#i would actually love to hear other people's opinions about fandom's feelings towards canon

[asingledropofwinter]

So this has been on my brain for a while, but like something I see a lot in fandom spaces is a strong disengagement with canon. Like a hatred towards it? And I don't mean something like in the Miraculous Ladybug fandom where it's a bunch of people enjoying the concepts and possibilities of a show that they acknowledge is poorly written. I mean even in like ordinary fandoms where the canon is completely fine? It's like the concept of fix-it fics? Like there's a difference in them because sometimes the writer is essentially writing a what-if the bad things in canon didn't happen, or a happier ending. But then sometimes the writer is literally thinking "I'm fixing what's wrong with the source material". Two very different mindsets, and I can't wrap my head around the second.

Obviously fanworks are transformative content and stuff, but some of y'all really, really seem to actively dislike the source material and only acknowledge the fanon. Which, I mean, is fine, nothing wrong with enjoying content like that. But as a writer sometimes when I see people talking about the source material of a fandom (source material that isn't perfect but isn't a Miraculous Ladybug disaster level of writing) it's insanely discouraging. Like the discredit to the author because you didn't like the story they wrote even though you like the fanon, only acknowledge the fanon, because you think you can fix it. Like the "who cares about canon, I hate canon, canon doesn't matter" stuff.

I understand that fanworks can be whatever they want. I will literally read anything, the sheer variety of fic I have read cannot be understated. But I also appreciate the source material. If I didn't, to as least some extent, I could never engage with its fandom? Like how could I create transformative content of something if I don't acknowledge what I'm transforming?

So I guess what I'm trying to say is I don't understand the antagonistic feelings some people in fandom spaces have towards the canon of their fandom. And that I disdain the concept of fanon. I don't like how it becomes so ingrained in people that it is treated as gospel when the the actual canon plot line is actively despised by some people.

[joejhang]

fanon neil vs canon neil

god i am so FUCKING done with the aftg fandom mischaracterising neil i'm literally writing fucking ESSAYS about it and pacing circles muttering about it under my breath it's driving me up the goddamn wall so i am going to word vomit brain dump yap about all of it in an incoherent tumblr text post. spoilers ahead continue at ur own risk

i've said it before and i'll say it again I HATE FANON NEIL. istg this fandom LOVES to mischaracterise neil and ykw i think i know why. they take the smallest most unnoticeable parts of his personality and then exaggerate them to disproportionate and unrealistic levels in order for him to fit their idea of a conventional, stereotypical and desirable main character. they smooth out his jagged edges and prick at his "insecurities" to make him more likeable, more acceptable and more conventional of a narrator/main character and in doing so erase so fucking much of his personality and draw as a character that he loses just about all of the flavour that made me love him in canon. and also especially within the andreil dynamic this fucking fandom just loves to tweak neil's character until he's basically unrecognisable just so they can cram andreil into some preconceived socially acceptable clichéd ship dynamic. because andrew is perceived as the typical mysterious, moody and grumpy love interest therefore neil just has to be the sunshiney smiley blushing cute softboy in exchange. yeah because all gay ships have to be grumpy-sunshine and black cat-golden retriever dynamic. i raise you: andreil's dynamic doesn't work because of their differences it works because of their similarities. if u think about it andrew and neil are honestly very similar people in the way they think and process emotions and events and that's what allows them to connect and understand each other. andreil would not work if neil was super sunshiney and a blushy soft mess and andrew was the stoic, never smiling, unemotional stone of a guy the fandom loves to make them. just accept they do not fit into the conventional boxes laid out by booktok for what gay ships look like. i fucking digress.

neil is also just insanely mischaracterised on his own. people love making him very jittery and insanely oblivious and easily flustered with a generous serving of self-esteem issues. i hate to break it to you guys: neil josten is not insecure. i don't think there's a single instant in the series where neil is actually insecure about anything. as a narrator, person and character, neil is very realistic, pragmatic and logical. ruthlessly so. i'd say on this, neil is even more cerebral and unemotional than andrew is. neil is very straightforward and realistic abt himself in his narration and i'd honestly say his opinion and views about himself are one of the only things in the story that isn't affected by his narrator bias. if neil is anything, it's self-aware. i'm now going to present all my fucking evidence.

neil doesn't have a sexuality crisis. literally in the entire series never once does he even question his fucking sexuality. it's implied he's already figured out he's aspec/demisexual from the moment nicky questions him about his sexuality. neil says "i don't swing" and follows up in his narration: it wasn't quite the truth, but it was close enough. and later when he starts his relationship with andrew he doesn't ever question the nature of his feelings towards andrew or even anyone else and is pretty clear about it when andrew breaches the topic: "kissing you doesn't make me look at them any differently" so yeah neil is pretty certain and aware of his sexuality.

neil isn't insecure about his appearance. i feel like this is gonna require a bit of work to explain but hear me out. it is mentioned several times that neil has a complicated relationship with his appearance because he looks so much like his father/abuser. this is obviously understandable; you wouldn't want to look into the mirror and see the man who gave u all ur scars. that being said, neil doesn't have a lot of strong emotions regarding his appearance. most of his feelings of panic tied to when r*ko dyed back his hair is because of how it would be a lot easier for his father to discover him now that he has his original colouring back. i'm also pretty sure neil knows that he's cute. like it's never explicitly stated but i've reread aftg maybe fifty times and trust me i can read between the lines. neil explicitly says that he has a "love-hate relationship with his reflection out of necessity" and while the "hate" part of that statement is obvious: he doesn't like that he resembles his father, i've sort of just accepted that the "love" part of it is that he knows he's kinda fine. it's not brought up by him at all bc neil as a person is not one to linger on people's appearances almost at all. i think the only people to get a decent amount of lines dedicated to their appearance in the narration are allison and andrew. but yeah i genuinely don't think neil thinks he's ugly or unattractive and he's probably definitely been told how cute he is by others enough that he doesn't harbour any delusions about how he looks. regarding his scars, he never expresses any insecurity towards them and how they look, he just doesn't like them on display understandably bc of how acutely they point to his past and childhood that he's trying to hide.

neil is actually very very confident in his own and other people's abilties. this is esp regarding exy. he knows he's good at the game. like he knows. the most distinct example i can think of for this point is when kevin tells neil that he was at castle evermore to try out for the perfect court when they were younger. neil doesn't even doubt for a fucking second that he would've made it onto the perfect court. never does. he skips over the second-guessing and doubt part and just straight up starts daydreaming about the future he could've had playing with kevin and r*ko. like that really got me bc it's easy to assume neil would be super unassuming and have low self-esteem but no like neil doesn't doubt for a fucking second that he deserves to be perfect court. it's just that he doesn't believe in r*ko's delusions enough to play along with it by the time he gets the tattoo. he's also insanely confident about the foxes and their abilities and also kevin by the end of the series. at the beginning he takes a pretty realistic vantage point and says that with the way things are, the foxes will never beat the ravens. but even with that pov he still has the gall to challenge r*ko on LIVE TV and i doubt he's lying when he declares so boldly to everyone that if the foxes were united they'd be an unstoppable force (and guess what he was fucking RIGHT). and by the end, when the foxes are united, he has no more room left for doubt at all. some guy tells neil to kick the ravens' asses and neil just replies with zero hesitation "that's the plan". like he's so fucking on board with it. and he never once doubts that kevin is the best striker in the game. like literally never. at first he considers r*ko and kevin on par with each other (possibly, it's never stated outright) but by the end he literally has no doubts when he says "kevin is the best striker" like goddamn the amount of confidence neil has is so underrated.

neil is a very unemotional narrator. it actually gets me all the time how logical and ruthlessly pragmatic neil's narration and inner monologue is. some of the only strong emotions portrayed in neil's narration are anger, irritation and occasionally grief, which is only ever triggered by major trauma-inducing events (e.g. dr*ke). almost all of his inner monologue is analytical and observing others and dissecting either other people or the situation he's in. and almost all of his decisions and actions are made based on impulse and instinct. neil is a very instinctive person. this is outright stated in the way he plays exy; in theory, he can't give u a lot, but in the heat of the moment he's at his best. this applies to practically all facets of neil's life. he never plans his moves or what he's gonna say (except like that one time when he planned out what half-truth he was gonna tell andrew post-columbia). he's super quick and on the ball and literally does whatever the fuck he wants at any given moment. he's also insanely good at compartmentalising. like it's difficult to explain but while his priorities are obv hilariously skewed, they're also very clear in his mind. things he considers unimportant he simply just doesn't think about. what others look like and what they think of him don't factor into his internal monologue or his thoughts at all he literally just files them away in the back of his mind until they do end up becoming useful or important to him. he barely comments on andrew's appearance at all until andrew becomes someone worth staring at and admiring for him. the only reason he describes allison and renee in the detail that he does is because it's important in understanding how and why he reacts to them the way he does. this man was literally about to lose his goddamn mind at the fall banquet but he specifically reserved his mental breakdown for after the banquet so he could spend his time roasting the fuck out of r*ko. bro fully locked in and was like "clock riko now break down later" and i respect it.

neil doesn't actually have a martyr complex. it's funny because almost all of aftg is him being the absolute fucking opposite of a martyr. he wilfully sticks around the foxes knowing he's putting himself and them in danger. he doesn't "sacrifice" himself until he's absolutely forced to by his father's people. by then, he's already told himself he can't and won't run and he's smart enough to know he'll never get away anyway. and going to evermore wasn't about self-sacrifice or martyrdom it was about protecting andrew and those two are pretty fucking different. he knew he was coming back from evermore and he knew that he wouldn't die there, despite all the shit he went through, so i don't think that can be counted as "self-sacrifice". he was doing what he had to do to protect andrew, the same as andrew would've done for neil or aaron or kevin or anyone else he'd sworn to protect. the kidnapping in baltimore was the culmination of neil's character arc, which isn't really about learning to be selfless and self-sacrificing, it's about learning to stand his ground and stop running. those things r crucially different: neil not running in baltimore wasn't about selflessness, it was about courage. yes, part of it was obviously inspired by the foxes and motivated by not wanting them to be hurt but i truly believe it ultimately was about neil learning to stand his own ground and make his own home and have it be something he's willing to die for. call it whatever u want honestly i just don't think neil is as much of a martyr/sacrificial lamb as the fandom makes him out to be.

