#i wrote an actual essay under the vid...

[walk1nghe3rt]

Barcelona by Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé

Released in 1987, this masterpiece featuring both Freddie Mercury, the lead singer of the group Queen, and Montserrat Caballé, a famous soprano opera singer, was originally made for the opening of the 1992 Summer Olympics. Caballé was so enthusiasted she decided to make a whole album with Mercury. Himself a big fan of Caballé, accepted with joy; giving birth to the album "Barcelona", in 1988.

(Lyrics undere the cut)

[Intro – Freddie Mercury] Barcelona, Barcelona, ooh, ooh-ooh Barcelona, Barcelona, ooh-ooh

Viva!

[Instrumental Break]

[Interlude: Montserrat Caballé & Choral] Ooooh!

Ooooh-ooooh-ooooh-ooooh Ooooh!

[Verse 1: Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé] [Both] I had this perfect dream Un sueño me envolvi�� This dream was me and you Tal vez estás aquí I want all the world to see Un instinto me guiaba A miracle sensation My guide and inspiration Now my dream is slowly coming true

[Verse 2: Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé] [Both] The wind is a gentle breeze Ooh, él me habló de ti, aah The bells are ringing out El canto vuela They're calling us together Guiding us forever Wish my dream would never go away

[Chorus: Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé] [Both] (Barcelona) It was the first time that we met (Barcelona) How can I forget (Ho-oooh-oooh) The moment that you stepped into the room You took my breath away (Ho-oooh-oooh) (Barcelona) La musica vibró (Barcelona, ooh) Y ella nos unió And if God willing We will meet again someday

[Verse 3: Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé] Let the songs begin Déjalo nacer Let the music play, aaah-aaah-aaah! Make the voices sing Nace un gran amor Start the celebration Ven a mi, and cry, Grita Come alive, vive And shake the foundations from the skies (Aaaah-aaaah-aaaah!) Ah, ah, shaking all our lives (Aaaah!) Aaaaah!

[Chorus: Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé] [Both] (Barcelona) Such a beautiful horizon (Barcelona) Like a jewel in the sun Por ti seré gaviota de tu bella mar, aaaah-aaah-aaah-aaah (Barcelona) Suenan las campanas (Barcelona, ooh) Abre tus puertas al mundo (Aaaah) If God is willing, if God is willing If God is willing (Aaaaaaaah) Friends until the end Viva, (Aaaaaaaah) Ooh-ooh-ooh, aaah-aaah-aaah-aaaaaaah! Barcelona

[Vocalized Outro: Montserrat Caballé] Oooooh-oooooh-oooooh-ooh! Ooh-ooooooooooh!

Lyrics by Genius: Freddie Mercury and Montserrat Caballé – Barcelona Lyrics | Genius Lyrics

[dangerliesbeforeyou]

ok so ive been rewatching psychoville and saw on the wikipedia that there were a bunch of websites made for the series (they were all written by reece and steve btw) which i've been looking through cos they are genuinely SO fucking funny & also just amazingly creative lol!

anyway i know people in the fandom probs already know about this (since the show came out literally 15 years ago pfft) but i thought i'd share some of my fav bits (but honestly would just recommend just checking them out if you haven't i have been crying with laughter for literally hours lol)

i will say that a lot of the media (videos, games, etc) no longer work on the archived sites rip but i'm sure people have uploaded some of the stuff (vids especially) to yt or other places lol

so a) i love that we get some background stuff on jelly and 2) 'captain CRACKERS' bernie clifton's dressing room reference question mark ??????? (ofc bcdr was AFTER this but i know love the idea that mr jelly trained under len pfft)

what that red raw stump do though 👀 (sorry pfffft)

mr jolly's website wasn't that interesting soz tho i did like him comparing being a doctor to being a clown lol

the comment about fag bears did make me wheeze i'm afraid lol i also loved the blurry photos of lomax's commodities lol (kinda reminded me of the bit in tlog w/ that terrible old photographer guy lol)

when i tell you i DIED with laughter at the 'now known as hull' bit like u just know reece wrote that bit pfft

not really a funny thing but this poem written by david honestly kinda breaks my heart lol... i think it also a lot of additional context to david's guilt when he thought he'd killed his father(faver) because perhaps he felt guilty about NOT feeling guilty you get me? like, it felt to me that when maureen told david it was SHE who killed her husband, it didn't feel like he was mad at her for doing it, but more that she kept the fact from him. it's about... the mutual oedipus-coded obsession with one another that couldn't even be destroyed in death and in this essay i will....

ghoul_lass23 is just like me but about tumblr lol fr

nothing feels more cursed than the phrases 'the river minge has burst its banks', 'crying creamy tears' and 'fleshy rapunzel' (which i've just noticed they misspelt lol... don't think that was intentional lol?) so if i had to read this so do you <3

the way that i kinda wish this actually existed tho pfft... also, it does kinda remind me of that video where jenny nicholson talked about that insane reality show 'opposite worlds' lol

