#i wasn't doing fandom stuff necessarily

[our-lesboy-experience]

idk what the criteria for fandom asks is but have this .sonic fan lesboys where are you

i love seeing lesboy headcanons it literally heals the soul

[sukibenders]

Lottie Matthews: *a teenage girl stuck in the middle of the wilderness, stranded with other teenage girls and two boys and a coach, all traumatized and simply wanting to go home, starving, struggling with guilt and her own mind, trying to find comfort in whatever she can---which ends up being a supernatural force, some of the girl's cling to it, because it's provides comfort, while others turn against her because it's too far out of the realm of belief even though she stabbed a bear through the skull and fed them from it, but in the end she's just a teenage girl placed on a pedestal that she didn't ask for but took it because it would help her friends, only for years later said pedestal she didn't ask for causes her to be seen as a pariah amongst the same girls that she survived the wilderness with.*

Some people: Lottie is most definitely the villain of the series! Look how she's tearing the girls apart and making them the worst versions of themselves! She's just crazy, and none of this is even real. I'm glad Shauna--

[playingonedchess]

wonder if ill ever actually finish that bloody fanfiction

[desperatelyseekingcannibals]

Telling Hugh Dancy about trans masc Will and more...

As some of you already know by now, I went to Boston Fanexpo this past weekend for another stop on the unofficial Hannibal 2024 Reunion Tour.

I had planned to do autographs on the Friday before the Hannibal panel and had brought some gifts for Hugh which included a copy of Adapt. Evolve. Become: The Genderqueer Fandom of NBC's Hannibal, which I compiled and edited last year. I also got him to sign my own copy (above).

It all moved quite quickly, but I did have the chance to explain that it's a volume by and about trans, non-binary, and genderqueer Fannibals that includes art, fics, essays, and personal pieces. He seemed intrigued and I said I hope he'd have the chance to read it and that the art isn't explicit/sexual but some of the fics are - he laughed and said he appreciated the warning.

It was all quite the whirlwind, especially after coming all the way from the UK, so I was absolutely mortified when I remembered the next morning that I had talked with a few trans Fannibals who had specifically asked me to let him know that he/Will is a trans icon. So I went back up to see him again on the Saturday morning when it wasn't too busy (and get more stuff signed) and this is what happened:

[I wrote notes down right after so this is as close an account I can get without having filmed it!].

Me: I saw you yesterday Hugh: I remember (smiley-friendly) Me: I gave you a book Hugh: I remember (smiley-friendly) Me: well, I forgot to tell you. A few trans Fannibals reached out to me to tell you that Will is a trans icon to them and we all love you for it. Hugh was surprised (in a nice way) and I was pretty much going to walk away then - job done and feeling like time for me to stop bothering Hugh lol. But before I could walk away he sort of held out his hand to stop me and said something along the lines of - I don't mean this in a disrespectful way, don't take it the wrong way... I'm genuinely curious- I get that it can be about identity- but what is the connection to Will and being trans? Luckily - my essay in the book is exactly about how Will can be read as trans, so I sort of gave him a summary of that. I explained that (obviously) both Will and Hannibal can be read as queer, and that - especially as both characters have dominant masculine and feminine traits, it's also easy to read them both as trans or in some way genderqueer. He was nodding and agreeing, so I further explained that with Hannibal, he is fully formed - he's already whatever he is - which Hugh also agreed with. But that Will is still becoming, still transitioning and therefore can be more relatable to trans fans who see that journey in themselves. So although it's not necessarily the same journey - there is enough to it that it resonates with trans people. I said that in the show there is also the added bonus of Will being seen and accepted for who he is, just as trans people wish to be. He was nodding along and agreeing with me and then he thanked me for explaining that. It was pretty quiet previously but I'd been there a few minutes so the queue was building up a little but he was so focused on me - so genuinely intent on hearing what I had to say and learning more. SO I CARRIED ON. (lols) I explained to him that it goes further than the show, that we have found a community in the fandom and that many trans people have a catalyst in their life that sparks their journey - like Will had in his friendship with Hannibal. For us it might be a person, an event, or even a TV show. I explained how the fandom are so supportive of trans people - that we are SEEN. That I for one wouldn't have been able to afford top surgery without the kind donations of Fannibals back when I was not in a good place (mentally or financially). That we all help each other and for some of us that has been life-saving. He did the hand on heart thing and said "wow" and was clearly moved. I said to him that so much of this is in the book, that I completely understand if he doesn't want to read the fanfic, but I really hope that he will at least read each of the personal pieces - that each of the fics and art also have a little write up from their creator about what the show and/or fandom has meant to them and their gender journey - how important this has been in our lives. He repeated a couple of times that he would definitely read it. I thanked him and he held out his hand and gave me the most genuine hand shake I've had in my life.

I want to really stress here how much this was instigated by Hugh. That he really wanted to know more and understand and didn't even look at the slowly growing queue but was instead intently focused on knowing more about the trans Fannibals and about why this show and the characters mean so much to us.

I then went off and spoke with a few Fannibal friends in the queue before getting around the corner to another Fannibal friend and having a bit of an emotional moment/breakdown. I can't even explain how grateful I am that he gave me the opportunity to explain all this to him. And I was especially glad I got to tell that Will is a trans icon because I'd have felt terrible if I'd have not done that after people had asked!! Thank you for trusting me to pass that message on for you!

💖

I know for many of you Adapt. Evolve. Become: The Genderqueer Fandom of NBC's Hannibal might have gone a little under the radar. So here is some more about that >>

It was compiled last year for Trans Hanni Day, edited by Max Turner of (and in conjunction with) A Coup of Owls Press - and published under Max's ACoO imprint.

It features essays, personal pieces, fanart and fanfic by and about trans, non-binary, genderqueer and otherwise non-cis Fannibals.

IT IS FREE TO DOWNLOAD, however we ask that if you do that, please consider donating to one of the linked trans orgs if you can afford to (or a similar organisation/charity of your choice).

It can be purchased on Amazon, however, as the proceeds go to charity, and Amazon only gives royalties, more is earned/given if bought directly via Max's shop.

Dearest trans Fannibals, please know that YOU ARE SEEN!

[mdzsartreblogs]

Recognizing AI Generated Images, Danmei Edition

Heyo, @unforth here! I run some danmei art blogs (@mdzsartreblogs, @tgcfartreblogs, @svsssartreblogs, @zhenhunartreblogs, @erhaartreblogs, @dmbjartreblogs, @tykartreblogs, and @cnovelartreblogs) which means I see a LOT of danmei art, and I go through the main fandom tags more-or-less every day.

Today, for the first time, I spotted someone posting AI-generated images (I refuse to call them AI "art" - and to be clear, that's correct of me, because at least in the US it literally LEGALLY isn't art) without any label indicating they were AI generated. I am not necessarily against the existence of AI-generated images (though really...considering all the legal issues and the risks of misuse, I'm basically against them); I think they potentially have uses in certain contexts (such as for making references) and I also think that regardless of our opinions, we're stuck with them, but they're also clearly not art and I don't reblog them to the art side blogs.

The images I spotted today had multiple "tells," but they were still accumulating notes, and I thought it might be a good moment to step back and point out some of the more obvious tells because my sense is that a LOT of people are against AI-generated images being treated as art, and that these people wouldn't want to support an AI-generator user who tried to foist off their work as actual artwork, but that people don't actually necessarily know how to IDENTIFY those works and therefore can inadvertently reblog works that they'd never support if they were correctly identified. (Similar to how the person who reposts and says "credit to the artist" is an asshole but they're not the same as someone who reposts without any credit at all and goes out of their way to make it look like they ARE the artist when they're not).

Toward that end, I've downloaded all the images I spotted on this person's account and I'm going to use them to highlight the things that led me to think they were AI art - they posted a total of 5 images to a few major danmei tags the last couple days, and several other images not to specific fandoms (I examined 8 images total). The first couple I was suspicious, but it wasn't til this morning that I spotted one so obvious that it couldn't be anything BUT AI art. I am NOT going to name the person who did this. The purpose of this post is purely educational. I have no interest whatsoever in bullying one rando. Please don't try to identify them; who they are is genuinely irrelevant, what matters is learning how to recognize AI art in general and not spreading it around, just like the goal of education about reposting is to help make sure that people who repost don't get notes on their theft, to help people recognize the signs so that the incentive to be dishonest about this stuff is removed.

But first: Why is treating AI-generated images as art bad?

I'm no expert and this won't be exhaustive, but I do think it's important to first discuss why this matters.

On the surface, it's PERHAPS harmless for someone to post AI-generated images provided that the image is clearly labeled as AI-generated. I say "perhaps" because in the end, as far as I'm aware, there isn't a single AI-generation engine that's built on legally-sourced artwork. Every AI (again, to the best of my knowledge) has been trained using copyrighted images usually without the permission of the artists. Indeed, this is the source of multiple current lawsuits. (and another)

But putting that aside (as if it can be put aside that AI image generators are literally unethically built), it's still problematic to support the images being treated as art. Artists spend thousands of hours learning their craft, honing it, sharing their creations, building their audiences. This is what they sell when they offer commissions, prints, etc. This can never be replicated by a computer, and to treat an AI-generated image as in any way equivalent is honestly rude, inappropriate, disgusting imo. This isn't "harmless"; supporting AI image creation engines is damaging to real people and their actual livelihoods. Like, the images might be beautiful, but they're not art. I'm honestly dreading someone managing to convince fandom that their AI-generated works are actual art, and then cashing in on commissions, prints, etc., because people can't be fussed to learn the difference. We really can't let this happen, guys. Fanartists are one of the most vibrant, important, prominent groups in all our fandoms, and we have to support them and do our part to protect them.

