#is the ask blog side of tumblr still thriving

[gu-moo]

i missed 'em

[heartschampion]

september 30th — ethan landry

PAIRING. ethan landry x fem!reader

SUMMARY. in which you make a bet with your boyfriend, ethan, the night before the start of october. thirty-one days of sex.

CONTENT. no ghostface!au, ethan bailey is canon!!, established relationship, fluff, bantering, a little suggestive, no smut, basically a prologue chapter, no beta, not proofread.

WORD COUNT. 1.9k

previous. masterlist. next.

11:49 PM. 

It’s times like this where I find myself thinking — really thinking — deeper into life and its meaning. The closer I look, the more I start to realize how glorified life is. I follow the same routine day-in and day-out. Wake up, get ready, go to class, go home, and get ready for the same thing tomorrow. It’s like the only time I get to have a reprise is in moments late into the night, all snuggled up and ready to sleep. A sliver of freedom in a meticulously bland and boring way of life.

Not to be melodramatic or anything. Ethan often told me I have a knack for that.

The blinding light of my laptop screen hits my retinas with a harsh glare despite having set the brightness to its dimmest setting. Still, beggars can’t be choosers, so I tough it out. I scroll aimlessly through my Tumblr dashboard, skimming past posts until one catches my attention just enough for me to stop and actually read.

‘Mattheo Riddle x Reader, Niccolo Govender x Reader, Jack Ch—’

“Ugh,” a small groan sounds from beside me on the bed. With a quirk of a smile, I glance beside me at my boyfriend, Ethan Bailey, who is laid there in all his glory. He has his arm draped over his eyes, covering them from the light emitting from my laptop. For a split second, I feel bad for disturbing his sleep. Ethan lets out another groan before throwing his arm off to the side, his eyes flickering over to my figure. “Angel, can we please go to bed?”

I sigh as I hear the pleading tone of his voice and shoot him an apologetic look.

“Just a few more minutes, Eth. Promise.”

Ethan simply gives me a blank stare, not believing my words for a second. He rolls over onto his side, now fully facing me with a sulky little pout on his lips. As cute as he is, I can’t fall for his tricks and forget about the task I had assigned myself. Ethan raises his head from the pillow, craning his neck to peek at my screen. Curious, he asks, “What are you doing anyways?”

A soft smile crosses my face at his question, both amused by the innocence behind it and touched by his curiosity. I reach over to pet his messed up curls, a habit that I had developed ever since the two of us moved in together for the new semester. Immediately, Ethan melts into my touch, visibly relaxing at the contact shared between the two of us.

“Just waiting for all the October context to start being posted.”

“Why October specifically?” He asks while furrowing his brows in confusion, completely and blissfully unaware of what I was talking about at all. It was kind of cute that he didn’t know, especially considering Richie of all people ran an active and thriving blog. It was literally the worst kept secret ever. Even Quinn knew. “Something special happening?”

“Mmm, something like that…” I giggle, causing Ethan to raise his furrowed brow at me in question. Unable to keep a straight face at the overly serious expression that he’s giving me, I burst out in laughter, deciding to finally enlighten him to the world of Kinktober. After a few moments, I calm myself down, taking a few deep breaths, letting out some final snickers. On the flip side, Ethan just stares at me blankly, unamused. With a roll of my eyes, I softly scratch at his scalp, confessing the ‘dirty secret’ I had been keeping for so long. “It’s Kinktober. Y’know, when writers just shit out a bunch of written porn?”

“Kink…tober?” Ethan repeats back, his expression contorting into one of confusion. He repeats the word a few more times, looking deep in contemplation while processing the information I had just dumped on him. Without even trying to hide it, I coo at him like an owner would at their pet. Blinking, he deadpans, “So you’re up at midnight just to read porn?”

“Smut.”

“Right. Smut.” He corrects himself, but not without a dramatic show of rolling his eyes in faux annoyance. It’s now my turn to roll my eyes, removing my hand from his hair and flicking his forehead in retaliation. Immediately, Ethan swats my hand away from anywhere near his face and rubs his forehead, grumbling to himself as he gives me a proper stinkeye. In return, I simply give him a cheeky smile and stick out my tongue, albeit a bit childishly.

It doesn’t take much long though until he forgets about the whole ordeal and goes back to the topic at hand. He clicks his tongue, eyes brightening with an idea that I know could be no good and smirks at me. With a lazy drawl, he asks smugly, “Why read about sex when you have me?”

Not expecting that of all things to come out of his mouth, I’m taken by surprise. A snort escapes my lips at the suggestive implication in his words. Placing my laptop beside me, I prop myself up on my elbow and lean down to Ethan, squinting at him. “What’re you trying to say, Bailey?”

Like a predator stalking his prey, he gazes up at me, a tinge of seduction behind those innocent looking brown eyes. He eyes me with temptation, luring me in before he can swallow me whole. His larger hand stalks around my hip, caressing at my skin as he travels across its smooth surface. Suddenly, I’m pulled in, now on top of him and straddling his hips where I can feel him start to harden.

“There’s no way some dumb words could ever be better than…me.”

He’s right and we both know it, but a bigger part of me wants to challenge him on that. Maybe it’s his cockiness in his tone, or the fact that his growing boner is directly pressing against my clothed core as he grinds his hips. Either way, I raise my eyebrow, looking down at him from above. “Really, huh? Big words coming from someone who came within the first three minutes last time.”

At the reminder of the last time we had sex, his eyes widened and his face flushed in embarrassment. “That was an accident!” He vehemently exclaims, defending himself for his early ejaculation. 

If I were to be completely honest, I was kind of turned on from how easily he came from just being inside of me, not even fully engulfed. The idea was lewder than the circumstances surrounding it, but the prospect of him almost coming inside of me — Even though we were protected — was as enticing as it was terrifying.

“Besides, you know how good I can make you feel.” Ethan then attempts to wink, his eyelids not cooperating, leading to him blinking instead. Realizing that he messed up his attempt to be smooth, he shakes his head and instead smiles sheepishly.

I giggle at his silliness, brushing aside the curls near his eyes with a level of fondness I once never would have known to exist. He really was perfect for me. Pinching his cheeks, I keep poking at him and his cocky attitude. “You think you can keep up?”