'cross between seven and glee' is honestly sending me pfft

also on this part there was a script from stinkfinger (which is a show mentioned on the show) which sounded suspiciously like a reference to tlc lol

the less said about swastknickers the better

(will say i did nearly piss myself laughing at the nazi section of the hoity toity website lol which wasn't a sentence i thought i'd type today lol)

i just love these kinds of jokes pfft

also the whole biography sections of each of the pantomime cast are fab lol tho i AM kinda pissed they made debbie from yeovil and yet didn't give her a west country accent lol!!! (i guess they thought it'd be a bit much w/ joy being bristolian but i'm still mad about it lol)

also i know people have probably already pointed this out but i do find it funny that brian in the in9 episode last night of the proms is a closeted gay guy who likes watching drag was probably a reference to brian in this show that was a drag queen like... is anything these guys do NOT a reference??? u know those gaylor fans who obsessively look for clues in her songs about her apparent secret sexuality? all i'm saying is that i think they'd really like the extended reece shearsmith & steve pemberton universe pfft

all three of these made me cry with laughter lol

ohh this is interesting lol so obviously they suspected that some people might be all 'um why didn't the sprinklers go off during the fire at ravenhill? plot hole much!' so they wrote this into one of the websites so they could be like SEE! WE'RE ONE STEP AHEAD OF YOU DUMBASSES lol

both the jeremy kyle reference (remember when that was a thing? yikes... my mum used to watch his show CONSTANTLY...) and nurse kenshington's thoughts on david and maureen are interesting lol.. also there's a reference to the serial killer top trumps in this bit lol! (do people still play top trumps?? man i LOVED top trumps lol...)

the entire sunnyvale care home section is so fucking funny (both the website AND in the show lol mrs wren/mrs ladybird face is unironically probably my favourite character on the entire show) these were just some of my fav gags lol...

ok but why is this the SECOND reference to a guy punching a child who was apparently looking at his dick lol!??!! did this happen to one of you ??!!?!? reece did you punch a child ??!???!?!??

&&&& that's it lol

there were a few websites i didn't spend long on or generally weren't that interesting (coughmidgetgemscough) but honestly? i was really captivated with just how funny and well put together all these sites were! you can tell they had a lot of fun making it and i'm sure fans at the time LOVED being able to have this semi-interactive element of the show lol

there was just something so wonderfully late 00's about these websites lol i genuinely don't think i've laughed this much at anything in literal months and all of this is just solidifies that psychoville is a criminally under-appreciated masterpiece lol

[ruby-whistler]

Are you normal or do u sometimes go "IVE BEEN SCARED OF SLEEPING WITH THE LIGHTS ON(off? Idk its hard to decipher)"/lyrics -curious anon

me: oh boy, can't wait to try and make a tumblr blog! Before i do i should research it- *what in the hecking heck is an xkit*

djskdjsk i had no idea what an xkit was until yesterday and when i got it i got too confused and uninstalled it - dw curious anon i don’t use it either i just vibe and do whatever i guess. if you tag correctly and make good posts things should work out, can’t wait to see your acc around!

I got some sad-ist merch :DDD!!

yooo!! that’s so pog for you! it’s probably pretty comfy :D

me standing ominously in your askbox waiting to rec my fav fics:

fjsjdjsk i literally just finished passerine i still have 80 more (some of which are like 300k words long) on my to-read but uh if they have c!dream mischaracterized i’ll not be reading them anyways so it’s very hit-or-miss, will probably get through some of them quicker-

After many moons spent under the dsmp, seeing discourse and analysis alike, i have come to the conclusion i simply do not have the energy to care about any lore outside of c!tubbo and c!tommy's and will only defend them. And that is ok. It is ok to not watch or care about all dsmp or want to discourse about them or analyze. Idk man was thinking deep thoughts today

it’s ok to watch entertainment and enjoy it the way you want to! it’s great to want to enjoy or talk about your fav character!

the problems come up when you attack other people for their perspectives on the medium or spread misinformation about different characters based on only watching the perspective you like, but you know - if you’re not doing analysis, you really don’t need to look that deep into it.

it’s ok to just chill. your feelings about characters are valid! :D so yeah i agree with you! let people with different opinions exist if they’re also being respectful (e. g. tagging correctly).

Hey ik u worked with animgician's newest vid and i found a not-crit (i rlly think) little thought on it if u wanna see it

yoo feel free to send it in!!

No one: me: *shuffles around* wanna hear about my cool warden c!tommy au?

may i interest u in a little bit of my writing? If not that is ok i just wanna see if my writing is any good before working on a fic lol

Anyways if i am not in the askbox for a little it is because i am now writing a proper fic thing out. Wish me luck o7 -curious anon (i have three different lyrics i am going to be incorporating and a little analysis and just a smidgen of projection)

Ruby do u wanna read a little something i wrote? *does the little fingers thing* its really short just a headcanon with a little prose

i sure do! that sounds rlly cool - are you sure you don't wanna make a post about that on your own account though? i don't mind seeing it at all but i think the c!tommy tag would be able to appreciate that au better than my followers. you've gotta find the right target audience, y'know? /lh

though of course i'd love to see your writing, i'm sure it's great! looking forward to it :]

Ayo i remembered u talking about how punitive punishment doesn't work the other day so i want to discuss. What would u consider to be a fitting "punishment" for c!dream's canonic killing of mexican dream?/gen

i mean... we're not trying to - being against punitive justice is about the fact punishment is wrong, not just certain types of it. asking me what a "fitting punishment" would be is sort of very not getting the point.

hurting people further is not going to teach them anything and it’s not going to help anyone, why is it necessary?

so the answer is: none. he shouldn’t be punished, actually! he should learn on his own that what he did wasn’t right, and that’s about it. that’s the thing about transformative justice. him becoming a better person who Wouldn’t Do That again because it goes against who he is.

however, there’s also restorative justice, which is working to “make it up” to the victims. to which i propose; dream has the revival book and could literally bring him back once he is out of the prison. give him some powder maybe. md would probably be chill w/ that.

