#gutwrenching content. my bad!!!

[chaosblast]

something to remember you by. a memorial, of sorts

[marymekpop]

I must have liked him. I must have liked him a lot, Yeong-ju.

[anotheruntitledsong]

i did like the hidden palace but (SPOILER if anyone hasn't read it?) i'm genuinely so annoyed at how Arbeely is handled like... I wish i could be sad but i'm just fucking irritated. I was overly invested in him and that's def why but i just feel like they did him dirty

[nixii-sabre]

chat ive got the brainrot BAD. i've attempted to kiss a bracken in game. i think nutcrackers are actually very huggable (MISTAKE). and ohh ohhhhh oh my godddd oh my goddd mIMICS I LOVE MIMICS THERES SO MUCH. SO MUCH POTENTIAL. I . AHJSUXJKKKJJH!!!!!

THE ANGST THE TWISTEDNESS OF IT THE CONCEPTS THE IDEAS GOOOHOHOOOD

I LEGIT HAVE BEEN READING FOUR OF THEM SERIES ON AO3. WHICH YOU SHOULD ABSOLUTELY READ ITS SO GOOD ITS SO GOOD!!!!

I LOVED MIMIC'S BEFORE. BUT NOW I JUST LIKE THEM EVEN MORE AFTER READING THIS. AAAAAAAAAAA TJE BRAINROT IS REAAAAL!!!

Ngl., Ngl it makes me want to talk about chiri some more. I literally made that stupid guy on a whim and now they've progressively integrated themself into The Brainrot(tm).

I'll probably never make too much lore on Quinnley. Cheerio's the star anyhow <3

oKAY BACKING UP FROM THE OC RAMBLE. I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOOOOVE THIS SERIES. IN FANFICTION ESPECIALLY ON AO3 I USUALLY EXPECT A LOT OF GRAMMAR MISTAKES (which I make. often. but they annoy me when i find decent content and sometimes can't understand it). BUT THIS ONE HAD NONE. NONE. NOT A SINGLE ONE. NOT A SINGLE ONE! AND IT WAS SO VERY DESCRIPTIVE GOD GODGOD I LOVE DESCRIPTIONS SOSOMUCH

I think mimics need more love. yeah. In general. GIVE THOSE PSYCHOTIC MASKED BOIOS SOME HUGS AND AFFECTION. YEAAAHHHH WE NEED MORE MASKED UP IN THIS FANDOM!

SCREAMINGCRYINGFALLINGAPARTBEINGTORNTOBITS ITS ALMOST THREEEE IN THE MORNING CHAT!!! THREEEEE! IVE BEEN READING FOR THREE HOUURSS!!! THE FACT THAT IT HAS SO MUCH PACKED INTO SINGULAR/TWOPARTER CHAPTERS IS INSANE. ITS SO GOOD. IT'S SO FREAKING GOOD. I CANNOT EXAGGERATE THIS ENOUGH.

IT'S SO GUTWRENCHING BECAUSE IT'S SO ENDEARING ANDF AJIKXZKLSKSZDCXWCZZ okay im gonna go paass out...

AND THINK ABOUR MIMICS WHILE IM AT IT! AHAJUISJXKE!!!!

[the5n00k]

Small vent about my art, especially my writing, scroll past if you want, I just need to get this out

Being a creator for a fandom starved of content is hard sometimes. Being a creator known and loved for one thing you do is harder. Especially when people completely miss the point of it.

I don't create heartbreaking scenarios and gutwrenching experiences because I want the reaction or I want to torture the characters (as much as I joke about it) I do it to explore character dynamics, hypotheticals, and psychology in a way I don't get to see in canon

Part of the reason I made Long Time Friends was to explore the concept of the Butterfly Effect the two main characters had on each other in the very early episodes, not so I could emotionally grind Molly into a fine paste for my own amusement and the pain of others. It's just... Whenever someone pegs me as the person who makes a ton of angst, they aren't wrong but I have more light-hearted projects too. A good portion of my comics/multiple part drawings are very silly but people only remember me for one thing.

For a while I was into it! I'd made a name for myself in the community! But now I'm starting to despise my reputation and even the word "angst" itself in general (although I don't think this particular feeling is the only thing contributing to that sentiment) and... I honestly get really worried when people get shocked when I draw the line at a sad concept

Like FUCK no I'm not going to strip a character of one of his only comforts and ties to his past by associating it with a bad memory, FUCK no I'm not going to mortally wound my protagonist because I think it'll make you cry harder, it needs to ADD SOMETHING to the narrative. If it just keeps layering sad upon sad upon sad, you just get a depressing cake with "ow the edge" written on the top in tear flavored icing

Confusing metaphors aside, life is full of DEVASTATING setbacks, challenges, and hardships. It is full of pain and suffering of yourself and others, sometimes at your own hand. But it's also full of joy and healing. Kindness and understanding. Forgiveness and teamwork. That's why my fics always end on a high note. That's why I say no to certain ideas thrown at me for my aus because they're too dark. If there's no hope or growth in my stories...

Then what's the point?

[dragonfly0808]

holy shit, I’m not from the USA and like, I know that things are getting all kinds of fucked up over there but this is a whole other level (like I’m actually planning on reading a bunch of books that they’re trying to/have already banned just as a big fuck you, How to Kill a Mockingbird is the first since I have my mom’s copy but have never read it)

I cannot believe the amount of insanity that is going on over there when it comes to banning and censorship its just insane and I feel so bad that this is happening

Like Mexico is supposedly ‘less progressive/less’ in the eyes of a lot of USA people especially older folks but I cannot imagine smth like this happening here, like i cannot imagine worrying about going to school on a daily basis and now that they’re banning books it’s giving very concerning vibes, reminds me of a certain horrible group of people that burned a lot of books (a lot of which were from queer authors/queer stories) and we lost so much history and so many stories to censorship already that I just… as someone who first read about a queer couple when I was fucking 7 years old I can’t understand how people think that this shit is protecting people. At seven I was like, ‘oh, two guys are kissing. Neat…. Oh, this is pretty cute!’ And that was fucking it

Like- I just can’t even put myself in their minds even for a split second I just cannot understand banning books like this with not giving a single fuck about children that need to form their own opinions and that books are so important in helping kids look at the world from different points of view.

I remember being 6 reading The Red Pyramid by Rick Riordan and not understanding why one of the main characters, Carter Kane spoke about having to be cautious of cops from the moment he lost his baby fat and being like… but why? cause I didn’t understand racism and bias and that helped me gain a new perspective at just 6 years old I may not have fully understood it but over the years tidbits of reading so many books from people that are nothing like me has helped me with the way I see the world and I can’t just- I hate this. I hate this so fucking much.

I can’t imagine not getting to read books from queer authors and about queer/black stories not just because of many beautiful love stories that would be taken away but just, stories in general that are so precious even if they sometimes deal with heavy subjects, heavy subjects are a part of life and a part of the world and I do not understand wanting to limit the view someone has of the world in this way

I feel like I’m witnessing the start of a fucking dystopian society. I realize that might sound like an exageration but, I think most people who have been readers from a young age can agree that this is just so insane, like… banning books for having a few queer characters because ‘OH THE CHILDREN’ no. Fuck you. You don’t and have never cared about the children.

I know I rarely get personal or ‘political’ on my blog but this is smth that is just outrageous and so wrong to me and truly just breaks my heart. I’m in my room, surrounded by books. I have 2 bookshelves (3 technically) about 400 books in my room not counting hundreds of books that I have given away or donated or sold to make room and to think that at least 50 of these would probably be banned in the USA is just so gutwrenching to me.

And then to know that they would likely target sites like AO3, specifically because they often involve many queer stories/couples is just… ugh…

I don’t know if this is fully true but the idea that sites could be sued for HAVING QUEER CONTENT is just fucking insane

I’ve been reading a few classics lately. And to think that even those might not be safe from these idiotic acts is just… wow.

We have so much to learn from stories and books. Or even if you just read for fun there is still so much there. Stories help people, stories have helped me my whole life. This should be criminal

I am so tired…

We all know about the DDOS attacks on AO3 as it is still down. So it is very important we talk about the KOSA(Kids Online Safety Act) that is going to hit the floor soon. Because if that act goes through this could very much be the new reality of not only AO3 but online fandom spaces within the next year. The point of this act is to limit queer media and to eliminate online queer spaces.

Let me stress, the politicians are lying to you. Democrats and Republicans are lobbying for this. It is not pro trans rights and it is not pro lgbtq rights. This is very reminiscent of the Restrict Act! Politicians can SUE websites for having QEEER CONTENT. This act will not protect kids, it will further separate and marginalize the queer community!

If this bill goes through AO3, Wattpad, TikTok, Tumblr, and Twitter will be limited and fanfiction websites could be wiped out all together. If you are apart of fandom spaces pay attention and ACT! Call and email your senators! AND SIGN THE BELOW PETITIONS!

