#fans: ahsoka was so annoying in the early seasons but she got better

[antianakin]

Unpopular opinion: I think Ahsoka is at her best and most interesting in the first two seasons of TCW and has only gotten progressively less nuanced as the years have gone by.

Ahsoka in TCW intentionally has flaws. They're pointed out more than once, there's ENTIRE EPISODES dedicated to Ahsoka having to fix her mistakes or being punished for disobeying orders or having to learn how to be better after she messes up and hurts people. Ahsoka has to keep learning lessons from Tera Sinube, and Aayla, and Luminara, and Padme, and Yoda.

But by the time you hit around season 4, Ahsoka starts being PERFECT. She is suddenly FLAWLESS as far as the narrative seems to see it. Even if she's doing the wrong thing, you're supposed to recognize that she is doing it for the right reasons. She's constantly level-headed, wise, and often treated as though she's practically an adult Jedi by the other Jedi around her despite having been young to be a Padawan at all and with only 2 years of training tops. It's no wonder so many people were so ready to believe that the Jedi were ready to Knight her at the end of the Wrong Jedi arc, Ahsoka's being written as though she's suddenly 25 years old with a decade of training, similar to how we see Obi-Wan acting in TPM instead of the barely trained child she should still be.

And then you hit Rebels and she's literally making entrances BATHED IN LIGHT LIKE AN ANGEL, incapable of being beaten by anyone except Darth Vader himself, she's got lightsabers of PURE WHITE LIGHT, and the other two Jedi characters treat her like a Master. And then she dies, walks off into the shadows, and comes back swathed in white robes and with a white staff, haloed in light like a wise shaman of some kind.

At least Din manages to push back against her choices in The Mandalorian, it's probably the first time we've seen Ahsoka have an opinion that someone else disagreed with and that the narrative explicitly treats as WRONG, forcing her to reconsider and make a different decision.

But by The Book of Boba Fett, she's schooling Din now, back to being the wise shaman who knows everything and can do no wrong.

In Tales of the Jedi, Ahsoka is practically perfection incarnate: more skilled than any other Jedi, more compassionate and connected to the galaxy than anyone else, someone who tamed and rode on the back of an apex predator before she could walk.

I want Ahsoka to have FLAWS again, I want the narrative to let her be WRONG and reap the consequences of that, I want to see Ahsoka LEARN SOMETHING again, I want to see her GROW as a character for the first time in over a decade.

[rocket-sith]

Salty asks; 2, 4, 6, 8, 21

Okay you’re getting all these plus #5 because I can’t read for shit and accidentally answered five instead of four when I was looking at which numbers went with which questions.

#2 - Are there any popular fandom OTPs you only BroTP? - Anakin/Padme. I really like both characters, and I adore them as friends, but on the smokin' hot romantic chemistry meter, their level is somewhere between sub-arctic and absolute zero. I think there are tons of fascinating things to explore with their different worldviews, their different upbringings, the way their protective streaks come out around each other, etc., but I just feel absolutely nothing for them in the romantic shipping department. 

#4 - Do you have a NoTP in your fandom? Are they a popular OTP? - If NoTP = I get all pissy when other people ship it because I think I’m some sort of divinely appointed fanfic cop, then hell fucking no. If NoTP = a ship that personally annoys me so I avoid it, then...yeah. Guilty. Obi-Wan/Satine just bores the hell out of me. I know it's got basis in canon, and it's fine if it's used as a springboard for Anakin to troll the hell out of Obi-Wan, or it's just mentioned as some shit that happened in the past, or if it shows up in a fic to serve some other narrative purpose, but in and of itself, snoooooore. Satine in general is just boring af, and the only uses I really have for her are as a plot device or a character foil for characters I actually care about.* (Gotta say though, the "collection of half-truths and hyperbole known as Obi-Wan Kenobi" line was pure gold. Gotta give credit where it's due.)

*If anyone is gonna try and send anon wank turning this into a feminist or an “stfu obikin jerkface!” issue, get bent. There are plenty of female SW characters I totally dig - Leia is a goddess, Ahsoka is an unmitigated badass, Padme kicks all sorts of booty in all sorts of ways. My issue with Satine is that she's boring, not that she's female and/or hogging Obi-Wan's coc...*ahem*...lightsaber away from Anakin.

#5 - Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you? - Not the SW fandom, but the Potter fandom really made me start disliking Remus/Sirius. NOT because I didn't love the pairing, and definitely not because a bunch of antis wanted to whine about it (we really didn't have the aggressively virulent brand of tumblr antis back in the LJ days, just the "durrrr, pffffft, ur ship iz teh suxx0r bcuz minez better" tripe), but because I saw it written so so often, so so poorly. Author after author tried to turn them into a couple of gay stereotypes with leather pants and effeminate mannerisms and the whole nine yards as opposed to just staying true to the characters, and alas, they wrecked the Good Ship Dogstar. IDK if that was the case with all slash pairings back in the early/mid 2000s (I kinda got the impression it was since I heard similar complaints from Harry/Draco fans), but it was pretty annoying.