As if those two points aren't enough, there's already growing evidence that AI-generated works are being used to further propagandists. There are false images circulating of violence at protests, deep-fakes of various kinds that are helping the worst elements of society to push their horrid agendas. As long as that's a facet of AI-generated works, they'll always be dangerous.

I could go on, but really this isn't the main point of my post and I don't want to get bogged down. Other people have said more eloquently than I why AI-generated images are bad. Read those. (I tried to find a good one to link but sadly failed; if anyone knows a good post, feel free to send it and I'll add the link to the post).

Basically: I think a legally trained AI-image generator that had built-in clear watermarks could be a fun toy for people who want reference images or just to play with making pseudo-art. But...that's not what we have, and what we do have is built on theft and supports dystopia so, uh. Yeah fuck AI-generated images.

How to recognize AI-Generated Images Made in an Eastern Danmei Art Style

NOTE: I LEARNED ALL THE BASIC ON SPOTTING AI-GENERATED IMAGES FROM THIS POST. I'll own I still kinda had the wool over my eyes until I read that post - I knew AI stuff was out there but I hadn't really looked closely enough to have my eyes open for specific signs. Reading that entire post taught me a lot, and what I learned is the foundation of this post.

This post shouldn't be treated as a universal guide. I'm specifically looking at the tells on the kind of art that people in danmei fandoms often see coming from Weibo and other Chinese, Japanese, and Korean platforms, works made by real artists. For example, the work of Foxking (狐狸大王a), kokirapsd, and Changyang (who is an official artist for MDZS, TGCF, and other danmei works). This work shares a smooth use of color, an aim toward a certain flavor of realism, an ethereal quality to the lighting, and many other features. (Disclaimer: I am not an artist. Putting things in arty terms is really not my forte. Sorry.)

So, that's what these AI-generated images are emulating. And on the surface, they look good! Like...

...that's uncontestably a pretty picture (the white box is covering the "artist's" watermark.) And on a glance, it doesn't necessarily scream "AI generated"! But the devil is in the details, and the details are what this post is about. And that picture? Is definitely AI generated.

This post is based on 8 works I grabbed from a single person's account, all posted as their own work and watermarked as such. Some of the things that are giveaways only really show when looking at multiple pieces. I'm gonna start with those, and then I'll highlight some of the specifics I spotted that caused me to go from "suspicious" to "oh yeah no these are definitely not art."

Sign 1: all the images are the exact same size. I mean, to the pixel: 512 x 682 pixels (or 682 x 512, depending on landscape or portrait orientation). This makes zero sense. Why would an artist trim all their pieces to that size? It's not the ideal Tumblr display size (that's 500 x 750 pixels). If you check any actual artist's page and look at the full-size of several of their images, they'll all be different sizes as they trimmed, refined, and otherwise targeted around their original canvas size to get the results they wanted.

Sign 2: pixelated. At the shrunken size displayed on, say, a mobile Tumblr feed, the image looks fine, but even just opening the full size upload, the whole thing is pixelated. Now, this is probably the least useful sign; a lot of artists reduce the resolution/dpi/etc. on their uploaded works so that people don't steal them. But, taken in conjunction with everything else, it's definitely a sign.

Those are the two most obvious overall things - the things I didn't notice until I looked at all the uploads. The specifics are really what tells, though. Which leads to...

Sign 3: the overall work appears to have a very high degree of polish, as if it were made by an artist who really really knows what they're doing, but on inspection - sometimes even on really, REALLY cursory inspect - the details make zero sense and reflect the kinds of mistakes that a real artist would never make.

So, here's the image that I saw that "gave it away" to me, and caused me to re-examine the images that had first struck me as off but that I hadn't been able to immediately put my finger on the problem. I've circled some of the spots that are flagrant.

Do you see yet? Yes? Awesome, you're getting it. No? Okay, let's go point by point, with close ups.

Sign 4: HANDS. Hands are currently AI's biggest weakness, though they've been getting better quickly and honestly that's terrifying. But whatever AI generated this picture clearly doesn't get hands yet, because that hand is truly an eldritch horror. Look at this thing:

It has two palms. It has seven fingers. It's basically two hands overlaid over each other, except one of those hands only has four fingers and the other has three. Seeing this hand was how I went from "umm...maybe they're fake? Maybe they're not???" to "oh god why is ANYONE reblogging this when it's this obvious?" WATCH THE HANDS. (Go back up to that first one posted and look at the hand, you'll see. Or just look right below at this crop.) Here's some other hands:

Sign 5: Hair and shadows. Once I started inspecting these images, the shadows of the hair on the face was one of the things that was most consistently fucked up across all the uploaded pictures. Take a look:

There's shadows of tendrils on the forehead, but there's no corresponding hair that could possibly have made those shadows. Likewise there's a whole bunch of shadows on the cheeks. Where are those coming from? There's no possible source in the rest of the image. Here's some other hair with unrelated wonky shadows:

Sign 6: Decorative motifs that are really just meaningless squiggles. Like, artists, especially those who make fanart, put actual thought into what the small motifs are on their works. Like, in TGCF, an artist will often use a butterfly motif or a flower petal motif to reflect things about the characters. An AI, though, can only approximate a pattern and it can't imbue those with meanings. So you end up with this:

What is that? It's nothing, that's what. It's a bunch of squiggles. Here's some other meaningless squiggle motifs (and a more zoomed-in version of the one just above):

Sign 7: closely related to meaningless squiggle motifs is motifs that DO look like something, but aren't followed through in any way that makes sense. For example, an outer garment where the motifs on the left and the right shoulder/chest are completely different, or a piece of cloth that's supposed to be all one piece but that that has different patterns on different sections of it. Both of these happen in the example piece, see?

The first images on the top left is the left and right shoulder side by side. The right side has a scalloped edge; the left doesn't. Likewise, in the right top picture, you can see the two under-robe lapels; one has a gold decoration and the other doesn't. And then the third/bottom image shows three sections of the veil. One (on the left) has that kind of blue arcy decoration, which doesn't follow the folds of the cloth very well and looks weird and appears at one point to be OVER the hair instead of behind it. The second, on top of the bottom images, shows a similar motif, except now it's gold, and it looks more like a hair decoration than like part of the veil. The third is also part of the same veil but it has no decorations at all. Nothing about this makes any sense whatsoever. Why would any artist intentionally do it that way? Or, more specifically, why would any artist who has this apparent level of technical skill ever make a mistake like this?

They wouldn't.

Some more nonsensical patterns, bad mirrors, etc. (I often put left/right shoulders side by side so that it'd be clearer, sorry if it's weird):

Sign 8: bizarre architecture, weird furniture, etc. Most of the images I'm examining for this post have only partial backgrounds, so it's hard to really focus on this, but it's something that the post I linked (this one) talks about a lot. So, like, an artist will put actual thought into how their construction works, but an AI won't because an AI can't. There's no background in my main example image, but take a look at this from another of my images:

On a glance it's beautiful. On a few seconds actually staring it's just fucking bizarre. The part of the ceiling on the right appears to be domed maybe? But then there's a hard angle, then another. The windows on the right have lots of panes, but then the one on the middle-left is just a single panel, and the ones on the far left have a complete different pane model. Meanwhile, also on the left side at the middle, there's that dark gray...something...with an arch that mimics the background arches except it goes no where, connects to nothing, and has no apparent relationship to anything else going on architecturally. And, while the ceiling curves, the back wall is straight AND shows more arches in the background even though the ceiling looks to end. And yes, some of this is possible architecture, but taken as a whole, it's just gibberish. Why would anyone who paints THAT WELL paint a building to look like THAT? They wouldn't. It's nonsense. It's the art equivalent of word salad. When we look at a sentence and it's like "dog makes a rhythmical salad to betray on the frame time plot" it almost resembles something that might mean something but it's clearly nonsense. This background is that sentence, as art.

Sign 9: all kinds of little things that make zero sense. In the example image, I circled where a section of the hair goes BELOW the inner robe. That's not impossible but it just makes zero sense. As with many of these, it's the kind of thing that taken alone, I'd probably just think "well, that was A Choice," but combined with all the other weird things it stands out as another sign that something here is really, really off. Here's a collection of similar "wtf?" moments I spotted across the images I looked at (I'm worried I'm gonna hit the Tumblr image cap, hence throwing these all in one, lol.)

You have to remember that an actual artist will do things for a reason. And we, as viewers, are so used to viewing art with that in mind that we often fill in reasons even when there aren't. Like, in the image just about this, I said, "what the heck are these flowers growing on?" And honestly, I COULD come up with explanations. But that doesn't mean it actually makes sense, and there's no REASON for it whatsoever. The theoretical same flowers are, in a different shot, growing unsupported! So...what gives??? The answer is nothing gives. Because these pieces are nothing. The AI has no reason, it's just tossing in random aesthetic pieces together in a mishmash, and the person who generated them is just re-generating and refining until they get something that looks "close enough" to what they wanted. It never was supposed to make sense, so of course it doesn't.

