#i got a whole ton of these kinds of drawings that i never posted lol

[zakura-ss]

Butler mas

[ryuichirou]

I apologize if it is too personal but how do you deal with "antishipper" and the way they make callout posts and harassment campaigns against you ? It’s legitimately so scary and it makes me hesitant of posting my own art

Anon! I am very sorry you are going through this horrible feeling of hesitation and anxiety; knowing that people get targeted like that could not only stop you from posting, but stop you from creating altogether, and this is the worst part about this whole thing.

It’s not too personal, and I don’t mind talking about it at all. I’ve talked about our position and our relationship with fandom policing a bunch of times already, so I’m sorry if I’m repeating myself.

I used to be worried about posting certain stuff too. Well, when I was a teen/in my early 20s I wasn’t worried about anything: we had so much juicy stuff posted here lol But then the nsfw ban happened, and the social climate of this app and internet in general started shifting, the first stories about people driven to end their lives because of the hate they received started to come out, and we stopped posting completely. It wasn’t a huge loss to us back then, and this situation wasn’t the only reason why we stopped, but still, it clearly became much more difficult to just appear out of nowhere, throw problematic stuff in your blog and run away again.

I vividly remember us wanting to post my Shingeki no Kyojin drawings and comics based on our AUs and stuff, but not knowing what to do with Ereri – there was no way for us to be “unproblematic” (which was never a concern to us, we just didn’t want to get tons of hate lol) and still post Eren with a man twice his age. So we started posting them without a tag, starting with a drawing that wasn’t too shippy, and then miraculously the world didn’t end. That made us bolder, and we started to post them openly, and posted them for almost two years pretty regularly, alongside some of our other problematic ships + problematic themes. Of course we did get hate, we got a lot of hate while we were posting SnK stuff from all kinds of people, but what we also got a lot of people who found our content refreshing and interesting, even if it was weird and uncomfortable at times.

We weren’t the only people who shipped Ereri (let’s ignore my petty thoughts about the difference between Ereri and Rivaere for now), and we weren’t the only people in Twst fandom who liked Shroudcest, which is another ship that we were super hesitant about posting or even mentioning at first. But with all the hate around I was so certain the world was going to end the moment we post them, and that didn’t happen. The end of the world never happens, but what does happen is that people either get introduced to a fun new dynamic and get invested, or get happy that someone finally posts for the ship they were too afraid to post for. Somehow, when you see some other person being ballsy, you don’t feel as scared anymore – it happened to us with other people’s posts too. Yes, I still say this even though it spawns a bunch of callout posts and harassment, as it did with us. Were we cancelled? Yeah, somewhat. There’s so much you can say about an acc that states “problematic stuff, 18+”, right? I was super relieved and happy, actually, that a lot of people left/blocked us just because they’re the people I’d never want to interact with my art.

I’ve been yapping for a long time already lol so I’ll give you some pieces of advice instead… These are things that legitimately help us.

Surround yourself with people who support you – if not you personally, then at least your ideas (i.e. other proshippers). Luckily, nowadays it’s easier to find them… But also, having a friend who you can vent about these things to helps a lot! It’s cheesy but it’s a fact: when you’re not alone, it’s not as scary.

Always ignore comments/asks from antis and block them on sight, block anonymous asks too. Even if you really want to sass them, it’s much more effective to ignore them: when you give them attention, it invites more engagement from them.

Block people you get bad vibes from. Block those who like or comment bad takes or support harassment of others, block all of their alt accounts. It’s tedious and takes time, but it really helps to keep you hidden from them, at least to some degree. I look up Shroudcest sometimes just to block new people. They try to make fun of me for that, but who cares if it works? You can’t block everyone, but these people usually flock together and it’s usually just a bunch of friends, so taking several posts on these topics from people from the fandom and blocking everyone involved will obliterate the majority of harassers.

In terms of your safety, having multiple accounts in case you main one gets mass-reported helps + I would advice to keep irl stuff away from your fandom stuff just in case.

This is going to sound stupid, but please keep in mind that this isn’t about you. These people are very miserable and not very smart. Even if they try to paint you like a bad person, they don’t know anything about you, so don’t let their judgment affect how you feel about yourself. This is exactly what they want – to have power over you.

Stay strong and take care of yourself, i.e. lock your acc and/or take a break if you feel overwhelmed. Don’t worry, it will pass: it’s very rare for these clowns to keep focus on one person for a long period of time; they have like 5 different dramas per day. There are some absolutely batshit crazy rapid assholes who won’t leave an artist alone for years, but those are super rare and special cases altogether, I don’t think you need to be worried about those.

Keep in mind which fandom you want to do this with, btw. It’s usually okay for the most part, but if the fandom is just a bunch of kids, it’s more likely not worth it or deserves an empty account, at least. Twst is surprisingly good despite anything it might look like! Thanks to Yana being a shotacon and a creator of Kuroshitsuji, I guess. There are many great and supportive people in the twst fandom, it’s been a pleasure to be here, even though, once again, it’s the first fandom where I got a bunch of callout posts and nasty stuff in my ask (SnK fandom usually harassed me for other things).

TL;DR: it is scary, and you could easily get callout posts about yourself, but guess what, you also get to be yourself. Because realistically, callout posts can’t stop you from creating art. They want you to believe that they have power over you, but this isn’t true. Your life online won’t end after some random callout post – mine didn’t. They also don’t understand that each consequent callout post affects the person being called out even less. We do have a minor panic attack for the first hour or so, and it does involve more extra blocking, but mostly it just sours our mood for the day and drops our morale. I still draw, though, out of spite a little lol Oh, and do try to report these types of posts if you get them, there’s nothing wrong with that.

People had been persecuted for their art and ideas for centuries, so what happens now is really nothing new. Without diving into specifics, there are way worse things they could do than writing callouts, but they aren’t super likely to do those. Luckily.

Take care of yourself, but also please don’t doubt yourself; when it comes to your art being way too fun for lovers of censorship to handle, you’re in a very good company. I’m referring to all the artist and writers of this world btw and not just me and Katsu lol but us as well!

[gemapples]

see you in 2024 💗💗

very personal ramble about my year and experiences, etc. under the cut. kind of neg just a warning but if anyone would be willing to read it the whole way through i'd appreciate it so so much

2023 was certainly... a year for me. had many highs but a Ton of lows, went forward one step but took two steps back. i'd be lying if i said i didnt struggle and know what to do for a lot of it

i did get to meet and even become friends with people i look up to, got to learn new things i didn't know before. and one of the problems i noticed throughout this year is i spent way more time than i needed to focusing on my usefulness for others and what i can do for people rather than prioritizing myself and my mental health. i think a lot of problems i experienced in 2023 was due to me getting too caught up in how i'm perceived by others (especially on social media like tumblr). for 2024 i want to work on this and be sure to put myself first in every situation and be the best person i see myself as -- not overdo it for the sake of others. i'm going to try being more straightforward with myself and how i choose to approach people. i want to be more involved in this fandom and get to know more people who love kirby better rather than just hiding away and watching from the side like i have for many years, waiting for them to approach me first at some point. i made a lot of progress on this a lot in 2023 but i could always be better :')

regardless though, i wouldn't have been nearly as ready to get back on track if it weren't for the support you all have given me throughout this year. august and september were two of the worst months i've ever experienced; i won't get into it (if you know you know), but goddd was it harder than i can even describe. i've never had to go through something that resulted in me questioning my Entire artistic ability, my whole worth, and whether everything i've grown and learned from is just completely fake. i couldn't look at my work and all of my social medias without being completely disgusted and disappointed with myself. i'm in art student too, so you can imagine how fucking hard it was to balance and muscle through that as well lol. it was nothing but hell. if i didn't get the support i did from everyone, i can say with full confidence i wouldn't have been able to pick up my pencil phone and get back to drawing Nearly as quickly as i did. in fact, i probably would still be deeply effected by it and not have the motivation to continue posting for at least a long while. so i seriously can't thank you enough for that. all the words i was told still stick with me to this day and gave me a reason to keep pushing and learn to better understand myself

im tearing up as i write this so i'll have to cut it short LOL but i want to express how deeply it means to me that through all the conflict i've experienced throughout this year, you guys were there for me and were so generous to offer your time to support me and help me out. knowing i make at least one person smile and enjoy what i post is enough for me. hopefully 2024 will be easier on the emotional rollercoasters, i think all of us could use a long break from chaos really lol

thanks for everything and i love you

-mac

[lil-tachyon]

Yo! Whats one thing you love drawing and find hard to do, and one thing you hate drawing but can do easily?

Really great question!

I love designing characters and I never get tired of doing it, but it also never really gets easier. I agonize over every little detail, drawing and re-drawing things over and over and pulling up tons of reference images. A fully-inked and colored character usually takes me a whole workday. I'm generally pretty happy with the finished results but I never seem to get any quicker at it haha.

I don't know if there's anything I'm good at drawing that I also hate to draw. I find the act of drawing pleasurable in and of itself. I sometimes find it frustrating when I'm commissioned to do "generic" fantasy or sci-fi illustrations. Like something that's just a "knight" or just a "spaceman" and the client really doesn't want me to riff on the design. I chafe under those kinds of restraints. Not gonna post any example pics because I don't want to offend anyone but it happens lol. Most of my clients are great though and give me a pretty free rein!

Hope this answers your question. If you've got any other questions about art or how I draw or whatever, just send them my way!

[greenplumbboblover]

Happy almost new year!

Yesterday I posted that whole "Top 10 Tumblr posts" but while that was fun to see, I figured I'd go through things I felt was a great accomplishment of this year for me. And some new years resolutions ;)

Accomplishments of 2023:

I made a website!

I know it's tiny and that it's not really great (yet) for getting tons of views, but I do want to thank everyone (I actually typed out all the names but tumblr was being stupid and I couldn't post the post then :/) for either giving it a try or using it. Without you, it would've just been a floating idea with no purpose. :) Thank you so much for believing in it!

I created a new sims story!

Gone a bit back to my original Simblr roots and made a story! Chapter 1 had been in my screenshots folder for over 2 years now, but I was just self-conscious about sharing it. I'm glad I actually got to terms that the only way to know if people will like it, is by sharing it. :)

Came back to Tumblr fully again.

Over those 2 years I hadn't really been on Tumblr much. I'd post my mod posts and that was it. Truth be told, I didn't really have much motivation to do TS3 stuff anymore at that time. But I think in the end I forgot how fun it can be :) I know I suck at interacting with people, though my anxiety often gets the best of me, and I'm genuinely sorry about that! I'm hoping to change that next year with some help.