[kiisaes]

I still think it's really crazy that Horikoshi did Midoriya so dirty by having him murder the boy he wanted to save, and, now that he's lost his Quirk, is stuck being lonely for like eight years feeling like a husk of his former self, only feeling like himself again when he gets an Iron Man suit. I'm not a big Dekuhead, but I'm asking around to see what Deku fans think of the writer's choices concerning his conclusion. I'd love to hear your thoughts!! did you like this? did you not? why? etc

as a dekuhead, i agree that killing shigaraki was confusing and i still don't know what the thought process is behind that. like, saving him has always been deku's plan and everything was pointing towards shigaraki rehabilitation but then ... we didn't get it???

so yes, shigaraki should have lived (it aligns with deku's goals and the narrative's goals) and toga also should have lived for similar reasons. i also agree that deku's conclusion should have been expanded upon more — i really wanted to see how killing shigaraki, losing his quirk, etc. truly affected deku, and we were kinda left hanging. but also i sorta just equate that with lack of time / horikoshi being rushed to finish his manga

but i fundamentally disagree with the rest of your ask. it feels like you've developed this opinion based on the 430 leaks and not the actual official chapter; it's just misleading. which i don't blame you for, because the mha leaks scene is fucking awful and has ruined an entire reader base's reading comprehension, which has consequently been perpetuated by the fandom

"is stuck being lonely for like eight years feeling like a husk of his former self"

it's not stated if he feels like a husk of his former self or not. he lost his quirk, true, but he verbally says he's ok with it (ofa was like a dream that he got to live out), and never shows that he's particularly depressed or upset about being quirkless again. i feel like this specific idea is very fandom-coded. everyone was drawing deku sad as fuck for losing his quirk but canonically he appears at most wistful, and normally just neutral. it is what it is, yknow? after all he says himself that he was originally quirkless anyway, so not much has changed.

also he mentions feeling lonely, but i hate this idea that deku has been lonely for 8 straight years. people have twisted this into meaning his friends ghosted him after high school, but like ... how would that even make sense. deku's friends love him so much, will fight at the world's end with him, and he changed their lives for the better. they would absolutely not ghost him. they just canonically don't meet up much anymore, because OBVIOUSLY, when you don't live in the same building as your high school classmates anymore you are NOT going to meet up as much as before. this is just how adulting is. you have responsibilities and jobs and lives now. people hate to hear it but it's the most realistic part of this ending.

"only feeling like himself again when he gets an Iron Man suit"

again, we have no idea if deku didn't "feel like himself" when he was just teaching. and this idea that he's not is fueled in some weird anti-teacher belief that i'm seeing a lot of, now that deku pursued education in his future. in my opinion teaching is a very fitting career for him; he's been inspiring and helping his classmates as a student, and he loves quirk analysis and gushing to others about their quirks.

he's literally training a new generation of heroes, he gets to work alongside pros (such as aizawa), he's constantly learning more about new quirks ... why is this not the deku we've known and loved? what about this feels wrong? just because he's not a stereotypical hero on the scene, he's suddenly a worse version of himself?

mha has drilled into our heads so much atp that being quirkless doesn't mean you can't be a hero. deku was quirkless his whole life but he had the spirit of a hero, and even when other heroes quit during the apocalyptic era between wars, deku was still out there, doing what he could. he didn't need the money. he didn't need the fame. he didn't need the recognition or the credit, even. he just wanted to help people. and being a teacher is one of THE most directly helpful jobs you could take.

from what i can tell, people who complained about teacher deku and "peaking during high school" and "working a dead-end minimum wage job" were all from the western fandom. i have not seen a single japanese fan complain to this degree. it's definitely a cultural difference but also i think they just read better than us. UA is a prestigious school with crazy name recognition and all teachers there are registered pro heroes. even though deku isn't technically a pro, they recognized him as one anyway, which allowed him to work there in the first place. like hello. over everything we should be grateful he didn't become a cop.

the way i interpreted him getting his suit was that

his friends love him so much they pooled their money all in secret just to give him another chance at actual hero work, even though they know deku's content with his teaching job. probably also so they can see him more, now that their schedules might align better

even though he's quirkless, he is still symbolically — and literally — a hero. turning society's preconceived opinions of quirkless people on its head

it had nothing to do with making him feel like himself again. he was doing fine. the suit is just a (very expensive, labor of love) perk.

and before anyone complains about him "receiving handouts" and that "he just lazed around for years until his friends picked him back up with the suit", SHUT THE FUCK UP. he's done so much for them that they felt it right to return the favor, especially to the one guy they know who earned it the most. also - he deserved a break from all of the shit he went through; why should it Not take him 8 years? do you KNOW how much pain he suffered? that amount of trauma lasts a lifetime. all of you SHUT UP.

as a dekuhead, i think his conclusion as a teacher who also works as a pro hero is awesome and cool and i see no qualms with that. my main concern is that we should've gotten more of a conclusion to deku's ARC and its connection to the story, but regarding his future 8 years later i'm totally fine with it. he's living out his dreams, working with heroes, studying quirks, and keeping in touch with the ones he loves. that is epic as hell

[butchsophiewalten]

For the character opinion bingo can yuo do felix..

This fucking guy. I have such a torrid relationship with this character. I've spent a lot of time joking about actively hating him, just because (especially back in 2021, when I first got into The Walten Files) there was such a gross oversaturation of these terrible, bland, thoughtless interpretations of the character. Like so many people saw this really interesting sort of character, and watered him down into something that was more personally palatable and sympathetic for them.

I don't know. Felix is so uninteresting when you don't hold him accountable for anything. I remember a lot of people trying to pin the responsibility for his actions onto the other people in his life, chiefly Jack, because they sympathized with his personal struggles and wanted to woobify him into a character who had never really done anything wrong. Which is such a shame, because that sort of wishy-washy attitude a lot of the fandom had taken towards his actions really soured me on him for a while. And that's not fair, because he's a genuinely fantastic and really interesting character.

I've always loved Felix when it comes to canon depictions of him, y'know? Because it's so free of that kind of Fandom Baggage. Even the good fandom Felix content has to bear the burden of that baggage a lot of the time, and it's worsened for it. But it's like, man, I always forget how fucking fascinating Felix is until we get some Fun New Canon, or someone in the fandom writes or draws something really good, and then it all comes back to me. I'm dying to see more of this character. I really want to get further into his head. I want to see exactly the depths of depravity he's willing to go to save his own skin, and I want to see how he justifies it to himself all the while.

I think a lot about his Formerly Positive relationships with other characters, too, because I think even before things went bad, Felix was always pretty self-centered. Very upbeat and overfriendly to the point where it seems, very obviously, like he's compensating for something. I think he cares a lot about what people think of him, but doesn't necessarily value other peoples' opinions. I think he very genuinely thinks of himself as the smartest person in the room, but is chronically resentful of everybody else in his life for outsmarting him. I really love the idea of everything with him being this sort of paradox. He's so self-deprecating, thinks so little of himself, but would move hell and high water to avoid actually changing and improving anything about his life. He's always so sorry, when he does something wrong and it blows up in his face, but the last thing he'd ever be willing to do is try and do better next time. He treats every tragedy that befalls him as some terrible innevitability he's subjected to, instead of the natural consequences of his own, controllable behavior.

I've already said I think Jack was a bit of an emotional anchor for him, in a way where Jack was this sort of representation of a Successful, Fulfilled man, so Felix really craved validation from him. He would always try, with varying degrees of success, to be on Jack's good side, because having Jack tell him he had done a good job made him feel that much closer to being the Pinnacle of Success he imagined Jack to be. And in this way, Jack was sort of dehumanized by Felix from the very beginning. Jack, in many ways, stopped being Felix's friend, an important person in his life, and started being this idyllic representation of a Good Man that Felix both resented and desperately clung to.

I think about this idea a lot when rewatching Guilty and hearing Felix try and justify his actions to himself through the lens of how Jack would feel. He had to bury Edd & Molly, because Jack would be devastated to see them like that. He could never do that to Jack, his best friend. Jack would be devastated. That's why it has to be a secret, why Jack can never know. He's doing good, he's protecting Jack's feelings. It's such a fundamental disconnect from the reality of the situation, and it feels to me a lot like he's projecting this imagined idea of Jack Walten onto the circumstances to soothe himself, and in the process is denying the real Jack Walten his autonomy in the situation. Jack doesn't get to be told what happened and decide for himself how to feel, Felix gets to decide how Jack would probably feel, and act on that instead.

Imagine for a moment, this same situation, but involving something much less terrible and serious. Maybe Jack has a nice vase in his house that he likes and is important to him. Maybe one day, Felix comes over and, when Jack is in the other room, accidentally knocks it on the floor, and it shatters. Felix, imagining how upset Jack would be to know his favorite vase was broken, sweeps it discreetly into the garbage, and plays stupid when Jack asks about it later. Now, Jack: 1. Never gets the closure of knowing that happened to this thing that he valued so dearly. He never knows if it was stolen or misplaced and is in one piece somewhere out in the world, or if it really was broken, and he should give up trying to recover it. 2. Never gets to decide what should happen in the aftermath of this vase being broken. Maybe he, too, was just going to sweep it into the garbage. But maybe, beforehand, he would take the opportunity to mourn this broken thing before it was out of his life forever. Or maybe he'd try to glue the shards back together. The point is not what he does, but the fact that he was never given the chance to decide what he would do.

I'm worried that last paragraph might come off as pretty patronizing. The point I'm trying to make is just that I don't think Felix really considers Jack as an autonomous person, and that's a really interesting part of their dynamic to me that I think is relatively really underutilized.

Apparently I have a lot to say about Felix Kranken. There's a lot more I could say, but this post is so fucking long already, holy shit.

[yannisdesk]

I am simultaneously reading The Iliad and The Song of Achilles. It is quite a wild trip, though I am thoroughly enjoying both; but, I want to say something...

I feel like a lot the debate surrounding TSoA is the result of people misunderstanding it's intentions.

I would understand some of the opinions towards TSoA in regards to Iliad accuracy if Madeline Miller did the thing that a lot of Greek Mythology retelling/reworking authors did back in the day, and pretended as if her version of the story was more "accurate" or the "true" version of the myth. But (as far as I can tell) that isn't the case. She's pretty upfront about the fact that this is just another version of Achilles' story using her creative license as an author to create a different take on the narrative using the knowledge she obtained while pursuing her classics degree.

