy of the title Scythe Faraday is. It’s that compassionate that makes him stay as one even after the title is gone. Because that’s what he truly is.

-“I find fire a horrific way to glean and would never use it.” ROWAN WOULD DISAGREE OHOHOHOOOOO—

-Its here where I think Rowan gets a lot of his moral code, or at least starts to think about it, to him Faraday is a model scythe, the scythe anyone should strive to be, and when he eventually sees scythes the complete opposite of him, his way of thinking as Scythe Lucifer becomes more clear.

-“I am an accomplice to the world’s oldest crime, and it will only get worse.” AAAA THAT LINE MAN

-“All they do is play games and watch cat holograms.” Oh Neal you really don’t know shit about how people actually use technology—

-I think me and Rowan would have similar handwriting (bad)

-“Rowan found it increasingly hard to parse his feelings about her.” ROWAN FELL FIRST AND HE FELL HARD MAN!!!!!!!!!

-Ben mention :(((((

-This entry of Curie’s journal really fucking hits you man!!! Especially the “I don’t know” at the end like UGH!!!!

-AMAZING CHAPTER AS ALWAYS!!! It’s really laying the groundwork for future character development!

—

Chapter 8!!!

-We get some foreshadowing to Citra’s gleaning method! The theater part if you can recall!

-Also the “No, I lost. Twice.” Is SO funny

-“It was the only time in all my years as a scythe that I had been thanked for what I do.” And you’ll be thanked SO much more soon Faraday!

-Them becoming more violent and thinking about gleaning is SO interesting esp since its so early, just shows how much it can affect you.

-Foreshadowing to where Rowan chooses which Scythe he chooses to glean when he becomes Scythe Lucifer

-GOD you can FEEL his guilt of having to choose between these 4 people!! How horrible and awful he feels to take their lives away as he learns more UGH

-AND he’s thinking about Bias’s unlike SOMEONE *cough cough* SCYTHE GODDARD *cough cough*

-“Does it ever get easier?” Rowan asked. “I certainly hope not,” the scythe said.

-Bradford Ziller is such a shit name lmao

-Rowan not wanting to admit he’s the one who chose him is soooo!!

-“They had bitten her. Good for them.” HAH that’s such a fun line

-Oop! There’s an error on my copy of the book! There’s a quotation mark at the end of “How was any of this fair?” When there shouldn’t be because it’s not dialogue! Interesting right?

-Even if he has a stupid name, you can really feel the terror and panic on Bradford, really good stuff

-The fact he wants to be aware and awake when he dies is sooo interesting man

-Rowan and Citra’s love is continuing to blossom!!

-“I fear for all of us if scythes begin to love what they do.” *STARES AT GODDARD*

-Amazing chapter as always!! Two more to go!!

—

Chapter 9!!

-Esme!! I always remember her being an underutilized character, let’s see if I was right though!

-Idk why but I hate mentions of food, esp greasy foods in books, makes me ick a lot idk I’m weird

-“Well, she could learn self-control tomorrow. Today she wanted pizza.” ICONIC LINE!! Such a mood!

-Luigi mario :)

-Elegy of scythes are back!!!

-Oh Esme there’s gonna be *so* many mass gleanings later on you have NO idea

-VOLTA

-Esme you’re life is gonna be FUCKED GIRL YOU HAVE NO IDEA!!

-A utopia where everything is perfect would be boring, most ppls lives in Scythe are boring, that’s what I think makes Scythe interesting compared to other dystopian books because its a utopia that turns into a dystopian whilst giving ideas of how that utopia itself was already a dystopia even if it wasn’t a tradition one

-Shorter chapter! Still good tho, not as interesting as others however

—

CHAPTER 10!!!!!

-TYGER!!

-Rowan you’re scaring people—

-Rowan’s disobedience is what makes him soooo interesting to me mam!!

-Lmao Rowan is worried about Tyger stealing Citra, already getting jealous!

-Apparently ppl ship Citra and Tyger which…I don’t see??? At all????

-We get some more Citra-Rowan interactions!! Very nice!!! Makes my Citran heart happy <3

-Emo-Nanites <3

-“We are not the same beings we once were. So then, if we are no longer human, what are we?” UGH ANOTHER GOOD LINE!!

-Another short chapter though not as short as the last one! Liked it more than the last though!