New Year's resolutions:

I know most people probably didn't get through the whole thing because I type a lot, but if you do, hey there :)

Making Simblr.cc feel more personalized

I feel like currently it feels very download-oriented, which I'd like to keep! But that vibe also seems to be around with the more picture - oriented things. So I just want to make part of that feel more Tumblr-ish where it's just your personalized space. :)

Starting to sell stickers (and such)!

I know, kind of clique thing that everyone seems to be doing now and then, but I have seriously been loving to draw a lot. Though, my creative outlet only seems motivated when I do something for someone/something. So I was hoping to not just sell stickers for SImblr.cc as a donation thing, but also to make some of my own. :)

Finishing LISISV

I never intended to make LISISV like those shows that have been around for 20 years and going on. :p I know most of you do, which I love! But I'm not sure if I will be able to, lol.

I was hoping to rewrite the entirety of "Elly" which I did YEARS ago as a wee 14 year old (till I think, like 16?) but that's all basically teenage cringe IMO :p The concept and the characters however I always adored. So who knows!

Figuring out what to do with Interests & Hobbies

I keep promising that I'll finish it "after this mod" and I honestly do open it up, work on it for a little bit but then I start working on a feature and it... just doesn't work with the mod? However, the more I do that, the more 'bland' the mod becomes. So I don't know what do with it anymore 😅 Anyone who knows please help!

Unless you are all okay with remnants of it, which I'm doing currently :)

Making this space mod I have been wanting to do for a while

Not many people know this about me but i'm a huge sci-fi nerd :p And I wondered how hard it would be to make this “colonizing the a planet” space mod in TS3. Though I know that most people probably wouldn't care about that, since TS3 is more about generational things and... not so much about those things. So, who knows.

I guess I just need to sit down with myself and get my shit together, honestly.

Attempting to actually talk to others.

I don't know how people do it... I honestly want to keep tap of everyone I follow but I get so exhausted, if not, my anxiety starts kicking in because "what if I say the wrong things?" It's not just a tumblr thing though, i've been like that since forever, and maybe should just reach out for help for it. I just don't know.

I just feel as of late that people put great effort into commenting on my things and I'm barely there for them. Yet, just know that I am there, that I do think of you, i'm just deleting my sentences over and over again and just giving up. I'm genuinely sorry about that.

Hopefully your year will be nice and may your wishes come true :

[thedovahcat]

Gorillas and the New Year (Plus Price Increases)

Wow we made it to the end of 2023! Somehow...! Barely maybe for some of us.

For me it's been a lot of climbing out of the rat bucket I found myself in last year and the first half of this year. Maybe a little beyond that. I feel like now with college on the horizon, I'm just starting to be able to reach the rim of said bucket. It's been very hard and challenging, but honestly, probably necessary if I was ever going to start breaking any unhealthy cycles in preparation for my new upcoming school years.

This is the last chance I get to actually form some kind of career, something I didn't think I'd ever care about because I was always so willing to throw in the towel, and for a multitude of reasons. I've talked about it before in other posts, my lack of confidence that I was ever smart enough or like...good enough for anything beyond art... and this isn't a dig at art. But I've just had this whole self discovery thing all year where I'm realizing a career in art is not for me. I've been doing this for ten years now, maybe a little less but let's round up, and it's taken me all this time to realize as much. Unfortunately, I just had to go through it in order to realize as much, but it wasn't all bad. I made a ton of friends through it, I got my first full time job from it and gained much, I was able to buy my first car with it, a whole lot of firsts happened because of my skill in art. Not that it's like...spectacular or anything but I'm pretty proud of how far I've come. I don't know where I'll end up with my style, as I want to keep drawing as a hobby, but it's fun seeing it evolve year after year slowly into something I really dig.

Got a little off topic, but yes. So there's been that whole battle, along with the other side of it where I still worry if I'll be able to succeed in this Computer Science path I've chosen. I've met a lot of nay-sayers and doomspeakers about it, but I suppose that's the way it is with near everything. After all, -I've- turned into a doom speaker about an artistic career too. It's hard not to keep that to myself sometimes, only because I just don't want people to end up in the same dead end hole as I have where you can't advance your job anywhere, and you don't have a degree so people are even less willing... Gosh I feel like I've ended up turning into my parents in a way, they're the same. Harsh but fueled by concern. I come off that way a lot unintentionally and I feel bad about it. So I'm trying to combat. It's ...well it's going. It's my whole personality at this point lol.

So there's been those angles, there's been a lot of social changes in my life in regards to who I put my time into and what and where. It's gone pretty good on that front. I'm setting boundaries harder than I ever was before, and even then I'm still a bit shaky on things, but I've got what I call an obsessive mind, so if I don't do anything to help myself, then I'll be ruminating on shit I don't like for the rest of my college years, and perhaps life. And that's definitely not what I need right now. I gotta bring my A game to this and really put my neck out there if I want to succeed like a normal person lol (or whoever those go-getters are called. Something I am definitely not by heart.)

Started playing D&D 5e for the first time with my friends and honestly that's been like the top point of my year. I've been wanting to play for so long but things just never panned out or were a good time for it, and I was scared by all the numbers. I have gotten over my fear of numbers for now by scoring so well on that placement test earlier this year, so lol! Whatever it takes. I just really miss having some kind of group thing to look forward to weekly or maybe every 2 weeks, or whatever the case. Feels good when you feel like you belong somewhere, or people are looking forward to the same stuff you are. Always nice.

And I've started some new RP storylines with people I've known a long time, and unearthed some old ones that had been on hiatus for yeaarss, so that's also been really nice and exciting as well! Sure we're not all glued to the screen 24/7 anymore like when we were younger, but just a little fiction break in between life stuff happening is so welcome. I've been having a super hard time getting this 'escaping-life-through-fiction' thing I have under control, and I won't say that it is.... but it's considerably shifted into RL has taken priority over computer. Which, yes, good. Not that I ever had a problem with -that-. I knew it would be like this when I wasn't working. When I -am- working again though, I won't be so worried. I'll always care more about my irl job than silly things going on online, which is the goal I'd like to reach eventually.

Commissions were really really good this year, I tallied it all up, and even though it only came out to me being able to pay for a semester and 2/3rds, I'm still really really happy so many people have come back over and over to buy from me. It all feels worth it, my art journey. And I'm very much happy to continue it, for my own sake and for your sake! I love seeing your characters and I am very happy ya'll trust me enough with them time and time again. Despite all I've said, I'd be more than happy to offer commissions to people and draw for myself for quite some time yet.

...You're probably still holding your breath about the prices huh?

Sadly, as with anything, now that I have college to think about and, at the moment I can't really mentally handle a real job and school at the same time, I'm going to keep running commissions to do in between my school work (alongside rather). They might come out a little slower, but that's how it'll have to be a while.

At most I want to increase the sketch prices by $5 for each category (bust, half, full), and see how that does until the middle of the year. If it's all well and dandy, I will increase them again by another $5. Originally I wanted to bump it up ten all across the board, but I feel that's too much of a spike compared to what people are used to. Not to mention I'd have to raise the prices of all my other items, which will also see an increase come middle of the year. This plan isn't solid yet so don't hold me to it. I will make the necessary announcements when it's time!

Anyway, I wanted to thank everyone this year for just overall being there and helpin' me out tremendously when I needed it. The efforts are not taken lightly or forgotten, and likewise once I am able, I can't wait to be able to help all of you in the same way ya'll have helped me. Really, aside from financial and life stability lol I honestly miss having a job cuz it allowed me to spoil so many people. I really really miss that. So I'm working hard to get there again.

For now, here's to 2024! Come what may. We'll make it to the end some way or another, so buckle up.

[olderthannetfic]

i've never understood what people meant about tattoos looking awful, what's wrong with jk's? is it the design or like the, execution I guess? all I know about 'good' tattoos is from that one post from years ago that explained good tattoos shouldn't look say unsaturated or have colors spilling out of the lines of whatever, and I figured jk's tattoos don't seem to do any of that so they they must not be bad...?

I don't have much of an opinion on jk's sleeve, from the little i've seen i just think it's cool he has it I guess? but tons of people seem to hate it and idgi? and I want to get it less for jk and more bc I want to get tattoos one day too lol

--

There are several ways to evaluate tattoos.

Technical skill at the physical act of tattooing: Are the lines that are supposed to be straight actually straight? Are colors where they should be? Do solid areas look solid? Many bad tattoos fail here, but I don't think that's why people hate JK's.

Long-term feasibility: Was this tattoo designed by someone who understands what will look like absolute shit in 2 years. JK's are fine here, but all those ultra thin loopy line tattoos BTS fans get of album covers are going to look like garbage as the ink spreads. Things with straight lines are even worse. Some body parts are more likely to sag and deform a very precise tattoo too.

Fine arts design skill: Is the overall composition pleasing and balanced? If lines nearly intersect in one place but not another, is that intended to draw the eye or create tension, or is it an error? Do the elements come together to create one coherent artwork consisting of body and tattoos, or is the body a storage space for random shit that does not go together? This is similar to how we tell if a composition of a photo or painting is good.

Frankly, JK's sleeve looks like a hodgepodge shoved together without good layout skills. I'd need clearer photos of it to really nitpick, but even if there are thematic connections, it doesn't seem well designed visually.

And finally, BAD TASTE: Some tattoos are executed fine, but the choice of subject matter is offensive, stupid, or just plain ugly.

JK's hand tattoos look like he drew on his hand with a sharpie. What the fuck kind of junior high bullshit is that? Ugggggggly!

--

For myself, I chose to get a tattoo of a wayang kulit puppet I got as a child. I found a tattoo artist who's also a fine artist and had him do a creative interpretation of the shadow because I wanted a tattoo in black ink only, and I wanted any age-related fuzziness to work with the design instead of against it. I chose a Mexican guy who does a lot of Aztec and Mayan-inspired art because while the specific art traditions are different, there are some commonalities.

Like with commissioning fan art or any other art, pick someone who already works in a style close to what you want.

I chose a size and position I thought made an overall nice composition on my body, wrapping around my left shoulder, and when I get a second one, it will be on my right hip to make my overall body look like one artwork.

There are styles of tattoo I find very beautiful and ones I don't like, just on an aesthetic, artistic level, same as I don't like every painter or cartoonist. Some things I find pretty I still wouldn't get though.

I've been fascinated with irezumi since I was a teen, but the level of color would clash with too many of my outfits, so I would probably not get a tattoo like this myself.

