#even so many actually good ones still started this way!

[zoe-oneesama]

The Kwamis! Some of these came easier than others, but since Angelic Layer has no magic involved, all the kwamis became human~ They won't be very prevalent, they're mostly here to fill in background character roles - shop clerks, MCs Tournament Directors, fans - so they won't have a whole lot of speaking roles (aside from, you know, the MCs who're there to commentate on the fights lol). But I thought I'd give them all a nice nod in the story somewhere.

As expected, Tikki and Plagg are the main MCs. Marinette and Adrien's fights will be going on concurrently so Tikki will be commentating Marinette's fights while Plagg commentates on Adrien's. They'll have the most dialogue of the kwamis, so I do want them to have unique ways of discussing what they're seeing.

Pollen will be working directly for the Bourgeois'. As a VIP with a direct relationship with the international director of Angelic Layer, Chloe has her own private practice layer in her home and Pollen is in charge of it's upkeep and maintenance. She matches Armand the Bulter's levels of competence.

Trixx is a Rena Rouge mega fan. They've been following Alya's blog for as long as they can remember and are mega stoked that Alya moved to their city. When Alya starts to doubt herself, it's Trixx's voice that can be heard cheering her on to not give up.

Nooroo and Duusu are servants in the Agreste Estate. Unknown to Adrien, they are fully aware of his sneaking around to play and the two do what they can to make excuses and deflect Nathalie when Adrien isn't where he's supposed to be. They're rooting him on from the shadows!

Wayzz is the adult son of Marianne and Fu. He brings them to Angelic Layer fights against his will because the two really enjoy them. The two seem to be really invested in Ladybug and Chat Noir's career (and the behind the scenes shenanigans that they secretly spy on).

Longg is Kagami's bodyguard. Like Nooroo and Duusu, they are fully aware of what Kagami is doing behind her mother's back and feigns ignorance when Kagami pulls something..."sneaky" to get to a fight secretly.

Here's where we get into some existing jobs from the show:

Orikko and Kaalki are the "Layer Hot Girls (and boy)". lol I just thought it was funny that Angelic Layer even has them.

Mullo is the sales clerk at the Princess Piffle store (the store where you can buy your Angel and all the accessories). All of them lol. Mullo and her many many sisters who look just like her.

Barkk and Fluff take similar but still different roles (the uniforms are ALMOST the same but there are some tiny differences). So Barkk is the receptionist at the Practice Ring (literally you pay to reserve a mini-layer to practice on) while Fluff is the waitress/cashier at the cafeteria at the Tournament Center.

(and back to making shit up lol)

Daizzi is a nurse where Rose goes to the hospital and she has segmental localized vitiligo. Rose is particularly close to Daizzi since she helps Rose make her donations to the hospital.

Sass is the backstage directory, aka, the guy who makes things run. He has an earpiece that has the same diamond pattern as his pants on it! The anime does show one person who helps backstage, but I wanted to have a little fun with Sass's look and tie in to him being "in charge" of the kwamis.

Ziggy works at Socqueline's family art supply shop, which is frequented by Angelic Layer players who are on a bit of a budget. They love talking with the customers about their angels, though mostly the design part.

Stompp is Ivan's foster mother and Roarr his foster sister (Stompp's bio-daughter). I actually didn't think of what kind of job this outfit would be good for, but I think she'd make a good security guard - usually working at rock concerts, which she bonds with Ivan over, but she's also been hired for Angelic Layer tournaments. Sometimes sore losers get a little...violent.

Roarr falls in love with Juleka's Angel Purple Tigress immediately thanks to her pre-existing love of tigers in general. She's even bold enough to proclaim her love to Juleka herself!

Xuppu is Ondine's sibling and a fan of King Monkey, though they'll go out of their way to make fun of Kim himself. Secretly, they're very invested in Kim's career and get very upset on his behalf when he loses.

[caffeinatedvigilantewriter]

So Danny is older, and lives in Gotham as a mechanic (he could be a We mechanic, a JLA mechanic, whatever) and eventually, he starts dating Bruce Wayne.

Now, Danny knows the Wayne at the bats, it’s kinda hard to hide your vigilantism from a former vigilante. But Danny doesn’t mention it, he knows the dangerous of telling your loved ones.

Jazz is alive and a therapist is Coast City (Jazz x Hal? Could that work? Idk too much about the green lanterns). Dan is undercover to investigate pools of corrupted ectoplasm that’s guarded by an assassin cult, and Dani is still traveling the world, not for pleasure, but for the Realms.

Dani doesn’t age. It’s a side effect of being a clone. She destabilized one to many times and now her ghost half won’t let her age so she won’t die.

Dani can’t exactly settle down in a city likes the others. She looks 12. And while her siblings would take care of her in a heartbeat, she needs to fill her obsession of history and adventure.

So, she starts hunting for old artifacts, especially the magic ones. It’s a great way to learn about history and get a sense of adventure.

She’s been doing this for a couple years, building a name for herself and she gotten very good. (Keep in mind she only looks 12, but she’s actually like 33 mentally and intellectually)

Eventually, she crosses paths with a bat while searching for an artifact. (Even better if its Duke. We need more Duke. Probably won’t work with Cass, we’ll use Duke for the prompt, but can be switched out)

Obviously, Duke is kinda confused as to why a 12 yo is going after a dangerous magic artifact in the middle of but-fuck nowhere and offers to take her to Gotham and drops her off there after taking the artifact.

Dani knows better, she was going to refuse, but the realized she could take this as a free ride. So she agrees.

The reach Gotham and go their separate ways, and Duke goes home immediately, didn’t even take the time to tell anyone about the girl. but when Duke is at home hanging with their civilian stepdad, Danny gets a call and says he’s inviting his younger sister over

Bruce: Jazz? Jazz is older that you

Danny: nope! I have another sister!

Everyone: ???

Bruce: how comes we never meet her?

Danny: you have! She was at the wedding! But you’ll see her again don’t worry! She doesn’t visit often so I’m excited!

They arrives, the bat opens the door and Dani walks in.

Danny: Dani!!

Dani: Danny!!

So people are confused, Duke is like omg my aunt is an artifact hunter?? while everyone else is like omg my aunt is younger than me??

Eventually, Danny opens her backpack and goes:

Dani: so I was in *insert random place in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere* and found this! *pulls out artifact* I thought you would like so I brought it for you!

Danny: aww, thanks Dani, you shouldn’t have

Duke, who put that artifact in the cave for study: 👁️👄👁️

And Dani gives them a wink.

Duke isn’t going to take that lying down and attempts to find out Dani’s secrets while shes thwarting him at every turn.

Dani stays at the manor for a while, but nobody believe Duke when he tries warning them of Dani, because Duke didn’t tell anyone about the artifact

Things become even more alarming when Danny also start thwarting him, despite not know the family secret. (Danny thinks that Duke is onto the family secret.)

Cue crack, angst, fluff, whatever your heart desires.

[grendil5]

History is completely fabricated. None of those things happened and none of their opposite stories happened either. It's all made up. Opposite stories meaning history was designed with stories that mirror eachother. The opposite stories for your examples are:

-The african slave trade didn't happen.

-The link between the words slave and slav doesn't exist. (not really an opposite but still) (I admit I don't know this one for sure but it would be extremely funny and cruel to do this to Christians and thus right up their alley)

-The european opium sales to china (to addict and enslave them) didn't happen.

-The uh hmm well i'm sure you can figure out the polar opposite of this one. It didn't happen.

-The other three don't really have an opposite, to my knowledge, perhaps the story of the holy roman empire being secretly run and exclusively kinged by Dutch/Germans? More insane impossible fantasy bullshit. But rest assured not one truth has been told to us or today's Russians about Soviet Russia.

But there are many, many more examples. You probably have some too. You'll notice that in all of history, there's a team good-guy and team-bad guy example for everything. Some "thousands of years" (lol) apart. All of it the west vs the world. Or white people vs the world. Christians vs the world. That's because it's all made up, it's designed to completely ensnare your brain. The full spectrum of good and bad behavior is taken care of. Every race and religion is written to be a victim in one story and a perpetrator in another.

The reason history is designed that way is neutralize your moral compass. To drive you away from Christ, and to make you easy to control. To make you disbelieve in a "true good", which is what Christ has always been.

There's no "morally grey" mankind that "has been kind of bad, but always tries to do good." or some slop. There is only one good and it's our Father. Anyone acting against our father is evil. There has never been anything else. This world operates on one single principle: If you love God, everything works out for you. Period. No countries, no nations, no history. It's all fake. Completely made up. Our textbooks were written by drunk Skeksis in some lodges somewhere and mass-produced after WWII to feed to children whose great-grandchildren, us, now accept their dumb stories as law. And they've been constantly adding to it. "This sounds plausible, put this in" becomes a "new fact recently discovered by the university of _____" Coincidentally, all scienceslop (and subsequent NASAslop) also works this way.

Ask yourself, what would be better? For the goyim to know some truths and some lies, or for them to live in a complete fantasy world? If you tell them some truths, they use those truths as a jumping off point and will discover the lies and awaken. Truth sticks out like a sore thumb. I have no decent historical example for this because they've never told us a truth. That's how fucked it is.