“Babe, I know I can.” He states as confident as ever, a smirk playing on his face. Without another word, he starts to run his hands up my thighs, my skin prickling up at his electric touch. Reaching my hips, he starts to rub circles around my hip dips, fondling my inner thighs. I let out a deep sigh, both relaxing at his intimate touch, and tensing as his boner pokes into me. Unable to help myself, I grind my pulsating core against him, satisfying the need.

“So cute...”

I whine at his words, embarrassed at just how badly I needed him at this moment. He was the one who started it in the first place, yet I was the one here left to look like a mess instead of him. It was unfair. Continuing to grind against him, he suddenly stops his movements. I hiss out, “Eth, you annoying fuck…”

Out of nowhere, he flips the two of us around, the lower half of his body pressed against me as he looks down on me. I’m caged in his arms, each one placed beside me, trapping me as his prisoner. Ethan cocks his head to the side, an innocent look on his face. He speaks in a sickeningly sweet voice, “What’s the matter, angel?”

“You know what’s wrong.”

“Do I?” He asks, pretending to think about it.

“Eth!” I hiss, squirming underneath him. He’s so close, the only thing separating us being the clothes we have on. Never have I ever wanted to not have any on more than I do right now. I needed to feel him, all of him. Not just his warmth, but skin against skin to truly prove that he was right there with me.

Ethan lets out a chuckle, grinning at how needy I was being. I bet he really got off on that, huh? Knowing that he was in control, having me wrapped around his finger. Fuck, I needed him in me whether it was his fingers or his dick. He clicks his tongue, shaking his head at me like he was reprimanding me. “Thirty-one days, angel. You can wait a few hours.”

Just like that, Ethan shifts off of me and back to his side of the bed with a satisfied smile on his face. The sudden switch from before to now was jarring and it took me a few moments before I completely processed what just happened. I scoff, propping myself up on my elbows and looking over at him.

“Are you serious?” “Super.” The pain in the ass called my boyfriend responds, closing his eyes, ready to fall asleep.

“You’re literally cockblocking yourself!” I sputter out in disbelief. Ethan Bailey, the boy who couldn’t keep his hands off of me. The same boy who literally cried the first time we had sex — I did too. The same boy who was now laying in our bed with a rock-hard boner, yet doing nothing about it when he had the more than eager opportunity to. What a fucking idiot.

“Mmm,” he hummed, thinking over his words carefully. “I can handle it.”

I let out an overdramatic huff as I collapsed onto the bed. Looking over, I peer at Ethan’s ‘sleeping’ face. A few moments passed of me just staring at him with a blank expression before he opened one eye and looked at me with a questioning expression. “Can’t sleep, love?”

“Don’t even.” I warned, glaring at him and his feigned nonchalance.

He chuckles, and I can feel him shift in the bed. Soon, arms wrap around me and pull me into a tight embrace. My face is gently placed against Ethan’s nape where I often laid on nights like this. Without a word, I wrap my arms and legs around him like a koala with a tree, seeking any contact with him. I bury my face into his nape, taking in his cinnamon scent.

“Sorry.” Despite his words, Ethan lets out another chuckle, the vibrations of it throughout his body a soothing feeling against my tense body.

I grumble, “You’re not sorry.”

He huffs in amusement at my sulkiness, petting my hair. Pecks and kisses litter my face in a frenzy as a way of him trying to make me feel better. To his credit, it does work despite my attempts to not let it. How could I ever resist his kisses? Peering down at me, Ethan smiles softly before kissing my lips. Cinnamon chapstick and lemonade citrus.

“Happy…uh…Kinktober, angel.”

[vladdyissues]

Hi, I'm asking this question because I'm genuinely afraid. I want to post art I did/I commissioned a different artist of Pompous Pep on my blog, but I'm terrified of others attacking me. I've always liked this ship since I was kid and didn't it was considered taboo until I was older. How do you deal with hate? Would it be better to post on a side blog? My main DP AU does have Pompous Pep when Danny is in his early to mid 20s.

I answered a similar ask here, but this one also deserves its own answer. Here are some things you can do to protect yourself from hate:

✦ Turn off anonymous asks. That curbs 99.9999% of abuse, because haters are too chickenshit to send stuff that they can get reported for and possibly have their account terminated. If you do decide to open anonymous asks at some point and receive hate, you can still report it. More on blocking here.

✦ Make sure you tag your post with "pompous pep" so those who love the ship can find it and those who have the tag blocked can avoid it.

✦ As you can see, there are quite a few of us Pompep fans here on Tumblr, and it's good to be part of a community. Being able to laugh off anon hate with one another is a superb morale-booster. (If you spend any amount of time on Discord, DM me. We have a server, and you'd be very welcome there.)

Bottom line: Haters will always find a reason to hate something they don't like. You can never "perform" purely enough to please them, so don't even try. If you age up Danny and Vlad, they'll still bitch about the age gap. If you make them the same age, they'll bitch about the "toxic dynamic" of Enemies to Lovers. If you make an AU where they've always been friends and are the exact same age, they'll still accuse you of Shipping Crimes™ because it's still the same characters—even if all the obstacles that made the ship problematic have been removed. All you'll do is wear yourself out trying to conform to their standards, so just say "fuck em" and do what you want.

Me, personally, I've been in fandom too long to be bothered by anon hate. I report them, block them, and delete the message, and I don't waste any more energy than necessary. I also follow the golden rule of Don't Feed the Trolls. Haters thrive on attention, and if they get no response from you, they'll eventually give up their attack and move on.

I'm sorry that the actions of an idiotic, vocal minority have made you afraid to participate in fandom activities. No one should ever feel that way. Just remember that you're not alone. Almost all of us Pompep fans have dealt with negativity at some point in our lives, but that hasn't stopped us at all. We're still here, and we'll always be here.

✦ As for sideblogs, they're great if you want to keep certain stuff separate from your main blog, but it's totally up to you. Just keep in mind, if you want to block anyone from seeing your sideblog, it must be done from the Blog Settings of that particular sideblog. More on sideblogs here.