Yknow. In all my time in dsmpblr i can confidently say that the main differnece between c!dream apologist/enthusiants and c!wilbur/sam ones is that the c!wilbur/c!sam ones want their fav to have a breakdown and c!dream ones want theirs to get positive reinforcement /hj /lh

i’m pretty sure the sam and wil ones also want them to get better/get redeemed, at least deep down, but i get what you mean! you’re *glances at the 🟩⛏ gc where all we do 24/7 is write angst about c!dream being terribly hurt and then we cry about it* 100% correct. no angsters who like the pain here *nervously laughs* we all just want him to heal and be happy for the rest of his life with no heart-shattering breakdowns whatsoever! /s /lh

Hope ur having a great day m8 :]] -curious anon (also i have a new canon fact i wanna share. In quackity's alt lore stream yesterday he said (to the best of my memory) that "no law/juridsiction exists on the dream smp to prevent one from building anywhere" so i guess that clears up the big debate on wheather or not c!dream had a right to enforce rules (or basically the arguement that he owned the server by divine rule)

no i’m - i’m pretty sure that’s just how it works. dream still owns the smp, but he himself has said wayy back at the beginning “everyone can build and go wherever they want” and that was that. it was one of his rules on the smp, it was his main problem with l’manberg. being able to build anywhere were the rules that he “had the right” to enforce. and he did, not because he was a god, but because it was his smp, his home that he claimed for his friends. wouldn’t call it a big debate, it’s really that simple.

.AGONY. HURT EVEN. THIS IS HOW IT IS FOR CURIOUS ANON. I LAUGH, I CRY, I FIND AN ANIMATED GIF ON TWITTER THAT SQUEEZES MY C!TOMMY ENJOYER HEART INTO OBLIVION. (i am being dramatic btw for the funnies just so ya know) I AM NOT GOING TO FINANICALLY RECOVER FROM THIS. AAAAAAAAAAA UEEEEEEE

OK THAT FREAKING

O U C H-

also for the old phil ask. Hes a bad dad because of how he treated ghostbur. I will elaborate if u want

didn’t ghostbur just say “i’m not wilbur” and philza said “you’re not my son” and they went on with their day? weren’t they actually in agreement that he wasn’t the same as wil when he was alive? i don’t remember him really treating him badly tbh other than disowning him which seems fair to me, because ghostbur was a literal stranger to phil at that point?

wish you a nice day, curious anon! (i’ll be back on my essays and answering other asks now, so i might not reply right away :])

[animalinvestigator]

HI CHARA im back w another petscop question. a big one bc i dont understand literally the entire vid. lmk if you need me to be more specific but what is going on in petscop by pieces part 23 ??? like. all of it. lichrally whats going on <3 its all v confusing

well thats the sort of resolution of the series is what it is! I’ll go over my take on it but its extremely spoilery because i have to talk about Litrerally Everything! Its not very concrete but this is kind of the thoughts ive gathered about it! under a readmore becaseu tis literally the spoilers for the ending. also long fucking post extremely long post.

In petscop 23, paul and belle have collectively gathered all of the pieces for the “machine beyond school basement” that pink tool mentioned very early on in the series. that machine is what is used in petscop for “rebirthing,” and the end of the video details marvin’s attempt to see paul “rebirthed.”

in order to find the final pieces, paul has to dismantle “boss,” which is the strange triangular structure in the computer room. “boss” in petscop is actually the text taht autofills when someone uses the ingame language to type “lina,” so its likely that this is yet another representation of lina leskowitz. in the room with the final casket, paul discloses his location to marvin -- at this point, paul is located in one of the “ghost rooms” on the walls of this classroom. we dont know how he got there or how long hes been there, but wherever it is, its a physical location that marvin can physically go to, and he does, and something bad happens. notably, as marvin heads towards paul’s location, paul starts typing “da” on the controller, like hes starting to say “dad”. belle tries to warn paul to block a hidden door in the room using nifty, but its presumably too late.

marvin does whatever it is he does and then leaves, leaving paul to beg for help from belle when he can use the controller again. belle gives him the code to unlock the locker in the school, where a pink and purple (belle’s colors) easter egg is stored with a very love-filled note from lina leskowitz to tiara leskowitz. this is belle’s safe place. shes storing very precious things there! remember that!! after that, paul descends to the pit and the rebirthing ritual begins.

in the pit, he disposes of items associated with carrie mark (crayons, which we saw in cares room in the frozen house, a model of the school where she was trapped for 5 months, and a picture of a child, which paul regards with notable hesitation) the closet door opens and care b can be caught. (her pet description is some of the most poignant writing in the entire series to me, and it really illuminates how completely entrenched in guilt rainer was at the time he wrote the description. it also illuminates that rainer seems to have been at the school with care at some point, and maybe rescued her. if this pet description is confusing to you let me know i could write 200 essays on it.)