Reblog this! Send the links to people who aren’t on Tumblr! If you care about fandom, fandom spaces, your ships, your blorbos, fanfiction writers’ works, freedom to create, etc. Spread this!

If you aren’t American you can still sign/send some of these!

[thevampireslestat]

annnnnnd I finished the vampire lestat, and I loved it!!! here's some of my (not spoiler free) notes about the book:

☆ dionysius in san fran, the vampire armand and on the devil's road from paris to cairo are my favourite chapters

☆ personally.....I think gabrielle and lestat's relationship could do without the weird oedipus-ian vibe and yknow, just have them be normal vampire mother and son but idk maybe anne was feeling quirky 🤪🤪 when she wrote this book

☆ armand my sweet, traumatised vamp, I also loved how gabrielle and lestat were in essence saying be gay make art towards the end of the vampire armand chapter, and trying to encourage him to be his own person and separate himself from his old ways and embrace new possibilities, relationships and to exist and live for HIMSELF (in the end he's like.....fine ok)

☆ louis and lestat reunion 😭😭 not as gutwrenching as the show but it was still really sweet, they seemed to be on really good terms (even louis going to his show!!! before they were ambushed by vexed vampires but HE WENT TO HIS SHOW)

☆ marius: please do not share any of the secrets I have told you about, about my life, about akasha and enkil, about the Keltoi, nuffin

lestat: ok yeah sure

lestat in 1984: I am the vampire lest-

☆ poor nicki man....I feel bad for him, and I've seen a lot of ppl say that lestat's hesitation to turn claudia is because he's experienced having someone dear in his life who should not have become a vampire become one and end up becoming so mentally unwell and unstable and how that deeply affected lestat, and I didn't understand the severity of it until I read the book and oh man

☆ magnus is fucking weird, man.....he's just a strange halloween decoration looking guy who decided after traumatising lestat to become a human s'more

☆ also I love akasha she's so cunty muwah

☆ a final note bc I can't remember much else, I feel so so so bad for lestat at the beginning and yet so happy for him: his entire life before vampirism he was forbidden by his family to pursue anything that he loved, from the monastery to the theatre troupe; he wanted his life to mean more than just what he was born into and what he had to be and from the moment he left to go to Paris his life changed for both the worst and the better and over a century later he's on stage performing and doing something he not only loves but chose for himself without being reprimanded or punished for what was considered his only real "sin" in the early years of his life - being content and happy in the path of his own choosing

and now onto queen of the damned yeehawww

[alrightberries]

tell me a secret was gutwrenching in the best way possible. i'm so excited to see if you'll write more from that universe, it's such a beautiful, heart aching story.

confessions (unsaid)

PAIRING: nanami kento x kumiho!reader

SUMMARY: there are words that are said, and words that are unsaid.

TAGS & WARNINGS: smoking, nudity, implied nsfw.

a/n: continuation of this universe

there's something oddly familiar about the way nanami looks tonight; about the way he pants above you, catching his breath and brushing the hair away from your face before holding his warm palm against your cheek.

there's sweat on his forehead and you know you're no different after a filling night of sex, and nanami's eyes briefly glance at your lips before he leans in, only to stop himself as soon as he'd began.

your heart cracks the slightest, but you understood

he couldn't.

he wouldn't.

and neither could you.

so his eyes leave yours and so does the palm on your cheek, wordlessly lifting himself up to sit on the edge of the bed.

"we should stop this," is what he says, back turned to you. "whatever... this is."

but his words don't register in your mind— you don't want them to register in your mind— as you sat up, crawling over to where he was sat to wrap your arms around his bare torso and press your chest into his back.

against his better judgement, nanami sighs in content when he feels two hands find their way to the middle of his chest. he leans into you.

"your heart's racing," you whisper, hiding into the crook of his neck, lips leaving a small kiss on his shoulder. "why?"

he gives your hand a firm squeeze before gently taking it in his own, pushing your palm to lie flat against your chest, where your heart should be.

you don't feel anything beneath your fingertips— not a murmur, not a peep of what was supposed to be a familiar, beating rhythm.

there's nothing there. nothing at all.

"because this is wrong. we're wrong." he sighs. "your heart belongs to gojo."

a small, irritated grunt escapes your lips before you wretch your hand out of his grip. you find his work shirt discarded on the floor, putting it on as you got up.

he was right— you knew he was right— and yet, he couldn't be more wrong.

"my heart is with gojo," you grit, finishing up the last button on his shirt. "but it belongs to you."

nanami's eyes follow you as you flitter to the window, pushing the glass open before— ah, of course— fishing in his pockets to grab the new obnoxiously pink lighter gojo gifted him again when he learnt about his first one finishing.

and nanami can't even say he's surprised when he sees you reach out to the windowsill where he keeps an ashtray and an extra box of cigarettes. stress smoking was a bad habit of yours.

so he sighs, pushes his hair back before making his way next to you, not even bothering with boxers.

"those things could kill you, you know." but he takes the cigarette you offer anyway.

"good." is all you say, and nanami doesn't bother dignifying that with a response.

yet, despite all his protesting of how you should stop your... meetings, he couldn't bring himself to push you away when you lean back into him, blowing out a puff of smoke.

"so, same time next week?" you smile at him, eyes gleaming.

those eyes. oh, how nanami adores those beautiful, mischievous eyes. and seeing you here, bathed in a halo of moonlight, asking to see him again next week, wearing his shirt, in his arms...

nanami doesn't say it out loud, but he knew.

his heart belonged to you.

"you're more trouble than you're worth," he murmurs, but he takes a deep breath anyway, lets it fill his lungs before he sighs. "i'll see you next friday after work."

lips meet your forehead. "the garden as usual?"

he hums. "the garden as usual."

nanami knew he could never deny you anything.

he was a slave to his heart just like you.

[frenchiefitzhere]

Five Things You Never Get Tired of Writing — Songs Edition

I did this one as a general "5 things I Never Get Tired of Writing" post already, but @autisticempathydaemon tagged me for songs specifically and I thought that was kinda cool so...

1. Fun Stuff for Villains

Because I love me some juxtaposition. And I was raised on Disney and the Muppets and sometimes a bad guy just needs a song.  Villain Song Count: 21

A select sampling:

Moore than the Average Mortal Man

Welcome to Wonderworld  (Adam)

The House Always Wins (Imperium Sofia)

2. Quick Turnover for a Whole-Ass Gutwrencher

a.k.a. Erik works hard but Frenchie’s always on his heels. (j kidding)

It’s just that, like many fic writers, I get seized by the urge to write the thing as soon as I’m inspired. So a few of my favorites have actually been things I finished within hours of the Redacted content that inspired it. 

Lighter than Air

Hey Buddy

Hoodie Song

End of the Earth (Hey Buddy Imperium Reprise)

3. Lullabies

My first song was a lullaby. Jess was the initial inspiration. It's a fun little genre, and it's sometimes my favorite thing to do a lullaby when it's totally inappropriate for the situation (i.e. here come some more villain songs hehehehehe).

Lullaby Song Count: 12

Sleep Tight (Vega's Lullaby)

A Little Drizzle of Blake Syrup

A Lullaby from the Desk of President Moore

Power Down (Aaron's Lullaby)

4. Cheesy, spur-of-the-moment shit

I sometimes write songs in under 30 minutes, but these don’t always get posted publicly. Often I just share them in a private server and they’re a response to some art or an inside joke.  

One of my very first songs qualifies as this category (although I’d say it’s solid gold). 

Pocket Caelum Suite

Tooth Fairy Song

Hero of the Purge

5. Challenge Pieces

There are a few things that have been a lot of work for me on a composition level and/or production level. These are the ones that may not necessarily be the “favorites” but they’re the ones I’m most proud of because I had to push myself. I don’t have much formal music education (just a lot of experience). And I definitely don’t know wtf I’m doing in GarageBand. So the fact that any of this has been worth posting on the internets is a small miracle. 

Song for a Young Steward

Powerless (**This is the prettiest shit I've ever done.**)

By the Lights

Inversion Rap (Summarize 1 month of content in 6 minutes? Yes I did)

Not pictured: Content that isn’t Redacted fan art. I’m having a hard time getting up the nerve to post the stuff I have on deck I think. 

[pestercide]

HI I hope y'all don't mind me butting in here to say a few things /gen /notneg

I genuinely enjoyed reading these because it kinda gave me a deeper understanding of certain things!! But also allowed me to further understand the fandoms hypocrisy with certain topics (like being fine with one ship over the other).

This also got me thinking about certain other things that I've come up with or other people have come up with relating to shipping discourse in the fandom.

I think discourse is overall kinda stupid and I've grown past caring for it, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy discussing certain things (and that feels kinda silly to say considering this is a topic that's literally about smashing two characters together Barbie doll style to make them kiss pff)

But yeah!! I first kinda started being curious about this after having a conversation with a mutual on Twitter over the shipping discourse in the fandom that was brought on by Holydemon, and a point that I brought up was the ship vs the artist's intention/interpretation with said ship.