I hope this post answered your questions and eased some of your fears. If you have any further comments or questions, you know how to reach me :)

[iam93percentstardust]

so one of the things that i think is happening in the likes vs reblogs debate is that when people who support reblogging over liking say things like "likes don't do anything," they don't mean they literally don't do anything. what they mean is that in the grand scheme of how this site works--as a blogging platform--a like doesn't share the post any further than your own blog. no one else is ever going to see the post; it's going to end right there.

but, for whatever reason, whether it's in bad faith or just misunderstanding, people who support liking over reblogging seem to consistently take this as the other side does mean that liking literally doesn't do anything, which they then meet with the argument that of course it does something. it, as i saw someone put it today, gives my internet friend a boost of serotonin.

the thing is, a lot of these people who are against "likescolding" seem to have this idea that they're fighting against the all-terrible algorithm, and what they're forgetting is that in the process, they're hurting the very real people on the other side of the computer screen. going back to the serotonin argument, yeah, i do get a boost of serotonin from receiving a like, or i did back when i was still bothering to post here. so it would follow, therefore, that i get more serotonin from more likes. but in order to get more, someone is going to have to suck it up and reblog the post so that other people can see it, because my reach on its own only goes so far. if the entire argument rests on giving me serotonin, then shouldn't a reblog give me serotonin as well? why are likes the only form of acceptable serotonin givers?

which leads me into my next point, that by demanding reblogs, i'm supposedly just a greedy numbers counter who can't be satisfied with what i have. and frankly, at this point, after watching this argument go round and round in circles for literal years, i don't think that anything i say is going to change anyone's minds. the people who say i should be satisfied with likes are going to say that i'm greedy and want more attention no matter what argument i present. it doesn't seem to matter to them that i have activity muted on tumblr and statistics muted on ao3 and therefore can't even see the numbers. but i'm hopeful that some of the newer people on this site will see this and understand why i'm arguing for the value of reblogging, so i'm going to say it anyway.

let me paint a picture for you: i joined my current fandom on tumblr almost exactly five years ago. the biggest movie to date had just been released, the fandom was thriving, and i vividly remember seeing artwork after fanfic after gifset on my dash. if i tried to scroll back through my dash in the morning to where i'd left off the previous night, it would take me hours because so many fanworks were being created and posted and shared while i was asleep. the very first fanfic i posted to tumblr for this fandom got more than a thousand notes literally overnight. i'd only been a part of the fandom for a few months at that point and had very few fandom followers, but the field was more than welcoming to a new writer.

but then the landscape changed.

within two years, i'd started to notice a drop in reblogs. i can't tell you for certain what the reason was. maybe it was covid fatigue, maybe it was purity and anti-culture being driven to an all-time fever pitch, maybe it was that people were leaving my fandom, once one of the biggest on the site, for other, more diverse media. i really can't tell you what the reason was, but as the reblogs started to drop, fan creators started begging. and as the creators begged, i suddenly started seeing these posts circulating about how creators should be grateful for the likes and lurkers, and asking for anything more was just being greedy.

slowly, the number of fanworks on my dash started to drop. the fanfics went first. for whatever reason, maybe because reading a fic is more time-consuming, people were particularly hateful towards fanwriters wanting more reblogs. writers tried various tricks, writing shorter fics, putting things under read mores, posting in the form of bulleted headcanons, but nothing really worked. and so they stopped posting. and then they left tumblr altogether. i see a lot of them on discord, and occasionally, twitter now, but i don't see them on tumblr.

the art was next. see, a lot of the artists in my fandom make money off their art, which meant they relied on those reblogs as a way to get their name out there. and if those reblogs aren't happening, and if people are deriding commissions because they think fanworks should be free and available to everyone, then no one is seeing their commission posts. and if the site is already hostile to artists, which it has been since the tumblr purge of 2018, then why are they still on this site when they can be on twitter and instagram?

now i'm watching it happen again with gifmakers. that old resentment is building back up, this time around reposting gifsets and claiming them as their own creation. people claim to be unable to make cool gifsets so they have to steal them, and in the process, other people stop reblogging the original gifmaker. as of writing this, i haven't seen us reach the point where the gifmakers start to leave, but i'm betting it'll happen soon.

you know how many new fics i've seen this last week on my dash? three.

you know how many new artworks? eight.

you know how many shitposts i've seen? political posts? posts lamenting the deaths of whatever current fandom op is in? too many to count.

i'm one of the people who doesn't post my fics on tumblr anymore. i don't see the point. i'll get a much bigger reception talking about them on twitter. and i feel bad for all the newcomers arriving here because their dashes are going to be full of shitposts and politics and misinformation and reposts from tiktok where they once would have been full of stories and art.

but i wonder. if people keep on this reblogging hate train, will we lose the shitposts and politics and reposts from tiktok too? you're not obligated to reblog everything, i'm not even saying that you're obligated to reblog anything, but if we keep going the way we're going, if more and more people drop a like and keep scrolling, will we soon reach a point where there's nothing on our dashboards at all?

fandom is a community, and i think that that's something that people tend to forget. creators create for themselves, but they share for everyone else. i see a lot of posts talking about how creators will stop sharing if all they receive is silence, but most of those are old posts that miss that creators have already received silence. they've already stopped sharing. they've already left.

the thing is, before i gave up on posting to this site, i used to remind myself that if ten people were sitting in my apartment, listening to me read my fics, i would think that's a lot of people and be very honored in the hopes that it would make me feel less sad about the fact that in just a few years, people stopped reading what i wrote. and it isn't that it's wrong, but five years ago, even as a new writer, i was reading my fics to packed auditoriums with standing room only.

and there's a big difference between speaking to an auditorium and speaking to my living room.

no one is obligated to reblog. no one is owed a reblog. and likes do actually do something. but sharing does something too, and it doesn't hurt anyone to reblog it. truth be told, i think we're already past the point of no return; i don't think we'll ever see the creators who've already left come back. but that doesn't mean we can't make this a welcoming space for new creators or that we have to make them feel bad for wishing that more people would share their fanworks. i see a lot of those posts railing against likescolding talking about how it's not okay that likescolding makes them feel bad, so i guess my question to those posters is this:

why is it okay to make the creators feel bad instead?