Hang on, how about the world trade thingy. They told you that a plane crashed into it, which it didn't, the entire thing was CGI, so that's a lie. But what if they told you a truth? What if they told you there were bombs on every part of the tower, and that it was a controlled demolition. What the fuck would their excuse be? Now that this truth is revealed to you, how could they ever explain it away? Their narrative is fried. The same goes for all of history. You think even a little bit about one inconsistency, and the whole case is blown apart. That’s why they’ve never, ever told us anything. Nothing.

If you hear even one truth about our history, you'll come to the realization that most of the shit they sell you is logistically impossible. Plus if you "get got" too many times, and realize it too many times, you'll start to look at everything as potentially bullshit. And then you'll start to see that actually it's all bullshit. And then you'll begin to seek Jesus Christ and find the truth in God. And to the people who invent our history to deceive us from God, that's a fucking disaster.

Just about every war doesn't add up. Food and water supplies when marching across continents don’t make sense. Whole populations lived in and around the most beautiful, mathematically perfect buildings but we’re told they were all dumb stinky peasants who threw sewage into the streets.

One way you know it’s fake is that in all their stories human beings are fucking stupid. The holodomor was obviously supposed to mirror the other one, but both stories have to treat the supposed victims like dumb cattle. So it barely even works! Picture yourself as a Kulak watching your children starve to death on some farm and saying "We're not leaving, this is our home." Yeah fucking right!

If you care about the truth you must look at the history books they write for us as a lie. The real truth is that absolutely nothing can be trusted before the end of "WWII" which itself may have been a lie.

All war is fake, that's something you come to understand. Go look at old war photos and ask yourself what these kids were doing when the photo was taken? What were they thinking according to the official story? Why are they standing there like that? Why are they all fucking smiling? How did that vehicle get into that hole in such a way? Why does everything look so fucking ridiculous? It's NASA-tier fakery. All fake soldiers playing dress up and having fun coming up with rediculous "oh so sad" war photos. You can see it on their faces. Their Skeksis director behind the camera was having fun with them. Fooling Christians unites them. Same thing with the civil war. With all wars. With all tragedies. All Hollywood.

It's all just dumb shit for you to get mad at. It's all designed to tear you from God. Don't buy a word. History isn't real.

[lizardsfromspace]

I've looped around from finding the belief that The Wizard of Oz was "the first color film" or "first technicolor film" understandable if wrong to finding it deeply annoying

Like. I get how it feels true - how the transition from sepia to technicolor in the film feels epochal, and how it's a springboard to people imagining how AMAZING and how AWESTRUCK audiences must've been at the time, but it just isn't the case, and no one in 1939 would've thought it was the first color film.

I mean, you've probably seen Snow White (1937) and Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). At the time color features were becoming more common, and they had been common in cartoons and shorts for years.

On a base level, if The Wizard of Oz was such a monumental moment in film history, giving people something they've never seen before, why did it only break even at the box office? By all accounts while not a flop it did decently but not great, and it only became a Cherished Classic thanks to TV airings later on. I mean, 1939 saw what is still, if adjusted for inflation, the highest grossing film ever made, and it wasn't The Wizard of Oz

Here is the actual history of color: most silent films were tinted, most commonly with different scenes being all tinted different colors, but more rarely hand-coloring. But back then people started experimenting with many different "true" color film systems, most of which failed for one reason or another, and there were a couple silent features made in two-strip technicolor, which had a more limited palette. At the start of the sound era, some black & white scenes would have color segments; this stage has been largely forgotten bc in many cases, the color segments don't survive & we only have them in black and white. Then three-strip technicolor began and became the dominant form of color until the late 1950s, with the first full-length three-strip technicolor film being 1935's classic...Becky Sharp. Which did decently, and got one Oscar nom for Best Actress, but didn't really become a classic. And then color films became more common until they became the norm in the 1960s

But it has to be a classic, right? It can't just be some random movie that ushered in technicolor. It has to be a famous movie everyone's heard of. It can't have been a gradual process touched by many individual artists, it has to be something one Great Man ushered in overnight, and the crowds were amazed, bc they had just been waiting for someone to Do Color Film so they could ditch black & white forever. It couldn't have been the case that they rejected many previous attempts at color film bc they sucked. Nothing can ever be the result of many people making many choices in many works of art, it has to be the work of one Great Work of Art that Changed Everything Instantly, and all the little people and failed experiments and less-enduring ones just have to be erased to make way

But it isn't. The transition from sepia to color in The Wizard of Oz did dazzle audiences, and still does, but that's because it's a incredibly well-done visual effect and a creative choice within the story to show the change from Kansas to Oz. We don't have to say it was important bc it was the first to do something technologically; it can be important for just being a really good movie

[derinwrites]

Do you have any advice for writing in a web serial format?

Let’s look at this in two sections – the business part, and the actual writing part.

The Business Part

1. Consistency. Consistency in updates. Have a schedule and STICK TO IT.

If your schedule is too hectic and starts affecting your health or otherwise adversely affecting your life, change the schedule; update less often. Don’t update in spurts and then randomly stop. The audience will far more easily tolerate a slow schedule than an inconsistent one; an inconsistent one will lose many readers. You’re not Andrew Hussie and you can’t get away with that bullshit.

There may be times where you need to take a hiatus due to some emergency, life event, or health condition. This is fine – your wellbeing is more important than your story. But you need to be up-front with your audience about this; tell them you’re taking a hiatus and tell them exactly how long it’s going to be. If you can, you should tell them in advance (this isn’t possible for things like a car accident, but is very possible if you’re planning to, say, move house in a month). If you’re taking too many hiatuses, then it’s better to slow down your schedule and update less often. Audiences prefer fast and consistent, but if they have to choose, slow is better than inconsistent.

The #1 helper to consistency is having a big buffer – that is, have several weeks’ worth of unpublished chapters. The length of your buffer is personal taste, but I like to keep mine as long as possible so that if there’s some problem that stops me from writing for several weeks, it won’t upset the schedule. It keeps my stress down to know that I have that leeway. Other writers prefer to only write a week or two ahead, though, so different things work for different people.

2. Decide on your monetisation system early and prioritise it.

The most popular and most effective method for monetising a web serial seems to be the patronage method, which is the one I use. You set up a patreon, ko-fi, or whatever sponsorship system you prefer, and offer rewards to those who support you. Having their names in a credit list and getting access to advance chapters are very common rewards. Some people also lock access to their discord behind a paywall, or offer extra stories or let supporters name story characters.

This model is not the only way to make money from web serials. Some people make money via advertising, or selling merchandise, or use the web serial itself to advertise stories that they sell. You can of course use several revenue streams – you can have both a patreon/ko-fi and run ads on your website (I don’t because I hate ads, but you can), or start selling merch related to your story once there’s a demand for it. Many web serial authors (including myself) sell their completed works as books. But the important thing here is that one of these systems will be your main system, and you need to know what it is and behave accordingly. If you run ads AND have a patreon, are you more focused on ad revenue or patreon revenue? You’re going to have to put your time and attention into one of them over the other. You’re going to have to make decisions that will help one and harm the other. So know in advance which one is most important to you.

You don’t have to monetise your story at all, of course. Plenty of people write fiction on the internet for free every day with no thought to making an income at all. But if you’re serious about this, I would recommend monetising it, because that makes a better and more consistent product. The reason I’m still able to keep writing these year after year is that my supporters pay my mortgage; without Patreon and ko-fi, I’d have to get a different job, and wouldn’t have time or energy to write consistently. Also, the reason I can write and update even when I don’t feel like it, and the reason I always push to make my stories as good as possible even when I’m not interested, is because I owe it to my supporters who are paying me real actual money to read my work. If I didn’t owe my readers anything, none of these stories would ever get finished, because writing is only fun about half of the time.

3. Don’t expect to be able to turn this into a career.

This advice sounds silly coming from me, who has through sheer luck, as well as the generosity and passion of my readers, somehow turned this into a career. But I need to emphasise that that luck is not typical. Most web serial writers will not be able to support themselves solely with their writing. It can make a good side hustle, but if your primary goal is “low barrier to entry work-from-home career where I don’t have to answer to a boss and can support myself comfortably,” then web serial writing is usually all of those things except the last one. There’s no harm in trying to turn this into a career – I did it, as have many other web serial authors – but don’t expect that result, is all I’m saying.

Still, if you can do it, it does have a lot of advantages.

4. Don’t expect to make money fast.

I remember when I finally started making an entire $100/month on Patreon. It was a fantastic day.

It was when I’d been writing web serials for four years.

5. Your most valuable resource is your readership.

Your readership will grow and gather momentum over time. The best business decisions you can make are those that grow your readership and allow your readers to participate in community, even if you have to give up opportunities to make money to do it.

A good example of this is discord. Some people have private discords that only their patrons can access; while this is a useful anti-spam and anti-harassment tool, I don’t recommend doing this if you don’t have a major spam or harassment problem. Some people will pay for discord access, yes, so you might get a handful of extra dollars per month that way – however, you will also get a far less active discord. When it comes to readers, population density is critically important; the more activity, the more people talking about your work together (or talking about anything and bonding with each other), the better. Plenty of people have joined my free discord just because it was there and only read my stories after seeing people talk about them there. Then they go and get their friends to read the stories. Enthusiastic readers are inherently valuable, and the best thing you can do is give them the resources they need to talk to each other and share their interest.