But overall, I do love how beautiful these are as artworks (even aside from being tattoos) and how they turn the entire body into one canvas.

I only like fairly large tattoos, say covering the entire upper arm with one design, and I hate small flash (prefab) designs. I would never get something on me that came out of an artist's back catalogue, and since I'm making a body-level artwork, I want it to be something of a size that shows in the context of looking at my whole body. If it's going on my body permanently, then it will be designed by some combination of me and my artist to my unique specifications.

[cdmagic1408]

Highlights from The Art of Onward book!

alright so I've decided this week for Onward Fan Art Friday that I'd do something a little different...

tbh I kind of had a hard time deciding on a theme for my 11th edition—or "up to 11" I should say—post, so hopefully that'll be decided by next week (it most probably will)

so what's this week all about you ask?

well believe it or not, I had never owned ✨The Art of Onward book✨ until yesterday! i know...crazy, right? but I found my opportunity to finally get it when i saw that it was 45% off on Amazon. so instead of paying the usual 40 bucks, I only had to pay $21! it was good deal, I'd say. but yeah I had ordered it a couple days ago, it came in the mail yesterday, and as soon as I got my hands on it I read through the whole thing, carefully looked through every page, did some excited squealing every now and again lol...cue my daily I absolutely love this film, its world, and its characters so much speech...

it took me like three hours and all I can say is WHAT A RIDE. this is such an amazing book!!

Now I've seen a good number of the art in this book from previews or elsewhere on the internet, but there are also a ton of really cool pieces in here that I'd never seen at all before that I am just blown away by! it reminded me of the amazing onward fanart I only ever see on Instagram, and in turn—the purpose of my onward fanart sharing series

so whether you own the Art of Onward book or not, tonight I'm going to spotlight pieces from within it that caught my eye, deserve more recognition, and perhaps some analyzation (this is OFFICIAL onward art after all...)

and let me tell ya, picking just 10 pieces for this wasn't easy...everything from everyone in here is SO GOOD!

Artists

just a few quick pre-notes...

I did happen to catch the names of the artists in some of the angles, but others not so much, so I'm gonna credit them all down below like I always do anyway

I won't, however, put in links to instagrams this time around because some members of the fabulous onward crew don't have insta and instead either don't have social media at all or are on lots of other social sites (primarily LinkedIn), and/or have their own portfolio websites—all of which you can easily find by looking up their name in a Google search!

lastly, all the images above are taken from The Art of Onward book, specifically my Art of Onward book, and were captured using my iPhone 13 Pro

Noah Klocek, Production Designer - ahhh I love this! The gang's all here! Ian and all his friends, including Kagar it looks like! I've always wanted to see a character line up of these 6! and a 3D model of Kagar too!

Madeline Sharafian, Head of Story at Pixar - ok this gives off major levels of sassy Ian and I just love it! I wonder what he's being sassy about tho...like, is he telling someone off? is he claiming he can do anything he sets his mind to with his magic? I NEED CONTEXT

Chris Sasaki, Art Director/Character Designer - awwwwww young Barley reading young Ian a storybook! emphasis on AWWWWWWWW!!! this is a very small drawing but it really doesn't matter how big it is...this is absolutely precious!

Maria Yi, Character Designer - I really love all her character drawings of Laurel, but I also really enjoy what she made here! This is something every artist needs a reminder of every once in a while: that all characters are made up of simple shapes and it's a great place to start when going about drawing them!

Kristen Lester, Storyboard Artist - 🎵 wouldn’t you like to quarter own a beautiful vacation home? 🎵 i swear...that song, and these lyrics in particular, from the deleted scene just started playing in my head the moment i laid eyes on this piece! i think cause the sirens themselves are holding contracts lol

Grant Alexander, Character Designer - this drawing seems to imply that Ian and Barley were once going to meet the pixie dusters in an actual swamp instead of the swamp-like aesthetic that ended up in the final film...but I love this idea of them hanging out in a club or bar when they're not riding their motorcycles!

Nat McLaughlin, Art Director/Set Designer - this concept looks very epic but also very dangerous at the same time...while I wouldn't want to risk being in a train accident inside a volcano, the idea of looking out a window and watching lava bubble and boil while riding in a subway sounds like a very fun attraction!

Don Shank, Set Designer, and self-proclaimed to draw and paint - OH MY GOSH KEVIN!!! Kevin from UP is in this drawing!! I love Kevin! if they were thinking of giving her a cameo at the time the phoenix was going to be the final villain that would've been interesting!

Zaruhi Galstyan, Freelance Character Designer - this is a piece from Jenny's set of pages and all I wanna say is I really love this beautiful character design! she looks like an ancient nature spirit! and now I have to ask: do these creatures exist in the onward-verse?

Dan Scanlon, the creator of all that is Onward! - who better to save for the best for last than our man Dan himself? I love all three of these drawings he made! I really enjoy drawings that visually set the scene and point out where everything is going to go, like actually pointing out with arrows who or what goes where

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 304: The Council of OFA

Previously on BnHA: Hawks and Best Jeanist were all, “what up Todofam, we are here to apply for the positions of ‘son #4’ and ‘weird uncle’, respectively,” and then proceeded to insert themselves into the family drama without waiting for an answer. Hawks briefed Endeavor on the nation’s current status of “totally fucked”, promised to help him sort that out, and then asked him about OFA. Endeavor was all, “oh do you mean One For All, the mysterious thing that my intern Deku was apparently being targeted for?” and then we cut away, presumably before Endeavor could clarify that it never occurred to him to follow up on that, and Hawks was all “no of course not, why would it occur to anyone other than me to follow up on any of this super weird and ominously important shit.” Anyway so meanwhile Bakugou was all “LET ME SCREAM AT DEKU UNTIL HE WAKES UP” and the other kids were all “NO”, and then the chapter ended with All Might being all “I wonder what the vestige!me is currently chatting with Deku about.”

Today on BnHA: Deku drops in on the Vestiges, who are all “sup Deku, how do you like our fancy chairs.” OFA II and III are all “if you need us we’ll just be standing here silently in the corner pretending to be invisible and sparking endless discourse with our mere existence.” OFA IV is all “and now I will explain to you in a very convoluted way that you being quirkless was actually a good thing, since it means that you are probably not going to suddenly drop dead at the age of twenty. But also you’re probably going to be the last user of OFA for that very same reason.” Deku is all “that is wild. I’m just gonna stand here and stare at my hand.” Nana is all “so now that that’s settled could you please do me a small favor and kill my grandson for me”, because having just one topic to discourse about this week WASN’T ENOUGH, apparently. Thanks so much Horikoshi.

(ETA: okay so just a note before I start, this week’s RHA translation was a huge mess, so I followed up this chapter by reading a couple of other translations. the main one I’m using for reference is the one by @hanashimas​, whose weekly posts I highly recommend. anyway so you’ll see a couple of ETAs in this post in places where the initial translation was off.)

how many layers of bandages did they wrap this poor kid’s fucking hand in omg

jesus Deku. are you holding onto a bouquet of flowers under that thing?? or a tennis racket??

omg yes, finally

is he reading these names off a teleprompter lol. and if so, what has Jeanist ever done to slight you, Deku? “god bless Kacchan and Aizawa-sensei and Todoroki-kun and everyone else in the whole wide world... except for Best Jeanist. fuck that guy.” actually this joke would be funnier if half of tumblr didn’t legit feel that way lol but anyway

OH MY GOD

I NEED TO HAVE A TALK TOO. ABOUT, OH, EVERYTHING

I got immediate KHR vibes from ALL OF THIS. this is seriously such a Vongola aesthetic. “let’s use the luxuriously cushioned chairs with the seat backs that are ten feet high, and arrange all of the handsome ghost people in a big circle” like come on

that said there are also some slight LoTR vibes as well. “bring forth the ring, Deku”

I like how Six is sitting there with his feet drawn up all casual, but with his arms inexplicably sticking STRAIGHT OUT IN FRONT OF HIM and dangling over his knees like he’s doing some sort of zombie walk

apparently the Fourth wasn’t a big fan of shoes huh

interesting that All Might is the only one who’s still faint/indistinct, and and that Two and Three are fully visible

(ETA: the rest of my speculation about Two and Three has been moved into a separate post, the better to focus on the shit that’s actually happening in this chapter lol.)

and lastly, interesting that all of them are talking now, except for All Might (and I guess the Second and Third as well). to the best of my knowledge Deku hasn’t unlocked the Sixth’s quirk yet, so I guess the quirks don’t really have anything to do with it

oh and it looks like Deku’s mouth is still covered. I guess that’s convenient for the vestiges since we all know it’s hard to stop Deku once he gets going. but on the other hand it’s very inconvenient for people like me who wanted to see some interaction. alas

so First says that OFA’s power has grown a lot in the last four months (i.e. since Deku unlocked Blackwhip), and now the vestiges can communicate with each other as well as Deku

so even when Deku’s not around they can all just chill with each other. this is such a weird thing to me lol. like it’s cool, don’t get me wrong, but it’s also strange as hell to know that you’ve got eight other people hanging out in your head spying on everything you do and having conversations with each other about it. it would be like if Dark Shadow had someone to hang out with other than Tokoyami. good thing you weren’t triplets, Tokoyami

First says that it’s become easier for the vestiges to interact with Deku ever since TomurAFO barged into the OFA Domain back at Jakku. huh

(ETA: apparently this is because AFO forcibly pulled out OFA’s power when he was trying to steal the quirk, so I guess that makes sense.)

okay thank you Banjou for addressing this concern which I initially brought up as a joke, but which was apparently real enough for you to reassure Deku about

“don’t worry, even though we’re awake and hanging out inside of you at all times, we’re definitely not secretly watching and making fun of every single thing you do” hmmmmm

(ETA: “not that you could do anything about it even if we were, since you’re probably going to be the last OFA holder ever!” I don’t trust anything this asshole says lmao.)

OH SHIT??

YESSS DEKU now you can hold them accountable for all of their bullshit! because I do not doubt that there will be bullshit lol but let’s see how that goes

oh damn

well okay then. you didn’t have to stand up and walk over to him and loom all threateningly like that but okay sir

this guy has kind of a Kimimaro vibe to him. remember? that bone-growing guy from Naruto? except I’m pretty sure he had eyebrows. and wasn’t twenty feet tall. speaking of which, that explains the chairs

why are you wearing only 3/5ths of a shirt

lol what

someone’s gonna have to explain this to me. is he just redundant or something lol, or is he strangely poetical or what

(ETA: apparently HE’S MAKING A PUN omg. I immediately gained +10 love for him lol. also it flows a lot better in Japanese. this is one of the things Caleb is usually good at, so we’ll see what he does with the wordplay.)

omg the hermit theory is true!!