—

SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG, but here’s the next 5 chapters, those last two chapters didn’t have much but everything else was great as always!! Next time we’ll be doing chapters 11-15! Hope you’ll join me for it!!!

[psychewritesbs]

hi! i didnt have much success when looking through ur blog to see if uve addressed this alrdy so apologies if u have.

i was curious to know ur thoughts on jjk's portrayals of gender, esp women/femininity. if u have particular insight from a psych or philosophy bg, id be interested in hearing that (warning, i have a v feminist critique lens)

ik u love gege's writing 😅 but his handle on female characters/femininity has given me such a difficult relationship w jjk, and its v difficult to have discourse on it. on one hand, we're introduced to sm interesting realistic women, tbh i actually never stanned a woman in manga before jjk. but imo it cant be denied that gege is a sexist writer. despite how realistic jjk women r theyre all .. halfwritten? i cant think of a single one who isnt underwritten, not fully explored, not utilized substantially in the plot, etc. and there r sm ex's of extremely minor male characters in jjk who r given more thematic relevance than frequently recurring women that just underscores that gender gap imo

this isnt solely a gege problem ik but what bothers me in particular about jjk vs other mangas is how gege addresses strength, even in the light of nb/androgynous characters, and how it feels as if gege's def of strength is inherently masculine? even despite going so far as to give us a philosophical battle shonen w diverse reps of gender and emphasizing individuality that encompasses both femme/masc traits

how a reader interprets whether a jjk woman is strong or not is obv subjective. like, i think shoko is strong but shes not depicted as such bc she doesnt have a combative technique whereas yuki maki nobara or mei r depicted as "strong" bc of their battle abilities. but it also feels as if those women r strong bc they take on "masculine" traits/mindsets whereas there r no clear depictions of "femininity" making women or men stronger. even utahime who falls into v classic shoujo girl tropes is seen as weak despite teaching her students v proficientally in battle strategy (mechamaru v mahito is a good ex of that imo), as compared to how gojo teaches his (ie dumping them into missions for experience). but thats not what gege ever chooses to highlight

femininity also doesnt even seem to make men/nb characters stronger. the ex's i can think of r naoya as a vagina (lmao), geto as a mother to curses, yuta as highly attuned to his emotions, kenjaku as yuji's mother -- those r things that support these (mostly) men's strong sense of individuality but like, those arent really the things that lend those characters their "strength", u know? like geges just sprinkling in androgyny for the spice 🧐

what is feminine vs masculine, how an individual embodies those traits in their gender identity r already complex topics. im obv generalizing a lot here, but i just, idk despite how many other nuanced philosophies gege explores, what is strong/desirable in jjk still falls down to all-out fighting abilities/physical prowess, emotional detachment, isolation, extremism, etc -- all things we harp on toxic masculinity for. and even when he critiques that, theres no cogent counter solution/way to be strong that gege provides, much less one that incorporates "femininity" and women

maybe im just asking for too much from gege after having read so many great representations of women and gender by female (and male) mangakas/writers but.. i shouldnt be 🙄 he can utilize his female characters more imo, esp when he can clearly set them up so well. and im sure theres things ive misread about jjk and its portrayal of femininity, theres plenty of holes in my thoughts ^^ anyways, this is obv not a great topic to bring up in a fandom that is so polarized between dudebros and women w unaddressed internalized misogyny.. so i welcome any and all thoughts and interpretations on ur end! (also omg im rlly sorry this got so long)

I love you feminist anon, if I may call you that lol, I just always name my anons 😂. I am so grateful that you sent this.

I feel like you've very eloquently explained the deeper reason as to why I personally can't relate to the female characters in jjk. If I'm honest, I like them and think they are fun and good enough representations or attempts at depicting the archetypes that rule their personalities.

As you say, however, some of them remain rather superficial and underutilized... and please forgive me anyone who loves them, but some of them feel like they are basically dudes wearing skirts.

No offense to dudes who wear skirts or people who like men who wear skirts or anyone for that matter. It's just that, as a personal preference, I like female characters that wear skirts, pants, leggings, etc and have equal amounts of masculine and feminine energy.

So, even if I find they are good enough, I've never necessarily loved jjk female characters, because, as you also say, I've read/seen one too many amazing and iconic female characters by other authors...

