#i do not like woobification

[synchodai]

just an aegon ii rant

The thing about Aegon that makes people root for him more than Joffrey is that Aegon just seems like everyone's punching bag in a way that Joffrey wasn't?

Aegon did horrible things, don't get me wrong. He raped a woman, he bullied his younger brother, he's implied to have his bastard children join fighting pits (this was never outright confirmed — Arryk only lightly alluded to Aegon doing something shady while they were looking to crown him), and he executed innocent ratcatchers as retribution for his murdered son.

But his rap sheet isn't any worse than Daemon's (murder, grooming, being a cop, etc.) or Criston's (his murder of Joffrey Lonmouth was downright homophobia /jk) or even Rhaenys's (talk about killing innocent people, right?), but for some reason all the characters hate Aegon's guts specifically? Given the people on this show, why?

It's like if Joffrey Baratheon threatened to kill Arya's direwolf and her best friend in episode 1, but he never does anything extraordinarily malicious or sadistic in the next episodes after that. And yet his own family just keeps treating him with outright contempt anyways despite him being their key to power.

Yeah, Aegon should be shamed and punished by the narrative for the horrible things he does...but nothing ever going his way and emphasizing how much of failure he is at every turn is just overkill, man. At some point, this amount of narrative humiliation has nothing to do anymore with dealing with the consequences of his bad actions or his personal failings, and it just makes every character look like they're taking turns unloading their frustrations on an acceptable target.

It's not fun to watch someone get kicked around by their entire family for no reason when he's never done anything especially horrible to hurt them other than be somewhat gormless. Otto most likely doesn't even know or care about Dyana, so does he despise his grandson simply for being a drunkard? For having an addiction? He was plotting to install him as king but all they ever did to prepare him for it was....yell at him and slap him around?

And on Aegon tormenting Aemond with his bullying, it's not like Aemond especially hates humiliating people in public since he regularly does it himself. When Lucaerys smirked at Aemond when they were served a pig in that dinner scene, Aemond bullied Jacaerys and Lucaerys back and Aegon was on his brother's side defending Aemond from getting attacked. Aemond isn't some put-upon victim who's been tolerating his brother's constant abuse — he obviously punches back. He has a hair-trigger temper and has messed up more things for his family's plans than Aegon has. Aemond's the one who was involved in the Driftmark fight that almost implicated Alicent for treason, Aemond's the one who made the Strong toast, Aemond's the one who killed Lucaerys and damaged their cause. And all three times, Aegon defends him!

This is all to ask why? Why are they writing his character like this? Why does the story and other characters keep piling on this dude? Why make Aegon's family hate him? Why make him awful at everything and good at nothing, not even riding his dragon who he has had for over a decade? Why give him these almost sympathetic moments with his brother, son, smallfolk, and dragon, only to have all the characters not show him a lick of sympathy?

Why do they all hate him for being an incompetent king when he straight up gave them the option of him abdicating by running away to Essos? They all act like he's the one imposing his incompetence on them, but they're the ones who forced the position on him. "Every man on that council earned their seat." YEs, Aegon didn't earn his seat — because it was forced on him and I am clawing at my eyes wishing the show would acknowledge that!

Is it supposed to be a deliberate commentary on the tragedy of hereditary monarchy? To show the Hightowers' cycle of abuse (even though no other Hightower is getting consistently hit and berated even after committing the WORST crime)? Is the show making him so pathetic and incompetent to make Rhaenyra more dignified and regal in comparison? Or is it doing this deliberately to woobify Aegon? To have his family and life be horrible so the viewers have built up their sympathies for when he gets his emotionally-resonant plot beats in the end?

Even if that's the case, the means certainly don't justify the ends. There's just no logical consistency to how these chracters treat and view Aegon and it's getting frustrating to watch sometimes.

[shallowseeker]

Dean is a lot of things, but super transparent and open isn't one of them. You're contributing to a trendy rewrite of Dean and influencing fandom in ways that just don't reflect what we see on screen.