In conclusion...

After years of effort, artists have gotten across to most of fandom that reposts are bad, and helped us learn strategies for helping us recognize reposts, and given us an idea of what to do when we find one.

Fandom is just at the beginning of this process as it applies to AI-generated images. There's a LOT of education that has to be done - about why AI-generated images are bad (the unethical training using copyrighted images without permission is, imo, critical to understanding this), and about how to spot them, and then finally about what to do when you DO find them.

With reposts, we know "tell original artist, DCMA takedowns, etc." That's not the same with these AI-images. There's no original owner. There's no owner at all - in the US, at least, they literally cannot be copyrighted. Which is why I'm not even worrying about "credit" on this post - there's nothing stolen, cause there's nothing made. So what should you do?

Nothing. The answer is, just as the creator has essentially done nothing, you should also do nothing. Don't engage. Don't reblog. Don't commission the creator or buy their art prints. If they do it persistently and it bothers you, block them. If you see one you really like, and decide to reblog it, fine, go for it, but mark it clearly - put in the ACTUAL COMMENTS (not just in the tags!) that it's AI art, and that you thought it was pretty anyway. But honestly, it'd be better to not engage, especially since as this grows it's inevitable that some actual artists are going to start getting accused of posting AI-generated images by over-zealous people. Everyone who gets a shadow wrong isn't posting AI-generated images. A lot of these details are insanely difficult to get correct, and lots of even very skilled, accomplished artists, if you go over their work with a magnifying glass you're going to find at least some of these things, some weirdnesses that make no sense, some shadows that are off, some fingers that are just ugh (really, getting hands wrong is so relatable. hands are the fucking worst). It's not about "this is bad art/not art because the hand is wrong," it's specifically about the ways that it's wrong, the way a computer randomly throws pieces together versus how actual people make actual mistakes. It's all of the little signs taken as a whole to say "no one who could produce a piece that, on the surface, looks this nice, could possibly make THIS MANY small 'mistakes.'"

The absolute best thing you can do if you see AI-generated images being treated as real art is just nothing. Support actual artists you love, and don't spread the fakes.

Thanks for your time, everyone. Good luck avoiding AI-generated pieces in the future, please signal boost this, and feel free to get in touch if you think I can help you with anything related to this.

[nanamiscocksleeve]

Calling all monster lovers!!

When I first started this account back in April, I wasn't expecting that in 4 short months, I'd be at 1500 followers?! I was just a girl who loved smut. Now I have all these people who like my stuff??!!!

To celebrate, I decided to host a little writing collaboration just in time for spooky season.

Introducing: MONSTER MASH!

Fic List Here

Info/Rules:

The theme of the collab is monsters. Any kind of monster. Werewolves, vampires, aliens, ghosts, Loch Ness, Frankenstein, fairies, tentacle, sirens, devils, incubus, succubus, WHATEVER. No bounds here as long as there's a monster involved.

There needs to be at least one character from the fandom list below (but this is me guys, threesomes and gangbangs are welcome!). I'm opening this up to a few fandoms that I don't necessarily write for. Fandoms for this event include: -JJK - Love and Deepspace -Bleach -Solo Leveling -MHA

Can you have the pairing with a monster? Can the character of choice be a monster? GOD YES! It's called 'Monster Mash' for a reason!

Does not necessarily need to be horror, accepting any genre.

Word count: minimum of 700 words, no upper cap.

It should be an original fic created for this event.

How to enter / Deadline:

DM/Inbox me so that I can add you to the fic masterlist stating which fandom and monster you're writing for.

For example, a message to me could look like, "Hey Ray! I want to participate in the monster collab. I'll be doing Gojo from JJK and my monster is a vampire!"

Please be sure to tag your fic as '#ncs monster mash' and also @ me so that I can keep track of all your lovely fics!

The deadline for sending me your fic is October 31st!

Have fun my Spooky Sluts!

And thank you so much @actuallysaiyan for making the spooky banner for this event! You really got my idea designed so well 💜

- NCS

all dividers by @/ cafekitsune

@aether-seawolf @actuallysaiyan @makingtimemine @snwvie @chronicreadz @facelessfionna @theimmortalbuns @otomegamesforlife @sweets-kozume @kentocalls

[captainsophiestark]

I Made You Breakfast

Kai Parker x Reader

Masterlist - Join My Taglist!

Written for my personal fic writing challenge for 2024, Sophie's Year of Fic! Featuring a new fic being posted every Friday, all year long :)

Fandom: The Vampire Diaries

Summary: Kai's on his apology tour, and Y/N is his next stop after things didn't go too well with Damon or Bonnie

Word Count: 2,000

Category: Fluff, Humor, a little bit of Angst

Putting work into an AI program without permission is illegal. You do not have my permission. Do not do it.

I sighed to myself as I headed downstairs in my favorite pair of sweats, mentally making a list of everything I had to do today. It was an unfortunately long list, compounded by the latest supernatural drama, which my friends insisted on dragging me into. Bonnie had finally made it home from the prison world, thankfully, but that didn't mean any of the drama in our lives had gone away. In fact, it had almost doubled, with news of Damon's mother floating around in another prison world somewhere. I got halfway through an eyeroll at the memory of everything going on lately when I stopped dead in my tracks.

I could smell bacon, eggs, and toast wafting up towards me from the kitchen. Someone was here, in my house, cooking breakfast. And with everything going on lately, I knew for a fact it wasn't one of my friends.

I glanced around, grabbing a stake off the nearest end table. No vampire should have been able to get into my house unless they were a friend I'd already let in, but I'd had enough near-death experiences despite that fact that I was constantly prepared.

I crept towards the kitchen, trying to listen for any signs of trap or trouble. All I could hear was a faint clinking of plates. If someone had seriously broken into my house, why the hell were they just hanging out in my kitchen making breakfast?

I got my answer a second later when I burst through the door, going for the element of surprise, and found none other than Kai Parker standing before me.

"Oh, hey!" he said, jumping and spinning to face me with wide eyes. "You're up!"

"...Yup. And... you're here. In my kitchen. Making breakfast."

"Yeah! I hope you like it. Here, let me get your plate. I thought I'd have a few more minutes."

With that, he turned to the stove and starting scooping scrambled eggs and toast onto a plate. I just watched him, not moving an inch.

"Kai?"

"Yeah?"

"What the hell are you doing in my house?"

He turned back around to look at me again, his eyes wide and the plate half-finished in his hand. After a moment, his expression morphed into a sheepish grin. I just blinked at him, my expression unchanging.

"Well, after I merged with Luke, I started getting all these... feelings." He said the word like somebody else might say 'zits' or 'rash'. "And one of those has been guilt, for some of the stuff I put you through. Or I guess, your friends, mostly. I tried apologizing to Bonnie earlier, and... it didn't go well."

His expression darkened, and I frowned. But a moment later, the clouds apparently cleared, and Kai fixed me with a beaming smile again.

"So I thought I'd try again with you. In the Prison World, I saw Damon making Bonnie breakfast all the time, and she seemed to really like that. So I figured you might, too."

I just stared at him for a few long moments without saying anything. I turned my options over and over in my mind, trying to get my still half-asleep brain to make a rational choice. I probably should've been incredibly freaked out that Kai was here at all, but I'd actually had a few positive interactions with him even before the whole merge thing, and had kind of started to like him. Or, at least, started to think he had some ally potential, despite other things he did. We'd even bonded over music taste and his new fascination with social media, and he'd tried to help Sheriff Forbes, although it hadn't necessarily been out of the goodness of his heart. For some reason, I just couldn't muster the fear or anger I probably should've been feeling when I looked at him in my house. Finally, I sighed, my mind made up. No reason to try to force bad feelings when they wouldn't come on their own, right?

"Thanks, Kai," I said, actually meaning it as I moved over to the dining table. "Aside from the fact that you broke into my house to do it... that's actually pretty sweet."

He beamed at me, and I found myself returning his smile. He turned back around to finish making my plate, and I shook my head. This was absolutely ridiculous, but I couldn't say I minded very much.

"Here you go!" he said, setting the plate down in front of me with a big smile. He didn't move away, just standing off to the side and watching me expectantly. I picked up my fork, but didn't take my eyes off Kai.

"...Aren't you gonna join me?"

"Oh! Right. You know, I've been practicing how I was going to do this in my head all morning, and now that I'm actually doing it it's like I completely forgot everything I was planning to do. That's weird, right?"

I shrugged. "I mean, sounds like a normal part of being nervous to me."

He nodded emphatically as he returned to the table and sat across from me with a breakfast plate of his own.

"All these new... emotions from Luke have been, like, super weird. I don't know how you all deal with these all the time."

"Eh, yeah, they can be annoying sometimes. It gets easier with practice though, and I'd say on the whole they're a positive experience."

Kai nodded thoughtfully, taking a bite of his eggs as his gaze wandered around my kitchen. I took a few bites of my own food, and I had to admit, he was a surprisingly good cook.

"So..." I started. "Was this it for the apology? It's a great breakfast, but usually an apology has a little more attached..."

"Oh!" Kai's attention snapped back to me. "No no, this isn't it. I was planning to do the other part of the apology while we ate breakfast."