And it's not like I think you're asking for too much from Gege in wanting better female characters, it's just that, as you also said, I like his writing and I read jjk precisely because of what it's doing for my masculine psyche. Like... quite literally.

So perhaps I'm more forgiving than you are because of it? Because in all reality, there are female character moments in other manga that I have to give the bombastic side eye to, and jjk isn't one of them.

Let's taco'bout it more under the cut.

So, that said, I have to admit that you might not find a lot of "feminist oriented" content in my blog because my feminist lens is reserved for dealing with lame dudebros in my real life, and also, I honestly do not know how to wear the lens on the same level of depth as you do.

Also, since my blog's lens is depth psych, I very much focus on femininity and masculinity as psychological qualities that exist on opposite ends of a continuum regardless of biological gender. You'll see me refer to femininity and masculinity like this throughout my answer.

So because of this, I'm coming at the whole issue from a slightly different angle than you are. The way I see it, I think the way the jjk female characters are written and thematically utilized (basically everything you said), ultimately comes back to how Gege's exploration of femininity is limited by his own sense of self, and very much likely biased by the sociocultural landscape he grew up in.

I don't know how much you know about Japan, but Japan has one foot in the future, and one foot in the past...

And like... ok I'm totally oversimplifying the whole thing. All I'm saying is... Gege is a man who grew up in a man's world, sharing his view of the world through jjk, which is a story about initiation of the male psyche that is published in a magazine for young boys.

Do you see the pattern there?

So If you feel like his female characters are underutilized and underexplored, and that thematically jjk focuses way too much on masculinity and masculine definitions of strength at the expense of the feminine archetypes he does present (like Naoya as a vagina LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL)... well... to me, we're basically looking at the limits of his own relationship to his femininity, which, this relationship is in turn an imperative precursor for psychospiritual development in depth psych. More of this in a bit.

Anyways, that's my anticlimactic reasoning for why I am more forgiving about the issue than you are. To be honest, I've been so consumed exploring my masculine psyche through jjk (because personally my feminine psyche is more developed in certain aspects) that I just never focus on the female characters (that is not to mention what I shared earlier).

ANYWAYS, I fucking love what you wrote about Gege's exploration on power from a masculine perspective because you're 100% spot on. What I'll say to that is that, to me, from a depth psych perspective, that's kind of the whole point.

I invite you to look at it from this other level of perspective (in addition to the whole "Gege's psych is a product of his upbringing"): the whole idea of individuality and focusing on the sense of self as a measure of "The Strongest" is being shown as an incomplete part of the equation...

... that leaves "the strongest" ultimately feeling dissatisfied.

This is a sentiment echoed by several characters because ego strength (masculine definitions of strength) is ultimately an unbalanced measure of strength precisely because it ignores feminine values and measures of strength.

Who knows where Gege is taking jjk at this point, but I will admit I am hoping he is going to explore this in more depth because, central to Jungian thought and depth psych is the idea of the Buddhist middle path and union of opposites.

In Jungian psych this means that, when you have an unbalanced ego attitude like that, something has to give so that the pendulum swings in the opposite direction, which gives the ego the experiences it needs to integrate the "opposite" attitude. This ultimately results in a more holistic and balanced perspective for the ego.

That to say that I'm wondering if Gege is going to make the pendulum swing in the opposite direction with the whole "individuality" idea since self-preservation is a "masculine" trait. Again, psychologically, it's all about balance, and right now, the story is out of balance in favor of the masculine traits you mention.

But... to bring it back to Gege's possible limitations around his perception of femininity and how developing a healthy relationship to his anima (femininity) is a precursor for psychospiritual development... what if, on a meta level, jjk is depicting part of Gege's journey towards integrating and deepening his relationship to his femininity and what you're seeing is the beginning of that journey?

Hint hint Tsumiki! maybe I'll write about it someday

This is the thing... In depth psychology, more specifically what is called "the psychology of fairy tales", fairy tales and myths are stories that depict the thinking patterns of a peoples through metaphor and symbol. The characters in these myths and stories are thus characters playing out dramas in our own psyches. So basically, think of jjk as an objective exploration of Gege's subjectiveness (psyche).