anyway, the pit is all about getting rid of the past in order to prepare for what “your baby” -- the rebirthed person -- will see after the ritual. paul gets rid of everything that reminds him of carrie.

then we see the rebirthing. belle has already gathered 500 pieces to power the machine alongside paul, and she watches unmoving as the ritual plays out. paul places care -- carrie -- inside the machine , and is instructed to play needles piano. playing a song is, for whatever reason, part of the rebirthing ritual,. in order to be rebirthed in the way marvin intends, paul is meant to play the song that marvin taught him at the end of petscop 11. this song is called “care’s melody” in the subtitles.  he...uh...doesnt play cares melody! he plays his own song.

this is obviously not what marvin wants, as he starts begging paul to stop. paul doesnt, but the rebirthing isnt failed -- something new gets born. its just not the new thing that marvin was trying to make.

paul has always been associated with the color red. the triangle shape on his player avatar is red. care has always been associated with the color yellow. the easter egg , the person that paul becomes, is red and yellow striped.

the pet description is a  cut off portion of amber’s from way, way back in the first episode ... “What’s the safest place you can put her in?  You should start thinking about that.” Paul puts it in the safest place he knows. he nestles it in the locker, right next to his sister’s. then he goes and sits on the bench.

thats the end of petscop!

i kind of had to do this big long synopsis about it so that you know where im coming from when i say how i interpreted it, because it relies on a lot of little details. basically, paul is starting over. the rebirthing ritual was always about starting over, shedding trauma, becoming someone else . marvins aim was to use this “starting over” to turn carrie, and by extension paul, into the childhood friend he never got over losing-- thats why so many of the pieces paul gathers come from effigies to lina, like the one in the windmill and the one in this episode. paul playing his own song and creating a new self, a synthesis of who he was (carrie, yellow) and who he is (paul, red) is spitting in the face of what he was supposed to become (which is presumably the reason why he was kidnapped as a child) and saying  “i’m going to be myself instead, write my own song, create my own identity, synthesize the parts of me that were broken off before into something new, and face the future.” and then he does. paul ruined marvin’s ritual and created his own one, out of the broken up pieces of the person he was supposed to become.

its not even really an ending -- at the end of the OST (IF YOU HAVENT WATCHED THE LITTLE CHUNK AT THE END OF THE OST PLEASE GO DO ITS EXTREMELY VITAL) paul and belle talk about continuing their investigation, because there are still so many mysteries. lots of things we dont know, lots of things they dont know, lots of things that we wont ever see, and lots of things we wont ever know. because the story isnt for us anymore ! its not for the family. its just for paul, its just for the new person he created all by himself. thats the ending of petscop.

news flash its been a story about synthesizing trauma into recovery the whole god damn time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yeah i cant talk much more about it without getting like emo as fuck but thats really what happened in petscop 23 in my mind. the subtitles are SO important on this episode, so i hope that if you didnt see them before, you’ve seen them now!

sorry this is extremely long, i have a lot of feelings about this and there are a lot of little details so i had to kind of walk through every single part of the episode >_> i hope its not too pretentious sounding or long, and i hope it illuminates some things.

[agender-ghast]

Hm, I think you know a lot more about old MCYT artists than I do, and I sorta need some of that information to help with a 2012 MCYT comic I’m working on, so I’ll bite. Who’s crowmulent? And what experience do you have with work by old MCYT artists? What did you see when you were younger?

Alrighty I'll do what I can to help! Get ready for an essay!!

(Also note for anyone reading this, idk ur stance on shipping mcyts but it was a big thing in the fandom back then so any vids you may watch or art you look at remember to keep that in mind)

Alright first question: who's crowmulent? Crowmulent (now can be found under avaridiation though their yt channel only has 8 vids and they hevent uploaded in 3 years) was previously known as aleatoraye and had two different channels: 'aleatoraye autumn ryan' and 'aleatoraye winter ryan', both renamed "moved to crowmulent !!"

They were known on youtube and deviantart back in around 2014-16 for MCYT fanart and animations/animatics, pretty much all their MCYT work is archieved on those channels though! (Just search aleatoraye on yt you should find the first two and if you look in the 'channels' section you'll find avaridiation aswell)

Next question: what experience do you have with work by old mcyt artists?

Well, there's a lot to unpavk with this one, just because I consumed a lot of content by them back then (like, even more than I did with the actual MCYTs themselves), I mean I used to try and copy taxeycabs artstyle when I was younger, and similarly with rayes, I never actually interacted with the creators much (except like, one or two times I tried to get into an multi animator project (which there were a lot of back then too) but I didn't even have the skillset to do that back then.

The only 'mcyt' artist I ever interacted with was marsarts when they still drew for it (if you know them from back then, if you saw their idgaf oc map i was actually in that one, and when they did a qna long time ago I asked the 'so you know the muffin man' question as a joke(and I was also the one who requested the seto drawing when they did that weekly drawing comment requests thing- ANYWAY)

there were a lot of AUs, though I can't really remember them, but I remember that mangokiwi wrote a danganronpa AU, and there was also the labyrinth series by saltvenian (though I never read them i know they were both on wattpad, idk if they're still up or not though) uhmm,, I can't really think of much else rn (also idk if I understood this question correctly, but I hope it works-)

And lastly: what did you see when you were younger?