“I’M NOT WEIRD, IT’S SOCIETY WHICH IS WEIRD.” lol whatever you say buddy. also love how Banjou tried to give him a big hearty slap on the back but Hermit Boy was not having it lmao

IS HE TRYING TO CAPTURE HIM WITH BLACKWHIP

AND ACTUALLY, NO, SIR, AS A MATTER OF FACT, WE ARE NOT AWARE. SO SPILL!!

?!!?

okay my first response was LOL ARE YOU SERIOUS, THAT’S THE BIG SECRET!? -- and then it hit me what the significance of “died from old age... AT AGE FORTY” meant. at which point it was like “!!!!!” and then “OH, SHIT”

(ETA: there’s also an Iida joke here somewhere but I’m just too tired to make it.)

oh my god oh my god

did he somehow get a copy of the coroner’s report or something? like how does he even know that he died from “old age” as opposed to any number of other natural causes? ??

but anyway. so this is the quirk singularity coming into play then I guess. but then how come All Might is still alive and ticking?

(ETA: so this is one example of where this week’s translation is a mess lol. apparently the Fourth explains here that he didn’t know what the fuck he died from until All Might researched it. and it turns out there actually was an autopsy lol so there you go.)

so Fourth says he held OFA for eighteen years, and since he knew he would never be strong enough to defeat AFO on his own he basically just spent all his time punching rocks in the woods and training to power the quirk up

oh shit

is he implying that his body literally fell apart?? like that’s how he got the scars on his face? -- IS THAT WHAT KEEPS HAPPENING TO TOMURA, THEN. oh shit

DUDE

so you’re telling me that this quirk actively shortens the lifespan of anyone who uses it?? and my little boy here has had it now for a year already?? fuck me, I have immediately have a TON of thoughts about all this but let me save it until he’s done with his explanation

THANK YOU, DEKU

right?? how come All Might didn’t die then. even after he got injured. please don’t tell me he actually is dying still and is just being slow about it because I SWEAR TO GOD

what does this mean??

so what you’re trying to say is you all have NO FUCKING IDEA how long Deku’s gonna be able to hold this quirk before he SUDDENLY DROPS DEAD?! five generations ago this dude was able to hold it for eighteen years, and then four generations later All Might was able to hold it for thirty-odd years or so, and now Deku has it and you all have no clue which way it’s gonna go? actually this makes it sound like it really wasn’t OFA that killed the Fourth at all and you guys are just really bad at forming hypotheses. but since you’re making a big plot point out of it I guess it must be true

and don’t think I didn’t notice the part where you said you didn’t have OFA very long and then “died while fighting”, Firsto. I want to hear more about that. specifically who you passed the quirk onto before your death

and yes, if we are agreeing that OFA was the cause of the Fourth’s death, then the conclusion on this next page is the natural one to draw

so that’s a bit of a relief then, because Deku is quirkless too. so it means he won’t be able to hold OFA forever (and will probably have to find another quirkless person to pass it on to), but at least he won’t be randomly dying out of the blue next Tuesday or something

oh my god now he’s talking about OFA and AFO and user consciousnesses and all sorts of good theory stuff but it’s so much exposition. you’re really gonna make me read all this lol

wait what. why would All Might being quirkless have anything to do with the presence of his vestige in OFA Outer Space Party Land

but Deku is also quirkless and he’s clearly visible and chatting with you guys. so what gives. like how much of this is verified fact and how much of it is you guys just shrugging and making stuff up lol

SERIOUSLY, GUYS

BUT DEKU IS ALSO -- you know what, never mind sob. none of this shit makes any sense but whatever

(ETA: seriously, this all seems like an awful lot of speculation on their part. for Deku’s sake I sure hope they’re right.)

FSSKDJFLSKLKJLKJL ALL MIGHT IS FIFTY-FIVE?!

lol that’s a full ten years past my closest estimate, wow. but this pretty much confirms his age now at last! or at least confirms it within a couple of years, because we know All Might and Nana met when he was in middle school, and he presumably had the quirk by the time he took the U.A. entrance exam. so yeah. gonna go with fifty-five

so they think that because All Might was quirkless, OFA was better able to adapt to his body and became his true quirk, as opposed to being an extra quirk that stacked on top of the one he already had and overwhelmed him. ties in back to the whole “AFO used to bend people to his will by forcing quirks on them” thing, as well as the “Noumus are all mindless because of the strain of having multiple quirks”

Two and Three are really ruining the serious vibe of this scene here lol

they look like they’re doing the counting for hide and seek

and is this Deku talking now? I was about to get mad at First for implying that quirkless people are somehow freaks, as opposed to “normal” people jdslk

so in other words, don’t go giving it to your best friend all casually for shits and giggles, Deku. even if it would make a really cool climax for a movie. well shit. maybe that’s why they were so quick to nope back into Deku’s body afterward

so First says that because quirkless people are becoming rarer and rarer, the fact that All Might just happened to stumble upon Deku is “nothing short of a miracle.” which, yeah, that was definitely a stroke of luck there. being quirkless saved his life. but being quirkless is also part of why he was chosen in the first place, and we’ve always known that much

“in other words, kiddo...”

looks like there was some hurried clone stamp usage going on here lol. but props to RHA as always for putting this scan out so fast, especially given how exposition-heavy this week’s chapter has been

“anyways, that was the main topic” ARE YOU SERIOUS. there are like ten other topics imma need you all to get to here, people

(ETA: seems like this is a mistranslation; the line should actually read something more along the lines of “and now for the main topic.”)

FFFFFFFFF

“ENJOY YOUR CLIFFHANGER THIS WEEK.” dskfalkjlkjwlgkjl you really went and dumped this discourse on us yet again. fucking...

(ETA: forgot to mention, but as several people mentioned, this seems to be another mistranslation -- rather than asking Deku to kill Tomura as though it’s doing her a personal favor, Nana is asking “will you be able to do it.” in other words more of an “are you capable of doing it” type of thing. which is a very reasonable question to ask given that Deku is, well, Deku.)

anyways, and the answer is obviously going to be “no” of course. this isn’t going to end any differently than when the previous Avatars all told Aang to kill Ozai. but I guess it means we’re in for a fun conversation next week

so Nana looks pretty grim here though (nothing at all like the person who once taught All Might the importance of saving people with a smile), and I’m wondering if this means she believes that her grandson is already beyond saving. as in killing him would be a mercy, as opposed to him continuing to live with AFO bending his mind and body to his will. except if that is the case, I think she’s underestimating Tomura’s own will. and definitely underestimating Deku’s will to save

and also, just... I’m so fucking sick of AFO screwing the Shimura family over, honestly. this is exactly what he wanted. well fuck you, guy. you don’t get to have what you want. go out there and save Tomura, Deku. for his sake and for Nana’s. give them some hope. do your thing, boy. can’t wait for your big speech all about it next chapter lol

[elencelebrindal]

If I'm not mistaken you've now read/watched the three mxtx works and WoH. How would you rank them following personal preference? Which main couple did you like the most? Favorite plot twists in all four?

Yep, I did. I still have to read Faraway Wanderers though. Can't wait to.

This came out to be quite a long post, so I'll put it under the read more thingy.

Now, how would I rank them?

I'll have Tian Guan Ci Fu at the top, no doubts. It's my absolute favorite among all these four, and will probably remain my favorite even after I finally get to read the huge thing that's 2ha. It's the perfect balance of a story with no characters left unexplained (except for the minor ones and RIP Hua Cheng's backstory, why did mxtx rob us so much), of characters being unique all in different ways, and of a romance that, while being absolutely the main focus of the novel, is not overwhelming. For me, an aro/ace person, the romance written in TGCF is so good that it made even me stupidly happy. I don't get such big smiles on my face while reading my own romantic content.

This is the ONLY novel I've ever read that doesn't have a single character I hate in it. Only one, maybe two at most, that I dislike. That's it. Everyone's good. Everyone.

Then I'll definitely have Word of Honor. Just like TGCF, it's a really good balance between an interesting story (I was literally squirming in my seat while impatiently waiting for things to be revealed, enjoying every second of it) and a subtle romance that was still obvious enough to make me wonder what the hell happened with censorship in this drama. Not that I'm complaining though.

Almost all the characters are incredibly good. They have depth to them, all the main ones have either a satisfying backstory or a beautifully crafted development.

And this is it for the ranking. I wrote way more than I should have, but oh well.

After that, it's a tie between Mo Dao Zu Shi and Scum Villain. I don't want to favor one over the other, because I genuinely like them the same. Scum Villain is really underrated, and while I understand it somewhat, it's really unfair.

MDZS (and The Untamed) has a story that draws you to it, especially if you (like me) have an obsession with all things dark and spooky and terrifying like the demonic cultivation in this, like the whole mystery they have to solve with body parts leading them to the solution. The drama, as good as it was, really didn't do justice to the spook factor of using dismembered parts of a corpse to move around.

SVSSS is straight up weird, literally an isekai but make it Chinese. I think the best part of it is Shen Yuan panicking and cussing everyone out every time something happens around him, though... I really loved the story and the way it played out. I especially liked how the novel kept mentioning Proud Immortal Demon Way and compared the events of that book to the events that were happening in that book's world.

But why do I prefer Word of Honor to them? Well, it's simple. There's some aspects of the romance that don't resonate well with me.

WangXian is a beautiful couple, and they deserve all the happiness in the world (they have a canonic son!!!!!!!!), but Wei WuXian's initial obliviousness made me really uncomfortable at times. Not because he didn't know Lan WangJi was in love with him (the fool! thank goodness for Guanyin Temple), but because he kept teasing Lan WangJi about it while the latter was drunk. I mean, I get it. If you don't know, you don't realize what you're doing. But as a person that easily suffers from people making fun of me behind my back... it kinds struck a nerve. I still love them to pieces, though, they're so good together.

BingQiu, well... this is a rollercoaster of a couple. Again, I absolutely love them together, but some parts come off almost as scenes where consent is thrown to the wind. As a reader you know Shen QingQiu is willing and in love (gods, they married each other, I'd be a fool to say the opposite), but there should be a limit to how many times a willing person should say "No" in such a novel. This is mostly me being my aro/ace self, though. I don't really understand what goes on in the world of intimacy between people because I (literally) don't give a fuck, so I'm probably reading too much where there's too little. Don't take this as me not liking BingQiu, I'm in love with them and I desperately need more content.

