#for some people who might be newer to the series

[mantisgodsdomain]

We ought to write more Pokemon fic some time. We want to recreate the Pokemon Manners/Human Manners cheat sheet that we made a few years ago we think that this site would like the Sliding Scale Of Politeness When Greeting A New Pokemon You've Never Met Before.

[gu6chan]

99% just my autism speaking here but something ive been noticing lately that im sorta kinda 😶 about is when ppl are like "I think you'll like this" but not bc they ACTUALLY think you'll like it, rather they just got into it and want you to also get into it so "I think you'll like this" is a nice personal hook. i love chill stuff as much as any other person ofc but given i don't divulge that EVER, what makes you think my berserk reading, made in abyss watching, drakengard playing ass would like YURU CAMP????

[theofficialvincenzo]

I only just got into the Legend of Zelda series a few years ago with BotW, and I absolutely love it. But every time I play through one of the older games, I discover connections to the newer games and find myself baffled by how many people just like, actively refuse to interact with some of the lore.

Like, the Zelda community is such an amazing place for community theorizing and conspiracies, and the people involved are so smart and passionate about this stuff. But then the moment I try saying "Hey, I think the Ancient Robots from SS and all the glowing-green robots from TP might be related to the Zonai Constructs from ToTK"

or "Hey the ancient guardians from those astral-realm trials kinda look like the Zonai, and also have 3 eyes??"

or "Hey, ancient mysterious flying islands with blocky Jomun-inspired architecture also appear in Twilight Princess and Four-Swords Adventures..."

"...Do we think the writers had this in mind for longer than we thought? Or maybe they're connecting older unanswered stories to try fleshing out the world's history?"

I'll definitely see a few people point these things out but then I see an overwhelming amount of people who just respond with "hmm. Nope. Can't." or "Stop putting so much thought into it it's not that deep."

Like omg who cares if it's not that deep? What happened to forcing Nintendo to retcon in the "three timeline" thing? Where's the pizzaz? Where's the imagination?

These games are so much fun to try connecting together

[starberry-cupcake]

GUESS WHO'S BACK??? Happy new year you bone-loving weirdos (affectionately)!!! Let's start 2025 with Nona!!!

previously, in this react series:

we (I mean me, but also you, alongside me) finished harrowcita del 9

we read some short stories

I made a gideon craft as a gift and the person I made it for told me that the recap I wrote in the back made it to some discord server somewhere

my legacy is being unfunny

NOW LET'S START WITH NONA:

(that's how I called 2 of my great-grandmothers)

I decided to skip all the praise for the book because some of them were getting a little too involved with the story and I don't want to know anything, thank you very much

I did however read the blurb in the inside cover that I missed the last time

I wonder if at some point I could make like an audio version of a recap as I read, because my reaction when I read the following was Something, but then again you'd have to deal with my pronunciation of the names and idk if I want that

anyway, blurb says "with Pyrrha, Camilla and Palamedes"

???????????????????????????????????????????

I thought it was judith and coronabeer twin??????

I'm gonna change her name from regina george twin to coronabeer twin now because she outlived her other nickname

she's the only nickname graduate so far

who took palmolive out of the tamagotchi river loft???????

who set him loose????

how is phyrrha there, she was with gideon/harrow/gideonharrow fusion??????

"each night, Nona dreams of a woman with a skull painted face"

don't we all

the list of books says "Nona the Ninth" and so does the title in the paratext

instead of dramatis personae we have a guest list for a party

there are a lot of dogs invited to the party, which is nice

one of them has six legs

there's also people with BOE names

and one kevin, love to see it, I'll remember him

lots of meme potential there

there are some camilla annotations beside all the people from BOE allegedly nona wants to invite

still not seeing coronabeer and/or judith

gonna imagine that, wherever they are, they're making out

good for them

we got two poems after, the latter of which is a bit heart wrenching, I don't wanna ask about it

then we got a title that looks like a bible verse

had to google it and it is a verse about peter and a disciple finding jesus's tomb empty

ice cube barbie is locked tomb jesus confirmed

I've never mentioned this before but this has happened to me ever since book 1, and since it's here again I'm gonna say it

I have noticed I have a bad knee jerk reaction to the adjective 'fat' being used so often for so many things, but I'm trying to work thought it

don't wanna project my trauma onto unintended narrators

we got a summarized recount of events of what might be how emperor asshat and some of his lyctors got where they got from maybe present times???

there's talk about cryogenics for a lot of people and an evacuation plan from earth

and names are erased but we have some initials that could be augustine, mercygirl, cassiopeia and gideon

I don't think c is not!dulcinea because she was meant to be a newer model lyctor

during this recount he's in the beach alongside harrow, who he says he's gonna hurt

harrow apparently says she still loves him

gideon would be kicking him in the nuts

also, I thought the emperor was with yandere twin

what the hell happened between the two books???? where's everyone????

DAY ONE (hot sauce and 5 days until the tomb opens) CH 1

we've got a recorded statement of what feels to me like the Pool Situation Wink Wonk You Know The One

is she harrow??? or is harrow in the river with the emperor and this is a new person???? who is this????? is harrow's soul in the river???? where is gideon's perfectly preserved body that we knew camilla was carrying around with coronabeer and judith???

I don't know anything

but my wife is here, so it's all good

also, she's apparently sharing a body with palmolive now

so now the wife ideal turned into a polycule situation, I guess

didn't have that in my 2025 cards

I have two hands, apparently, idk

turns out, palmolive was somehow freed from his tamagotchi loft in the river and placed in camilla's body so they share it

how? by who? when?

glad you asked, I don't know

they're sharing space now, that's all I know

it's kind of like the lyctors should have been if the emperor wasn't an asshole, I guess

because it seems they can also switch easily and like coexist without totally cutting the other one out

it feels a lot healthier and organic in their relationship, even though palmolive is a soul guest

palmolive says camilla's body is a temple, so I'm glad we agree

pyrrha is also there, I assume taking over og!gideon's body fully, since he died, afaik

they're taking care of nona, who doesn't know who she is and they don't seem to know either, but if she has harrow's memories, I don't know what to tell you

they're living in a complicated militarized situation with few resources and little light use

palmolive thinks he could write explicit materials for a living but camilla doesn't want them to be remembered for that

palmolive wrote a lot of Things to his bae in correspondence, so maybe that's already part of his legacy

nona is sent to her room while palmolive and pyrrha argue about BOE acting weird

camolive want to rescue people, pyrrha thinks it's a bad idea and wants to get nona away from the planet

pyrrha also mentions a "she" that's crazier than camilla and makes references to commander wake me up when september ends but that one died???? twice????? so idk who this new "she" is

let's remember, for the record, that both og!gideon and pyrrha were Intimate with commander wake me up before we go go

apparently there are more people who are planet refugees in this one planet than two houses combined

which doesn't surprise me in the least, because that's how oppression often works, but is good to have it confirmed

heralds are also still a problem and camilla wants to fight them

pyrrha thinks that's a bad idea, because there's data of that not being possible

but she doesn't know that camilla hect is perfect and can do everything right always

it is important for me to clarify that, more than anyone ever in this book series, nona is the true definition of what in my land we refer to as: "está en un cumple"

the literal definition of the phrase means "she's in a birthday party"

the idiom definition is that someone is totally unaware of what is going on, without understanding what's around them, often used for people in a content state while unaware of a problem everyone else is worrying about

I truly think it's a very good way to describe her and I can't translate it in a way that feels the exact way, especially due to the party context

I headcanon her wearing this shirt

she also wants to save the animals, while camolive want to save the people

pyrrha is just tired and wants to retire to a farming planet to live in peace

I get it, though, imagine having to serve emperor asshat for so long

poor cavalier deserves some rest, og!gideon had the right idea when he exited the entire situation

saw an out with that fight in the river and left the chat

pyrrha is also worried about BOE capturing and torturing camolive for interrogation

and there seems to be an underlying plan between camolive and pyrrha that I'm not entirely sure of yet

nona, apparently, goes to school, because she's in a cumple, as previously established

going to school on top of the eye in the sky and the military issues and the social strife and the potential torturing doesn't sound ideal but very glad there's still an education system in place among all that

AND THAT'S IT FOR NOW!!! It's proving a bit complicated to do recaps with a paperback but I'm gonna try to find my footing!! See you on the next one!!

[rainecreatesstuff]

right not to get ahead of ourselves but I’ve had the best idea for another life series:

Past Life.

They start off with the normal traffic life system, but other than that, no rules or mechanics other than the very basic ones. Every session, a number of players are randomly selected, and randomly assigned different life seasons. Until the end of the session, they are to play exactly as they would if they were in that season.

Of course, the interpretation of this is entirely up to the individual players. I imagine for most seasons they would be given the actual mechanics for the time they’re playing that season. For example, if someone gets assigned secret life, a task will pop up in their inventory. Limited life players are playing with the clock system until the end of session, double life players are linked to their soulmates (maybe their previously assigned one, maybe a completely new one). Last lifers can gift lives, and maybe have a chance of being assigned boogeyman as well.

Like I said, it’s completely up to the players how they wanna interpret the prompt. Maybe to one person, it just means playing with a new set of rules and mechanics, maybe others decide they are fully embodying their character from that season, and their current alliances and grudges are null and void. Maybe some players tell their allies and others decide not to.

This would not only be a fun return to earlier mechanics and perhaps even character dynamics, it would also return the series (in my opinion) to feel more pvp oriented. You don’t know when your teammate might suddenly become a whole different person and stab you in the back. As well, you don’t know what rules other teams are playing with. Maybe you’re not allowed to team a red with a green, but others are. Maybe you, at times, don’t even know that killing someone will actually drop them, cuz it won’t if they’re on a clock. And if you’ve got the secret life heart system, well, do you keep that a secret? Do you tell people that when you lose health, it’s gone for the session? Is it safer or more dangerous?