Alright theres still a lot here, but I'm also kinda tired so I can't think of everything rn, all I can say is watch old animatics by raye(specifically the colord chibi style ones), mangokiwi and dopier toast, a lot of these are funny shitpost type one that charmed me into the artist side of the fandom.

One thing I remember was the mcyt + mc monsters fusions, the only ones I can remember rn are enderlox, skybrine and setoblaze, but I know there were more.

I honestly mostly watched speedpaints and antimatics and read fics, I never interacted with the fandom outside of places like youtube, DA, fanfiction.net and wattpad so I certainly don't remember everything did see either.

I can't remember the names of all the fics I read, but I do remember miles and inches, which was a huge group of just different oneshots and shit (it had like?? 300?? 400?? Chapters last time I read it?) I know if I dug around I'd be able to find a bunch more fics but I'm tired atm-

But yeah there's a lot i don't specifically remember bc I have a kinda shit memory, but if you ever want me to talk abt anything else or want me to elaborate anything i said here I'd be happy to!

And good luck on that comic!!

[theintentioncraft]

To continue supporting content makers, this tag game is meant to show the entire process of making creative content: this can be for any creation.

RULES - When your work is tagged, show the process of its creation from planning to posting, then tag up to 5 people with a specific link to one of their creative works you’d like to see the process of. Use the tag #showyourprocess so we can find yours.

I've been tagged by @lordbelacqua (thank you Dea! <3) to talk about Backlead aka: that one Masriel fic I wrote where I got massively carried away...

Rambling/essay under the cut - fair warning, it's a long one!

Okay so first of all just a little disclaimer that Backlead did not follow my usual writing process - the idea was 110% borne out of self-indulgence and it was also both my first foray into HDM fanfic and my return to fanfic as a whole after a long hiatus from writing, so for me this was really a chance to just get back into the swing of things. Everything from Heavenly Guard through to Swansong and all of my current WIPs follow a more structured process and I'm happy to discuss any of them in a separate post!

PLANNING: I tend to find with my fics that I either have a nice little timeline of events planned out pre-writing or I have a very specific event in my head and I just take that and see how things unravel from there and Backlead was 100% the latter.

All I had in my head initially was the ballroom dance scene and so a lot of my admittedly-minimal planning was around the technicalities of that particular section, as well as some of the more general details e.g Marisa's outfit, the setting of the ball, etc. Planning the dance was the most fun part because it was a chance for me to put a lot of my dance knowledge to good use and think up something that fits the back-and-forth way in which Marisa and Asriel frequently navigate their encounters. In a way though I'm actually very glad that a lot of this fic Just Happened instead of being planned out, sometimes it's nice to just run away with an idea!

MUSIC: This gets its own section because this is one of the most important things in my process. Every single fic I write is written to various pieces of music that just help me to put myself in the right headspace for whatever I'm writing at the time - sometimes its just a single piece of music (I wrote Swansong in one hour with just one track from the Unforgotten - a TV show in the UK for those of you not familiar with it - soundtrack on repeat) and sometimes its entire playlists. I do love geeking out about my music choices for fic writing so happy to talk more in a separate post about music for some of my other fics if anyone's curious!

For Backlead I found a couple of playlist-vids from the lovely raviolae on youtube that really worked wonders for my writing. This comes with a disclaimer that I did not necessarily attribute any of these specific songs to either dance scene and I wanted to leave that open for people's imagination - but it's still brilliant vibes for thinking about two once-lovers-now-enemies trying to one-up each other whilst ignoring how much they still find each other attractive.

The two playlist-vids in question are here: you're stuck on the dance floor with your rival and find out they're an annoyingly good dancer and you're dancing with your rival and both of you want to lead

WRITING: First step every time is to figure out who's POV I'm going to cover because that makes a major difference in the way I'm going to write. Characterisation is the big thing for me and there's nothing I love more than to really get inside a character's head and basically think like them, and figure out what makes them tick and how they'll react to the story I'm putting them in. With my initial idea for Backlead being basically about the subtle power dynamics of a ballroom dance, Marisa felt like the natural go-to for this one and I found it much easier in this instance to write in her headspace than in Asriel's.

I wrote this fic in a very out-of-order fashion. The first dance (the slower, waltz-style dance) was the first part I finished, then I did as hinted at above get very carried away and move onto the section in the hallway, then I went right to the start and covered the entire section leading up to that first dance. Then I revisited the hallway scene because I wanted to rework it (the initial version was planned to be more explicit and involved less dialogue - but I wasn't comfortable with writing out the former at that time and the latter got changed by way of me having a sudden burst of dialogue-themed inspiration). The second, more set piece style dance came last in terms of the 'major events' that I wrote purely because I spent a lot of time racking with my dance knowledge to try and make it work in a way that didn't feel forced.

My final major writing stage is to write the 'transitions' between each major part - small pieces where nothing particularly noteworthy happens but it helps the fic to flow from one conversation/event to the next and also sometimes allows me to sneak in a bit of characterisation that I couldn't fit in elsewhere.