I get where you’re coming from—Dean isn’t always the most emotionally transparent guy on the surface, and his wariness is definitely a big part of his character. That said, I personally think Dean’s performance of toughness/gruffness pulls the wool over some viewers’ eyes. Dean’s time in Hell, in particular, made him more protective of his vulnerabilities, adding to the tougher exterior he develops over time. It’s not that I don’t think Dean isn't guarded; he absolutely is. But I think he’s far more open than some parts of fandom paint him, and even more open than he sometimes portrays himself. Dean chooses to be selective about who he shows his vulnerabilities to, which is a consistent part of his character.

It's also important to acknowledge those times he’s been open only to get shut down (ahem, especially in Season 7, by Sam, Bobby, and Eliot Ness). I think his close family members are terrified that his grief will lead to his death during a hunt, so they balk at it, encouraging him to lock his emotions down tight.

///

Of note, I think Mary struggles with a similar issue. She says, “I know I can be cold,” yet she’s often incredibly honest about her actual emotions. In fact, Mary is one of the first characters to answer honestly when people ask if she’s okay: “No.” (Dean will in fact mirror her example in 13x06). I even think her “I love you” during her would-be death scene with Billie in 12x09 inspires moments like Cas’s “I love you—I love all of you” during the fight with Ramiel in 12x12.

Like Dean, Mary downplays her own emotional intelligence and her own keenness to both read and reach out to others. All in all, I think these two are far more emotionally generous and intuitive than they give themselves credit for, even if they struggle to acknowledge or articulate it when they get too overwhelmed.

As for what we see on screen... For the record, I like to think that I do a decent job of referencing specific moments in the script or episode when I talk about Dean's emotions or openness. Even if you don't interpret things as I do, I hope you can see my perspective.

/// Just as a point of contrast, I don’t think Sam is as emotionally intuitive as he’s often credited to be, and I think sometimes even Dean gives Sam too much credit. We see this particularly in Don’t You Forget About Me, where Dean instinctively builds rapport with Jody, empathizing with her and even pitching in to help with the dishes as they commiserate over their girls’ behavioral problems. Interestingly, this rears its head again in Ladies Drink Free, with Sam's intellectualizing of emotions being a point of contention.

Dean’s ability to both read people and connect emotionally often goes underappreciated, even by himself.

///

Bonus: I actually think Cas is also far more emotionally intuitive than he gives himself credit for, even with the billions of years of suppress-or-die under his belt. Cas often deploys a distinctly reciprocal style of communication, revealing a personal failing or emotion to encourage others to open up about their own failings. We see it with the original "I'm not a hammer / I have doubts" scene with Dean, we see it in a big way with Jack in Tombstone, and interestingly, we even see it with the news anchor here.

[oleworm]

Though unjustly reviewed as a film that one suffers through, or that is too brutal to watch, I enjoyed my experience of The Nightingale (2018) very much, especially the developing friendship between the characters of Billy Mangana, an Aboriginal tracker who has decided that he will no longer work with the British, and Clare, an Irish convict in unwilling service to the colonial forces—both of whom lost their families at the hands of the British and who can never go home, one because the land and his people have been destroyed through genocide and the other because she was transported with no means of return, as a consequence of the class system that drove her to commit theft. The music and the nature stand out, the sounds of Tasmanian birds and marsupials, the vegetation and the geological features—one of the most subtle horror details is the appearance of an English farming village near to the end of the film, the consolidation of British lifeways in a land that was not originally empty but that is being made so, to create scenes of country life that would not be out of place in an Austen film.

It’s interesting that though it came out the same year as The Terror (2018) and they deal with similar topics it appears to have appealed to a completely different audience. Perhaps because one work is more subtle in its criticism of imperialism, while also being an adventure story among other things, to the point where those who choose to ignore it can easily do so, while for the other it is a central theme, and the violence employed to enforce the structures of the empire is directly shown. The Nightingale has good acting and writing, proper costuming, beautiful landscapes and music, all the things that made The Terror great—maybe people never heard of it, or were put off by hypersensitive reviewers, but it does surprise me that not many have seen it. Myself included! I only watched it yesterday. But why I didn’t do so before is a subject to explore in a personal journal, not a blog post, though if I come to a conclusion I would like to share I will certainly do so.