Because a lot of the time, it turned out Batmeat was used/interpreted by artists in the fandom that were genuinely problematic and wanted to use it to fetishise abuse and imbalanced power dynamics in relationships. Which I concluded left a bad taste in people's mouths regarding the ship. Not to mention the characters included are both insanely popular and a lot of people are attached to them, so putting a character (Streber) in a relationship with another character (Bob) considering the canonical scenario that happened between them (one severely injuring and traumatising the other) made people uncomfortable.

And I think people don't feel that way about Holydemon, for example, because both characters involved are nowhere near as popular, plus the ship popped up as a joke between the team that later became a ship people began genuinely enjoying. I will say that the moment I saw the Holydemon content from the team I assumed the fandom would be in an uproar the same way they would have been with Batmeat. But,, people were surprisingly calm and even playing along. That's not to say there weren't people who were upset though, because people did see the ship as weird or problematic but not on the same level as Batmeat.

And it was that conclusion that kinda brought me here. That the perceived popularity of the characters and the intentions behind the ships including them is what makes people hate them/uncomfortable with them. I sometimes wonder if Batmeat were treated as a joke ship between the SM team would people still hate it to the degree they do? Or would it get the Holydemon treatment? It's not really something that can be answered because I feel like the bias towards it is too strong so I can't really make a fair and accurate judgement.

Oh, and as an extra sidenote. I remember someone mentioning that Batmeat was likely hated because we know what Bob did to Streber, which was arguably worse than what Gregor did to Moloch. And I was like 'yeah that makes sense!' at least until I saw one of my mutuals pitch the idea of Moloch x Michelle (no hate or shade to said mutual they're chill and I enjoyed the idea they had). We know that Moloch tricked Michelle and killed her in an extremely brutal manner (I mean we saw the blood splattered across the walls of the morgue...) then later impersonated her and her son to try and trick Gregor. And the thing is, people on Twitter were eating up the idea of Moloch x Michelle because of the dynamic that was presented between them (if I remember correctly, it was something along the lines of 'Moloch learning to love because of Michelle, but simultaneously trying to hide the fact he's the reason her son is dead'). I thought people would take that idea poorly, but people ended up loving it (myself included). And now that I know that Moloch not only killed but ate Michelle and Dexter, it just made the situation that happened in the episode all the more gutwrenching. Yet again, people don't really see a ship like Michelle x Moloch as bad or problematic because of the intention behind it and the popularity (or lack of popularity) of the characters.

(Also here's proof of that whole Moloch ate Michelle and Dexter's bodies in case anyone wanted it)

So like,, imagine a scenario where Bob and Streber aren't as popular, and one day a random artist is like 'Bob x Streber but Bob spares Streber because he admires his love for Halloween and his dedication to what he does' (again, this is just a hypothetical situation). Like would Batmeat still get shit or would people think it's a cute concept?

BEFORE I ASK AND BEFORE YOU CONTINUE

PLEASE remember I am asking this question because I want to know Tumblr's consensus on this ship vs the Twitter side of the fandom which is much more vocal about their thoughts.

I am simply asking out of pure curiosity and nothing else. And please don't assume any less of me just because I am curious. I don't want ppl to assume I'm this horrible person or anything qwq

Anyways onto the question:

What are your thoughts on Batmeat (Bob x Streber?)

Feel free to reblog with additional thoughts!!

[breitzbachbea]

End of the Year Review

I guess (?) I was tagged by @kitaychan - Thank you!

1. What fandoms did you create for?

Hetalia.

2. How many works did you make this year? Fics (posted on ao3 or tumblr or wherever), edits, gifsets, moodboards, playlists, fanart, vids, meta?

I don't think my historical musings for Hetalia AUs or Scenarios don't count as meta. Apparently I've added 4 new drabbles to the Drabble Collection, finished the last two drabbles for 'Tis but a scratch, published the last chapter and Epilogue of Italian Affairs, a new chapter for Herz auf Beat on Fanfiktion.de and published 7 One Shots (6 on ao3, 1 on tumblr). I've also wrote another TurGre One Shot and another part for The Amulet that are unpublished as of now.

3. What are you most proud of?

Finishing Italian Affairs and Part 4 of The Amulet (The Amulet is not yet published). I've been working on Italian Affairs since 2015 and to have finished it is a sensation that is quite hard to put into words. I've often been afraid I'd never see the day. It's such an achievement. And Part 4 of The Amulet, a story I've been writing and editing since 2017, was another thing I'd fuck up. But it turned out so incredible and gutwrenching that it really reminds me why I write and why I put so much work into it.

4. Any stats you wanna tell us about?

Between Me and the Goddess (and You) has a bibliography of 5 books :) (No but for real, I can't remember how many words I wrote this year or anything else).

5. What inspired you this year? Any specific works or creators?

I feel so bad answering this question because everyone else linked a bunch of people and their fanfictions (and I was among them), but there was only one fanfiction that truly inspired me. The İstanbul series by sadlygrove touched me deeply for personal reasons and it was so formative for how I approached the climax of The Amulet. It really put into words why this relationship is such a tragedy.

Aside from that, my inspirations were the usual - The world, its history and music. Maggie Kilgour's book "From Communion to Cannibalism. An Anatomy of Metaphors of Incorporation" really opened a third eye in terms of how to analyze and speak about my Like Father Like Son Series. Actually - I won't tag this person but you should check them out - it was @/catilinas cannibalism tag (Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed) that started the entire obsession with cannibalism as both tool for writing and tool for literature analysis. Truly inspiring - and now rereading my stuff is even more interesting, for all the unconscious Incorporation themes I've already included in my works throughout the years.

So yeah, I've used my term paper, which I wrote about the Bath curse tablets, for one drabble and I've read a lot of literature which left its mark on me. As did my trip to Palermo.

However, I do want to thank everyone who read my works this year, because it's still bonkers to me. @needcake (One day I will get around to read more of your stuff and maybe, maybe deliver some more neighbourhood AU), @shithole-state (I know I promised to get back to you on the ancient celts, sometime, my friend, hopefully), @fireandiceland @hetaari @kitaychan @i-declare-the-poland-rule @cunchishai @exi-stencil-ism @chaosintensifies.

I'm probably forgetting someone and I am very sorry for it. But it's so nice to see that people care! I feel almost bad that now I am already turning my back on producing content specifically for the fandom, when everyone welcomed be back in so wonderfully! But it's been great to meet you all and talk to you about certain things, about my writing and see someone else's perspective! If you ever left me a comment, trust me, it was the highlight of my day.

6. What’s a piece you didn’t expect to make? Why?

No Rest For The Wicked, because the the premise for this one was whacky as all hell for my standards (aka it felt super self-indulgent in its character selection) with a paperflimsy plot. But then I felt like going for it anyways, took a gamble ... and hey, other people liked it! And I've had one hell of a blast to write the different character relations in it, I'm very proud of the interactions and the piece actually helped me grow as a writer. (And I got to listen to Shimmy Shimmy by Takagi e Ketra ft. Giusy Ferreri on repeat for hours).

7. What are you excited to work on next year?

I really hope I'll get started on the rewrite of Irish Problems. Priority No. 1 right now is the last chapter of Herz auf Beat, which I also look forward to! As well as Part 5 of The Amulet, which then will also be finished! But man, I've got so many ideas for the rewrite of Irish Problems. I'm so excited to finally tell the story I've wanted to tell for years now. Like Father Like Son has been my life since at least 2014 (I started in 2013), so that's eight years I spent with these kids and their friends (and enemies). I just cannot wait to lay the groundwork for so many more adventures to come, for a complex but fun story with so many more characters. And to talk with people about the rewrite! The blessing of 2021 was that people read my stuff and finally, after years of isolation, I have more than three people with who to talk about my writing! It's quite freeing and thoroughly magical.

Tag some people!

I think everyone and their grandma already got tagged, but hey, if you see this and wanna do it - do it.

[h1ghtechl0wlife]

im trying hard to embrace the "make art/be creative for yourself and not for commodification" but it's so hard, it's just like. so then what's the point. i know it's to like enrich yourself, etc, but it just feels mega pointless if i cant make money off it because drawing never particularly brought me joy or whatever. it was just something i got positive feedback for as a kid so i just. kept doing it. did it for work for a while and that really killed the last spark of pleasure in it. tried other mediums, more realistic painting, quilling, felting, got an embroidery kit, got some simple starter sewing guides, and at the end of the day even if i start off interested and excited partway through the project i just lose interest because what's the point? what am i doing this for?

i had a pretty good handle on felting, made some things i felt were good quality work, had ideas for future projects. got 85% done with the last project and just stopped. stopped working or caring. i occasionally think i should finish it then shrug it off. i got just interested enough to spend a good chunk of money on supplies and specialist tools then went ok, now that i have my craft dragon hoard, all done now :)

i just want to feel happy or content creating something but really all ive ever felt when working on stuff is bored, and thinking about playing a game or something. so idk how or why i started in the first place. ig just to get any positive attention from my parents and teachers. childs latest attempt at attention whoring leads to unstable miserable adult who doesnt know why he ever cared about art yet feels a gutwrenching depression and worthlessness in his inability to create anything.

maybe my moms obsession with me honing my skills faster and younger so she could show my work off and use the awards to prove what a good parent she was to have created a Talented Child^tm made it too tied to my self-worth, so now it feels bad to fuck around with in case i accidentally decimate my self-esteem by not being perfect. all those art classes she sent me to, all the restructuring of my school to put all elective focus on art, and for what 🤷‍♂️ just to make me sadder and crazier?

another day another thing to blame my mom for >:3c victims of child abuse stay winning

[yoggybloggy]

for the hollow knight asks!! quirrel, lemm, elderbug, and the dreamers?