Admittedly, even if the pendulum swings in the other direction (more feminine definitions of strength), you might find that his exploration is rather shallow or that it falls short of your expectations for what you'd like to see from a feminist perspective. And you wouldn't be wrong for it, it's just that Gege is probably not on the same level of understanding that you have about femininity because he's, like you and I, a human on a journey of self understanding and growth reflecting on how his environment has shaped who he is.

The same goes for women with internalized misogyny. Sometimes you don't know what you don't know, and coming to an understanding of it is a process that doesn't take place overnight.

So I think the only part I'll disagree with is that Gege is a sexist writer. But that's perhaps because I'm being a bit too technical in what sexist means? i.e. masc supremacy or hating women and perpetuating stereotypes. I think that rather than being sexist, his unconscious biases are showing, which is why someone like you can pick them out.

I do understand where you're coming from though, and admittedly perhaps I am being too forgiving of him.

Last thing I'll say is that I've said a couple of times that wanting for jjk to have these iconic female characters feels like an exercise in futility. In retrospect, I now understand that it's not that anyone shouldn't want for jjk to have iconic female characters, but that doesn't change the fact that jjk will probably remain the wrong manga to look for them, and that's something to make peace with because it is what it is.

So, here's to hoping we get a chance to see a deeper representation of feminine values in jjk or Gege's next manga. Because, if he's done such beautiful work with the masculine psyche, like you, I'd be curious to see what he makes of a deeper exploration of the feminine psyche.

Between you and I, I'd actually love reading a proper battle bl from Gege. And I mean proper. Like... gays so canon that even the dudebros can't deny it.

ANYWAYS... giiiiiiiirl what an ask 😮‍💨. I don't think I've done it justice tbh. But hopefully I made sense? I really do love what you wrote. It was very eye opening to see this age-old argument spelled out the way you did it. So thank you again for sharing your thoughts!

If you over have any other thoughts on the topic I look forward to hearing from you!

I rambled too so... hopefully I made sense 🤣.

[omorinintendoswitchedition]

2, 3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, and 26 (My question is just say something about them you want to say)

For whichever character/characters your want

woweee this is gonna be a looooong post

2-Favourite thing about this character

Doing this for Dante. The Dr Faust cutscene, or to be more broad I love his silly attitude and his stupid jokes. Made this series iconic and funny and gives him a personality.

3-Least favourite thing about this character

For Dante this would probably be the ‘if you were 18 i would date you’ joke from the first episode of the anime. This really rubbed me the wrong way and its kinda weird to say that to a kid you just met???and ooc for him???

7-Whats something the fandom does when it comes to this character you like?

Actually give the girl characters time to shine instead of just making them sexy eye candy. And the silly family dynamics between the Sparda boys.

8-Whats something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

the fucking Vergil dodges child support and is a ‘sigma based alpha male’ homophobe. i hate it so muchhh even though the meme is dead it still annoys me so much when i see people still think its funny.

9-Could you be roommates with this character?

I probably could be roomies with people like Dante and Nero and Kyrie. Id probably get a little annoyed at Dante for constantly being in debt and gambling but we could survive. Do not think I could be roommates with Vergil. that man does not know how the oven works.

10-Would you date this character?

fuck yeah I would date Dante.

12-What's a headcanon you have for this character?

Nico is the kind of person who drenches everything in ranch. She buys the ranch ice cream a lot and it makes Nero loose his shit every single time. She drowns her chips in ranch and Nero looks at her from across the table like shes murdered someone

14-Assign a fashion aesthetic to this character.

Hrngh fuck im not a fashion person. Do kinda see Trish getting into gothic fashion tho.

20-Which other character is the ideal best friend for this character, the amount of screentime they share doesn't matter?

Nero and Nico are the perfect best friends duo. Always got each others backs, always making fun of each other lightheartedly. I want more of them sooo badly you have no idea.

21-If you're a fic writer and have written for this character, what's your favorite thing to do when you're writing for this character? What's something you don't like?

its been decades since I have last written anything in general. But I do remember Dante’s dialogue being fun to write for me and I dont like everything else because im constantly worrying if something is ooc

22-If you're a fic reader, what's something you like in fics when it comes to this character? Something you don't like?

Its been decades since ive read any dmc fic either (get caught up in other things) but as mentioned earlier do love those family dynamics and the attempts to fix everything. Dont like when Vergil os portrayed as ice cold after dmc5.