"Makes sense. Go for it."

He cleared his throat and shifted around in his seat, then met my eyes before hesitating again. I tried to look encouraging as I ate my eggs, and after a moment, he nodded to himself and continued.

"I'm sorry for trying to kill your friend, and testing out my power on her. And that I couldn't save your other friend's mom, even though I really couldn't do anything about that. I still... I still feel bad. And honestly, I'm mostly sorry for everything I've done that hurt you, even if it was indirectly. I... I actually really like you, and so, uh... I don't want you to hate me. I keep getting this stabbing pain in my chest when I think about it... or when I think about that time I saw you crying over Bonnie..."

He trailed off, staring at the table instead of me, apparently lost in thought. After a moment though, he shook his head and cleared his throat, looking back up to meet my stare again. His blue eyes were wider than usual, his eyebrows pulling together, and he looked to be in actual distress for maybe the first time I'd ever seen, at least when his life wasn't being threatened.

"I'm sorry, Y/N. I promise not to do anything to hurt you again. Will you give me a second chance?"

The corner of my mouth quirked up in a smile, especially at the rare senserity in his tone. I knew my friends would have quite a few things to say about this decision, but I didn't let myself think about that. At least not right now.

I sighed. "Kai, despite the fact that you broke into my house, I'm going to believe you about this whole 'turning over new leaf' thing. I... I'd be lying if I said I didn't like you too. So, if you really mean what you're saying about not hurting me or the people I care about anymore?"

He nodded so fast I was actually a little worried about him.

"Completely serious. Cross my heart and hope to die. I'm ready to join the Mystic Falls Scooby Doo team for good."

I smiled, laughing a little and shaking my head.

"Well, okay then. I can't promise anybody else on the team will be quite as easy to convince as me, but... I forgive you, Kai. I'm happy to see you like this. And, by the way, you make some very good eggs and toast."

"Thanks. I had to get good at cooking, you know, alone in the Prison World." A shadow passed over his face again, until I reached across the table and lightly rested my hand on top of his. Then, his face lit up like the sun. "And thanks for giving me a second chance. I promise, you won't regret it."

I wasn't totally sure I believed that, but I decided not to say so. Instead, I smiled and gave his hand a little squeeze before pulling back.

After a moment of silence where I could see Kai vibrating with the desire to say whatever he was holding back, he finally blurted out the other thing he'd apparently been planning to ask me this morning.

"So... I might be a little rusty about how all this works, or if it's changed since the eighties, but... would you want to go out with me sometime? Like on a date?"

I smiled, then buried my face in my hands. My friends would kill me if I said yes to this, but despite myself, I really, really wanted to.

"What's wrong?" Kai asked. I shook my head and looked up at him again.

"Nothing, Kai, I just... ugh, my friends are really not going to like this."

He smiled. "Does that mean you're saying yes?"

I took a deep breath and let it out, then shrugged and matched his smile with one of my own.

"Yeah. Yeah, I think it does. What the hell, right?"

"That's great! I was thinking we could go do karaoke? I've always loved karaoke. I got good at it when I was passing time in the Prison World."

"I have to warn you, I am very much not good at karaoke. But I'll still sing my heart out with you anyway, if you want to go!"

"Perfect! We can go tonight." I laughed, and Kai's expression immediately dropped. "Is that okay? Do you not want to go tonight?"

"No, Kai, I do. It's a little fast, honestly, but I don't mind. Why wait?"

"That's exactly what I was thinking. So... should I pick you up? Around seven? We could get dinner first, and then go."

"I think that sounds like a great plan, Kai," I smiled at him, which he immediately returned. A moment later, though, his hand shot up to clutch at his chest.

"Ugh, what is... what is happening to me? Why does my heart feel like it's about to explode?"

"That's probably excitement, Kai, or butterflies, which are like positive nerves. I'm feeling them too. It's because we're looking forward to going out together tonight."

Kai made a face. "This is what people were talking about when they said they got butterflies? This is terrible." I hid a laugh behind my hand, and Kai's eyes snapped up to mine. "Wait. You said you were feeling it too?"

I nodded, and Kai's expression immediately changed to a wide grin.

"So you're excited, too?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I am."

He nodded, the smile staying on his face as he dug in to his eggs again, glancing at me between almost every bite. I just shook my head, a smile on my own face all the same. This was going to be an adventure, going on a date with Kai Parker, and I knew my friends were going to want to murder me for it. But I couldn't totally bring myself to care.

Despite some pretty rocky history, I had a weirdly good feeling about Kai, from the moment he'd started his apology speech this morning. And so far, I'd never been wrong when I trusted my gut for stuff like this, even when it led me into karaoke. I had a good feeling it was going to be right about Kai Parker, too.

****************

Everything Taglist: @rosecentury @kmc1989

TVD/TO Taglist: @elenavampire21

[copperbadge]

I was making breakfast and listening to an episode of Just King Things this morning, which is a podcast I do recommend -- two very smart English teachers are reading the books of Stephen King in publication order and discussing them. This could go extremely awry except they're both highly conscious of his failings as well as his skill, so they do really well handling a lot of his less salutatory content.

They've hit the point in King's ouvre (this episode was about Hearts In Atlantis) that follows his recovery from the car accident that very nearly killed him, where he was struck by a van while out walking. One of them pointed out that it seems as though he came back from nearly dying determined to write the wildest shit imaginable and only write what he wanted, which struck a chord in me this time despite having listened to this episode before. Perhaps because I was thinking about my own writing and where it's going in the short term (there are a couple of short stories I want to do that I don't quite have a way into yet). I generally don't think about the drift of my creativity in the long term because when I do I usually draw the wrong conclusions.

I don't really classify my life, the way some people who've had high-impact injuries do, as before-TBI and after-TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury -- the fairly severe concussion I had in January of 2020). For one thing, given I had to cancel a trip to NYC because of it, it may have saved my life; I almost certainly would have caught COVID as someone with known lung issues in New York at the time. For another, the TBI was way scarier to almost everyone else; for me it was just one more dumb injury I gave myself and I didn't even remember most of it so it hardly registered. I used to open the story of it with a joke about waking up not remembering going to bed the night before, but nobody ever found it funny.

It's true that there are changes it wrought in my life, though. Even practical stuff like making sure my living space doesn't have tripping hazards and continuing to wear a fitbit even though I don't really need to (the fitbit told us, the morning after, exactly when the concussion happened, because it registered a heart-rate spike when I fell). For weeks after, I had to move slowly and put off making important decisions because I couldn't trust my physical or intellectual judgement; I didn't even jaywalk in my own neighborhood because I couldn't be sure I was judging the cars' speeds properly. For about a year after I had periodic post-concussion syndrome which basically just slammed me back into concussion space, which wasn't painful or upsetting but was definitely inconvenient.

And it's also undeniable that my writing shifted after the injury. It's not necessarily because of the injury, since my initial recovery from the TBI and the declaration of quarantine happened at roughly the same time, and anyone who tells you that a years-long global pandemic didn't impact their artistic expression is selling you a line. But the last thing I wrote before the TBI was the first draft of Six Harvests, and aside from the Six Harvests publication draft, which had fairly minimal changes, almost all that I've written has been blue-sky, light-hearted, PG-rated romance. It's been on my mind that I've been writing different subject matter from what I used to, but the timing of it didn't strike me until just recently.

I don't mind, really. I love fandom and I support fanfic in whatever expression it comes, but I'm also happy writing my own stories. While I'm aware it's been years since I've meaningfully written fanfic, it doesn't bother me per se, as long as I'm writing. It bothered me much more when I could write fanfic but not original fic, especially in those last few awful months at my last job. I'm proud of the literary and non-genre fiction I've written in the past, but it's also much more trying and frustrating to write at times, so I'm enjoying having a different sort of challenge that feels more fulfilling in the process. I'm sure at some point I'll go back to literary fiction -- there are ways in which it's hard to avoid turning the later Shivadh novels into literary fiction, being honest -- but for now I like what I'm writing, and I'm writing primarily to please myself and without regard to what's necessarily rational or linear.

Just struck me, is all, that it's by far the most noticeable major shift in my work. I do sort of wonder what will be next.

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

what are your thoughts on the ministrife situation? imo literally the worst fate for eridan to be damned to tbh

i think he will eventually (after <5 minutes) just shoot cronus and leave. (CW for mentions of abuse and cronus's romantic grossness and stuff under the cut).

Ignoring the extremely creepy and gross fact that Hussie doesn't seem to have a problem with the age gap (it's There, we've acknowledged that it's creepy and weird, i personally think it highlights how immature the dancestors are despite their physical age, and it actually serves to hint at how trash they are, but it's still really uncomfortable in the moment and never gets properly called out. In any case we've talked about it critically, we can move on and talk about characterization now), he and cronus are actually kind of polar opposites. Given that Cronus, along with many of the dancestors, are riffing on what the fandom interpretation of their Alternian counterparts are, it's kind of a fascinating look at all the things Eridan ISN'T.

The fandom (especially at the time) had flattened Eridan down to "overdramatic Nice Guy hipster who won't stop hitting on people," with varying degrees of sympathy. In other words, they took all of Eridan's outward presentation - the narration calling his genuine anxiety and distress "overblown emotional theatrics," the fact that his being rejected was a running gag - entirely at face value, while also missing what sort of archetype he was actually supposed to represent.