(hollow knight ask meme)

quirrel - what was your favorite thing to discover for the first time?

HMMM. i'm actually kind of bad at remembering stuff like this LOL but i guess one memory that particularly stands out is when i first found and used the tram pass, on the bottom line of trams, and just realising how many areas i had opened up and how much there was to explore was just super exciting to me!!! like the "oh my gosh there are SO many places i can go to" and the game is structured so well that the exploration just feels so rewarding

lemm - favourite piece of lore? favourite theory?

honestly i'm not big on theories that much just because i'm not that smart LOL and like. writing this is basically revealing that im a very indecisive person and i'd go with "something that i do like which comes to mind most at the moment" in lieu of committing to an actual fav lmaooo. preamble aside i do like how the lore about the five great knights are integrated into the story! just like almost everything about hollow knight's writing it's very well integrated and feels natural, you aren't overly informed about it in a unnecessary loredumpy way yet we still very much get the sense of their (past) significance and their characters. very lovely <3

elderbug - do you stop to talk to all the NPCs? who is your favourite?

yeah pretty much! unless i accidentally miss them lol OTL i think i definitely don't always exhaust the dialogue though, i prooobably haven't gotten all of elderbug's dialogue, and i could not be bothered going through zote's precepts myself wheeze. i feel like saying quirrel is my favourite is ngl kind of boring cuz isn't he everyone's blorbo 😭 but it's the truth!!!

the dreamers - who's your favourite dreamer? why?

so like on a base level, i kind of feel neutral about the dreamers tbh? though i certainly do appreciate character exploration (and i do wish there'd be more herrah content around, or maybe i just haven't gone looking hard enough, and maybe there'll be more when silksong comes around with hornet backstory or smth). with that being said, stag beetles and broken legs. that's it that's the post

no just kidding. but for real that fic made me go from "oh yeah, quirrel's a lovable little guy i love his nerdtalking ways and his poignant storyline, probably my fav npc" to my current ultimate blorbo. and by extension, the way that the fic explores its interpretation of monomon and quirrel's relationship... gutwrenching and mindlosing. so by extension, the answer is monomon ... i guess!! she also has some really interesting cut lines though i understand why they were cut. they were saying too much and hollow knight's gotta be how it is <3 applies to the other dreamers too tho

[sortasirius]

“The Trap” and The Confession

Coming to you live from my coffin this evening: this episode ripped me apart in about ten thousand ways and I am grateful for it.

Oh boi oh boi is this L O N G.

Tbh, I’m going to gloss over a lot of the Chuck/Sam/Eileen stuff, let’s get to what we’re all here for: what in the FUCK that Destiel content was.

So, we all spec’ed a lot about the return of Purgatory, I specifically talked about what Purgatory meant for Dean and Cas’ relationship in season 8, and man oh man, Bobo Berens didn’t disappoint.

Let’s kick it off with, once they get inside Purgatory, Dean literally immediately wants to split up, and ngl, I kinda groaned internally, thinking that’s how we get the prayer or whatever, but my mans Cas is having NONE of it.

“Yeah we’ll also improve our odds of getting lost or killed.  Come on.”

And Dean???  Doesn’t even argue??  He’s just like ur right let’s go.  Ok king.

And when they catch that Leviathan, and the way Dean looks at Cas when Cas like force throws him into a tree.....like go adjust ur pants dude lmao.

I just felt, up until that scene, that Dean was teetering on the edge of saying something to Cas, like Cas is clearly still kinda mad and doesn’t want to talk but Dean does, he keeps looking at him and making little jokes and stuff...an idiot in love.

Also hey guys I will not, under any circumstances, accept that my man Benny is dead ok thanks for allowing me this sidenote.

“I know you’re sorry, Cas.  About Bel, about mom-”

“I was talking about Jack.  I already apologized to you, you just refuse to hear it.”

Woof.

“Sorry I brought it up. Maybe if you didn’t just up and leave us-”

“You didn’t give me a choice.  You couldn’t forgive me, and you couldn’t move on. You were too angry.  I left, but you didn’t stop me.”

At this point I believe that my jaw had literally hit the floor.  Because, I want y’all to think, NAME ME a similar scene, post a breakup like Dean and Cas had, that isn’t romantic?  Yeah, I couldn’t think of one either.

So Dean really tried it, huh?  Tried to make Cas’ leaving about Cas and not what Dean did?  Which we’ve seen so many times from him, but finally Cas is pushing back and refusing to accept that, refusing to rollover and just let Dean win the argument, he makes Dean think, makes him think about his anger, why he pushed Cas away.........can we give Berens the Nobel Peace Prize pls?

I do wanna say that Berens and Singer did a masterful job heightening the tension between scenes. Like the bleak future scenes that Sam was watching vs. Purgatory.  A really well done episode all around.

Cas gets taken by the Leviathan, trapped in an angel trap, Dean gets knocked out, and when he comes to he’s alone, the area and the shot almost a direct comparison of the first shot on season 4, when Cas pulled Dean out of hell.

And then there we were, my heart was literally racing, I had to stand up and get as close to my TV as I possibly could, but man, even though they warned us about the confession, good GOD.

Dean’s desperate, he’s breathing too hard, looking everywhere for Cas, screaming his name, and then he just collapses, he just breaks in half:

“Cas?  Cas I hope you can hear me.  That wherever you are, it’s not too late.  I shoulda stopped you.  You’re my best friend, but I just let you go, cause that was easier than admitting I was wrong.  I don’t know why I get so angry. I just know that- I know that it’s always been there, and when things go bad, it comes out.  And I, I can’t stop it.  No matter how bad I want to, I just can’t stop it.  And I, I forgive you, of course I forgive you.  I’m sorry it took me so long- I’m sorry it took me til now to say it.  Cas, I’m so sorry.  Man, I hope you can hear me.  I hope you can hear me.  Okay.”

So uh.  Yeah.

Listen, I know I’m not the only one that thought this, but damn, damn if that wasn’t the most double sided speech ever.  Sure, it’s an apology, he’s sorry that he pushed Cas away, but....what else?

We talk to much about how Dean projects this macho, masculine persona, when we all know he’s a big nerd who loves comic books, bad scary movies, cucumber water, and Taylor Swift.  He isn’t, he’s never been the macho man he so desperately wanted to be, and to me, that prayer wasn’t only an apology for pushing Cas away, it was an apology for not being able to see, until now, what was right in front of his eyes.  That he loses it every time Cas is gone, that he was willing to spend a year in Purgatory looking for Cas the first time, that he would do anything, cross any line, go down any road, for Cas. 

“I’m sorry it took me so long-”

He cuts himself off there, but the unsaid words hang in the air “I’m sorry it took me so long to realize how I feel about you.”

This scene is just so fucking painful, Dean never cries like this, he never loses it like this, but this confession, this declaration to Cas, it drags all of these pent up emotions, all that shit that he feels for Cas that he has tried, for literal years, to tamp down, comes out all at once.

I’ve said for a long time that Dean gets angry and takes things out on Cas because he’s angry about how he feels about Cas, and pushing Cas away is easier than accepting just how deep his feels run for Cas, but he told Sam that he felt “pure” in Purgatory once, and I feel like he almost just....couldn’t lie, if that makes sense.

And, just like every other time in Purgatory, Cas doesn’t show up, and Dean pulls himself together and does what he’s always done in Purgatory: he keeps looking for the angel.

When they find each other, sweet baby Cas curled up by a tree.  That hug, the way that Dean grips Cas like he’s clinging to a liferaft.  Lay me to rest.

“Okay Cas, I need to say something.”

“You don’t have to say it.  I heard your prayer.”

This snippet is so little and awkward and they’re looking at each other like people look at their crushes and I’m just really really really soft okay?

And then, for our grand finale, the Sam/Eileen scene:

“You should stay.”

“I wish I could.  After what happened, I don’t know what’s real anymore.”

(Insert the sweetest goddamn Saileen kiss in the world)

“I know that was real.”