Favorite plot twists, eh? Okay, big SPOILER ALERT from here onwards. And I mean it. BIG. SPOILER. ALERT.

Now, which main couple did I like the most?

Hualian. I don't even need to think about it. Bonus point because they're both out of their minds and the extras show it.

I said it before, and I'll say it again. I never have smiles so big and goofy in front of anything else, not even my own stuff. Hualian genuinely makes me happy.

Stop reading if you haven't finished all four of these, please.

...

Okay, here I go.

WoH:

Wen KeXing faking his death and telling basically everyone but Zhou ZiShu.

The villain being Zhao Jing; I was actually fooled and thought the main bastard of the series was Gao Chong.

Episode 35, and I'm not saying anything else. Although, as soon as that son of a bitch put his hands on Cao Weining's face like that, I genuinely knew what was going to happen.

The hairpin being the key for the armory. That was so stunning I had to pause the episode for a second and take a walk around the house.

MDZS:

Jin GuangYao being the villain. And being an amazing villain, on top of that.

Nie Huaisang. Fuck's sake, that man fooled the entire fandom just like that. I don't think many people realized he was the one behind everything.

The golden core transplant reveal. I'm sure that more experienced readers and viewers (aka people that had read/watched a ton more cultivation world stuff) had hints of it, but when I watched The Untamed I never read/watched anything remotely close to this genre. It hit me like a brick and I sat in front of the screen in shock.

SVSSS:

Shang QingHua being Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky. It's such a silly thing, but it made me pause for a good five minutes. I wasn't expecting it in the slightest.

The whole thing with the Old Palace Master. The man belongs to the dumpster he never got thrown into.

Tianlang-Jun not actually being the villain. Poor demon, he just wanted to continue with the questionable hobby of reading porn and daydreaming about Shen QingQiu's relationships.

I think I had another one, but it's late and I'm probably forgetting it.

TGCF:

Oh boy, where do I belong? Ah yes, the entirety of book 4. Took me out on the spot.

Jun Wu being Bai WuXiang completely blew me away. That was probably the biggest plot twist in the history of plot twists.

Also, Ling Wen knowing, and her being the creator of the Brocade Immortal.

Fu Yao and Nan Feng being Feng Xin and Mu Qing. For some reason, even if it's kinda obvious when you take a good look at them, it never clicked before being revealed.

On the same note, Ming Yi being He Xuan, and the Earth Master being actually dead. What a ride that arc has been for me.

One of the most important details, however... I got it myself. The ring Hua Cheng gives to Xie Lian. I see so many people saying that they didn't expect the ring to be his ashes, but I did something I generally can't stop myself from doing. I guessed something tremendously important by accident, something I do with many many books so I can ruin the experience for myself. I was literally sitting down, taking a break from reading (I devoured TGCF in 3 days, I needed that break lol), and all of a sudden this goddamn revelation descend upon me like the holy spirit, completely out of the blue. I just sat up, looked at the screen, and went "the ring is is fucking ashes, isn't it?", and completely ruined the surprise for myself.

And this is it.

If there's more I forgot (probably) I don't know. For now, this is my answer. Way too long, as always.

[asleepinawell]

How has poi changed your life? Genuinely curious, I love this show

I got this ask in May '20 and am only now answering it. :')

part of the problem with answering it is that half of the answer would be to the question of 'how has fandom changed your life' where poi is the fandom I've been the most active in and where fandom made the most difference. and that's a long story

my first draft of this was over 2k words long, and went back much further in time explaining how i had and hadn’t fit into queer spaces and fandom throughout my life. I edited it way back but it’s still long-ish, so you can read it below the break

many years ago, when I got my first full time job in my chosen industry my senior year of college I was so busy that I couldn't function. massive unhealthy amounts of overtime and a toxic work environment. (don't work at tech start-ups, kids!!!) my social life vanished. strikethrough on livejournal happened right then too and fandom, which i’d only been a silent participant in at that point, kind of went quiet for a while and by the time it started regrouping I was so busy that I didn't know about it. several awful years later I quit my job, spent several months in my room in my parents' house trying to recover from massive burn out (see my comment about tech start-ups), and then got a job on the opposite coast and left behind my whole circle of friends some of whom made up my entire connection to the queer community at that time.

making friends after college is very hard when you're an introvert and just generally don't like socializing that much. making queer friends can be even harder since there's fewer places to meet them and there's often an underlying question of dating/sex that hovers around awkwardly when sometimes what you want is just an absolutely no romo/no sex friendship. so while I did make a few queer friends eventually, I didn't have that same sort of community I did before I'd moved and I missed it

(I would be remiss in not saying that the queer friends i made in this time are all amazing and wonderful and some are still my close friends and very important to me. The thing I’m highlighting here was the lack of feeling like I was part of a larger queer community).

fast forward a bit. I get sick. like really really sick. I'm in and out of the ER, I'm missing tons of work, I'm mostly bed-ridden. I think after the last few years people can more easily appreciate how intensely lonely and surreal being stuck at home by yourself non stop can be when you're not used to it. sometime right before that I'd joined tumblr for the sole purpose of looking at cat pictures on my phone during boring meetings. I wasn't really aware that this was where fandom had migrated to (it was in fact possible to use tumblr without intersecting with fandom). but stuck home alone with time to kill I started looking for art and gifs of the tv and games I was consuming and stumbled into fandom tumblr and specifically queer femslash fandom.

I kind of poked around the territory and eventually fell into the carmilla fandom which became the first fandom I actually created content for. a few of my fics had a decent audience and while I was never part of the central core of the fandom I made some good friends there. some of y'all probably followed me back then. I eventually drifted away from carmilla for a lot of reasons I won't get into and stumbled right into poi. this would have been between seasons 4 and 5, late 2015-early 2016.

my health problems get more exciting and I end up in the hospital. I have vague memories of watching poi on my laptop in my hospital bed (vague because I was on a lot of morphine). I actually posted some fic while I was in the hospital (would have been the end of my carmilla run still).

and I get out of the hospital (early 2016) and am somewhat better but it's pretty clear that I'm going to have chronic health issues probably for the rest of my life. my social life, such as it was, was mostly dead, a lot of stuff I used to do for fun was much harder to manage. I'm still spending a ton of time at home (not even counting covid) and I have bad days where I feel terrible and can't do much. but I'll come back to that

I think most of us remember 2016. the year tv show runners fully embraced the bury your gays trope (and sometimes the fridging trope at the same time as a bonus!) and, by autostraddle's tally, 30 queer female characters in tv shows died. and then on top of that we had the actual real world tragedy of the pulse nightclub shootings. it was a massively depressing time all around for queer people

s5 of poi aired that year. I know people have different opinions on s5 of poi, and that's valid. I hated it. and I really intensely hated how it treated root and shaw. there aren't enough words to express how fucking angry I was after s5. or rather, there are 319,678 words.

I wrote a fic many of you may have read called sliding towards chaos that rewrote the entirety of poi from mid-s3 onwards. it got pretty popular lol. I put so much into writing it, too. it was basically a second full time job for me and a great way to take my mind off the fact I was still having health problems and all the crazy shit going on in the world (we had a presidential election in the US in 2016 :)))) it did not go well!)

i'm very proud of writing stc, and even if I think it isn't my strongest writing (which is good! improving over time is good!), it was what really connected me to a lot of other people in the fandom. I felt part of the fandom community in a way I hadn't with carmilla and it was an intensely queer community built around shared interests

one of the problems with finding queer friend groups out in the 'real world' is you're often gathering to meet based on the uniting factor of being queer, and your interests may vary greatly. fandom is amazing because it lets you find queer people who you share all these interests with and who you can bond with over them and collaborate with and that's just so so important. does fandom have a ton of issues and toxicity and bigotry? yes, absolutely. but it also has so much good to offer

through stc and later fics I became close friends with some really really cool people in the fandom (including my favorite writer and my favorite artist). these are people I'm still very close friends with. some of them I've hung out with offline and the ones I haven't are mostly because they live too far away. after years of not having my own queer circle of friends I have found one again and one I can usually participate in even with my health problems and that is such an important thing to me

on a creative front, the fic writing and the gif making I've done have both taught me an enormous amount and been a very positive part of my life. working collaboratively on comics has been one of the coolest things I've done. there is just so much good that came out of me seeing one shoot gif on tumblr dot com years ago and being like hmm looks gay I'm in

and in terms of the actual content of the show, I think a lot of the reason I was drawn to it (other than my lingering crush on fred from angel) was that root and shaw felt so uniquely and wonderfully queer in a way few f/f ships I'd seen had before. shaw being bi and reading as aro to me (I've talked about that here) and root being a chaotic computer nerd just felt so relatable to me and their relationship with each other made sense to me in a way that few others had. and the specific draw that they had for some fans probably has a lot to do with why I found friends in this fandom who I really clicked with

so yeah. I don't know how to sum this up. fandom can be a great way to find your people and engage your creativity and I think that's very sexy

[zeppelin-and-unicorns]

So, as I said in a previous post, I spent the whole night yesterday making picrews, and I thought: “Why not make picrews of the fictional family that I love more than everything in this world?”

Anyway, here they are! This is a close representation of how I picture the Hyde family whenever I think about the TSG universe (I am going to come up with a different name for this universe one day I promise). I am also going to give you guys some glimpses about their quirks and their personalities, so, click on the thingy if you’re interested on reading that.

Unfortunaly, it was impossible to make Jackie and Gracie’s eyes the way I picture them (mismatched, lol. I know this is a controversial topic but every single time I see the show I notice how Jackie’s eyes are different colors and I add that to every single one of my fics. It’s one of her little flaws that only makes her more perfect). So just pretend that one of their eyes is blue-ish, and the other one is green-ish.

Oh, and as I post more and more picrews, you might notice that out of all the adults characters from the TSG universe, Jackie’s the only one who doesn’t have any wrinkles. Years of a very strict skincare routine payed off really well for her.

Hyde grew his beard back, mostly because I always picture him with a beard when he’s older. Oh, and sorry for the lack of sunglasses, he stopped wearing them everyday when Dylan was a baby (he kept taking them off his face and throwing them at the ground lol).

On the left, we see Layla, the eldest and the wisest from all the three kids. The age gap between her and her siblings is big, so they always run to her when they need advice about something. 

Layla’s a lot like Jackie, she cares about her looks, she’s a social butterfly, and she’s probably the most popular girl in school. She’s not shallow though, nor does she have the superiority complex Jackie had in the first few seasons of the show, Hyde and Jackie made sure to raise her well. 

