#i feel crazy trying to write him thinking it’s always ooc and there are ppl out there rping him

[bluegarners]

dick grayson rp blogs are fascinating bc half of the things they do or say are things dick grayson would not do or say

[demonsfate]

anonymous sent . . . tbh, jin never really struck me as "whiny" tho...he keeps his problems to himself for the most part. he never goes "WAH my life sucks and i went through more pain than you", he's just a stoic dude doing his best to try to make everything better. he doesn't cry much either.

hard agree. imo, most (fandom) beliefs about jin's character are... incorrect lmao. i don't wanna be that person, but it really does feel like most people don't even understand jin's character well. there are lots of popular misconceptions about him. those misconceptions i'm sure everyone has seen being: he's antisocial (technically wrong) he hates / doesn't care about people (wrong) he's rude (usually wrong) he's emo (doubles as whiny, but also wrong) he's an edgelord (wrong) he's aggressive (kiinda wrong? but especially this is regarding his relationship with hwoarang) most of these are either just STRAIGHT UP INCORRECT, MISCONCEPTIONS / MISUNDERSTANDINGS, or are technically true, but was depicted in tek6 only, therefore there's not much faith to hold in them. (sorry but if jin is completely ooc in tek6 and acts utterly different from the other games he's in, you can't really use tek6 as proof of "what he's supposed to be)

MOST people who call him "whiny" are people who SOMEHOW do not understand why he doesn't want the devil gene - that's usually when i notice ppl use the word "whiny" for him (or the fact that he wanted to kill himself) i know for the LONGEST TIME, people dunked on jin like crazy for this quote -

which what's even funnier is that jin doesn't even say this here lmao. this is was just placed for the trailer. in the actual game, jin wants to live haha. but anyway - it's like. how is any of this "whiny"? how is he wrong to say that uhh maybe people who have lead to the deaths of THOUSANDS maybe don't deserve to live? or the whole devil gene thing. BEFORE THE STUPID "DEVIL WAS ALWAYS PROTECTING ME?!" retcon tek8 did, jin had no reason to... want the devil gene lmao. the point was (PRE-TEK8!!!) was that if you DID give into the devil, you lose yourself. how no one understood that is beyond me. especially when "selling your soul to the devil" is one of the oldest stories ever lmao.

jin never acted like he had it worse than people, jin never took out his issues on others, and lastly - jin had an actual very hard life. so uhh... the fact that he's not the happiest about himself or his life is?? completely understandable.

of course... there is problems that tek8 caused which makes jin's biggest problems seem very miniscule in actuality. by making devil jin a protective force, it DOES make it feel like jin was just upset and pushing people away over nothing... over something he was completely wrong about. (therefore, makes him look like a big idiot & fuck up) then whilst i'm glad that jun is back, but uh... it also takes away his grief. i mean, yeah - he still endured the grief for several years thinking she was dead. but again, it's another thing he was wrong about, and it turns out his mom being dead wasn't that sad because she's not actually dead. buuuuuuut that (mostly just the whole devil gene stuff) is something that i didn't like about tek8's writing because it does harm jin's character & his journey lol.

but long story short - i never saw jin as a whiny / emo character. especially not tek3-tek5 jin. (which are the Prime Jins & how jin should be. tek8 has his characterization quite similar to Prime Jins, buuuuut... like i said, the story does some silly things that i unfortunately wish they hadn't)

[stanfordsweater]

@aftershocked

moving this here because you’ve brought up a TON of points i’d love to dig into and the tumblr reply system is garbage--

(under the cut: much talk of possessive sam vs. possessive dean, benefits of a long-running series, ooc actions vs. consistent characterization)

“they change a lot over 15 seasons but it's consistent enough” i feel like differences and inconsistencies in episodes/writing/seasons are one of the reasons (besides personal preference) that ppl get twisted around when it comes to possessive sam and possessive dean, like it’s easy to focus on one or two things w/o taking larger patterns or predominant characteristics into account.

also it’s easy to focus on like, smth happening a few times that is in contradiction to something that happened many other times, & not want to Deal with the complexities & contradictions—but the complexities are the best part! i’ve seen you talk about it before too, the benefits of a longrunning series where we get to really watch the characters grow from young men to essentially middle-aged,

you get to actually have characters w the kind of multifaceted personalities you’d expect of, like, normal people (just way more fucked up and traumatized). so yeah, dean isn’t always straightforward in the way he’s content with keeping sam with him, and can dip into weird behavior (ESPECIALLY in the sort of parental “i make the decisions around here” sense)—

but his general preference, his base character, does not lean towards possessiveness at all. versus sam, who SEEMS like he’d be more grounded and chill, but is actually the crazy jealous guy. that kind of irony, those kind of subversions, are what make them enjoyable as characters and contribute to why possessive sam is so much fun to explore,

bc you Wouldn’t think he’d be the one who’s jealous enough that even when dean gives sam so much of himself already, sam still wants more. you’d look at him and expect him to be the brother capable of letting go, of being halfway normal, instead of like, sam’s built so much on seeking dean’s approval and lived his life at the center of dean’s universe,

so he’ll reject anything that threatens to change that dynamic. like the contradictions are weird and spicy and i like them a lot and god i love sam’s reactions to benny so much. i’d feel bad bc i really like benny & he deserved better, but it’s too much fun to see how much sam of all people unreasonably, irrationally, illogically hates the guy,

just because he represents someone dean might, might, might possibly actually like more than sam (even though we, the viewers, know that’s impossible). beautiful

--

yes, you’ve hit on so many great points here! firstly, the inconsistencies in characterization: i think it’s very easy to see why people get annoyed by the writing, and i do think it’s occasionally justified; however, i’ve always found it a lot more rewarding to think about it as the same kind of inconsistencies that real people have! sam and dean might make “ooc” decisions and it’s okay because real people do that too, out of anger, resentment, sadness, trauma... it makes sense, to me, that they aren’t the same people they were fifteen years ago. getting stuck in one ‘mode’ of characterization is damaging to an overall reading of the show, but at the same time it’s okay to latch onto one era if that’s what you enjoy. it only bothers me when people take characterization from one era (for example, dean’s ptsd, anger, and jealousy over amelia) and apply it to every version of that character.