This principle applies to a lot of things. I have a lot of free stories on my website that aren’t the usual web serials, and more than once I’ve considered whether they should be paywalled. The answer I always land on is ‘no’; I couldn’t tell you how many readers have been roped into my web serials because they liked Copy <|> Paste, or The Void Princess, or Drops of Blood. These readers may or may not then become monetary supporters, but even the ones who don’t will increase activity and discussion about the stories, have fun and tell jokes in the discord, and may even produce fanart. A thriving community is always going to be more valuable to you than a few extra dollars; make sure to support them accordingly.

Your readership will start very small. In terms of marketing, this is your hardest time. A big readership does the majority of the marketing for you, but when you’re on your own, it takes a lot to convince anyone to give your stories a shot. It helps if you have an existing readership to leverage, which is what I did – I’d been writing Animorphs fanfiction on AO3 for years, and many of my first readers followed me over from there. If you have such a community that already has faith in your writing, leverage it. If you don’t, you can gain one my writing in a place where people go to read stories similar to your work, such as an appropriate subreddit, or a web serial site like Royal Road or Scribblehub. You are looking to gain as high a number of enthusiastic, engaged readers as possible.

And now, the fun part – the actual craft!

The Writing Part

1. Always remember that you are writing for two audiences

A web serial author has to keep two audiences in mind; the serial readers, and the bingers. You are writing a story that needs to be fun and engaging when read very slowly, at the pace of whatever your update schedule is, but that also needs to be interesting when read all at once.

This is not an easy task.

It’s something I fucked up pretty significantly with Curse Words, which was my first attempt at this. Curse Words has a lot of complicated political stuff happening throughout pretty much the whole story, as well as a complex save-the-world plot that’s reliant on a lot of secrets, mysteries and extremely speculative information. With so many wheels spinning, I decided to make the protagonist not particularly smart and move him very slowly through the plot to make sure that the reader would be able to keep up.

This was a mistake.

‘Pretty slow and simple’ at a novel reader’s pace is torturous at a web serial pace. Readers got a full week to discuss the mysteries and implications of each chapter with each other, doing the detective work of ten chapters between each one. The frustration with Kayden’s slow pace was clear, and he came across as an outright idiot rather than an average teen. Personally, I think this lesson was one of the biggest reasons for the difference in quality between Curse Words and Time to Orbit. Don’t slow down for your audience; they’re already slowed down by your update schedule.

At the same time, though, you don’t want to move so fast that you lose the bingers. You can’t assume that your readers will have time between chapters, or that they will discuss each chapter with other readers, or that they will go back over previous chapters looking for clues. Interested people reading update by update will do this, but bingers absolutely will not. So you still need to make sure that everything is comprehensible on a binge read with no backchecking or outside investigation.

My advice on this matter is to move as fast as possible, but take care to make sure that readers are reminded of everything important a few chapters before it comes into play. That way, both audiences can keep up. If you have to make a decision, it’s best to favour your update readers; they’re your most active community. They’re doing the up-to-date discussion, and probably doing the most word-of-mouth and fanart, although binge readers will do that too (I have plenty of dedicated readers who wait five or six weeks to binge a bunch of chapters on purpose, just because that’s their preferred reading style, and they’re still very engaged). But if you plan to publish your story later as a complete work, you also need to keep in mind how it’s going to read as a binge – and also, new readers will binge the earlier chapters of your story to catch up to the current one, so make sure it’s a good experience for them or they won’t get a chance to become update readers.

Two audiences. Mind your pacing and information reveals accordingly.

2. Chapter length

The general rule of web serials is that the more often you update, the shorter your chapters should be. The generally agreed ‘sweet spot’ is 1-1.5k words, 3 times a week, but this depends heavily on individual style. I update once or twice a week (depending on what stories I’ve got going) and try to keep my chapters between 2 and 2.5k words. If you update once a month, your sweet spot is probably about 10k words.

Don’t hold religiously to what other people tell you the ideal word count is – this will vary drastically with genre and personal style – but it’s best to try to stay fairly consistent. It’s not always possible to stay exactly on target because the best break points between chapters will vary (I’ve got 1.8k chapters and 3.5k chapters), but readers like to be able to predict about how long an update will be and they like it to not vary too wildly too often. As with choosing your update schedule, choosing your chapter length will depend on what suits your personal schedule, and what suits the story you’re writing.

“The shorter the chapter, the more frequent the updates” is a good rule for attracting the widest audience. Short, infrequent chapters will have a lot of readers losing interest between updates; long, frequent ones will have a lot of readers feeling overwhelmed. But the most important thing is finding something that you can consistently output year after year (remember, it took me 4 years to make $100/month; this is a long game).

3. It’s a TV show, not a movie

This advice is less useful in our age of Marvel movie franchises and made-to-binge Netflix series, so pretend I’m talking to you in the year 2010 or earlier. If a novel is a movie, a web serial is a TV show. What I mean by that is that a novel is shaped primarily as a complete experience, whereas a web serial is shaped as a chapter-by-chapter experience.

It’s best, in both cases, to have a well structures and paced story that is made of well structured and paced chapters. But sometimes you have to choose between the structure or a chapter and the structure of the story as a whole; making one better will cheapen the other. When you’re writing a novel, you should choose the structure of the whole, but when you’re writing a web serial, you should choose the structure of the chapter. Web serial readers will prefer a chained series of excellent chapters, over a beautiful story of chapters with mediocre individual structure.

In fact, whether you want a structure to the overall story at all is personal taste. My stories have strong overall structure and move towards a planned conclusion because that’s how I prefer to write (and it also makes the story bingeable, since it’s basically a novel being released really slowly), but plenty of web serials out there have no real planned ending and will wander about for years and years in no obviously consistent direction, occasionally throwing in a big twist or major change to freshen things up. These would make absolutely horrible novels, but make very popular web serials. Whether you write like me or like them, the rule is the same – the experience of each individual chapter takes priority.

Come to think of it, this might be why people call my stories “ADHD crack”…

4. Okay, so how do I structure a good chapter?

I generally try to do three things in every chapter.

- Hit the ground running

- Give them something new

- End on an open question

Hit the ground running – Unless it’s the very first chapter of the story, you don’t have to be coy getting into the action. Open the chapter as if it’s the middle of the chapter; start at full momentum. Catch the high point of the last chapter before it falls. It your last chapter ended with “We checked the fingerprints on the candlestick. It’s Colonel Mustard.” then you can start this one with “But he was in the library at the time!”, you don’t need to recap or slow down or anything.

Give them something new – Every chapter should give the reader at least one thing to talk and think about. A new choice, some new information, a shift in perspective, whatever. People are reading these updates one at a time so it is vital that they feel like they got something out of the experience. A chapter in which nothing is learned will make readers feel like their time was wasted, and they have all the time until next update to reflect on that.

This is also true of a novel, but it’s much more critical in a web serial. A novel with nothing chapters in it is just frustratingly slow-paced; a web serial with nothing chapters in it leaves the reader feeling cheated for long stretches of time.

The thing to talk about doesn’t necessarily have to be a big plot reveal or major advancement. An incredibly cute scene, or sad scene, or funny scene will work just as well. But you have to give them SOMETHING. If you’re giving them nothing, consider cutting the chapter entirely and integrating any important foreshadowing or whatever into the next chapter.

One major hurdle of mine with this rule is recap chapters. If you’re writing a very complex plot over a long period of time, you need ways to occasionally take stock and make sure everyone is on the same page and nobody’s forgotten or misinterpreted anything important. This information can be recapped or conveyed in the middle of an action sequence or something, but I personally find that putting other stuff in the scene makes it too distracting and therefore less effective. I like to literally just sit the heroes down in a room and have them go, “okay, we’re spinning a lot of threads at once right now; what do we know, what are we trying to figure out, and what are our next steps?” This is the literary equivalent of the save point or room full of health packs right before a boss battle. Game designers don’t put that room there to be nice; they do it so that they know exactly how much health you’re going to have going into the battle, and can structure it accordingly.

You can make these chapters entertaining with character banter, but you can’t really introduce new threads to talk about, except possibly as a twist right at the end. Introducing new information mid-recap distracts from the recap and makes it pointless. You might have something similar in your stories, chapters that are essential but don’t give the reader anything new to work with.

My advice for these is to just bite the bullet on this one. Release the chapter with nothing new to talk about. You can get away with doing this occasionally, if the chapter has a clear purpose (I get a lot of readers tell me that they appreciate my recap chapters). Readers who get nothing out of the chapter will shrug and talk about older stuff instead, so long as you only do this occasionally. But a chapter with no new information has a cost in opportunity and in reader patience, so only pay it if the chapter’s worth it.

End on an open question– End the chapter with a reason for the reader to come back. You want them to think about the story afterward and be eager to read the next chapter when it comes out. Adhering to this principle is probably why I have such a reputation for cliffhangers, although truth be told I don’t use nearly as many actual cliffhangers as people say, I just try to end by opening a question. By that I mean, the audience should always end a chapter asking a question, which can be something that will span dozens of chapters (“How can Colonel Mustard’s fignerprints be on the candlestick? Is he being framed? Does this mean that the candlestick was in the library and isn’t even the murder weapon?”) or span a single paragraph (“How will the narrator react to learning that Colonel Mustard lied about never touchign the candlestick?”) This could be the emotional height of a scene, or the point at which new information recontextualises everything. It could be the moment where the stakes are raised or an important assumption turns out to be false. Anything that makes the audience eager to learn what happens next will do.