Along the way I often leave sentences half-finished with a bracket indicator so I know to go back to it later or I make little notes if I've added something in that needs explaining earlier in the fic, and I make sure to sort those parts out before I jump to the self review/beta reader stage. A couple of examples are below:

Although sometimes this method does also annoy future me too 😂:

SELF REVIEW/BETA REVIEW: Whenever I finish a fic, it gets put away for a day or two and I stop thinking about it completely - if I'm using a beta reader (usually @thatlavanderbard but I sometimes enlist help from friends on discord), I'll send them a copy of my draft at this point so they can start going through and leaving comments for me to work on, but the idea is that when I go back to my work a few days later I'm looking at it with semi-fresh eyes and can properly sift through each sentence to make sure things make sense.

When I'm self-reviewing I generally tend to follow this order of operations: spelling/grammar check (via docs') -> flow check (making sure any deliberate time skips/POV changes/etc in my fic flow smoothly from one part to the next) -> address beta reader comments (because they almost always pick up on things I myself would've picked up on anyway) -> general detailed final read through to make sure I'm happy with every single line and it all makes sense.

Backlead didn't get a full beta read because I had hit a point with it where I just wanted it up ASAP and my impatience got the better of me, but the rest of the above self-review stages still happened and I still spent a fair few evenings going through it properly and also running the occasional sentence or two by some helpful discord friends if I didn't like the way it flowed but couldn't quite figure out how to remedy it!

POSTING: First step was to reset my AO3 password because I forgot it yet again whoops

On a more serious note this part is pretty straightforward - once I'm ready to post a new fic I generally just go on autopilot for this part of the process (other than when I get to 'additional tags' and immediately get brain freeze...). As soon as it's up on AO3 I swing by here to make a post about it, then swing by discord to drop the link to friends who may be interested in reading it and then I normally nervously scuttle away from my notifications for a while out of fear that people hate it lmao.

That last part was especially true for Backlead because of it being my first trip into HDM fanfic and I always get extra nervous when posting my first fanfic for a new show/game/etc. Thankfully I got quite a few nice comments both on here and on discord that provided good motivation to stick around and post a few more things!

I always panic when asked to tag people lmao but I'll tag @fortheloveofwii for any part of the Onward, Onward series, @lyracordelia for any chapter in Hiraeth or the fic as a whole, and @glassrunner for this absolutely gorgeous gifset of beautiful game soundtracks. Please don't feel like you have to do this if you don't want to though!

[batbaffle]

Ok so I never send asks like ever... but every time you reblog (I have your post notifs on bc your blog is gold!) something about yugioh I get more and more interested,, any tips on where and what to watch?

(。･o ･ ｡) Well, the Yugioh franchise is mostly nonlinear, so it doesn’t really matter which series you watch or what order you watch in. They aren’t very dependent on each other plotwise. I’ll just tell you a bit about each one in release order under the cut, and some other important info. Whoops sorry I kinda wrote an essay, I used this an excuse to ramble...

I usually watch on Crunchyroll, but I use Gogoanime for anything not on there, like the movies (with adblock). I think most of the dubs are also available on Youtube. The dubs make lots of changes to characterization and character motives, plus censorship and general localization stuff (thanks 4kids). GX and 5Ds weren’t completely dubbed, and the Vrains dub is harder to find.

I’d personally recommend learning the basic rules of the game (with youtube vids) before watching the show, just because it makes the duels easier to follow. Each series usually introduces or focuses on a particular “summoning method”. DM and GX use “fusion”, 5Ds uses “synchro”, Zexal uses “XYZ”, Arc-V uses “pendulum” and all other methods besides “link”, Vrains uses “link” and all other methods besides “pendulum”, and every series uses “ritual”. They don’t really teach you how each summoning method works within the show.

Yugioh Duel Monsters (DM for short) is the first (and most iconic) one. The overarching plot revolves around spirits residing in ancient egyptian artifacts, so there’s some interesting lore. The rules of the game weren’t fully established at first, so they pull some weird bs moves xD. DM is a bit weak character-wise imo, but some of the characters are really interesting and have legit arcs. My main complaint is that the duels can get long and boring sometimes, especially since the game was much simpler then. 

Yugioh GX takes place about a decade or so after DM, and they’re actually closely connected (unlike every other series). GX has frequent references and cameos from DM, but you could probably understand most of it via context clues if you don’t wanna see DM beforehand. It starts off as a lighthearted slice-of-life highschool anime™, but it gets really dark (and pretty gay) over time, and there some interesting themes and concepts addressed. I personally like it for its absurdity and character arcs.

Yugioh 5Ds takes place later on the same timeline as DM and GX, but that isn’t really relevant. It’s generally pretty dark, except for the more chill (technically filler) section halfway through. The first half has strong themes of class divide, corrupt authorities, fighting the police, stuff like that. Almost all of the main characters are very likable and interesting, plus they’re badasses who ride motorcycles. There’s a big focus on bonds between characters, and there are lots of good scenes involving that. 

Yugioh Zexal is a series I haven’t really watched, so I can’t give a fair opinion. I’ve heard good things about it, but a lot of the fandom brushes off the protagonist as an annoying idiot, since he isn’t an incredible duelist right off the bat like the other protagonists. He has a spirit partner trying to provide him with guidance, and they have a really entertaining dynamic (plus they’re fairly gay-coded, just like Yugi in DM is with his own “spirit partner”). The main plot involves an alien war, and things get darker over time. 