So........lets compare to 15x02:

“I’ll tel you what we do know: nothing about our lives is real.  Everything that we’ve lost, everything that we are is because of Chuck.  So, maybe you can stick your heard back in the sand, maybe you can pretend that we actually had a choice.  I can’t.”

“Dean.  You asked what about all of this is real.  We are.”

Yo.  Are these writers serious?  An absolutely direct damn parallel between Cas/Dean and Eileen/Sam and Sam and Eileen KISS?  Ok guys, I’ll see myself out.

Bobo Berens has been one of my favorite writers for a long time.  He knows how to make an episode flow, make it gutwrenching, funny, scary, romantic, all at the same time.

I answered an ask right after 15x02, when someone asked my why I didn’t want Buckner/Leming to get credit for canon DeanCas, and I stand by what I said: Bobo has always been one of the writers that understand them the best.  He gets what they are: best friends that turned into something more, something so much more that Dean, in my opinion, doesn’t even have to say it out loud for it to be as incredibly obvious as it was.  Berens is one of the people that deserves the credit for where Dean and Cas are today, that we even have to argue about what makes canon canon. 

I spend so much time with this show, with these characters, that sometimes I feel like I need to take a step back and just fucking appreciate that this scene, this incredibly beautiful episode would never, in a million years, have happened without this showrunning team.  Andrew Dabb and Bobo Berens are creating this literally masterful final season.  I mean what I say when I say that each episode is better than the last, because they ARE, and Dean and Cas are right there, at the forefront, every time.

Dean Winchester’s growth into who he is is, in my opinion, one of the greatest character arcs in TV.  He is NOT who he was in season 1, in season 4, in season 10.  He’s grown so much, he’s so much more willing to be himself, to love what he loves openly, and that scene, that heartbroken, tearful confession where ten words said a thousand is even more than I could have ever asked for.

[pranks-zappa]

RANT TIME WEEWOO WEEWOO

If I'm looking for a movie, and its NC-17, then I want the original uncut movie. I wouldn't seek it out if I couldn't handle the material. I'm sick of looking for a movie (Bad Lieutenant in this case, but there's been others) and only finding mangled, chopped up R rated versions.

I think the only NC-17 movie I've been able to find uncut on streaming (legally) is The Cook The Thief His Wife and Her Lover, and I'm glad it wasn't chopped up. It has become one of my favorite films. It's a gorgeous, gutwrenching movie; tough to watch in parts, and I don't recommend it to any of my friends with giving them ample warning about the graphic themes first, but the reward of the beautiful tableau and narrative is worth it.

Idk, everything has become so fucking sanitized, and absolutely there should be content warnings for media so people are warned if there's triggering content. But difficult art should not be relentlessly sanitized and censored for the sake of corporate distribution.

There's stuff that triggering for me in movies like The Cook The Thief His Wife and Her Lover or Bad Lieutenant. I'm very open about being a survivor of SA and it's hard for me to watch. But I'm ready for it going in and I'm good for it. Because, if I thought I couldn't handle it, I would just avoid the movie, or manually skip scenes, I wouldn't ask for chunks of a film to be excised.

And I know it's not individuals or "SJWs" or whatever that are doing this, it's the corporations that own these IPs that doing it, which makes me all the more cynical. I don't need the higher ups of HBO Max or Netflix or whatever deciding whether or not I can handle the full film I'm fucking looking for. I dont need everything in my life Disneyfied and sanitized. By all means, absolutely put a trigger warning before the piece you're showing, let people know what they're in for, but don't touch the piece itself. Jesus god.

[toaarcan]

Sonic X, Sonic Heroes, and IDW, or: How a bad anime from 2004 spoiled a comic from 2019.

Now, I haven’t been following IDW Sonic all that closely. I get regular updates from Nemesis via Discord, and additional info from some of the Tumblrs I follow that are invested in it, but I don’t really have a desire to touch it myself. Here’s why.

There’s a multitude of reasons for this. Starting with the background of Sonic Forces wasn’t really a good place to begin from, and being based on present-day game lore in general was always going to hurt it, mainly because SEGASonic canon is currently a confusing mess of retcons brought on by Iizuka taking the J.K. Rowling approach.

Wait, no, he’s just saying stupid shit that contradicts previous canon, not trying to score woke points and hoping nobody notices the frankly terrible stereotypes and TERF tweets. Iizuka is taking the Greg Farshtey approach.

Added, as anyone that’s had experience with my opinions will tell you, I started falling out of love with Ian Flynn’s writing somewhere around Issue 200, and moved to outright dislike during Mecha Sally, and to make matters worse I started noticing that some of the flaws in the 200-247 era were also present in the 160-199 era, retroactively making those harder to go back to.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: I kept up with Archie for the SatAM cast. SatAM reruns back in 2004 were my Sonic, moreso than anything else, and even now I still have way more attachment to those two seasons of animation than I do to most other aspects of the franchise, warts and all. So Archie providing me with additional content for said characters was a major draw for me. I’d generally put up with a lot just to get myself more SatAM content.

That in itself is a large part of why I fell off the Archie train during Mecha Sally. The entirety of the SatAM cast were removed from the regular lineup, just leaving three SEGA characters with their personalities stunted, even if that didn’t make sense in-universe. But that’s a discussion for another day.

So being written by someone whom I no longer enjoyed the writing of, set in a mess of a canon with a thoroughly shite game as the main basis, without the cast I read the previous comics for gave me little reason to invest in IDW Sonic. It wasn’t for me, I’d just keep reading Transformers and move on.

Then MTMTE/LL ended with a heart-twister and Ex-RID ended with a giant Unicron-shaped fart, and the new comic is dull as fucking dishwater and started by killing off one of my favourites, who was also one of the franchise’s confirmed LGBT characters. So now IDW is getting none of my money. Which is good because I’m broke.

Tangents aside, my lack of interest wasn’t something set in stone. If it turned out that the comic was actually really good, then sure, I’d try it. I was up for being proven wrong. But so far, I haven’t felt compelled by the responses from the internet. If anything I’ve been more turned off.

I could talk about how zombies are really fucking boring. I could talk about how SEGA’s recent confusion over what to do with Amy has combined with Ian’s need to include a Sally-esque character to make IDW Amy into Sally Lite. I could talk about how Ian seemingly fundamentally misunderstood everything that was cool about Neo Metal Sonic and somehow managed to reduce him to a boring Eggman minion in an arc where Eggman was out of action due to amnesia… But I won’t.

Instead I’m going to talk about how the comic has done something that would legitimately make me think twice about picking it up even if the FF were to debut tomorrow.

Yeah, I would pass up a SatAM fix because of this, that’s how much this ticks me off.

Now, I presume that if you’re reading this, you have a favourite Sonic character. And you probably feel pretty strongly about how your favourite character is portrayed. If they get a bad run in a game or two then you probably get a little salty about that. Tails and Knuckles fans in particular, as of late, seem to be the ones getting the short end.

Well, my favourite character in the entire franchise is Emerl the Gizoid. I will take Gemerl as a worthy substitute, they’re basically the same character. And the comics have been doing them dirty since the Archie reboot.

(Sidenote: I will be referring to Emerl with male pronouns from this point on. The Maria-soul thing isn’t as widely known as I’d like it to be, so I’m going to compromise for the sake of keeping the focus on the actual point)

However, not everything about this can be laid at the feet of Ian Flynn. Arguably his portrayal of said character is merely a symptom of a long-running issue that has plagued Sonic storytelling for roughly 15-16 years now.

But before we get into that, let’s get into something important: Why Emerl is my favourite Sonic character.

Part 1: Emerl in Sonic Battle, or “How I learned to stop worrying and love the Gizoid”.

This game doesn’t get enough love.

Now, I totally understand why it doesn’t get enough love. There are game design choices, like the grinding and the repetitiveness of the story mode that really drag it down, and because of that, Battle can become a slow-going and tedious experience, and that’s a real shame, because the story that’s hidden in this game is a thing of beauty.

Like most Sonic games from the 2000s, this game introduces a new character to join Sonic’s list of friends. Unlike the games that aren’t SA2 and Sonic Rush, this new character is actually good (This is hyperbole, Omega, Silver, and Shade were fine too).

Emerl enters the story as a mute, barely-functional robot that doesn’t do much of anything for a while, and only seems to come to life when Sonic locates it and attacks it. However, as the robot absorbs more Chaos Emeralds, slowly a personality starts to form, largely pieced together from other characters’ traits.

Emerl, as he is dubbed, is initially childlike and naive, but as he grows he develops a sassy streak, and his speech becomes a lot more developed. Maturity sets in, as Emerl grapples with his own nature, particularly the legacy he carries from the ARK, and Shadow’s ongoing turmoil with regards to the whole “Living Weapon” deal. Ultimately he becomes a hero, following in the footsteps of his mentor, parental figure, and closest friend, Sonic.

That’s right, Sonic, not Cream, is Emerl’s closest friend. We’ll get to that.