dean’s parental sense of possession over sam is one thing i do agree with wrt the possessive dean takes, and i think they’re more memorable for a lot of people because they’re not what you usually see from a family show-- it’s weird for dean to feel that way, and i don’t know if i’ve ever seen that intersection of parental ownership and romantic partner jealousy. it’s important that this comes out when dean is under pressure, not all the time-- AND it’s essential that sam does not cave to this. it gets iffy during dabb era, but i still don’t see sam immediately caving to dean’s demands. a good example is the scene where dean holds a gun to sam in season 15, which i see fairly often as an example of dean demanding obedience from sam... but sam doesn’t cave! and sam doesn’t even flinch, because he’s used to having guns pointed at him, and he knows that no version of dean could ever kill him. dean knows this too, and dean is the one who caves, as per usual. this is only not the case a few times in canon, like season 4, parts of season 7, and season 9, all for different reasons i won’t get into now. it’s remarkable when dean doesn’t go along with what sam asks, which is why it sticks in people’s memories, imo. dean is very loud with what he wants and what he thinks is best, but if sam disagrees he will argue dean around to his point, or he’ll go behind dean’s back to do it anyway (case in point, season 11 with the cage.)

anyway-- “the complexities are the best part!” and “you get to actually have characters w the kind of multifaceted personalities you’d expect of, like, normal people (just way more fucked up and traumatized). so yeah, dean isn’t always straightforward...” TOTALLY AGREE. i love the times when the brothers are making decisions that fandom disagrees with, because it’s interesting. the show is here to provide a compelling story. i’m not going to lie and say i always agree with that story or those choices, but it’s fun for me to try to get into why a character would make that decision, not just rail against it. i like the dudes we have in canon! they’re fun!

this is why possessive sam slaps for me. what you said here-- “sam, who SEEMS like he’d be more grounded and chill, but is actually the crazy jealous guy. that kind of irony, those kind of subversions, are what make them enjoyable as characters and contribute to why possessive sam is so much fun to explore” yes yes yes. 100%. and we see these subversions right from season one! it’s not new that dean isn’t actually the uber-confident womanizing asshole, but if you aren’t paying attention it can sneak up on you, i guess? and sam, who comes across as the level-headed one in common archetypes, the soft-spoken college boy, crashes the impala into a building. in the first episode. and in route 666, he  follows a crazy instinct that is proven correct and saves their lives (because he’s intelligent!) but toys with the chance that it could have failed and killed dean (because he’s reckless!)

the fact that we have all these examples of the ways the brothers fail to fulfill the tropes they would in a less-interesting tv show means that possessive sam makes so much sense. sam is built up as the independent brother, the one who left home, the rebellious one, but he loves his family and he needs dean. he needs him. “sam’s built so much on seeking dean’s approval and lived his life at the center of dean’s universe...” i love the way you put this. sam has had dean’s attention and protection for most of his life, and hell if he’s giving it up now for some two-bit vampire, lol. sam is independent, but like with everything else, dean is the exception. sam’s desperation for dean’s approval and attention is absolutely hilarious in the benny situation, because, like you’ve said before, benny is the least-threatening dude ever. he’s so nice. and the fact that sam won’t rest until he dies is-- well, i’m being a little uncharitable, i don’t think sam wanted benny to die, but he sure didn’t shed any tears over it.

the contradictions are delicious. i do think some of it is that dean gets his friendships fulfilled outside of sam, so sam is in a category all his own, while sam doesn’t have as many relationships as dean does so dean is fills all of his categories. but then again, that isn’t always true. it shifts over the seasons and even through episodes. broad trends!

[bondedtrauma]

send a url and i’ll tell you what i think of them!    /    ACCEPTING let me talk about u!!!!!

  @miasmalungs​​​  asked  :   ❤️ + me

tomy  🤝  me

loving horror aesthetics

lobotomy i LOVE ur filthy rot brain. the aesthetics that your blog + muses hold are so FUCKING!!!! GOOD! we don’t have NEAR enough interactions on this blog NOR MY MULTI. i’m gonna bodyslam u into discord for plotting. also i hope u like the nickname ‘tomy’ because it’s sticking for life. i love your psd for your icons! it makes me want to switch my own to match lol. it can fit a lot more of an expression in a bigger canvas and brrrrr it scratches my brain. your blog aesthetic is so perfectly creepy and i ADORE IT. i love our alpha conversations ooc on discord too! some of the shit u and leo be saying tho.......my god i added both of the biggest crazies on this hellsite. also ur graphics are all gorg and i love seeing u post edits/reading new bios!

as for MUSES: HISAO is such a rat i love him SO MUCH. i want to write more with him and kaneki ofc -- they have such a funny dynamic and even if ken pushes him around he really loves his company :) he’s starting to see him as a dad figure that he always craved as a kid and it makes me....angsty. 12/10!!!!! AGELOS is a character i just KNOW elli’s savior complex would just jump out at. i havent interacted with him yet but i just read his bio / interactions and ;w; WEEP!!!!  i’m taking him away from u bc ur too mean to him. i wanna kiss their little forehead and tell them tht theyve done enough.

IZZABEL is so interesting to me ! i havent interacted with them yet, but i see her threads on my dash with other ppl and im always just so ENTRANCED by her. the best word i can use to describe her is just haunting. they are another oc i just wanna hug and say everything will be okay!!!!! i hope she finds peace at one point UGH. deserved. ELLIOT has such an intriguing backstory! the mystique of finding out that you dont actually know as much as you thought you did about someone is always a harrowing experience, and i feel like that could be explored so well within lovelace’s psyche. mwah i love that trope tldr LOL. 

i haven’t yet interacted with JUNIOR, but i’m always SO excited to see his threads on my dash. he is the literal definition of ‘ little shit ‘ , and i feel like sekiko would wanna punt him across a football field. i crave that interaction LOL. i don’t know much about him quite yet, but i want to learn ! hanako being his fc fits ur blogs aesthetic too oml...pats him on the head. he seems like someone who would bite. does he bite? EUN is my favorite muse on ur blog. like hands down i adore him. i actively look forward to seeing his threads with you and my mutuals. he is SO FUCKING FUNNY. like he’s not even trying to be but the threads have me cracking up each time. also his BROTHER is hot and thats extra points. he’s such a brat and elli would mother him 100%. if he ever tried a pick up line on sekiko she would laugh in his face.  ALSO putting the rest under a read more because its getting long lol