Yugioh Arc-V isn’t one I’d personally recommend, but it can still be enjoyable. There are some alternate versions of characters from previous series, and it takes some other elements from each series. I don’t wanna spoil much, but there’s an interdimensional war as the main plot, which turns into a bit of a clusterfuck at some point, and the writers didn’t do a great job with juggling the excessive amount of characters imo. 

Yugioh Vrains mostly takes place in virtual reality, and it’s shorter than the others. The whole plot revolves around a group of sentient AI, an organization trying to destroy the AI, and the protagonist who is seeking revenge for something the organization did in the past. Some of the main characters experienced traumatic events, and the topic is actually addressed. I think I actually cried at the end? My main issue with Vrains is that the gameplay is really complex and gets hard to pay attention to sometimes.

Yugioh Sevens is currently airing, and I’m planning to watch it all without spoilers once it’s finished, so I have nothing to say about it xD.

There are three main movies: Pyramid of Light, Bonds Beyond Time, and Dark Side of Dimensions. Pyramid of Light is just a cash grab connected to DM, and it takes at some unspecified point in the show after season 2. Bonds Beyond Time is a time travel crossover special between DM, GX, and 5Ds. It takes place partyway through season 3 of 5Ds, after GX, and at some point after season 2 of DM. Dark Side of Dimensions is actually connected to the original Yugioh manga, so it’s a different DM canon, and it takes place after the series. 

There’s also what the fandom refers to as Season Zero, which is a 27 episode Yugioh series made by Toei in 1998, based off the first part of the original Yugioh manga. It doesn’t revolve around the card game like the later shows do, and it features a different type of game almost every episode. I’d actually recommend it as a general anime. It’s pretty difficult to find, but all episodes are on Youtube with slightly altered audio.

I hope this was helpful :) feel free to message about anything, I’m always down to talk about yugioh

[neo-shitty]

toffee!

ah yeah i suppose ur right. yeah i think quarentine has had that sort of effect on a lot of people :( sorry to hear abt ur strict parents, hopefully ur friend will be able to come back soon. small outings (even with family) are still good tho, make sure ur taking care of urself toff.

youre totally right! ah yes thats good advice (/gen) ill try and use that when im in a slump ty. any music suggestions?

lol sames. even some of the stuff abt seungmin, innie etc is a little uncomfortable, like theyre grown ass men for sure, but at the same time, theyre still young, still just over being a teenager in the grand scheme of things. (on that note, i do struggle with worrying that im infantalising them, obviously theyre adults but at the same time, theyre still young. i do treat all fictional characters as my children, but i guess its different when its real people. idk. what do you think?) yeah some stans rlly need to take a chill pill, some are rlly walking the wire between 'ah theyre attractive/that look rlly suits them' and making fucking smut fics abt minors, like... they do not see a problem with that?? yeah tbh i feel like unless theyre 18 they shouldnt be put into the spotlight, weve seen what it does to peoples mental health, but modern day kpop industry is a lot like old hollywood with a lot of popular child actors -_- hopefully the big companies will learn but i agree, its unlikely

suuuuure toff haha. ill go searching for them, but idk if ill be able to find the fluff needle in the angst haystack (jkjk) yeah, fair i groan and complain but you do write angst etc rlly well, so if its what ur comfortable with, then pls continue, it is one of your strong suits, well as you write fluff aside

ah okay good! ill continue to send you essays then

THE ALBUM YES. so ive been looking forward to it for literally months, this is actually my first skz album release as a stay (since the last on was 9 months ago) i was sitting there hitting refresh on my spotify the second 6pm kst came around. (speaking of which, how did you do the release? i couldnt decide whether to watch or listen first but i ended up on listening cos there would be more material) okay: so cheese was super cool, very skz ya know? tho i almost wish theyd made domino the title track, tho obv it was a more experimental track and would have been a bit controversial (much like whistle for bp) i looooved domino and thunderous was absolutely impeccable. all the songs were amazing but standouts were- secrets, secrets which lowkey made me tear up idk why, red lights which almost killed me (it did not have to go that hard, but it did) and OT8 WOLFGANG omgggg i wasnt sure if hyunjin was going to be included in it but i was hoping and, ya know people had said hed be in there, but the further i got in, the less i was sure and then BAM hyunjin started what had been jisung's part and i just sat there grinning for about 5 minutes. surfin was absolutely adorable and gone away almost made me cry AGAIN. star lost was so touching, almost a nod to hyunjins little star? silent cry was relatable beyond anything. SSICK was funny? for some reason I was laughing while it was playing, idk the combination of added cheering and minhos aggressiveness and the totall seriousness they sung it. but i rlly enjoyed it. sorry i love you showcased their vocals like nothing else. the view is THE BOP of 2021, absolutely going to be stuck in my head for the next decade, that hook is genius. what did you think?

also did you watch their grow up performance? with all the stays and ALL THE TEARS? ;n; i feel like this is the end of an era of skz and tbh im kinda happy but also sad. super excited for their promotions but super bummed they wont get to tour. ah well