I feel like we’re at the point now where a sort of nostalgia cycle is starting to hit people for third and last life especially, and we’ve also seen so many different mechanics that i think some people are starting to feel like it’s distancing itself too much from the original series. I feel like this would be a really fun way to sort of roll back and revisit the older seasons, and might give people who are feeling a bit less connected to the newer mechanics a sort of connection and closure with the older seasons so the creators can move on with bigger things.

Of course, probably none of this will ever happen, but I genuinely think it would be so cool and fun both in a narrative sense and a meta sense.

[winchesterwild78]

On the Sixth Day of Christmas

Master List

Characters: Ben/Soldier Boy x Reader

Warnings: Language, SMUT, Oral-Female receiving, Fluff

A/N: Day 6 of my holiday fics. I hope you enjoy this short series. I’m really excited about it. All work is my own, please don’t take it. Reblogs and likes are welcomed. 

I do not own the rights to the characters I use, these will not follow the story lines of the series the character appeared in. This is a work of fiction.

Written fast and edited fast, please overlook any errors. 

Minors DNI 18+

I hate parties, especially at Vought Tower. As a newer employee I wanted to play the part and attend, even if it was just for a little bit. Annie convinced me to go, and even picked out my dress. 

It was a formal Christmas party, because Ashley wanted everyone to “dress to impress” as she put it. I would have much rather been at home with a carton of ice cream, my warm pajamas on, snuggled under a blanket and watching Christmas movies. 

But, here I was in an uncomfortable dress, in heels and eating food that would barely keep a mouse alive. 

“Oh come on, Y/N. You’re going to have a great time. It’s Christmas!” Annie, the ever enthusiast, was excited because it was her first Christmas with Huey. I loved her like a sister, but sometimes I wanted to punch her in the face because she could be a bit much. 

Huey stood near her, his hand on her lower back. Looking like a dutiful boyfriend. “Huey, wouldn’t you rather be at home?” I asked with a chuckle. He looked at Annie and then at me, “Naw, I’m good.” I rolled my eyes and laughed. 

We talked as the night wore on. Huey and Annie going on and on about what they wanted for Christmas and how they didn’t want anything from each other because being with them was enough. 

I rolled my eyes. They were head over heels in love with each other and it was nauseating at times. 

“What do you want for Christmas, Y/N?” Annie asked with a grin. She knew what I wanted, but she wanted me to say it. I glared at her. “Drop it, Annie.” 

Huey looked confused, “What? What’s wrong?” Annie giggled, “Nothing, she’s just got her eye on someone is all.” 

“Annie, I mean it. Let it go.” I warned her. She put her arm around me, “Oh come on. It’s Christmas, you never know he might be open to it.” Huey looked at Annie and back at me, “Who?” “Nobody, Huey. She just needs to drop it.” I glared at Annie. I really didn’t need her telling everyone, especially Huey who I wanted to be with. 

About an hour later my feet were killing me and I was a bit buzzed. Between the free alcohol and the mice sized food, I was feeling a little better about being here. 

Ashley told Annie and I to get on the dance floor, because people were starting to complain the party was lame. “That’s because it is, Ashley.” I snorted out. Annie laughed, “She’s drunk, Ashley. She didn’t mean it. Come on Y/N, let’s go dance.”

She pulled me by my hand to the dance floor and we started moving to the song. The alcohol in my system loosened me up a little more than usual. 

I started dancing seductively, not caring where I was or who was watching. That is until I caught his eye. 

I saw him around the office and of course I knew who he was. Who didn’t know who Soldier Boy was. He was an asshole, a womanizer and a chauvinist. But damn was he hot. 

I had often thought about what he would feel like pressed against me or dominating me in bed. The thoughts often led to some pretty intense play time with my battery operated toys, and an increase in my battery budget. He was all I wanted for Christmas, and Annie knew it.  

Annie and I were dancing close, bodies moving together and I was dancing very seductively. Running my hands up and down my body and through my hair. 

I glanced up and made eye contact with Ben. His piercing green eyes now darker with lust. His jaw clenched and his grip on his whisky tight. 

I licked my lips and bit my bottom lip. He chugged the last sip and set the glass down, walking towards me. 

My pulse quickened and so did my breathing. I knew what I was doing, but did I just bite off more than I could chew? 

Annie chuckled as my face flushed red. “You did it now, Y/N.” She said looking at Ben as he walked towards us. 

“Blondie, who’s your friend?” His voice is smooth and dominant. “Ben, this is Y/N. Y/N, this is Ben. Soldier Boy.” She giggled, because she knew. 

I bit my lip and looked at him with a smirk, “Oh I know who he is.” I placed my hands on his chest. 

He grabbed my wrists, “Oh do you now?” He growled. “Yep” I said, popping the “p”. “You’re Soldier Boy, the strongest supe and the biggest jackass to ever live.” I giggled. Annie’s eyes went wide. 

“Ben, I’m sorry. She’s not usually like this. She’s drunk. Jeez, Y/N. Are you trying to get yourself killed?” She said, trying to pull me away. 

I stood my ground, “I’m not going anywhere. I’m dancing with him.” I started dancing against Ben. My body moving around him and rubbing against him. 

He grabbed my waist and pulled my back flush to his chest. Moving my hair away from my ear and neck his lips ghosted my pulse point. “Careful doll, you might not like what you get.” Ben whispered into my ear with a growl. 

“Hmmm maybe I want Santa to bring me a big bad supe for Christmas. Are you up for the challenge?” I smirked. 

Before I knew what was happening Ben grabbed my hand and was pulling me towards the elevator. Annie tried to protest, but I shot her a look that told her to leave it alone. 

Once on the elevator Ben’s hands pinned mine above my head and his lips ghosting mine. “Tell me to stop and I will.” He whispered. 

I loved that he was asking permission. Damn that was hot. “Don’t stop, please.” I whispered back. 

His lips crashed on mine. His hands let mine go and then found their way into my hair. 

I moaned as he deepened the kiss. The elevator dinged and opened to his penthouse and he pulled me out. 

Throwing me over his shoulder we headed straight to the bedroom. Ben dropped me on the bed with a bounce. 

I giggled as I saw his eyes turn darker with lust. 

“You’re playing with fire dancing like you were.” He smirked. I leaned up and got on my knees on the bed, face to face with him, “Maybe I like playing with fire. It’s hot.” 

I grinned as he grabbed my dress and ripped it off. I gasped. “Ben! My dress!” “I thought you liked fire, doll?” 

I was still kneeling on the bed when he started to remove his suit. I slid my hands over his belt and started to undo it. 

He removed his jacket, tie and shirt. Leaving his chest bare and exposed. I bit my lip looking at his perfectly toned body. 

“Fuck, you’re gorgeous.” I groaned. He chuckled. 

I couldn’t get his belt undone and got frustrated. He pushed my hands away and took his belt and pants down. Leaving him in his boxers. 

I could see his arousal starting to grow and my body reacted in a way that surprised me. 

The need to feel him, to take every inch of him filled me up and set my body on fire. 

I bit my lip as he pushed me down on the bed. “I need to taste you” he growled as he hooked his fingers in my panties and pulled them down. 

His strong, calloused hands pushed my thighs apart as he kissed up my legs. I squirmed under him as he took his fingers and spread my lips, feeling how wet I was. The chilly air caused a shiver to run through my body as it swept across my wet folds. 

He licked a stripe up to my clit. I gasped. “Mm, you taste amazing, sweetheart.” He licked again, and then sucked. I moaned and wiggled under him. His strong arms hooked around my thighs holding me in place. “Stop fucking moving.” He commanded. 

I moved my hips off the bed and pushed him further into me. He ate me like a man starving. His fingers slipped inside me and hooked up, hitting my g-spot. 

“Fuck, Ben! Don’t stop.” My hands found his head and pushed him in deeper. I felt him smirk against me. His tongue worked my bundle of nerves perfectly. Before too long I felt the familiar feeling deep in my core. I was close. 

I bucked my hips into him, “Ben I’m close.” He sped up and soon I was being thrusted over the edge. My vision blurred and I saw stars as I came hard on his tongue. 

He kept licking and sucking my engorged clit. “Ben, oh god, I’m close again.” I came again. Panting and moaning his name like a prayer. 

After Ben helped me ride my second release he leaned up and kissed my lips. 

“You taste better than I thought. Damn, sweetheart. I can’t get enough of you.” 

Ben stood and removed his boxers. His cock hard and dripping with precum. I bit my lip looking at the size of him. I wasn’t sure if I could take him. 

Ben grabbed a condom and slid it on and positioned himself between my legs. “Relax sweetheart. I’ll be gentle.” My mind was spinning. Soldier Boy was going to be gentle? Did I want him to be?

He leaned forward and kissed my lips as he pushed in. I gasped. He stretched me and filled me up. As he bottomed out my hands gripped his biceps. 

“Ben, move, please.” I begged. Ben began to move. Pulling out and snapping his hips back flush to mine. 

Moans and the sound of our pleasure filling the air. “Oh god! Faster!” I begged. 

“You can call me Ben, sweetheart.” His thrusts picked up. Ben grabbed my legs and put them on his shoulders as he pushed in deeper, hitting my cervix.” 

Ben’s lips landed on mine, all his desire pouring onto my lips. Our bodies are in perfect rhythm. 

Without warning Ben pulled out and flipped me on my stomach. My ass is in the air on full display for him. He grabbed my hips and buried his cock deep inside me with one thrust. 

I screamed in pleasure. Ben’s thrusts picking up. The way he felt was incredible. More than any fantasy I’d had over the past few months. His hand coming down on my left ass cheek. I yelped in pleasure.

Ben’s hand rubbed the spot where he hit me. Being gentle again. As Ben continued to thrust I felt another release coming. “Ben, I’m close.” I panted. “Me too, darlin’.” 