But this heart-warming story of Sonic becoming a dad for a robot doesn’t have a happy ending. Despite Shadow and Rouge finding a way to neutralise Emerl’s destructive Gizoid programming, Eggman has a way to reactivate it anyway, driving Emerl into a berserk rampage. This is kind of the one sticking point I have with the game’s plot, Eggman shouldn’t have been able to do this after Shadow and Rouge neutralised Emerl.

Additionally, while Emerl was on the ARK getting Maria’s soul crammed into him, Gerald also added a self-destruct mechanism that would trigger if he ever went Ultimate again.

So with Emerl quite literally exploding with all the power of the Chaos Emeralds, but his destructive programming forcing him to turn Eggman’s latest Death Star knockoff on Mobius/Earth/Sonic’s World, Sonic races up to confront his mecha-child, and things take a turn for the Old Robot Yeller.

In a moment that really deserves more attention, Sonic confronts his own child on the bridge of a space station, while Emerl is running on the power of the Chaos Emeralds and outputting more energy than he can physically take, and they fight. In the space of thirty seconds, they have a ten-round knock-down, drag-out brawl, and at the end, Sonic stands triumphant. Without using a single transformation. Yeah, that’s how powerful this guy is, that’s not travel speed, that’s combat speed. Looking at you, Death Battle.

It’s not really clear whether Sonic outright defeats Ultimate Emerl, or just survives long enough for his opponent to reach his limit and self-destruct, but the end result is the same. Sonic cradles a robot that became his own child over the course of the past few weeks, someone he raised from a baby-like state into a mature and heroic individual, and Emerl looks up at him and asks “Sonic… am I going to die?” And despite Sonic desperately trying to get him to keep it together, Not only does Emerl die, but he’s aware that the end is coming, and bids farewell to all of his friends as Sonic pleads with him to hold on. Shadow is equally distraught, his only friend with a connection to the ARK, someone he can call a brother, someone who carries the soul of his deceased sister within him, is dead.

Emerl: “Sonic I don’t feel so good.”

Like it’s canon that Eggman basically murdered Sonic’s kid.

And goddamnit this ending hits me hard. It frustrates me that Eggman was able to pull a means to drive Emerl into his Ultimate freakout mode out of his arse, but other than that, it’s so gutwrenching, I love it.

Gamma’s story from SA1 gets a lot of praise on the Internet, but for me, this is even better. It’s like Gamma’s story, but if Gamma was actually central to the plot of the game and the characters other than Amy gave a shit about him, and gave a shit about him for longer than a single cutscene, after which they are never mentioned again. Hell, due to Chaos Gamma being a thing, Gamma gets more love from the other characters in Battle than he does in SA1.

But, unfortunately, it doesn’t end there.

Part 2: (Sonic) Anime was a Mistake, or: “Sonic X ruins everything.”

I’ve made my dislike of this anime quite clear in the past. The characters are flanderized, Sonic is a B-lister in his own damn show, the villains are weaksauce or boring or both, the plot is only remotely close to good when its cribbing from two videogames which told the stories in question better, and for the first two seasons the entire show actually revolves around not Sonic, but the least relatable audience surrogate ever made. The third season would continue to include him, but shove him (And everyone else) to the side in favour of a Pokemon whose only move was “Flashback”, making audiences the world over question why he was even there in the first place.

Oh, and it also near-singlehandedly destroyed the thin shreds of character development that Tails, Knuckles, Amy, and Eggman had received in Sonic Adventure 2.

All four of these characters had been significantly enriched by the then most recent console game. Eggman had been revealed to be motivated by an admiration for his grandfather, Gerald Robotnik, but in the same game learned that Gerald had lost his marbles and programmed the ARK to smash into the planet and kill everyone on it, probably including his surviving family, i.e. little baby Ivo Robotnik. Gerald betrayed Eggman posthumously, and it’s clear from Eggman’s interactions with Tails during the credits of the game that this is giving him a lot to think about.

Knuckles is a weird case because most of his characterisation in SA2 is conveyed via… the lyrics to his rap music. Yes, really. He gets minor growth through the cutscenes, most notably in his decision to shatter the Master Emerald early on. Having already reassembled it once after it was broken in SA1, he’s now confident that he can do it again, so is willing to break it to prevent Eggman or Rouge stealing it. Via the rap lyrics, however (Yes I just wrote that), we also learn that Knuckles is slowly warming up to Sonic, gaining a greater respect for him, that he is more in-touch with his history and ancestors after SA1 (Though fortunately not in a Ken Penders way), and that he’s also struggling with feelings for Rouge, a plot element that went completely out of the window after this game.

Tails and Amy, however, get it the worst, as both went through arcs in SA1 that are followed up on and expanded in SA2. Amy had come to the conclusion that she didn’t need to rely on Sonic for everything, and that she would make him respect her as a hero in her own right. And while Amy is clearly in way over her head throughout the events of SA2, she still makes a significant difference, not only freeing Sonic from his cell on Prison Island, allowing Tails’ invasion to be a distraction and stealing a keycard to facilitate it, but of course, she later saves the world by motivating Shadow to join the fight to stop the ARK drop.

Tails had a similar plot, about learning to believe in himself as a hero, without having to rely on Sonic, and in SA2 he gets to prove it, not only partaking in the same rescue operation as Amy and fighting Eggman on even footing, but effectively taking command of the heroes and becoming their new leader, and for the first time, Sonic defers to him.

And then Sonic X came along and fucked it all up.

Eggman became a clownish antagonist with no semblance of nuance, and he actually got off the easiest.

Knuckles became a loud, dimwitted loner who got tricked by Eggman constantly, which would go on to be his personality for the rest of the franchise, ultimately culminating in the travesty against all sense that was Boom Knuckles.

Tails was reduced to a wimpy taxi driver, incapable of doing anything without his giant mecha plane to sit in. This was largely exacerbated by the presence of Donut Steele, who usurped his role as Sonic’s best friend and sidekick for two seasons, a problem which only got worse in the third season when Donut Steele suddenly became a genius inventor too, encroaching even more into Tails’ territory. Tails did get himself some more focus in S3, but only to make googly eyes at the Pokemon, a role which frankly could’ve gone to literally anyone else and would have made no difference on the plot. I would say that Tails being involved in a romance story at all is weird, but given the comics and Boom the weirdest thing about this latest tragic love story for the kid is that the Pokemon was actually close to his own age, because outside of this it really does seem like Tails goes for older ladies. Though she did turn into an adult at the end so I guess that counts?

But Amy arguably got the worst of it. Not only was her crowning moment in SA2 taken away from her and given to Donut Steele, but the poor girl had her promising character arc cut short and replaced with an obsessive, unhealthy fixation on Sonic, combined with a violent temper and an eagerness to smash anything that displeased her, Sonic included, with a giant hammer. Her admiration and crush on Sonic were warped into her being a possessive, mean-spirited stalker, whom only got away with it because she was an anime girl and therefore it was cute rather than creepy.

I want to take the time at this point to stress that stalking is not okay, under any circumstances. A girl obsessively following an older guy and threatening him and everyone around him with violent assault if they ever so much as imply that he isn’t interested in her is not cute, it means it’s time for a restraining order. Sonamy is not cute.

Now that I’ve swatted that particular hornet’s nest with a cricket bat, let’s move on!

I’ve always found it ironic that, despite being the adaptation with the most oversight from SEGA and Sonic Team, and the most endorsement from them too, Sonic X had easily the worst characterisation of any of the shows at the time. But, for all its faults, I can’t blame everything that went down in the aftermath on it. It had a comrade-in-arms. Mediocrely-written arms.

Part 3: Partner in Crime, or “Sonic Heroes also ruins everything.”

Sonic Heroes has a lot to answer for. And I mean a lot. It was the beginning of the franchise’s obsession with references to the classic games, it codified the really awkward ages for certain characters, and it seemed to be dedicated to completely unpicking everything established in the Adventure duology.

Shadow’s sudden resurrection is one thing, at least they had the graces to include a means to preserve his sacrifice via having him be an android, the blame for that not taking should be laid at the feet of his own game.

But the rest of the cast? Ohhh boy. Sonic’s still fine, he didn’t change much in the Adventure games, but then there’s Tails. Despite all the development he went through in SA1, in this game he needs to turn to Sonic when Eggman returns, and honestly this whole setup could’ve been fixed if Tails sought Sonic out not for the sake of having him lead the charge, but rather simply to recruit him into the counterattack he was already planning. Nevertheless, throughout the rest of the game Tails is almost as wimpy as his X counterpart, not helped by the voicework he’s given. No offense to William Corkery, who was probably like six when he recorded his lines, but this what you get when you choose actors via nepotism, rather than talent. But at least he does something.

