#i would also like to add the concept works way better for a supporting character

[sporksaber]

I love the concept of someone/somebeing who was considered the most dangerous warrior to ever exist taking on a weak form. Specifically when they're still seen as or are shown to be just as dangerous as before even though they can't physically hurt anyone on their own.

[thepunkmuppet]

thinking about an alternate season 7 wherein instead of every potential slayer being hunted and then activated, every past slayer gets brought back to life. I don’t really like post-chosen content anyway, but when I do read / look at it the whole slayer academy, everyone’s a slayer thing is really stupid to me ngl 💀

previous slayers, though… nikki wood and xin rong interacting with spike, actually finding out about the slayer before buffy, slayers with different backgrounds and situations and personalities, KENDRA?! I just love it so much.

you’d be able to focus on a relatively small cast of slayers, much like the potentials, throughout the season. this would include buffy, faith, kendra, nikki, and some other american slayers from varying time periods with a couple interesting international characters too (maybe a slayer from ancient greece / rome / egypt, or an anglo-saxon one or something). these are all experienced slayers, so no need to focus on training - it would be more about lore, history and their personal character journeys, assimilating them into society (creating some fun bottle episodes, maybe a day out on the town with dawn and a historical slayer) and trying to figure out why they were all brought back. also, if you want to keep the first as the main villain, then it can look like any one of them because they’re all technically dead, which means you can still have that episode with the dead potential revealing herself as the first and all the mistrust that’s threaded throughout the season.

plus with nikki back, there would be no need for the stupid sleeper agent thing with spike or the ridiculous fight between him and robin. all the same ideas (and the flashbacks to spike’s mum) could still be explored, and in a way better way imo.

I reckon the reason they were brought back would probably be the powers that be (tying nicely into angel ofc) trying to defeat the first. and of course the ending would be this huge battle, as all the slayers from around the world come to sunnydale, and maybe to add some drama they would all disappear and die again when the battle’s done as they have fulfilled their purpose (a classic finale knife to the heart that would have everyone sobbing, especially over nikki and kendra).

there’s also the added thing of like,, I appreciate the show was leaning towards a theme of “hope for the future” with the potentials angle, but literally every other aspect of the season is about harkening back to the past. faith, robin, the first taking the form of previous characters, the high school, the slayer origins, etc etc. so I just think this idea would work so much better with the themes of the season, and tie in really nicely.

and the most obvious perk of this concept is kendra! she was forgotten about so quickly, and this season would really give the writers a chance to redeem themselves for the terrible way poc characters have been treated throughout the show (ignoring what they did to robin. FUCK that but that’s another conversation). I think the show really downplayed how much kendra’s death would have affected buffy, and seeing the two of them interact after buffy has changed so much and kendra’s still the same would be amazing. there’s also the interesting concept that, having been brought back from the dead, kendra still be 17, and therefore closer in age to dawn than to buffy, which could make for some really nice interactions between the two of them. also of course the biggest most exciting thing is having buffy, faith and kendra all interact. they all represent places on a spectrum in terms of personality, and I would LOVE to see kendra and faith interact and how much of a unit they would likely become as a trio.

there’s also the theme of buffy feeling (and being) alone in this season that would hopefully go away, as she would now have dozens of people who truly understand her, giving her a proper support system which I would love to see (season 7 scoobies can actually eat shit btw <3)

so. was this born out of my hatred for insufferable kennedy and the annoying potentials? yes absolutely. do I now want them to rewrite and re-film the entire last season 20 years later? yes absolutely I’m so glad you understand

side note wouldn’t it be sick if in the final battle there’s just this one slo-mo shot where buffy stakes a vamp and through the dust she sees the first slayer looking at her from across the battlefield before she disappears amongst the fight. WHAT it would literally be awesome hello?!

also also other side note sorry but Mother(TM) nikki wood would NEVER kick buffy out of her own house. fuck them kids fr

[onbearfeet]

Kat watches Moon Knight

Okay, so with the encouragement of several people on here and the emotional support of my roommate, I have finally (in February 2024) started watching Moon Knight, a show whose basic concept scares the shit out of me.

Context: I had an adopted older brother with DID. Note that I said "had". That's past tense because life treated him so appallingly poorly that he died (horribly, in prison) when I was 19. Part of that abuse was enabled by pop-culture depictions of DID in the 1980s and 90s that convinced everyone who knew about his condition (including the court system) that he was a walking time bomb.

One of my earliest memories is of my brother as a young adult, playing Super Mario Bros with my toddler self. Another is of him patiently teaching me how to make friends with a large dog. I never met any of his alters, afaik; I was small and cute and safe for him to be himself with, so he probably didn't need them around me. He was a profoundly gentle man when he was allowed, and it hurt like hell to see him turned into a monster in movies and on TV. I've turned off a lot of "psychological thrillers" in sorrow and disgust.

Ironically, I loved Moon Knight comics as a kid in the 90s, BEFORE he was retconned to have DID circa the mid-2000s. Because those comics came out right after my brother died in 2002 and leaned HARD into making people with DID seem like violently unstable monsters (for reference, see the cover of Moon Knight: God and Country), I stopped reading them around 2008, when I couldn't take being poked in the trauma by a comfort character anymore.

But I do love Werewolf By Night, and there's been a lot of good fic mashing Jack up with Moon Knight without dehumanizing anyone, and several people have encouraged me to try the show. So this post will be a place for my thoughts as I try to work my way through with my Essential Editions in one hand and my memories of my brother in the other. I'll add to it as I watch.

If this entertains the Moon Knight fandom or provides useful fic reference, so be it. Just don't be jerks on my post.

Also, anyone who chooses to be shitty about my brother will be eaten by bears. I don't make the rules.

Episode 1

Okay, we open with Steven as our POV character, and he's...convinced he's a sleepwalker. All right, not terrible. Steven is now a bumbling nerd, which is probably an improvement; good luck making a billionaire playboy sympathetic in the 2020s. Jake would be the logical everyman POV from the comics, but I understand from fic that he's got a different role now. I'm confused about the accent, but it's only episode 1, and Steven clearly doesn't yet know who Khonshu is, or that Marc exists, so obviously there's a ways to go here. (Is Marc ... undercover inside Steven? Ugh, this is a trope I have seen and do not like.)

Did Marc kill Steven's fish? Did Khonshu kill Steven's fish? I'm baffled by the fish. Which is a nice break from the larger anxiety. I'm gonna try to worry more about the fish.

The bits with Steven losing time and finding himself in odd situations were distressingly close to the old tropes, but both of those happened to my brother, so I'm not going to bitch about them quite yet. I want to be as fair as I can.

Oh, hey, I recognize Harrow from the comics. What up, dude. How's the cult biz treating you?

The end of the episode, with the jackal thing chasing Steven into the bathroom, came RIGHT up to the line for me. I realized that what I was most afraid of was that the story would assign "good" and "bad" labels to the alters--make Steven the sweet, innocent one and Marc (or maybe Jake, I guess) the monstrous killer. The early flashes of Steven covered in blood didn't really help allay that anxiety. And now Marc is demanding that Steven let him have control in a pretty threatening manner. But so far, it seems like the contrast between Marc and Steven is one of competence--Marc is better at fighting and Steven is better at ... panicking? Unclear. At least Oscar Isaac is playing the protagonist, so his character(s) might remain sympathetic. Nobody has been monsterized quite yet.

I finished the episode with every muscle in my body locked up, waiting for the emotional punch in the face. But I did finish it, and I think I'm gonna try episode two.

[sbtorms]

SUNSETTER - An Undertale roleswap take

A couple months back I started making a concept for an Underswap take. I'm happy with what I've made thus far.

Long ago, Monsterkind and Humanity lived together in harmony. But a war sparked, and the peace shattered. The monsters, overpowered, made a bunker, and hid underground. The humans, discovering this, created a machine to keep monsterkind from leaving it, hoping their opponents would eventually die out. And the war soon was long forgotten...

... Eventually, in the year of 202X, a story unfolds.

On the surface are the caverns of Night's Aura. Underneath the earth lies the refuge of Monsterkind...

A bit of information before we get onto characters...

This is a human's SPIRIT, the very essence of one's being. A monster's spirit, containing seven human's spirits, would become godlike.

Anyways...

The first character swap on the AU is...

A Flowey - Frisk swap!

Finley is a human kid, around 15 years old. They're a bit of a brat. After running away from home, they hide away in a cave. Picking up sticks to make a fire, they unfortunately discovered some loose ground, and fell into the SETTLEMENT.

The Human is... a human? Maybe. They seem a bit... undead, though. A silent type, seemingly not talking at all. Who knows if they can. They hide and watch from the shadows, acting on instinct alone. No one seems to know they exist. What even are they?

Next is your average Asgore - Toriel swap!

Asgore is the guide to the OL' TOWN from the OUTSKIRTS, and one who used to be the king of Monsterkind. He's a big fuzzy pushover, just like in Undertale. He's beloved by all in the area. It's a wonder why he's so far from the captial... but he's there to give hope to all that lives in Town.

Toriel is the keeper of the BARRICADE, and the queen of Monsterkind. As of now, all know how she tires from the situation she's in. Many fear her wrath, but others know her warmth. With her mighty blade, Queen TORIEL will set all free.

As with most Underswap takes, you can't have it without the usual Papyrus - Sans swap!

Papyrus is a skeleton who's lost his ambition. Due to certain circumstances, a goal he once had is completely out of reach. Due to this, he's become a bit more... distant. He's not lazy by any means, but he has a hard time getting up in the morning. Besides all of that, he still shares some visions and ideals as his original self. Though, perhaps someone can come by and help him...

Sans is also a skeleton. The Skeleton, even. He's mainly very similar to his original lazybones self. But he's gotten a little more upbeat and extroverted, in an attempt to help his brother get back to his former greatness. There isn't much else to add, actually. At the core, he really is still Sans, puns, pranks, and all. Though, he does have a few jobs, including working as an assistant for a magical girl vigilante. Though, it's mainly just taking phone calls. They'd be met through SNOHFAL CAVERNS and the CITY OF SNOHFALIN

I decided to do something interesting for my Alphys - Undyne swap, but the usual thing is still like the average one.