23-Favorite picture of this character?

FUCK THIS IS SO HARD. I do love the capcom cafe art with dante and his tits out. the teppen card art is also pretty cool.

24- What other character from another fandom of yours that reminds you of them?

So considering the only other fandom I am in is about depressed teenagers trying to overcome their trauma its safe to say none. I guess Kel somewhat for Dante? Only cause theyre silly and have older brothers who like blue.

25-What was your first impression of this character? How about now?

When I first saw V back when I knew absolutely nothing about dmc, I thought he was edgy and didnt really like him (the video used the ‘what evil lurks I must destroy’ clip out of context). But now that I have played and beaten the series I must say V my poor guy hes an absolute menace.

26-FREEBIE QUESTION!!

no idea what this means!!!!!so im just gonna make up a question!!!!

26-Would you work for this character?

ABSOLUTELY NOT DANTE HAS NO BREAD!!!! and the job is like. insanely dangerous and im just an internet guy.

[emblazonet]

So, the Black Jewels Trilogy

Saw these books recommended in a thread about adult sexy fantasy books, and my brain went ??? Wait. They weren’t that adult???? They had dark themes, but they were fluff.

I’d almost forgotten about them. I read them about 15 years age (wat!) in high school. My friends at the time peer pressured me into it. They would tell me about all their favourite scenes and squee about them as we whiled away lunches in the stairwell, which both spoiled a lot of the fun of reading them the first time and I still remember which scenes were spoiled as I did my reread.

I enjoyed them well enough at the time, because they were dark and a bit gory and a bit sexy and I was ravenous as a teen for anything with sex, violence, and especially BDSM. I grew out of them by uni.

So the thread was specifically recommending them as an adult alternative to the trendy ACoTaR books by Sarah J Maas that I have never read and don’t intend to. I have since learned that some hold the opinion that SJM plagiarized or otherwise cribbed heavily from Black Jewels. (The other alternative offered in that thread were the Kushiel books, which I would agree are more adult, both in subject matter and style.)

On a reread, I think my initial impression that these books are more for teens—or people who specifically want and need an id-based power fantasy—holds up. Content warnings for literally all the standard bogeyman: rape, pedophilia, implied cannibalism, torture, etc etc. It dives shallowly into all the dark stuff in order to get to the revenge fantasy at the heart of the series.

Extensive spoilers under the cut. There’s a few things I liked, but there’s a lot more I didn’t enjoy about it too. (And it’s not because of any of the content warning stuff above.)

I wrote my review of the first three books before reading any of the sequels. Sequel reviews will be forthcoming.

The Setting

The worldbuilding is a mess. I have no idea how the economy works or why there are even nonBlood ‘landens’ (basically magicless folk) at all when they Literally. Never. Show. Up.

Yet! For all that! It is so rare to see a matriarchy in a fantasy setting that I will forgive the cardboard worldbuilding and pretend like economics doesn’t matter it’s just fantasy. I love that the greatest power is downwards, the Darkness rather than the heavens. Dark stuff more powerful. It’s neat! Like even today the books feel different, even when they’re extremely 2000s aesthetically. Goth vibes ftw. Less good is the gender essentialism and the caste system, which feels like a forerunner to A/B/O in some ways.

Basically, like in A/B/O, everyone has like a secondary biological gender that determines their rank in the hierarchy. So women who are born Queens are biologically meant to rule, and men are drawn to serve them. (It’s stupid, but I respect the inherent service kink aspect.) Some males are Warlords, who are more aggressive, and some men are even higher caste as Warlord Princes, who are ‘predators’ who want to murder ppl all the time, but they’re supposed to be controlled by the women I guess. They're emotionally immature alpha males. Yuck.

I still have no real idea how the fuck Terreille and Kaeleer are different tbh, one just has sentient animals? Are they different dimensions?? The physicality of the environment in this book is like wisps of smoke. Stuff just appears, usually when it needs to, and then goes away again, much like how the magical protagonists are always calling and vanishing objects.

Daughter of the Blood

For a trilogy with a deeply repetitive, emphatic style that over-relies on (dorky) catchphrases (‘and the Blood will sing to Blood,’ ‘everything has a price,’ ‘Mother Night’) each book does have a unique flavour and its own problems.