There should always be at least one open question in your story, more if it’s thematically appropriate. You know how mmorpgs and crafting games and suchlike keep you playing for hours and hours by making sure you’re always near the end of an activity – keep playing til you reach the next level, oh but now we’re nearly at the end of this quest so we should complete that, oh but now we’re just 20 gold short of being able to buy that cool new armour so we should just… same trick. Readers should always have at least one ‘quest’, an open question that they’re following, and should always be close to an answer.

You don’t have to dramatically introduce an entirely new question each time; you can end a chapter by reminding the reader of an existing open question. I tend to be a fan of the Big Dramatic Reveal On The Last Line method (cliffhanger reputation), but you don’t have to do it that way. Indeed, it’s a good idea not to do it that way every single time, lest you get stuck in a rut; every chapter ending doesn’t have to be incredibly tense and snappy. Somebody mentioning that they wish they knew how they could get enough food to make it through the winter before a full paragraph of cuddling and falling asleep in their mother’s arms works just as well.

5. It will help if your story is good, but it isn’t required.

You don’t have to be very good at writing to do this.

It helps to be good at writing, of course, and I assume that since you’re asking me for tips, you’re the sort of person who wants to be as good at writing as you can. But there is some true hack garbage out there doing absolute numbers in the web serial circuit. I try not to harp on about this too much because Curse Words fans get really upset at me when I do, but I think most of us can agree that Curse Words kind of sucks. And that just sucks in an ‘author is still learning how to do this’ kind of way; there’s much worse writing, real bullshit Ready Player One-level writing, trucking along out there brilliantly.

The point I’m trying to make here is that this isn’t an industry where there’s any value in hesitating and wringing your hands and asking yourself if you’re a good enough writer to do it yet. You are. You can just start writing a web serial right now and so long as you consistently update, you’re probably already above average for the market. And your first one probably will suck (mine did), but it’ll teach you how to make a better one. I think that Time to Orbit: Unknown is passably okay, and it absolutely would not be passably okay if I hadn’t written Curse Words first. Just go for it. Try to write a quality story if you can, but if you can’t, it’s honestly not that big of a deal. What matters, truly matters, is that you are committed to improving your craft. And that means actually practicing your craft. Which means writing some chapters and setting up a release schedule.

Good luck.

[bunnygirllover45]

Hii!! I’m kinda obsessing over the Idea of Johann before he kidnapped his darling, going out to buy clothes and him just enjoying it WAY more than Darling. Like bro’s INTO it, picking out dresses and making darling do a fashion show for him?? Just wanted to put this thought out there lol. Idk if he’d actually do that but I can dream,,,, Anyways that’s all— thank you!!!!

Anon you're into some shit rn and I totally agree with you. Johann would do that 100%. TW: Darling had a past relationship that wasn't too nice, mentions of body insecurity, hints of dollification but it's Johann who are we talking about this is obvious by now.

Your past relationship before Johann wasn't the best, you weren't used to him buying you stuff so carelessly or taking you every other day. At first, it was a little hard to get accustomed to the sudden change, but eventually, you started to like it. Except for the part where you and he had to go to the clothing store. Each time Johann stopped dead in his tracks in the middle of a date to point at a cute outfit sitting in the window of a random store, a part of you internally screamed for him not to drag you inside.

Speaking about that— "You like these? These frills might be itchy on your skin though..." —yes, you were trapped inside another store again. Taking in a deep breath you stared at Johann, then at the dress he was holding. No matter how often you told him you either didn't like this style of clothing or that it wouldn't look good in it, he still made you buy and wear the stuff. Of course, he only made you wear it when both of you were alone, there's no way he'd let you look this adorable in front of someone else.

You wondered how many more clothes he could buy you, after all, even if Johann made sure to visit you almost every day, his job kept him from being with you all the time. Most of the time he kept some of the clothes in his house too, he had a 'special place for them', out of context that phrase could be worrying, but Johann was such a sweetheart behind that stoic exterior that you didn't really question it. As he grabbed another piece of clothing you shot your hands to grab his forearm, squeezing softly as you smiled up to him. "J-Johann, I don't think I'd look good on that. I have many dresses back at home too, you shouldn't buy mo—" But before you could even finish you felt Johann leaning down to whisper against your ear, his voice soft and secretive. "I think you'd look good in anything." the ghost of a smile appeared on his lips. "I've always wanted to take care of someone as precious as you, would you let me do that?" There was serious longing in his voice. From all the past experiences you had with him, you clearly noticed that ache to fulfill a role that Johann always had. Taking care of you during dates, making sure you didn't get sick, and even aftercare with him was a blissful experience. All the things he told you about feeling empty and without a purpose in life, it's like a part of him has been waiting all this time to have this, to have you. You stood stunned, questioning if you should feel even more embarrassed or prideful, he looked at you with an adoration written in his eyes that made you shiver, and you felt a little guilty at how much you enjoyed it. "Here, we can buy these and try them out at home, how does that sound?" You nodded, giving him a compliant smile as you reached to hug his arm. "Okay... thank you." One hand snaked its way around your waist, squeezing slightly as he kissed you on the top of the head, nuzzling against it. "You're welcome, baby."

[mel4rock]

"They don't love you, you are just normal." The tallest of the group spoke. It was obvious that they anted to breake you to take you over on their side afterwards especially since you heard them talk about it earlier when they still thought you where unconscious.

"Are you kidding me? I'm literally their favorite child." You respond "Do you even know how many school calls they got because Lora accidentally put something on fire or because Matt broke something? Don't get me started on Emma. They love me for being normal.

Belive me, mom thought about retireing just so she could attend all these conferences. Also I'm the only one my siblings trust and who can give them commands. I'm the one staying behind organizing every fight my family has with every villain.

To the public I am the calm one that never gets into trouble but belive me without me my siblings will be uncontrollable."

Your voice gets calmer the longer you talk but the guys in front of you don't seen to belive you. They are five, you are alone that could become a problem if you would try to flee. The room has two doors but only in front of one is a smaler but burly guy in position. You can't see any windows and you doubt that the unprotected door will lead anywhere else than a dead end.

The cuffs that tie you to the chair are easy to open, just because you are normal doesn't mean your parents didn't train you well. Actually -you think waiting for the right time to attack - it's weird that you only got kidnapped now like it's literally the first thing you would come up with as a villain, but hey, who are you to complain?

One of them excused himself to go to the toilet and you used the moment when it was only four against one to attack. More accurate you start running for the door. Confused as they were you actually reached the door 'till one of them reacted and grabbed your arm.

"What do you think you are doing there young lady?" Asked the tall one who already spoke to her.

"The chair is really uncomfortable so I thought I would disstretch a bit." All of them look at you confused and probably muffled by the comlete nonsense comming out of your mouth. You are as well. You take a step away from the door joust a second before it flies out of their angles. Lora Matt and Emma sorming the room. "Ohh," you say, "I wanted to say distract you, that's what I was doing." You kick ta.. guy in the stomach so he would back off and it worked.

Your siblings totally knocked out all of the men in no time. "Mom says you can't skip family day that easily." Matt said it in a tone that makes you smile.

"Wouldn't dare to." On your way out you see lots of other guys lying around every single one of them knocked out some of them having bruises or burns and some siluettes seem a bit off like something elementary messed with their bodies. Damn are you happy to be one of the good ones.

You, a normal human, were born to a family of famous superheroes. You’ve been kidnapped by a supervillain, who keeps trying to convince you that your family doesn’t love you because of your ‘condition’.

[eatmyheartoutjpg]

𓇻 𝗚𝗢𝗢𝗗 𝗟𝗨𝗖𝗞 𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗥𝗠 ˢᵉᵛⁱᵏᵃ ˣ ᵍⁿ ʳᵉᵃᵈᵉʳ

Previous: Beginner's Luck

𝙎𝙪𝙢𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙮 ;; Shortfic. Rom. You build a friendship with Sevika and make a new ritual where you always tell her "good luck." And as it turns out, your wishes have a hell of an effect on her winning streaks. 𝘼/𝙉 ;; I love me a woman that can gamble our life savings away

11.28.24 Masterlist

The Last Drop was as lively as ever, the air thick with smoke and the hum of conversations.

Tonight, you weren’t playing; instead, you had taken a comfortable seat at the edge of Sevika’s usual table. She was in her element, her focus razor-sharp as she shuffled a deck of cards with practiced ease. Her reputation as Zaun’s reigning gambler only grew with each victory, and she thrived in the attention it brought her (aside from the times she lost to you.. a tad too many times).

As her opponent nervously eyed their hand, you leaned forward slightly, catching her eye with a playful smirk. “Good luck, Sev,” you said softly, your tone laced with teasing familiarity.

Sevika raised an eyebrow, her lips quirking into a grin. "Don’t need luck when you have skill," she replied smoothly, though the slight flicker in her gaze suggested she appreciated the sentiment more than she let on.

The cards were dealt, and the game began. As the rounds progressed, Sevika’s usual confidence only seemed to grow. Finally, in the last round, with the stakes at their peak, she laid her cards down: a royal flush. The crowd erupted in cheers, her opponent slumped back in defeat, and Sevika leaned back in her chair with a satisfied smirk.

Her dark eyes flicked to you as she collected her winnings. "You’re not playing, but you’re still winning me pots," she joked, the low rumble of her laugh sending a pleasant shiver down your spine. "Might have to keep you around for luck."

You shrugged, feigning nonchalance as you grinned back at her. "Maybe I’m just magic."

From that night on, the game took on a new dynamic. Whenever you weren’t playing—and honestly, after that first royal flush, you decided to keep your seat more often—you would offer Sevika a teasing "Good luck" before a game. At first, it was a playful ritual, a way to needle her ego while supporting her. But something strange started happening.