[autisticlee]

kind of afraid to post this because I predict someone will misunderstand and be upset at me. but this blog is means as a personal journal and i don't post here for other people or attention—

something I see in the autism community (especially on tumblr) is when a less-disabled/lower support needs autistic is proud of their autism or likes it or whatever, the more disabled/higher support needs people think that person is invalidating them/their experiences and speaking over them (I'm not talking about posts that generalize all autistic people/autism as a whole and try to speak for everyone and say it cant disabled you because *they* dont struggle themselves. i only mean posts where people are talking about only their own personal experiences) but i've seen many posts and replies that tell people not to celebrate/be happy about/romanticize/like their own autism. just because they are privileged to not be disabled by it, and not everyone is as lucky, therefore it invalidates those struggling.

I get that it can make you feel left out and invalidated, but not everyone being happy about an aspect of something is forgetting you, talking over you, trying to invalidate you, etc. they can celebrate something without needing to add a reminder that other people are struggling. their experiences are allowed to be good and they are allowed to be happy about it! you can celebrate the good without it meaning the bad is being overlooked too. people can be happy about the positive traits of a thing without it meaning they dont care about the negative ones or the people affected by them.

maybe it sounds mean to "leave you out" but there's far more posts about the struggles of autism than good ones, at least from what i've seen, but tumblr algorithm so maybe thats incorrect. if you look up autism online though, you get flooded by negative things more than positive. lower support needs people also often get told they can't be autistic/don't need help/dont deserve accommodation because they aren't autistic enough. (even I get told this all the time and I feel i'm probably more in the medium support needs?) there's not much good for the people who need the good, so they make it for themsleves.

i'm sorry if it affects you to see people can enjoy an aspect of their lives that causes you great suffering :( I know how to feels to be struggling while people in the same place aren't and are having and sharing positive expiences because of the thing that causes you to suffer. i've been there and also felt left out and like they were ignoring me and my struggles. but!!!!! I learned that that's not always true! it doesn't have to be all bad for everyone! and they aren't trying to ignore my negative experience on purpose! we need to let people who need the positive have their own space just like the ones struggling. I struggle a lot with being autistic and sometimes wish I wasn't. but i'm still happy for the people that get positive things out of it instead and can thrive in life, while i'm barely surviving myself. these two things can coexist

maybe the low support needs people feel left out too and want to make their own posts among the sea of "autism is a horrible tragic disorder/disability and we wish we didn't have it and didn't struggle and suffer/autistic people can never have normal lifes/etc" and that's ok! everyone is valid, struggling or not. no one is talking over anyone else just by having a different experience and view! especially when they aren't making a side note to mention the other perspectives they don't experience themselves. it's not their job to always add a disclaimer about those other experiences. especially if they don't understand it because they never experiences it themselves and can't make an accurate post about it. you can make your own posts if you need to, or ask them to help you share it by sharing your experiences.

just like I make my own posts about how much I struggle in life because i'm autistic. often a post comes from reading a post where someone talked about how autism positively affects something for them, and I make my own post to talk about how that same trait affects me negatively. I don't comment on their post and say they are invalidating my experience. I don't let it make me feel bad or take it personally. I don't feel invalidated or attacked by low support needs who have amazing lives because they have friends and a job and other stuff and aren't struggling as much as me. I don't feel like they are talking over me when they say autism makes them smart enough to get a good job or empathetic enough to have lots of friends. i'm happy for them. they deserve support too.

basically, in simpler terms, someone saying they like pineapple on pizza and making a post about how amazing it is isn't invalidating people who hate pineapple on pizza, hate pineapple in general, hate pizza, or are allergic to pineapple or pizza. you can make your own posts saying you hate it, but don't say people who post about liking it are wrong and not allowed to like it!

again, i'm not talking about the posts where people say "*all* autistic people should like their autism because it's not a disability" or something like that. if that's what people are referring to when they make posts saying to not celebrate autism because it leaves higher support needs out and talks over their struggles, then I apologize. maybe i read those wrong or they aren't worded very well, just like i'm sure this post of mine isn't worded well and will cause people to misunderstand my meaning. but they're always worded to sound like no one should make positive autism posts because it makes people feel bad who don't have the same positive experiences. IF That is indeed the case, then that's just as unfair as the people that tell high support needs to stop complaining and enjoy their autism/disability instead!

this actually goes for many things in general, not just autism. replace autism with other things and it works as well. it's a lesson we need to learn together!

[hotfuss]

hello!! I have a few questions if that’s okay..? first question, do you know anything about the K thingy? the one they have on set! I’m planning to make my own (a much shorter version!) so do you know anything about it, the side detailing etc etc. also, in the Miss Atomic Bomb music video, do you have a screenshot of the scene where Izabella is dancing? it’s quite a specific scene and I’m not sure how to describe it, sorry!

first of all it's always ok to send me asks... this made me so happy, like we were back when there was a still thriving fandom on tumblr! 😭 second of all that seems quite a nice project i hope it turns out fine!!

now to answer your questions: the k debuted as a keyboard stand decoration for the day & age tour and after that has been consistently used for any off tour performance (2016 to any 2017 show before the official start of the ww tour, 2019 shows etc). for photo references the best is to just browse my the k stand at https://hotfuss.tumblr.com/archive/tagged/the%20k or https://hotfuss.tumblr.com/tagged/the%20k if you are on desktop/browser or just type #the k on the search bar of my blog if you are on mobile!

additionally sunsets and neonlights used to make nice hd edits of pics and mostly close ups, so it's worth browsing their d&a tag too if needed. i'm the only freak with an overly detailed tagging system so that's a more general era tag tho. but you can check it at https://sunsets-and-neonlights.tumblr.com/archive/tagged/day%20%26%20age and https://sunsets-and-neonlights.tumblr.com/tagged/day%20%26%20age!

for the mab video i took some screenshots and i'm posting them under the read more, hopefully there's the one you are looking for!