I absolutely do think it's a problem when members of the TSoA fandom try to claim that is the end-all-be-all of Achilles' story, because it isn't. For example, TSoA portrays Achilles as being monogamous-leaning and pretty straightforwardly homosexual (using modern terms here for convenience, I know this is not how Ancient Greeks actually thought about sexuality.) While in mythology, Achilles is more along the lines of bisexual and non-monogamous. Though, the nature of mythology, especially Greek Mythology, is that there is no absolute canon and everything is up for interpretation, so again, that doesn't make TSoA bad by default.

I tend to look at TSoA primarily as a love story before anything else. Honestly, it's a love story about Achilles x Patroclus before it's even an Iliad retelling, half of the book takes place before the war even starts. The tropes and logic of romance novels are going to be present over others that would be expected of an Iliad narrative. I've seen a lot of criticism pointed towards TSoA because it focuses "too much" on Patrochilles and not enough on other characters, but that should be expected, because it's ultimately about the love shared between Achilles and Patroclus. It's kind of like the difference between reading a romance that takes place during medieval Europe, and reading A Song of Ice & Fire. War may happen in the romance, and ASOIAF may have elements of romance in it, but at the end of the day, you're reading them for very different reasons.

Now one thing that can and should be criticized is its treatment of female characters. Thetis and Deidamia are done so fucking dirty and its honestly infuriating. I hear Circe is done better in this regard and I hope so.

[force0fchaos]

Last yap session of the day but while I’m at it, i wanna share my kanade headcanons!!

Unrelated opinions paragraph here, scroll to the red title to get to the actual hc’s

Headcanons are a tough thing for me in the pjsk fandom because sometimes I see people get a little lost in the sauce and use ‘hc’ when what they really mean is ‘au’ or ‘thing I want to happen/wish happened.’ In addition, many hcs I’ve seen tend towards being reductive in my opinion, or not necessarily accurate to the way I see the character. This is fine with me! I love fandom discourse (as long as everyone stays respectful). Everything is a matter of opinion, and as someone who prefers to stay near the canon-accurate side of things (unless I am making an au, see: evil nightcord) not everything will be for me. All that is to say, these takes might not be super daring. I’ve thought a lot before coming to my own conclusions about my favorite characters, and feel a strong need to sufficiently explain and support my takes with evidence and elaboration. But I do hope they’re fun to read nonetheless, and I’d love to hear other people’s opinions as well as their own hcs in the reblogs, contradictory or otherwise!

KANADE HEADCANONS (in order from least to most elaboration)

1) kanade has albinism :D she inherited it from her mom, and it’s (part of) why the sun is especially rough on her

2) kanade is terrible at stem, especially math. She seriously struggles doing operations in her head, she has good spacial awareness but can’t grasp conceptual stuff. When she was younger her parents considered getting her a tutor, but since she’s going into music anyway she just took the bare minimum math classes and moved on

3) (this is a little contrary to canon but) kanade DOES have some semblance of a hair routine (bc how else is it not all matted by now). When she was younger, her mom liked to dress her up and would braid her hair before bed, so kanade always brushes and braids her hair whenever she goes to sleep properly instead of passing out. She will neglect her own needs for the purposes of composing, but her hair feels more like her mom’s than hers, so she makes sure to take good care of it.

4) kanade is the rectangle body type. I only feel the need to say this myself because pjsk has such little variation between their character models, and you really have to look hard to discern their features from one another, but I do think it’s fairly obvious for kanade in particular. Part of it is her lack of healthy eating habits, but I always picture Kanade to be relatively flat with a boxy torso and a round face

5) kanade is demiromantic & ace! (This one is just for me) but I like to imagine her wondering at some point why she doesn’t have crushes on anyone while in junior high school, but all of those thoughts get pushed aside and mostly forgotten after her dad collapsed because ‘I don’t have time for that, I need to make music.’ In terms of other orientation, I imagine kanade to be pan as I don’t think she would have much of a preference as long as she knows the person well. And I can’t honestly picture her going out of her way to use pronouns other than ‘she/her,’ at least in the context of canon.

(Now for the more major/stretching canon hcs)

6) kanade has a chronic illness, which is a major cause of her general fatigue. Yes I know it’s canonically because she doesn’t eat enough or go outside but I think that’s part of why she doesn’t know about it: she rarely engages in physical activity, so she chalks up fatigue to lack of practice, not realizing her fatigue is abnormal. I also think it makes sense for her because her parents both have histories of underlying conditions. Not that pjsk gives us anything to work with, but we know her mom passed away of an illness, and her dad suffered a stroke due to stress; one so major that it could only have been caused by an underlying condition. Running on the assumption that she would have inherited her condition from her mother, I’m sure this would be a subject that would, at least, be on Kanade’s mind. I can’t imagine when she was younger that she would be able to understand her mother’s condition in its entirety. But I can easily imagine as Kanade grows older and puts herself out there more, her having to confront that she may be sick. She would admit her concerns to her grandmother once she realizes she can’t deny it anymore, and her grandmother would confess that she had feared this all along; that it was the same condition her mother suffered from. It’s a compelling concept to me, and one I definitely want to fanfic in the future…

Last but not least, the one you’ve been waiting for:

7) kanade has autism. This one is also tough because project sekai gives us nothing but my CANON evidence is: she eats the same thing every day (not just out of convenience because she also orders noodles when she goes out to eat), wears the same thing every day (verified in a 1koma that she has several of the same outfit, and possibly pointing to sensory issues), focuses on composing for such long stretches that she forgets to eat and take care of herself, and ofc, special interest. I also like to think that kanade is hyper-empathetic, doing things in her childhood like: “I have to spend the same amount of time with all my stuffed animals so none of them feel left out”. Not having the words (much less the diagnosis) to explain some of her behaviors, when she goes nonverbal with niigo she will use the chat function and say something like ‘my voice hurts,’ or more often skip out on the call saying she needs to focus for a while (because when she’s stressed enough to be nonverbal, she’s also going to fall back into the mindset of needing to work herself to death composing). She stimmed a lot when she was younger but (as many do) learned to mask it as she got older. It still manifests in her drumming her fingers on her desk, bouncing her knees, etc. when working at home, and a lot of the time vocally in the form of singing. Her house has always been musical, so this was never a problem. But whenever honami hears her doing this (as it’s often without her realizing it) she gets very embarrassed, so honami pretends not to hear it so that Kanade will do it more.

[unreadpoppy]

Halsin, Minthara and Datamines

I've talked about this before but I decided to make a more "formal" post about it, so that I don't have to keep repeting myself. Also, this is a situation that lowkey makes me a bit stressed and it has been plaguing my mind for quite long now, so I'll use this as an excuse to talk about it.

Context: There's datamined stuff that people found of a potential ultimatum scene. In it, Halsin confronts the player for saving Minthara in the party, because of what she almost did to the grove, and basically says it's either her or me (hence the use of the word ultimatum) and then the player would have to choose to either keep Minthara or Halsin.

Now, Larian, as far as I know, has made no move to actually implement this in game but apparently, lines have been voiced.

So... my opinion on this (and let me make this VERY clear: this whole post is solely my opinion ok, feel free to disagree with me, I'm not the owner of the truth): I would hate if this got added in game.

First, because I love both Minthara and Halsin, and I was so happy when Minthara was finally recruitable in a good run, because I personally, don't find evil runs as appealing, so it was nice to have her while still enjoying what I was doing. And Minthara is such a fun character and I loved every second I got to spend with her.

Second, I don't think it's a choice/scene that makes sense. Why implent the option to recruit Minthara on a good run and then make the player choose between her or Halsin? Because, if you can't have both, why go through all the pains of doing a good run, and just stick to an evil one if you want Minty? Like, it goes back to what it was previously, making the option to have her in a good run pointless.

Third, this scene, TO ME, feels incredible out of character for Halsin. Look, I'm not saying that the two of them need to be best friends, but it feels weird that the one guy who believes that time heals, that people and circumstances can change, a guy who believes in freedom and all that, would give an ultimatum because Minthara, under mind control of the Absolute, wanted to end the Grove. If Halsin knew that Minthara didn't do those things willingly, that she didn't have a choice and is not proud of the hold that the Absolute had on her, I doubt he wouldn't offer her the same grace of possible change and healing as he does others.

I'm ok if this scene was something like the confrontation between Lae'zel and Shadowheart. The two have a fight, due to different beliefs, and Tav 'picks' a side to end the conflict, but ultimatly, both stay and eventually, get over their animosity towards the other.

But, in my opinion, forcing the player to have to let go of a companion that they fought hard to get, it's just so absolutely shitty and feels like a betrayal to what their characters are. And sincerely, it would make me feel very negative towards Halsin, if he wasn't willing to listen to what Minthara had to say and was forcing the player to choose.

With all of that out of the way, I want to address data mines over all. To make a long story short, I'm not a fan of datamined content. I think it's stuff we (players) were not even supposed to know, and when datamined stuff gets discovered, it's spread around the fandom like canon when it's not. Sure, there is a possibility that this stuff might get implemented but it is not a guarantee, and it should not be treated as canon. What is canon is what is IN the game, what we can see, hear, find, interact, not datamined material.

Also, please people, if you're talking about datamined material, MAKE IT KNOWN SOMEWHERE IN YOUR POST. More than once was I left very confused by people talking about character interactions that weren't in game, only for later to discover it was datamine.

Finally, to end on the Minthara-Halsin situation. I think these two have a lot of potential together. I've been told by a friend that a reason this would be implemented would be because of the 'issue' of these two characters sharing a tent, which I hope it's not the 'reason', bc that's such a non issue, and the two of them having to share a place is exactly the type of potential for like, interactions and dialogues;

Just stop trying to pit two bad bitches against each other and let Minthara and Halsin be together.

[persephoneed]

I’m very old and tired so I’m not going to fight or argue with anyone who disagrees but these are some of my Thoughts™️

I’m a very normal amount of obsessed with Hunter Doohan so I listened to that entire podcast episode he was on recently the one where we all lost our minds because he used the words “Wednesday,” “Tyler,” and “sexual compatibility” all in the same sentence

At one point he brought up Wenclair and he was really cute about it! He said that he found it to be the “great irony of his life” that he would play the love interest that “gets in the way of the queer ship” because he’s gay and happily married to another man irl. He even said how the Wenclair shippers are sweet to him, and he loves their enthusiasm for the show and the characters.