At no point does Eridan ever actually mention a hipster interest, like vintage clothes or indie media. It's all entirely in his design and Karkat calling him a hipster (it's not even in his character introduction), so presumably, it IS a part of his character (Karkat knows him really well), but it's probably a part he keeps to himself, like his love of wizards.

Moreover, he isn't really a Nice Guy. The closest he gets is thinking Nepeta owes him a chance for saving her life, but as far as we can tell, he only ever asked her once, got rejected, accepted that rejection, and has never taken out that rejection on her. When he complains about it, he frames it as a bitter "I guess what I did wasn't enough," not "she's an unreasonable witch withholding romance from me even though I'm so nice to her." All other romance attempts are crimes of... just being way too forward.

He bursts into Kanaya's DMs demanding she auspicetisize with Vriska because... that's what she likes to do, right? The same happens to Terezi in [S] Karkat: Wake Up. He comes on strong in Rose's DMs and after getting a little annoyance back, goes "wow, we kinda have something," and does not realize her blowing up his computer is a rejection because she didn't explicitly tell him no and he's a dumbass. And even though he's nasty at Sollux because emotionally, he's still bitter about Sollux "stealing" Feferi from him, at least CONSCIOUSLY he's recognized the rejection on both fronts and has repeatedly told Feferi that he has no more interest in getting back together with her, in spite of her recognizing that he's emotionally not over her. And speaking of Feferi, his confession to her is entirely genuine and respectful toward her feelings. At no point does he indicate that he feels like she owes him a date.

These aren't Nice Guy actions, they're "I have 0 social skills or self-awareness" actions. And also a little bit "due to my trauma and anxiety and desensitization to murder, I struggle to care about other people" actions. He's not even actually casteist or genocidal - I spent an entire essay arguing that.

But regardless, that's what the fandom ran with, in large part because they didn't bother reading between the lines. Ironically, like Eridan, they just believed what he told them. I don't even necessarily blame the fandom - at least part of this obfuscation was intentional, and a clever trick on the part of the writing. By highlighting Eridan at his worst, and having the narration be complicit in his self-delusion and mockery, the story is able to put the audience in the same mindset as his in-universe bullies - Eridan is dumb weirdo whose emotional problems are worthy of ridicule, not sympathy. Let's all point and laugh!

This sets up his meltdown to be more of a twist - even though his literal introduction is him killing something and talking about genocide, the very real danger he poses is forgotten both by the audience and the other characters because they've gotten so used to dismissing his feelings that they ignore his cries for help and the warning signals he gives off. And it makes his character more relevant and meaningful, because this happens in real life all the time - I'm sure we either all either knew, or were, the friendless weirdo at school who, upon reflection, definitely had either some bad shit going on at home or severe and untreated mental illness (or both).

The reason I'm bringing up this fandom misinterpretation is because, like a couple other dancestors, Cronus is very much a riff on the fanon version of his Alternian counterpart. Unlike Eridan, who's not actually casteist, but desperately trying to act the part, Cronus IS a casteist sea dweller who thinks he's better than lowbloods and land dwellers. Unlike Eridan, who seeks emotional connections with others, and accepts rejections, Cronus is only looking for some action, and keeps trying even well after he knows he's been rejected. Unlike Eridan, who's so consumed by anxiety and trauma that he's pretty much unable to function properly, Cronus DOES exaggerate his problems and explicitly leverage them for attention and sympathy. And unlike Eridan, who feels crushed under the weight of duty and responsibility, and tends to blame himself when things go wrong, Cronus refuses to take responsibility for anything, immediately blaming anybody BUT himself.

They're practically exact opposites, and this is, again, a clever trick on the part of the writing. It's an excellent usage of a foil: though superficially similar, the differences between these two really serves to highlight just how much Eridan is NOT the things that Cronus IS.

And it's especially interesting given that Eridan spent his entire life trying to emulate Dualscar, to the point of modeling his outfit after the guy. To him, it was not only his duty, but his inevitable fate, to wind up as Dualscar's successor. And when he finally meets the guy in person, his opinion is "even I think you're trash."

If that isn't a form of rejecting the values his society has told him repeatedly that he has to uphold, maybe in the service of perhaps setting up some sort of redemption arc or something, I don't know what is.

I've seen people point to this moment as kind of a hee haw funny one-off joke, look at how little Hussie cares about Eridan, but that's not what it is to me. You don't really need to say anything more about their relationship to each other. Eridan thinks Cronus (and by extension, everything Cronus stands for - and everything Eridan has tried to be) is garbage, but is lonely and friendless and desperate enough that he feels pushed into accepting it anyway. It's extremely consistent with his characterization and character arc.

So uh, yeah. Join me next time for more deep dives on how this funny innocuous thing in Homestuck actually Means Something.

[mcmonstructuk]

Sebby's "wedding" ring

Okay so after seeing some things I think I can kinda see where people are coming from when it comes to Zerum being 'weird' over Sebastian, and have now decided that his wedding ring isn't a wedding ring anymore, but instead a re-purposed ferryman coin

I actually had this idea a while back, but as earrings instead of a ring, but I thought I may as well repurpose the headcanon for the ring bc honestly,, the ring looks nice on him, I do like it, but I'm not a fan of it being a wedding ring

Honestly, imo it doesn't even make much sense for him to still have his wedding ring or anything? I suppose I wouldn't entirely mind it if the ring wasn't added there to spite people/the fandom and make them mad. THAT is what my main issue is,, like I feel as tho this was added despite knowing full well its gonna cause discourse in the community, which I do not appreciate at all

At the end of the day, he is Zeal and Zerums character. They can technically do whatever they want with him,, I personally js won't view things such as Zerum being Sebby's wife as canon - and am honestly wondering if this whole thing was js a joke taken too far

Something I do js wanna point out now,, I have not seen proof of Zerum allegedly being rude and removing people from the discord server just for shipping their characters with Sebastian.

When it comes to that stuff, I am remaining neutral. Do I think the wedding ring was still a bit of a petty, nonsensical move? Yeah. But that's all I think. I don't think Zerum is being overly possessive necessarily (ik I said possessive earlier but that was poor choice of wording and I've edited my post now), as I myself haven't seen that.

Until I am to see proper proof of all this drama going on, I'm not picking sides. I think all of this is js kinda immature and petty tbh

[bucketsquid]

An Exhaustive List of Octarian F.A.Qs... and Answers!

There's one thing I've noticed about the Western Splatoon fandom.... and that's the weird amount of misconceptions, mistranslations, and misunderstandings about the Octarians.

For some reason it's often lore about them, surrounding them, or about their activities that always seems to have this happen. And so I want to help correct that! They're a super cool faction and I want to work on people hopefully understanding them better, while helping to correct misconceptions about them.

This will be long, there will be many citations and pictures both. Shoutout in particular to Inkipedia and inkfish translator rassicas, and the hard work of both, for this.

If there's any common lore misconceptions that I left out, please let me know! I'm including every single one I can think of, but I probably missed something somewhere.

================================================

General Octarian Questions

Q. How are Octarians made? And are Octolings made the same way?

A. Octarians are made from severed Octoling tentacles (The Art of Splatoon + SplatoonBase) that are then somehow animated. Ones with more tentacles are "more intelligent"; they're sapient, either way.

Octolings are not, to our knowledge, created like this. The existence of SashiMori's Paul suggests that Octolings undergo the same life stages as Inklings do. (Similarly, Diss-Pair's Warabi has lore that mentions having parents.)

There is concept art in HaikaraWalker (the Octo Expansion artbook) that depicts Octolings mutating from Octarians... but it seems to just be concept art.

Q. Did Octavio brainwash the Octarians into obeying him? Wasn't music used to make them obey?

A. No, they were never brainwashed. Octavio uses his music to keep the Octarians in order and to keep their working rhythm correct-- like a military march. Inkipedia compares the Onward! jingle to "a call-and-response clapping rhythm used by teachers to grab students' attention in elementary schools". It does sound like that...

Now, if you want to say that Octarian propaganda is brainwashing, yes, that does exist.

Q. We've only ever seen feminine Octoling soldiers. What's with that?

A. The "rival Octolings" we meet in the story modes are all part of a special military unit that's female-only. They're referred to as "Takozonesu" in Japanese, a mashup of "tako" (octopus) and "amazons". Not every female Octoling can be one of these, and this group isn't completely representative of Octolings in the military.

There are male Octolings, they're just not part of this one group. (Fun fact, did you know that these Octolings are voiced by Callie and Marie's voice actors?)

Q. What's with the green sclera on Octarians?

A. There's no confirmed canon reasons. Octolings are very inconsistent about it, as well; Octavio has it and so do many enemy Octolings, but not other Octolings of note.

It could just be that the whites of their eyes are really reactive to stuff in general, since sanitized Octarians have black sclera. The green color could also just be something that happens with age while living in the domes.

Q. In Octo Expansion, Marina calls Octarian society "oppressive"-- how oppressive is it really?

A. This descriptor is actually inaccurate to the original Japanese, and was added in localization. (The Splatoon 2 Retranslation Project has a more accurate version over here! Thanks @shiverhohojiro for the link.) Octo Expansion has some notorious details that were added in localization, like Craig being more racist than usual or the omission of Commander Tartar's chatter about humankind.