Layla’s also a bookworm, and a big romantic at heart. One of her dreams is to publish an epic romance novel, and writing is probably one of her favorite things in the entire world. She has this little red notebook filled with heart stickers in the cover where she often writes poems -- and Jackie is the only person allowed to read said poems.

Her hair is naturally wavy (as showed in the picture), but she starts to straighten it when she’s older. She grew up in the 90s after all.

Then there’s Dylan, or as I like to call him, the Hyde’s little evil spawn.

Don’t get me wrong here, Dylan is literally so sweet, and he cares about his family more than anything in the world. He’s a sucker for his mom’s hugs and he wants to be like Hyde in the future, but he also has a lot of pent up energy, which tends to put him into some pretty funny situations.

Dylan has a partner in crime, his name’s Jordan and he’s Fez and Laurie’s son (I’ll post a picrew of him later too). I’ve based Dylan and Jordan’s friendship on the Weasley twins from Harry Potter, they are natural pranksters and they drive Laurie and Jackie insane. Red helps the duo out with their pranks sometimes, claiming it’s “payback” for all the years he had to tolerate his son and his dumbasses friends mooching off him and making his life “miserable”. Dylan and Red also have a cute bond, we’ll see more of that in the sequel.

As he grows older, Dylan gets tall. Like, Jackie’s a midget next to him, guys (that doesn’t stop her from coddling him though). No one knows where he’s got that height from, and he uses that to his advantage (by placing Jackie and Layla’s Pop music CDs on high places that they couldn’t possibly reach just to mess with them. Oh, and he also joins the basketball team lol).

He’s very protective of his family, like, really protective, and he doesn’t take shit from anyone. He has a special soft spot for Hannah (Eric and Donna’s younger daughter). Hannah is a year older than him, and she’s hearing impaired. One day a guy from school stole her hearing aid to mess with her, and he got the beating of a lifetime. Dylan was suspended and Jackie went to the school to yell at the principal and defend her son, because she’s that kind of mom.

Don’t get any wrong ideas about Dylan and Hannah though, they were raised like siblings.

Dylan’s very into cars (another thing in common he has with Red), and when Hyde finally gives him the Camino, he babies the fuck out of it.

And last but not least... Gracie. Or Erica, as Eric likes to remind everyone about it.

Gracie will only be three years old in the sequel, so we won’t see a lot of her personality, but as I said many times, I do plan on writing one-shots about the kids when they’re older once the sequel is done, so...

Hyde has a special nickname for her, he calls her his little “Goldilocks” because her hair is curly and it’s almost a golden color. She’s a very smart kid and she’s always drawing.

Seriously, Jackie and Hyde’s fridge is filled with Gracie’s drawings, it’s the sweetest thing. They never threw a single drawing of her away, they always keep them, and they incentivize her as much as possible when she’s growing up.

She grows up to be an artsy person, and she’s very talented. She’s not a social butterfly like Layla, nor is she a “badass” like Dylan, she’s an introvert, she likes to stay home with her parents (she loves her parents so much) and have movie marathons with them on the weekends instead of going out to party.

She hangs out a lot with Katie (Fez and Laurie’s youngest daughter), who’s her best friend and her complete opposite, they have a bunch of sleepovers where they watch a ton of horror movies together and stuff their faces with ice cream. Their friendship is really something else, and she’s the first person Gracie comes out to (yup, Gracie’s a lesbian).

Gracie and Eric are very close, and she gets him very into Harry Potter. It’s funny, because Eric insists that he’s a Gryffindor, and Gracie tells him he’s totally a Hufflepuff, which makes him mad and they end up bickering because of it. But overall, they love each other a lot, and Eric’s a father figure to her.

Her relationship with Jackie and Hyde is beautiful. She’s not afraid of asking them for cuddles when she’s feeling down, and they are literally her biggest supporters. When Layla moves out for good (insert very sad Jackie and Hyde noises), they turn her room into a mini art studio for Gracie, and she spends most of her days there, listening to music and painting whatever comes to her mind.

Wow, I got really excited and I ended up talking waaay too much, but well... I love this family so much, I couldn’t help myself.

If you have any questions about the TSG sequel or about the characters in general, please feel free to send them to me!

Posting picrews of the Forman family next!

[wrestlingplaylists]

Tam Nakano & Kagetsu’s Greatest Hits: Being a summary of my favorite wrestling feud with links

NOTE: This post assumes you have a Stardom World subscription or know someone who does. In 2017, Tam Nakano, the Stardom Dream, hasn’t been in World Wonder Ring Stardom very long. She was an idol singer first, then she got famous doing exploding bat deathmatches (which are more or less what they sound like). Stardom signed her, but she’s out of her element, there’s no gimmicks here. With no friends and no bats, she hasn’t been winning much and she’s starting to feel really lost.

In the 5 Star Grand Prix Tournament, she fights Io Shirai, the ace of Stardom and leader of Queen’s Quest (a faction of super competitive tomboy types). The girls who check on her after her match are Hana Kimura and Kagetsu from Oedo Tai (a faction of hot goths who don’t play by the rules). Queen’s Quest and Oedo Tai fucking hate each other and this will be important later. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1412/contents/1403?fcid=14

Hana and Kagetsu face each other later in the same show. All of Oedo Tai is pulling for Hana to win the tournament, but Kagetsu believes her job as the leader is to make her juniors prove themselves, so she isn’t about to go easy on Hana. When the match is over, Tam sees the way Oedo Tai takes care of each other and she asks to join. More than anything, Tam wants a family, and Oedo Tai seems like that to her. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1412/contents/1405?fcid=14 

Tam gets injured pretty soon after joining and gets kind of shunted off into a manager role. It’s not the coolest thing ever, but at least she has a cool new costume and a panda stuffy. Meanwhile, another new member (Natsu Sumire) has joined Oedo Tai and the rivalry between them and Queen’s Quest has really started heating up. After an epic 4v4 match, Kagetsu has a special request for a final faceoff between the entirety of both factions. Tam is also here and she is a delight. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/298/contents/297?fcid=2

At the January 2018 Anniversary show, Oedo Tai and Queen’s Quest have a 5v5 elimination match with the stipulation that the last wrestler eliminated will be kicked out of their team. It’s a huge match for both teams and Tam is back for it. Finally, she will prove her worth to Oedo Tai now that she’s back from her injury and can fight alongside her chosen family. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1593/contents/1592?fcid=2 

Tam and her new tag partner, Mayu Iwatani, announce their intention to win the Goddess of Stardom tag team belts. The belts that Hana and Kagetsu took from Mayu and another partner not that long before all this. Needless to say, Oedo Tai sees this as a betrayal. Tam was supposed to find her own way but not like this. This is personal. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1613/contents/1611?fcid=2 

Tam and Mayu challenge for the tag belts and, well, it’s emotionally intense for everyone involved, but at least it means the feud is over right? Right? https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1620/contents/1617?fcid=2 

Lol nah, Oedo Tai is as pissed as ever. Things are still extremely tense and personal. Natsu challenges Tam and a partner of Tam’s choice to a tag match against her and Kagetsu to end the feud once and for all. Any stipulation Tam wants. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1687/contents/1686?fcid=2 

IF YOU ONLY WATCH ONE MATCH IN THIS POST PLEASE MAKE IT THIS ONE!! I don’t know what else I could say here. Tam and Io get their revenge on Oedo Tai with the gimmick that made Tam famous. An exploding bat death match. I don’t want to overhype it too much, but it’s a real good capper for the feud and I just, yeah, I go back to this one a lot. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1073/contents/1072?fcid=2 

With the Oedo Tai feud more or less ended, Tam spends some time working on herself and helping to build Mayu’s new faction, Stars. She mostly plays supporting roles in other people’s stories for a long time and doesn’t get a ton to do specifically with Kagetsu. But she does have a few tense moments with Hana, and it’s interesting to see Hana and Oedo Tai starting to begrudgingly respect Tam again. She’s stronger and more confident than ever.

It’s the last match of the 2018 5 Star Grand Prix Tournament before finals. Tam hasn’t been having the best tournament. She only has one win so far, but she hasn’t been letting it get to her. Though she’s lost and lost, she’s kept her spirits up and she’s going into her match with Kagetsu with her head held high. Kagetsu, for her part, is the World Champion now and she’s won nearly all her tournament matches despite increasing tension within Oedo Tai, She only needs one more win to secure her place in finals. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1678/contents/1676?fcid=2

At the January 2019 Anniversary show, Tam challenges Momo Watanabe for the Wonder of Stardom belt, but it’s not really about the belt. Tam remembers losing to Momo a year ago. She remembers being kicked out of Oedo Tai, losing her family and having to start over. She’s dyed her hair black like the old days, she’s made her peace with her past. And whether she wins or not, Tam is determined to prove that Stars has made her better and that she can no longer be disregarded. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/19/contents/70?fcid=1 

The Cinderella tournament, a one day tournament where competitors are eliminated over the top rope, hasn’t historically gone great for Tam. She just never seems to take it especially seriously. Even meeting Kagetsu in the first round doesn’t seem to bother her. She says she thinks about fighting Kagetsu all the time. She says it nonchalantly and with a smile. Tam’s not angry anymore. She and Kagetsu are finally equals and this will be the night that proves it. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/346/contents/352?fcid=1 

Through 2019, Tam’s main focus is Stars and her relationship with her teammates. She has something of a rivalry with her teammate Arisa, at first they fight over Mayu’s affections and then over the Wonder of Stardom belt after Arisa takes it off Momo. The rivalry grows into a grudging respect and I could make a whole playlist for that storyline. What’s relevant here is that by the time the Goddess of Stardom Tag League rolls around, Tam’s tense friendship with Arisa has consumed all her time and energy. When the two face Kagetsu and her new partner Andras Miyagi, Tam isn’t even thinking about Oedo Tai. What matters to her is the hope of winning the tournament and the relationship she’s built along the way. Though of course, Kagetsu hasn’t forgotten, and the draw at the Cinderella tournament was only salt on the wound. It’s been two years since the bat match and the humiliating Grand Prix defeat, and Kagetsu is still too angry for words. https://www.stardom-world.com/set/876/contents/885?fcid=1 

It’s the January 2020 Anniversary show. Kagetsu has announced her retirement. Tonight is Tam and Kagetsu’s last match together and they’re going to leave it all in the ring. I have a lot of feelings about this one. I’m just gonna let you watch it.

https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1025/contents/1030?fcid=22 

A month later, Kagetsu prepares for her last match in Stardom. A gauntlet match against the entire Stardom roster. Every friendship, every rivalry, every weird tense relationship in between, it all ends here for Kagetsu. Tam is here too, but for once it isn't about Tam. Here, Kagetsu gets to be the hero of her own story and pass the torch to a generation of wrestlers she helped train. And I'll be damned if it doesn't make me cry every time.

https://www.stardom-world.com/set/1127/contents/1126?fcid=22

[steropeshu]

Theory: What if Tsukasa was a good guy?