He also talked at length about online harassment he gets…he never mentioned any of it being stemmed from shipping wars. All of it was related to his personal life and his sexuality, which is unfortunately very reflective of the recent backlash we’ve been seeing towards the lgbt+ community.

I want more love, hype, and support for Hunter from everyone in the fandom regardless of shipping preferences or opinions of Tyler. He’s really sweet and talented, seems like a down-to-earth guy, and he just deserves it!

Does it get annoying to hear people call Tyler “boring”? Or frustrating to see people dismiss the grooming and manipulation that happened to him? Does being a Wyler stan sometimes feel like you’re on board a sinking ship? Absolutely.

But honestly the best way to be supportive of Hunter (or Tyler or Wyler) isn’t to become defensive against queer interpretations of characters. Whether Wyler remains canon or not, Hunter is not going to lose his job; the writers seem invested enough in his character to keep him in the storyline whether Wednesday is romantically involved with him, someone else, or no one at all.

On a smaller scale, the best way to support Hunter is by being supportive of those queer character interpretations; on a larger scale it’s to be a good human and be supportive of the lgbt+ community. Because that’s what actually affects him on a daily basis. Being so “anti” towards Wenclair (even if you’re in equal amounts against Wavier) isn’t helpful towards that goal. Nor does it do any favors for the actor playing one half of your OTP.

Honestly, it isn’t a betrayal to Wyler by imagining any of the characters as anything other than straight - for whatever reason that may be. Just because on the surface Wyler is a heterosexual ship doesn’t inherently mean that either or both characters have to be heterosexual, nor does it mean that any of us are forbidden from having lgbt+ headcanons.

And it especially does not mean that we tolerate homophobia or biphobia in our community.

[tysonfurybattlepass]

💫 King 7, 8, 13, 14, 23

7. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you like?

I love a lot of the fan interpretations of his design, especially the ones that really lean into exaggerated, cartoony shapes. i am really not very good at that style so i'm always delighted by this kind of character model. @levshany probably has my favorite king design. their understanding of shape and flow is just so so good and i look up to them a lot as an artist.

8. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you hate?

probably the lack of nuance. i'm a very good example of the saying 'the middle of the road gets run over by both sides'. in regards to this character, people tend to fall into two distinct camps: 1) the dismissive haters who neglect the character's fantastic writing in favor of flanderized "bad" personality traits for the purpose of taking easy potshots at a character they don't like. 2) the woobifying stans who have attached a lot of their own identity to the characters they like, and thus trip over themselves to justify or dismiss objectively toxic behavior by their fictional fav because they think enjoying a villain character is somehow commentary on their own moral compass.

i have a very specific type of appreciation for the character as a literary device, but am comfortable with the fact that he is intentionally written to be a bad person. this is, in fact, why i gravitate toward the character in the first place. i like him because he's a bad person. i think he's fascinating and tragic and very well written, despite how subtle his actual setup and progression are. i think, whether negative or positive, fandom attitude tends to reduce complex antagonists like this to very flat, one-note, and uninteresting caricatures of their canon identities. toby fox can write a fucking villain, man. don't ignore half of the work he put into this character just because the other half makes you feel better, you know? it does a disservice, in my opinion.

13. What is an emoji, an emoticon, or a symbol that reminds you of this character or you think this character would use a lot?

this man does not know what an emoticon is lets be so fr. so, in that case, i think a symbol that i heavily associate him with is a bear trap:

hear me out for a second on this one. i think a lot of people don't realize that the thing he uses in battle is definitely supposed to be a chain. the game's graphics arent high res enough to render individual links but like. it has individual rigid parts that interlock. the original concept art shows it as a chain. that's 100% a chain. aside from chains, the other big motif that his physical design leans on is jaws/teeth. so my brain goes to a metal bear trap, since it's essentially a set of huge jaws on a chain. also something something trapped by fate and the laws of the universe... thrashing wildly against your tragic destiny but only succeeding in hurting yourself further with its teeth...theres something there, let it cook for a while.

14. Assign a fashion aesthetic to this character.

this is the worst question to ask me i fucking always say punk no matter what i'm SORRY i just think it looks good on everybody ;m;

23. Favorite picture of this character?

the fucking. that smear frame of him about to throw the chain whip is so goofy it makes me howl every time i see it. i cant fucking find it rn but it's so good. agent i know you have this frame somewhere you know what i'm talking abt

[kitty-ception]

Greetings!

A warm welcome to my page under the cut! :)

Let’s start things off with a simple introduction:

Who am I? My name is Everest! However, you can also call me by my username. I don’t mind ^^

Sexuality? I am asexual! Inappropriate posts and comments make me very uncomfortable, so please be respectful! Unfortunately, I am aware this is the internet, so not everyone will abide by my boundaries, but let’s try to at least keep it mostly PG here.

Pronouns? I go by factory settings, so she/her please! Honestly, I can go by any, but this is the one that I’m more used to hearing lol X3

What will I be posting?

Mostly fandom content or fanart! The fandom I’ll be mainly posting about is Invader Zim, which is my current interest. Unfortunately, this may change at any moment. For now, all you’ll be hearing from me is them while this obsession lasts!

Oc/Self insert drawings or textposts! Cringe culture is dead, so why not insert myself into my current interests? We’re all weirdos one way or another. Just a warning: All of my self insert and canon interactions are all COMPLETELY PLATONIC!! (There is only one exception to this, and it is Sebastian from Stardew Valley. What can I say? He’s great.)

Writing prompts/ideas! My brain comes up with lots of scenarios, but I myself can’t write. Feel free to use any of mine as inspiration! I’d be honored.

Random thoughts/updates in my life! Of course you’re going to see these, because what is a blog page without a “OMG I SCREWED UP SO BAD THIS IS SO EMBARRASSING!” scattered here and there?

Reposts/Reblogs! Sometimes I’ll see a really good artwork my friends made or someone making a headcanon for a character in a fandom I like. Naturally, I’m gonna show it on my page because “HOW HAVE I NOT THOUGHT OF THAT CONCEPT EARLIER???”

What is your opinion on [ship]?

Honestly, I would say, “Cringe culture is dead, why shouldn’t we let people do what they love as long as they’re not hurting anybody?” but I know people witch-hunt others if they see something they don’t agree with.

So, I guess I have to put my opinion out there, so the right people can stay, and others can find a better blog to go to. Stay safe out there.

Let’s start with the fandom I’m in right now: Invader Zim.

Just a disclaimer! I view most of the main characters in this show as children! If you create or consume content that contains inappropriate material with these characters aged up or not, it is safe to say this is not the page for you. Please find another one to go to. (Also, the fact that you have to age up characters to do anything with them is pretty self explanatory.)

[ZaDr]: Mostly neutral, but partial to liking it. Sue me, I think it’s cute. Well, actually, don’t sue me. I can definitely see it, and I don’t mind having it on my feed if it’s appropriate. (View disclaimer above for minor character ships.)

[TaGr]: Completely neutral. I can see it happening, but I have no opinion on it. It’s just girlbosses in love. As long as it is appropriate, I have no issues with it. (View disclaimer above for minor character ships.)

[ZaGr]: Mostly neutral, leaning towards dislike. I personally cannot see this happening at all. I do think it’s really funny that Zim and Dib’s rivalry went so far that Zim started dating Gaz. Imagine your worst enemy dating your sister - I would never recover. Good luck, Dib! (View disclaimer above for minor character ships.)

[TaZr]: Neutral, slightly dislike. I will admit, having to hide your relationship from the irken government does sound pretty cool. However, Tak absolutely hates Zim’s guts, and vice versa, so I don’t see it happening anytime soon. (View disclaimer above for minor character ships.)

[TaDr]: Mostly dislike. I know that in the show, Dib did try asking Tak out, but it just doesn’t seem like the right match. Tak was only using Dib for information, and Dib depended on her for being one of the only ones to believe him. Sounds pretty toxic to me. But hey, maybe in the future they’ll chill out, and perhaps it’ll work then? (View disclaimer above for minor character ships.)

[RaPr]: Neutral. I think it’s alright. Pretty amusing to have a militaristic-centered government being run by two dumb gay aliens. I think everyone on the Massive would know they were somewhat in a relationship, because these guys are not subtle in the least. (View disclaimer above for character ships.)

Any other ship I didn’t list: Same rules apply for both characters I view as children and characters that are viewed as adults or young adults. If it’s not inappropriate or illegal, then it is fine in my eyes. Just don’t be weird and only ship them to sexualize them. That’s real uncomfortable.

Well, that’s about it folks!

Anything else that I have missed, or if I have gotten any information wrong, please do reach out to me either in private messages or in my asks. They’re always open, and I will try to respond as quickly as possible.

Thanks for visiting my page, and reading so far! Keep yourself safe and be respectful on the internet! :)

[mareenavee]

15, 17, and 20!

HI TOPSY!!! AHH. Thank you for taking the time to ask these! I appreciate it!

Fandom Positivity asks from this game here.

15. A topic you never get tired of discussing.

Oh I feel like you knew what I was going to say. I mean there's A LOT about TES that I'd happily chatter over but let's focus on my favorite first.

✨ Weird Magic Shit ✨

To prevent myself from absolutely rambling about this, because I absolutely will given the time and space, I will simply outline what I mean when I say this. There have been a number of ways spells have changed for the series over time. So in fic, we are really free to change the perception of spellcraft and magic in whatever ways we see fit, pulling from lore sources or the game mechanics, or whatever we want. I spend a lot of time thinking -- well, what if a spell could work differently? Is it too far out of canon compliance to make sense? If so, why? And how do we tie it back in a specific way that allows the reader to suspend their disbelief just for a bit? How can a caster's skill affect how they perceive magic or make use of it? What cultural aspects affect how magic is learned or utilized? How does magic and language connect? Are they one and the same? etc, etc.

All of it comes back to the fact that magic is inherently weird and also a huge, huge part of TES. So I'm happy to twist it and warp it out of shape, because it seems there's so much not told in the source material. Early on I did also write a smol post with some super basic ideas on it, and not every aspect of what I am working with is on that post -- but it's there. :> And I'm always happy to discuss weird magic things.