[gureumz]

just a little something i want to touch on seeing as it's an issue that a lot of people misunderstand.

this site is meant to thrive on reblogs. blogs grow from reblogs because the content gets spread around to a larger audience that don't otherwise follow the tags or content in the original post, thus attracting possible new followers (and in writers' cases, readers). i know reblogs are dying and it's been dying for years now bc (as i've seen personally, feel free to disagree) aesthetics have pretty much overtaken the entire internet. the current average tumblr user's mind, i think, has been somewhat programmed to see a blog full of reblogs as "messy" bc of all the differing formats and fandoms and content. i also think the decrease in reblogs is also bc of the rise of short form content but that's a discussion i don't want to get into rn.

now, this attitude towards keeping a cohesive look on your blog isn't wrong by any means, you do what you want to do on your own blog, but as a writer on this platform who writes for free, one of the few indicators we have that our work is appreciated is through reblogs. i'm not demanding anyone to write lengthy reviews or comments in the tags, but if you really, really, really like what you've read, a reblog goes a long way. i've been informed i have over 500 likes across my posts on this new blog (with only three full scenarios posted) but a mere 50 or so reblogs. that's...a big difference.

i know i did state that this blog of mine is a side project that i don't mean to take too seriously, but part of why i do this as well is to see what people like and don't like about my writing. an exercise of sorts, if you will. so yes, a tiny bit of clout chasing is in play.

it's saddening to see that the view on tumblr writers has come down to the word "entitled". we don't ask for much, but there are still things we would like in return for our time and effort. isn't that how content creation works?

anyways, it's not good to dwell on these things but i hope some of you can consider what i've just said. that's all, happy sunday 🫶🏻

[risingsoleil]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love❤

Happy holiday season!! Let's get into it yuh 😈

Choices, Chances, Changes - This one is kinda self-explanatory and I've mentioned it several times on my blog. It holds an extremely special place in my heart and it was written with so much love and emotion and tears. I'm incredibly blessed for everyone who has read, enjoyed, and even took the time to lmk how much it impacted them 💛

Come As You Are - This is an AU created from a collab with two Coco fandom friends who I still keep in contact with! Though the story is incomplete and only touches on a small portion of Imelda and Hector's life, we basically planned out the rest of their lives completely. Idk when and if I'll get back to the fic, but if I don't, then I would love to post our brainstormed ideas on tumblr!

Talking To The Moon - This was such an emotional piece to write. The idea struck me while I was listening to Bruno Mars' song in the car, and four days later, I uploaded this. So many tears. My heart needed to write the pain and angst.

You Are My Life - The happy Linzin AU. I can't do this list without this fic. I'm so heartbroken over Linzin's heartbreak in LOK, so I wanted to remedy that with an AU that gives them the best of everything in life. Happy life, thriving careers, beautiful children (inside and out). Most of the chapters are happy and tend to be family-oriented, so I don't have many angsty pieces written here. But I think eventually, there may be a few hurt/comfort chapters in the future.

The Other Side of Heaven - This is a complementary piece to Choices, Chances, Changes, and are just different what-ifs scenarios, extra or deleted scenes to that main fic. What I love most about working with this is I get to explore different AUs of an AU lol it also gives me an opportunity to correct anything I may have made in the storytelling of the main fic. I recently finished a mini story here with the canon characters clashing with AU characters, and what a ride that was! It was so much fun to do, and I'm looking forward to other cool ideas that might come up 😄

Thank you for the ask and have a wonderful holiday season, anon!!

[expvrgction]

Hey. Charger here.

This is an out-of-character post and tagged as such-- As well as an important announcement. Even if it's not for you, then at least it is for me. Don't worry, it isn't anything life-threatening. I'm sorry for possibly having worried some, if not all of you.

You're in for quite a long read, so everything will be under "Keep Reading".

The last few months was a "parched" moment for me in terms of creative writing and art both. I barely post anything on Tumblr these days, and whatnot with being torn between maintaining all role play blogs I manage, and retiring all of them altogether.

I am currently unemployed as of the date of writing this, and as much as I would like to be hired under someone else, or be hired by a company, it isn't my type, and I don't find myself thriving nor surviving in such a work environment anytime soon. The way I see it, freelancing may be the best choice moving forward.

There are many ways in which this can go. I am currently interested in art, creative writing and video games, but all of these so far had been just hobbies, and making a living out of either would require a lot of knowledge before jumping in. At the same time, I have tried to dip my toes into live streaming some time in the past, and though content I made might be full of scuff, I have gotten the hang of the basics, and wish to pick it up again and move forward from there. This will also require more knowledge and learning along the way.

However, if I do decide to do live streams again (I have a couple past live streams on YouTube before taking a year-long hiatus due to burnout and prioritizing on myself, my friends and loved ones)-- And have a schedule I can work well with, then I may end up either having to engage in text role-playing more sparsely, put it to the side for now, or retire from it, here on Tumblr, and possibly Discord as well.

As such, all role play blogs I manage, including ones I have not promoted here (@expvrgction, @tokeikaijin, @mayor-bubblegum) will be put on indefinite activity/hiatus, effective immediately. Any thread that has recently been replied to on any blog listed, if at all, will still be worked on, and any in-character asks and submissions will still be accepted at this time-- But ask boxes and submit buttons to the following blogs will be closed at some point after this announcement. If any RP partner still wants to continue where any thread has been left off, feel free to send me IMs, or contact me via Discord @ zicasupercharger.

I can be contacted via my main Tumblr account (@zica-supercharger @notphonecharger), my other main Tumblr account focused on posts and reblogs ZeniMax Media related (@the-world-spear), or my aforementioned Discord handle. Any changes to these URLs, as well as my Discord handle will be edited and reblogged as necessary.

Thank you for 2+ years here (and more, if you count previous RP blogs I have deleted, going as far as my not-so-proud early 2010s RP era)! I would like to apologize for some things I did that might have upset you in any way, and wish you all the best.

See you when I see you,

Charger.

[thea-dacity]

This is going in my secret blog because events need to unfold before I can say... anything.

Today is June 6. My little town is having a pride festival this weekend. I went to their last one and it was... small. But I want to support community pride where it happens. So when they opened up to vendors, I signed up. I thought the tent price was a bit high, but whatever, I'm supporting a cause.