DAEJEON yes sirrrrr!!!! im proud to say i was the first like on ur first starter call for him after his creation. clocked in a .4076 miliseconds because i’m just built that different. i love the interaction that he and elli held, and i think they could have a really cute platonic/sibling dynamic!! she just needs to be looked after 24/7 she gets into so much trouble just because of her naivete all the time. another possible plot could be them working together seeing that she interns in cyber forensics :) i always love ocs with chainsawman characters as a fc and MIER is no exception!! i love the uncanny valley vibe he has going and want to see more of him on my dash!!!! LET ME INTERACT WITH HIM!!!!

grabs SYBIL by the neck and squeezes him like a squeaky toy. I LOVE HIM. i love characters like him and idc if its problematic i just adore them. hes so creepy and rude and the idea of him wearing/creating masks is SO cool. he and sekiko’s past threads have cracked me up and we should have more of them!! GIVE ME A STARTER FOR HIMMM I COULD FIX HIM. GORI is so heartbreaking!!!! i have a thing for being TERRIFIED of losing my s/o and gori’s backstory is so sad :( i can’t imagine having to raise a kid after such a Wild(tm) incident. he has all of my support and i want to give him a forehead kiss....

JURO my love!!!!!! he’s reminiscent of frankenstein’s monster for me, and i just LOVE him. he’s so precious to me tbh idek why i have such an attachment to this muse. i just DO. grabby hands give me more of him!! SEVEN is such a perfect twist on the guardian angel trope. we haven’t had many interactions, but he was so kind to sekiko and i just want to hug him!! he seems so gentle and kindhearted but know you hes probably secretly fucked up LOL. CASINO is the coolest name ever so i wanna get that out of the way LOL. i love disturbed characters and i love putting elli in front of them with her ‘ i can fix them ‘ mindset. please let her try to fix him. he’s so gross but i LOVEH IM!!!! nasty, nasty, NASTY. i wanna know why sybil let him go 👀 and, lastly, tomatsu! i don’t believe i’ve seen any interactions with him yet, nor interact, but his design is SO COOL. i want to see a thread of him going feral <3

tldr: follow lobotomy for pretty graphics and wild muses!!!! plot wiht me tomy

[redxblueihateloveyou]

1/2 "Explore the fuck was that" Xiaoge is not Xiaoge and talking is not the problem here. It's literally everything thats the problem. Also like you I've also read all the books, but failed to put into words why Xiao Yu Liang's and Huang Jun Jie's Qilings didn't give me any divergence from the original character despite the changes, while others did and pretty drastically. I thought it was a bit irrational on my part, but you just sorted it all out so effortlessly I'm a bit jealous

Lol I said the exact same thing, the talking and the phone was not a problem as some say, he has a phone in the book too at some point and talks more than you'd actually think, it's just that literally nothing about him is Zhang Qiling. Literally not one vibe or even tiny feeling. I don't know how that happened honestly.

AAAAAAAAA I saw the smile comments too lmao. I was like who's gonna tell them. Not only he smiles, he's full on laughing in the 2nd book already, when Wu Xie is using his spit as a lotion lmao. And Wu Xie was so happy about, he was like "I saw him smile before, but it was always so bitter and cold, this was the first time he smiled genuinely, he just needs to spend more time with him, we'll get him there" T_T Before that his smiling was legit a bit scary tho, sometimes brash, like when he told him about the stairs and he went "oh really?" haha

I thought about it and I honestly have no idea about the reference point for some people. I think maybe they go from that first adaptation? Maybe they think it's how he is in the book? Idk. It just weirds me out that I feel like some created some their own picture in their head and then judge everything from there throwing "thats ooc" left and right. Like this "Xiao Ge doesn't smile thing". Maybe it's because of the "Poker-face" thing, but do they know that "Men You Ping" doesn't actually mean that, it was just the closest thing you could come up with with english alternative to keep the nickname short (like I doubt it would read well if he kept calling him a bottle xD). Like according to Wu Xie since the very first book, his hubby can't even lie, so he's definitely not a poker face at all. He also gets pissed pretty easily and he likes to fool around sometimes too (like troll Wu Xie and Fatty obviously).

He's also not emo and not the "mysterious hero from some romance", not a stone and not a zooty. I don't know where this all came from tbh.

I can really debate 24/7 about this, but they're 100% Qilings, just slightly changed and softened accordingly to what they'd be like at this point of their relationship, if he did write it in (and I'm like pretty sure I'm right about this). It's the way they behave, how they act in certain situations, how they're with Wu Xie, how they're with other people, the right amount of sass and being done with everything, just the overall picture, the "you're an idiot, but you're my whole world". But also you know, that strange feeling that Wu Xie describes, like "when he's there, everything is suddenly alright" lol (just the magical safety vibe esp in SOP). I literally don't know how ppl who read the whole thing watched them and thought "thats not right". It's the fucking overall feeling of.. yes, i'm watching Zhang Qiling.

Just change the book's impending doom of tragical "you're my whole world, but I can't stay and there's no way for this to work" to "we actually have a future and I want to stay in our home with you" and that's basically Yuliang's and Junjie's versions (one on the way, one fully there by the end). But even if for some reason you can't accept this, I still don't get how some could hate it, cause overall they still have basically everything they need. Unlike others who are way off in my opinion, bc of the weird templates they are.

And about "Explore the fuck was that" (lol I'm gonna use this title from now on) seriously, no offense to this creation and everyone who liked it (no judging here for real, everyone likes what they like), I'm not gonna heavily diss anyone or anything, I don't really care for the thing, just telling the truth. No one who's participated in this thing have a fucking idea about the characters they're playing or writing about.

I mean, as a fan many things that were adapted from books, I already do not care for minor divergence or even bigger once, if it makes sense and you see the care and understanding of the characters, but sadly here it felt like no one cared. Like for example honestly if someone asked me what would you choose "watching wu xie and xiao ge but not 100% sticking to the plot" or "loosely watching the plot, but it's not wu xie and xiao ge", I'm gonna pick the first option.

And some will say that's it's only the writers/directors mistakes for not explaining or guiding actors etc, but to be honest it's not completely true, bc as we know many actors if they really care before taking on the role actually try to do a research about the character and read the material to understand what they're playing. Especially if it's such iconic characters of a franchise Сhina's been going crazy over for like a decade.