Alphys is the aforementioned magical girl style vigilante in the WETLANDS, trying to make a name for herself. The matters of protection throughout the SETTLEMENT had lessened before she started, due to certain circumstances. She's gotten herself a few fans, stopped a few crimes, supported the local soup kitchen... But she still feels like there's more she can do. Toriel's stressed, and she knows this. So, maybe... she can try to get the next fallen human's SPIRIT on her own.

Undyne is the Queen's Royal Engineer, and a rather good one at that. She's made various ways of making the settlement, and the lives of those that reside in it, better. Though, there's nothing that outdoes the previous ones's greatest creation, MEGA, a generator that powers the entire Settlement. She resides in a laboratory in PYROCLAST Due to certain circumstances, she's much more determined to get the next fallen human's SPIRIT. She's enlisted the help of a ghostly friend of hers to help her do so.

The Blook Cousins have a different swapping arrangement from normal Underswap Napstablook - Dummy Mettaton - Mad Dummy/Mew Mew

Scarecrow is, well... a scarecrow. A ghost monster possessing a scarecrow, actually. Despite their name, and weird face, they're actually rather shy. They probably just need a little cheering up once in a while. They also really like music.

Bittinaugh (pronounced: bitty-naff) is just your average ghost monster. They don't talk much, though. Who really knows what goes on in that little ghost's head. They're also a shy sort, and a bit sensitive, despite their monotonous expression.

Starcrow is also a ghost monster possessing a scarecrow. Though, they have VERY high aspirations for themself. They wish to be a celebrity, a star for the whole SETTLEMENT to enjoy. After learning about a human's fall through their cousin, they decided that a perfect start to showbiz would be to face one head on!

The "Mad Mew Mew" boss would have them possess a big gundam-like figure, with similarities to Mettaton EX.

Amornalek (pronounced: a-more-na-leck) seems to be your average robotic suit of armor, but she's actually a VENGEFUL SPIRIT!!! Or... just an angry ghost monster possessing the suit. She works with Undyne, and is her best friend... and training dummy for battle practice. They two spar a lot, and it's fun for the both of them. Undyne souped-up her with a TON of weapons. Magic, missiles, knives, a LOT of knives, those knives were kinda Amor's idea.

There's an "EX" form, but I haven't designed it. It would be similar to Mad Mew Mew, but not exactly. It'd also go for more of a mix of cute-yet-violent in design than just cute.

And finally, Asriel - Chara

Both of them are... more or less the same as in canon. Their life and death are more or less the same. It's just that Undyne was allowed by Queen Toriel to use Chara's corpse for a... certain experiment. Being allowed to do so was due to desperation, and the idea of at least seeing one of her children alive again.

But that's another story. ... Which I'm gonna tell right now.

SOW-WOS - The "Willpower" Experiments

There was an attempt by Undyne to make stronger monsters/warriors, beings able to get past and destroy the barricade. All of the monsters that were experimented on were volunteers, rather than just being on death's door like in Undertale. Each and every volunteer was a member of that time's current Royal Guard.

Each volunteer was given a machine put inside their bodies that courses Willpower, a lifeblood extracted from the previously collected human SPIRITs, throughout their body.

Unfortunately, the volunteers start to become a metallic-like fluid, an immense pull making them come together. Their bones and joints reconfigured within the combined masses. The fluid hardens and loses polarity as they turn from magnetic fluid, to almost a hard metal, like titanium.

The amalgamates form, with a distinct taste in the air... similar to that of copper.

These experiments, Undyne couldn't reveal the full results of, so she locked the masses down below the main lab. She simply recorded that they perished in the experimentation. And what makes things worse, is that the body of the deceased human had disappeared. Learning this, Toriel completely disbanded the Royal Guard, not wanting something like this to happen again. She put Undyne on probation, yet did not completely fire her. The whole thing was an accident, completely unexpected, and the subjects were volunteers. It was not Undyne's fault. But to Undyne, it was. With that on her shoulders, she made it her new mission to get the next human's SPIRIT... By any means necessary.

[gatheredfates]

Oh my goodness, I can't believe we're here! This is the FIRST Compendium update for Dawntrail! ☀️ In the end I didn't need the extra weekend off; I just put this together in-between trusts (don't judge me).

I hope everyone is having a fantastic time with the new expansion. I am especially excited to see how this document expands as I find new things in its advent, so please let me know if you make/find anything interesting!

While I don't think the Compendium will have anything pertaining to spoilers, I will try to note where resources/communities contain them going forward. Resources may update without me knowing, however; please do your best to engage with content keeping the possibility of spoilers in mind. Thanks!

With that said, however, as of today (07/06), the following resources have been added to Sea's Community Compendium for XIV Creatives.

LARGE SCALE

XIV Modding — In the online game known as FINAL FANTASY XIV, modifications usually fall under the “tools”, “mods” and “plugins” categories. The purpose of this wiki is to provide a semi-comprehensive breakdown of the existing tools & ways to mod the game cosmetically, ie visuals, audio & other on-screen assets.

*Please note: Modding is a direct violation of the games ToS and discussion of it in game will earn you a ban. Its inclusion in the Compendium is for collection purposes; I am not responsible for what you do with the tools should you download them.

FRIEND / CASUAL SERVER

A Walk Across Etheirys — We are a group of friends, and story-lovers, who have chosen to make the slow journey through every zone of FFXIV we can! We take these walks by expansion, remembering them for what they were and what they meant to us, and aim to add new ones as they arise.

LORE

A Comprehensive List of Halonic Swears — For your Ishgardian fanfiction and lore reference. Created by @rosestarart.

SEAFLOOR

We're a Tumblr Community now! For people unfamiliar with the concept of Communities, I encourage you to check out the tumblr post by staff made about them here. However, copy/pasting what I have written in the Compendium, the Community functions as so:

SEAFLOOR (A FFXIV Community) is a Tumblr community whose duel-purpose focuses on my projects — the Compendium, question drives and screenshot events — whilst also reblogging member created works, resources (including events, commissions and looking for content/roleplay/free company posts), affirmations and other xiv-related content. If you are interested in supporting my projects without the social aspect of a Discord, I highly encourage you to join the Community. Everything hosted on the Discord will be cross-posted there; you will not miss out on anything. As Communities are still in beta, members need to be manually invited. If you would like to join, please like the tumblr post here. Once Communities are out of beta, I will remove this section to better reflect its true public status.

I'm hoping the Community will function as a member-curated dash, resource hub and visual diary for my projects and member created works. There are no hard feelings if you want to leave the Discord and only join the Community. Please do what makes you comfortable!

Want to submit? You can either fill out the google form here or send me an ask with the relevant information!

Is my space suitable for the Compendium? Most of the time, yes! Below the read more is some more information/stipulations. Again, all the below information is accessible on the document! 🌻

Below are the following things I do not accept on the Compendium:

Personal/Single-Character LFC ads.

Content intended for or can be used for bullying, harassment and OOC gossip. E.g. ‘Secrets’ blogs, receipts, callout posts, etc. This does not include in-character tabloid blogs used to generate RP.

Communities that do not have an RP/writing element (large-scale exempt).

Anything I find personally distasteful or goes against the spirit of this project.

Common-sense rule applies.

FAQ.

I want to put my community on the compendium but we have an application process. Is this okay?

Yes! Just note somewhere in your application that's a requirement. The only thing that is mandatory for the Compendium is that you must be open to new members or have a public-facing/accessible facet. There's no point advertising a community if no one can join it in some way!

I want to put my community on the compendium but I only have x number of members —

Also totally okay! People don't start with large communities. Activity is a must but, whether your server has two or two thousand members, if you're looking for new people to join, I'd love to help you find people.

I want to put my community on the compendium but I worry its too niche?

Okay, and? If your Eorzean Fishing Alliance has four members but you roleplay every second weekend, I still want to know about it.

What resources/communities can I add if I'm not the owner of them?

Mutual consent is extremely important to me, so anything that isn't a large-scale community OR a publicly accessible resource must be endorsed by the owner/admin/moderators in order to be added to the compendium. I operate under the assumption that a resource posted to a public space (tumblr, googledocs, youtube, etc) is open to all. A large-scale community is one with a significant member count or openly advertises itself as being accessible to everyone for whatever purpose it serves. If in doubt, please get in touch with me. I'm happy to contact your community owners for you!

How active does a community need to be?

If you find a community has not been active in about two/three months, send me a message and I'll take a look at it. Communities have ebbs and flows, especially event spaces that may take hiatuses depending on member interest/life events. I'm not strict in my implementation provided a space isn't dead. If a link or anything is broken, absolutely contact me about that.

I have [insert a question not stated here]?

No drama! Send me an ask or use the #Compendium channel in my Discord!

[diagonal-queen]

Hello! So, how do you think Chuuya, Fyodor, Nikolai, and Dazai(You can add some more characters if you want!)would react if their S/O was a compulsive liar? Not exactly a bad person, but they lie almost every chance they get. Please and thank you <3

i always get the best and most interesting reqs!! now i can't say i'm an expert with this subject, but here's how i think it'd go:

When their S/O is a compulsive liar

♡ pairing: Chuuya Nakahara, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Mykola Hohol, Dazai Osamu, Ranpo Edogawa, Yosano Akiko x gn!Reader

♡ synopsis: How do these characters react when their S/O is a compulsive liar?