I knew something was odd when they reduced the price last month and offered partial refunds.

Then they released the vendor list and it's almost ALL nonprofits.

I found out that one of my usual shows is happening literally a block away and since the show runner is always looking to collaborate with people, thought maybe there could be cross promotion. Most of the vendors are queer, I thought it would be a good fit.

So I messaged them both.

Usual show: "Thanks. Yeah, we had talked with them gor a few months about providing the vendors for them, but they just wanted our vendors list instead of us taking care of it. And we felt they were asking too much and weren't planning to compensate us at all. We then offered to cross promote and didn't get a response. So idk. I tried.."

Pride event: "That’s interesting to know. They actually refused to work with us. 

Thanks for letting me know, but since they wouldn’t collaborate with our organization, I can’t assume they’re queer friendly, even if they’re monetizing queer artists."

So... I've worked with Usual Show Guy a few times and hes a very good dude whose main concern is ALWAYS "are my peoples needs being met?" Is this show attended well? Are people having a good time? Is the weather impacting people's sales?

If a show gets rained out, he'll give you a free space at the next show. He wants to connect all the weirdos and queers together and he wants us to thrive.

Hes Just A Guy, ok?

I havent spent much time with the pride people because they're always meeting while I'm working. But... they're young. A lot of them are young. Like... just out of high school young.

And its possibly rude of me to say this, but I feel like they dont know the difference between negotiating a deal and performing a microaggression.

You know I'm always trying to see as many sides as I can, but if I was gonna pick I liar from the two of them, I'm gonna pick the pride people. Like the way they used The Tumblr Words at me makes me feel like they're being sensitive to something that isnt there.

Just... fascinating interpretation of events.

I'm still doing the pride thing because I paid the money to do it. But I dont have very high Hope's for the event. The facebook page only has 15 people 'going' and I'm 90% sure it's the vendors.

I have at least one bad show every season. Might as well be my first one.

[stop-breaking-my-heart-telltale]

after a year long break, I replayed TFS

I haven’t been too active in the twdg fandom for about a year now, only popping in from time to time to talk about the Clementine comic or to answer the occasional ask. 

A lot has happened- I got into the Dragon Age series and created a side blog dedicated to it, got a new job, played a LOT of Stardew Valley, read Clementine Book One enough times to make me weep all for the sake of a review, gave Skyrim a second chance and that went terribly, went on the search for a good sapphic romance novel but have yet to find one, replayed Fallout: New Vegas and remembered why it’s my favorite Fallout game, and it’s November so I’m crying about nanowrimo.   

I haven’t touched The Final Season, or any Telltale game, since September of last year. My interactions with the fandom on this blog have been scarce, especially when you look at the way I used to post in 2018-2021 by comparison. But I got an email the other day from tumblr telling me that this blog turned 4 years old. I began looking through all of my old content and that inspired me to boot up TFS and experience it once again to see if my opinions changed.

Spoiler alert: A lot have. 

I wasn’t planning on writing a post like this when I did my replay. After all, as I’m working on this it’s nanowrimo. I may or may not be an anxious mess, it’s fine, I’m fine. 

I’m aware that the fandom isn’t exactly thriving at the moment but I feel like I need to get these feelings out of my system.

Y’see, it’s fascinating. I spent years running this blog- so many themed nights, talking with you guys and answering asks, writing fics, getting into dumb arguments, saying dumb things, and streaming the series on Mixer and Twitch, and for the most part? My views/opinions on the series were fairly consistent. There are a few exceptions, like my feelings on Minerva as a character changing or why I now choose to leave Lee at the end of S1 rather than shoot him, but everything else I was rather sure of. 

So imagine my surprise when I finished and many of my opinions changed. 

Turns out, time makes a fool of us all and spending a year away from the fandom and the series has shifted my perspective quite a bit. I’m able to set aside those rose-tinted glasses, but not get rid of them entirely. 

I still stand by TFS as being a fantastic conclusion to the series. It was the ending Clementine deserved, and it’s still my favorite. 

I believe the overall plot holds up great- Clementine and AJ find a new home. They have to fight to protect the people that become their found family. Clementine potentially falls in love or finds herself a best friend. The bond between Clementine and AJ is strong but tested in each episode. And to make matters emotionally complicated, the antagonist is someone from S1. 

It’s flawed, sure, but point me in the direction of a plot you believe isn’t and I’ll find something to nitpick just to spite you. 

I couldn’t imagine a better continuation/end point for Clementine’s story, and I will forever be grateful that this is just as much AJ’s story as it is Clementine’s.

I think this is the best looking game of the series. The school is something to admire for how beat up and overgrown it is, and the walkers are so decayed they’re practically walking skeletons with some flesh clinging to their bones. The character designs are great. The controls are easy, gameplay for Telltale games always are. The only time I had any trouble is the section where you have to distract the walkers so that James can retrieve his mask. I died three times before I was able to complete it without killing a single walker.... I did it all for you, James! 

I also prefer the over-the-shoulder camera versus the fixed camera of the previous games. A lovely change, that one. 

Oh, and the collectables!  I love the collectables, that was such a great feature to implement into this game. Giving Clementine and AJ their own dorm that you can decorate with things you’ve collected makes it feel like home, like this is where Clementine is going to stay. For a lot of people, the last time Clementine had a room was back in S1 at the motor-inn, and she does have a room with AJ if you stayed at Wellington. I just like collecting things, man, it’s fun! Love it, I collect every item!

A big problem I do still have with this season is it’s only four episodes. Yes, it’s still a damn good season, but it always gives me a sense that it’s this close to being the best game Telltale ever created. So many things fall short and it sucks because they were so close, y’know? If they had just one more episode, they could’ve had time to cross the finish line.

I know that some of the developers have said they only needed four episodes to tell the story they wanted to tell and that’s why a fifth episode was cut. If that’s true, then I believe that might’ve been a mistake. If they said it was just a budget thing [and knowing Telltale, that probably was the more important factor] so they cut an episode and had to find a story they could tell in four, or cutting an episode meant they could improve things previous games were criticized for. I’d be more inclined to forgive it if that were the case. 