Sevika kept winning.

Not just a little. Not just by chance. She was on a hot streak unlike anything the Last Drop had ever seen. And every time she crushed her opponents, she’d glance your way, her expression equal parts amused and incredulous.

"Alright, you’ve got to be doing something," she accused one night after yet another victory. She leaned against the bar, her metal arm resting heavily on the wood, her grin almost sheepish. "There’s no way this is just coincidence."

You raised an eyebrow, taking a sip of your drink as you pretended to think. "Maybe I should start charging you for my services. You know, ‘professional good luck charm’ isn’t the worst job title."

She laughed, a sound that was rare and warm, sending a ripple of pride through you. “Careful. I might actually pay you.”

It became your thing after that. Whenever Sevika was gearing up for a big game, she’d glance at you, her expression expectant. You’d roll your eyes, but you always relented, giving her your signature grin and whispering, "Good luck" in her ear.

And every time, without fail, she cleaned house.

The other patrons started to notice too. The rumor mill of the Last Drop churned with tales of Sevika’s mysterious charm, the one who sat on the sidelines and seemed to will her wins into existence. She brushed off the teasing with her usual bravado, but when it was just the two of you, the truth came out in quieter ways.

"You’re good for me, you know that?" she said one evening, her voice uncharacteristically soft as she walked you home.

You looked at her, surprised by the vulnerability peeking through her usual tough exterior. "Oh, so now I’m more than just a good luck charm?"

She smirked, but there was warmth behind it. "Yeah. You’re... more."

From that moment, something shifted. It wasn’t just the games anymore. She started seeking you out, finding excuses to spend time with you even when cards weren’t involved. Whether it was a quiet drink after hours or a walk through the winding streets of Zaun, Sevika seemed to gravitate toward you, her walls lowering bit by bit.

And somewhere along the way, you realized the feeling was mutual.

Sevika, for all her bravado and sharp edges, had a way of making you feel like the center of her world. The way she looked at you when she thought you weren’t paying attention, the rare softness in her voice when she teased you, the way her smile seemed just a little brighter when you were around—it all told a story she was too proud to say outright.

One night, after another streak of wins and a particularly celebratory round of drinks, she leaned down, her face close to yours, her voice a low murmur. "You know, I don’t need luck to win," she said, her tone teasing but her gaze serious.

You tilted your head, matching her grin. "No? Then what do you need?"

Her smirk softened into something genuine as she reached out, brushing her metal fingers lightly against your hand. "Just you."

And in that moment, you realized you weren’t just her good luck charm anymore. You were hers, and she was falling—hard.

ˢᵉᵛᵉⁿ

[angrykittybarbarian]

About that Dragon Age: The Veilguard audio web series

Thinking back about the marketing for DATV I now realize it was kind of deceptive.

No, it was not literal fraud. They did not make specific promises and then broke them, not explicitely and in a way you could hold them liable in court over. And I get when you are advertising your product you will of course highlight its most favorable aspects while not shoving its negative sides into everyone's noses.

However I do think that EA/Bioware did stretch out the boundaries between regular endorsement and fraud.

It started with the web series Vows and Vengeance they uploaded weekly on Youtube right before release. At that time I was still hopeful and excited for the game. And Vows and Vengeance all but encouraged that excitement.

You know why? Because, and this surprised me, it was genuinely good.

Vows and Vengeance functioned as an early introduction to the companions. While they were not the main characters they did play a key role in each episode. The plot was what could be typically expected from a regular DA installment. It had a dark, gripping story. The dialogue was well written. It dealt with mature themes, it actually discussed the classism of Tevinter.

Lucanis was a proper crow who killed a good man because he was hired to do so. He was positively morally grey. Davrin had actually strong opinions when the main character dropped the Dread Wolf's name. Bellara was interesting in that it became clear how she struggled with her ADHD without using infantile language, Scout Harding acted smart, mature and competent, Taash was a morally grey bad ass, fitting for a freelance treasure hunter and with smart and witty dialogue to go with it.

It was amazing, I found myself excited every week for a new episode. It got me interested in the companions. I already contemplated to romance Taash because they were so cool and charismatic in that series. I thought, if a FREE webseries that was made for advertisement was already this great then the game had to be nothing short of phenomenal.

And then it just...wasn't. There was nothing of the depth that came through in the web series. It was as if I was presented with a sample of a multilayered chocolate cake but got a dry brownie after I actually paid the full price for it.

The sheer audacity behind this course of action is still so inconcievable to me, I sometimes still wonder why they put effort into writing the free thing and not the product they demand payment for. I still don't get it. The only explanation is they purposefully put out a misleading sample to lure in the customers in the beginning to spend money, right?

This fraud adjacent behavior does not stop there.

Remember when we thought we would be importing our worldstates from our previous games? There wasn't even a question about it in the beginning because this is such an intrinsic Bioware feature. But then the info about the three choices in the character creator leaked.

Leaked!

Meaning they never intended for this information to be known pre-release. They fully intended to keep it secret until it would be too late. They also never said they wanted a soft reboot.

This is the conclusion the fandom has drawn after they destroyed their own lore and went scorched earth on the entire south of Thedas.

And the biggesr lie was when they said this was their best work. After all this!

This is the reason why DATV's shortcomings are so devastating. This is why so many feel like the game was a slap to their faces. EA/Bioware gaslit and manipulated us from the very beginning. We have been cheated and betrayed.

The last bit of trust I and many others had in Bioware, they mercilessly crushed.

I personally will never take even one thing they say at face value again. You can only trust their actions from now on.

[romanarose]

Safe With Me

Eddie Brock x fem!reader (Some Venom x reader)

Join my taglist : Masterlist

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Summary: You open up to Eddie about being sexually assaulted. He takes care of it.

Warnings: mentions of past sexual violence. Actually literal violence lol but its okay because he's a bad guy. talking about how hard it is to report and victim blaming.

dividers by @kodaswrld

************

Eddie held you close on the couch, letting you tell you're story the way you wanted to. You sat straddled on his lap, resting your head on his shoulder because you said this made you feel extra safe. Like he was all around you. Sometimes, if things were extra rough, venom would come out like a blanket of sorts around you, wrapping you up in his warmth. Today, you thought it might be overwhelming.

Eddie knew something had happened to you, the way you were skiddish when you first started dating. And not that he was complaining, but it was a little odd to wait 2 months to have sex. Still, that was your choice and you were worth waiting.

He wasn't an idiot, he could read the signs in your behavior, so he made sure you're first time together was filled with the most explicate consent you could dream of, and was always conscious of your non-verbal ques in bed. Eddie liked to think he was always the kind of guy to pay attention to that, but with you, he was extra certain.

As he got to know you, you made passing references of a bad past, and he let you know he was ready to listen when you were ready to talk, but you were a private person and wanted to wait. You and him talked about exes, and nothing stood out.

Finally, a few months in, you and him were having a movie night. Rewatching your favorite Disney princess movie Eddie was nice enough to indulge you in and Venom was thoroughly enjoying, when you pause it.

"Can I talk to you?"

At first Eddie thought you were about to dump him, but when you looked at him with sad eyes, he knew it was something more serious.

You sniffle against his wet sleeve. "That's it, I guess..." You said as you finish telling the story. "I know, *sniff* i should've reported it but... I dunno this was when 50 Shades was coming out and I was afraid he'd say I just liked it r-rough..." A fresh little bought of tears come, and Eddie is quick to rub your back in comfort.

"Ah, shit, hey now... I know it ain't like that..." He presses a gentle kiss to your hair. "We believe you, baby. Trust me, I'm not tryna scare no one away from reporting, but man... it can be fucking brutal."

You nod against him. "And, and I was just barely having sex, you know? The idea of a stranger doing the rape kit, having to tell a hundred different people what happened knowing they don't believe me... and I couldn't really prove I'd said no... and god, having to tell my parents?!?! I couldn't do it Eddie! i just couldn't do it!"

"Shhhh, shhhh... it's okay, I know, I know... you made the best choice for yourself."

You sit up, rubbing your red and puffy eyes. "Now I see colleges have this thing, well, some of them, the You Have Options Program where you can report and choose the level. Like if you want to report but not press charges, or you aren't sure if you want to press charges but they can gather evidence... or maybe you just want something on record incase they offend again, you know?"

"That's good, that's real good baby. i think they'll help a lot of people." As a journalist, Eddie had reported on many rape cases, or times people had tried to cover up sexual abuse of different kinds. he'd seen many young girls crying, expressing the same feelings you had. He knew better than to say 'it's not your fault' even if he still had the urge. Instead, he thumbed away a tear as you looked down at him. "We believe you, we don't think any differently of you, okay? We're here to help you."

You smile at him, fondness in your eyes. "Thanks for listening, Edide. And Venom." You lean down and give him a chaste kiss on his plush lips. "I love you."

"I love you too."

The next day...

Eddie is furiously typing on his laptop while you're at work.

"Okay, so she said college, he went to college with her."

Venom excitedly shouts out the name of your old school, happy he remembered, but Eddie shook his head, frustrated. "That's a big fucking school buddy, we need to narrow this down." he pulled up school records. "She said they were in theater, right?"

"YES! AND HE WAS IN HER SPANSIH CLASS!"