♡ cw: Reader is a compulsive liar (you probably already figured, but I figure it's best to put the warning just in case), they are aware of this and they feel bad about it, Fyodor (and Mykola lowkey) is toxic as hell, like he's real bad (manipulative and abusive), misunderstanding and or ignorance towards the concept of compulsive lying

note: I did a bit of extra studying before writing this just to make sure I wasn't misinformed at all. I'm fully aware that compulsive lying is not a choice and can be very harmful to both the liar and person(s) being lied to. I know that compulsive lying does not indicate that someone is inherently a bad person. I'm not aiming to demean or glorify it! I'm very sorry if I get any details wrong or handle this topic incorrectly (please let me know if I have), apologies for errors, and I hope you enjoy x

Chuuya:

Chuuya is a really genuine and honest person. As such your behaviour takes some getting used to

However he does acknowledge that you don't actually want to lie to him and that it's something you don't know how to control, and he does his best to support you with it

He tries to get Mori's help for you so that the two of you can work towards dampening any potential issues that can arise from your behaviour (it probably doesn't work because Mori, but Chuuya's doing his best)

There are times when he does get a little frustrated with your lies and when you deny him calling you out but he's working on it

Chuuya constantly reminds you that there's no need for you to lie about yourself for him to love you and that you have value regardless of how you see yourself

Knows that it's not a personal thing, but lowkey has a hard time admitting that at first because he doesn't really get it initially

Wouldn't tell other people you're a compulsive liar but he would defend you if you get in trouble for lying to somebody

I'll be honest this would really put a strain on your guys' relationship, but if you're willing to put effort into it then you could definitely make it work

Fyodor:

Fyodor can see through basically all of your lies, and because he's messed up he really might see it as kind of a game.

He understands that you don't control it but he kinda feels like each time you tell him a lie (insignificant or harmless as it may be) you're challenging him in a way.

He gets some sick entertainment out of exposing your lies and watching you double down on them

Always asks you if you're lying to him whether or not he knows you are. In his head he wants to reinforce that lying is a sin and he does that by making you feel bad about them

To be totally honest the fact that you lie to him about things doesn't actually bother him much, he's just mean and sees it as a good way to control you

He might be less of a sadist if you initially admit to him that you're a compulsive liar instead of him finding out on his own because then he knows how it is from the get go

Will utilise your compulsive lying somehow for the DOA's benefit (and also tell the other members about it :/)

Fyodor knows full well that it's most likely an indicator of trauma or a symptom for something worse, but there's no better way than to build someone into your perfect S/O like breaking them down first!

Mykola:

He knows and he honestly doesn't really care.

Mykola is just not really that concerned about it. He knows that you do love him, and to him that's all that matters

Though he knows he won't receive always honest answers he still likes asking you questions (about your day or yourself or whatever) and is just happy to hear you talk whether or not it's true

Unfortunately though he doesn't really believe anything you say unless you can provide some kind of proof

Even though he does sometimes like to poke fun at you (things like catching you in your lies so you don't have a choice but to admit the truth), he really hates when other people do the same and will actively defend you

He likes to 'study' you in a sense, and hypothesise reasons as to why you're a compulsive liar. Sometimes he can cross the line when asking you about it

Kind of an enabler, not gonna lie. He wants you to tell him the truth, but he doesn't really care what you say to other people

In fact, he might actually play along with your lies in public to maintain your image (and for amusement probably)

Dazai:

So Dazai already knew this before you got together. He can tell when you're lying, believable as you may seem to other people

He himself doesn't lie but is also very good at evading questions and secret keeping, which are habits he picked up from his time as a mafioso. He understands you in that way and feels for you because you're generally pretty misunderstood by others too

As such he's rather defensive of you. He would hate for someone to make you feel bad about your behaviour because he knows you feel bad enough about it as it is

He takes notice of certain things that you have a tendency to lie about so that he can learn more about you and help you heal

Dazai generally tries to talk about things with you and communicate with you in a way that doesn't really invite any opportunities to lie, if that makes sense

If you lie to him, he doesn't really bring it up unless he's worried that it could cause trouble for you in the future

If you lie to other Agency members about something he might approach them later and explain that it was a lie and also explain why you said it

He might to help by bringing up contradictions in your lies and asking you to explain them (not as a 'gotcha' but more as a way to understand what you're trying to do)

Ranpo:

Back when you and Ranpo first met, he used to be a little bit insensitive about it (unintentionally!)

But after learning more about compulsive lying he kind of started to feel bad for you in a way? So he started going a lot easier on you

He always, always knows when you're lying because he's able to discern the truth with no effort. So, whether or not you lie to him it doesn't make much difference. He knows it's not intended to be malicious or personal

Ranpo can get frustrated with it though, because he's lazy and can't be bothered to figure you out sometimes

When in public he does most of the talking for you because if you do lie to someone and you're found out he doesn't want you getting in trouble (this is especially the case during investigations and stuff)

He actually kind of helps you in a way to lie less because you know that he knows the truth regardless so there's not much point in lying? Of course it's still a habit but you do find yourself lying less

Eventually he does enlist Yosano's help to try and see if there's anything she can actually do to help you too

Even if it turns out that she can't or something like that, he'd still be there to help you and he'd still love you

Yosano:

She's determined to help you with this condition, but she understands that it's not something you can control

Yosano is honestly probably the best one out of everyone here who you could talk to about it because she'd actually put a ton of effort into helping you stop lying (besides Chuuya lol)

She herself can usually tell when you're lying but unlike Ranpo she can't tell what exactly the lie is, if that makes sense?

She's very nice about it and never takes your behaviour personally. Yosano is very gentle when she encourages you to be honest with her, and doesn't force you to admit things if you feel you can't

That being said she doesn't enable your behaviour, and will sometimes end a conversation with you if she knows you'll keep lying after she brings it up

It's possible that as a doctor she may receive some raised eyebrows for deciding to date someone who is a compulsive liar, but she really doesn't care. Something like that isn't gonna deter Yosano from loving you

She may suggest couple's therapy in order to help the two of you communicate better (whether or not you decide to go is up to you)

Overall she's pretty good at handling your behaviour and not making you feel bad about yourself because of it :)

got the vibrant colour tachihara mayoi yesterday ˚‧º·( 。ᗒ ᴗ ◕✿) also...do we really expect many of these characters to correctly deal with behaviour as a result of psychological issues?

[istherewifiinhell]

IS FLYING GENDERED?

On the masculine default, typifying gender in genre, and women as the other in the transformers cartoons.

question for the ages

once again i said back in the halcyon days of watching g1 (aka 5 months ago) i was like. Nooooo, decepticon is NOT a gender that's Silly. It's funny, but as a Read Of The Text, I thought it largely unneeded. (The concept came about, as a joke, involving dismissing the bad guys using the same language you would abt women (sexistly) that they're emotional [heh, flighty], vain, and shrill) after all. If in the 80s era there are 5 whole named/speaking woman tfs, its only ever gonna get better from here right? (<- booboo the fool)

anyway

Let's consider the axiom that the assumed default gender is male, that maleness is often seen as LACK of gender, and femaleness and gender variance are the PRESENCE of gender. In certain reasoning and worldviews, of course (See Androcentrism). Then add that, for transformers, the assumed default thing a transformer turns into, is car. (Autocentrism, if you will)

(The most general term for what a tf turns into is "Alt mode" as some of them are not vehicles at all. The other mode is "Robot Mode", whether its humanoid or not)

So I will be laying out why I believe the cartoon iterations support: non standard alt modes = non standard genders. This is in spite of the fact that FIRST lady tfs were all cars. Sleek cyber cars, but still. For whatever reason, (possibly, the reason for everything in tf, toys) they might as well not exist for how woman tf characters presence in the cartoons progressed over time.

And, to be clear, this is a reading of how these works of fiction are created, not a new unified bioessentialism but for robots aliens I'm proposing for like. In universe lore reasons. I hate that idea.

That said, alt modes in order of most to least gender: Spider, motorcycle, flying (in general, with rotors, jets), tank, and then FINALLY, car. (water and space crafts are already too marginal to rank, but they too can be assumed in relation to default maleness, AND that in making one a woman, would still qualify as othering her).

The NUMBER one reason for this is the bizarre need to have an ESTABLISHED woman tf character before making new ones. AS YOU MIGHT IMAGINE. With a g1 gender ratio something like.... (counting even the most marginal cases for the ladies) 9:120? (That's a rough count from a quick scanning of the tf wiki g1 char list) Shits dire out here.

The second is, ofc, character design based. cis people [stand in phrase for the hegemonic world view] are not okay, and their opinions about how tf gender must need be depicted visually is. uh? Im not a fan. Size and shape dimorphism in general is a given, and specifically having women tfs as far more humanoid and curvy in specific. Also general cartoon lady face syndrome but, whatever. I think there's exactly one character here who doesn't have "lips" or "lipstick" as a distinguishing factor. I'm so tired.

Third is generally, the idea of The Girl Of the Team. When there's The Girl, she often isn't JUST a normal character, who happens to be a girl. See, of course, the Smurtfette Principle. But in my view there's also a trend to give The Girl "special traits" on top of "Girl", maybe even to directly combat the idea that the Girl Character has no other traits? To stop this from being a General Primer on Woman in Media, my explanatory focus is things specific to the tf franchise.

(A phrase I use for thinking about normative modes [in general, not just the Alt ones] in within the tf universe is "unique transformerdom" or, even more clunkily, "A transformer of unique transformerdom". The excessive verbosity is amusing to me personally. All I mean by it is to have an umbrella term for any of the ways tfs can be made unique from their peers in the non allegorical realities of the fiction).

I could, and do, and greatly want to, speak about this AT LENGTH. But it keeps spiraling away from me. So I'll say for now were looking at ways a character is being depicted different from her peers, not because she is the only woman (which she likely is), but cause she's a different kind of transformer, AND if she's othered for it.

(IN SOME forms of the lore. Being a transformer woman, IS A UNIQUE KIND of transformer unto itself. Let's just say I hate it and move on)

Fourth, is the gender of villainy. There is much to be said about gender presentation of villains, the ways they are allowed to be aberrant. We will get to it. There is also all the tropes specific TO evil women, and the modes of villainy open TO female characters. But a general thing I think impacting the gender ratios of the factions is the how "Good" and "Evil" female characters are written. I'll generalize and call this the "Damsel vs Temptress" dichotomy. (See concepts like the Madonna-whore complex). Transformers, is by and large, an action franchise. Unless special reasons are made, characters who can impact the action– have more screen time, and likely more memorable, and iconic presences. A villainous woman can be unchaste, violent, aggressive. While a heroic woman, even if not a literal damsel are more likely to be in a support role. The secretaries of the action genre: medics and techs.