That said. The domes are an isolationist* military-centric society, with emphasis on meritocracy. Octolings go into professions for things they're good at, not necessarily for what they want to do. Resources like electricity are limited, so they have to structure life around that detail, and strictness logically follows. The military doesn't tolerate slackers or nonsense, but talented people seem to do well for themselves based on how Marina's life was. Even so...

A lot of music, culture and artwork gets made down there! And they have things like beachside domes, bowling-themed domes, amusement park domes and even circuses... so it's not completely strict. There's a lot of room for silliness, it just needs to be in the right place.

So, to be totally fair? We don't know much. It's not perfect, but it's also not a hellish place to live if you wanted to stay. * They trade with Salmonids, but don't seem to do so with anyone else.

Q. Can they respawn? Are we killing them when we splat them?

A. Yes, they can use respawn technology in the same way Inklings and Octolings do. The only situation where an Octarian explicitly dies is, potentially, during the escape phases in Octo Expansion!

Q. Where/how did they make the domes?

A. Leftover human technology, meant to be similar "last resort shelters" made by humans. Think Alterna, but on a smaller fragmented scale.

================================================

Questions about DJ Octavio

Q. Why do we always see him in octopus form? Can he shapeshift?

A. Octavio can't shapeshift because of an injury from the Great Turf War. He was able to do so before and during it, however!

Q. We know Octavio leads the Octarians, but what is he? A king, an emperor, or what?

A. He is a Japanese shogun, as referenced by his title in the first Splatoon: "DJ Takowasa shōgun". We don't know if he was appointed by an emperor, if he was part of the previous shogun's family, or if he just sort of... took up the mantle (haha octopus joke) after the Great Turf War.

Q. Did he brainwash Callie?

Based on the information we have... I am inclined to say, no, he didn't brainwash Callie.

Callie was in an extremely stressful period of her life, Octavio reached out to talk, and... we don't know what happened next. But the context feels like Callie might have joined willingly. In reference to the Hypnoshades, it's important to note that hypnosis as a concept is incredibly variable, with one argument made that "you cannot hypnotize an unwilling participant".

"But, didn't he say--"

He likes music puns. He's a DJ. It's supposed to be funny, why aren't you laughing? (What this line was in JP, I wonder...)

... But, I feel like the evidence stacks up. It suggests that Callie wasn't kidnapped or brainwashed or forced to join the Octarians. It was probably an escape from fame and loneliness for her-- the Hypnoshades helped her get away from that and just have a good time. But with Octavio being a guy to hold a grudge, nothing got to be that simple, and Callie was ultimately weaponized against the New Squidbeak Splatoon.

It remains very up-to-interpretation because we don't know, exactly, what happened behind the scenes. But Callie fosters zero ill will towards the Octarians, even after being rescued... and if fiery, outspoken Callie doesn't seem to be angry about it, what does that say about the matter?

Q. Why do all the tentacles piloting the Great Octoweapons have the same scar as him?

A. Because they're directly cloned from Octavio and are then made to pilot them, presumably because they have the muscle memory to operate as pilots. Octopuses have very complicated brains and neural centers that extend out into their arms.. so this cool bit of sci-fi checks out.

Q. How old is Octavio, really?

A. We don't know. But the narrative often parallels him with Craig Cuttlefish, who mentions in Octo Expansion that he's 130 years old. It would be fair to assume Octavio is also, at least, 130.

Q. Why is he so gigantic in Splatoon compared to the other games?

idk man, you tell me. I think this is much funnier and cooler than later games, though.

================================================

Octo Expansion + Octarians Questions

Q. It's suggested that there were thousands of test subjects before Agent 8. Where did Kamabo Co. get all of these people?

A. Not only is it suggested that the Deepsea Metro may be accessible from other train lines, but it's also plausible that the subterranean networks that the Octarians use could be connected to the Metro. (Thank you for your hard work, Dodo.)

Test chambers always reminded me of Octarian domes, anyways, with the large amount of highly versatile space they have, and how it'd only make sense underground.

After all, Commander Tartar offered a glimpse of "the promised land", and that plays very specifically into the Octoling desire to see the surface world again. ("A utopia of light beyond your wildest dreams".) Its appearance as a telephone even seems to evoke an Octarian's face, which they're more willing to trust.

Q. Are sanitized Octarians a hivemind?

A. They're something like that, being hollow shells that have lost their memories and identities while submitting to a higher force. (This can be fixed, as we've learned.) They seem responsive to being assigned roles, what with Acht being made to produce music while other sanitized Octolings act as enemies in test chambers.

Commander Tartar's ideology revolves around a lot of "giving up one's individuality for the greater good" and "joining something bigger than yourself". To "eliminate the general idea of the individual" for "a harmonious world"... "becoming one with existence".

I think that carries a lot of interesting implications. You can draw your own conclusions, since there's no explicit canon answer.

Q. Was Acht sanitized willingly or unwillingly?

A. Public twitter info suggests that they were sanitized willingly, to "get rid of doubts and conflicts involving production" and to commit completely to music. But in Side Order, Acht says that it wasn't done willingly.

There's a lot of ways to interpret this. Maybe they wanted to at first, had a last-minute realization that they got tricked, and ultimately didn't want it. Maybe they committed completely and don't want to say it. Maybe social media is lying to us completely, in the same corporate word-twisting ways that Grizzco also uses, to make Kamabo Co. seem better. So... who knows?

Q. How does the Kamabo Corporation have clones of the Octo Canyon bosses?

A. Uh...

... I don't actually know. Clearly they have pretty advanced technology going on, so maybe they actually did manage to replicate and clone these bosses perfectly?

Or, maybe, it's just a psychological recreation of Agent 8's memories. Octo Expansion has a lot of stuff like that, so it feels pretty possible!

================================================

Anyways, that's all... for now. I'll probably only edit in more sources and tweak details on this post, but it's completely possible that I might need to add more things later.

[hamcakevaletguy]

My thoughts on the Damien situation, from the POV of someone who’s relatively uninvolved with posting on social media:

As a newer fan of Smosh myself (I watched some videos in 2012, but haven’t really kept up since, and only started regularly watching the last year or so), I went through the backlog of content that they have because I enjoyed their more recent videos. Zayna, a newer Palestinian fan, did the same and found this joke in an old TNTL disappointing and wanted him to address it firsthand and make his stance clear.

For anyone saying Damien has already made it clear that he is in support of Palestine: it’s not a given that the fan who brought up the clip would have already known about Damien’s stance on Palestine. Yes, he’s talked about it in a couple of his streams and posted Insta stories about it, but a newer fan of Smosh, not necessarily Damien himself, wouldn’t know about those unless they were looking for it because they are:

temporary (IG stories only have a lifespan of 24 hours unless you take screenshots) or

a few minutes hidden under several hours of game streams on a separate platform (he talked about Palestine several months ago and has streamed a lot since, unless you know the specific Twitch stream and the timestamp when he talked about it or had clips of it, most casual fans wouldn’t know either)

In his defense, Damien himself has recently said that more fandom stuff has reached his timeline than he would like, so maybe he thinks more people know about his activism because of that. However, even if Zayna did know, wanting a straightforward statement apologizing for the insensitive joke (because bringing up the "Israeli-Palestinian conflict" [as it was called back in 2019, not accurate to what has been going on for 70+ years and counting, which is an ethnic cleansing] for shock value, as he himself said, is insensitive) is not an unreasonable request.

More under the cut

When all you have is 240 characters per reply, the things that you do choose to say matter even more. When you parse out everything in Damien's replies, he doesn't come out looking too good. Yes, he did apologize for the original joke. In his replies, he said:

using it as shock value was in poor taste and naive of him,

it was in poor taste back in 2019 and he wouldn't make it now

(in response to his first couple of replies) he is sorry for reacting in frustration and he'll learn from it,

and, in his final reply, his parting words were "With all my heart, I hope for safety for your loved ones. Be well."

However, he also says and does things that undermine his apology in the same replies:

questioning why the clip was brought up in the first place, as if bringing up old content wasn't something fans regularly do with things they're interested about and as if it's not still a public video fans can easily find,

bringing up that the fan in question had 19K followers, a fraction of the followers he has as a public figure,

saying that this conversation could have been done in private, as if an initial DM request wouldn't be buried in his other requests as a public figure, and as if he doesn't have the capability to start a DM himself to clarify things after the initial reply/post,

saying that the original tweets tagging him should have been deleted after his first response when he never asked for that, and just assumed it would happen for some reason,

deleting his replies a couple of hours later,

and blocking Zayna and several others who were only interacting with Damien through quote tweets (I'm not sure how quote tweets work, do they notify the OP?), some who don't even say anything remotely critical of him - in his defense, blocking is not inherently a bad thing, it just means that he doesn't want any further interactions from them for whatever reason. However, silencing any Palestinian voice isn't good, to say the least.

Damien has always been a proponent of “trying to understand and see from different perspectives” so his response here surprised me, personally. I get that he has a fear of being misunderstood, but jumping to the conclusion that the other party is purposefully trying to be incendiary is the opposite of that.

I'm not going to try to make excuses for him. He knows better. He's been a content creator for years. He knows he has more influence than any normal fan would. His autism is not a part of this conversation either. Mental illness is an explanation for behavior, it doesn't absolve you of the consequences of it. If you're citing Damien's autism as an excuse for his behavior, you have to also account for Zayna's autism.