Like how the hell happened that Zhu Yilong for example while playing embodied all the Wu Xie's traits througout the whole book series from behaving exactly like young Wu Xie did in certain needed parts to going to the cold, strategic and rational old self in others, I mean, they could've just go with the "Restart" one, where not much happens and he could've played just that. But literally each time he did something, I was like "yeah, that's my boo". And that wasn't the part of this exact book, it was part of Wu Xie. Like the way he behaved, acted in some previous situations that you know its him. That's happening only when the actor knows who he's portraying.

Or Yuliang knowing and loving and feeling the character he plays, because he wanted to know and cared.

It's just strange to me, bc if they're not making it for the fans, then for whom do they even make it? For themselves? It's really stupid no matter how you look at it. Like your success depends on it, so what's the point in sinking your own ship I will never get.

I also do not get how could they just fail literally everything. Like casting was a miss already, but good acting and chemistry and putting character's soul in it could've make it great still, but they have literally none of anything, it's just fascinating to me. I just don't think I ever seen something like that, it's kinda funny.

But this is like once again just my opinion. Like everyone is free to think what they think, but maybe just stop yelling "OOC" without knowing the original character, cause maybe it's not really OOC. Like book Xiao Ge is not exactly what many ppl claim him to be really.

[2ndblogg]

Hey! Just read your hot take on novel!wangxian and I absolutely agree. I'm gonna have to say here that I believe it boils down to the fetishization of homosexual men in a lot of the fandom culture that surrounds mlm shipping, as you said it's a space for a lot of women to experiment with their desires and whatnot, but I think therein lies the breaking points between reading novel!wangxian as a good, healthy relationship vs. reading it as a very flawed and toxic one. As an LGBT person, reading the way the author dealt with their relationship made me extremely uncomfortable, it just really feels like something that is written by someone who is more invested in using her queer characters for satisfying her and her reader's own pleasure than a well-built, strong relationship between two characters. Not to take away from the novel in some other aspects, I believe that novel!wwx is a much better, much more nuanced character than what he is in cql, but when it comes to wangxian, I think the intentions are very different for each of them. To each their own, I guess, but I do find it very troubling that some people in the fandom have a really hard time admitting that novel wangxian is not even remotely healthy.

Absolutely.

And can I just say how glad it makes me to see that not everyone is praising this book for it’s lgbt representation...

But I guess that’s also why I just occasionally feel the need to scream my frustrations into the void or try to make sense of the novel.

And why I try to be understanding and accepting of people’s opinion of the novel and not take it ‘personally’ (in the sense of sitting there thinking “holy shit this is how they view ME, this is what they think of ME” etc).

I was in fandoms back when they were really a place dominated by straight (homophobic) women and realism or lgbt representation wasn’t on anyone’s mind (and the occasional dude butting in to say that’s not how sex works or bottoming is experienced was ignored or told to get out). I experienced this change to fandoms being more of a lgbt space, of people becoming aware that media can shape your views of groups of people, of people becoming aware of their fetishizing of fictional gays vs. their prejudice against real life lgbt people etc.

And tbh MXTX just writes like one of those, she writes wangxian like everyone wrote their gay relationships around 2005 and earlier; clear power imbalance, clear roles and attributes that are divided into ‘manly’ and ‘feminine’, certain physical attributes (like the female self insert character aka the bottom being pretty and slight and weaker and shorter), men/the penetrating partner can’t really be raped so anything the woman/bottom tries isn’t really ‘bad’, the male love interest is forceful and self centered but ONLY because he’s so in love and since he’s emotionally stunted he has to express that through sex, men/tops NEED sex and it’s rude/mean to deny them that, the girl/bottom isn’t THAT horny or in charge of their own sexuality but wants to please their partner and what they really get out of it is the emotional aspect, decisions need to be made for them because the dude/top just knows better, the girl/bottom is childish and flirty and the guy/top suffers through it until he finally snaps and shows the girl/bottom who'sboss etc etc. (honestly homophobia and misogyny is so tightly knit in this kind of fiction, if it wasn’t so frustrating it would be very interesting).

Tbh I disagree with novel!wwx being more nuanced (despite a lot of ppl whose opinions I really respect also feeling this way), because I simply cannot seperate him from the wangxian relationship. All I see are tropes and stereotypes applied to make him ‘work’ in the context of the wangxian relationship instead of an actual personality...

To me, in CQL WWX is clearly the main character and you love his interactions with LWJ and want more of them and value them, wheras in the novel most of the time WWX plays second fiddle even when a scene should technically be about him and LWJ’s presence is incredibly suffocating, because he’s always being controlling or at the very least influencing WWX.

I also don’t feel like WWX has much of a character arc/growth. We’re essentially told he had one but the only thing that really actually changes is him hating himself a bit more and letting LWJ smash..., and I guess: he’s less independent than ever, he’s more isolated that ever...

I’ve called novel!wangxian a relationship between an abuser and his victim, because you can find evidence of that in the text. Not because I think the author wanted to portray an unhealthy gay relationship. Like you said, she was fetishizing and wrote for a similar crowd. But to me that ‘realization’ helped...I still don’t see how people can call it a masterpiece but I can at least understand hyping something you like up...

And like, badly written gay relationship or not; gay/straight,man/women, I see how people can find it hot. Exploring your sexuality through fictional characters isn’t necessarily a strictly straight girl phenomena. I probably have read fic that was exactly like this, I can’t judge anyone for it. But no one prints out the last PWP they read and goes, “this is ideal lgbt representation and nothing will ever be this good, the fact that it includes rape makes it so realistic” like????

(Is that part or an effect of the woke and purety culture? you can’t say ‘i like this book but it has flaws’ or ‘i’ve enjoyed this but it’s not up the feminism or lgbt acceptance that i preach/live’ so you have to pretend it’s flawless?)

And like, I do think novel!wangxian is a nightmare when it comes to lgbt representation and I do believe this is largely due to a cishet woman writing about gay men and fetishizing them (the fact that a lot of peoples arguments why novel!wangxian ‘is better’ boils down to ‘there’s kissing and sex’ is also pretty telling). And I am frightend and worried by some peoples response to it.