(Another factor is that tfs are giant robots, and the good guys are often friends with tiny squishy little humans. These make very good damsel fodder, and can be taking up the spots on the roster that might, in a different franchise, go to women. Additionally, while woman characters in transformers overall is an interesting topic. When I say tf women, I'm referring to ones that are in fictionally, transformers.)

SO, now understanding our points of attack/obstacles for getting woman into transformers. (Getting established, gendering the designed, uniqueness of existence, and general villainy). Lets go over those alt modes, and the characters that have em, in more detail.

Spiders

The "Beast Era" (1996) intro-ed the spider ofc. And what don't we have with this one. She's a villain, but shes also misunderstood, the era and design style let to these more organic shapes. And they used them to make sure she was very sexy. She's genre aware, she's quippy, she's an absolute icon. So naturally. She gets ported to other later shows. Which means we just have sexy spider ladies running around when everyone else is a fucking truck and shit.

Her own origin is, well think of her as a "Bride of Frankenstein" to the resident evil scientist, also a spider. She was designed for, and manipulated by him in multiple ways. Her protoform (A blank robot base), was supposed to be one of the good guys (a Maximal), but was reprogrammed into a bad guy (Predacon). Even then, she eventually joins them, for her own reasons. She's not even the first predacon to do so, the difference? Well the characters are a lot more NORMAL about his autonomy. Both of these characters stress that being a predacon is an identity they still see as important. But only the woman is told that really, she is was was always MEANT to be a maximal. And while that's true in a sense. There's also a plot were she's forced (by plot contrivance, not the other maximals) to get corrective robot surgery for it. And when they think she died from, everyone's more sad for her boyfriend than for her. Ouch.

The second spider, in the 2007 show, is now one in a world where she is the only "techno-organic" transformer, hence, she is spider, everyone else is a vehicle. Similar to the first, her narrative is very gendered, but less in the way were, like, I do literally think the first was was experiencing in universe sexism from other characters. Here, they really focus on the "techno vs organic" narrative, and the tragic circumstances on how that happened. In this case its just real world sexist writing.

THIRD SPIDER, (2010), instead of misunderstood and tragic evil, this ones just super mega likes to cause pain evil. She also occupies a strange place between the typic vehicular tfs, and the insecticons. This is because she has a helicopter alt mode, and her robot mode is just, a lady with spider characteristics. And, more than just a passing bug like similarity, she has the power to control the insecticons (you know, cause evil woman mind control). However, she doesn't fit in with them either, as the insecticons are at the most insect like they've ever been, in look, living in hives and that most don't even speak.

They may vary in exact character, relationship to the story's moral conflict, and design. But they stay comfortably established, dimorphised, flirty and flirting with villainy. And bonus points, always, for black widow spider trope.

SO. SPIDERS. Established: ✅️ Gendered designs: ✅️ (Extremely!) Unique: ✅️ Othered: ✅️ Villainy: ✅️

Motorcycles

Tooooo my knowledge the first bike lady was in 2004, and fairly minor, in the actual plot, but rest assured, they did go the previously established woman route, by being pink, though, which one shes named after varies by language. But neither were previously motorcycles. (And yes, there is also this problem of mixing together or swapping out one woman tf for another. As if we have the ladies to spare). Even though motorcycle men also exist, this one just stuck for a bit. Maybe something to do with Those Movies. I think the Gendered Existence of a motorcycle is pretty evident though, general sex appeal, being smaller, the mode of riding a motorcycle is different, more physical and intimate. Mainly this ranks so high for the level of grossness they can pack in. Just how objectifying it can be, particularly with two instances where the human rider is an annoying teen boy. Naturally, I've also never seen a male and female motorcycle in the same room, but the approach to design tends to be different. And yeah most of em are Arcee, who's first alt mode was cyber car, but it's not just her.

Established: ✅️ Gendered designs: ✅️ Unique: ✅️ Othered: Depends on iteration, I do NOT like the way one gets called "tough, for a two wheeler". Villainy: ❌(they wouldn't need to be motorcycles if they weren't making them the Special Girl Autobot, after all)

Flying

General: It just tends to stick out when your one girl is only flyer in the group, even she's otherwise tactfully done. Only flyer of the Maximals, a falcon, only flyer of the dinobots, a Pteranodon.

Rotors

I can barely even figure this one. Maybe it's just a general, aesthetics and use case of the actually vehicles, the associations? None of these ladies (and special case) are very connected otherwise. As previously mentioned, the spider helicopter. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A big one for this is the preschool demo shows, which are rescue team focused. In the first one the only woman on the human response worker team pairs with the helicopter, they mention she does medical at times. The helicopter is male, like the other tfs. But also he's afraid of flying, and while not the first case of a flyer with a fear of heights, their personalities are, pretty different. As he's both fearful AND effeminate, fine as character traits go but, with the tone of humour used, marks him as Other.

In the second, Whirl (pointing to icon) becomes a girl for the first time, now with standard humanized face. I assume as move to keep with the previous show of having a girl one, as there's no human team mates. She's also the only one who really likes rescue school. Aaaand that's all know of her. What more do you want from me.

Helicopters: Unique: ✅️ Othered: ✅️ (milder than some)

But why'd I call this section rotors instead of helicopters? That would be because one of the latest Sole Female TF we just put in everything™ is a VTOL jet with rotors. She'll tend to be the only jet of her type, which is also smaller than the type of jet used for the villains.

And, of course, aside from alt mode, the thing that makes her stand out most in the cartoons? That she's very clearly a comics character. (I find the emphasize that she's "fan created" over done, as it only controlled minor aspects, and irrelevant cause tfs get completely overhauled in new versions all the time). From her design, which is a bit busier than most characters she stars with. And also uses Japanese aesthetic signifiers in ways that I think are a bit misappropriated and untactful. (VERY USamerican comics). Also, when she stars next to a guy, also from comics employing Japanese aesthetic, you can tell its not deployed in the same manner. (E.I she has hair and makeup, he has armor). Either way, her depictions have her either as badass sword lady on mission from god who's constantly getting hit on by an annoying guy. Or have her be from a different planet and has special telepathy.

Do we see how both her gender AND the cultural signifiers are having affects here? That the main woman tf in a series can be a literal alien even among our alien robots, with cultural signifiers they don't have?

Ratings Established: ✅️ (made the comics to cartoon jump) Gendered designs: ✅️ Unique: ✅️ Othered: ✅️ (SO SO EXTREMELY, using methods in fiction and real life)

Jets

I think my association of jets with tf gender is stronger, than some of the above examples, even if there's less reason to it. And why is that? Well, lets get socratic. Here's another question.

Is This All Starscream's Fault?

No. He's not real, he can't do things. But. His legacy as THE main stay transformers character that gets to subvert gender? Yeah. (Sure, the G1 autobots have their own effete, but he's not in every single cartoon they ever made now is he? Plus now that I think about it, he is a FLYING car...)

From the get, he's not a Man's man. He's shrill, he's manipulative and duplicitous, petty and emotional, cowardly and wheedling. He is, of course, the Perfect character. Now naturally, the 80s cartoon was not concerned with your paltry logics. Starscream and his ilk are the jets, but every decepticon can fly. The gun, the cassette player, the camera, the cassettes.

And each to a last, more masculine than he is. Vocally or behaviorally, physically. Every one of them fit the gender expectations more than he does. Even being a small time grunt, is a masculine trait, after all, more so than unchecked ambition. So its not femininity from flying, from jets. But direct relationship, reference, and descendancy from Starscream that makes it. I've yet to see female versions of Jet fire and or the aerialbots, for example.

So what to do when an effeminate male villain was less maltese falcon and more that man has effeminate hips? Well. We had to start getting his ass for being effeminate, explicitly. They made the female clone of him, which yeah, is an offensive joke stemming from the various The Gender Anxieties. (Transmisogyny, homophobia and sexism. General relation toxic masculinity. A heady mix of all and more).

But I mean. It's free girl tf... Once given a name in extra canon materials, she start's showing up in other things. Once you're in books, video games, comics, and most importantly, toys, you're real. And then eventually, her first non clone appearance in a cartoon, and how her presence shaped it.

That being, Cyberverse. Which is a cgi show, you need to know this for reasons of production. Making new models is expensive. This has always been the reason you just make recolours of Starscream and name them different things. Chicken or egg on this one, I don't know, But because CV has Slipstream, and the only difference between her and the generic "male" decepticon jet, is a more feminine face; Suddenly, any random decepticon goon can be a woman.

An absolutely revolutionary take for striving to populate a fictional world with gender parity. By at large it also means they're way more lady villains, and specifically flying model of villain. The show has other woman, but none who get the same androgynous body mold treatment.

Established: ✅️ Gendered designs: Mildly to NO. Unique: By design, no. Othered: Yes for the clone, and Screamer himself, I suppose. No, otherwise. Villainy: ✅️(That's, the whole idea)

Tanks

It needs to be said. Sometimes, when doing things that transgress a norm, anteing up is less subversive. This is another reason why gender variance, female agency and overt sexuality are more common traits of villains. When already defying strictures of society. What's one more.

That's Right. TANKS ARE THE BUTCH WOMAN OF TRANSFORMERS.

Alright. Let me back up. Strika is the stone cold knock out undefeated champ of lady tf designs that, actually has a reoccurring cartoon presence. She is, admittedly, only a reoccurring to minor character.

Her introduction is in another show with techno-organics, this one involved in the struggle between well, the techno and the organic. Strika as we see her, and as the design that will go on to be iterated, is not in her normal transformer body. She has been transferred into a 'vehicon' body. Without a preexisting essence contained in one, vehicons are not considered alive, in the way a transformer is. Visually, they lack the more human body plan, a standard face, feet and hand like appendages.