One of the biggest contrasts between both works is how the hierarchies of the Navy and Army are treated. In The Terror, it is up to the viewer to decide how they feel about these structures and those at its head. I can’t think of any character at the top of the hierarchy who is portrayed with more negatives than positives, even Franklin—whose presence in Tasmania is alluded to, but not dug into, an Easter egg for those who have read about it—is portrayed more as a pompous fool than the overseer of a genocidal colonial government, and while Fitzjames’ exploits in China are explicitly described and he dies as a result of injuries received in the First Opium War his character is sympathetically portrayed, to the point that like with Franklin it is often treated as just a bit of historical flavour. Class and rank structures are deeply ingrained in both sets of characters, but where mutineers in The Terror were interpreted as villains for sabotaging and breaking away from the group, and imperfect leader Crozier becomes one of the best loved characters, in The Nightingale we have Lieutenant Hawkins, who while initially charming and played by a conventionally attractive actor—he even looks similar to Edward Little, a popular character in The Terror fandom—consistently brutalises not only the convicts and the Aboriginal people, but also his own men. They are both loyal and afraid, like dogs abandoned, threatened and killed when they have fulfilled their purpose or no longer perform to the level that their superior expects of them. One could say, they are in it for personal gain, but after a certain point in the film there is nothing that he can give them, and yet they persist. Why do they follow him? Why don’t they run away into the bush? When I was thinking about this question, I remembered the character of Thomas Hartnell, who after being lashed does everything he can to please Crozier, the one who gave the order, but except a few people (you know who you are!) many viewers saw this positively in contrast to Hickey who developed a hatred of Crozier and ceased to respect the hierarchical order.

There’s also the fact that we see what happened to the Tasmanians after the British arrive, but we only see the beginning of what will happen to the Inuit. At the time that The Terror ends, only a few of the many search-and-rescue expeditions have made it to the Arctic, whose explorations led to the establishment of a stronger European presence in the North, with all that it involved.

So what was it? 126 white men syndrome, which makes this show attractive to people with an especial interest in men? Are more realistic portrayals of imperialism and colonialism too uncomfortable? Since many fandom participants are women, is it too heavy to think that women can be—and regularly were—assaulted under such circumstances? Are we not too different from the Reddit men who love adventures and the friends we made along the way, to the detriment of other themes important to the story? You decide. For me it’s a little bit of everything.

[doctorcanon]

I usually vibe with the "let people enjoy things" crowd but some of y'all really need to be more cognizant of your surroundings. It's not about you being cringe or annoying. Its about the fact that y'all seem to think your innocent enjoyment of something means it's above criticism, any exploration into how or why it exists or any reproach of your behavior while doing so.

Yes, the internet does have a habit of shaming people, I get it. But in many cases, people don't just bring that shit up to make you feel bad especially in regards to implicit lgbtphobia or racism. They bring it up because they feel bad and are allowed to say so even if it bums you out.

[marioyuri]

Its kind of nasty how people babygirlify an incel who became a cop just to carry a gun so he can exercise police brutality and who exploits his position as a pig to assaults women and teenager girls sexually then kills them when they fight back. Because he weaponised male incompetence to get away with everything . Huh

[quicktimeeventfull]

this is also largely how i see beyond and L -- like 'i want to be destroyed/you destroy me.' beyond sees himself as a victim because he wants to hurt L so bad and that wouldn't be happening if there weren't something wrong with L. u know. also sometimes i see them as fluffy and sweet because they are made up and they can be anything you want but truly i think this is a compelling version of them.

[scorpius-rising]

The current trend of 'anti-capitalist' (for want of a better term) positive affirmations leaves me fundamentally cold. It's not that I don't agree with the sentiments that 'rest is important', 'your worth is not defined by your productivity', etc., but at this point they're just the trend of motivational posters of the 90s and early 2000s looping back around again.

They can so easily feel like a substitute for engagement with awkward realities and the sobering nature of material conditions

[brokentoys]

it sucks being the dc fan with all the right riddler opinions.