A few more thrusts and my release hit, pulling Ben’s out too. He spilled his seed in the condom with a grunt. 

As he pulled out he leaned forward and placed a soft kiss on my lips. “That was incredible, Y/N.” I smiled softly, “Better than I dreamed.” He chuckled as he got up to clean himself up.

I laid down and pulled the blanket over my naked body, completely blissful. Ben crawled into bed and offered me his arm. I snuggled close to him. My body pressed against his side. 

His arm wrapped around me and his fingers lay lazily on my arm. “Ben, that was amazing, thank you.” I tilted my head up and placed a soft kiss on his lips. My hand rested on his firm chest.

“Yeah it was, baby. You are the best Christmas gift ever.” He smirked. I chuckled, “You’re not so bad yourself, Soldier Boy.” 

He looked down at me and smiled, eyes full of lust and love, “I love you, Y/N. Thank you for tonight.” “I love you too, Ben. Thank you for saving me from that party. Ashley was a bit much.” 

Ben laughed, “Merry Christmas, Y/N.” “Merry Christmas, Ben.” I snuggled closer to Ben and drifted off to sleep in the arms of the man I loved.

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[cam3lliaw]

Catching the eye of a prince

-crownprince!gojo x maid!reader

Who would’ve thought getting caught reading a book during work hours one random day would not only make you good friends with the right hand of the crown prince, but also end up making the said crown prince be interested in getting to know you.

contents/ warnings: might be ooc, insecurities( some implied), mentions of stealing, a bit of angst at times to eventual fluff, friends to lovers trope, the main characters are all in their early 20s, tba

word count: 0.7 k words

series masterlist

notes: I've read a lot of jjk royalty au recently and I was inspired to write one as well :) this is the prologue and I don't really know how long this will turn out to be but i hope you enjoy it !! (fic under the cut)

“Need any help with that?” a gruff voice could be heard from behind.

You didn’t need to turn around to know that the voice belonged to none other than Geto Suguru, the crown prince’s right hand, his one and only best friend, and last but not least, your occasional thorn in the side.

“You really like that joke a lot, don’t you, Lord Geto.” you said, still not turning to face him as you continued to hang the sheets on the clothesline.

“And you really like to call me that, even though I tell you all the time that Suguru is just fine. And besides, I wasn’t, and never will be, joking when I ask you that question, [name].” he chuckled.

“You know that my answer will always be no, Suguru. There are some lines that even I won’t cross, and to be honest, it’s absurd to even consider I’ll let you help me.”

“And why is that?” he asked, even though he fully knows the answer already.

“Well for starters, I’m not that stupid not to be aware of the difference in our status, friends or not, it still matters to me. And secondly-” you turn to face him as a smile stretches on your face “You don’t see me coming to your office and telling you how you should do your work.”

“I wouldn’t oppose to that, you know.” Suguru smiled back.

“Like I’m smart enough to even step into a place like that.” you huffed jokingly.

At that he grimaced slightly.

“Come on, [name]. We both know you are way smarter than a lot of the people that work in this palace.”

“Reading a few books here and there only get you so far, Suguru. You, out of everyone, should know that well.”

It never gets easier, admitting that you wish for more. In another universe, you would read all day, study literature properly with someone who actually knows what they’re doing, not only from damaged pages of stolen books from the royal library, books that are about to be disposed not only because the years have left them in a horrible shape but sometimes also because the concepts explained are so old that they aren’t even right anymore.

“You know I could always bring and lend you newer ones right? I told you that on multiple occasions already and I mean it every time.” Suguru said as he approached you and stood by your side.

You also know Suguru would never make fun of you, he really wants to help. But it’s hard enough to get and hide the books in the maids’ chambers before you finish reading them and returning them to the library's unofficial “trash” section. Imagine what trouble you would get in if you get caught with fancy new books. It hurts only to think about it.

“I know…I’ll let you know in case I need anything. I promise.”

Saying this is clearly better than admitting the truth. As much as you don’t want unnecessary problems for yourself, dragging Suguru into all of this mess is even worse.

“This doesn’t look very…straight.” Suguru changed the subject to lighten the mood, as he tried to lightly stretch one of the sheets.

“We both know that’s a bold-faced lie! Don’t mess the laundry! If it ends up falling down and I’ll have to wash it again, I won't talk to you anymore, Suguru.”

“We also know that’s not true.” he chuckled as he gently bumped his side into yours.

You returned the action.

And he did it once again but a bit more forceful.

And the cycle repeated itself for a few more times until you literally shoved him, but before he could fall on the grass, he grabbed your hands and dragged you down as well, falling down a step away from the dark haired man.

“You’re acting like a child!” you exclaimed as you started laughing.

“Says the one who shoved me!” he started to laugh too.

“You started it!”

“Oh that’s such a mature argument, [name]. Impressive, really.” the male continued to laugh as he got up and helped you up as well.

Unknown to the both of you, this whole exchange was watched from afar by none other than the crown prince, who was initially looking for his best friend, but it seems like he found something else instead.

end notes: i hope you liked it! :)

[peterfurisfluffy]

“percy jackson is the best percyverse series!!”

“no heroes of olympus is!!!”

trials of apollo: 🤫🤫🤫

sorry guys but toa is my favorite🤯🤯 its so underrated for literally no reason. ITS SO GOOD?? i understand some people might not like apollo in the first few books cuz hes SUPPERR arrogant and egocentric but that’s literally the whole point😭 hes supposed to be like that and your supposed to see him grow. im not saying that the hidden oracle is the best toa book bc its not, im just saying that him being super annoying is kind of the whole point.

not to mention the character development???? he went from not caring who the hell dies as long as he survives to SACRIFICING HIMSELF so his friends could stay alive (ex: in the burning maze his sticks the arrow of dodana into his chest ((still didnt really work cuz jason died but wtv😭💀))

im also not saying that HOO and PJO are bad series because theyre not. PJO is so iconic and amazing and original and HOO is so important to the growth of almost every character made.

TOA is so underrated and you hear NOTHING of lester, meg, and every other character in that series. ik that its kind of newer compared to the other series its just still so amazing.

i could rant about meg and lester forever. their relationship dynamic is so well written and just absolutely amazing. lester got so attached to meg just in the first book. he loved her so much. their bickering was amazing and their care for each other was amazing.

thank you🙏

[storiesofsvu]

All of us need to do better

y'all... this is hitting another bad streak. I'm seeing multiple friends/moots/other accounts either disappear from fandom/writing silently, or making posts about how they're either leaving, taking an indefinite hiatus or want nothing to do with writing anymore.

And I *completely* get where they're coming from. (and am losing motivation to write/post every single day).

interaction on posts is WAY down. and I don't mean notes. I mean reblogs and comments/a conversation going in the ask box and even requests. (which can happen ON ANON).

i get messages asking when the next ____ (insert character here) fic is and I have nothing for them because no one's sending in req's anymore either.

I have MULTIPLE people who have signed up for taglists (and recently and I know they're active blogs) who then don't interact with the fics theyve ASKED to be tagged in. You're literally holding a spot someone else might want, the very LEAST you could do would be to reblog things. (and i've seen their blogs, some of them don't reblog ANY other fics, they only have their own posted). this is just bad manners.

If you're a newer blog, let me let ya in on something.... reblogging and commenting and engaging with other people's fics is the easiest way to make friends on here, to become part of discord servers dedicated to fandoms where you can discuss headcanons, watch eps together, and spitball for your own fics and theirs.

it takes 2 seconds to reblog, and if you don't want to ruin the aesthetic of your blog, or don't want people to know it's you reading and enjoying fanfic, it takes 5 mins to make a secondary blog to do exactly that on.

ETA: i also see people complaining in the show tags that “no one writes for ______” anymore. Meanwhile they clearly havent done a good job searching as they havent seen my blog or any of the ones i reccommend.

anyways, i could go on forever. i guess i just woke up in a very lacking mood and wanted to get this off my chest because it's been bothering me a lot recently. Decadent Desires is almost wrapped and I have no motivation to even CHOOSE which series to start next because it seems like most of you do not care AT ALL. And yes i threw in random gifs to grab your attention but at least i'm going to tag this appropriately lol

[aroaceleovaldez]

I've been listening to hank green explain (at various times with various contexts but most recently during a vlogbrothers video on Bree Sharp's David Duchovny) how "nothing lasts on the contemporary internet" and I wonder what that might have to do with your analysis on fandom infrastructure... like IS it even possible for BNF/public AUs/OCs/fandom events to exist at the same scale in the new internet? I also have to wonder if rr is similarly operating in this new (awful) way with the knowledge that the old books could last longer as cultural moments while the new books are kinda just... there to trend for a hot minute and then fade away into nonexistence within the fandom canon. or maybe i'm just coping bc I miss old tumblr

I absolutely do think old-style fandom is possible on the modern internet! some of the oldest pillars of fandom are from BEFORE the internet was popularized! Plus, there are still plenty of old-style fandoms that are active in those same ways!

You mention "at the same scale" and i think that's interesting because, yes, a lot of those old-style fandoms that are active are smaller. The thing is the scope of old fandom we're used to when we think of classic examples are outliers who were MASSIVE. PJO was a fandom GIANT back in the day, at least so far as book fandoms went (and still is!). The major thing that's changed is that "fandom" has become mainstream - or at least, the concept of fandom.

The thing with mainstream modern fandom is it gets conflated with general audience a lot. A lot of people trying to engage with fandom when they're new to it don't understand how it's different from just being a normal fan or audience member of a thing, and so just treat them as equivalent and this causes a lot of problems. The main one being the reliance on source material - which causes a lot of newer fandoms to die out whenever there is no new source material - comparatively to old-style fandom, which is inherently self-sustaining.