To further contrast Strika against the two techno-organic woman. Both of them are tall, and slender. Their softer organic shapes designed towards elegance or beauty, whatever your subjective opinion of that result might be. They both have romance subplots too. By the way. Or honestly one subplot and one main plot. Strika. In contrast. Is built like a brick shit house. Her face is. Minimal. And her goal: protecting her planet... by terminating the heroes.

Now, existing as a character that can be referenced for other media, and given the detail that she was a "Famous general", it's off to the races. She makes a wonderful big tank menace that can fill out a background shot, too.

Without her I hardly think we could have Clobber, also from CV. Who is. The true goat. The finest thing, the achievements of all we could ever hope for. A big fuck off woman, gender swapped from a previous male design with minimal faff, with now even more personality and show presence. Friends, wants, desires. Emotions. Thank God for Clobber, Thank Clobber for Clobber. Thank Randolph Heard and Mae Catt for Clobber.

Established: Depends if you want to count that Strika had so much swag they kept drawing/modeling her Gendered designs: FUCK NO Unique: ✅️ Othered: only originally Villainy: ✅️

Cars

So now you have the final piece of the puzzle. In transformers, Autobots are Cars. Yes, there are plenty of autobots that are NOT cars, and there are cars that are not Autobots. But they're exceptions, they're aberrances. They're unique. And Autobots are the norm. They oppose the Decepticons. Decepticons are Villains. And Decepticons can fly. Modal simplified binaries and false dichotomy abound!

And the thing about those original Autobot woman, the one's who largely did not influence all of this? They were cars, it's true, but not like how the men where cars. They've not been designed from transforming car toys, with a shellac of humanoid gender over top. Their designed in the way of human gender. With the car on top.

When the preexisting clause leads to the original designs to be revisited, which, has largely only happened in more recent years. They aren't car woman robots. The cars are literally not part of their bodies, they are additional. Instead of a unifying identity of a robot who is a car, its Arcee and her backpack. Parts of cars get grafted onto their petite lady bodies, and placed anywhere out of the way.

In order to make a transformer a woman, they have to give her a gender, not understanding that that's always been the case. And to give her a woman's gender, she's got to LOOK like a woman, not a transformer. And to look like a woman, she's got to act like a woman. She must be heroic but reactive instead of active, or else, villainous, conniving and or self centered. To be a woman, we must have some other previous woman to explain her presence, or else explain it anew with her unique, strange, or exotic origin. How could she ever be a woman if she simply, existed, looked average, talked average. How could she be a woman if her body is hunks of ungendered car. How can she be a woman if she's everything we expect a transformer to be.

A woman is transgressive, a woman is not normal. Autobots are normal. Autobots are heros. Autobots are men. And Autobots do not fly.

[wildissylupus]

Name; Jiayi Ying-Yue

"Name: Maia Larue"

Callsign: Nebula

Age: 41

Faction: Lucheng Interstellar (Mars Colony)

Role: Astronaut

Alignment: Neutral

(Carries out Lucheng's dirty work :〕 )

– Ingame –

Speed: 6.2 m/s

Gravity: Low Gravity

Health: 200

Armor: 25

Total: 250

Primary Fire: Plasma Gun

Damage: 25 per shot

Ammunition Capacity: 60

Attack Time: 0.3s

Abitity 1: "Golden Opportunity": Jiayi is able to have teammates temporarily have increased jumping via low gravity for a short duration in a small box

Abitity 2: "Vortex": Throw out a small projective that pulls the enemy slightly when nearby (4/4) (close range pull in)

Abitity 3 (Switch): Be able to switch between healing in Golden Opportunity to heal (ammo/skill one) or have increased jumping (skill 1) (0.1 cooldown)

— Ultimate Abitity: "Gravity Disrupt": As soon as the Ultimate is active, she is able to fly into the air, (holding in place but able to move to some degree) and available to place down a small-medium "TIME" device that can disrupt the surrounding area (15 radius) (Placeable) (Hackable) [ slows down enemies, projectives and abitity by 0.04 seconds ] (circle of area)

Passive Ability: "Floatation Device": Due to Jiayi's condition, her footsteps are quieter and she's able to glide/float way better than others. But she makes a obvious noise while she hovers. (+light low gravity)

Let me know your opinions i would love to hear them! And critiques :)

Yes!! Love this!!

Though personally I'm hoping she's a cleansing hero cause one, Kiriko can get nerfed and people can stop complaining about that, two, with all the status effects in the game we need another cleansing hero, and three, in general tank and support need more cross over with the characters abilities in game. Especially tank as they get hard countered most often and having a similar skill set in another character add someone that players would be willing to play.

A little critique though is that I would have her abilities be more repair focused, not just for the support theme, but because she would have been living on Mars. Maintenance and repair would have been a big thing she would have needed to do, not only that but her current concept design looks like she was specifically there for either maintenance, analysis or both.

Otherwise I love the gravity theme and I hope her being an astronaut is featured in her kit. Also love the addition of "Carries out Lucheng's dirty work", like I've said before, I really hope she's a villain. We need more villain supports and Lucheng Interstellar is being set up to be antagonistic, it would be stupid not to make her a villain. Maybe even make her a foil to Symm in the fact that when her loyalty started to waiver she doubled down instead of searching for answers and other perspectives.

[tokusaatsus]

HI HI HI HI SUNNY may i have the honor of being your first request... may I request accidentally proposing to nazuna... (haha im totally sane about him) i was thinking that this could be a drabble or smau but whatever you wanna write more!! i have this concept in my drafts but it won't get written in 1000 years and i wanna see it happen so haha... whenever someone's requests are open i will plop one of my drafts with nazuna and see what happens

OKAY BUT HAVE FUN WITH THIS (if you wanna do this) (also feel free to add any other characters you wanna write w this prompt) (idk it's a fun prompt) (at least imo) anyways ty <333

☆—NITO NAZUNA

“Senpaiiii~” The distinctly whining tone of one Tenma Mitsuru only serves to worsen your headache. Ugh. “Are you done yet?”

“Not yet,” You say. “A little longer.”

“But you said that ages ago!”

Forcibly swallowing down some choice words, you close your eyes briefly and immediately regret it as your vision swims. You blink back dark spots. The alarm clock reads 18:09. Last you checked it was 09:12. Fuck. You’ve been awake for longer than you thought…

Your fingers stall on the keyboard of your laptop and you force yourself not to scream. God, you want to sleep so bad, but your assignments won’t write themselves, especially when your deadlines are drawing near. You're hoping to be able to finish all your work before the next UNDEAD concert. You did promise to go support your cute little kouhais…

You rub your eyes. The spots don’t recede. You rub harder.

“Hey.” Lithe fingers wrap around your wrist and tug your hands away from your face. You blink as your view of your screen is obscured by the red-eyed gaze of your worried boyfriend (and wow, doesn’t that make your heart skip a beat? Even after so many years of dating and you’re still like a blushing kid whenever he smiles at you…).

“Hn…Nazu?”

Nazuna frowns at you. “When was the last time you slept?”

“I…” You avoid his gaze. A sheepish Tomoya and a placid Hajime smile at you out of the corner of your vision and oh. Using your beautiful boyfriend against you? That’s brutal, you think approvingly. You’ve taught them well.

Though you wish they wouldn’t use your scheming tactics against you.

“...”

Your silence is enough of an answer for him, it seems, because his frown deepens and he sighs.“Never mind,” He carefully arranges the sheets of paper scattered across your desk into some semblance of order, piling them neatly to the side. “Here~ I bought you some tea and snacks.” He places a can of cool green tea, and a box of omurice in front of you, chattering as he works. “Shiina-san was really nice about it, he even gave me a discount…you really should take better care of yourself…”

“Oh, you didn’t have to…”

“I know.” Nazuna flashes you a bright smile. “But I wanted to. What kind of boyfriend would I be if I let the love of my life work themselves to death~?”

If you weren’t so sleep deprived, the casual way in which he refers to you would have made your cheeks heat up as red as a blushing schoolgirl. But your higher brain functions have effectively shut down, and you don’t really have the energy to blush, let alone think before you speak.

“God, you’re perfect.” You cup your hands around the can, and the coolness against your flushed skin is so relaxing. “Mm…just marry me already…”

“HUH!?!”

You jump, fumbling to grab the can before it spills all over your hard work, heart pounding all the while. “Wh–?”

“Nii-chan and senpai are getting married!?” Mitsuru screams. And…there go your eardrums.

Tomoya looks shell-shocked, whilst Hajime looks as though his birthday has come early. There’s a dangerous gleam in his eyes that reminds you of Eichi, and you think he’s been spending too much time around the leader of fine.

“No, no,” you attempt to do damage control, looking desperately at your boyfriend all the while, but he’s as unresponsive as Tomoya, who seems to be slowly getting his bearings. Nazuna.exe has stopped working…

“Aren’t you a little too young for marriage though, senpai?”

“No, we’re not…”

“Tsk tsk,” Hajime shakes his head disapprovingly, bulldozing over your protests. You can see the glee in his eyes, and you shudder. “Love is love, Tomoya-kun. If nii-chan and senpai want to get married, then they should get married.”

You despair. Oh, dear God, the rumours. The rumours. If half the dorm hasn’t heard of this already, you’ll eat Hajime’s hat. Mitsuru is loud loud. Rei is going to have a field day with this. That is, if Itsuki doesn’t kill you first for ‘besmirching the honour’ of his former doll… Seriously, you need to clear up this misunderstanding and fast. You have no desire to be stabbed with craft scissors. Ever.

You slam your hands onto the desk. The baby rabbits all jump, startled. Oops. “LISTEN! We are not getting married!”

“Not yet, at weast…”

You glare at Nazuna, who appears to have clocked back in to reality. Really?! The first thing he says, and it’s that? “Not helping.” You say through gritted teeth. Nazuna just smiles calmly at you.

“What, youw don’t want to mawwy me?” His stutter makes itself known, which is how you can tell he’s nervous.