#6 - Has fandom ever made you enjoy a pairing you previously hated? - Not really. I've seen some pairings I'm normally just sorta "meh" about written well enough that I enjoyed it, but even then, I was only into it in the context of that story, done by that author. Good characterization and good storytelling are enjoyable even if it's not my OTP, but I've never had a ship that I flat-out hated turn into something I actively sought out. I will say fandom has definitely piqued my interest in Vader/Aphra, but that was never something I hated - I just wasn't aware of who Aphra even was until fandom informed me.

#8 - Have you received anon hate? What about? - LMAO YES YES YES! It feeds my soul, it brings me glee, and it only makes me stronger! Faster! Better! TONIGHT WE DINE IN HELL, AND I SEASON MY FOOD WITH THE MOUNTAIN OF SALT EXTRACTED FROM THE FLOWING RIVER OF ANTIS' BITTER TEARS! *ahem* Anyways! Usuuuually the anon hate has been some sort of shipper wank related to Obikin (omg how dare I enjoy things!) and another time it was in response to me saying I thought AO3 had the right idea by refusing to censor "objectionable" content (omg how dare I think other people should be able to enjoy things too!) - Basically, the common trend is whiny little pissbabies taking a dump in my inbox because they're mad at me for saying people should be allowed to tell fictional stories and stuff. (O THE DEPRAVITY!) There was also this one really weird anon who was trying to goad me into flaming someone after some 15-year-old troll started shipper wank, but TBH I never really did understand what that person's goal was other than possibly stirring drama, so I can't say for certain what it was really about in the first place.

#21 - What are your thoughts on crack ships?  -  They're good for a few lulz, but that's about it. I mean, if someone REALLY wants to get excited about Threepio doing the horizontal file transfer with Jar-Jar Binks or whatever, more power to 'em, but that shit ain't my scene. Chances are I'll read the summary, laugh hysterically, and move the fuck on. I do have a soft spot for well done satire though, so if somebody drops a clever joke fic with a crack pairing, I'm all over it. (There was one a while back on AO3 where the pairing was Kylo Ren/Darth Vader's Helmet. Yes, really. Some friends and I did rock/paper/scissors to see who had to read it and report back to the others. I lost. The fic turned out to be really hilarious trollfic/spoofitry, but alas, I can't seem to find it to share with the rest of the class. Yes, I did go look.)

[Want to give me more shit to rant and bitch about and possibly get flamed for? CLICK HERE! Salty Ask List ]

[short-wooloo]

The taming an apex predator before she could walk thing really pissed me off, mostly because of double standards regarding Rey

Every "inexplicable" skill Rey displays has a very plausible answer, but she's lambasted as a Mary sue

Meanwhile Ahsoka AS A BABY TAMES A SPACE TIGER and everyone's talking about how awesome she is?

Unpopular opinion: I think Ahsoka is at her best and most interesting in the first two seasons of TCW and has only gotten progressively less nuanced as the years have gone by.

Ahsoka in TCW intentionally has flaws. They're pointed out more than once, there's ENTIRE EPISODES dedicated to Ahsoka having to fix her mistakes or being punished for disobeying orders or having to learn how to be better after she messes up and hurts people. Ahsoka has to keep learning lessons from Tera Sinube, and Aayla, and Luminara, and Padme, and Yoda.

But by the time you hit around season 4, Ahsoka starts being PERFECT. She is suddenly FLAWLESS as far as the narrative seems to see it. Even if she's doing the wrong thing, you're supposed to recognize that she is doing it for the right reasons. She's constantly level-headed, wise, and often treated as though she's practically an adult Jedi by the other Jedi around her despite having been young to be a Padawan at all and with only 2 years of training tops. It's no wonder so many people were so ready to believe that the Jedi were ready to Knight her at the end of the Wrong Jedi arc, Ahsoka's being written as though she's suddenly 25 years old with a decade of training, similar to how we see Obi-Wan acting in TPM instead of the barely trained child she should still be.

And then you hit Rebels and she's literally making entrances BATHED IN LIGHT LIKE AN ANGEL, incapable of being beaten by anyone except Darth Vader himself, she's got lightsabers of PURE WHITE LIGHT, and the other two Jedi characters treat her like a Master. And then she dies, walks off into the shadows, and comes back swathed in white robes and with a white staff, haloed in light like a wise shaman of some kind.

At least Din manages to push back against her choices in The Mandalorian, it's probably the first time we've seen Ahsoka have an opinion that someone else disagreed with and that the narrative explicitly treats as WRONG, forcing her to reconsider and make a different decision.

But by The Book of Boba Fett, she's schooling Din now, back to being the wise shaman who knows everything and can do no wrong.

In Tales of the Jedi, Ahsoka is practically perfection incarnate: more skilled than any other Jedi, more compassionate and connected to the galaxy than anyone else, someone who tamed and rode on the back of an apex predator before she could walk.

I want Ahsoka to have FLAWS again, I want the narrative to let her be WRONG and reap the consequences of that, I want to see Ahsoka LEARN SOMETHING again, I want to see her GROW as a character for the first time in over a decade.