Actually, messing with magic starts pretty early on with World and continues throughout, like, every fic I write. It's a big deal. I'm always here for talking about how I work with it and how others headcanon weird magic shit. (:

17. Something you love that you don’t often share because you’re worried what others will think?

Hm! Well this is interesting because I am very transparent with the kind of fandom participation I work with LOL I don't really generally worry per se what others will think of my taste in fanfic or fanart because at the end of the day, people can scroll past me if they don't prefer to engage with what I'm yelling about. I've been lucky in this regard that most of my mutuals will also yell about similar things.

I'm trying to think of things recently I've read and loved that I would worry about discussing --

Oh! I know. One thing which is really more of an unpopular opinion than anything. I love to dunk on the Nerevoryn ship, but the ✨Morrowind Fic Writers✨ who lean heavily into this give me pause sometimes with how adamant their commentary can be LOL. So I'm not about to write out my unpopular opinions. Because it's very much not like that for me with fandom. Like I want to have a discussion about the merits of the writing or story, not cause chaos in the comments section by posting "lol okay then, you do you" right lol. I find it to be sort of a waste of time to be negative toward others on the internet and I don't want to invite others to waste their time being negative to me because of how funny I find this ship generally speaking. (Please know most of the humor comes with me hearing Voryn/Dagoth Ur's voice as it was in Morrowind while I'm reading. It is a thing I cannot help.) I suppose sometimes in general I'll read this ship for funsies? To be perfectly fair, I don't mind the ship. I just haven't encountered much content for it that isn't absolutely absurd to my eye. (And sometimes even if it is absurd, it's in the best possible way.) Perhaps it's not that I worry about what others will think. It's more that I just don't have a lot of opinions that aren't jokes I think. LOL (For the record, smut/pwp also has this effect. It'll be funny to me most of the time, unless it's well written then I'm just like good for ya'll and move on.) I am simply not the intended audience for that, or, unfortunately, the majority of Nerevoryn ship content. And that's totally okay.

20. Give kudos to someone who is a devoted fan (either of your own works or others’)

MORE KUDOS! I wanted to give a huge shoutout here to @changelingsandothernonsense who has been reading World since the very beginning, version one, challenge mode, me posting every day and cutting content left and right, and also skipping editing phases. She knows SO MUCH about the story upcoming and has been following along with the revision. Not only that, but keyboard smashing with me in my DMs and reading snippets that nobody else has gotten to see so far. AH and it's been such a joy and an inspiration. We chat every day pretty much about fandom things. Thank you for being a fandom bestie and for your enthusiasm. 🫂 I could say so much more LOL. I appreciate all the effort and all the shenanigans. And most of all, I appreciate getting the chance to talk not only about World, but also about Danger!Josh. :>

[bonnielass23]

I was tagged the lovely @astarkey to list 5 unpopular opinions from 5 fandoms! Thank you for the tag! And I’m copying 2 fandoms, but different takes

1. From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series

First, jumping on Astarkey’s take, I love the idea of Kisa and Kate being best friends because they dealt with two sides of the same coin of patriarchal bullshit. Literally all I want is them to tear down the patriarchy with their bare hands together.

Other unpopular opinion. In some ways I’m glad they didn’t do a season 4. The ending of season 3 pretty much made SethKate canon, or at least confirmed their love for each other. I worry that given the age gap of both the characters and the larger age gap between DJ and Madison, that they would have rolled rolled back the development, or even potentially given Seth a different, more age appropriate temporary love interest, out of fear of backlash. I know the majority of the fandom was rooting for SethKate, but it’s one thing to tease it and drop hints to appease the fans, and it’s another to openly display it in the show and open themselves up for backlash beyond the fandom. The potential of people hearing about the age gap relationship and jumping on the “let’s cancel fdtd” bandwagon without watching the show. Community and the actors got so much backlash over Jeff and Annie, calling Jeff a pedo, and other than the goodbye kiss in the last episode they didn’t make that ship canon. That show was airing pretty much at the same time as fdtd. I think SethKate could have been safely portrayed in comics or novels though which I’m sad they didn’t do and wish they would. I am also kinda hoping for them to finally do a season 4 with an actual time skip, like it’s 2023, or later, because I think with Madison/Kate being older and them really defining the age gap (other than the one line on the radio that the Gecko brothers are in their late 20′s) that they could more safely develop the relationship.

2. Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel

I have a lot of opinions but these are probably my most unpopular. I used to be a hard core spuffy shipper when I was watching in middle and high school. I think that was because I liked Spike more than Angel (his snark speaks to my soul). I’m currently doing a rewatch, almost through season 5, and maybe my view will change in season 6 and 7, but right now I’m not a fan of either spuffy or bangel, or honestly any of Buffy’s romantic relationships. Actually currently questioning my younger self’s judgement.

My actual otps currently are Xander and Anya, and Angel and Cordelia, and I will forever be pissed that they never got Xander and Anya back together and killed her off, and that they killed Cordelia. 

Also as a note, I have not read any of the comics or continuing story, so there could have been developments with Buffy’s relationships with Spike and Angel that could sway me, but I’m going entirely off the two television series.

3. Doctor Who

I loved RTD and hated Moffat, which I know isn’t that unpopular, but I actually loved Chibnall’s era. I really appreciated the social commentary and thought he and Jody did an amazing job. Also I’m not sure how unpopular this is anymore, but I loved Rose and Tentoo’s ending. I think given that this is a live action series with actors who want to move on to different projects it was the best ending we could get for The Doctor and Rose. Also Tentoo IS The Doctor.

4. Fairy Tail

Gray and Lucy work better together than Gru//via and Na////Lu. I stand by my statement and will not budge. 

I think Gru//via is actually harmful. I don’t think there’s anything necessarily wrong about toxic or abusive relationships being portrayed in media, but I think it needs to be recognized in the series that it is toxic and abusive behavior. That’s not the case with Gru///via. No character is calling out Ju///via’s behavior towards Gray as abusive, it’s played off as comedy or that Gray is the bad guy for not returning her feelings, and as far as I know Mashima hasn’t said anything publicly about it being problematic behavior either. I know someone who has used that as a model for how to get a guy and is in a very messed up situation where he is taking advantage of her.

Also not exactly unpopular as in controversial, but super rare pair ship, Loke and Cana is my OTP for the series. I only actually ship and have strong feelings about GrayLu and and Lokana, all the other ships range from NOTP to I have no issue with it existing.

5. Big Bang Theory

Not a huge fandom of mine but something that just irks me to no end, and I know has been done in other media. I HATE that they had Penny backtrack on being childfree. I get wanting to have this happily ever after for two characters, but it doesn’t have to be children. Having Penny change her mind because Leonard and her dad is so problematic though. It delegitimizes actual women who have this stance (including me). It perpetuates the idea of this is just a phase and we’ll change our minds, which has real world consequences of employers looking at all women as not as serious because as soon as they have that baby that we all KNOW they will, they’ll be taking a step back to be a mom so why give them a promotion. And bodily autonomy. I understand not tying an 18 year old’s tubes, but the fact the so many adult women are denied sterilization procedures because “you’ll change your mind” or “what if your future husband wants kids?” like the wants of a hypothetical partner takes precedence  over what the woman wants to do with her own body. It’s just such bullshit when this happens.

The ONLY time I’ve witnessed this happen that I’ve been okay with is Elliot in Scrubs, it was part of a long character arch, and her not wanting kids seemed to be rooted almost entirely of her fear of it affecting her career. It wasn’t just a snap decision of omg after years of not wanting to procreate I suddenly want children.

Definitely did some rambling and got political up in here, but I think these are probably some of my most unpopular opinions. Depending on the fandom my opinions can fall into more popular or mostly controversial

Some of my fdtd mutuals have already been tagged, so not gonna double tag them: @darth-tella @sunniebelle @kelkat9 @yourundead @fortysevenswrites @scrumptiousperfectionwizard @milkshakemicrowave @elialys @gralunaisland (Although I feel yours should be 5 unpopular opinions on gru//via lol) and of course anyone else who’d like to do this!

[absolutelyinlove]

let's talk: canon events! how'd you get into the dream team? what brought you to dtblr?

oh god ok my like. origin story of how i started watching dteam is insanely convoluted so i’m going to put it under the cut and like. to preface i just need u to know i’ve never been normal about anything in my life like i am so completely incapable of having passive interests. that is really crucial to understand

ok. So. basically i’ve always been super into mcyt content, i was a Massive cube smp + cube uhc stan back when that was a thing, i was like. 12-14 at the time but i was on stan twitter, wrote rpf on wattpad, experienced the severe trauma of ccs i wrote about Finding my fic and talking about it very publicly. The whole experience. and then when cube smp started to die my overall mcyt interest heavily faded, i’ve still always been incredibly fixated on minecraft itself i used to be super into uhc and other competitive gamemodes but in terms of actually watching content creators that was like. something that kinda faded in and out i’d go through long phases of watching nothing at all sometimes for entire years then randomly get slapped by nostalgia and fall back into it and rewatch old series’, etc.

but anyway. i had other interests, i had a different main fandom, i was still on stan twitter (kpop twitter to be specific) when dream rly started blowing up and. All i ever heard abt him was negative. because i was. on kpop twitter where like everyone was just excited there was a New Most Hated Fandom on the internet so he was an extremely common punching bag and i just Solely knew of him in a negative light and i’d never actually watched him to form my own opinions because (and this sounds so absurd) i also had this very irrational Jealousy toward the like. “new wave” of mcyt stans in 2019-2020 because suddenly it was a COMMON mainstream fandom and it ABSOLUTELY WASNT back when /i/ was a teenager and at my peak obsession so therefore all i felt was very misplaced dislike because How come this massive fanbase wasn’t around when this was My interest ? anyway.