Some examples of old-style fandoms that are still plenty active are furry fandom (obviously), a decent number of anime fandoms (particularly older ones or less mainstream ones cause the communities are smaller/closer-knit, also their fandoms aren't as strictly western-leaning), and Hermitcraft/associated fandoms is one particularly that I'm in that's VERY active and old-fandom style. They're constantly engaging with material that's long over or series that have ended (Evo, older Life series, older Hermitcraft seasons, etc). They have fandom OCs/AUs/concepts that are shared, they have a TON of projects happening constantly (a recent massive one that just finished is the Hotguy Comics zine! It's an incredibly cool project). Hermitcraft fandom is pretty much the closest new* fandom to old-style fandom that I've found so far (*it is technically 11 years old but it had a recent boom during the MCYT surge in like 2020).

But yes! Old-style fandom absolutely can still exist - and does! It's just far less common because the mainstream image/concept of what fandom is that has become popularized differs from it in practicality. People are being introduced to fandom as just being equivalent to a general audience and are interacting with it as such, when it should be interacted with as a niche, very passionate community. The core of old fandom is always community.

I guess i would describe it as like, passive fandom versus active fandom? Passive fandom being the "new fandom" type format - near complete reliance on source material, usually some attitude of entitlement towards fanwork creators because theyre viewing it as another source material to passively engage with, large lack of headcanons or hcs being equated to theories, shipping is restricted almost exclusively to canon pairings (and ships/headcanons are treated more as things you want to become canon, not explorations outside of canon), etc etc. There's no community or creation happening, only a focus on consumption and maybe at best how to streamline consumption (the only sorts of hubs we see form in this type of fandom are update accounts and official social medias). Basically no proper community has formed and there is little to no engagement with the material outside of the source media. (I also have a theory that this format leads to some New Fandom behaviors that have become more commonplace comparatively to Old Fandom, such as a LOT more trying to directly interact with writers/cast/crew or reliance on them as secondary source materials during hiatus or similar - we see this now with PJO TV and a lot of people downright literally stalking the actors - and almost a refusal to make fanwork of their own. You see a lot more of "omg somebody write/draw [concept]" or trying to pitch ideas to source material writers because they only want to engage passively, not actively, or genuinely don't know how to engage actively.) Big Name Fans can absolutely exist in this sphere, but it's a completely different environment (for PJO, Velinxi is a good example of a new fandom BNF - ive found in this format of fandom, BNFs are almost exclusively fanartists, because fanart is one of the easiest fanworks to find and passively engage with. This also often results in the community being extremely entitled towards larger fanartists).

Active fandom, comparatively, is focused on community and creation. This is where you see fandom projects, engaging with the media beyond the source material, things of that nature. There is actually a structured community.

This post got long but I have more points regarding the second half of your question and my thoughts for why the new books are so. Like That. so I'm going to move that whole ramble to a second post which I will post momentarily.

[part 2 here!]

[holybasementdweller]

wanted to add my two cents because shipping discourse is just all over recently. Forgive me rambling a bit here. I have a lot of thoughts on this topic and would like to get them out there in some form.

Stop harassing CC's about their boundaries.

Would you go up to a random person whom you've never met before in your life, who has never met you either, and likely has no idea who you are, purely to ask them if you can draw/write/ship them with one of their co-workers?

No! It's a wildly uncomfortable question to a lot of people, it puts them on the spot, and some CC's may not care as long as they never see it. Now that the concept has been shoved in their face, they're forced to view the idea.

I feel like a large part of the issue is the divide between younger, newer fandom members and older, traditional ones. Primarily the concept that fan content is not intended for CCs, but for fans specifically. Most 'traditional' and older fandom participants follow this view because that's what fandom is. You get to make cool things, and ramble about different head cannons and ideas with your friends and maybe find other fans who become your friends along the way. Maybe you want to throw these characters you really like into this elaborate superhero AU, or draw them in costume, or explore relationship dynamics because it's fun and you get to ramble with fellow fans. It's called a fandom for a reason!

I'd like to clarify here that this post is not meant to target anyone in particular; it's going off a general trend I've noticed.

There's been an influx of people who create fan works or fanart that seems to be aimed more to gain clout or to be noticed by CCs. It's something they wanted to make, but is leaving the realm of "by fans, for fans," in a sense that it seems to have lost more of that "for fans." The work is then shoved at the CC more aggressively than if it was just for friends.

There's a reason that spaces like AO3 and Tumblr exist with such large fan communities- because the communities are meant for fans. It's all well and good when CC's decide to take a peek or participate in said fan spaces of their own volition. They're the ones making the choice to engage. It's NOT all well and good when someone, as a fan, is trying to make that choice FOR them by shoving fanworks at the CC begging for clarification on what is okay with them. You're not going to help anyone in that way. Fan spaces exist separately from the CC spaces for a reason. The CC is a person behind the screen who you don't know. The character or role they play in the series you watch? You might know just about everything there is to know about them!

If a CC has laid out a boundary that they aren't comfortable with X Y Z, then there's a really, really simple solution here. Don't show it to them.

Don't put it in main tags, don't tag them in the post, hell, block the CC so you know they won't be able to view something that makes them uncomfortable.

There's a lot of what comes across as almost puritanical virtue signaling I've seen lately, where people are talking about CC boundaries everywhere and trying to police fanwork. I will again refer you to the point above. The fanwork is not made for the CC. It is made for fans, and if it is something the CC isn't comfortable with, then don't go posting it where they might regularly look at things (such as main fanart/fanwork tags.)

Yes, there are CCs who are over here. Yes, they look through fan works. This app is primarily a fan-oriented space and it has tags that CC's (or anyone else!!) can block to avoid things they are uncomfortable with. Though at this point the few that are over here either were already gay dot com natives or have basically become one.

I may have gone a bit off my original topic but TL;DR:

KEEP FAN WORKS TO FAN SPACES, AND STOP HARASSING THE CC'S PLEASE. LET THEM EXIST IN PEACE.

[rainbowsky]

Hi rainbowsky! I'm a new-ish (autumn 2023) Yizhan fan - it's been so much fun to explore and read everything available, your blog included! I really enjoy your opinions and insights. I have a question and a request. Question: When CQL first started airing, what were people saying about the relationship between WWX and LZ in the show, and about the actors playing them? Did the CP start right away? Request: Then later on, when the BTS started appearing (when was that - after the show finished airing, right?), what were people saying about the real interactions between the two actors? Were people shocked? Amazed? Even more curious? I can imagine social media was on fire! But I'd like to hear from someone who "lived" through it in real time. Please give me a description of what it was like - especially what your thoughts and feeling were as you saw it happening. I wish I could have been there! Thank you!

Hi Blbrave! Thanks so much, I'm glad you're enjoying my blog!

This is all a very, very long time ago, but I'll do my best to share what I can remember.

Actually, the CP started before the show began airing. The supertopics were opened during filming in 2018. I think this was inevitable, given that the series is based on a BL story. Of course fans of the novel will go into all of this with an eye toward the two characters and, by extension, GG and DD.

Similarly, as the show was airing of course there were a large number of viewers who knew it was a BL and viewed it as a BL at that time, even though it was being billed as a martial brotherhood series. There was a lot of analysis from fans trying to spot various ways that the production team managed to get around censorship and signal the queer romance between WWX and LWJ.

Others have done far better, more comprehensive analysis of all that than I could ever do, but it's so long ago I don't know where those posts might have gone. Some of this was discussed in my post about queerbaiting, so you can look there for more info.

As I said in that post, one of their smartest ways of highlighting the queer relationship was to downplay romance between the straight characters. We never see a straight couple doing something that we don’t also see LWJ and WWX doing. Yanli's wedding happens off camera, yet we see LWJ and WWX do their bows on camera. There’s never a kiss or any kind of PDA between straight characters, yet we see LWJ and WWX in each other’s arms throughout the series.

We got a gay kiss:

We got gay sex:

There was also the headband repeatedly being described as the domain of only family and spouses, and the various ways they connected it with WWX. WWX grabbing it when he was possessing the paperman, and also at one point being tied to LWJ by the wrist with the headband - all of this signalling that WWX was a spousal figure for LWJ.

There was the drunk scene with LWJ giving WWX chickens (a wedding tradition in China).

And many more examples I won't get into.

There were many of those types of things in the series, and they were discussed enthusiastically at the time. However, I don't think there were many bystanders who made those connections. It was primarily fans of the books/show (i.e. those who appreciated it as a BL story and not as a bromance/friendship story) who saw and discussed those hints.

I know the idea that anyone could be so oblivious to the gay subtext throughout the story that they miss the queerness entirely is hard to get one's head around, but straight viewers usually just see WWX and LWJ as best friends and sworn martial brothers. The show could never have been made or aired if that wasn't the case.

In fact, newer fans might not be aware that there was a lot of controversy during filming because of leaked early attempts to create a straight romance between Wei Wuxian and Wen Qing. Some relationship-building scenes between them were filmed, and at one point in the BTS GG is heard complaining about the straight romance and saying that all those scenes should be deleted.

In the production team's defense, there was doubt at the time about whether the show could air given its source material as a BL novel. They likely had investors and backers pressuring them to make sure that the story was unambiguously straight.

Fans of the novel made a massive uproar about it, threatening to boycott the series. The backlash was so extreme that it became a bigger threat to the success of the show, and the straight romance was killed. We all owe a lot to those agitators! 😅

The BTS

The BTS clips were first discussed in an Untamed press conference (that section of the interview starts at around 36:30). The producer said that in the future some of the behind-the-scenes moments would be shared. GG and DD exchanged a glance and looked extremely uncomfortable with it.

A lot of turtles find that clip funny, and laugh about what GG and DD might 'have to hide', but I have never understood how fans can find GG and DD's discomfort funny.