How about Knuckles? As the other side of his derailment, Knuckles just turns up in this game, buddy-buddy with the characters he was only just starting to warm up to before, and blatantly not caring about the Master Emerald until Rouge mentions she’s going to steal it at the end. This will combine with his becoming a dumbass in Sonic X and become basically his entire character for… ever. Even in Forces, where he’s supposed to be doing slightly better as the leader of the resistance… but he’s a dumbass, and even Ian Flynn, who kept Knuckles as competent and intelligent in the Archie comics (Making the best version of Knuckles we’ve had in forever), kept this ongoing in the IDW comic. The Forces prequel portrays him as deciding to become leader of the Resistance (To an empire that hasn’t actually formed yet) purely to be a glory hound, and then goes on to establish that he was basically a figurehead while the real work was done by Amy, of all people.

And speaking of Amy…

Yeah, poor Amy is basically her Sonic X counterpart. But worse. I didn’t think that was possible, but at least X’s Amy seems to care about her friends. In Heroes, we’re treated to an equally violent and stalkerish Amy, who ostensibly starts searching out Sonic because he’s implicated in the abduction of Cream and Big’s pets, but when they actually catch up to him, Amy clean forgets why she is looking for him in the first place and tries to force him to marry her. Despite being twelve.

Y’know when Amy said she wanted to marry Sonic in SA2, she was joking, right?

This is why I find the idea of Amy being the real leader of the Resistance frankly absurd: Because the only time she led anything, it was a team that consisted of herself, a small child, and a man less intelligent and aware of reality than said small child, and she completely forgot their actual objective the moment she set her eyes on Sonic. Add in an unfortunate stint of very poor eyesight that got less and less understandable with every instance, and we got Amy’s rough personality for the next decade.

While Knuckles mostly stagnated at the same level of stupidity during that time, Tails got worse and worse, losing all of his badass traits with every game, a factor only increased by the “Sonic only” mentality costing him playable status, until he reached his nadir in Forces, cowering in terror from Chaos 0, and crying out to Sonic to save him, despite knowing full-well that Sonic was captured already.  Amy, meanwhile, limped along at the same level until about 2014, where it seemed someone at SEGA finally realised that A) Having the only female character you regularly use be a pink-coloured gender-bent version of your male hero whose only function is lusting after said hero doesn’t and shouldn’t fly in this day and age, and B) violent stalkers aren’t cute, and dropped this trait. Unfortunately, this has been more of a lateral move than a fix, as, much like Antoine in the comics, they forgot to give her anything substantial or fitting after she lost her negative traits, leaving her a bland and dull character, and when you’ve had a character be consistent for ten years, even if they were consistently bad, then changing it without cause or warning is still going to be jarring and awkward.

Part 4: Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right, or “Why the fuck did this happen?”

As I said in Part 2, Sonic X was made under heavy oversight from Sonic Team, and was heavily endorsed by them at the same time. There were promos for the show inserted into Sonic Adventure DX, a few episodes were released on GBA cartridges, and it received a long-running comic from Archie that ran alongside the main book, even after the show had ended. Additionally, characters that debuted in games from 2002-2004 were restricted from appearing in Archie’s main book for years afterwards (Which will become relevant later). The third season was commissioned solely off of the response to the first two, and primarily overseas response, hence why the original sub was never aired in Japan.

Sonic X was huge. And with that in mind, it’s plain to see that the portrayals of the characters in Sonic X were intended by SEGA. Yeah, all that horrible characterisation was intended as the vision for the franchise going forwards, and subsequent games were adjusted to match it.

And unfortunately, not only did this have a serious impact on the main cast of the games, but it had an even worse effect on Emerl.

Part 5: Emerl in Sonic X, or “Emerl vs. ‘Emel’”

Sonic X’s original mission statement was to adapt Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, and Sonic Battle. Why they skipped Sonic Heroes, despite Shadow being a major player in Battle’s story, I don’t know.

For whatever reason, the show took a full season to actually get to the first game adaptation, SA1, and instead spent the first 26 episodes on bland episodic “adventures”, in some kind of strange reverse-Isekai series. However, once it got there, the adaptation work was fairly faithful to the source material, which the exception of Donut Steele’s being crammed in to the plot. However, he mostly followed Big around, and since Big was the least involved in the game’s plot, he didn’t disrupt too much.

Sidenote, after 26 episodes of filler, the actual SA1 adaptation only lasted six episodes.

SA2 was likewise only six episodes, but with the exception of Amy’s big scene, it likewise wasn’t too bad. Tails suffered this time around too, which is somewhat surprising since he was mech-dependent in the anime anyway.  

After some more filler, which introduced the Chaotix and then did nothing with them, Emerl finally made an appearance, albeit they got his name wrong.

‘Emel’ looks like Emerl, and somewhat works like Emerl, but might as well be completely  different. ‘Emel’ stays completely mute for the entire time he’s around, never advancing much beyond Emerl’s initial silent, pre-first Emerald persona. He does get better at fighting, but he’s limited to only absorbing a single skill at once (Except for when he isn’t).

Dispensing with Battle’s interesting, rich, and heart-twisting plot, Sonic X instead has ‘Emel’ linger in ensemble for three episodes, before condensing the entire game’s premise into a two episodes of really bland tournament arc, where Sonic himself doesn’t actually fight and we get two rounds of Donut Steele being a dick to his friend and his father.

‘Emel’ wins the tournament, and is given a Chaos Emerald, and just when you think it might kickstart him becoming an actual character, instead it just drives him insane and he immediately becomes a pathetically weak version of Ultimate Emerl. After kicking the crap out of the entire cast, he is defeated by Cream and Cheese, because even though he can take on Sonic, Knuckles, and Rouge at the same time and win, along with Tails, Amy, Donut Steele and everyone else, he… can’t handle two opponents at once.

This is stupid.

You’ll notice that I haven’t talked about Sonic’s relationship with ‘Emel’, and that’s because he doesn’t have one. The wonderfully-written parental bond that these two characters share in the games is completely excised, and instead the focus is put on Cream. Bare in mind, Cream is so inconsequential to the actual game that she doesn’t even get mentioned individually in Emerl’s dying speech like Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Shadow do. Instead she’s just grouped in with Amy.

This is also stupid.

And as a result of this, it means that what is arguable base form Sonic’s most impressive feat just doesn’t happen in the anime, instead Emerl dies because he is lightly kicked a bit by Cream. Yeah, unlike the Advance games, Sonic X’s Cream is not an unstoppable engine of destruction, she’s basically just a small child who can sometimes fly.

Instead of Emerl’s tragic speech and Sonic’s desperate attempts to keep his son alive, we get treated to a prolonged scene of Cream crying over the death of her “friend”, something that is probably meant to tug at heartstrings but doesn’t because Cream’s voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard.

And Shadow isn’t even there! He doesn’t come back until a third of the way through Season 3, and never meets ‘Emel.’

This is really stupid. And, for those keeping track, that means of Sonic X’s originally commissioned 52 episodes, and the full series run of 78 episodes, a stunning total of seventeen of them were actually adaptations of the games that the series was supposed to focus on, leaving us with 61 episodes of what might as well be filler.

And, unfortunately, that franchise-wide initiative had damning consequences for Emerl.

Part 6: Gemerl and Sonic Advance 3, or: “An incomplete resurrection.”

So, Gemerl. I know his name is apparently G-Merl now but fuck that I’m calling him Gemerl. If the comics can do it then so will I.

Gemerl is the worst thing Eggman has ever done to Sonic. Like, there is no contest. Some of his other schemes might be more destructive and generally evil, but in terms of personal pain inflicted, nothing has topped this.

Eggman salvaged Emerl’s corpse, and brought him back to life as a mindless murderbot under his control. So not only did he kill Sonic’s robo-son, but he also brought him back as a weapon.

Come the conclusion of the game, Gemerl predictably betrays Eggman, steals the Chaos Emeralds from Sonic, and goes on another rampage. I have… headcanons about this fight, but that’s something to worry about later. What’s important is that, once again, Sonic is victorious, and Gemerl’s defeated body plunges into the atmosphere.

Fortunately, Tails is able to bring Emerl back properly this time, presumably using the Chaos shard that was left over at the end of Battle’s finale. So, it’s all a happy ending, right? Sonic has his child back, Shadow has his connection to his history restored, and Emerl is alive and well, right?

Wrong.

See, the vile spectre of Sonic X rears its ugly head once more, and sabotages this conclusion. Gemerl doesn’t return to Sonic, in fact we never see him reunite with his father. Instead, Sonic X’s version has enough clout now to take precedence, so Gemerl is now Cream’s playmate.

Bear in mind that Emerl’s idea of a fun game is all-out combat against his friends, and Cream doesn’t like fighting (Even if she’s really good at it in Advance 2 and 3).

And then he never shows up again. Even when Cream is part of the game’s plot, like in Rush or Generations, he’s not there, and most egregiously, in Sonic Chronicles, where Cream is not only an active player in the plot, but so are Gizoids, the creators of said Gizoids are the main antagonists, and Emerl himself is mentioned… Gemerl is not there.

But he did make it into the comics, for better or worse. Mostly worse.