Then like. sometime still in 2020 ? my irl friend sent me a manhunt and was like u NEED to watch this (because all my irls know i am. Very abnormal about competitive minecraft content) and i was like. Huh is it time for me to finally watch this dream guy. and i watched it and well it was very inevitable i got hooked because manhunt is soooo comedically perfect in terms of how me-catered it is, it is Literally everything i could ever ask for in terms of youtube content so it was absolutely over for me and i binged the entire series over the course of like. a week. and at first i really did think i would just be a passive youtube fan, because again. all i’d ever heard about dream was that he was a Bad Person and therefore i really did Try not to get invested beyond just thinking the videos were good but ofc as soon as i finished watching every manhunt that was out at the time i moved onto other dteam videos and i just fell reallyyyyy really in love with their dynamic and it was like. MAN! i had to accept i was growing attached and i Wanted to know more abt them at this point. i watched every single video on dream’s channel by the time i accepted Okay im in too deep now i want to know more.

this is the part that is going to make me sound incredibly fuckin g crazy so i need u to just hear me out. so i started googling dream and looking at the dsmp wiki (because as a youtube-only viewer i knew Nothing about dsmp other than people on my side of twitter hating it) and i was so surprised to realize hbomb was a member i’m crying because i knew him from CUBE SMP!!!!!!! i was like whta the fuck. now i feel Obligated to care like this is my Past combining with the present… it’s like fate… so then. naturally. i Looked up like. Reasons Dream Is Problematic threads on twitter. because i was like if im going to do this i need to know what exactly i am going into here i want to know why this dude is so hated and i unironically went through every single thread and callout post i could find, looking at Every reason someone gave for hating him then looking up the original clip with full context and watching it for myself so i could make my own judgement of it and also looking into how he responded and that was how i realized Oh like 87% of this is exaggerated and the stuff that’s true is either kind of nothing or he seems to be trying to do better. And that was how i decided. He is just some guy who seems very well-meaning and is making efforts to Grow and Now i can allow myself to . watch his stream vods? i know ho w crazy this sounds im crying but u need to understand i genuinely waited to watch any vods and grow attached to his content in a non-casual way until after i was SURE no secret horrible misdeeds were going to catch me off guard and i’d realize i didn’t actually want to support him i’m fucking crying

and then naturally ijust got incredibly fixated on mcc when i discovered That and that was what led me to watching a ton of other streamers, i was never super into dsmp but i Did get very into watching non-lore dsmp vods and just. tons of vods in general. i got severely fixated on mcsr around this time too which was awesome until it Wasn’t and i made a lurker account on twitter like literally a priv with 0 followers where i only followed ccs because i didn’t want to follow them from my acct with all my kpoptwt mutuals and get Called a freak for supporting dream. i also kept up very closely with any drama/situations involving dream even before being on dttwt in any capacity because again. i just like to have full context for everything so this was like. when i was unfortunately a very active dwt2 user because that was mostly how i stayed in the loop with things and tbf at the time it was actually a pretty good place for nuanced discussion this was before it got terribly unbearable but. Yeah. i started reading heat waves “ironically” while it was ongoing like i was reading it bookclub-style with my dranti friends and pretending i knew nothing abt dream or george outside the context of the fic (I AM TERRIBLE) but i ended up getting curious about what other fics were out there and that was how i started reading dnf earnestly.

i didn’t start writing until wayyyyy later after i came out of the dream stan closet to my friend reyna (still the only one of my kpoptwt-era friends who knows i am. the way that i am) in like. mid 2021? and i got them invested in dteam too and then in december 2021 we made our ao3s + new twitter accts together and both started writing fics

as for dtblr in specific i am relatively new here i guess ! i have been a long time lurker as i’ve always preferred tumblr for fandom discussion compared to twitter but i was always too shy to actually make my own account andddd because i started on twitter and had exclusively used twitter in my previous fandom it just like. Came more naturally to me and it’s so good for fic promo i just. Accepted it. but then after october several of my friends and like at least half of my mutuals at the time all became antis and once i was back to feeling. normal about consuming fandom content in like late october early november i desperately wanted to have a place where i wasn’t being made to feel GUILTY constantly so i finally made an acct over here so i’d have at least one space where i could Talk Freely about fandom things without expecting 10 people to tell me to kms for it. (don’t worry i eventually did finally make a new priv and i’m no longer held hostage by ex-stan mutuals on twitter but it was ROUGH at the time like so many of my friends have told me they assumed i’d just lost most of my interest and was only still in the fandom for the sake of writing because i never talked abt anything anymore for so long IT WAS BAD I JUST FELT SILENCED but im free now i promise) so yeah.

but don’t worry now i am here less out of “i have nowhere else to go” necessity and actually just because i Do enjoy it and i prefer it immensely to maintwt i am so content now with basically solely talking abt fandom things here and on my privtwt and just using main for fic talk life is beautiful !

sorry this is really fucking absurdly long i am so normal

[kitkatt0430]

Spike and Angel

Spike

How I feel about this character

Favorite vampire (sorry Angel) of all time right here. He's the big bad. He's a fluffy puppy with fangs. He's a killer and a poet. He's complicated and ridiculous and cares so much.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Buffy, Angel, Fred, Xander

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Dawn, Tara, Fred, Willow

My unpopular opinion about this character

Honestly, no idea. I know that some of my opinions on him are popular based entirely on what part of the fandom the post reaches and those same opinions would be wildly unpopular in other parts.

I do think he got pretty badly abused in parts of S6 so I do wish he'd been the ones to break things off with Buffy. And that he would have done so to try and push Buffy to seek help after finally recognizing he couldn't give that to her. That continuing down the path they were going was hurting Buffy as much as it was him. (Possibly still a trigger for Spike to seek out his soul.) This tends to be unpopular because some people look at any discussion of Buffy's canonical abuse of Spike as erasure of Spike's equally canonical abuse of Buffy so... *shrugs* I tend to avoid the subject.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I wish Spike had gotten in contact with Buffy during his season on Angel. I really think, after everything, she deserved to know. To hear it from him. And instead Spike jumped on the 'paternalistic towards Buffy' train that Angel was the conductor for.

Angel

How I feel about this character

I like him a lot less as an adult than I did as a teenager. I mean... I always found him weird, but as an adult I really do find his whole 'fell in love with a fifteen year old at a distance' thing kinda sketchy. Vampire from a different era or not, it's kinda sketchy.

That said, he's just kinda an out of touch dork and I really do enjoy the character over all. Especially when he got his own show. His dynamic with Cordelia in particular is just really fun to me.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Buffy, Cordelia, Xander, Spike, Wesley

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Wesley, Lorne, Fred, Doyle, Lindsey

My unpopular opinion about this character

Possibly that I like his relationship with Cordelia better than his relationship with Buffy? Again, kinda depends on the part of the fandom the post floats into.

As noted, his initial interest in Buffy was kinda... sketchy. But also he's just very paternalistic towards Buffy and has a tendency to treat her as immature, needing him to make decisions for her. I can get why they both idealize the relationship, but I think that's because they're both more in love with the idea of each other than actually in love with each other.

Whereas with Cordelia, he falls for her after knowing her as a friend. They've got a much more solid base to build their relationship on and he treats her a lot more as an equal. Cordelia is able to grow as a person because of Angel's support and they really seem to see each other and like one another, faults and all.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I wish we'd have gotten a chance to actually explore what it would be like for Angel to raise a (vampire powered) human son. Just imagine Connor running into the sunlight as a kid to avoid arguments with his dad and stuff like that.

[ben-wisehart]

Hi! I LOVE your SVSSS meta, it's always so well thought out<3 At the very bottom of your BingQiu meta post you mention that LBH is gay. I had interpreted his sexuality in SV as like, he could be attracted to anyone (evidenced by his huge harem in PIDW) but after falling for SQQ, he wasn't interested in anyone else. What leads you to believe that LBH is gay and not bi or pan? (I don't have a strong opinion either way, I'm just interested in hearing your take if you feel like talking about it!)

the post anon is referring to

Oh man I've had this one stewing in my brain for days. I DEFINITELY feel like talking about it.

So here's my obligatory disclaimer that media should be enjoyable first and foremost, and if someone reading this enjoys seeing Binghe as bi or pan, I think you should continue to do so regardless of whether or not it's supported by canon.

To be honest, while I don't read either Luo Binghe or Shen Qingqiu as mspec, I'd probably have an easier time believing it of Binghe than SQQ. SQQ's feelings and attitudes toward women come across very much like your pretty stock-standard compulsory heterosexuality; he talks a lot about how he's straight and wants a girlfriend, but try to name one single woman he's actually attracted to and you come up short. In practice, he's constantly making excuses why any given woman who crosses his mind isn't suitable for him: usually it's "they belong to the protagonist" or maybe "she's too intimidating", and he never seems to realise that these things...don't actually preclude him from finding them attractive.

To Shen Qingqiu, simply not being attracted to a woman is very easy and he genuinely doesn't realise that that isn't normal for straight guys. It's why he finds it so confusing why so many people like PIDW despite all the terrible sex scenes. Even when Madam Meiyin (a woman whose predictions he's just described as infallible) is describing his literal destined partner, he tries to picture a woman who fits that description and immediately dismisses the prediction out of hand because she's unrealistic and would obviously go to Binghe anyway.

I think it's really telling that his favourite female lead in PIDW was Liu Mingyan—the only one who never got sex scenes with the character he was actually attracted to. Like. Seriously. His favourite wife was the one he never had to read having straight sex with Binghe. The lack of sex scenes gave her room to breathe and grow as her own character; Shen Yuan talks about how he thinks she should get "pushed down" but I'm willing to bet that if that had actually happened and she'd ended up in the same ridiculous sex scenarios as the other wives, his fondness for her as a character would have mysteriously dried up.

I don't think I have a specific moment I can refer to for this, but you also just...get the impression that even though Binghe is obviously the person SQQ finds most attractive, he's still capable of finding other guys hot. With Liu Qingge in particular Shen Qingqiu spends a hilarious amount of time fixating on what a Pretty Boy(TM) he is compared to how the PIDW fandom liked to portray him. Tianlang-Jun, Gongyi Xiao...even Shang Qinghua he describes as "handsome with an air of sleaziness" in his first appearance. I'm not saying SQQ wants to bone each of these guys, but it does make you kind of feel like a man's general attractiveness is something he takes note of. He does also describe female characters as pretty, so there's an element of it that's just...the POV character relaying the other characters' appearances to the audience, but with the female characters he's usually describing them as they appeared in PIDW, and I sincerely doubt PIDW ever took much time to establish that any given male character was nice to look at.

Anyway. I'm digressing.