"Right! Fuck yeah! and she took Spanish her freshman year because she wanted to 'get it out of the way'. Okay I can narrow down the year, look up students who took Spanish that semester... then i just gott pull up the theater pamphlet... she said he was an actor... alright, now we just gotta cross reference the names of people who acted in that production with spanish class students..."

10 minutes later they had a match.

Pulling him up, he matched the description of the student to a T. He would have a senior at the time, same hair, skin tone, facial features...

"Now, we just gotta find him."

That didn't take long either. Eddie was able to find everything he needed. His job, his home address, everything was right there.

That night, he gave you a little kiss on the forehead as he left for the night. He told you he had something to investigate for work, and you didn't ask any questions.

"And you're sure you don't wanna come over after you're done?" You give him a pout. He hated to leave you alone, everything you'd trusted him with made him just want to watch over you all the time... but who knew how messy this would get?

"I might be out late baby, i don't wanna wake yuh at 4 am. I'll bring you lunch tomorrow, how 'bout that?"

that makes you smile. Food usually did.

"Okay. Lunch tomorrow it is."

The house was way too nice for someone like him, someone who hurt innocent younger girls. He was a corporate executive too, and Eddie was sickened to find he'd had a string of bad luck keeping assistants and interns, no doubt preying on more vulnerable young girls, using his power to keep them complacent. Men like that never changed. He wasn't gonna feel bad.

The light turned on the the living kitchen, revealing where Eddie sat drinking his expensive whiskey.

"Your security is shit, man."

He looked shocked, dropping his briefcase and freezing in fear. Eddie figured its not often he's the powerless one. He was going to let him cook in his adrenalin.

"Whatever you want, you can have it."

But Eddie just shook his head, standing up. "I don't want nothing here but you."

"i have-"

Eddie interrupted him with your name, "Remember her? Freshman girl you raped in college? Or does that not narrow it down enough?"

He chuckled nervously, raising his hands and backing up. "Listen man, you her husband? i don't know what she told you, but i swear to god she wanted it."

"Shut the hell up."

"Begged me for it!"

"Oh yeah? That why she had a black eye and a busted lip after?"

"Hey," he shrugged, trying to play it cool like he wasn't about to dash for the door. "What can I say, she liked it rou-" His words turned into a scream as Venom took over the body, biting off his head before he could say another word about you.

Eddie's face popped from behind the goo. "Venom! i had a whole speech planned!"

"TOO LATE! I was tired of him talking!"

He rolled his eyes but hey, what could he do about it now? Nothing. At least the asshole was dead, couldn't hurt anymore women.

The next day, at lunch time...

Baby <3: Meet me at my place, I went home early.

Eddie Boo: Everything okay?

Baby <3: Just come please?

When Eddie let himself into you're apartment to find you sitting on the couch with your arms crossed, eyes wet.

"baby, are you oke-"

"Do you want to explain to me why, a few days after I tell you I was raped, he ends up dead with his head ripped off?"

Eddie blinked. "Uhhhh.... coincidence?"

You stand, walking over to him. "Venom, got anything to say to me?"

Venoms head popped out behind Eddie. "WE ARE NOT SORRY AND HE TASTED DELICIOUS!"

"Venom!" You gently flick him. "Eddie, why would you do that?"

"Ahhh, come on baby, you know he deserved it! I'm not gonna apoligize for killing a rapist, and i don't feel bad!"

Eddie watched your face soften, lip quivering a bit. "I know. I know he deserved it I just... it's just a lot, right now..."

"Ohhh baby...." Eddie took you into his arms as you began to cry again. "Do you feel guilty? Is that it? Cause this was all me, nothing to do with you."

You sob into his strong chest. "I can't believe you love me this much."

His heart almost broke at that. "Of course I do! baby, don't you know we'd do anything for you? We'd break a guys finger off for look'n at yuh wrong, of course we'd kill for you."

Eddie scooped you up, carrying you over to the couch where he sat you down on his lap. "You're gonna be safe with us, always. You know that don't you? We're always gonna protect you. never gonna have to worry about anything again."

"LETHAL PROTECTOR!"

You chuckle in his arms, and Eddie holds you close. "Yeah, the lethal protector. No ones ever gonna hurt you like that again."

OKAY THIS IS MY FIRST TIME WRITING EDDIE/VENOM

Eddie will be a part of the team in my very gay series The Prodigals and maybe has gay sex with marc spector who knows! yet to be determined. but there will be a lot of gay sex. logan and wade, logan and scott, scott and kurt. It will be 99% gay.

Anyway!!!! thanks for reading!!!! i love fics were rapists die so I thought eddie was appropriate! I saw venom for the first time at the start of the month, literally watched one and two the day before i went to see three in theaters. CRIED

if anyone has any good eddie series, something quality im looking for a masterpiece here! eddie/venom is 100% welcome! so is gay shit.

If you are new to my blog just coming in from this fic, I mostly write Logan Howlett, and oscar isaac/pedro pascal characters. Mostly fem! reader but i like to dabble in other stuff, like trans readers or trans characters, lots of gay shit.

Anyway, hi if you're new!

Have a great day!

I wrote this after already writing a chapter of rooms on fire, and after doing a bunch of homework AND battling bronchitis soooooo plz be patient my writing isnt the best in the first place, i type and spell very badly.

[atlasblue85]

ok as a raised catholic who is well acquainted with the list of popes wikipedia page i could not stop thinking about this so uh. here we go

some notes first:

-for the first nearly thousand years of the papacy, popes did not choose papal names, they just kept their own. John II was the first to choose a name (because his birth name was Mercurius and he felt it was not appropriate for a pope to have a name associated with a Roman god) but it wasn't until Gregory V in 996 that it became tradition.

-i've only seen the movie (and only once at that) and not read the book, but it seemed implied to me that the recent history of popes deviated from reality, which isn't super relevant but just to note that I'm kind of operating on every pope from like WWII onward not existing in movie canon. at the very least JPII onward.

gonna start with the ones we know

-Cardinal Lawrence - John - of course he would choose John, of COURSE. John has been used as a papal name more than any other name, of course Lawrence would choose that. He does not see himself as special or unique, he's just one more in a long line of servants of god. He would be proud to carry the same name as so many before him. Also, considering what I mentioned above about John II, I think he would definitely have taken that into consideration and would be honored to carry on the tradition of giving up his birth name, especially considering the implications of his name (there has never been a pope Thomas). (Popes John fun fact: the numbering of the popes John is messed up due to a few errors hundreds of years ago, so although there have only been 21 popes John the count is at 23.)

-Cardinal Benitez aka Pope Innocent - I mean. what a name to choose. He's portrayed as fairly apolitical in the movie, but he knows the truth about him will be revealed once he becomes Pope so like, talk about getting ahead of the allegations. It's such a good, smart choice and I love it. There have been 13 prior popes Innocent, the last being in 1724, and all but 2 of them (French) were Italian, which is also so significant considering Benitez's main rival. Just love this choice.

to the rest of them

-Cardinal Bellini - I feel like we know the least about him actually, aside from that he's extremely liberal in Catholic terms, but it's not like the papacy is known for being liberal so there's not a precedent for him to follow name-wise. it's tempting to say that he'd pick Thomas or Lawrence lol, but actually? I don't think he'd pick a name that has never been used, he wouldn't have the conviction for that (which is ultimately why he didn't become pope....). But I could definitely see him choosing Adrian as a way to still give a subtle shout out to his bestie, as Adrian IV (1154-59) has been, to date, the only English pope. It's also a fairly innocuous name which I think would be appealing to him.

-Cardinal Adeyemi - believe it or not there have actually been 3 popes from Africa - Victor I (189-199), Miltiades (311-314), and Gelasius I (492-496). All were from North Africa, much of which was part of the Roman empire for many hundreds of years. Victor was the most significant of these 3 and is also known to be of Berber descent, though he is usually (unsurprisingly) depicted as white. While Adeyemi is Nigerian, where there is not a significant Berber population, I think he would nevertheless want to acknowledge and highlight the actual first African pope, as well as subtly call out the hypocrisy of the church. There were two other popes Victor, both in the 1000s, so he would be Victor IV.

-Cardinal Tremblay - there's a tweet/post saying it's tradition for no one to choose Peter as their papal name out of respect even though there's no law against it but Tremblay would do it and like. yeah he would. or at the very least he would want to, but I don't know that he would actually go through with it because it would be wildly controversial and he wants popularity above all else. So what else might he pick? My first instinct is to say he'd choose a name from a pope that was extremely popular and well liked, so the most obvious choices would be Leo and Sylvester. However, there have been 13 popes Leo (last in 1903) and only 3 popes Sylvester (last in 1045), so that would make me lean toward Sylvester because I think he'd want a less common name. But I also think it would irk him to not come after Sylvester II and could see him going a Pope Francis route and picking a totally new name. Seeing as popularity is important to him, I think it would fit that he'd take the name of one of the twelve Apostles. Other than John and Peter, most of the apostles' names have never been used as papal names, which is appealing to him. So if he's not choosing Peter II and he's choosing one of the apostles' names, the natural choice is, of course, Peter's brother, Andrew. that's my final answer.