People are also bringing up the possibility of Damien getting death threats as a result of this, which we have no proof of and won't have proof of unless Damien himself decides to disclose that. He has only stated that he is taking a social media break, which has been a long time coming, not necessarily only because of this, because he has been busy and tired in recent months. What we do know has happened is that Zayna has received death threats (weird of people to want the death of a Palestinian when the original argument they're defending Damien for is that he is in support of Palestinian liberation).

This isn’t an issue of cancel culture, it’s an issue of accountability and frankly, hero worship of Damien in the part of people attacking Zayna and other people on Twitter.

When the only people who had spoken about their support of Palestine in their own words, however briefly, are two or three cast members, some people are naturally going to put them on pedestals. This hero worship of Damien has been exacerbated by his image as the most politically correct member of Smosh, and Smosh’s (until recently) silence about the issue.

While we're at it, for people saying Smosh's sudden outward support for Palestine and joining Creators for Palestine is in response to backlash about Damien, or only in response to the block list going around:

It's only been a few days since the Damien's whole ordeal. Smosh is not that fast, and historically, their response to backlash would have been either complete radio silence or unlisting or privating the TNTL that the clip is from, combined with silence.

I’m sure Shayne, Ian and Courtney have been working on it for more than a few days, based on their liked posts, to get everything straightened out with the organization themselves and adding their names to the list of creators.

People have been asking for Smosh to be more public about their views on Palestine. Some of the cast members have said their piece on their personal social media, but their views could have changed. Those posts were made shortly after the events of October 7 brought even more media attention on Palestine and the Gaza Strip, which was not necessarily in favor of Palestine because of the effects of U.S. propaganda. It's been several months since then and people have a lot more information now, and more clarity.

Up until now, the only indication of Palestinian support not from social media is a brief statement from Ian who said something along the lines of "travel watermelon", while they were talking about their rejected roasts during Anthony's Funeral After Show in December, which are codewords that were used in TikTok for Free Palestine. However, this is heavily censored, behind a paywall, and temporary, because of the nature of their live shows. This support of CFP is the bare minimum of what Smosh could do, but the bare minimum is more than they were doing before.

They listed Smosh as the name under their $15,000 donation to CFP, not just Shayne, Courtney and Ian, which could be intentional, referring to Smosh as a whole company, or just referring to the three that have posted about it as a collective. Unless Smosh makes a full statement about it, themselves, it's still up in the air.

The timing of it is unfortunate. Damien has been silent about it so far, making his original posts about Palestine seem performative to some. However, it’s only been a few hours and he is on a social media break. The only thing he has briefly gone back online for is to promote something he's doing with Nintendo, which he could have been contractually obligated to do. He may or may not say something when he fully comes back from his social media break, but for now, that's everything we know. People can make their own conclusions based on all of this.

I am being very intentional with every single word I say on here, as to not be misconstrued in any way, however, if I missed anything or anyone else has anything to add (constructively, like images of either the actual conversation had by Damien and Zayna, or the cast and crew's support of Palestine prior to CFP, not outright anger and disagreement), please do. If anyone has any genuine questions about the situation, please feel free to message me directly and not bring it into this post, which is supposed to be a civil discussion surrounding more facts and events, less speculation. If I feel those questions have relevant points to add on here, I will add on in reblogs.

[dotthings]

"Open to interpretation" does not mean you get to tell Destiel shippers how to see the canon, Karen

After the spntwit drama this week I think it matters to emphasize again how hard the antidestiel hatedom was going against how Jensen rolls when it comes to interpretation.

antidestiels continue to behave as if they believe "open to interpretation" means they themselves can dictate to other fans how to see the canon, and they call Destiel shippers and Misha "disgusting" just for speaking our viewpoints of the canon.

Destiel shippers give our take on the text and antis go "well you can't because JENSEN SAID--"

They very obviously do not listen to what Jensen says. Here is Jensen at Dencon 2021, where he pretty much clears the runway for fans to interpret however we please and his praise and appreciation for those readings: “This is the great thing about the show and I think the relationships and some of these characters is that they’re open for interpretation. If you find identity in a character because of whatever reason, fantastic! Great! If that encourages you to be a better person, or to love someone a little harder, to forgive someone for something, fantastic. That’s—that’s I think that’s one of the beautiful things about what we do is that we get to encourage people on a variety of levels.” -Jensen Ackles, DenCon October 2021

(Antis: But you CAN'T, because JENSEN SAID--)

Antis are stuck in a loop of their own making.

This is not the first time Jensen has conveyed his support for fan interpretation.

Jibcon 2015:

We also know from reports from a virtual m&g a short while after SPN ended that Jensen said he and Misha talked about the confession scene beforehand, and they "didn't want to over-define it" and "the artist isn't going to stand next to that piece of art and tell you what to see. You should be able to see, and it should be able to mean what it means to you and that's--that's the beautiful thing about art." (There is no video, this is pulled from fan reports, but as far as we know this is accurate reporting).

Antis: but you can't because Jensen SAID--

blah blah blah

Yes we can and it's not that we need Jensen's--or anyone's permission--however it's just so heinous how severely antidestiels stomp all over Jensen's respectfulness and protection of fan readings and his appreciation of that, and their lying about how he rolls. They are making very negative insinuations of him, yet somehow everyone else in fandom is the problem but them.

It doesn't add up.

"But you can't say Destiel is real and there was queer coding because JENSEN SAID--"

But Jensen said he's completely cool with how we see it.

He said so.

I have a permit. Jensen signed it. See?

Get over it. Find a new hobby. Move along.

A further thing--note my highlighting on excerpts from an interview with Jensen Ackles about Big Sky concerning the Beau/Jenny relationship. (TV Insider, 1.18.2023)

The phrasing should sound familiar.

Yes, that's right, he's used similar language to speak about Dean and Cas. And this is for a het ship.

"leave the audience wanting more" "we gave just a little bit" "but do we need to play it out in a graphic sex scene?" "a kiss wasn't necessarily needed" "let's tiptoe for now" "fired it up in a way that made it not so sexual...two humans really, truly connecting. It wasn't just like, oh, let's rip each other's clothes off."

Put that next to "I don’t think lust is involved with the romanticism" "there's some people that might try to sexualize that" "it was two sentient beings essentially" (Dencon 2021, Vancon 2022)

Isn't that interesting. (Also isn't it interesting he called it "romanticism"?)

Jensen also said something somewhere about how he would like to do a romantic comedy so long as it involves killing zombies. He doesn't hate romance. It's just that he likes genre and action stuff. He's not against, whether it's queer or straight romances.

He's also said he'd like to do a rom-com slash western playing opposite Misha Collins.

Not telling Destiel shippers what to do, but along with antidestiel misinformation spread, the Destiel lane is justly notorious for flinging accusations at him and I think it's relevant that he speaks about a het ship using similar language, and it's relevant how supportive he is of queer readings.

one last thing, this is old, from Jensen's time on Days of our Lives, but he wasn't against playing a queer character.

[aitadjcrazytimes]

It's been a good run

But it's time to bring this to a close!

The saga is over, C, T and I are all together. T and I are in the swing of it, C approves as much as it is possible for him to approve of anything, everyone knows about the blog and is chill.

C is back at his rightful place of walking his sister down the aisle.

I'm getting everything I want, and we're all free to make each other miserable until the day we die.

I'm not going to be updating this blog anymore! Nobody else involved with the situation will be submitting any more AITA posts either, because they are either not on tumblr or agreed it would be annoying.

I will say that there is some stuff on here that I've alluded to that isn't necessarily 100% in the spirit of things, so I've included some stuff below the cut for the folks who have caught onto that. I would not suggest reading it if you like how all of this played out and want to keep it that way. I know that's incredibly vague, but I'm not sure how to phrase it without making it weird?

Thank you all for listening and talking to me over the past few days! That's where I'm leaving it!

...

...

...

...Is everyone who wants to keep believing in the disaster polycule gone? Yes? OK!

So, this was fake. I made up the whole thing. TK and C and T and everyone else are fictional characters. Did I lie? Yes. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

Q: All of it? Even the og AITA post? The followup AITA post? The screenshots?

A: All of it.

Q: Wh... Why did you do this...?

A: Well, first this all started as a Red vs Blue fanfic for the ship Chexer (Church/Tex/Tucker)-

It started as a fanfic for Chexer. However, I was already working on a different fanfic for RVB that was totalling about 15k words at this point (+ at least 90k to go), and I knew I would never have the time or energy to write this one. I thought: yknow. this would be really funny as an aita post.

Q: It was a fanfic of a Halo fanfic series.

A: Yep!

So, I submitted Tucker's perspective. I did not expect for it to get more than maybe 100 notes at most. I totally thought someone would call it out right away.

The funny part is, if I'd dedicated all this energy to a fic instead of this blog, I'd probably have about 15-20 thousand words of fic already, but whatever, can't ruin my personal day!

Also, I wanted to see how many people would figure it out/how long it would take for it to become too obvious that this was a fandom thing. I was dropping names and RvB lore since the beginning. A few people did figure it out, and I DMed them in private to let them know.

Q: But why make the blog then?