It might surprise some newer turtles to hear that there were moments where GG and DD appeared to be uncomfortable with the BTS, but there were.

Another moment happened in an interview where GG and DD were asked to explain a BTS scene of the two of them in the boat, where GG is lying in DD's lap. DD turns to the interviewer with a shocked and displeased look on his face and says, "They released this?"

There were other moments as well, but I haven't kept a comprehensive record of all that. This happened long before I clued in on how quickly clips can disappear in this fandom.

I believe that it is totally normal to have mixed feelings about the BTS, and I believe GG and DD are no exception to that. No doubt they enjoy some of the clips and feel uncomfortable about some of them, just like many turtles (myself included).

There were official BTS clips released during promo, but the unofficial BTS clips didn't come until later. I talked in more detail about the unofficial BTS and how they came to be released here.

The unofficial clips began being released by fansites in the fall of 2020. It would be hard to overstate how different the atmosphere around them was to what it is now. Now it's quite common to find BTS clips all over the place, both in C-social media and on international sites like YouTube and Instagram.

However, back in 2020 they were extremely hard to get ahold of, and sharing them outside of where they were initially released was strictly forbidden and frowned upon by fans. In fact, if you dig back through my 2020 posts I'm sure you'll find many posts where I admonish people not to share the BTS clips, and where I bitch about people sharing them without authorization. I also answered a lot of asks about these issues at the time (just one example).

Times have changed a lot, and now everyone is sharing them all very freely without any concerns.

The situation was a lot different back then:

GG and DD had gained a tremendous amount of popularity from the show, but their reputations and careers were not yet fully established and secure.

227 was still an active concern that was still making news and still impacting GG's life directly. He had not yet recovered from any of it and was still mostly lying low. He was constantly being attacked and antis were constantly out to get him.

The Untamed was still fresh and current, and being discussed regularly in the media. Because filming was still fairly recent, what happened during filming would still run the risk of impacting GG and DD's lives and careers.

Fans were coming under very close scrutiny because of 227 and other fandom-related scandals. The government was starting to crack down heavily on fandom culture.

This was all uncharted territory. No one knew how the BTS might be received, or how it might impact GG and DD. Fans were very freaked out about the possibility of anything compromising getting leaked and harming the boys.

No doubt fansites were also worried about how fans might respond to some of the releases, and wanted to ensure they didn't upset or anger fans, or stir up more excitement than could be safely contained within the fandom.

All of this contributed to a climate of extreme caution and secrecy around the release of BTS clips.

We never knew when one might be released, and when they were released they were typically only put online for a few minutes, then deleted. This was all done in an effort to limit the exposure of these clips primarily to turtles who have GGDD's best interests in mind.

The clips were heavily watermarked and overlaid with visual and audio curses that 'reuploaders must die!' ('banyun biss', which I'm sure most of you have encountered in some of the clips you've seen).

Early clips were heavily watermarked.

Those who missed out were out of luck. It was extremely socially unacceptable to re-share clips once they'd been deleted. Those who missed out would have to rely on recaps and transcripts from those who had seen the clips. Fans took to staying up all hours watching and waiting for a release.

Back in those days people tried to save every clip they could, hoarding them greedily. Turtles' phones were filling up with large video files. It's funny to think about now, because the clips are everywhere and so easy to find these days, but back then it was a whole Thing.

The initial releases were sporadic and quite tame as fansites dipped their toes in the water of how all this would be received. Gradually over time clips became more frequent and stayed up longer, and some of the more salacious stuff began being released. Those clips were often accompanied by hilarious intro images.

(For those who don't get it, it's the PornHub logo).

Of course all of the clips were heavily discussed as they came out, and a clearer picture of GG and DD's relationship and of their experience of filming began to take shape over time. Some of the fake rumors (such as the 49 fake candies and the CPN that GG designed a racing suit for DD) were gradually proved to be true as these clips were released. However, that was mostly confined to fandom circles.

There were occasionally times when these clips or their content would cross over into the mainstream and start trending on Weibo. In many of those cases, the hotsearches would be bought and pushed by antis of GG and DD who want to see them cancelled. At those times turtles would jump into action to wash those topics and replace them with mundane, unrelated content.

There were fan theories and fake rumors about GG and DD's reaction to the clips. Sometimes when new clips were released GG and DD would be seen online and turtles assumed they were watching them. Of course, considering the clips featured them, it's highly likely that they did eagerly await releases just like the rest of us.

I suspect that it was likely a mixed bag for them. Some clips might have really stressed them out either upon initial release or after reactions began to emerge, while others likely made them laugh and feel nostalgic about filming.

A large percentage of BXG light banners and slogans came directly out of the BTS, some of which you can see GG and DD discussing in LRLG rumors.

Dumplings, rice noodles, 3+2 biscuits (cr @knivescharade in this post), discussed in this LRLG rumor.

There were definitely a few scandals and close calls that came out of the unofficial BTS, and solos and antis frequently tried to use them against GG and DD and tried to spin negative narratives about their relationship using disingenuous takes and edits of them (they still do to this day).

For example, the clip where GG tells DD that he prefers a natural look to idol makeup was used against GG at the time, and antis tried to make it seem like GG was homophobic and that GG was against men wearing makeup. Some of the clips where they were playfighting or bickering were used to try to create a narrative that they hated each other. That kind of thing.

BTS and fan service

One of the most common questions I've gotten about the BTS - and I still often get this question - is, "Aren't the BTS just acted out/scripted as fan service to promote the show?"

There are a few reasons people have this question in their minds.

Solos #1 narrative about GGDD is that their CP was just for the show and the BTS was all fan service, and nothing about their relationship is real. They push this claim very aggressively on social media anytime GGDD or The Untamed is discussed, and new fans will almost always encounter those claims in this way.

CP fan service is a normal part of how dramas are promoted, so people familiar with Asian dramas will often immediately jump to that assumption about GG and DD and about the BTS.

Heteronormativity leads many people to immediately dismiss the possibility of a gay relationship, which leads them to try to come up with other explanations for those clips.

People naturally have a hard time believing what they're seeing with some of those clips. Some of it is pretty jaw-dropping and it's understandable that some people will be skeptical.

However, there are a lot of really good reasons why these clips are obviously not fan service.

For one thing, the show was billed as a martial brotherhood, not as a romance. Some of the official BTS clearly did try to appeal to CP and MDZS fans and could be counted as fan service, but those weren't even the ones BXG are most excited about. (There is a playlist of some of the official BTS clips here).

The most exciting stuff was never released during promo, and almost none of it is overtly romantic. A lot of it is really crude and totally unreleasable as promo. GG and DD are lewd, crude and often rude in ways that only two people who are really close could ever get away with. In many cases it's the casual way GG and DD constantly cross polite social boundaries with each other that shows their intimacy, rather than anything overtly sweet or romantic.

A lot of it is also totally incomprehensible to regular audiences. You have to be a turtle digging deeply into GGDD to understand the significance of most of it. For example the way GG took care of DD on his birthday, or the way DD constantly bargained and haggled with GG to get him to eat more.

Most importantly, if it was all fan service then why did GG and DD never do any joint CP endorsements? The entire point of doing that type of fan service is to make a buck. Other drama CP - including BL - do this all the time.

And it doesn't make sense that a production that was as low budget as The Untamed could afford to have the two lead actors learn a whole second set of lines and do a whole second performance that never ended up getting released.

And of course, none of that explains why the bulk of the BTS clips ended up in the hands of fans and released years after the show finished airing. A lot of it still has never been released to this day.

I've often joked that if the BTS were scripted they were far more complex, more melodramatic and better written than the drama itself. You just can't come up with this stuff in a writer's room. 😅

Anyway, this post got a bit long but hopefully it gives you a bit more of a picture of what it was all like at the time. Sorry, I guess I didn't talk much about my own feelings/reactions, but hopefully you can get somewhat of a sense.

Overall it was exciting, but I also had some deep reservations about it all (and got a lot of hate mail for voicing those feelings, too). Keep in mind this wasn't long after 227, so I think it's understandable that I was feeling very wary about everything.

But that's all water under the bridge now. It's been many years, and if the BTS were going to harm GGDD it would have already happened. I think it's all pretty safe territory now.

Edit: some more of my thoughts and feelings at the time:

One of the most exciting things for me about the BTS clips was seeing so many of the fake rumors being proved true. There were a lot of rumors (including the 49 fake candies) that I totally scoffed at when I first heard about them, only to later find via the BTS clips that I had been totally wrong about them and that these things had actually happened, and even crazier things were gradually revealed.

Things were changing pretty rapidly for a while there now that I think about it.

Learning more about their relationship and seeing just how much they looked out for each other was another big one for me. Also the timeline. The BTS really reinforced my belief in The Devil's Timeline (the belief that they got together prior to filming).

But overall that was a very different time in the fandom as well. There were always so many candies coming out, not just BTS clips but things that came out of GG and DD's activities and social media posts. It was a really really busy time in the fandom.

Since then there has been a government crackdown on fandom culture, on the entertainment industry, on LGBTQ etc. in China, plus DD's split with Nike and him having to delete a lot of his GG candy posts from his Weibo account.

Things are so different now, and unfortunately a lot of it for the worse. Being a turtle is not always easy, and I'm sure being GG and DD can't always be easy either. We make it work, but I do sometimes look back wistfully on the freer, more exciting times in the fandom.

More such times could come in the future. We just have to keep moving forward and hope for the best.

Somewhat related: I did a semi-comprehensive post about GG and DD's reaction to turtles here.

[jujus-bizarre-blog]

Some of my favourite Crooked Kingdom quotes :)

So I finished Crooked Kingdom and this post is gonna be a lot less articulate than my last one about the series because...

Who the actual fuck let the last 100 pages of that novel happen???