You pause for a second. You’ve never really thought about it, marriage. You always wanted to stay in the present, not fixate on the past or daydream about the future. But…

When you think about it, really think about it… It sounds kind of nice, marriage to Nazuna. You imagine soft voices and soft kisses and soft love. Sharing a meal, sharing a bed, sharing a life. You imagine a large house, a dog and maybe some rabbits, filled with noise. Your baby rabbits dropping in to visit, friends checking in at odd hours. A home filled with warmth and life and love.

You want that. You want that.

You smile back at him, a little nervously. “Of course I do. If it’s with you, then I’ll always want it.”

Nazuna blinks, shocked. “O-oh.” He breathes.

You reach up and snag your fingers around his collar, tugging him closer so you can kiss him. It’s a chaste kiss, swift and feather-light–you do have an audience to be mindful of–but it’s heavy with the promise of together, as long as you’ll have me. He tastes like peach chapstick and iced tea. You pull apart, breathing slowly.

“So…youw weally wanna mawwy me…?”

You don’t really know how to explain the vision of the future that you imagine marrying Nazuna would encompass. To tell him how you feel without sounding like the protagonist of some cheesy shoujo manga.

“There’s no one else.” You say simply.

In silence, the two of you stare at each other. Marriage, huh…?

OMAKE:

“I want to be a part of the wedding!” Mitsuru proclaims, only to be shushed heavily by both Tomoya and Hajime.

“Mitsuru-kun! You ruined the moment!” Tomoya cries. Hajime smiles, a little evilly (and oh, you will be having words with Eichi for how he’s corrupted your little  baby…!), and Mitsuru cowers in fear.

“I’m sorryyyyy…” He wails. Then, seeing the terrible look in Hajime’s eyes, he decides to cut his losses and escape with his life, zooming out the half-open doorway. “Dash dash ☆!”

“Don’t run away, Mitsuru-kun~” Hajime calls after him, giving chase. Tomoya heaves a tired sigh and follows suit, presumably to prevent poor Mitsuru from being dismembered horrifically.

You and Nazuna exchange a single glance before you both burst out laughing.

☆—notes!

WC: 1.1k words

so i took the idea of ‘accidental proposal’ and just…ran with it. sorry if this isn’t what u wanted :sobs: also the characters might be a little ooc bcuz im p new to enstars so my excuse is they’re all older (vague handwavey setting&timeline) and so they’ve all matured a little bit but i tried to keep to as close of their canon personalities as i could remember! still can’t believe my first fic isn’t abt chiaki but nazunyan is p cute too ig LMFAO  hope u liked it lili <3, ty for requesting!!

[sebastian-lerm-scoop]

In advent of how shitty the velma series turned out to be here's my pitch for a hopefully better take on an adult Scooby-Doo show. First thing it would be set a bit further back than the original show. Specifically in the sixties, but a more realistic version of the sixties with plenty of opportunities to demonstrate race and civil rights issues. Now that we have the setting let's go down the list of characters!

•Shaggy: He would be like an actual stoner not just implied. He would smoke weed often and get the munchies from it. Now here's my spin on his character. Shaggy would be a VERY good martial artist. This is obviously in refrence to the UI Shaggy meme, but it goes deeper than that. Shaggy's father would be a WWII vet who after coming home from Japan opened up his own dojo which was a commonplace thing at that time. He would then teach Shaggy some form of martial arts and Shaggy would EXCEL at them. However to not alter Shaggy's character too drastically he would be fearless around people but EXTREMELY scared of ghosts like the good old shaggy we know and love. I also think he would be into comic books and The Beatles.

•Fred: My concept of Fred has him as a really gifted mechanical engineer that comes from a rich family. Why is his family rich you ask? Well his father would be a popular conservative politician with some pretty harmful worldviews. Keep in mind this is the sixties. Fred would be very opposed to his fathers politics and actually be a pretty active civil rights protester much to his father's dismay. Fred's father would want Fred to follow in his footsteps and get into politics, but Fred wants to be an engineer as previously stated. I think Fred would enjoy working on the mystery machine as well given his enjoyment of machinery. Fred I think would like to build Rube Goldberg machines mainly as complex mouse traps or something of the like. His father would hate this of course. Also since this would be an adult show Fred could say fuck.

•Daphne: Daphne would grow up on a farm. Her parents and grandparents and so on would be a long line of farmers. Daphne isn't at all interested in this though. She really enjoys fashion, art, and poetry. Similar to Fred I think she would be an activist as well. That could actually be how they meet. She would also be pretty into history and things of that nature. I feel like that interest would tie well into her enjoyment of different kinds of art. I think she would aspire to be a musician not only to further her love of art and poetry, but to also spread positive messages to as many people as she can. Her family would also be very conservative but in a contrasting way to Fred's parents. While Fred's father would be pretty hateful and deliberately manipulative in nature being a politician and all, I think Daphne's parents would more represent the ignorance and blind fear of those different than them. I feel like Daphne aspiring to be more knowledgeable about the word around her would put her at odds with her family often.

•Velma: Velma would be a pretty shy and often bullied person. I feel like Shaggy would fight off her bullies for her at times. She would have pretty bad social anxiety but would begin to open up around her friends. The main thing I would add to her character would be to make her a closeted lesbian which in the sixties I imagine was excruciating. She would take to books and liturature as a way to cope. Namely mysteries like Sherlock Holmes, Nancy Drew, and the Hardy Boys. To add on to her daily stress her parents would be VERY Christian and while not being as overtly bigoted as some of the other gang's parents they would definitely be judgy to those they deem different. Velma would want to be a private investigator (which she would get the chance at when the gang starts solving mysteries). I imagine her parents would have been supportive of her dream if they didn't want her to be a traditional wife and settle down with a man. "Leave the mysteries to the men :)" ugh I can FEEL the patronizing tone.

•Scooby-Doo: At last we have Scooby. Now the big thing about good ol Scoob is that he's a talking dog. How would I make that work within this setting? Well I would make him a ghost of course! Not just any ghost however he would be a Yokai. I feel like the fact that Scooby is a Yokai would be hidden to Shaggy and maybe even Scoob himself. I could see this being an end of season reveal. I think the kind of Yokai that fits the best is one known as the Inugami. Inugami are said to be essentially familiars for a person or family heres an excerpt from Yokai.com "Inugami serve their masters loyally, performing tasks just like a faithful dog. They are loyal to one person or one family only, and unless seriously mistreated they remain loyal forever; these spirits can be passed down from generation to generation like an heirloom." Now doesn't that sound familiar? (Pun intended). Now I imagine Shaggy's father could potentially have married or remarried a Japanese woman and this woman would have the Yokai Scooby-Doo protecting her family. Now Scooby loyally protects Shaggy. Sticking with him through thick and thin! What a good boy.

Well theres my weird and wacky ideas for a (maybe) better adult Scooby-Doo show. Let me know what you think or if you have something to add. It is a bit goofy but hey so is Scooby-Doo! See ya.

[formulaorange]

Spring 2023 Anime Review

Sorry this is late - I was in Japan for a month and a half

Oshi No Ko The series that easily stole the #1 spot this season. It really stands out, I've never seen a story like this one and it really hits hard. The episodes feel real and definitely show a side of the film/idol industry that a lot of people brush over. It's such a great concept and I'm thoroughly looking forward to future seasons. 10/10 - Masterpiece

Demon Slayer - Season 3 I really can't stress how next level Ufotable's animations are and you really get to see it in this season. The story itself is also picking up the pace with my guess of 2 more seasons before the series is completed, it's such a great feeling to really experience the series moving forward and being able to get to know more of the key characters introduced in season 1. A really killer season packed into a reasonable amount of time and episodes. 9.5/10 - Amazing

Hell's Paradise I can't put my finger on exactly what it is, but this really didn't hit as hard as I thought it would. The manga was impeccable and I guess the anime just didn't live up to it. I also felt that some of the animations were lackluster, which is surprising for MAPPA. Maybe they're really starting to feel the weight of having to work on so many titles. I'm hoping the next season feels better, the second half of the series is really where it picks up and is what makes everything worth it. 7.5/10 - Good+

Mashle Honestly one of the best comedy series I've seen in a while, I kept thinking maybe it wouldn't hit as hard the next episode but it always did. Excellent Harry Potter memeage and overall comedy. 8/10 - Very Good Dr. Stone S3 This took me a second to get back into but once I started watching, I really got into it, it's honestly such a good series. I feel like we're really headed toward the main story now and things are picking up the pace. Was a solid season for the story. 8/10 - Very Good My Love Story with Yamada-kun at Lv999 I loved this series so much. It was a bit of a slowburn but so very wholesome. I think it reminded me a bit of a younger wotakoi if that makes sense. just realistic and cute, the last episode is 100% a killer payoff, very much like jdramas where it's not over the top and you're stoked about the tiniest thing. definitely a couple i support all the way. 8/10 - Very Good Heavenly Delusion This season did such a 180 for me. I loved the initial concept of post-apocalyptic survival vs the captive kids but man did it get uncomfortable fast. There were just way too many naked kids and borderline harassment scenarios that I felt super icky watching the show. It could've gone such a different direction without all that stuff and be amazing.. End of the day the series was novel and that stuff wasn't the whole show. 7/10 - Good Gundam: Witch from Mercury Season 2 - Part 2 I was a huge fan of the first season, the story was solid, the characters were great and in general it was just a really good season. I had a much harder time with this season, it felt way more political and felt a little more rushed than i'd like. 6.5/10 - Fine+ With the new season coming out this weekend I'll post this and add to it when I complete the following 2 shows: The Dangers in My Heart Skip to Loafer

[ashleywool]

Hi, I saw the show on February 4th and it was so amazing!! You were so fantastic as Jessica; I related to that character a lot and even wore an outfit inspired by her/ Caroline to work the next day lol. I also really appreciated how you stayed at the stage door for so long talking to people - fully expected you to leave before you made it the whole way down the line (which I would have supported as it was very loud and very crowded/ overwhelming. I almost left twice). Anyway, I was wondering if you have any thoughts about being recognized just in daily life because of htdio. Obviously being on broadway puts you in the public eye a little bit but not to the level of a tv show or movie. Would it be weird if someone came up to you and said they loved the show, or would you be excited? (Largely asking this because I’m 95% sure I saw Amelia Fei in a coffee shop yesterday and I wanted to say something but instead I just stood there, frozen, actively listening to the songs from the show.) I might ask some other people from the cast this too so if you see they’ve replied and don’t want to answer, that’s cool. Thanks for reading my long rambling message and hope you’re feeling better after the surgery you posted about!