-Cardinal Tedesco - no way that man isn't choosing Pius

[raguma1002]

i have some thoughts about what would happen if bojack and mr peanutbutter got together before the start of the show. @fandomfreakstudios have a wonderful post on this topic and i like their au very much. i just want to speculate on this from a slightly different angle.

i agree with freak's vision in many ways, but thinking about it, i've always found their relationship in such a scenario to be more messy and extremely ambiguous. ambiguous in terms of the fact that they themselves do not know who they are to each other… okay i'll try to explain

they meet for the first time at some event: an award ceremony, a party, whatever. then they see each other again, again, again, and in the end bojack reluctantly gets closer to pb - out of boredom, maybe - they drink together, chat about everything, discuss acting and so on. gradually they grow closer, their relationship becomes more trusting and intimate.

and before they knew it, they suddenly started spending nights at each other's places; mr peanutbutter recently divorced katrina, and he doesn't want to feel lonely, so all his attention is now focused on bojack. he became attached like a faithful dog (literally) and it will be almost impossible for him to let this man go, no matter what a jerk he actually is.

and bojack, who completely destroyed his previous relationship with herb, sees this. he doesn't reject pb when he becomes more intrusive for two reasons: firstly, he is afraid to ruin everything again, to lose a loved one, and therefore he tries to play a good friend; secondly, he likes this attention. he craves it. he longs to be wanted, to be admired, to be needed no matter what.

so, yes, their relationship is growing, and so is codependency. bojack tries to be kind, fair, supportive, but when he discovers how difficult it is - and most importantly, when he sees that his efforts don't matter, because pb won't leave him anyway - he stops. and, when there is not only an agent who will get you out of any trouble, but also a close person who is ready to love you no matter what disgusting things you do, and justify your behavior in any way, you stop not only growing, you become much worse than you were already.

nevertheless, he still has bright sides, some kind of concept of morality, and he is literally eaten up by guilt for what he is doing with their relationship. he, from time to time, makes some attempts to fix it - with well-known grand gestures - but it doesn't last long. then he gets tired again, realizes that everything he does is pointless, and turns to alcohol, drugs - everything, just to calm the pain and guilt consuming him from the inside.

mr peanutbutter also tries hard at first. he genuinely believes that if he makes enough effort, their relationship will be as happy and trouble-free as it was in his family, as it was on his native peninsula. he keeps ignoring all the red flags until everything turns into a real disaster. he still doesn't want to leave bojack because a) he is afraid to be alone, b) he is attached to him, he actually likes him very much; c) he feels sorry for boj.

we have seen how mr peanutbutter can behave in a relationship if he is really displeased or upset about something. eventually even his patience comes to an end, and maybe he makes the first attempt to leave, but quickly returns - either on his own initiative, or because of bojack's conviction that he will change. then everything repeats again.

this time, pb stops ignoring the bad attitude and goes on the offensive - he responds to manipulation with manipulation, to neglect with neglect etc. as a result, he becomes little better than his partner. they start quarreling constantly, it exhausts both of them. but that's all they have left when they just can't let each other go.

if we draw analogies, then this is something between bodiane, pb/diane and bojack/pc relationships, but i hope you understand the course of my thoughts.

bojack's career is still a failure, but at the same time pb's one is much less successful than in the original, obviously because of his personal life. well, now he has much more time to, for example, fight with his life partner again and eventually drive off to the other side of the united states together. for some unknown reason. they're sick to death of each other and yet still codependent. well. you know how it is

i could write more, but it seems like i've got a cold and i also want to sleep (whimpering whimpering) and the post already came out kinda long. so yeah. but maybe i'll talk about it later again

oh and i almost forgot

[ilikekidsshows]

Many people said "CN is not a good fighter' and I just realized how the narrative really make it looks like that's really the case despite of him being supposed to be a fencer champion and know martial arts and I was?? Baffled?? He even beaten by Scarabella despite being more experienced in fighting than Alya?? Either this show favor the girls more to the point it want to show that boys are incompetent or the boys are really incompetent in universe idk

---

The Scarabella thing is a combination of three things, at least, in my view, and some are problems that were always there, while others relate more to the retool. 1) The writers are pushing this being a girl power show so the girls always have to be smarter and stronger than the guys. You can see a bit of this in the preretool show where the boy classmates are, to be frank, already depicted as a bit more stupid than the girl classmates. Compare what the boys get up to when they gather together (throw a frat party) with what the girls get up to when they gather together (fashion shows, planting trees, hatching get Adrien quick schemes). 2) Cat Noir/Adrien is too popular so his role in episodes and importance to the narrative have to be diminished as much as they can while still keeping him around enough for his toys to sell. I’m actually starting to think “and Cat Noir” was a purposeful decision to make the show more marketable that Astruc then didn’t want to commit to. 3) Ladybug has to be the greatest at everything ever, regardless who is being Ladybug at the moment. Ladybug can’t lose to Cat Noir because she’s the better/more important/stronger hero.

Please ignore how Ladybug’s “fighting ability” in most episodes with actual villains is running away while Cat Noir fights them head on. Please ignore how Ladybug’s strategy for physically strong or fighter type Akumas is to have Cat Noir fight them while she comes up with a plan. Please ignore every single time there’s a horde of enemies, outside of Rena Rouge’s introduction episode, where Cat Noir was worfed to make her entrance more impressive when she saves him (wow look, another pattern), Cat Noir is the one who takes them out. Please ignore how Cat Noir utterly destroyed Miracle Queen’s elite fighting force with the most broken superpowers at their disposal.

Like, before I was done with the show and fandom, I tried to avoid saying I think Cat Noir is the better fighter. I said it was a “matter of taste” instead of “Ladybug gets handed the most important powers and the writers obviously favor her and her fighting style so this comparison is incredibly unfair on Cat Noir”. But, even then, I have always thought that Cat Noir’s fight scenes are just more often actual fights versus Ladybug’s super planning skills making her the most important character ever. Miraculous leans into trickery in fights, because that’s Marinette’s strength and lets her be “the best in a fight”, but in terms of actual fighting ability, Cat Noir just shows more actual moves and strength and tactical thinking in a moment. In a battle shounen series, Adrien would be the better fighter, and Marinette would go through a training arc before she can best him.

We also have a bunch of evidence that Cat Noir is physically stronger than Ladybug from the OG show, but I could never say that straight-up, because, even before the retool made discussing this show into a minefield, Marinette stans were a fucking annoyance on the fandom who’d dogpile anyone who said anything that could be construed as “Marinette salt”, like, “I think Cat Noir is physically stronger and her wins are based on strategy and not strength”. The reason this statement would rub people the wrong way is because Marinette is always needed for the win condition, so she has to be better, even though Sailor Moon is the worst fighter among the Sailor Scouts and still has the purification powers. There’s also the sexisim of the girl character needing trickery to win, while the guy wins in honest hand to hand more easily. After all, the Miraculous fandom’s logic is that pointing out obvious writer biases means you actually hold those biases.

In a fight between any type of Ladybug and Cat Noir, Cat Noir will lose because it’s Ladybug. In addition, the boys are provably depicted as more incompetent than the girls, especially when they're shown doing something side by side. But, if we look at actual fighting accomplishments, Cat Noir has more impressive fight scenes under his belt than Ladybug, because the people making this show are actually pretty sexist in what they actually show their girl characters doing.

[latibulater]

im not going to spend too much time after this one post

Treister as this character-figure on the same story level as Jonas Venture. Jonas to Rusty to the twins, Treister to Hunter to Brock. this episode implies a rich history where I'm left thinking that Hunter's insecurities around inner turmoil stemmed from Treister ("Hans Brinker's thumb was stuck in a dike" "Son, whatever depravity you get up to on your own time is between you and your living god") which of course bled down to Brock, who must have tried to block out the fact that his mentor and person he respects most is constantly belittled and degraded as being foolish and girlish ("Wayland Flowers called, he wants his Madame back") because Hunter's entire character, of course, is introduced as a transphobic gag. Hunter can't escape from being a man who wants to be a woman no matter how hard Hunter begs the narrative ("I miss my breasts! Inside of me, there is a woman screaming to be heard."), the very next episode Hunter meets with Treister and is immediately shoved into the role of successor, replacement, and son. Over and over, Treister calls Hunter son, makes regular remarks into homophobic comments, and "Took guts to bust out the nest and go off on your own, son. Took balls to cut off your balls. Even without 'em, you got more true grit man-moxie on tap than any of these "yes" men and bureaucrats been runnin' the place."

Similarly to Rusty, in this regard at least, Hunter was created for a singular purpose and trying to make a new way inevitably results in Hunter right back where he started. Honestly, in the same way I imagine Jonas constantly belittling Rusty over any perceived weakness, I can easily picture a young Hunter being put through hell by superior officer Treister, for the good of god and country and the secret president. And additionally, just like how Rusty says no matter how bad a father Jonas was, he still loved him and misses him and wouldn't be who he is today with Jonas and so he can't imagine ever actually going against his father, Hunter clearly is panicking when he thinks Treister is self-euthanizing.

Even after Hunter lets go of the wheel the first time and Treister yells "What the hell are you doing?! Do not let go of that wheel, boy! There are 2,000 souls on board!", Hunter inevitably lets go AGAIN because he can't bear to hold on while someone he must've cared greatly for climbs into a shuttle-capsule. "Do not kill yourself, you crazy bastard!" "Ain't killin' myself, son." And AGAIN with the BOY. the SON.