But if it was just a creative choice and they could’ve easily had five episodes, it’s one that prevented it from surpassing two games that I would consider the best they ever made: Tales from the Borderlands and Batman: Enemy Within.

However, I’m aware that adding one more episode could’ve caused the season to crash and burn. Fair enough. We’ll never actually know how things would’ve turned out had they stuck to the five episode structure the previous installments followed. It might’ve become bloated, or dragged into boring territories, or more characters would’ve been killed off to fulfill a kill count, or more choices would need to be implemented that would’ve only furthered the illusion of choice these games are often criticized about.

The pacing can feel really rushed in a lot of spots, especially with the final episode. And yes, I know the fast pace was intentional, I watched the commentaries. Just because it was intentional doesn’t magically fix anything, it’s still a problem I have with it. 

Lilly and the delta could’ve used more fleshing out. Most of the Ericson crew are underdeveloped. I would’ve liked to interact with Louis and Violet more before the Marlon confrontation, as well as more opportunities to interact with the others. 

Speaking of characters, as much as I would love to write these grand essays about each character and what worked, what didn’t, all that… I don’t have time. Some will get longer sections than others, and I’ll discuss any opinions that have changed, as well as things that stuck out to me as I was playing.

Normally I’d start Clementine and work my way down to the antagonists, but fuck it, let’s start with our antagonists and work our way up. 

Lilly, Abel, and the delta are terrible but in a good way

Fighting the raiders in this game feels like a final stand, y’know? These delta assholes want to kidnap people to fight in their war and they feel justified in this because they see those opposing them as worse. The delta aren’t the real baddies, they’re just trying to survive by any means necessary and they need people to fight, otherwise they’ll lose everything they worked for... but a lot of morals get muddied and downright tossed out in the process where these kids they’re taking, abusing, and traumatizing aren’t really people to them until they submit. 

Lilly can have Louis’ tongue cut out and not bat an eye because he isn’t a person to her, he’s a “recruit” who stepped out of line. They’re all “recruits,” but that gets complicated when she sees Clementine as a person. 

The raiders are a bunch of pieces of shit, no doubt, and they deserve what they got in the end for what they did, but I do like that you can look at them and say “I understand you want to protect your home and your people, that’s an honorable goal, one that mirrors our goal.... but this isn’t the way to do it, you’ve lost too much of your humanity and it will be your downfall.” 

Honestly, I think the Delta vs Ericson group dynamics and what they’re willing to do to survive is interesting to compare and contrast. 

Like the delta loses Abel in ep2 during the fight, and we get to interrogate him at the beginning of ep3. He tries to tell Clementine that Lilly’s on her way to get him but we all know that’s not true. The delta cut their losses. Despite needing people to fight in their war, they’re quick to kill, maim, or abandon and it has little effect on the group as a whole. They’ll just get more recruits, Abel is expendable, replaceable. Lilly’s upset when she hears what his ultimate fate was, but I wouldn’t say she’s distraught because she cared deeply about him as a person.

But then you have Ericson where losing two members, Marlon and Brody, rocks the entire foundation of the group. It causes rifts in relationships because they value each other a lot more as individuals. They’re younger, and the group is way smaller. Marlon’s betrayal left wounds, Brody’s death scared them, and the decision of what to do with Clementine and AJ wasn’t an easy one and they fought about it. When Aasim, Omar, and Louis/Violet get captured, the group doesn’t decide to cut their losses and more forward. That’s something Marlon would do. Instead, they risk so much to infiltrate the boat and save them. They’re not just three lost bodies, they’re people, friends. They plan to blow up the boat to kill the raiders so that they can’t harm anyone ever again. 

I like an antagonist who mirrors the protagonist. Lilly and Clementine, delta and Ericson, what are they trying to do? Protect their home and people against an enemy, to survive, to have food and water and a chance to live in a world where the dead roam. But their methods? Very different. They’re not on the same scale and again, the moral compasses are all over the place, and they treat their people differently. 

Both Clementine and Lilly are leaders who go to great lengths to protect their communities, they’ve both suffered a lot of trauma, their father figures play a big role in who they eventually become for better or worse. They both wandered alone until they found people and a home, a reason to keep going, and now they’re desperate to protect that because without it, they will have nothing left and that’s terrifying.

Plus, there’s the bonus of realizing Clementine could potentially become Lilly if she went down the wrong path. I mean, look at some of the shit she pulls in ANF. No one wants to hear that but there is it. What’s important is Clementine makes it clear that she’s not Lilly... and I hate to say it, but if Lilly lives, there is a possibility that she could change for the better, too, and I kinda like that. 

Not excusing the bullshit she pulled. The only reason she’s even alive is because she manipulated her way into murdering James before the boat exploded. It’s hard to believe a woman who forced Minerva to relive the trauma of being forced to murder her own twin sister just so that Lilly could make a point to Clementine, or as mentioned before, having Louis’ tongue cut out. Or murdering Mitch... kidnapping children in the name of survival, brainwashing.... just a lot of bad stuff- it’s hard to believe a woman who did all of that could ever possibly change. She certainly appears unredeemable. 

However, in the end she’s left with nothing but the weight of everything she did and knowing she did this to herself yet again. Might be the push she needs, and I’ve seen worse characters not waste their second chance. 

Or you can just have AJ shoot her and then she rots. After all, your choices do matter, yes? 

I know I’ve given Lilly as an antagonist shit in the past, complained about how they could’ve picked a better character to bring back, she sucks and I hate having to deal with her, blah blah blah...

but well actually Lilly is a great antagonist, ignore past CJ, past CJ doesn’t know anything and she’s dumb. 

In my opinion, Lilly was the best option for a character to make a return as an antagonist. Yeah, yeah, “what about Christa??” I hear you, but Christa wouldn’t be nearly as compelling and this whole cry for what happened to Christa is old and tired and I think we should just accept that we will never, ever know. 

Lilly is such a piece of shit, she’s so terrible, I hate her but I also really, really like her as the central antagonist. 