They were so entertaining but aside from that they had some of the most beautiful sentiments and prose. So I am going to share my favourites from each character's POV in Part Six: Action & Echo :3

Nina: Page 455

"But she hadn't been made for shame."

"Nina had grieved for her loss of power, for the connection she'd felt to the living world. She'd resented this shadow gift. It had seemed like a sham, a punishment. But just as surely as life connected everything, so did death. It was that endless, fast-running river. She'd dipped her fingers into its current, held the eddy of its power in her hand. She was the Queen of Mourning, and in its depths, she would never drown."

It's such a beautiful sentiment and moment to watch her fully come to love herself again and her new power. I love Nina as a deeply relatable character and this was just so perfect to see her come back to loving and finding herself.

Inej: Page 460

"But what about the rest of us? What about the nobodies and the nothings, the invisible girls? We learn to hold our heads as if we wear crowns. We learn to wring magic from the ordinary. That was how you survived when you weren't chosen, when there was no royal blood in your veins. When the world owed you nothing, you demanded something of it anyway."

This gave me chills. Everything about this is utterly gut wrenching and feels incredibly relatable. I reread that line probably 4 times before moving on.

Jesper: Page 471

"It's not a gift. It's a curse. But when it came down to it, Jesper's life had been full of blessings. His father. His mother. Inej. Nina. Matthias leading them across the muddy canal. Kaz--even Kaz, with all his cruelties and failings, had given him a home and a family in the Dregs when Ketterdam might have swallowed him whole. And Wylan. Wylan who had understood before Jesper ever had that the power inside him might be a blessing too."

Jesper realizing that for all the shit luck he has at tables he has been lucky enough to have amazing people in his life. It's just very sweet.

Matthias: Page 483

"Unnatural, said the old, determined voice. Beautiful, said the voice that had spoken the night he'd helped Jesper and Kuwei escape Black Veil. It was newer, less certain, but louder than ever before."

I love this part because it shows just how much Matthias has changed through the two books. It's beautiful and sweet and heartwarming.

Wylan: Page 427

"Wylan summoned every bit of bravado he'd learned from Nina, will he'd learned from Matthias, the focus he'd studied in Kaz, the courage he'd learned from Inej, and the wild, reckless hope he's learned from Jesper, the belief that no matter the odds, somehow they would win."

Okay... I cheated with Wylan's it's from his chapter just before Action & Echo... BUT, I think this sentiment is much more telling than anything in his Part Six chapter. I love this quote because it shows just how much his found family taught him. They're messy, they're brutal, and they're awful, but they are everything to each other. They teach each other, they help, they care, they tease, and that's way more than Wylan ever had at home.

Kaz: Page 480 & 529

"'I also had her stop at the Menagerie.'

She smiled then, her eyes red, her cheeks scattered with some kind of dust. it was a smile he thought he might die to earn again."

"'That's the laugh,' he murmured."

The second quote isn't from his chapter, it's from Inej's final one, but it conveys the same thing as the first quote. It shows what Kaz could have been, that somewhere in there he wants to show Inej can take his armour off, that he is willing to do it for her and I think it's just really gratifying to see.

That all being said chapter 42 was so evil. It had me going from sobbing of joy to sobbing of sorrow and back to joy in the span of 3 paragraphs istg. What the actual fuck Leigh Bardugo???

[storiesbyjes2g]

Hey Jess! I had a question that I figured other people might want to know as well. I'm always amused at how your game matches sims up to marry or have children. I was wondering, what are your MCCC settings that make it happen so well? I have sims sitting in my 'manage households' and none of them have married or moved out with the 'in game' story progression. What's the secret sauce? 🤣

Howdy, partner! 🤭 It's funny you should ask me this because on my seven mile long list of video ideas I have is a short series about MCCC settings, and this is one subject I wanted to cover. But who knows when I'll get it together and actually record those videos lol. As you could imagine, the secret sauce has many ingredients, so I'll put the rest of this under the cut because it's a lot. Here we go!

Even though I said this is a multipart answer--and it is--I'm gonna split this up into two sections because marriages and pregnancies are two separate entities. Many of the settings are the same, and they both fall under the MC Pregnancy module, but they're still separate, and I think of them differently.

Marriages

Marriage Sim Selection

The first thing you should consider is who you want marrying and if your sims should be included in the process. As you've seen, I like seeing the other sims' lives progress, even if it's messy AF LOL. I especially love this happening in the aDOLTing save because I'm technically not allowed to play with anyone else but Luca right now. BUT, I don't want every single sim there is to get married, leaving no single sims for my sims to date. That's what happened in Emmy's generation and why I added Ali into the world because there were exactly TWO eligible males in the entire world, and I knew one of them would definitely not work out. In the Marriage Sim Selection part of MC Pregnancy, you can specify who can and cannot get married. I'm not gonna through each setting, but here are a few that are important enough to note.

Allow homeless marriage: Unless you regularly add your own sims to the world, I would enable this. Otherwise you probably won't have any marriages happening. This is disabled by default. Yes, you run the risk of your unplayable sims marrying someone hideous, but it's better than them dying alone, right? Plus you can always make them over. Your sim doesn't know the difference anyway lol.

Bypass dorm residents: If you don't enable this, your university students will be eligible for marriages!

Bypass played households: IF you want to be the matchmaker for your sims (the playable ones), turn this on! If you're flexible and don't mind surprises, turn it off.

Bypass active sim romances: This one needs to be in red lol. TURN THIS ON! If your sim is dating an NPC, and you don't want that sim to suddenly turn up married (I'm giggling...you know why), you need this on. I think it's on by default though. The only "gotcha" with this setting is that the relationship has to be significant. Lovebirds status isn't strong enough to prevent a marriage. I usually get my sims into an official relationship as soon as possible to prevent this.

Other Marriage

In the Other Marriage section (MC Pregnancy), there are settings for renaming, moving, etc. after marriage. You should definitely check out the settings to tailor it to how you want your world to be, but I want to call out Use Traits for Marriage. This is a newer setting that I enabled as soon as it launched. It doesn't make sense for Don Lothario to get married in every single save. He has the noncommittal trait! Turning this on will take a sim's traits into consideration before determining if they are eligible for random marriages.

Spouse Sim Selection

In this section, you can do things like allow polygamy and inter-family marrying, specify what % of marriages should be same sex, allow teen marriages, etc. Here are just a few settings I want to call out.

Occupancy Preference: It took me some years to figure this out, but this is honestly the key to my entire setup. This determines which group of NPCs are candidates for marriages and pregnancies by where they live. The choices are homeless only, prefer home sims, living in homes only, and none. I have prefer home sims on. I like neighbors dropping by and seeing them walking around, so I tend to put my sims' friends and sims I like into homes. This setting says when it's time for random marriages and pregnancies to occur, sims living in homes get first dibs. If none of them are eligible, then everyone else will have a chance. I used to have this on none, and I was experiencing waaaaaay too many random marriages. Like, good on the homeless sims for having lives lol, but they were snatching up every single eligible sim and I was like this has to stop lol.

Use Same Age-Group: I've gone back and forth about enabling or disabling this one and finally decided to enable it. This will keep your fresh from high school babies from getting married to someone with one foot in the grave! Sims will only marry other sims in the same age group as them. Back in the day I felt sorry for the elders because they're always single when they die. But I also felt sorry for the baby they married lol. True, when they croak, the kid can find new love, but they've wasted so much time being married to the old sim. So with this on, elders aren't completely out of luck. They can just only marry each other.

Pregnancies

Okay! Now that we know how to let sims get married, let's learn how to knock some up! 😂

I would check out the Offspring section of MC Pregnancy on your own just to get familiar with how you can shape your sims' families and even the children to a certain extent, but let's get to the important stuff.

Other Pregnancy

There's really good stuff in here like allow pregnancy aging, pregnancy duration, and random moods, but the only thing I want to call out is Use Traits for Pregnancy. This will take into account sims traits before they are marked as candidates. It won't prevent sims with the hates children trait from getting knocked up, but it will lower the percentage (which you can specify in another section, I think).

Partner Sim Selection

This is similar to marriage sim selection, and in here I also prefer home sims in the occupancy preferences. I also allow a veeeery tiny percentage for allow affairs. I like tea, what can I say? LOL Not everyone is faithful!

Pregnant Sim Selection

This is similar to spouse selection, and I do not allow homeless pregnancies for the same reasons I don't allow homeless marriages. I have all the same settings enabled from spouse selection, so revisit the above. Additionally, I use days until max age. This prevents a sim from getting pregnant X number of days from the end of whatever lifespan you specify is the oldest to be pregnant. I don't allow elder pregnancies, so this stops my adult sims from getting pregnancy X days from their elder birthday. My number is 10, but you pick whatever makes sense for your lifespans. I do this because I've had waaaaaaay too many sims get pregnant and have babies like the day before their elder birthday, and then they die before the kid is a teenager. I don't want orphans in my game! They make me sad. Besides, in real life, at a certain point women can't have children anymore, so I want my game to be the same.

Days to Run Checks: By default, MCCC will go through this process of marrying and knocking up sims 3 nights a week at midnight, but you can change that to whatever you like here. I thought 3 nights a week was WAY too often, so I only have it run once a week on Fridays.

Pregnancy Percentage: Just because the check runs every week doesn't mean I want someone getting pregnant every week. I'm not trying to create a baby boom. I cut the pregnancy percentage for young adults by half and adults by 75% (since IRL it's harder to get pregnant the older you get). I'm not afraid of a teen pregnancy story, so I do have teen pregnancies on and reduced their percentage by 85%. Even though I wouldn't mind telling that story, I don't want a teen pregnancy epidemic lol. I've had this enabled, but I've yet to have MCCC knock up a teen.

I think I skipped over Marriage Percentage but I use the same logic and similar percentages there too.