But is it really fair to see it as just that? It’s a problem sure, but that same thing happens in straight media (which I am admittedly not well versed in). Stephanie Meyer didn’t set out to write Edward Cullen to be a creep and non of the teenage girls that went crazy over him viewed it as such...Reylo fans (aside from some of them proclaiming Finn to be the real villain and saying it’s racist and misogynistic to not find Kylo Ren hot) found a way to view him threatening her as romantic and sexy, Loki fans that didn’t ship him with Thor usually fell into the camp of “he would be a perfect boyfriend” or “what if this OFC was his slave and he raped her everyday <3″... like ignoring/glorifying/romanticizing behaviours or exploring what kinks you might have through the safety of fictional characters and fictional settings isn’t JUST happening when it comes to ‘the gays’...

And not just specifically in fandom spaces either, a lot of ‘romantic’ movies include inappropriate touching, the boy/guy knowing better than the girl what she wants etc. And I absolutely do believe that that’s something that normalized these things for a lot of young girls and guys (I don’t want to get into this too much, I’ve really seen a change in the past few years, but before that it was pretty common for young boys to believe they need to keep pursuing and pressuring a girl that has said no, girls truly thought boys could die of blue balls, girls thought it was their duty as good girlfriends to let their boyfriends fuck them even when they weren’t in the mood, that they couldn’t talk about what they want in bed or what they don’t find enjoyable because ‘sex is for boys and girls get a relationship in exchange’ etc.).

And in much the same way movies have only relatively recently begun being called out for that, it’s also still pretty recently that they’re being called out for having their one queer coded character be a pedophile and a murder or whatever...Like, society as a whole becoming aware of these issues.

But do authors that publish their work with a specific target audience in mind have a responsibility to think about the effect it might have on them? (And I can already hear loud screams of ‘no way, it’s not your fault if your audience isn’t smart enough to understand that this bad thing is bad’, but I actually do believe in a way they do. That doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t write whatever you want, just maybe take a look at HOW you bring your point across. (We do KNOW people are influenced by what propaganda they’re consistantly fed. I mean, you wouldn’t write a pro-drugs childrens book...) )

What if the author isn’t aware of their bias and prejudices? Or their target audience isn’t their actual audience?

And do we, society and media, judge female and male authors differently when it comes to romance and sex in fiction? (The answer is yes btw) But also, where do we draw the line at calling something ‘badly written’ and calling it toxic? Can it be both? As I’ve said before, a lot of people claim that only the physical intimacy scenes of novel!wangxian are bad, because they’re badly written and OOC, some say the book as amazingly written and only the wangxian relationship is bad because the author doesn’t know how to write gay men. In my ‘hot take’ I essentially said that’s not necessarily bad writing so much as it’s simply an (okay, unintentional) toxic relationship. And would this relationship still come across as toxic (or badly written, whichever you want) if we didn’t know the author to be a cishet woman? Or if a gay man had written it? (my personal, eloquent answer for this is: yes, but differently.)

Which was really all just a rambly way to get to my point of: it’s not just fetishizing of gay men, it’s also the homophobia and self-inserting in a safe situation.

You can literally replace WWX in the novel with a female character and it wouldn’t change a thing. The author takes such an effort into building up this power imbalance in every aspect of their life that if WWX were a heroine nothing would change in this (sexist/ancient society) setting.

(And clearly this is something that appeals to people if you look at the amount of female!WWX fics...)

Not even the sex scenes. There are maybe two allusions in all of them combined that WWX might also have a dick but like, you can’t be sure and it sure as hell doesn’t need stimulation.

(and again, that could be written as a kink...but it’s just not.)

CQL is a gay love story. MDZS at it’s core is none of that.

But I also very much agree with your ‘to each their own’, like here I am criticizing and trying to find explanations and whatever, but at the end of the day it doesn’t matter why someone might like (or write) a book like this, I vastly prefer CQL!wangxian but people have their own reasons for not doing so.

The ‘problem’ really only lies in, as you said, people not being able to accept that it’s not a healthy relationship. Or claiming it to be perfect lgbt rep.

And because my brain can’t shut up today:

I also can’t stop thinking that the way some people ‘glorify’ the book as due to their age and ‘inexperience’.

When I was a pretty young kid and got into fanfiction, there was nothing but completely OOC!whump to be found in the first two fandoms I was in. And I loved it. It was YEARS later that I thought I might like to read something with the characters being...in character. What I’m trying to say, in different stages and phases of your life you might enjoy different things, for different reasons...and obviously, in that moment, you won’t think about ‘what appeals to me here/should this appeal to me/etc’.

I don’t mean inexperience as ‘sexual inexperience’ here, though of course that could be part of it, but also like, inexperience with this genre (is this the first book like this you read, or did you just read 50 in a row that all had the same unhealthy vibes?), with lgbt people and issues (do you know any lgbt people or is your only image of them either the cute boy you can’t have and don’t want to see with another girl or grown men in full kink gear in front of children during CSD? and also: do you think ‘i like this’ and that’s the end of it or do you notice how many people idolize this objectively unhealthy relationship and won’t allow critique on it...)  

I...just wanted to say thanks really.

I just can’t stop rambling apparently and I know I mostly just repeated what you said or what I already said but in longer... I just really do feel very strongly about novel!wangxian and the perception of them and have actually at times felt very personally...worried/affected, by people’s acceptance and love of them and I just... have to try and make sense of it...

[somewhereinchaos]

How I Run My Blog!

Speed. i sometimes do nothing and sometimes just spam replies (bc idk what a queue is) it really depends on my mood and if i’m busy or not. buuut im always lurking on this blog.

Replies. i format my posts but it’s nothing crazy. it’s mostly just small text, some color, bold & italic. and i love using icons! without them my replies feel empty?? icons just make things more... spicy?? but i don’t mind if my partner doesn’t use them.  i like both long and short threads. sometimes one-liners are really fun too even tho i don’t think they usually?? go anywhere?? i try to match my partner’s reply!

Starters. im trying so hard to get better at starters. i don’t think im that bad at writing them.. buut i feel like i could be a bit better u know. i really love inbox memes/starters too! and my mutuals can always write me starters, u don’t even need to ask ilu. 

Inbox. always open for anons and muses! i’m here to answer ooc questions too and i just.. rly like getting asks?? so please throw ur muse at me anytime. (i currently have things in my inbox so im a bit slow atm but i’m always accepting more!!)

Selectivity. semi-selective and mutuals only. i answer asks from non-mutuals but please don’t send me starters if i’m not following you.