First of all, your username is excellent. Fact.

As to your question about how I feel about being recognized: it's a good and reasonable question in and of itself, but knowing it was asked of one autistic person to another adds all kinds of intriguing nuances. And if there's one thing I love about Tumblr (and one thing that I wish people on not-Tumblr would do more often), it's how invested people get in all the intriguing nuances. So...here goes something.

I should probably preface this by saying that I'm still in the relatively early stages of being known on this level for this thing, and I'm still working through what it all means for me in both my professional life and my personal life. In many ways it feels like I'm relearning how to be a human with a whole new set of social rules or expectations or limitations that did not exist for me before--and, in a perfect world, would not exist. On top of that, the cultural concept of "fame," and the social rules surrounding it, is evolving rapidly. So whatever I say, feel, or believe right now may not necessarily reflect where I stand a year from now.

But back to your question.

Would it be weird if someone came up to you and said they loved the show, or would you be excited?

First of all, I can guarantee with 100% certainty that absolutely no one, no matter how famous they are, will ever get tired of people saying "I love your work." You might think it's tired and cliched and doesn't really mean much to them because they've heard it before and you're just another voice in the chorus.

But the thing is--we know you're not just another voice in the chorus. You're you. The story of how you became familiar with my work, and how and why it resonated with you, is completely unique to you. Your life. Your memories. Your relationships. Your pain. Your joy. We might have drastically different upbringings, cultural backgrounds, life and work experiences, political views, religious views, whatever...and yet, something in the work I did transcended all of that and connected with you.

In a world that expects us to be constantly and aggressively polarized and divided over all sorts of things, what could possibly be more important than that?

If my very soul doesn't joyfully blaze like a bonfire of gratitude at every single voice that tells me they love my work...then what's the point of the work? What's the point of anything?

THAT BEING SAID...

Yeah, sometimes getting recognized can be a little jarring. While I luckily haven't had any outright negative experiences with being recognized (yet), anticipating the possibility of being recognized certain places has raised several etiquette considerations that I simply never had to think about before.

For instance, when I waited outside the Barrymore for two hours one frozen morning to get rush tickets for the last Thursday matinee of Harmony, a few people on that line recognized me from Ohio. They were very nice, and not at all intrusive, but I remember thinking, I hope nobody recognizes me in the audience at the actual show. I didn't want my presence to distract anyone from their experience with a show I was not working on. Especially a new musical that had opened while we were in tech, we had signed each other's opening night cards, and now we were closing within a week of each other.

My concern about being recognized in that space was not rooted in "I don't want people to talk to me," but rather in "this is their show and I don't want things to be about me right now."

I got a box seat at the matinee, which all but eliminated the possibility of people recognizing me (or even really seeing me), and even if they had, it's not like I'm, you know, a celebrity celebrity. So my concern about being recognized may have been a bit disproportionate to the situation.

But that could change one day. No matter what my humility-cum-imposter-syndrome impulses want me to think, the plausible and pragmatic reality is...that could change. So I might as well start processing all of those things now, when my presence in the public eye is at a significantly-increased-but-still-manageable level.

What sucks, though, is that I haven't been able to find or access very many mental or emotional health resources specifically tailored towards "how to process and cope with a life in the public eye." The few therapists out there specializing in those issues wouldn't take my insurance; they're overbooked with celebrity celebrities.

And that's a bummer. Fame-related mental and emotional health issues are not just relevant for wealthy A-listers, especially in the age of social media. An ordinary person who's not even looking for the attention can post one video and go viral within 24 hours--sometimes for positive reasons, sometimes for negative reasons, but either way, they are overwhelmed, because nothing in their upbringing even thought to prepare them for a situation like that. Whether you're an A-lister, an accidental viral star, or a mildly niche-famous T-list Broadway person, I don't think humans, on a neurological level, were built for fame.

Our natural trajectory of cognitive and emotional development is intended for our families and immediate communities. We are not naturally neurologically equipped to handle attention from "the masses." It's well-documented that we have a more difficult time empathizing with "the masses" than with individual people--psychology calls this the identifiable victim effect.

This effect is not rooted in cruelty or apathy--it's a well-documented neurological survival mechanism that all humans have, and all humans need in order for their empathy to function at all.

But try telling that to anybody on American social media during an election year. Everybody needs you to believe that all of the people on ~the other side~ are numb to human suffering or are refusing to take action on behalf of a group of people because their brains sometimes have to focus on other stuff.

You ever see a celebrity post an innocuous, uncontroversial Instagram picture from their regular degular life, and the comments are like, "don't you realize there's a WAR going on? how can you just SIT there, eating a BURRITO, with your CATS?" Or like, "well, it's obvious you care more about your CATS than about [insert cause/issue/group of people]." Or like, "it's been X amount of time since Y atrocity and you have said NOTHING about it. What's the matter, are you afraid to speak up for [victims of atrocity] because it'll interrupt the aesthetic of your burritos-and-cats feed? Your silence is DEAFENING."

To tie it all back to the original question: no, it's not inherently weird or bad or awkward to be recognized in my current daily life as a T-list Broadway person. So far, it has been a generally positive and harmless experience.

But I'd be lying if I said I didn't worry sometimes about my future ability to just eat a burrito with my cats without someone making an Internet about all the things they think they have the authority to tell me I should be doing instead.

[gatheredfates]

Hello everyone! 🐋 It's Friday here, just before the Live Letter, so I thought I'd whip out a small Compendium update before it gets crazy!

There's not that much this week but, with Dawntrail, so close, I'm not worried — I'm sure I'll be swamped with people coming back very soon. With that in mind, however, as of today (06/14), the following resources have been added to Sea's Community Compendium for XIV Creatives.

MISC

Pride Backlighting Tutorial — Do you want to see your characters awash in the colours of Pride? Maybe you just want some cool backlighting behind them? @whitherwanderer has put together a guide for you!

SEAFLOOR

We're a Tumblr Community now! For people unfamiliar with the concept of Communities, I encourage you to check out the tumblr post by staff made about them here. However, copy/pasting what I have written in the Compendium, the Community functions as so:

SEAFLOOR (A FFXIV Community) is a Tumblr community whose duel-purpose focuses on my projects — the Compendium, question drives and screenshot events — whilst also reblogging member created works, resources (including events, commissions and looking for content/roleplay/free company posts), affirmations and other xiv-related content. If you are interested in supporting my projects without the social aspect of a Discord, I highly encourage you to join the Community. Everything hosted on the Discord will be cross-posted there; you will not miss out on anything. As Communities are still in beta, members need to be manually invited. If you would like to join, please like the tumblr post here. Once Communities are out of beta, I will remove this section to better reflect its true public status.

I'm hoping the Community will function as a member-curated dash, resource hub and visual diary for my projects and member created works. There are no hard feelings if you want to leave the Discord and only join the Community. Please do what makes you comfortable!

Want to submit? You can either fill out the google form here or send me an ask with the relevant information!

Is my space suitable for the Compendium? Most of the time, yes! Below the read more is some more information/stipulations. Again, all the below information is accessible on the document! 🦈

Below are the following things I do not accept on the Compendium:

Personal/Single-Character LFC ads.

Content intended for or can be used for bullying, harassment and OOC gossip. E.g. ‘Secrets’ blogs, receipts, callout posts, etc. This does not include in-character tabloid blogs used to generate RP.

Communities that do not have an RP/writing element (large-scale exempt).

Anything I find personally distasteful or goes against the spirit of this project.

Common-sense rule applies.

FAQ.

I want to put my community on the compendium but we have an application process. Is this okay?

Yes! Just note somewhere in your application that's a requirement. The only thing that is mandatory for the Compendium is that you must be open to new members or have a public-facing/accessible facet. There's no point advertising a community if no one can join it in some way!

I want to put my community on the compendium but I only have x number of members —

Also totally okay! People don't start with large communities. Activity is a must but, whether your server has two or two thousand members, if you're looking for new people to join, I'd love to help you find people.

I want to put my community on the compendium but I worry its too niche?

Okay, and? If your Eorzean Fishing Alliance has four members but you roleplay every second weekend, I still want to know about it.

What resources/communities can I add if I'm not the owner of them?

Mutual consent is extremely important to me, so anything that isn't a large-scale community OR a publicly accessible resource must be endorsed by the owner/admin/moderators in order to be added to the compendium. I operate under the assumption that a resource posted to a public space (tumblr, googledocs, youtube, etc) is open to all. A large-scale community is one with a significant member count or openly advertises itself as being accessible to everyone for whatever purpose it serves. If in doubt, please get in touch with me. I'm happy to contact your community owners for you!

How active does a community need to be?

If you find a community has not been active in about two/three months, send me a message and I'll take a look at it. Communities have ebbs and flows, especially event spaces that may take hiatuses depending on member interest/life events. I'm not strict in my implementation provided a space isn't dead. If a link or anything is broken, absolutely contact me about that.

I have [insert a question not stated here]?

No drama! Send me an ask or use the #Compendium channel in my Discord!