All right, first time that I’m throwing out a theory, (with the assistance of @trish-chan​!) so forgive me if I’m tripping on my words. Okay, so, theory time. (Also, to avoid confusion, I call No.7 by Hanako, and pre-death by Amane)

When I say Tsukasa was a good guy, I mean as in a good bro before he died. I think the current consensus is that Tsukasa was the one abusing Amane (theorized to be in varying degrees…), but what if he wasn’t the one behind it? What if Tsukasa ended up becoming corrupted or messed up in some way?

This ended up really really long, so the whole this is under the cut...

First, let’s focus on how they were alive. What was their relationship like? Well, we know they were close, at least. There’s this one bit in the Tanabata arc where little Amane says that Tsukasa will get violent if interrupted.

However, in the official translations it says that he’ll throw a fit. Y’know, like an excitable little kid.

It also says that he’s playing katanuki, and he LOVES katanuki, so we can assume he wouldn’t want to be interrupted. (Also, Hanako loves katanuki too!)

But other than that, we don’t really see them being brothers in the past, do we. Right…?

WRONG! Something I completely overlooked before were the volume sleeve illustrations.

Also, in this (^) illustration, I’d like to point out that the Tsukasa’s radio and Hanako’s kokeshi doll are sitting on the chest of drawers!

Something to note in these illustrations (and also the Tanabata arc) is that Amane is happy and there are no signs of bruising anywhere either. So at least as little kids, no form of abuse is present.

Also, something else I noticed:

He says that “WE believe it’s real.” Tsuchigomori said that he doesn’t have friends, and he’s obviously not referring to Tsuchigomori here. Tsukasa is the only one left he could be referring to in this “we”. They both were enthusiastic about this rock that supposedly fell from the sky, ever since they were four.

I feel like I’m grasping at straws in this part, but why would Amane include a third party unless they were important? Especially when it comes to something so sentimental to him.

Next, we have the picture from the Kamome school orientation.

Nothing here either. Just the two holding hands, and Amane is still bright-eyed. Note that they are alone. We know the Minamoto siblings live alone, but Mitsuba and Nene both have parents with them. The Yugi twins don’t. Another theory was that Amane’s parents were abusing him and they just favored Tsukasa, but this can allow us to presumably scratch that.

So that means any harm to Amane happened somewhere between here and his death. So, let’s make a time frame, hmm? We know Amane died around age 13. What age is he here…? Well we know he just entered Middle school, the first level Kamome provides for. What age…

Wow. That lines up perfectly.

This leads into the next major part of the theory.

We all know that Kamome is incredibly “haunted.” Filled to the brim with supernaturals. So, what if these two got caught up in supernatural business and things went south?

Originally this was a theory on proving Tsukasa wasn’t the one abusing Amane, but now I’m possibly considering that it was him. However, he wasn’t fully there, or something caused him to go mad.

In this part, Hanako is reciting a part of Mori Ogai’s “Takasebune”. (Credit to  @nanabansama​ for finding that out!) In the story, a man is being exiled for a crime he committed. He seems kind so the police escort is wondering what he did. Turns out, he and his little brother were orphaned when they were young. At some point after growing up and working together, his brother fell ill. He came home one day to find out that his brother tried to kill himself so he wouldn’t be a burden. The man had finished the job for his brother, essentially putting him out of his misery.

We can draw some parallels to Hanako from this.

The man has a little brother that he killed

Absence of parents, this makes it likely that Hanako and Tsukasa’s parents are dead.

The man is being punished for what he’s done and is fully accepting of what has to happen to him as a consequence. In the man’s case, being exiled, and in Hanako’s case, being mediator for human and supernatural relations.

Perhaps from this we can draw that Hanako killed Tsukasa to put him out of his misery.

(Also, something really interesting, Ogai is spelled 鴎外. 鴎 is pronounced “Ou”, however alone it is pronounced “KAMOME”! While we’re on the subject, kamome means seagull. I had no idea why the school would be named that, but I would not be surprised if this were the reason!)

@daikon-senpai​ has pointed out that we can see a reoccurring “hole” in Hanako’s stomach. There’s a high likeliness that he killed himself after killing Tsukasa.

There’s a traditional method of suicide called seppuku, where one would slit their stomach to bleed out (though they would usually have someone cut their neck for efficiency and to minimize suffering). One of the reasons one would commit seppuku were if someone committed a crime or had brought shame on themselves. Both of which would be a likely reason Amane would have killed himself, and he even still carries intense guilt now as Hanako.

[UPDATE: I had made a post about how it appears that Hanako pulls his knife out from his stomach, something absent from the anime. Some of the earlier instances can look like he’s pulling out from his gakuran, so here’s a more obvious example:

@shweshishweh​ and @spades-queen​ have additionally pointed out that in some official art Hanako is depicted with a bandage over his stomach and Tsukasa with a bandage over his heart (or a heart that is damaged, as shown in the Valentine’s Day art).

With this information, not only can we assume Hanako died from wounds on his stomach, but also that Tsukasa likely died from an injury to his heart.

END OF UPDATE]

Speaking of guilt-

It’s believed that when Hanako cries while confronting Tsukasa, he’s afraid because he’s with his abuser again. I doubt this is true at all. He hasn’t cried since the Mitsuba Arc, though he still locks up briefly.

Obviously Hanako holds a ton of guilt from what he did to Tsukasa, so of course he would freeze up when the dude comes out of no where and is like, “Long time no see!!” He’s being confronted with what he did, front and center. No amount of jokes can distract him from it. There’s no avoiding it. After Tsukasa had entered the picture for a while, Hanako stops reacting so strongly, as he’s more prepared for it. (This was pointed out to me by @trish-chan​!)

It’s also possible that Tsukasa is acting the messed-up way he was before he died, and Hanako is realizing that death really didn’t free him from it. He’s mortified at what’s happened to his brother.

Another thing she’s pointed out was that currently, Tsukasa hasn’t hurt Hanako. Not physically, at least. If he was the one hurting him then, why not now? It’s not like he’s hiding being violent in front of people. Let’s see… he turned Mitsuba into a monstrosity, nearly killed Kou, ripped out No. 3’s heart, totally would have turned Nene into a bloody pulp, killed the pufferfish into a bloody mess, and he’s finger painted with blood (who knows where that came from) among various other psychotic things.

Last thing I have here is a kind of lose connection, but worth including, nonetheless.

Only Tsukasa and No. 6 are creepy black mokke. I can’t bring myself to believe that AidaIro would do that for no reason. I wouldn’t question it if it were only Tsukasa, but now No. 6 is in the mix.

This actually made me think of possible connections that Tsukasa has to No. 6. After all, who has a giant gaping hole to the far shore and has messed with someone’s head so hard they basically tried to murder their childhood friend? Is it possible that No. 6 did something to Tsukasa, for whatever reason?

We don’t know enough about No. 6 currently to really be conclusive about this, though. Could both of them been corrupted somehow?

UPDATE ON THIS PART: Since I’ve first posted this, more chapters with No. 6, or Shinigami, have been released. While I have even more doubts that he and Tsukasa have any direct connection than before, I still think there are some shared aspects. Sumire’s seal is probably the most major revelation, now that it’s pretty much confirmed that Tsukasa is a yorishiro. If we assume Tsukasa is Hanako’s yorishiro, then that’s something in common with Sumire and Shinigami. But then wouldn’t Hanako be a black mokke?

This makes me think that that particular connection isn’t the shared aspect Tsukasa and Shinigami have. Perhaps it’s just something that hasn’t been revealed yet (or I haven’t picked up on lol). Something else interesting of note is the fact that Tsukasa has been completely absent this entire arc. His only sort-of presence is through Natsuhiko, who we still don’t know the motives of. We also don’t know how the Tsukasa+Sakura+Natsuhiko+Mitsuba quartet have been dealing with the Severance.

So, there are a lot of questions yet to be answered so I’m not dismissing this idea yet.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, in a nutshell, this theory is: Hanako and Tsukasa were good brothers, until they got caught up with supernaturals after entering Kamome. This may have caused Tsukasa to go crazy, and hurt Amane at the same time. This leads to Amane killing Tsukasa. Possibly out of self-defense or putting him out his misery. Following this, Amane kills himself. ~50 years later, present Kamome Academy. Tsukasa makes his way to the near shore and either gets corrupted or was never freed from whatever ailed him when he was alive at the school.

I’m realizing now that this would also explain this:

“Tsukasa is not himself. I know that. So I forgive it.” But we all know that Amane/Hanako is too cryptic and secretive to actually say that.

[stormblessed95]

Hello! Somewhat baby ARMY here :)! I would just like to say that I love your blog and all the perspectives/opinions you have posted! It is awesome reading all these differing opinions on here and other Kookmin blogs. What I love most of all is the general calm atmosphere and the silly picking at trolls. It makes my day to see that everyone can have fun and enjoy each other's presence without getting up in arms when someone has a different opinion. However, I do have a question for you! That is if you do not mind answering it?

How would you label the boys' relationships with each other since they have definitely grown and matured with time? Furthermore, how would you label Kookmin's relationship since they have also grown and matured together? What has changed and what has remained the same? (All of their relationships amaze me since I can literally see these beautiful bonds grow with them! It's something I thought I would never get the permission to see. Especially, with Kookmin! What I have seen blossom between these two in front of my eyes gives me so much joy! Whatever their relationship may end up being, I am glad I got the privilege to witness it.)

Anywho, this has been troubling me since I have come across tons of old and new prejudice (some of the, pardon my language lol, shit and filth I have seen being spewed toward specific members from people claiming to be ARMY/stans of a specific member amazes and disgusts me) that some, if not most, parts of the fandom still believe.