Wishlist. i can’t stop thinking about shadow making bead bracelets.. anyway. i really like. angst. hurt shadow or let shadow destroy ur muse. IDK. make shadow SO ANGRY he just chaos blasts. and consider.. shadow sobbing loudly while ur muse tries to comfort him. uhhhh and what if ur muse accidentally sees shadow without his gloves. monster hands :)

Honest Note. i like to plot?? and i always want shadow to meet new ppl (even tho he’s.. not very friendly.) also please keep in mind i’m very friendly even tho i rp this mean boi. i don’t want to seem intimidating bc im not!! i’m baby i swear.

[reasonablespeculation]

submission re: EB & more anon reviews below

I thought maybe I can give my review of endings, beginnings that nobody asked for because well I'm seeing so many biased reviews on twitter of ppl who already decided they hated it before watching it.

Starting off, I would like to say that I expected it to be much more worse than it actually is based on all the exaggerated reactions to the clips and some of the shitty reviews.

Style - I have personally always liked drake's style. Dialogue playing over their body language enforces the idea that what they say is something and what they want to do is something else specially in the bar scene between Frank and daphne. I loved the colour palette used, although it's a bit too dark at times and I ended up watching my own reflection at the screen lmfao. I don't mind jump cuts but the jump cuts at the very beginning were too much.

Dialogue - I'm not a fan of completely improvised dialogues. I prefer a script to be pinned down and the actors are given the freedom to add or take from it. The dialogue is lacking for a movie! But if we compare it to real life it's very realistic and I assume this is what drake was aiming at yet this made the film lose its cinema charm.

Actors - I feel like everyone did absolutely great with what they were given. The process shailene described seems like hell for an actor, going into the scene and saying whatever and expecting the other to say whatever and you have to respond on the spot. Frank and Jack's characters were one dimensional because I assumed they are seen through daphne's eyes and she is not interested in them beyond what they can give her (one gives her security while the other gives her passion). Daphne's character is annoying yet you can clearly tell that was the purpose. She's messy, she makes dumb decisions, she craves to be wanted yet claims she wants to stay away from men, her self righteousness when she saw Frank doing coke shows utter contradictions with her own messiness. I felt like there are a lot of ppl who can resonate with her...she's not your typical heroin. Regarding frank, I felt like he was initially even more one dimensional than what was seen on the screen, but sebastian gave him more character. The last dialogue in the diner felt very real and it made me sad. His chemistry with daphne is one of the things I found to be very real too, when he stared at her during that game It felt so intimate that I wanted to look away and give them some privacy (a choice bart didn't have)

Sex scenes - fans have really exaggerated the sex scenes in the movie because in all honesty for a romantic drama 4 sex scenes is not much and they are not long either or too raunchy. You can tell frank and daphne are very attracted to each other which made the intimacy in the scenes super real and had the viewer squirm in their seat feeling weird for watching it. I'm used to sex scenes being very theatrical in American cinema and that often makes them lose the intimacy required for the scene to be considered "hot" much like fifty shades with it's cold approach to sex and nudity.

Ending - I liked how none of the men tried to chase her to the ends of the world, its realistic and if this was real life all of us would be saying they can do better. Drake didn't exaggerate the love stories and he kind of deployed these relationships as self exploration rather than love. What I hated is how she magically went through character development as she got pregnant (this is such a Male perspective that it made me annoyed) I get how he's trying to promote self love but it just didn't resonate with me because it was associated with pregnancy (yet another person to love and be loved by) her journey towards self love should have started solo and I found it incredibly unrealistic for her to not want to know who the father is and even more unrealistic that none of them demanded to know. No one can live their lives knowing their kid must be out there, even if they don't want kids. And it was so ooc of Jack to say "oh that's great" when she told him she's pregnant and he thought it's his because he clearly stated so many times he doesn't want kids.

Overall I liked the movie, its chill, its decent, and it's not cringey it just has a narrow view of what its trying to prove. It's not a movie you can't take your eyes off of when watching but it's one you are interested to know what happens at the end. Many seb fans expect too much after itonya that they are now criticising sebastian's filmography as if opportunities like itonya happen every day and are just waiting for him to hop on. It's much more complicated than that. Endingsbeginnings is a decent movie, we're just looking too much into it because seb is in it.

RS: I agree with you, great review.

anon1: I j watched eb and I still have no idea what happened to frank where did he go - ghosted, bb. went and had more wild adventures and totally ignored Daphne trying to get in touch.

anon2: I remember fans saying there's a sex scene that lasts 20 min in the movie and clearly there was not, which is one example of people exaggerating the hell out of everything about this movie including how bad it is. Shailene mentioned that they shot a 20 minutes long TAKE of the floor sex scene and drake ended up choosing the bits he wanted - yeah I’ve seen a few reviews from other people on tumblr and the reviews Drake is posting in his stories and nobody has any goddamn chill. it’s either the most heartbreaking movie they’ve ever seen (??????) and dug deep into their psyche and replaced the need for a therapist for the next ten years OR it literally came into their home and called their mom a wh*re and stole their cat and peed on their favourite pair of jeans. LIKE?

anon3: So, I still can’t figure out why Seb, Sha, and Jamie were like, kissing the ground Drake walks on because of how great a director he is. While I didn’t thing E,B was awful, nothing about the style or direction of this film makes me want to see any other of his work? I didn’t think it was that profound and found that his writing (especially Daphne’s character) wasn’t that great 🤷🏻‍♀️ maybe I’m just uncultured lmao - I feel like Drake had a big hit with Like Crazy and has been riding that reputation into the sunset

anon4: Watched the movie. Frank is a pathetic guy with no morals and a very low self-esteem. Shailene acting is painful to watch. The plot is prosaic and inane, the characters are unconvincing and the dialogues are dull.

anon5: I agree that the film didnt have a lot to say. Also i didnt hate Daphne like i thought i would and definitely related to her struggles & sadness. But really, apart from Seb the movie didnt make me feel anything much like you. Which is okay i guess if you're into that sorta thing. Also, did anybody else get the feeling she only really wanted Frank but was with Jack cos she didnt wanna be alone? - yeah for sure

anon6: I am somewhat confused about the film's premise. Was Daphne always so messy and the assault was just a catalyst for her or is she simply dealing with the trauma of being assaulted? The film does suggest the former with the mommy&Daphne cuts, but i am not entirely sold on that. And i fail to see how being *thatbigtwist* helps with her self-loathing? Whats happening there? - I agree with you that it seems like the former... but maybe with the assault kinda kicking off the latest round of messiness and exacerbating certain negative habits in she was dealing with people? Andddd idk... magical healing pregnancy trope?