Valid Target Ages: HA! I see why I've never had a teen pregnancy lol. Even though I have it on, I never marked it as a valid target age. For whatever reason I only have YA selected. Not sure why. Probably for the best. If a teen pregnancy happens, I'd prefer it be my own sims.

Bonus

I love a little risk and challenge and surprise in my game. This is why I love using lumpinou's mods. I not a micromanager and prefer some things be left to chance. I like being able to try for a baby and it maybe not work that time. I don't like how predictable the game is. So, if you're feeling froggy, here are a few more settings for ya!

MC Woohoo - Woohoo Pregnancy

Risky Woohoo Percent: I used to have YA on 3%, but lumpinou has intergrated her mod with MCCC more, so I don't have this enabled anymore here. (it's controlled by her mod now and I think it's at 5% now). 3% might sound low, but MAN I've had so many oopsie babies on that little 3% lol.

Try for Baby Percent: I lowered mine to 65% just to add some variety and give my sims something to work toward. (No, this is not what caused Luca and Sophia's problem LOL).

MCCC Settings - Relationship Settings

I'm highlighting this because, even though I placed it in the bonus section, I highly recommend you check this out. These are the settings that control if/when sims move in together or break up!

Auto-Relationship Settings

Breakup Settings: You can specify which sim will move out and who the children will live with. Couple relationship change percentage applies a modifier that will make a couple's relationship (dating, not married) increase or decrease over time. I increased mine to 20%. Same thing with spouse relationship change except I only did 10% there.

Move-in Settings: I allow homeless romance move in and kept the romance level to the default. (sweethearts) I also increased the romance move-in percent to 25%.

Bypass Played Household: It should go without saying, but just in case it's not clear, I always want my playable households bypassed because I want to maintain control over what happens to them. About this, I have other households that I don't actually play (in the Pierson save) that I have as playable just to preserve them and prevent anything from happening. So to be clear, unless a household is marked as played, they will be subjected to the random marriages, pregnancies, and relationships.

A few months ago, I FINALLY decided to mark Emmy and Ali as unplayed, hoping that Ali would find love again and that Emmy and Dwayne would move in together. Instead, Alessia got knocked up, and Dwayne put his foot down LOL. Sorry dude. Wish I could help! Well, I could just move her in, but it actually doesn't feel right for the story...but that's an entirely different conversation lol.

Anyhoo...I hope you found something in this novel that helps to spice up your game! Thanks for asking!

[batnbreakfast]

Okay I'm so curious because I see you posting about it all the time but I never know what is *actually* going on.

What does the zoom booze no doom thing entail? What are the rules? What is the origin story? Can anyone join?

I love when newer mutuals finally ask about Zoom. 😄

So my main and OTP fandom is Berena - Bernie Wolfe & Serena Campbell in the great *giggles* British hospital soap series Holby City.

Zoom, Booze, no Doom was born as an idea to actually watch Berena scenes together. At the end of 2019 this started as a bit of idle talk about how to actually do this, but you know : time zones, private lives, and so on…

Until, at the start of 2020, we suddenly all had nothing much more to do, but sit at home, watch tv, and worry about Covid.

So in April 2020 a weekly Berena Zoom rewatch started, hosted by a fandom friend. Everyone was welcome to join in. We skipped the doom scenes, which is how the name of our Zoom was born, because there was enough doom for everyone in real life, and finished our rewatch around the end of June, if I remember correctly.

The Zoom was fun! It was great to meet fandom friends at least virtually. It was a space to talk and vent and scream about our beloved on our screens. For me, it was something solid in uncertain times.

After we finished the rewatch, I didn’t want to stop zooming, so I took over as the host. We watched all kinds of media with our favs. The good, the mediocre, and the very, very bad things. We branched out. We had Halloween Zooms and Christmas Zooms. Bat’s belated birthday Zoom. Anniversary Zooms. ESC Zooms and live watch Zooms when Doctor Who or Silent Witness aired.

Covid restrictions became less and less, real life took over more space again, I started working and travelling again, but we’re still meeting up whenever I’m home (and not sick *sighs*).

We chat about our lives - there’s definitely more to tell nowadays - then we watch something together, then we chat some more, and at some point I kick everyone out of the Zoom because I’m getting tired. 😄

Some of us have been doing this since the very first Zoom. Some left, some joined in. Some take part whenever their busy life allows. A lot of us met in real life by now. We’re friends. Some of us went to the theatre together as a group from all over the world. While we all seem to suffer from severe writer’s block somehow these days, while Holby City has stopped airing for quite a while, we still hold on to our tiny, close knitted fandom corner. I feel like the Zoom changed our approach towards our fandom quite a bit.

I wouldn’t have thought that we’d make our first anniversary, but now it seems like we might reach our fifth? Five years, huh. Amazing. I love everyone taking part in this and I’m deeply grateful for the friendships grown from the Zoom.

I’ll stop being soppy now.

The rules are quite simple: Be kind. Bring joy. An interest in whatever we’re watching. A love for Berena and their actresses is a good thing.

If someone joins in for the first time, it’s nice if they chose a Zoom name that’s connected to their Tumblr, so we know who they are. Letting me know in advance is appreciated, because I tend to get anxiety if a new name pops up unexpectedly. 😌

Hope this answers your questions!

PS: I tend to avoid Zoom posts breaking containment these days (my nightmare was a containment break for a Doctor Who live watch 😂 - there’s only so many people I can host), so reblogs are off on this one.

[evilwickedme]

hey it’s me from the Batman posts! (the one that left the tags abt wanting to get into Batman but having no clue where to start)

If its not too much trouble, I’d love any advice on where to start with Batman or Batfam(?) stuff, I saw someone suggest reading the Batman: Wayne Family Adventures thing on webtoon as an intro to the characters so I’ve been doing that, but I’ve got no clue about any of the official comics or shows/movies/etc. I’ve never read a comic series before so everything is super new to me.

I know different series(?)/versions(?) can be wildly different bc of different writers and stuff, I definitely trust your taste on what would be good / enjoyable bc the posts you’ve been reblogging are like 90% of whats gotten me interested in the first place

Thank you, and absolutely no rush!!

Hey I am legit SO happy that you sent me this ask this is literally my favorite thing to do!!!!

So to start with I do actually agree that wfa is a good starting point but for a different reason than I feel most people would recommend it. The thing about wfa is that it has a consistent design for every character, is humorous, touches not only on the main batfamily members but also many extended members, other noteworthy people in Gotham, and the batfamily's cast of friends and teammates as well. This means that while its approach to characterization is incredibly fanon-y, it's a good basis for how to continue. You read wfa, and you know that Dick is the first robin, wears ridiculous costumes, was batman for a bit, is nightwing, part of the teen titans... this isn't a lot, but it's just enough to orient yourself before jumping into some of the most convoluted art ever created, aka the comic world.

Another tip I'm gonna give you is to let yourself be confused. I think the people who end up sticking with comics are people who are aware that if they pick up a comic it's very likely the writers and artists have read and worked on comics that you haven't read yet or even heard of, so you're always going to be missing something. That's fine. If something is really important to the plot, it gets explained; if it's not, it's windowdressing. Often there'll be little boxes saying what comic and issue they're referencing, so if you find it interesting you can just go read it - otherwise, if it's not there, you can google it, or go to any comic fan and ask "hey do you know what this is about?" and if they know, they will answer. There is nothing a comic fan wants more than to explain how to get into their favorite character/s, trust me.

Anyway this has been a very wordy intro but here are some potential starting points for the batfamily!

Bruce Wayne

You know who he is. Pick up an issue of Batman or Detective Comics and he's there. Pick up an issue of any other DC comic and there's like a 30% chance he's there too.

Batman: The Long Halloween

Noir style, investigative, early in batman's career, two face's origin story

It has a sequel-ish story called Batman: Dark Victory that's almost as good

Batman: Hush

Batman: Year One

Frankly there's not going to be much information in this comic you don't already know, but also, it's a classic, so might as well

Batman: A Death in the Family & Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying (crossover with the new teen titans)

First story is Jason's death, second is Tim's introduction and arguably the start of the batfamily being a family

Tim drags Dick back into the fray in ALPOD. It's just sort of the kind of thing he does

Do NOT confuse A Death in the Family with Death OF the Family, which is a much newer story, and Not Good

Batman: Under the Red Hood

Jason's villain arc! More details below

Batman himself isn't actually my favorite but you know he's got some decent stuff since he's, uh, the main character. DC doesn't have a multiverse the way Marvel does - and getting into that would be a whole separate ask - but their elseworlds are stories about the characters in different situations. Some ones I've heard good things about include Gotham by Gaslight, Dark Knights of Steel, Batman: Last Knight on Earth, and I keep meaning to get into Batman: White Knight, which is a whole other universe on its own. I've been trying to get into more modern batman stuff and unfortunately I just haven't clicked with anything.

Dick Grayson

Guy has been in a lot of things. If you read a random Batman comics from before 1980, there's a good chance he'll be there.

Teen Titans and The New Teen Titans and Titans (1980s-2000s)

I haven't read enough of these to say much of anything, but he's a founding member of the TT

Nightwing

His post-Robin superhero identity. At first only present in NTT and occasional Batman comics, but eventually he gets his own miniseries in the early 90s, followed by an ongoing. Recently-ish started reading them and they're angsty and very 90s in a lot of ways but I'm enjoying it

Modern Nightwing titles also exist. For sure.

Batman & Robin by Morrison

In one of DC's ten million crises, Bruce "dies", and after a short story called Battle for the Cowl, Dick ends up becoming Batman. Damian is his Robin. It's an interesting time for batman comics, although not necessarily the best writing that Dick has ever gotten.

Batman: The Dark Mirror

Also a great story for the Gordons. Bruce is back from the dead, but Dick is still Batman in Gotham. This was my first even Batman comic and it's really good.