Additionally, I would like to say that I loved your posts about the vminkook dynamics! While I absolutely adore this trio, it was stupidly hard for me to get a clear feel of their dynamics due to certain shippers (if you know, you know) and the narratives they spread as (almost?) gospel to their shippers. I am totally fine with shipping, however, when the majority of a certain part of the shipping community spread disgusting theories, I draw the line. And I know not all of them are bad (seriously not all of them can be that bad, right?). But when what seems like the majority continuously spreads hate, it is increasingly difficult (for me at least) to hear what little of the minority (those who are willing to speak up) have to say. I seriously dread the times I get on Twitter to go through recent BTS or Kookmin content. Just the other day I saw someone who had completely blacked out JM from some photos and was asking Tae and JK if they didn't like JM. It gave me the goosebumps and, no, not the good kind lol. Whew, thank you for listening to me rant! I needed to get whatever that was off my chest. Thank you so much!

P.S.- I would like to say that I mean no offense to anyone whatsoever, no matter how it may come across. And if I do offend somehow then I apologize in advance.

P.P.S.- I am sorry if this ask, in general, is garbled and a mess! I have trouble putting my thoughts into words.

Hello!

I totally understand the need to vent and rant sometimes, especially about all the toxicity that can hand in hand with fandoms sometimes and the toxicity that we absolutely have in ours about certain topics. But I hope you love it here regardless and enjoy everything our boys give us!

If you are asking me about what i think the boys relationships are together as a whole, I'd say we take their word for it. They call each other a family, and they definitely act like one. Lol the most recent time they referred to each other like that is during the last RUN episodes where they collaborated with PD Na. They said they were all like a family and PD Na said they were like an old married couple! They are almost always together, they bicker, they love each other, and they miss each other whenever they are apart. They fight and they are each others biggest cheerleaders. I see all that too. They are ALL extremely close, all 7 of them. They grew up together, conquered the world together, sometimes they really only have each other. They are all very special connections that would be hard to understand without being literally in their shoes.

If you are looking for something more about specific relationships that I see in duos, like I did for vminkook, well I am getting into that. I do plan on doing duo posts for all the guys eventually, it just takes time because I ramble a TON when I talk about them. I'm currently working on a TaeJin post and then Jin with the rest of the vocal line and their dynamics. Then I'll branch out into the rapline, etc. I'll literally get to them all at some point. I promise. TaeJin first though, so look forward to that post eventually!

I also plan on doing a post specifically about Kookmin, and how their relationship and dynamics shifted (according to my opinion) over the years, from 2013 to now. So I'll talk about that eventually here too! I just have a lot of say apparently 🙈 sorry! I'm excited for this one though. I have too many opinions honestly... someone should not have told me to start writing this stuff down! LOL

If you were asking about something else entirely, I'm so sorry! Please come back and help me understand more what you were wanting to know? 💜💜

Also thank you for the compliments about my vminkook series!! I'm glad it helped you appreciate their unique relationships. They are just my personal opinions though and if you haven't gotten a chance to see the original content of the moments I mentioned in each piece, I would absolutely recommend watching them for yourself. 💜 Hope you all have a wonderful day!

[palmett-hoes]

Do you have any fan casts or strong takes/feelings on the foxes’ appearances? Fandom tends to use the same Pinterest models, which feels wrong to me.

i do in fact! i've actually been meaning to make a post about how i choose to write all of the foxes' ethnicities anyway

but yes i absolutely agree that the typical pinterest model types u generally see on edits is not how i see any of them. nor is reece king or froy gutierrez or lucky blue smith one of my FCs for anyone

for a lot of them i don't necessarily have a single specific FC so much as i have like,, a general impression of features that i will see on various different people, who all may look wildly different from each other or who may not even look how i see the character as a whole but do have a specific feature i associate with them. mostly it boils down to the Energy i get tbh and that's just a Feeling i cant even explain

fun fact im a tiny bit face blind so that might account for some of why i'm so all-over about this

may as well go chronologically. some of them i definitely have more thoughts on than others

1. Dan

ethnicity: Afro Native (Sioux)

features: medium dark skin. buzzcut, killer fade. she often styles it in waves. she's very butch, wears a lot of basketball and cargo shorts, tank tops and flannels and jerseys, hiking boots. skinny but muscular, with a very rectangular body shape. defined jaw. probably like 5'4 or 5'5

FC/Energy: sometimes i get some dan energy out of janelle monae but more butch. lotta dan energy out of samira wiley. lashana lynch

2. Kevin

ethnicity: a lot of things tbd, but he's pretty multi-ethnic. i like the idea of kayleigh being half- or a quarter-japanese in addition to irish because it gives her more of a reason to go to japan for her undergrad. wymack is from d.c. which is a majority black city for its actual residents, but i also like the idea of him being Pasifika/Hawaiian. HOWEVER - and this is pretty important to my read of kevin's character - he's white passing, and has been mostly treated as a white guy who tans his whole life, like occasionally asked if he's italian maybe. learning that his father was a Distinctly Not White Man was a big shock to him.

kristin kreuk, lindsay price, phoebe cates, and marie digby are all half-asian actresses i base kayleigh on

i suppose i base his story partially on broadway actress carol channing, who revealed publically that she was a quarter black when she was like 80 years old. though maybe wentworth miller, a biracial actor who knows his father is black but also doesn't know him, is more accurate to kevin's story. then keanu reeves is a white passing actor with asian ancestry

also none of these people look anything like how i picture kevin lol. kevin is just like,, a guy. handsome ig. but kind of in a CW character kind of way

actually

kevin looks exactly like young jason momoa

3. Andrew

ethnicity: kayin/karen from myanmar

features: fat and muscular, very wide and heavy. this blog is basically all andrew body type refs. medium-olive skin, has a bit of a greyish tinge that makes him look a bit eerie or unhealthy. deep set, droopy eyes; looks so tired. flat face with a low-bridged nose. crooked teeth, especially his canines. natural hair black-ish but he bleaches it light blond. has the beginnings of martial artist punching callouses in his knuckles

FC/Energy: holy shit the characters i feel have Andrew Energy are all over the place. pedro pascal. babe ruth (yes fr). oddjob (harold sakata) from goldfinger. the jinn (mousa kraish) from american gods. gaear grimsrud (peter stormare) from fargo. takeshi kovacs (joel kinnaman) from altered carbon. and i wanna be clear, it's these characters specifically, and generally NOT the actors outside of that specific role. except pedro ❤️

4. Matt

ethnicity: cuban

appearance: matt has more of an Energy than specific features to me rn. that energy is Warm. he has that Warm bro jock dude energy. kind of a marvel hero build, hunky and muscular. very rectangular face. has this haircut:

5. Aaron

i get to cut myself some slack and not go AS in depth about aaron because he and andrew are identical twins

ethnicity: kayin/karen from myanmar

appearance: similar build to andrew, less confident and casual posture and body language. less apathetically murderous and more emotive expressions. better teeth bc his mom took him to the dentist. yes also bleaches his hair

celebrities: probably a lot like the difference between the characters and the actors. andrew is the characters and aaron is how the actors actually look. idk ive never looked at someone and thought 'hey! looks like aaron!'

6. Seth

ethnicity: have been going with half-vietnamese. considering looking into various south asian possibilities like pakistani

appearance: string bean build. that's all i have to offer

7. Allison

ethnicity: allison's very up in the air for me. she and seth are the two foxes i feel fine with being white, but im committing to having no white foxes sooo. i would say i generally see her as either half-middle eastern or chinese

appearance: plus sized and hourglass shaped. heart shaped face. taller, like 5'8 or 5'9. she has a pretty fraught history with her appearance and her parents payed for/pressured her into getting a nose job to have a 'prettier' nose. she also bleaches her hair blonde. she gets it done at a salon tho the twinyards do it in their bathroom

FC/Energy: elle king and nadia aboulhosn are my main inspos for her, esp body type but nadia esp in Vibes

8. Nicky

ethnicity: multi-ethnic. his mother is southern mexican Indigenous, possibly oaxacan. his father is mixed white/kayin

appearance: definitely takes after his mother while his father is white passing. dark brown skin, warm undertones. slightly stocky build. tall ovular head and thin aquiline nose. he's kind of just,, the opposite of the twins ig, so like their facial features look very different, which is a big part of why people don't make the connection between him and the twins alongside the difference in their skin tones, heights, and builds. nicky's build and features are very vertically-oriented, with a tall head, narrow-set eyes, thin nose with a high bridge, etc. the twins are horizontally-orienged, with broad, flat faces, wide-set eyes, wide noses with a low bridge, etc.

FC/Energy: yalitza aparicio, not a guy but one of the few Mexican Indigenous stars in the film industry and i really like her features for nicky. she's oaxacan

9. Renee

ethnicity: Black. african american

appearance: plus sized, circular/apple body shape. round face. dark skin. microlocs to a bit past her chin, bleached white and dyed at the ends. she and allison go to the salon together. femme but plain style, a lot of blouses and long skirts, practical shoes. knuckle callouses. about 5'6

FC/Energy: dominique fishback. tracie thoms, esp in RENT. gabourey sidibe. nicole byer, but not in Energy. brandy, for some reason, probably bc i think she has very serene Energy and is a little bit otherworldly. like if brandy played arwen or galadriel from lotr it would make perfect sense to me, and that's the Renee Energy™️

10. Neil

ethnicity: mixed. Black/Jewish on both sides. his father is polish ashkenazi and afro-brazilian. his mother is Black British and algerian jewish

appearance: very... sharp. like sharp all over. does that make sense? sharp features, sharp face shape, sharp angles to his body. he's got what i vaguely think of as a 'basketball build' not meaning tall but meaning very rangy and angular and lean. all limbs. seth has a similar build. lighter brown skin. he has waardenburg syndrome which is actually where he gets he gets his eye color, and his eyes are very large and widely spaced as well. freckles freckles freckles. freckles everywhere. 4a hair but at least during canon it's not very healthy and thus the curls aren't well-defined. he grows it out long enough to tie back and starts taking better care of it in post-canon. wonky, slightly crooked teeth, with a gap between the fronts

FC/Energy: now neil i actually have a ton for. mostly models which im a lil ashamed of bc i do try to draw more from athletes. alton mason is a main body type ref. mugsy bogues is good to see what i mean about the basketball build without the height. here're the boys: cykeem white, luka sabbat, désiré mia, Leo Hoyte-Egan, dylan hasselbaink, this beautiful stock photo model i've never been able to track down

i think about him every. goddamn. day.

in terms of like,, real ppl and not models: corbin bleu, especially during Jump In. figure skater elladj balde. rayan "ray ray" lopez from mindless behavior. A$AP Rocky a lil bit, maybe i just like his hairstyle idk

two more models i think are important: carissa pinkston and ralph souffrant