Weirdly, the thing I hated the most about the first book was the random fatphobia. I never even noticed it as a kid, but almost every time a fat character is introduced they’re a gross dude and likely a pedophile. Don’t like it, tired of seeing it, stop. I’m not even going to forgive the series for being from the early 2000s. I don’t care. Cut it out. At least it only happens in the first book.

The Mary-Sue (she really is! I mean that with affection!) Jaenelle is a child in this book, and her main problems in life are getting sent to a mental institution called Briarwood that is run by pedophiles. We also—at no point ever in the books—get her POV, so a lot of the horror is mitigated by how much the details are glossed over. I think that was meant to be more horrifying but the author isn’t good enough at building atmosphere to make that work. The book chooses a couple specifically horrible situations and then hammers into them in a way that feels both schlocky but also makes the world and the situation feel smaller. I don’t like the way repetition is used in these books. It’s certainly a choice but it’s one that drives the nuance out of book. Almost every villain in this book is a rapist, which makes the rape feel cheap by the end—and I don’t think cheapening it was the intention.

Yet, to be honest, I think this is the strongest book of the three. I actually really like the beginning, with Tersa being crazy and giving prophecies. I don’t know, the writing just draws me in somehow. It’s not great writing, I want to be clear. It’s got nothing on, idk, Tanith Lee. But it is extremely readable and compelling. I was having a good time.

Also, Lucivar and Daemon, like, kiss? And that is just about the only gay thing that you will see in the books until Daemon fakes raping his father in the third book. It is unrelentingly heterosexual otherwise. But I think I was hooked early on as a teen hoping for some gay action. I was disappointed at the time and I’m disappointed now.

This is also the book with probably the most sex and violence. Men are castrated on screen a couple times, there’s explicit cannibalism of one of the other children at Briarwood, one of our viewpoint characters is an assassin, etc etc. Much bad sex happening. Daemon and Lucivar, the hot dudes who are brothers, have been sex slaves for like 1700 years which is objectively hilarious that is SUCH an absurd amount of time to just... be more powerful (aka have darker Jewels) than any of your slavers and just not gotten free? Even with magical cock rings that control them, it's still so stupid.

Also, our main character is actually their dad, Saetan (I WILL NEVER BE OVER THESE NAMES) who is like 50k years old? That makes me giggle so much. That’s so old. Why. Honestly props to Anne Bishop, she really just went for it. I have so much respect for how batshit absurd everything is.

Honestly I just kinda like the first book? It’s paced a lot better than the other ones, it’s dark and ridiculous and full of bad things happening. Jaenelle reminds me of a friend of mine, oddly enough. She’s probably tolerable because we never get her POV.

I also liked Daemon and Jaenelle’s relationship in this one. Under the worldbuilding power fantasy terms of this setting, Jaenelle is literally made up of the dreams of people in the world, and Daemon’s dream was to be the lover of the Most Powerful Matriarch Ever, who in the book is called ‘Witch.’ So meeting her as a kid he’s constantly bombarded by his attraction to her spirit/power/Witch-self, whatever. But she’s a kid and he’s Very Not Into That. He and Saetan are constantly respecting her consent at every opportunity, so it doesn’t squick me out in the slightest.

Because you know, at that age (12-14), I would have killed for an ancient powerful lover who is The Hottest Guy In All The Realms to be all but overcome with lust for me and yet completely absolutely in service to my every need and desire.

It’s a power fantasy, yo.

Anyway the next two books will completely kill any interest I have in their relationship so really, Daughter of the Blood could have ended here and I would have been satisfied.

Heir to the Shadows

Wow, does this one have middle book syndrome. It’s a slog. Someone out there probably likes it. One of the scenes my high school friends liked is the introduction of the Arcerian cat Kaelas where he squashes the Sceltie puppy Ladvarian. I remember them telling me about it with glee. It’s cute, but not enough to save this book.

Everytime a conflict happens it’s almost instantly resolved. Jaenelle grows up, Saetan spoils her, she has friends. All the characters feel really one note. There is almost no sex in this book, but there is some gore. The extremely boring villains, Dorothea and Hekatah, who are basically the same person except one of them is undead (‘demon-dead’), do some violence. Our protagonists do more violence. There’s a unicorn genocide. I can’t keep any of the characters that are in Jaenelle’s court straight (except for Karla and the aforementioned cat and puppy).