As for Binghe...

God, even when I'm trying to talk about Binghe I'm talking about Shen Qingqiu, aren't I??😔

The problem with Binghe, I think, is that he fixates so heavily on Shen Qingqiu to the point of obsession. Like, sure, it's hard to imagine Binghe (as we know him in SVSSS) being attracted to a woman, but it's equally hard to imagine him being attracted to a man that isn't Shen Qingqiu. He just has such singular focus on the person he's fallen for that you might just as well label him "shizunsexual" as anything else.

So if you heard that he married a man in one timeline and a bunch of women in another, and took this information in isolation, you probably could conclude that Binghe is a bi/pan dude who just got really invested in one specific person to an extent that it permanently blinded him to anyone else he might have otherwise shown an interest in, and that this one specific person just happened to be a man.

However, I do think it was MXTX's intention for Binghe to be specifically read as gay, and not just because she's a BL author with a fondness for making her romantic leads only ever have feelings for one single person (and by extension, one gender) in their lives. The Bing-ge extra just doesn't make sense to me if Bing-ge was genuinely attracted to women. And the story overall, I think, makes more sense when that's not the case as well.

Firstly, I want to emphasise that Airplane didn't originally plan for Binghe to be gay. This is a common misconception that I think stems from his teasing remarks to SQQ in the last chapter. In truth, his original plan was for Binghe to not have a love interest. Binghe was supposed to be a tragic protagonist destined to die alone and unloved. Airplane might have added all the wives in for fanservice, and it's obvious that he thinks he's been writing a straight character since he seems genuinely shocked and even upset(??) when he finds out Binghe is gay in real life, but...at the story's core, Binghe having a loving, positive relationship with someone who meets his emotional needs was not part of the plan at any point.

I want to pull up a quote that I think is incredibly telling. This is how Shen Qingqiu describes the scene in PIDW in which Binghe loses his virginity:

The girl thought, "Since I'm about to die, I must leave behind some memories to ensure that my life won't have been in vain. I don't have many days left, after all, so I won't suppress my feelings anymore."

Then, using her weak and fragile body, she pushed Luo Binghe down.

Luo Binghe put up a brief show of resistance before telling himself "She did it all for my sake. I don't have the heart to reject her final wish." He yielded, still half-reluctant, and went along with it...

(Vol 1 Page 143 of the official translation)

Which is just...utterly tragic. I do want to be clear that it's perfectly normal for men to not actually want sex all the time, even with the gender that they're attracted to. Even if Binghe were totally straight it wouldn't be weird that he didn't want to have sex with Qin Wanyue in a life-or-death scenario like the one above. This scene on its own isn't proof that Binghe doesn't like women, but I think it does show that Bing-ge didn't start out chasing women indiscriminately; his very first time was being pressured into it.

Here's the thing. Bing-ge had no positive male figures in his life, especially when he was young. All the men he encountered were indifferent to him at best or outright cruel at worst. He spent his formative years alone with no permanent caregiver. The Meng Mo arc suggests he was on his own until the age of four or five, and that he was regularly beaten on the streets, usually by men. Once his mother took him in, she became his safety and his shelter; it was the two of them against the world. When he loses her, he resolves to join a cultivation clan to get stronger, and is immediately chosen by a graceful and talented immortal—his dream! For the first time, little Luo Binghe allows himself to believe there's going to be somebody else in his life who will protect and mentor him—but then the harsh reality is dumped on his head and he's alone again. His new Shizun punishes him harshly and encourages others to bully him. His shixiongs are only too happy to oblige. His sect leader turns a blind eye to his abuse.

But Ning Yingying...Ning Yingying is naive and a bit tactless and sometimes her interference causes him more problems than it solves, but she's well meaning, she seems to like having him around, and she's the only person who will stand up for him despite everyone telling her not to. In PIDW, she was the person he trusted the most during his time at Qing Jing Peak. Admittedly not a very high bar, but he has a friend. And then the others. Liu Mingyan, Sha Hualing, Qin Wanyue, the Little Palace Mistress...these are people who make him feel wanted. Needed.

It's a really interesting and frankly tragic mirror to Shen Jiu, who was also abused by men and for whom women became his safety. It's also interesting in the ways that they differ. He goes to brothels to sleep so he won't be around men, but there's nothing to suggest Shen Jiu actually turned to having sex with women for comfort in the way that Binghe did. Shen Jiu closes himself off completely from forming relationships with other people, even superficial ones, while Binghe can't seem to stop forming new connections, even if they never manage to satisfy him in the way he really wants.

I think the members of the harem have varying levels of genuine care and love for Binghe. Unfortunately we don’t have the benefit of their POV and we only have brief allusions to what their individual relationships with Binghe were like in PIDW. Breaking down my exact thoughts on each wife would make this essay even more bloated than it already is and wouldn’t add much overall, but in general, I do think most of them were at least physically attracted to him. Some may have married him for political or social advantages, especially once he started to amass power and…eliminate their other options. Some might have wanted the safety and protection that came with being the Saintly Ruler’s wife. I think a good chunk of them were, consciously or not, using him in some way—but Bing-ge is so desperate for human connection (or at least a parody of it) that he doesn’t really care, especially as he spends more and more time using Xin Mo. If he's being taken advantage of, it’s not like he doesn’t have the resources to support it.

But there must have been women in the harem who genuinely loved him, who wished they could be more to him than just an interchangeable face in the crowd. There must have been women whose personalities meshed well with his. Women who earned his trust and his loyalty. Women whom, if Binghe were somebody with the capacity to have romantic feelings towards women, he would have fallen in love with.

And yet, all it took was a few days with Shen Qingqiu to change everything.

Now, I don’t think Bing-ge in the extra was gearing up to give up his harem unprompted. He wanted SQQ to come back with him. I do think that if Bingmei had simply never returned and provided a way back, Bing-ge wouldn’t have regretted the loss, and I also think that if SQQ had gone back with him to join the harem, Bing-ge would have never looked at another woman in his life, but these things aren’t outright stated in canon so I can’t in good conscience present them as indisputable fact. The fandom is pretty consistent on the belief that Bing-ge goes home with his worldview shaken and develops an obsession with SY, and I think that too, but the fact remains that we will never really know for sure how he moves on from that experience. I'm pointing all this out because I really do want to give mspec Binghe as much benefit of the doubt as I possibly can.

But god…I really just don’t see how it’s possible to read the Bingge vs Bingmei extras without coming to the conclusion that Bing-ge is a gay man who is experiencing a genuine positive connection with another man for the first time in his life. He’s hostile and standoffish when he doesn’t know what’s going on, but as soon as he understands the situation, he melts. He looks at Shen Qingqiu like he’s seeing him for the first time. He starts calling his name just because he can, because he likes hearing SQQ respond to him. He becomes drunk on it, unable to stop. He offers to cuddle him to sleep. For somebody who has never had intimate relations with a man before, he doesn’t even hesitate to start seducing him once he understands the situation. Everything is just perfect—right up until SQQ sees through his deception and the facade crumbles.

I don’t think Bing-ge knew he was gay before this point. How would he? Who could possibly have been a focal point for these feelings? The only male friendship we know he had was with Mobei-Jun, and even though Mobei-Jun is also a MLM, he’s not exactly Binghe’s type and they just don’t have the kind of dynamic Binghe needs in a relationship. He’s spent his entire life being the strong one, the one who saves the maiden, the one who carries the weight of the world on his back. So the relationship he truly craves, even if he doesn’t realise it, is one where he gets to be doted on and cared for. Where he gets his hair braided.

He finds that so suddenly in the Scum Villain world, and it shakes him to his core. He doesn’t know how to deal with it. He looks at his other self in a loving relationship with Shen Qingqiu and feels nauseated, but begs Shen Qingqiu to come back with him in the same breath. He doesn’t understand what’s different here, he just knows he doesn’t want to lose it.

Why am I so unwaveringly convinced that Binghe is gay? I’m going to bite the bullet and say It’s Just The Vibe, Your Honour. I guess you can argue that he could still technically like women even if he just never managed to connect with one the way he did with Shen Qingqiu, but there comes a point when you have to ask why you’re assuming a zebra instead of a horse. Narratively, Binghe being gay is the only answer that makes sense to me. The harem collectively serves as a sort of character foil to Shen Qingqiu, contrasting him as a love interest for Binghe. Binghe in PIDW was surrounded by an abundance of relationships but all of them were superficial and shallow, never able to completely satisfy him. Binghe in SV has one loving partner who actually fulfils his emotional needs, and it’s enough for him.

Sex God Binghe with a harem of beautiful women who obey his every whim is very explicitly the bad ending. It’s about the inherent brokenness of a man who would seek something like this. Amassing hundreds of wives isn’t actually something that normal straight guys want to do; most straight guys (most people) are much happier with a loving partner who supports them and actually connects with them on a deep, personal level. So having Binghe, the ultimate stallion, be somebody who isn’t even attracted to women just drives home the final point even more that this is a doomed behaviour that could never have made him happy.

There’s so much tragedy in the fact that this is the only way Bing-ge ever learned to get even a resemblance of emotional fulfilment. I maintain that a lot of his wives probably did care for him, even if they could never have played the role in his life that Shen Qingqiu did in the SV timeline. Being a harem master was the only way Bing-ge knew how to make himself feel wanted. And it’s sad. It’s really, really sad. I like to think that his foray into the SV universe might have served as a wake-up call for him, that he might have realised everything he’d built wasn’t making him happy and tried to find something else. Unfortunately, Binghe has learned such bad coping mechanisms that it’s easier to picture him trying to build a portal back into the SV world to kidnap the nice SQQ than, like, doing the normal thing of going out and finding a cute farm boy to settle down with, but we can only dream.

TL;DR Women were the only people Binghe was able to form positive relationships with, but I’m just not convinced there’s any real evidence in canon that he was actually attracted to them.

This is long enough so I'll stop here, but I might share this earlier post of mine from someone asking about Binghe's feelings about SJ as it feels somewhat relevant. This essay can be shared on twitter here. Feel free to check out my meta tag for other stuff I've written, too! (at this point, I might just make a specific svsss meta tag and be done with it)

Thanks for the question, anon!!

[tarobytez]

disability in the Six Of Crows Duology; an analysis of Kaz Brekker, Wylan Van Eck, and the fandom’s treatment of them.