[sternenteile]

★*･ lovely ooc meme.

TAGGED BY:  y’all i stole it from multiple ppl on my dash TAGGING:  idk just take it from me and let the thief train continue

NAME:  nikki NICKNAME:  nikkibun, bun, assturd AGE:  26 weeps......... FACE CLAIM:  my bunsona!! my bunsona’s icons are so old and crusty tho so i’ve just. been using geno’s. rip. PRONOUNS:  she / her, but they / them is fine, too! HEIGHT:  5′3″ i am berry tinie BIRTHDAY:  april 4th

AESTHETIC:  cute animals (namely bunnies and cats), a basic n64 with a purple controller, pastels, piles of tasty chicken wings, and. and. more terribly charismatic buns.

LAST SONG YOU LISTENED TO:  y’all listen the lavender town theme from pokemon lgpe is absolutely destroying me and it was absolutely the last thing i listened to. i love it.

FAVORITE MUSE ( S ) YOU’VE WRITTEN:  my boy papyrus ( @outbraves ) was easily one of my favorites ever. i just had... so much fun with him and had a lot of development for him, and just. i have such fond memories of rping him. i love my bone boy, even though his muse has long gone.

tbh, tho? geno is climbing up there, too. in so short a time, i’ve already got so many ideas and so much development plotting going on. given how expansive the mario universe is, too (esp. compared to undertale’s), there is just... so much room for different things to do with him?! i’m really excited. the potential is bananas.

WHAT INSPIRED YOU TO TAKE ON YOUR CURRENT MUSE ( THAT YOU ARE POSTING THIS ON ):  ok i’m not going to lie. this is a bit of a story, and it starts off in a very interesting way. at first, i actually... didn’t really give a single floppy titty for geno? seriously. i didn’t care. i played smrpg and i just fell for mallow that much more. i was like, gee, i wonder what people see in him. he’s cool and cute, but mallow has all this development and stuff! basically, based on my memories of smrpg and how ‘overrated’ i felt he was, i just didn’t really give geno much of a chance.

now, rosalina is my favorite mario character. ever. i used to rp her a long time ago. i absolutely adore her. thanks to smash speculation really bringing geno to the forefront of peoples’ minds again, i was like, huh. i wonder what kind of lore could come from her and geno? a lot of stuff i saw was implicating ship stuff, and i was... not impressed LMAO. i was like, naw, i see them being like mother and son. he’s a star spirit, after all, very similar to a luma. she’d totally be his superior + mom figure.

and then i started headcanoning more between them, which... via causation, started the headcanon train going for geno in general? i was like, no, i’m not going to get attached to this dumb doll, he’s overrated, blah blah. then i started thinking of him more, started doodling him, seeing why people liked him so much, and i was like... fuck. shit. damn. i used to have a weird disdain for you, you fuck puppet, why are you wiggling your way into my heart. no. get out.

needless to say, he didn’t get out, and i had to unleash my creativity with him. i missed rping, too, and i was like... this, this will do. voila. here we are.

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE ASPECTS OF YOUR CURRENT MUSE:  where do i even begin omg... ok. let’s see.

first, his design in general is just? really great. he’s a design that fits in the mario universe while also feeling so unlike it. mallow feels more integrated, yet geno feels... so... otherworldly? so different? his design philosophy hinges on round, soft familiarity while also being colorful, complimentarily so, and encapsulating it in a way that comes off as both cute and mysterious. i just love his design. even in all of my disdain for him initially, i’m pretty sure i always liked his design.

with that shallower bit out of the way, let me tell you about the virtues this boi has that i love (or, at least, in terms of my version, most of it not being canon oops). i love how courageous and forward he is, even if at times, it results in some fumbling. he’s fascinated in the world around him and has an innate desire to explore, to experiment, to experience. he gets pretty into it, but it does result in some very silly moments where his cultural differences play a large factor. he’s so distant from the modern world in a lot of ways, and it shows. between this and his curious nature, he’s just... god, he’s just a dork. he’s just a huge dork.

but boy, his vices. he doesn’t have much of... any at all in canon, but it’s clear how attached to his duty he is, even in what little we see. building flaws off of that has been a blast. i love how he feels so tied to his purpose that he feels branching out isn’t an option, yet it conflicts with his desire to break free and just be. he’s still figuring out how to be his own person, how to be geno and not just ♡♪!?, the protector of star road. even then, he’s trying not to fail his most precious person, rosalina, and those who depend on him. it’s a lot of conflict that pulls his heart in a lot of directions at once. chances are that he’ll progress and then harshly regress multiple times, going through a bunch of shit before he finally manages to find a happy medium. it’ll be a long road ahead, and what can stem from this has me soooo excited.

also he’s just rly cute. did i mention he’s cute? he’s so cute. he’s literally a doll and i need to cuddle him.

WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST INSPIRATION WHEN IT COMES TO WRITING:  honestly? steven universe and undertale have played huge inspiration into the way i write. undertale is obviously because i love it (and deltarune) and have written a muse from it. it’s just kind of integrated into my writing to the point that it feels natural. it’s... it’s something that’s just there now, lmao.

steven universe, however, is more particular. it hasn’t really influenced how i write in general, per se, but some aspects have inspired my geno, actually. garnet’s cool demeanor with inner conflict and a goofiness that she often shows? yeah, that definitely inspired a good chunk of my geno’s exterior personality. 

in terms of his inner self, those bits of garnet, plus the pearl + rose and steven + rose conflicts, pretty much shaped that up in my head. pearl + rose on its base level minus the romantic aspect definitely touches stone on how geno feels about his duty, his dedication to rosalina, and how he’s trying to become his own person, not just a star spirit in servitude. steven + rose more represents the mother + son aspect, the way geno wants to live up to her and what she wants, the way he views her as a parental figure that’s just unattainable (even if in a more figurative sense than steven and rose). there’s also a tiny, tiny bit of lapis in there, solely the tendency to flip a switch and bail if he thinks it’s best, just for less selfish reasons and more dutiful reasons. it’s. it’s very minuscule and very base-level, but it’s there.

in terms of geno himself, those two have to be my biggest inspirations at this point. ye.