<3 w.a. 🐺

answer under the cut bc i gave an equally long answer to this already long ask HAJSH

oh yeah, abt quarantine having an effect. my friend and i talked about this earlier actually. i didn't realize the world was moving so fast until the pandemic happened. being in quarantine gave me time to think and i got to know myself more. it's just the sole good thing i got out of the isolation lmao. and abt my strict parents, ironically i got to go out today so i got to hang out with a few of my bestfriends. i had fun but my legs are a bit sore from walking. but they're a different set of friends. i'll get to hang out with the others when my getaway driver comes home in december.

hmm music recommendations for writing? depends on the plot you're writing. care to share what story you're working on and i'll try to rake my brain for a song that might match the vibe. i listen to classical / lo-fi if i don't have song inspo for a fic because lyrics sometimes distract me.

i don't think that's infantilizing tho. for me, it has something to do with my environment and the way i was raised. maybe it's the same the other way around? like this certain age (for the ones above 18 but below 20) is thirst-able for them. idk really. it's just not for me ?n? what i do NOT condone is writing smut for minors??? like get checked : D // i agree with everything with the idols being 18+ before they debut simply because it's for the best for their well-being like. how can young idols decide that this shit is the thing they want to do for life? or at least until their contracts last. idk :// it's unfortunate that it's unlikely to happen.

WELL. i have a list so you won't have to go search for them! in class (minho), in the rain (seungmin), gladius maximus (chan) and you've read five star already. and i just realized that most, if not all, of my upcoming fics are fluffs and i'm fond of all of them :D i used to focus a lot on angst because fluff disgusted the living shit out of me. i think things changed when i wrote champagne problems and hurt myself so bad i wanted to drop angst entirely. i didn't, of course, but i allowed myself to be self-indulgent now.

for the release of the album, i was on twt and watched the vid at 12 views (if i remember correctly, i watched back door at 14 so HASJH) i’m gonna talk by track so it wont be too confusing? bc i wrote this in paragraph format and it just ???? beware im very picky with tracks even if they’re my ults. so no offense if we have opposing opinions and i’m not fond of reading lyrics so these are all music wise.

cheese - oh god i hated cheese at first listen but it grew on me easily. i was singing the yeahyeahyeahyeah bit all day today :D

thunderous - i cant say that it’s my favorite title track. it felt really dry sometimes, both mv and music wise. but at the same time, it’s not that bad. the choreography carried the song tho o.O it’s so fucking cool. but like go live, another track has my heart and it’s

domino - AND YES I AGREE THAT THEY SHOULDVE MADE DOMINO TITLE TRACK UGHHHHH WHAT A WASTED FUCKING OPPORTUNITY. WORDS CANNOT EXPRESS HOW FOND I AM OF THIS SONG. it stands close to the level i love easy.

ssick - was a skip on first listen too because i found the chorus underwhelming but it grew on me? not that much but i can bear listening to it.

the view - it’s something the gen public like, hence its something i dislike. im not fond of songs that are structured like this? it’s not a bad song, just not the type of song i like. but i agree that the hook is very not catchy but it would get stuck in ur head.

sorry, i love you - it’s not as sad as i expected but i actually like it??? i can’t wait to write a fic out of it (1) HAJSHAJ it’s like a 3/5 for me. it’s angsty but chill?

silent cry - i’m pissed at this song bc it hits but sometimes it doesn’t?@?#!? but it’s starting to grow on me but definitely not my fave track.

secret secret - glad i found a secret secret enthusiast because my irls thought it was a skip?$?#@$? it gives me ikon vibes and i’m a huge fan of ikon’s discog so this was a win for me T_T +

STAR LOST - gives me bigbang song vibes and now im very sad :(( in case u didnt know, i’m a hUGE yg fan and 2ne1/bigbang introduced me to kpop so when i heard this track that gave me yg feels i just <3___<3 and it’s one of my favorite tracks anw moving on,

red lights - I WANT TO SKIP THE FIRST TEN SECONDS OF RED LIGHTS EVERY TIME IT PLAYS LIKE IT MAKES ME FEEL AWKWARD KDSJFSK but fine. i’m adding this to props and mayhem’s playlist LMAO it’s more aggressive than sexc tho. more enemies to lovers o. O

surfin’ - this coming right after red lights just wasn’t the best decision arrangement wise because how did we go from ooh sexc to aigh pARTAY. felix saying sheesh T___T it’s such a fun song i want to go to the beach ;n; do you like beaches?

gone away - i have yet to read the lyrics because i’m using this as inspo for a jeongin fic jskjash it’s not the type of ballad i like but it’s so fucking sad to listen to :’ ) the pitch change caught me off guard? still does. it’ll grow on me prolly.

wolfgang - I YELLED WHEN I HEARD HYUNJIN IN WOLFGANG. i didn’t like this song until recently. it gives me the confidence boost i need to pick myself off self-esteem crashes.

and no i haven't watched that performance and i prolly wont because i’ll cry. i’m excited for the promotions too. do you think they’ll still have a repackage?? i cant fucking believe that i just finished waiting for 12am kst for skz teasers and now i have to look forward to 12am for nct 127??@?#? NOT A SINGLE DAY OF REST FOR THIS STAYZEN