Oh, Daemon’s just insane for the whole book, and I ended up skimming all his sections because nothing happened in them.

That sure was a book. Took me longer to read than the other two combined.

Queen of the Darkness

Back to a compelling read, somehow. I blasted through it.

A major issue I have with this series is about how power is framed. Might makes right. The good guys happen to be more powerful, so they can unleash their often bloody revenge, which is always framed as a good thing, a triumph. And also, no one just talks to each other, because bad guys are bad and good guys are good. There is no real compromise, and no nuance.

Like, Bishop is writing a matriarchy, but instead of, idk, expanding on that idea, she just kinda writes the same power imbalances that exist in our world except more villains are women, which instead of feeling empowering or whatever reeks of internalized misogyny. Yeah, I get it, women are bitches and oppressing the mens, so then the sad menz all rape vulnerable women. So it’s a patriarchy, actually, with the Queen-caste women as figureheads. WHY YOU DO THIS.

Honestly I find the ‘might makes right’ part much more problematic than any inclusion of sex slavery, unicorn genocide, or pedophilia. All the latter are perpetrated by villains; what's the excuse for the good guys?

Like this book is more about being righteous and also horny than it is trying to say stuff about politics or whatever, but it’s saying stuff about politics anyway, and what it’s saying is that the most powerful people make the rules. And being an emotionally unregulated nuclear bomb person is perfectly fine so long as you’re the good guy. And frankly, I hate that, and I disagree with it.

And ok, sure, so the Queens are supposed to emotionally regulate their Warlord Princes except that’s mostly just by hoping they hold onto their tempers until they can unleash them in a better direction which doesn’t strike me as real emotional regulation. And who’s supposed to regulate Jaenelle? Just... Jaenelle? Like theoretically the males who serve her, but the way they treat her seems more likely to cause nuclear explosions. She is herself a walking bomb.

Honestly the way males treat females in this book is gross. Men just like overprotect and patronize to the point of infantilizing a woman. And Big Yikes if she so much as gets a period—which is apparently The Worst and makes them unable to use power which THANKS I HATE IT—and it’s just awful, the men treat them like INVALIDS. Not romantic. Didn’t like it as a teen, don’t like it now.

Additionally, I don’t like how emotions and trauma are handled in this. I love a good broken traumatic character, and it's even better if they're powerful and need to navigate not causing harm whilst healing. I lap that shit up. Black Jewels fails me here. All the characters are so fucking one note and so the trauma/healing stuff feels shallow and uninspired.

Additionally, Jaenelle and Daemon are so boring and they’re ‘courting’ each other like high schoolers with zero personality and I hate it. They had better sexual chemistry when she was 12, which is probably just because Daughter of the Blood was the better written book.

Also, they got like a romancey fade to black sex scene? Yeesh.

I DO appreciate that Daemon has no magic healing dick: Jaenelle is still pretty traumatized about stuff after they bone. She’s better about sex, sure, but she’s still upset about being a Queen, etc etc. You know, this series has ooooodles of problems, but I really don’t think Jaenelle is one of them. She works for me. (Although Daemon being a virgin after 1700 years as a pleasure slave? I HATE THAT, that’s stupid. Miss me with that bullshit. At least Jaenelle is never punished by the text for not being a virgin.)

I don’t have much to say about the end. Because we go in knowing Daemon's got back up plans it takes all the tension out of the climax. The story ends with an expected triumph. The book doesn’t set up the idea that Jaenelle will die well enough either, like it’s telegraphed from the first that the Kindred will save her, and then they do. Ok then. Wow, so tense. Much thrill.

So like, I raced through reading this, sure, but it still wasn’t a satisfying read. But it wasn’t a slog. And there were some fun interactions—I enjoyed Surreal and her wolf Graysfang. There were moments.

Honestly this series is so unhinged that despite all the ridiculosity of it, I think I’m coming away feeling weirdly affectionate towards it? It’s bad, the alpha male tropes are nauseating, the matriarchy failed hard, and it’s repetitive as fuck. I’ve been thinking about this series for weeks now, and I have no idea why I find it compelling! It’s infuriating! Maybe it’s compelling because it’s infuriating.

In conclusion: I guess I’m going to read all of this garbage and yell about it. Stay tuned for the sequels.