FAVORITE TYPES OF THREADS:  god. anything is great, but these two are especially important:

slice-of-life. given geno’s distance from earth traditions, customs, and general livelihood, slice-of-life threads are immediately that much more interesting and even a bit crazy. being able to show how much of a curious little nerd he is and Hecking Things Up is always a good time.

finally, anything that draws out his insecurities. something that conflicts with his view on his purpose in life, that stirs his longing for parental recognition, that turns his beliefs on their heads... things like that. just. yes. gimme that.

BIGGEST STRUGGLE IN REGARDS TO YOUR CURRENT MUSE:  honestly, the fact that he’s such an old character that nintendo and square doesn’t care for is easily the worst part of playing him. it’s rough knowing that, even with all of the fan demand, he’ll likely never get a revival. he’ll just fade out of a lot of peoples’ memories more and more, and he’ll be even more irrelevant than ever. every time someone so much as knows who geno is, it just makes me giddy. i want that to stay alive, even if nintendo and square won’t do anything with him. the fan base keeping him going makes me feel so warm.

[sitabethel]

Hi I was wondering if you could explain the appeal of deathshipping to me. I don't understand that ship (it seems to me that yams Mark just wants to kill people and I don't know how I feel about you having feelings for him).I want to know why its so popular and why so many people ship it. I am into thiefshipping tho(mostly because of ygotas lol). Thanks so much!!

I can’t speak for why *every* deathshipper likes the pairing, but I can go into a few of the reasons why *I personally* like it. Oh boy, this is going to be long, so it’s going to go under a cut…

The Ryou side of Deathshipping: So when I first got into the fandom (2012-ish?) the vast majority of Ryou-paired fics had Ryou-crying-often hurt/physically abused-victim of non-con acts/abuse And not only did I hate these fics but they seemed so … ooc. I read the manga, but I didn’t see the anime, so scenes like Ryou getting attacked in the church, and Tristan tossing the Ring (only for it to come back on its own) weren’t part of the ygo reality that I knew existed until later, so it was honestly confused why ppl wrote him as such a weak victim. Ryou is a strong character. We know this, because people who aren’t strong that put on the Ring catch fire (Pegasus watched this happen right before he got the Eye). So one part of the appeal of Deathshipping is that Ryou is so strong, so clever, so capable, and such a horror-nerd that he sees this crazy monster character and is just like… aaaaaaw. In a good Deathship fic, Ryou uses his cleverness (and kindness) to always stay a step ahead of trouble. He’s capable and empowered instead of weak and victimized. 

Also, the whole seme/uke relationship dynamics of older fanfiction often plays out like a cis-het, abusive male in a relationship with a cis-het, victim female (although both characters are actually male, the “ukes” often read like badly 2-D female characters). And in them, it’s like the uke never gets to *enjoy sex* (hence the non-con). There’s this weird notion of “bad men like the “yamis” have raging sex drives and *need* sex, but if you’re a good “hikari” character and nice, then heaven forbid you do any of that uncouth sex stuff unless pressured into it, forced into it, or roped into it under inaccurate notions of “but he loves me so I guess I have to”. 

And this concept offends me. Women have sex drives. Nice people have sex drives. Kind, loving, caring people have sex drives. Even *gasp* some Aces have sex drives (they might lack sexual attraction, but that doesn’t mean some aces don’t feel erotic desire). So, going back to deathshipping, Ryou was getting portrayed as this sexless, uke character, and it’s just nice to write him as not only strong, clever, and kind, but as someone with all these good qualities who also has a sex drive, enjoys sex, and even *double gasps* initiates the sex instead of waiting on the more aggressive character to do it for him! (*side note: this is not to say that Ryou *has to have* a sex drive or sexual attraction. Ace!Ryou headcanons are awesome. I’m just talking about what I have fun writing when dealing with Ryou’s character). 

The Yami Marik Side of Deathshipping: First, I think it’s important to note that in canon, Yami Marik is not a full person/human. He’s not even a fully developed alter ego. Yami Marik is a Emotional Part Fragment of Marik’s disassociation disorder. His purpose is the hold the memory of the initiation, and to hold/process things like pain/anger. Why is this important?Because it means Yami Marik’s character has the ability to quickly grow/change in ways that other characters wouldn’t. I mean, obviously a fic can use Yami Marik as the antagonist and keep him in a simplified, angry state that just wants to murder/hurt things, but most of the times in deathshipping the author asks, well what would happen if he became fully human? What would happen if this Fragment ended up in a full body without a host ego to feed it commands? How does he process the past trauma? How does he move forward and grow as an individual? How does he connect with other people? What type of a person *could he* become? Even in shared body fics, Emotional Parts can evolve into more complete personalities, so the potential for character growth is still there. 

I mentioned this in author notes before, but I still like to apply the Soggy Potato Chip theory to Yami Marik (a child wants to eat a crispy potato chip, but will eat a soggy one if it’s the only way he can get a chip at all. Likewise, children want positive attention/interactions, but if they can’t have any, they will behave badly to get *any* (even negative) sort of attention/interactions.) Yami Marik has *only known* soggy potato chips. Poor thing doesn’t even know they come in crispy- Ryou becomes his first experience with a real chip (positive human interaction). Again, it’s about development and growth. 

Basically, is the human soul capable of growing/healing even after extreme abuse/trauma?  I know deathshipping is a relationship, but the underlying themes are usually (at least in my fics) about trauma recovery. Yami Marik trying to recover from Marik’s childhood. Ryou trying to recover from the death of his mom/sister, the neglect of his father, the spiritual wear of being the Host of the Ring. They’re both complex characters that have been through a great deal of emotional trauma, so it’s nice to see them play off each other in a relationship while both growing and becoming better people on their own and as a couple. *That* is the appeal of deathshipping for me. 

In conclusion, giving Yami Marik a puppy in Creepy Hide & Seek was the greatest thing I ever did, um, I mean- I hope this has given you some insight into why some ppl like the ship- it’s because it describes the characters as complex human beings capable of moving beyond their pasts and growing/thriving. Ryou isn’t a 2D “perfect” goody goody. Yami Marik is redeemable despite past mistakes. There’s potential for their character dynamics to play nicely off each other in a relationship, and that sometimes includes (because it’s a romantic relationship) healthy exploration of sex, and sometimes it just includes  simply establishing an empathy bond with another person.