[rust-berrie]

ERM ERM HI I JUST WANTED TO SAY I’M REALLY HAPPY YOU LIKE MY SHANE ART SO MUCH CAUSE YOURE A COOL ARTIST TOO OK BYE

WAHJHFGJ I'M GLAD!!!! I SHOULD BE THANKING YOU FOR DOING GODS WORK. BY MAKING HIM WHAT HE TRULY LOOKS LIKE. I LOVE YOUR STYLE AND YOUR SHANE. HE HAS SUCH A SPECIAL PLACE IN MY HEARTTT!!!!!!!! <<333 BANGING MY FISTS ON THE TABLE

[fiachrastudios]

ngl i kinda forget how much i like gale when i'm not playing the game because of the fandom 😩

[dayurno]

Hmm I definitely agree with most of your rant regarding neils ao3 characterization, with the idea that gay relationships can't be written as heteronormative, honestly especially if one of them is gender nonconforming, and I do think some of the dislike around his character can be from a place of transmisogyny. And people who ask for more masc4masc and fem4fem couples are a bit dumb. But I still have a bone to pick with his characterization on ao3 and I can't put my finger on whyyyy

Maybe, it's because (and I'm speaking about the state of the fandom back around 3??or 4?? Years ago when I would actively go through the tags and look for fanfiction and neil was my fave) it was always neil bottoming in every fic ever, no matter what character he was being shipped with in the fic, but like a lot of these fics or even the ones that weren't explicit would have something happen to him where he was the victim or he needed to be coddled and comforted by everyone else, and while I don't think neil is impervious and will never feel and inch of distress in his life, i can't help but think it's a bit ooc (not that there's anything wrong with ooc fic) and it's like neil can also be dangerous and has the capacity to hurt ppl and can be a dickhead but I don't think alot of fic back then showed that? They'd just call him sassy maybe he'd make a few quips and that's it. I think theres a lot of fics out there that wipe out his complexity ig. Maybe I just hate his characterization bc I wanna be a contrarion and I find his characterization boring if it's like that because you can find it in any fandom assigned bottom ever and ive seen it too much so i wanted to see a switch up or its more about his personality being written and less about being feminine and bottoming though i do think the ppl who write him being more feminine also tend to write his character a certain way. But like I also cant help but wonder where it comes from, like it's neil written like this and rarely ever andrew so

Back when I was younger I used to think people in fandoms would make the character who revieves the more feminine one, maybe it's bc it makes it easier to relate and project, or maybe it's bc it makes it easier to contend with a gay relationship if you can fit into like heteronormative boxes bc that's what's familiar to you and that's what you know and see everywhere, or maybe it is just people being fetishistic but now I don't know🤔 also I do think top neil or dom neil is just kinda fun like you said to me kandrew r more the type to have vanilla missionary sex their whole lives but neil would be more adventurous and willing to try new things, he also has cheek and audacity which is cute, like a puppy

Sorry this is so long, I've just thought about it before and has no one to discuss it with

no need to apologize i asked for opinions after all!!!!!!!

i see what you mean re: neil losing his edge, and i do think that it happens a lot with him because he is the protagonist and a prominent character in the vast majority of aftg fics, but i wouldn't say the same de-fanging process doesn't happen to andrew. the fandom has made it a point to soften all of andrew's edges; it's one of the most common bones people pick with nora that she never gives into the idea that andrew becomes a normal, well-adjusted, life-loving member of society post-canon. whether i enjoy andrew in a softer way or not is irrelevant, but i think this is definitely not a neil-only phenomena. i wouldn't even say it's really more pronounced when it's neil! i just think that helplessness, that lack of agency and bite, is a staple of most fandom content because it's self-indulgent and forces characters to act on their relationships by asking for and receiving help from their peers, whatever it might look like for each specific fandom

now i will say that i don't think that the process of making characters wholesome and ultimately consumable has anything to do with whether they are written as feminine or not; whether they are only in a receiving position or not. sexual preferences and gender presentations are inherently neutral: they don't say anything about a person's personality. i think neil bottoming being such a popular trope is just due to a natural consequence of how andrew and neil's relationship is presented in the books — andrew as someone who, at the point of where canon stops, physically cannot allow himself to be on the receiving end of any sexual act, and neil, who loves him and wants to help andrew to find pleasure in whatever way he can. it's the dynamic we're given in the original text, so it's what people tend to think about more.