[your-actual-therapist]

tumblr legalese (or, why it's safer to keep an emotional support dark lord around for emergencies)

sometimes i feel like i have to add legal disclaimers to the things i write on the internet, like those "may experience sudden diarrhea or pet death" disclaimers they have at the end of drug ads. mine would read, "not responsible for not anticipating all the ways you'll deliberately misinterpret and fuck up my advice, thus proving me a villain."

i feel this way because people are so good at playing that weird game where they take something you wrote and put it in the worst possible context to make you sound like an irredeemably terrible person.

feel a mote of self-esteem? only narcissists feel that way, and narcissists have abused me, and therefore you're abusing me now.

eat when you're hungry? some people can't eat and have to be tube-fed. your privilege is showing.

self-compassion? what if there's a bear near you? how can someone have self-compassion when they're being attacked by BEARS. priorities. smh.

trans women are beautiful? AM I, A CISGENDER PERSON WITH A SKIN AS THIN AS WET TOILET PAPER, NOT BEAUTIFUL?!?!

and as you can imagine i'm like:

i'm not relating any of this to "cancel culture" or "snowflakeism" or whatever other buzzword fascists are using to characterize actual harm as valid opinion. i think the truth is weirder.

rules, fear, and extremes

the expectations tumblr-adjacent people have for themselves and others are extreme. they are extreme in the sense that they have taken sensible statements like "be aware of others' feelings" or "remember that not everyone shares your experiences" and turned these reasonable views into unrecognizable, rigid, toxically exaggerated rules.

as a therapist, i have noticed that this tends to happen to people who have done a lot of therapy or self-reflection and continue to struggle with uncertainty. the therapist or self-help book says "have boundaries" or "take responsibility" and they're like, "i like this concept, but i don't want to make any judgment calls about it. my judgment could be wrong. being wrong would be catastrophic. i need solid, unambiguous rules for every situation."

so they morph that advice into something ridiculous. "have boundaries" becomes "have indiscriminately rigid boundaries," and "take responsibility" becomes "take responsibility for everything that results from your behavior, even stuff that you couldn't have anticipated." the only 100% safe situation, if you're not okay making mistakes and being wrong, is one where the rules are inflexible and taken to their logical extreme.

want to write a fanfic featuring a romantic relationship between two characters who are teenagers? you're an evil pedophile.

you think some foods have different nutritional properties than other foods and that people need more than just cheez-its and coffee for their bodies to work? obviously you're a diet fiend and encouraging anorexia.

you're neurodivergent and you're not always 100% jazzed about the challenges your neurodivergence brings to your life? ableist.

cosmic uncertainty and the allure of safety

these "rules" may sound silly, but they're also safe. without rigid rules, you're forced to take risks. you have to use your brain and assess the situation, and you could be wrong. you may then have to admit to other people that you were wrong and engage with them to learn to do better. you may not ever know whether you made the right call.

on a cosmic level, that gets scary.

because what if you can't ever know whether you're doing the right thing? what if you're going to be uncertain about the important things in your life forever? what if it's not possible to be certain? what if your perceptions and judgments are fallible? what if you're alone in your brain and no one can ever reach in there and be like, "that's what you meant"?

behind every inflexible rule is a deep well of fear. you see it in incel communities, where they've spilled millions of gallons of E-Ink© trying to make sense of their world by explaining sexual success by millimeters of difference in eye position. you see it in dogmatic expressions of religion, which can't allow for human fallibility or subtle shades of gray because if they did, their followers would have to risk being uncertain about something. you see it in those baffling self-help articles that turn self-evident statements like "be mindful of your time and energy" into dramatic extremes like "it's always okay to cancel on people at the last minute 'cause, y'know, self-care!"

enter the villain

so—back to tumblr legalese. my hunch is that it feels satisfying to call someone out based on a rule you believe in, even if that rule is profoundly weird and doesn't take human nuances into account. it's satisfying because it allows you to have a villain.

villains are simple. you don't have to think about whether darth vader or nurse ratched are bad people, and you don't have to waste time untangling your own motives for opposing them. there is no moral ambivalence or cosmic uncertainty. you don't even have to defeat a villain to feel good. it's enough just to know you're fighting the good fight, and that as long as you do that, your life is not meaningless. maybe you haven't defeated the villain, but you know what you have defeated? anxiety.

without a villain, you're left to your own fragile human abilities. what's scarier than pennywise? meaninglessness. uncertainty. being alone in your own brain.

i will leave you with the words of the existential psychotherapist ernest becker, who summed it up in one of my favorite books, the denial of death, much better than my terribly congested, snot-filled self can right now:

Beyond ourselves we sense chaos. We can’t really do much about this unbelievable power, except for one thing: we can endow certain persons with it. The child takes natural awe and terror and focuses them on individual beings, which allows him to find the power and the horror all in one place instead of diffused throughout a chaotic universe. Mirabile! The transference object, being endowed with the transcendent powers of the universe, now has in himself the power to control, order, and combat them.

[silent-partner-412]

I hope in the FE4 remake that they change up the romance system a bit, or at least streamline it in a way that makes it so you have more agency over it. Like, I didn’t know how it worked at all when I played FE4 and ended up with half my units in Gen 2 being substitutes, and the other half getting no good stuff from their parents cuz the pairings I just happened to end up with were bad.

The main changes I would make is to implement a system where two characters won’t become a romantic pair unless you want them to (i.e. Awakening and Fates, who is Chrom I don’t know him), perhaps through a similar system with support conversations? Idk how well that would work for FE4 but just giving the player some more direct control over it would do a lot. Also just some better explanations about the importance of the romance system in this game and maybe some hints about inheritance would help? I’m not exactly sure how to do all this without spoiling the game (I know everybody and their mother has had FE4 spoiled for them anyway but still) but there’s gotta be some way to do it?

I actually love the FE4 romance system conceptually, a lot more than the one in Awakening and Fates. I think it feels a lot more meaningful from a story perspective, and the concept of handing your important items down from parent to child is super compelling to me. Add in the Holy Blood and you have a solid ass game mechanic that gives FE4 a lot of character. It would just be nice to be able to understand and take advantage of it without having to pull up a long Reddit thread that explains how exactly it all works.

[ninjagirlstar5]

Honestly, I am very invested in the protag Teruya AU

Oh, I'm happy to hear that! Even though I'm mostly just sharing the concepts of it, I'm glad this AU is getting attention.

Honestly, I think it'd be interesting how different the events of SDRA2 would've been if Teruya had been the protagonist instead and the kind of domino effect it would have on everything else. Especially since he's explicitly known as a survivor from DRA for those who know the story. Knowing the poor guy gets put into another killing game AND doesn't have his memories on top of that? The poor guy can't catch a break and the SDRA2 canon was not kind to him either. It's a lot different with Sora, I feel, since we wouldn't know who she supposedly is at the start of the story.

To name a few things that would change off the top of my head:

Teruya being an amnesiac means that something had to have happen to him in order to have amnesia. And considering the state of Akane's body in canon that was revealed in Chapter 6, it does not spell good things for Teruya. I'm thinking his body ends up the way it did when a mission went awry, probably from a bomb trap they noticed too little, too late. And to add an extra bit of angst to this, imagine him ending up this way because he tried to protect Rei from it. I'm thinking Kinjo also plays a roll in this, but I don't know what would work better in this scenario: him purposely spreading misinformation to try and manipulate his friends into what he considers the best case scenario, even at the cost of Teruya's well-being or a genuine mistake and a consequence he hadn't anticipate for. Either way, I need to think about the scenario of the mission a bit more. And either way, Kinjo is totally not having trauma flashbacks to Kouhei Sasaki. Totally. (Sarcasm)

Teruya survives, of course, but he's completely stuck in a coma. And with him out of the picture, the Kisaragi Foundation...isn't doing too hot. He's kind of been the glue that kept Rei and Kinjo from fighting each other constantly, and even helped them see each other's point of view as they worked together for a few years. And unfortunately, without him, their little friend group falls apart and the Foundation barely goes a day without those two arguing constantly. Before they knew it, the Kisaragi Foundation ends up splitting, with Kinjo being supported by the Hawks for his strict orders, to use "evil" against evil and willingness to sacrifice for the greater good, and Rei being supported by the Doves for her intelligence, her willingness to try and look for a better option and to protect as many people as possible, even if it means rebelling against the Director's orders itself. And then there's the Neutralists that are either just trying to make sure the Kisaragi Foundation remains intact or trying to keep their heads down and not participate in this at all. Overall, it's just one big mess without Teruya.

Protag!Teruya going through character development as he tries to lead everyone through the Utsuroshima Killing Game. I plan to make him pretty active in trying to prevent people from killing each other, coming up with ideas that may keep things from escalating. Of course, since this is a Danganronpa story, it's never that easy. And with Void around...yeah, good luck, buddy. At least you get to do something in this story since you have to as the protagonist, haha. (No shade to canon!Teruya, I love him. But I can't recall any significant things he did to try and help the group aside from going crazy in Chapter 4 and sacrificing himself for everyone else in Chapter 5&6.)

Of course, Teruya's intelligence from the past game hasn't exactly improve. Like his SDRA2 counterpart, he's still a great merchant but isn't smart outside of his talent. He's not exactly the most useful during trials, which he's ashamed of. But unlike his SDRA2 counterpart, Mikado, as his support, helps him learn how to investigate and make deductions from the clues of the crime scene. And as the story goes along, he's able to figure out the culprit with a bit of help from his friends. He becomes much more independent and competent by the end of the story, which must be quite the shock for Kinjo and Rei who are...not used to that. Teruya will still be Teruya, of course, but with his amnesia and his experience in the Utsuroshima Killing Game, I'd imagine he'd end up quite different to his original self in certain ways.

And then there's the Divine Luck as a plot point...God, I am...SO tempted to talk about that. Especially about Chapter 6 and the Epilogue. But this post has gotten long enough, honestly, so I'm gonna stop here.

This is all I can think of that's related to Protag!Teruya atm. There might be more that I'm missing or things that could end up developing as I write the story. I'm still in the second half of the Prologue as I ended up making this AU while writing another ongoing fanfic so some things may change as I progress. And I haven't done much writing for the AU aside from drawing so that it might be a while before I finish the Prologue. But thank you for the ask! I'm happy to talk about my ideas for the Protag Teruya AU.

The Protag Teruya AU was inspired by @/anotherprofessional’s post! Beware of Void spoilers though!