Part 7: Embargos, knock-offs, and misused tropes, or: “Ian Flynn dun goofed.”

For a long while, Emerl/Gemerl was barred from the Archie comics, due to the Sonic X embargo, and when it was lifted, he didn’t appear until the reboot. We did, however, get a suspiciously similar substitute in the form of Shard.

Shard was the original Metal Sonic, but when he was brought back and rebuilt for the Secret Freedom arc, he was given a colour scheme ostensibly derived from Metal Sonic 3.0, but one shared with Gemerl, and a personality that was a lot like a watered-down version of Emerl’s own.

On some level I can understand Ian’s decision to bring back Metal Sonic v2.5, rather than use the character that seems to have been an inspiration for this new incarnation in some way. He’d need a fully-formed Emerl, necessitating a skip over the whole story, since there wasn’t room for an adaptation during the Mecha Sally arc that the Secret Freedom story was framed within. Heck, for all we know, the similarities between them may simply be a pretty sizeable coincidence.

But then the reboot happened and Gemerl finally joined the comic cast. And to say it was underwhelming would be an understatement.

You’ll notice that I said “Gemerl” rather than “Emerl”, because his entire story was indeed skipped. The events of Sonic Battle and Sonic Advance 3 had both happened already. This wasn’t Ian’s decision, as far as we know, his intention was for the comic to start over from the beginning. However, due to the interference of Paul Kaminski, who wanted a softer reboot, Ian was forced to fill the characters’ active histories with a large chunk of the games’ stories. Battle and Advance 3 were among those that had already happened, so Emerl made cameos in both incarnations via flashback… which unfortunately led to a plot hole.

See, Advance 3 and Sonic Unleashed are rather difficult to keep in the same continuity, because both share a common plot element: The world breaking into seven pieces.

For a long while, it was generally assumed that the handheld games and console titles were only semi-canon to each other. This avoided the awkward question of “If the Gaias were already there, why didn’t they emerge when Eggman broke the planet in Advance 3?”

Ian shoved them blatantly into the same continuity, and gave no attempt to explain what was different about the Advance 3 world-break compared to the Gaia incident, which served as the backbone to the reboot’s three year long Shattered World Arc. Why didn't the Gaias wake up during Advance 3? Because that's now a question we have to ask of the comics' world.

When Gemerl finally showed up doing something other than yard work for Vanilla (Despite allegedly being Cream’s friend, Cream spends all her time with the rest of the cast, and Gemerl is basically Vanilla’s maid), it was to get effortlessly dispatched by a brainwashed Mega Man with a terrible name in the extremely lacklustre Worlds Unite event.

This one was more than a little bit of a slap in the face, considering that Emerl and Mega Man are very similar in concept- robots that can copy the abilities of other characters- but Emerl is demonstrably more powerful. Now, if Ian had established that Gemerl had been nerfed when he was rebuilt, either by Eggman or by Tails, that would be fine. But he didn’t. In fact, Gemerl is given the title bubble “Super Gizoid”, implying that he’s stronger than a regular Gizoid.

Worlds Unite is generally pretty bad for having its corrupted heroes easily curbstomp every other character around, to the point that the only thing that can stop them is each other, but in Gemerl’s case it really serves no purpose.

This is the only thing that he actually does in Worlds Unite. He shows up to get beaten up and make Mega Man look stronger. That’s it.

This is something that TV Tropes refers to as “The Worf Effect”, a trope wherein an established powerful character is defeated easily by a new character, in order to demonstrate the latter’s power. Now, there’s nothing wrong with using this trope, but please note that I said establishedpowerful character, which Gemerl wasn’t.

At the point that this comic released, Gemerl’s last appearance in any Sonic media was over ten years prior. None of the comic’s intended target audience would remember him, and they wouldn’t know why defeating him was impressive. And this was, in addition, a terrible way to introduce him to new fans. Though the worst part is easily that this was unnecessary. Mega Man had already defeated everyone else, and had established his power pretty well just on them, and he was about to get removed from play permanently in the next issue. There was really no reason to throw Gemerl under the bus for this.

He made one more appearance in the event, getting controlled by the Zeti along with every other robot, and after that he got bopped on the head and just flew away.

Later, he’d make another appearance in the Panic in the Sky arc, and while his portrayal was far from the worst thing about Panic in the Sky, it only adds to the issues caused by the previous showing.

Gemerl makes one appearance, and promptly gets pinned down by the Witchcarters and Team Hooligan. Bear in that one of those groups are the joke villains who nobody takes seriously, and the other are a gang that was defeated by Tails before he met Sonic.

Archie Gemerl was a character who only existed to lose to villains in a vain attempt to make them look better, and that’s legitimately all Ian ever did with him, which makes me wonder whether he disliked the character. And it didn’t even make the villains look good, when you think about it. For anybody that was actually the intended audience for this book, Gemerl had no significance. He was just a robot that got beat up all the time. But for anyone like me, who does remember the games he appeared in, it stands out, not as good writing, but as a blatant narrative device and misused trope.

In this situation, I would simply rather Gemerl never appeared in Archie. At all. If Ian wasn’t going to give him time to shine, or at the very least be an adequate member of the supporting cast, he shouldn’t have used him at all.

Part 8: A Fresh False Start, or: “Wait, how did this get worse?!”

And now we arrive at IDW.

The one nice thing I can say about Archie Gemerl is that at least his personality was mostly on point. He read like a generally accurate take on the character that Emerl was at the end of Battle, which is what he’s supposed to be.

The same cannot be said for IDW.

In the pages of IDW, Gemerl acts like the most generic robot. He speaks in emotionless, stilted sentences with little in the way of actual grammar, leaving him to read like a poor man’s Soundwave, or Soundwave in one of those comics where the writer can’t decide whether they want him to speak normally or adopt his speech pattern from the G1 cartoon, so they just sort of do both.

Emerl pretty much never talked like this, as far as I can recall. His speech development is much more reminiscent of a child learning words, and the only time when he did adopt a more robotic speech pattern, it was a clue that he was slipping back into his destructive programming. He only spoke like a generic robot when he was in mindless destroyer mode.

He gets thrown for a loop by a simple logic flaw, unable to reconcile “Protect Cream and Vanilla” with “Don’t kill the zombots”, and has to be talked out of killing everything around him, when the entire point of Gerald’s modifications to the Gizoid was to make him a bringer of hope rather than destruction, and give him a compassionate heart.

The part of Battle’s story where Cream imparts a pacifistic mindset doesn’t frame her as being right. In that part of the game, they are cornered and under attack by hostile but ultimately mindless drones, and when she convinces Emerl to stop fighting, he almost dies. It’s Cream that learns the lesson there, that sometimes fighting is okay.

This character is already compassionate, he shouldn’t need to be talked into not killing the zombots by a small child, nor should he need her to point out that they’re innocent people who have been made this way by Eggman, because he was made into a killing machine by Eggman twice, and the first time he did die because of it. The character that lay dying in Sonic’s arms, scared and bidding his last goodbyes to his loved ones shouldn’t be the one experiencing this struggle when Omega is also in this arc.

That’s it, really. He’s not Gemerl. He’s a second, less goofy Omega. And it boggles my mind that, despite getting Gemerl’s character, if not his combat abilities, down almost perfectly in Archie, Ian is now subjecting us to this travesty.  

Like with the Archie example above, therein lies the crux of why the steady decline of Emerl/Gemerl that began with Sonic X is pushing me away from IDW: I don’t want to read Ian’s take on this character, because, to me, No Gemerl is better than Badly-Written Gemerl,

This isn’t the first time I’ve said this, either.  Way back in 2016, when I complained about Ian’s portrayal of Gemerl in Panic in the Sky, I said that the way he handled characters that I liked tended to make them the least likeable parts of the stories he wrote. As well as stating my dislike for his handling of Gemerl, I also stated that I used to really like Fiona Fox, moreso in concept than in execution, but under Ian’s pen she was largely an insufferable antagonist, little more than a trophy to make his pet recolour look better, and almost every story she was in only added to the “List of reasons she needs to stop lying to herself and just start the redemption arc already”. Additionally, I said that I didn’t want to see him bring back Neo Metal Sonic or Mephiles in any context, and we got the former, and it was exactly as bad as I thought it would be.

So, that’s basically why I don’t want to read IDW. That’s why, even if the aspect that was a big sticking point for me back when the comic launched was to be undone soon, I still probably wouldn’t pick it up. Because I don’t want to see my favourite Sonic character continue to be written badly by a guy that should know better, and has done better in the past.

If he were simply screwing up Gemerl’s personality the first time he wrote him, I would file it away under the same category as “Emel”, but the fact that he’s done better before, in a book where he had greater restrictions on what he could do with the characters, really settles this as an interest-killer for me.

Well done, Mr. Flynn. I legitimately didn’t think you could make me actually miss SEGA’s tighter control, but you somehow managed it. I would be impressed if it weren’t so sad.