Obviously there's other stories, such as Grayson, where he becomes a super spy for a bit. There's a million and a half reading lists for Dick out there as he's a massively popular character and he's one of the characters DC is pushing the most right now. As with all the rest of these, these are good entry points; from there I trust you to find your way

Barbara Gordon

The original Batgirl, sort of (nobody really brings up bette kane unless they're pointing out that babs wasn't the original Batgirl, she's just not important). She appears sporadically in silver and bronze age batman comics and detective comics, but she quits being Batgirl shortly before being raped and shot in the spine by the joker in Batman: the Killing Joke, which I purposefully did not put on my rec list.

Birds of Prey

Babs-as-Oracle at her best.

Batman: The Dark Mirror

Babs' long lost brother comes back to town. It's fucked up.

I've been reliably told to stay away from her Batgirl runs - most people who are a fan of the character don't like that they retconned Oracle away and it's mostly not very well written. There's a comic called batgirls that lasted about a year that included her, and it's okay.

Jason Todd (my beloved)

MY MAN

Batman: Second Chances

Collected edition of Jason as Robin, so much fun. Extremely silly at times since it's the 80s.

Batman: A Death in the Family

For obvious reasons.

Then he's just sort of dead for 17 years. He shows up in heaven in a Green Arrow issue and is occasionally brought up or shown as a hallucination, but that's about it.

Batman: Under the Red Hood

There's a new crime lord in town and he's so smart and talented and hot omg I wonder who he is!!!!

The collected edition also comes with the annual that reveals how he came back to life

Task Force Z

This shouldn't be as good as it is.

Jason gets recruited to work with a team of undead villains

Jason gets called a hot a bunch of times, and is shirtless a lot. This doesn't matter but you know, like, yeah it does.

For Robin!Jason there's also Batman: The Cult - which I finally got my hands on recently but haven't read yet. For Red Hood!Jason there's lots of stuff, but most of it isn't very good or is actively bad. Most people will tell you to stay away from Red Hood and the Outlaws, and they're right, although the 2016 run is better. Most people will tell you to read Batman & Red Hood: Cheer, and they're wrong, it's ass.

Tim Drake

Frankly this boy has no flops. Or very close to it.

Batman: A Lonely Place of Dying

Tim figured out who Batman and Robin are at AGE NINE. Respect.

After this he appears in various Batman and detective comics issues, I haven't read any of these.

Robin

The first Robin to get his own ongoing! Like with Nightwing, it started with a miniseries (a few of them, actually) and got turned into a long running series from there. Lasted like 200 issues, too.

Tim FUCKS.

Not Steph's first appearance, but most of her appearances pre-2009 are in this series.

Young Justice 1998

It's insane in all the best ways. Cars have sex on panel. They play baseball to save the world on an alien planet. A power of friendship speech prevents the end of the world. In the first issue, a woman develops breasts so big she falls on her face.

This team eventually breaks apart and Tim along with 3 other teen heroes nicknamed the core four (Superboy, Impulse, & Wonder Girl II) become part of Teen Titans 2003, which I haven't read and is also a bit of a flop era fashion wise for everyone anyway. I do have the volume of TT03 where they meet the versions of themselves from the future and I plan on reading that soon-ish.

In the mid 2000s basically everyone Tim loves dies. Steph died in 2004 ish after a very short stint as Robin. Tim's mom dies, then his dad is murdered, and it's unclear what happened to his step mom, but she was in Bludhaven, which had an atomic bomb dropped on it. Impulse becomes kid flash becomes the flash becomes murdered, and superboy gets killed while saving the world. Steph does turn out to not be dead after all and Impulse and Superboy come back from the dead eventually but by God he's having a tough year BEFORE Bruce "dies".

Red Robin 2009

After Bruce "dies" and Dick becomes Batman, Dick makes Damian his Robin and nobody believes Tim that Bruce is still alive, so he steals the Red Robin costume and goes on a mission to save his dad!

Not a comic to read first because it's so uncharacteristic of Tim as a person, but definitely something to read as soon as possible, because it's ridiculously good.

After flashpoint/n52 Tim doesn't have his own ongoing for a while, but he does come out as bisexual in an early issue of Batman Urban Legends (2021) and he got his own ongoing called Tim Drake: Robin in 2022 which was ugly AF and yet cancelled far too soon. There's a Young Justice run from 2019 I haven't read yet.

Stephanie Brown

For her I would go to Google, bc I haven't gone down the rabbithole enough for her yet. I know her first appearance was in a batman comic where she became spoiler to spoil her dad's plans - her dad being a third rate villain called the cluemaster - and she almost kills him, so good for her. Afterwards she appears every once in a while in various comics, most notably in Robin, where she and Tim as Robin start dating despite him knowing her identity but not the other way around.

Robin 60s (I don't remember the exact issues)

Steph gives birth and gives her baby up for adoption

Robin 126-128

Steph becomes Robin when Tim quits for his still-alive-but-not-for-long dad.

War Games

Steph does a fucky wucky and accidentally starts a gang war which gets her killed

There's another Robin arc where she comes back and it turns out she was never dead, Leslie (the family doctor) simply faked her death and sent her to Africa to recover

Batgirl 2009

Her first and only solo ongoing, but it's really good

She also appears a lot in Cass's Batgirl ongoings, and occasionally shows up in yj98. Her most recent series in Batgirls, which isn't very good but her interactions with Cass are very gay, and we've all been shipping it for 20 years at this point, so frankly it's long overdue. Unlikely to become canon tho, unfortunately.

Cassandra Cain

She doesn't use a lot of words, so neither will I. Probably.

No Man's Land

Frankly I am terrified to read this, it's so many goddamn issues, but this is her first appearance. I have one "volume" and it's as big as the fucking Bible.

Batgirl 2000

She's the first Batgirl to get an ongoing. The one from 2008 I've been reliably told isn't very good. She's absolutely terrifying in the 2000 one, I approve.

Outsiders 2016

Supposed to also be good for Duke content. I think at this point she's going by Orphan? Idk she's had a lot of names.

Idk I prefer Black Bat

Spirit World

Mini series that recently ended. Soooooo good. Alyssa Wong is a top contender for favorite modern writer.

She's mostly a background character. Bc DC is both sexist AND racist. She was also in batgirls.

Damian Wayne

Frankly he's my least favorite of the batkids, but that's not his fault, he's been a victim of a lot of really racist writing.

Batman: Son of the Demon

Somehow both his origin AND an elseworlds that doesn't count. Not required reading, but Bruce and Talia are madly in love in this.

Batman by Grant Morrison

After UTRH and before Dick was forced to become Batman Morrison reintroduced Talia's son, who in this version was a rape baby bc apparently brutalia weren't in love and Talia drugged Bruce. Fucking fine, I guess.

His character growth during his time as robin is sweet tho.

Robin 2021

His only solo ongoing, pretty good

Super Sons

He had two team up comics with then fellow child Jon Kent, son of superman, and it was fucking adorable. Then they aged up Jon to 17, so they're still friends, but Jon has his own shit going on.

Duke Thomas

He's REALLY new, and I haven't read any of it, I'm sorry.

Robin War

Batman and the Signal - I finally got my hands on the first issue of this last week!

The Outsiders 2016

Frankly they should capitalize on the Duke & Cass friendship/siblingship more often.

Alfred Pennyworth

I haven't read it, but there's a series called Pennyworth about his days as a spy for the crown. Supposed to be pretty good.

Kate Kane

The Jewish lesbian batwoman of our dreams

Batwoman: Elegy

Her introduction

Also, it's written by Greg Rucka, and if he can do one thing, it's write sapphic women. I'm not even joking.

Get the newer edition that has both of her original Rucka stories

Batwoman ongoings

She's had a couple, they're both supposed to be pretty solid, I've only read a few issues here and there

Batman in other media

Animated: I'm currently watching Batman the Animated Series for the first time and it seems to really get Bruce as a character, even if Robin will be there one episode and his existence will be a plot hole in the next. The Justice League animated series has also been fun so far. Teen Titans have gotten a number of animated adaptations all of which have pretty strong followings. There's an animated show called "Young Justice" which is a Teen Titans show and I refuse to watch it (it has a very devout following, but all that means is that the Young Justice - All Media Types tag on ao3 is just the same as Young Justice Cartoon and I have to filter heavily when looking for yj98 fics). Lego Batman is a REALLY fun film, and I think it turned into a whole franchise.

Live action TV: I have watched the first season of both Titans and Gotham, but both of those were before I was into the batfamily as a concept. My impression of Titans is overall negative and my impression of Gotham is overall positive.

Live action movies: There are so many Goddamn Batman movies. I like the Dark Knight Trilogy, but even calling it "based on" the Dark Knight comic trilogy is giving it a lil more credit than it deserves. The Batman 2022 is massively popular with the comic fandom for a reason - I'm not a big fan of it, but I did enjoy laughing at the movie so at least there's that. Batfleck sucks. I haven't seen anything else, up to and including the Joker movie. Oh, and Birds of Prey was really good, but that's not Cass.

Video games: The Arkham trilogy is well loved and I have indeed just bought it, but I haven't gotten to it because I'm currently working on Gotham Knights and uh. Okay so listen. This game is a lot of fun and I will be finishing it. But it's like. Got a massively antisemitic plot point. I can't even say I don't recommend it, I'm genuinely enjoying the game a lot. But I've never seen anybody bring this up, and it's bugging me.

ANYWAY I'm sure I've missed a LOT but this is introductory so you know I'm giving myself grace. There's characters I completely skipped and I'm sure mega fans of characters I haven't read much of will be offended that I said such and such about them but you know it's only been about a year and a half since I started reading dc comics and I'm still figuring it all out. And I probably will still be figuring it out for the next decade. To me that's actually part of the fun of it.