And like, Hunter was an open joke for believing in the GCI in the 80s, so why was so many resources, a private office with an escape hatch outside, and a personal hulking assistant given? I can only believe b/c at the time Hunter was still Treister's favorite, still Treister's spy kid and most likely prepped to be his successor, despite the weird results. Then Hunter fucks up with Billy and Phantom Limb and gets sent out of country and is separated from Brock. To me, that reads as Treister getting irritated his "son" is playing dress-up on stake-outs and is getting distracted running around on wild goose chases, and it's time to find Hunter a nice, new assignment away from the only person in the entire OSI to provide back-up and believe in Hunter full-heartedly. Sending Hunter to Guam is Treister's version of sending his unruly "son" to military school, never mind the fact they're all in the military anyways.

Parent belittles non-conforming child, child grows into a bitter angry adult, becomes a parent and slowly has to Detangle and work through their past, even getting dragged back in after believing escape was possible, and now trying to do a tiny bit better by their own children. Not TOO much easier of course, cant get rid of that "walked to school uphill through snow both ways" attitude instilled. i think a main difference is that in the end Hunter was verbally loved by Treister and handed the OSI as a sign of trust, whilst Jonas spent zero screen time ever complimenting or being loving towards Rusty. So this leads to an unequal balance between Hunter and Rusty where Hunter can mind-control and take advantage of Rusty whereas Jonas and Treister were on more even-footing IMO.

Moreso, in "Any Which Way But Zeus", when everyone is passing out and checked out, Hunter is the only one still trying to come up with a reasonable plan but Treister completely interrupts and dismisses the plan out of hand. AND

AND Hunter is the only one given a 'female' code name "Kelly Clarkson", opposed to all other code names "Kenan and Kel" "Matthew Perry" "Orville Redenbacher", EXEPT of course "Topanga Lawrence" (she was an actress). Who was the only other person at the table Treister called a girl/disrespected (from a military masculinity complex)? BROCK. Hunter's protege. Previously, Treister had given a lot of respect to Brock even as a commander to an insubordinate...subordinate. "Still breathing, General Treister, sir.

No thanks to you." "Aw, you're lookin' fine, son." and the following: "Son, I believe your mind has gone AWOL. I shoulda seen this comin'.

Your work's been gettin' sloppy across the board, boy.........Why don't you come back with us so we can find you a nice, new assignment? Maybe somethin' a little easier on the ol' noggin'?"

Then the next interaction they have is Treister realizing Brock not only left the OSI but joined SPHINX with Hunter. That is all to explain why I feel like Treister is directly disrespecting them best he can while avoiding making things personal in front of power players in the villainous community. It's this whole power play exchange that reminds me of a family feud happening in front of company where the father is holding on by the skin of his teeth to not slap his kids.

Moving beyond that, Brock's own issues with masculinity are never brought up by Hunter. He gets the length of his hair mocked by others, is told constantly he's over-compensating, and is emasculated over his role within the Venture family. Never by Hunter, far as I can recall. And personally, I think Hunter nicknaming "boychick" is much softer and more affectionate than "boy" and "son" even because it's a very possessive word.

UMMMM to wrap up this post b/c idrk where I'm going anymore, I feel like Treister was a lot more influential to the background of the show than is obvious upon first viewing because he actually has been around so long and most likely has a very deep complicated relationship with Hunter that appears as Hunter unable to escape expectations of being a good soldier/son which reflects Jonas' relationship with Rusty as Rusty is unable to escape his father's infantilization of Rusty's capability and society's pre-determined expectation of him failing.

GIVE HUNTER A RX FOR ESTRADIOL SEASON 8!!!!!!!!

[z0mb1epuzzy]

Haiii I’m actually going freakin’ CRAZY over Chris n Mike bro😔 I saw the thing you wrote about Mike and Chris having a size kink (The anon who wrote that DAYUM…) and I was wondering if you could write about them making their partner cry…in a good way!! It’s just that their so strong (Chris without realising) and it all feels too good that you just can’t help it :(

I feel like Mike would tease you as he very slowly eases into you, watching your facial expressions for any discomfort, he would be so so mean but also so so gentle, mumbling praise to you as you take him so well!! I feel like you crying would make him a little more gentle than normal but I think he’s still a little mean, saying stuff like “oh you poor thing, s’it feel good?” Or just being mean and putting his hand over your mouth and whispering in your ear “you gotta be quiet baby, shh” but he’s still super careful and sweet!!

Don’t get me started on Chris..he would worry for a second, asking if you were okay while stopping whatever he was doing, once you say your fine he would be so careful with you even after you said you were fine!! After some time of being gentle he soon sees you are genuinely all good! (He was scared broke you for a minute there..) and kissing you, holding you, cooing soft praise and reassurance while getting a little more rough without even realising, all while basically panting in your ear..

Need them both.. 🙏

anon i’m gonna lick ur brain.. also happy turkey day to those who celebrate!

i fully think chris and mike would be into (good) crying, especially mike imo…

hear me out, mike is a little more experienced, and my guess is that he’s pretty fucking good (since 3 bad bitches are all up on him in game), he’s probably made a partner get all teary eyed because of how good it feels before, but it’s certainly a rare occurrence.

that being said, when he gets you to do it… he’s initially worried, obviously.. no matter how many times he sees it, he’s always worried that it’s not good tears, freezing up and giving you the softest look while he puts a warm hand on your cheek, wiping away your tears. “Hey, hey… you okay, baby? did i hurt you?” it’s sweet, any roughness or teasing coming to an IMMEDIATE halt.

That being said, once you confirm that it’s not bad tears, he’d get a little mean, but it would still make him be easier on you. Giving you breathless little praises, “Goddamn, you’re so.. so perfect.” kissing away your tears and putting one of his hands over your mouth, shushing you softly, “c’mon baby, gotta be quiet for me, yeah?” only to fuck into you with that same relentlessness… GUH…

as for chris, we could easily clock his inexperience, even josh does so! so with him, he doesn’t really… know that crying is a good thing during sex??

the second he sees your eyes getting all teary, he freezes like a deer in fucking headlights, immediately stopping everything to gather you up in his arms, wiping away your tears with his thumb. “Hey, hey.. what’s wrong? are.. are you okay?” he’s just so worried about you, running his warm hands across your waist and looking at you with such an affectionate gaze.. “Do you need to stop? or.. take a break?” im so sick..

even once you confirm you’re okay, he’s still gonna treat you like you’re made of glass… easing up on some of his previous roughness, even if it was unintentional… one of my anons mentioned the idea of chris being a dude who doesn’t fully realize his own strength all the time, and i def agree with that.. that being saaaid… once he knows you like it? he’d def get back into that rhythm he had going before, even if it’s subconsciously.. he’s gonna be holding you, giving you little needy kisses in between and checking on you just to make sure you’re not broken :(

[see-arcane]

You've stated you want a proper Carmilla adaptation that actually stays true to the overall story and characters

That said, what changes and expansions to the story you think would be a good idea?

Carmilla turns into a cat monster when feeding on Laura. Give her cat familiars the same way Dracula got bats. Maybe show one of them eating a bat to hammer home the 'vampires do not automatically = bat imagery.' (Long unbroken stare at book cover designers.)

2. Elaborate on 1) The group of actor-lackeys that keep getting Carmilla planted in homes with hot young daughters to feed on and 2) The mystery vampire who came and went when Mircalla was human and turned her before ditching

3. Let Laura be present for the head-chopping. It's a narrative cop out to make her wait to be told the grisly details after the fact. Having her present, either by allowance or her sneaking out to spy, would at least go a long way towards proving the men weren't murdering some girl in a box, but an actual Monster. On that note?

4. Let Carmilla be Monstrous. She did not turn her previous victims. She did not take a dainty little tiddy sip and run. She has been doing murder. Bertha was killed before the story began--good opportunity for ghost-dream jumpscare for Laura!--and Carmilla only seems fixated on taking her quarry with her when it comes to Laura. She is a serial killing vampire who just happens to also be amorously fixated on this particular victim.

5. Highlight Laura's strange VIP status when it comes to Carmilla's targeting. She dreamed of Carmilla's coming as a young girl. She suffers what could either be PTSD or psychic warning pings that Carmilla's not really gone after the climax. There is something supernatural lurking about in her head and it seems to be aligned with Carmilla's presence specifically.

6. Remember the prologue to Carmilla?

As I publish the case, in this volume, simply to interest the “laity,” I shall forestall the intelligent lady, who relates it, in nothing; and after due consideration, I have determined, therefore, to abstain from presenting any précis of the learned Doctor’s reasoning, or extract from his statement on a subject which he describes as “involving, not improbably, some of the profoundest arcana of our dual existence, and its intermediates.” I was anxious on discovering this paper, to reopen the correspondence commenced by Doctor Hesselius, so many years before, with a person so clever and careful as his informant seems to have been. Much to my regret, however, I found that she had died in the interval.

Someone else is reading out Laura's writing on the subject.

And Laura herself has died after the writing of it.

What are the last lines of the story?

It was long before the terror of recent events subsided; and to this hour the image of Carmilla returns to memory with ambiguous alternations—sometimes the playful, languid, beautiful girl; sometimes the writhing fiend I saw in the ruined church; and often from a reverie I have started, fancying I heard the light step of Carmilla at the drawing room door.

Perhaps our reader, having sadly discovered Laura has passed, wishes to pay his respects at the grave. It is a simple and lovely affair. Sadly a marker declaring she had died young.

(You cannot tell the state of a coffin when it's buried. You cannot tell a coffin is even there.)

The late mourner might see great lambent eyes, still as a cat's in the surrounding wood. Four in total. But they are gone just as quickly as they are spotted. And all that marks their presence is the iron smell of blood on the air.