****Note: I originally wrote this for a tiktok series, which im still going to do, but i wanted to post here as well bc tumblr is major contributor to what im going to talk about

CW: ableism, filicide, abuse

In the Six of Crows duology, Leigh Bardugo delicately subverts and melds harmful disability tropes into her narrative, unpacking them in a way that I, as a disabled person, found immensely refreshing and…. just brilliant. 

But what did you all do with that? Well, you fucked it up. Instead of critically looking at the characters, y’all just chose to be ableist. 

For the next few videos paragraphs im going to unpack disability theory (largely the stuff surrounding media, for obvious reasons) and how it relates to Six Of Crows and the characterization of Kaz Brekker and Wylan Van Eck, then how, despite their brilliant writing, y’all completely overlooked the actual text and continuously revert them to ableist cariactures.

Disclaimer: 1. Shocker - i am disabled. I have also extensively researched disability theory and am very active in the disabled community. Basically, I know my shit. 2. im going to be mad in these videos this analysis. Because the way y’all have been acting has been going on for a long ass time and im fuckin sick of it. I don’t give a shit about non-disabled feelings, die mad

Firstly, I’m going to discuss Kaz, his play on the stereotypical “mean cripple” trope and how Bardugo subverts it, his cane, and disabled rage. Then, I am going to discuss Wylan, the “inspiration porn” stereotype, caregivers / parents, and the social model of disability. Finally, I will then explain the problems in the fandom from my perspective as a disabled person, largely when it comes to wylan, bc yall cant leave that boy tf alone.

Kaz Brekker

Think of a character who uses a cane (obviously not Kaz). Now, are they evil, dubiously moral, or just an asshole in general? Because nearly example I can think of is: whether it be Lots’O from Toy Story, Lucius Malfoy, or even Scrooge and Mr.Gold from Once Upon A Time all have canes (the last two even having their canes appear less and less as they become better people)

The mean/evil cripple trope is far more common than you would think. Villains with different bodies are confined to the role of “evil”. To quote TV Tropes, who I think did a brilliant job on explaining it “The first is rooted in eugenics-based ideas linking disability or other physical deformities with a "natural" predisposition towards madness, criminality, vice, etc. The Rule of Symbolism is often at work here, since a "crippled" body can be used to represent a "crippled" soul — and indeed, a disabled villain is usually put in contrast to a morally upright and physically "perfect" hero. Whether consciously on the part of the writer or not, this can reinforce cultural ideas of disability making a person inherently inferior or negative, much in the same way the Sissy Villain or Depraved Homosexual trope associate sexual and gender nonconformity with evil. ”

Our introduction to Kaz affirms this notion of him being bad or morally bankrupt, with “Kaz Brekker didn’t need a reason”, etc. This mythologized version of himself, the “bastard of the barrel” actively fed into this misconception. But, as we the audience are privy to his inner thoughts, know that he is just a teenager like every other Crow. He is complex, his disability isn’t this tragic backstory, he just fell off a roof. It’s not his main motivation, nor does he curse revenge for making him a cripple - it is just another part of who he is. 

His cane (though the shows version fills me with rage but-) is an extension of Kaz - he fights with it, but it has a purpose. Another common thing in media is for canes to be simply accessories, but while Kaz’ cane is fashionable, it has purpose.

The quote “There was no part of him that was not broken, that had not healed wrong and there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken.” is so fucking powerful. Kaz does not want nor need a cure - its said in Crooked Kingdom that his leg could most likely be healed, but he chooses not to. Abled-bodied people tend to dismiss this thought as Kaz being stubborn but it shows a reality of acceptance of his disability that is just, so refreshing.

In chapter 22 of SOC, we see disabled rage done right - when he is called a cripple by the Fjerdan inmate, Kaz is pissed - the important detail being that he is pissed at the Fjerdan, at society for ableism, not blaming it on being disabled or wishing he could be normal. He takes action, dislocating the asshole’s shoulder and proving to him, and to a lesser extent, himself, that he is just as capable as anyone else, not in spite of, but because he is disabled. And that is the point of Kaz, harking back to the line that “there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken”. 

I cried on numerous occasions while reading the SOC duology, but the parts I highlighted in this section especially so. I, as many other disabled people do, have had a long and tumultuous relationship with our disability/es, and for many still struggle. But Kaz Brekker gave me an empowered disabled character who accepts themselves, and that means the world to me. 

Keeping that in mind, I hope you can understand why it hurts so much to disabled people when you either erase Kaz’s disability (whether through cosplay or fanfiction), or portray him as a “broken boy uwu”, especially implying that he would want a cure. That flies in the face of canon and is inherently fucking ableist. (if u think im mad wait until the next section)

Next, we have Wylan.  

Oh fucking boy. 

I love Wylan so fucking much, and y’all just do not seem to understand his character? Like at all? Since this is disability-centric, I’m not going to discuss how the intersection of his queerness also contributes to these issues, but trust me when I say it’s a contributing factor to what i'm going to say.

Wylan, motherfucking Van Eck. If you ableist pricks don’t take ur fucking hands off him right now im going to fight you. I see Wylan as a subversion another, and in my opinion more insidious stereotype pf disabled people - inspiration porn.

Cara Liebowitz in a 2015 article on the blog The Body Is Not An Apology explains in greater detail how inspiration porn is impactful in real life, but media is a major contributing factor to this reality. The technical definition is “the portrayal of people with disabilities as inspirational solely or in part on the basis of their disability” - but that does not cover it fully. 

Inspiration porn does lasting damage on the disabled community as it implies that disability is a negative that you need to “overcome” or “triumph” instead of something one can feel proud of. It exploits disabled people for the development of non-disabled people, and in media often the white male protagonist. Framing disability as inherently negative perpetuates ideals of eugenics and cures - see Autism $peaks’ “I Am Autism” ad. Inspiration porn is also incredibly patronizing as it implies that we cannot take care of ourselves, or do things like non-disabled people do. Because i stg some of you tend to think that we just sit around all day wishing we weren’t disabled. 

Another important theory ideal that is necessary when thinking about Wylan is the experience of feeling like a burden simply for needing help or accommodations. This is especially true when it comes to familial relationships, and internalized ableism.

The rhetoric that Wylan’s father drilled into his head, that he is “defective”, “a mistake”, and “needs to be corrected”, that he (Jan) was “cursed with a moron for a child” is a long held belief that disabled people hear relentlessly. And while many see Van Eck’s attempted murder of Wylan as “preposturous” and overall something that you would never think happens today - filicide (a parent murdering their child) is more common than you would like to believe. Without even mentioning the countless and often unreported deaths of disabled people due to lack of / insufficient / neglectful medical care, in a study on children who died from the result of household abuse, 40 of 42 of them (95%) were diagnosed with disabilities. Van Eck is not some caricature of ableist ideals - he is a real reflection on how many people and family members view disability. 

Circling back to how Wylan unpacks the inspiration porn trope - he is 3 dimensional, he is not only used to develop the other characters, he is just *chefs kiss* Leigh, imo, put so much love and care into the creation of Wylan and his story and character growth that is representative of a larger feeling in the disabled community. 

That being said, what you non-disabled motherfuckers have done to him.

The “haha Wylan can’t read” jokes aren’t and were not funny. Y’all literally boiled down everything Wylan is to him being dyslexic. And it’s like,,,, the only thing you can say about him. You ignore every other part of him other than his disability, and then mock him for it. There’s so much you can say about Wylan - simping for Jesper, being band kid and playing the fuckin flute, literally anything else. But no, you just chose to mock his disability, excellent fucking job!

Next up on “ableds stfu” - infantilization! y’all are so fucking condescending to Wylan, and treat him like a fucking toddler. And while partly it is due to his sexuality i think a larger portion is him being disabled. Its in the same vein of people who think that Wylan and Jesper are romantically one sided, and that Jesper only kind of liked Wylan, despite the canon evidence of him loving Wylan just as much. You all view him as a “smol bean”, who needs protecting, and care, when Wylan is the opposite of that. He is a fucking demolitions expert who suggested waking up sleeping men to kill them - what about that says “uwu”. You are treating Wylan as a burden to Jesper and the other Crows when he is an immensely valuable, fully autonomous disabled person - you all just view him as damaged. 

And before I get a comment saying that “uhhh Wylan isn’t real why do you care” while Wylan may not be real, how you all view him and treat him has real fucking impacts and informs how you treat people like me. If someone called me an “uwu baby boy” they’d get a fist square in the fucking jaw. Fiction informs how we perceive the world and y’all are making it super fucking clear how you see disabled people. 

Finally, I wanted to talk about how the social model of disability is portrayed through Wylan. For those who are unaware, the social model of disability contrasts the medical model, that views the disability itself as the problem, that needs to be cured, whereas the social model essentially boils down to creating an accommodating society, where disability acceptance and pride is the goal. And we see this with Wylan - he is able to manage his father’s estate, with Jesper’s assistance to help him read documents. And this is not out of pity or charity, but an act of love. It is not portrayed as this almighty act for Jesper to play saviour, just a given, which is incredibly important to show, especially for someone who has been abused by family for his disability like Wylan, that he is accepted. 

Yet, I still see people hold up Jesper on a pedestal for “putting up with” Wylan, as if loving a disabled person deserves a fucking pat on the back. It’s genuinely exhausting trying to engage with a work I love so much with a fandom that thinks so little of me and my community. It fucking shows. 

Overall, Leigh Bardugo as a disabled person wrote two incredibly meticulous and empowered disabled characters, and due to either lack of reading comprehension, ableism, or a quirky mix of both, the fandom has ignored canon and the experiences of disabled people for…. shits and giggles i guess. And yes, there are issues with the Grishaverse and disability representation - while I haven’t finished them yet so I do not have an opinion on it, people have been discussing issues in the KOS duology with ableist ideals. This mini series was no way indicative of the entire disabled experience, nor does it represent my entire view on the representation as a whole. These things need to be met critically in our community, and talked about with disabled voices at the forefront. For example, the limited perspective we get of Wylan and Kaz being both white men, does not account for a large portion of the disabled community and the intersection of multiple identities.

All-in-all, Critique media, but do not forget to also critique fandom spaces. Alternatively, just shut the fuck up :)

happy fucking disability pride month, ig