A: Because I love to lie and be a nuisance to the general populace! <3

It was always my intent to wait until Carolina's perspective got posted (i am honestly still shocked i got away with "Carey/Georgia/West Virginia/Alabama/Miss Louisiana 1988"), let it simmer for about a day, then come clean. Which is what I'm doing now!

The reason I'm coming clean now instead of dragging it out is because I don't want anyone to feel stupid or like they got duped. You're not stupid! You were a part of this story! This was, as one anon said, a creative writing project. It was a collaboration! Thank you so much for helping me!

That said, I'm sorry to anyone that finds this disappointing! I had a blast doing this, but I will not be doing it again. I have gotten my fill. I have had my taste of being an influencer, and now I can go on with my life without ever feeling like I need to start a youtube channel.

Q: How did you keep up with a consistent timeline?

A: I didn't, especially at first. But in my time as a liar who lies about things, I have found that usually people are willing to believe you when you say "yeah, i lied about that".

Q: Wait, what about the thing with your kid?

A: Yeah, I fucked up on this one. In the other fic I was/am writing, Tucker was around 33. So, when I was saying what Junior's age was, I subtracted it from 33 and got 18. It wasn't until I was showing my partner the blog and they said "Wait, he had his kid at 13??????" that I realized I had fucked up. Oops!

Q: Was it really ALL fake?

A: For the most part. I will say that I did actually drop chocolate cake all over my tits that one time and had to shower by myself like a fucking loser. That one was true. I did also get my nails done for the first time ever, which did actually affect my typing. And I am in a band (but so is Tucker, canonically)! There are a few other things as well, but I don't want to list all of them.

Q: DID you ever read homestuck?

A: Nope. And I never will.

Even the title, though I will say that the title I came up with was "Leonard "Alpha Bitch" Church's Decidedly Not Lo-Fi Beats to Get Nasty and Get Clean To: The Movie"

Q: So there was never a combination sex/bathtime playlist?

A: Maybe! But perhaps more accurately: the combination sex/bathtime playlist was inside of you all along. You can make it. There are only three songs on there that are canon to the lore of this blog. Those are No Children by The Mountain Goats, Take It Out On Me by Thousand Foot Krutch, and one unknown song from the album Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV by Coheed and Cambria (Yep, the call was coming from inside the house, I gave Church my music taste). I had intended this to be Wake Up, but it's out of my hands now. The rest is yours to fill in.

Q: What's your main blog, so I can follow you?

A: Hi, this is aitadjcrazytimes. You're not getting that.

Q: Your AO3 handle?

A: Nope, not that either.

You will never find me. And that's the way I want it. You will see me in every blog. Every new follower. Every stranger you meet on the street. You will look into your discord kitten's eyes, and you will absently wonder if he was the one behind aitadjcrazytimes. And you will never know for certain.

Q: But-

A: Let me live on in your memory. The only person who knows both who I am and the fact that I did this is my partner, who is not into RvB or commonly on tumblr. I am not a RvB blog. I am not a writing blog. I am a nobody on the fringes of tumblr society who's been here long enough to know how to remain in the shadows.

And, even if you do manage to find me, against all odds:

No one will ever believe you.

I am closing my askbox. I am also closing my messages. If you have anything to say to Tucker or Me (tumblr user aitadjcrazytimes), you are welcome to do so in the replies or reblogs, but you will not be receiving an answer. I'll keep this blog up for anyone that wants to go through after the fact and do a deep dive or what have you.

Thanks to everyone who made this into the wild ride it was! Live long and get fucked or whatever! Xoxo <3

[decepti-thots]

something that is very interesting rereading early MTMTE is that the comic is actually very much written with the assumption a ton of its readership are specifically pre-existing IDW comics readers, which can sometimes be difficult to remember because of the fact that a lot of people wound up coming onboard to MTMTE from outside the fandom in the end and now it has a reputation as an entry point as a result. this manifests in a couple ways throughout the first couple major arcs. one obvious one is that the Overlord stuff functionally makes it a sequel of sorts to Last Stand of the Wreckers, at a time no direct sequel was planned. but my favourite is that there's a kind of narrative trick the comic pulls with the leadup to the payoff Remain in Light gives us for Magnus.

the Magnus we get in early MTMTE is not the Magnus we get in earlier IDW comics. he's very exaggerated; where phase one Magnus is a by-the-books stickler for not so much as bending rules and someone we see struggling to maintain that sense of moral uprightness in the face of the war and the people around him being far less dedicated to staying on the straight and narrow like him, it's completely turned up to eleven in early MTMTE. phase one Magnus would not be doing endless doorframe audits, or throwing people in the literal brig for crooked badges. but this doesn't necessarily register as a change in character so much as a change in genre. MTMTE is also a dramedy with heavy emphasis on the comedy side of that in a way no other IDW comic is, and the shift in Magnus' characterisation therefore feels like 'well in THIS genre, that's what that archetype is like', rather than a diagetic shift in character. even if you come to MTMTE straight off those prior comics, it is very much a 'roll with the genre shift' thing rather than a 'hm. Magnus is acting… weird' thing. you let it go.

there are a couple indications this might not be the case early on. Rodimus especially seems to be under the impression that Magnus is acting uptight even for him, with his insistence on waving it off like 'he needs to relax, Swerve can you get him to chill on Hedonia because my guy is REAL stressed' and the like. (this makes sense- Rodimus is the person on the ship who has actually been directly interacting with Magnus regularly pre-MTMTE.) but it's not super obvious and not heavily emphasised.

which makes the eventual post-Overlord and RiL reveal, which is that Magnus has in fact been acting weird because he's having a breakdown that has largely gone unremarked upon by his shipmates, really really good. Magnus has not been doing doorframe audits because he's the comically uptight second in command acting as straight man for genre purposes; Magnus has been sending Rodimus a million memos a day and losing his shit over nothing because as someone whose entire identity as 'Magnus' is rooted in a wartime role he escaped into, he's been having an existential crisis now the war is over and he has no purpose and doesn't know what to do because he never expected to have to play that part in peacetime. the entire time the genre shift was somewhat obfuscating the fact this characterisation was a thing that is in-universe relevant, which also then reflects back on the fact Rodimus is like. hm. probably should have noticed that, now I feel like an asshole for not realising. (the scene where he and Rung discuss those unread memos, post-Overlord.)

it's a small thing, but it's a really effective misdirect for the payoff Magnus gets in RiL that reads a hell of a lot more clearly on reread and rewards that chance to revisit the early issues with that knowledge. of course that wasn't just a gag, of course he's actually slowly losing his shit slightly, he cannot go five seconds without making it clear he is Stressed As Hell. but until you get to that actual reveal, there's just enough room for the comic to let a reader assume it's, you know, we're in a comedy now, we need a hilarious straight man, and Magnus is it. it's great! all the stuff MTMTE pulls to simultaneously obfuscate the Magnus/Minimus reveal while also making it feel completely reasonable on reread is great. really good use of reader bias there.

[thanakite]

You know, Shuro says to Laios that he subtly gave hints that he didn't like him that anyone else would have picked up, but I don't necessarily know that, that is true

Laios is presented to looked and act like a "Westerner" while Shuro is set up to look and act the way people from countries like Japan would

If you read through the Fandom page for Dungeon Meshi on Shuro it actually talks a great deal about how this interaction between them mirrors what happens when people from countries like Japan interact with Westerners where Japanese people are subtle about that kind of stuff and don't say it outright, while Westerners tend to be more straight forward and thus don't pick up on these things, it even specifies that this had been a thing with the entire group in the past where if they didn't pick up on his hinting he just went along with what they ended up doing

With that in mind, I truly wonder how many members of the group fully picked up on how Shuro felt about Laios

Like, yes, they might have picked up some stuff (Such as when we are shown Laios deciding to join him and Falin for dinner when it is fairly clear that Shuro at least wanted it to be a date (I'd be unsurprised if Falin failed to realize his intention here too as while she seems to be better than Laios at picking up social stuff, she doesn't seem to be MUCH better than him at it)) but really we are shown a fair amount of Shuro and Laios being alone and talking together, plus they were in the same group and fought together, which to most Westerners would generally mean that they were at least friends

My guess is that what Shuro thought was subtle things Laios should have picked up on, were more than likely things much more specific to his culture that were completely missed not only by Laios but by the group as a whole (I mean, I can't imagine the group would have just allowed his resentment over this to fester in such a way if they had realized the extent of it, especially Chilchuck who is super aware of how relationships within a group affect its dynamic)

I don't think any of this is helped by Shuro's own immaturity. Yes, to the group he appears to have it together and to be a fairly dependable guy, but to his retainers, they all seem to act like he's more of a brash kid, and knowing that he grew up a noble of some sort that would only add to it, as he was likely isolated from regular people his age growing up. A more mature person likely would have either realized their tactic wasn't working and changed course or would have found some other way of dealing with the situation, especially since he proposed to Falin, Laios's sister, meaning he would have had to interact EVEN MORE with Laios in the future, there's no way Laios or Falin would have let him just take her away to the east never to see each other again (not even getting into the issue of the fact that he apparently proposed to her without even dating first)

So yeah, Shuro blames Laios for not picking up on his subtle social cues, but it sounds like everyone in the group failed to do so at least some of the time, not just Laios, and so really this is more on him than on Laios