of course i'm not saying it never overlaps with neil's excessive sanitizing and de-fanging, and it might as well be, for some people, that neil's acquiescence to andrew having control of what they do in bed is an entirely justifiable reason for writing him in a more feminine way. my opinion is, i think, just that that is not inherently immoral — that feminine people with those sexual preferences exist, and at times might even find that their gender presentation plays a big role in why they prefer to interact with sex the way they do. the history of femme pillow princesses in the lesbian community is vast, just as is the history of stone top butches. these minor niches don't imply that all feminine and masculine people must respectively bottom and top, but we do no one a favor by disregarding their experiences when they are a big part of how queer people do sex. i think we fall into old conservative myths when we moralize sexual preferences; i think we try to conform to cisheteronormative ideals when we deny gender presentations that are inherently tied to sex.

and just as a personal comment, i actually agree with you about neil being written as a perpetual, helpless victim and losing his agency. i don't enjoy it. i think it is born from indulgence, born from projection and wish fulfilment, but indulgence isn't immoral. projection and wish fulfilment aren't immoral, either. and, while i don't like the sanitization of aftg characters, i think it is less a character or fandom-specific issue and more of a material consequence of late stage capitalism; it's a symptom of a sickness that goes beyond our little constructed world, and one we should discuss, in my opinion, outside of the boundaries of fandom and individual guilt

i guess my tl;dr is that sometimes things are bad and we have to sit with their right to exist anyway. and my general tl;dr is that we help no one when we go out of our ways to condemn and criticize content where one of the characters is gender non-conforming because of said gender nonconformity. and, ultimately, that what we are missing is more fanfiction about kevin day in tiny tennis skirts

[romulussy]

Sometimes I think my succession bubble gets a bit too cringe and has lost too much perspective.... and then I see the other takes out there and it's like. oh right it's the same in literally every faction, especially on twitter

first of all cringe is dead so jot that down. second of all skdjfbkjsdfhb i know exactly what you mean. i'm on succtwt but only the peripheral of it and i don't check my feed that often so i miss a lot of the drama, but i did spend a few days more involved post-4x09 and it was kind of like. eye opening.

also yeah the losing perspective def isn't specific to only one subset of fans. i feel like most of us are guilty of it in one way or another

[fooligancity]

merlin bbc merlin kills people in the same way that people die all willy nilly in any medieval or cowboy western media like idk where the idea came from that he’s ruthless and willing to kill at the drop of a hat when the series continually shows him just wanting to use his magic to make flowers and shit. plus a large majority of the characters he does kill in the show are like in the midst of trying to kill him and his friends like it’s a bit of a kill or be killed situation

[hell-heron]

Victimblamings taken right before disaster

[quicktimeeventfull]

hand me your hand, let me look in your eyes

4k words

Read on AO3

Content notes: Depictions of eating disorders. (In particular, EDNOS which includes purging.) Also includes nonbinary Light, Canada, brief allusions to Beyond studying mycology, and craft beer.

College AU. Beyond prefers to think of L, the beloved and unofficial head of their university’s queer centre, as untouchable and invincible but he is, of course, just a regular human being with regular human problems. When L has a really, really bad time at a holiday party, Light and Beyond do their best to help. Alternatively: Hurt/comfort in which everyone is really, really nice to L for a while.

L had called Beyond at one-thirty in the morning. Beyond, who had been working on a paper about mushrooms, picked up immediately. He didn’t have to check the name — he’d given L a special ringtone weeks ago.

“Hi,” he’d said, aware that he sounded a little breathless. He was always a little too eager with L. Most people found this off-putting, but neither L nor his partner ever seemed to mind. Beyond had met the two of them them through their university’s queer centre, and no one had ever been half as nice to him as they were.

“Hi,” L had sounded very distracted. He must have been on speakerphone, because the sound was very tinny and he could hear someone moving around in the background. Presumably it was Light. It sounded like xie was moving furniture, which Beyond was sure their neighbours appreciated at this particular time of night. “Listen. There’s a party tomorrow. For the holidays. At Kiyomi’s. Do you know Kiyomi?”

“No.”

“Oh. Well, anyway. You’ll love her. She’s very tall. Light and I wanted to make sure you knew you were invited.”

This didn’t sound quite right. He couldn’t imagine why Kiyomi would invite someone she’d never met. “Am I invited?”

“Yes. I’m inviting you. So you are.”

continue

[235uranium]

every time the female character discourse happens i just sigh. the ppl critiquing fandom misogyny don't even like that interesting of women