And look, I know so many people in this fandom don’t like nuance, they want a simple good or bad answer, especially with characters and other things they don’t like because it’s easier since “brain thinkies made hurt happen no like.” Which fair enough, I can totally relate, that’s an exact quote from me whenever someone tries to talk to me about Loghain from Dragon Age: Origins and I don’t have the emotional energy to deal with everything I know of him from the books that play into the game so I go sit in my sad corner and ignore everything.

but c’mon, look at Lilly and tell me she’s a poorly written, one-dimensional villain. You can’t! If you do, I will point my little finger at you and loudly declare, “I respectfully disagree.” 

She’s fucked up, she’s got her head up her own ass, she really wants to be in control as this intimidating, scary bitch who won’t hesitate to put a knife to your throat whenever she feels like it. She uses her power to manipulate and cause harm so that she never has to experience the helplessness she felt when she was alone and had nothing. She waltzes into Clementine’s cell with such threatening energy, but she’s also relaxed because she knows Clementine can’t do shit. And she’s impressed. She’s genuinely impressed at what Clementine almost accomplished. She sees that Clementine is the golden goose that made this entire trip and its losses worth it. Even if the delta lost everyone they captured but still had Clementine [and AJ] then it would still work in their favor. 

With Clementine, she hesitates. She shows little sprinkles of humanity and it throws her off kilter. Honestly, it almost feels like a performance in the cells, y’know? I’ve given Lilly shit for appearing sympathetic in ep2 only to turn around and be a nasty asshole in ep3 which I still do somewhat think, but this time around? Watching Lilly’s body language and the way she speaks does make me believe it’s all a part of some game she’s playing. Deep down, she’s still the scared little girl who wants to pretend she’s a tough bitch no one can hurt, and that’s the performance. And everyone buys it. It only cracks with Clementine. 

To me, that shows just how far gone she is. The others aren’t people, they’re “recruits.” They’re expendable despite the fact that the delta are supposedly at war and need people to fight. Lilly doesn’t want to see someone like Louis as a person because then she has to face the reality that she’s become a monster who believes cutting someone’s tongue out is necessary. She’s become the St. John’s who definitely didn’t see Mark as a person, and justified cannibalism with “all the dead do is eat people, it’s a waste! We were brought up not to waste, those folks were gonna die anyway, we do what is necessary to survive!” 

THAT is the kind of shit she’s going to have to face if you spare her and she’s alone again. 

It gets worse when she goes on about her father and it gives me this eerie feeling to hear the way she speaks knowing that Larry probably did more to traumatize her than just “he let our power get cut to teach me a lesson about turning the lights off, no more ice cream” like....... what the fuck bruh

I could honestly go on and on about Lilly as the main antagonist but I still have everyone else to cover, so I want to cover Abel next. 

Stinky man bad and that’s good

I think he’s another great character. The dude’s name is Abel and he smokes hand-rolled bible cigarettes. He survives losing an arm. He’s a fucking dumpster fire who spends most of his screen time getting the shit beat outta him. He’s a huge creep, and he looks like the kind of man who wouldn’t shower for a month but then drench himself in axe body spray as if that’s the same thing as bathing. 

But he’s a damn good character. I love that AJ is scared of him, that Abel is what AJ has nightmares about. It fleshes out AJ’s character while also establishing that Abel is scary. We meet him and you watch him approach Clementine and you just know this dude is a creep, you know he’s hiding something beneath the false chill he seems to have, and you know he won’t hesitate to hurt Clementine or AJ over some food. 

He also has no attachment to Clementine like Lilly does and he’s all “what the fuck is this??” when Lilly wastes time talking to her, trying to convince her to come peacefully. Abel is focused on the job and he’s got unfinished business with them if you pushed him out the window. Oh, speaking of which, the dude gets bit and survives because he either chopped off his own arm or he made it back in time for the raiders to do it... hate him all you want, but I’m impressed he survived. The dude’s like a cockroach- a scrawny, ugly little cockroach.

Also he has a magic shotgun that somehow misses Clementine but manages to hit AJ so that’s pretty cool. 

And the fight with him at the end of ep2 is soooo good. He gets his shit rocked and it’s great! Then the shot of him realizing he’s fucked as the Ericson crew surround him is *chef kiss*

His interrogation scene in ep3 where he breaks down, begging to not become a walker is my favorite from him. Like Lilly, he’s a piece of shit, but he’s at the point where he knows he’s going to die and everything hits him all at once. He talks about how it wasn’t supposed to end up like this and things got out of hand. The dude is broken, he knows he’s lost and all he wants is to be put out of his misery so that he doesn’t turn. 

He shows some humanity in the end and again, I know some of you don’t like it when antagonists do that, it’s so much easier when they’re one-dimensional and pure evil… but that humanity, that’s the beauty and horror of it! Abel’s an unredeemable piece of shit but he’s human and that’s scary. 

Minerva is not only a victim of the delta but of “uwu-ification” and it upsets me because she’s a fascinating, tragic character but the Minnie crowd are more interested in sexualizing/romanticizing her because they think she’s hot

....is the title of this section too blunt? Meh, I don’t really care.

Look, If you like Minerva, great. So do I. Even if you like the uwu-ification of her but aren’t pushy or obnoxious about it, then fine. I’m not criticizing you, I’m criticizing the “Minnie crowd” who are usually found mostly on instagram, but also on reddit, sometimes they pop up on here, and there are a few on wattpad and AO3. Or in my inbox under anon... I’ve gotten my fair share of Minnie crowd anons that were rather unpleasant.

I wrote an entire post about her and why I keep cringing at the Minnie crowd who seem to either toss away her trauma [and let’s be real, her character as a whole] because they feel it gets in the way of their fanon or they romanticize it because heeeeyyyy wouldn’t it hot if she and Clementine fought and then made out? Wouldn’t it be hot if she tried to kill Clementine and Violet?? CJ, you just don’t get it! Man, it’s soooo hot that Minnie’s tortured and sad and fucked up and feral and traumatized, like she killed her twin sister, let’s give her a new girlfriend to fix her trauma or turn her into a caricature to add some questionable drama to violentine~

Hm? What’s that about “a chip on my shoulder?” His name is Tim and he hates this shit, too, what of it?

Listen, I will never not have a bone to pick with the uwu-ification of Minerva, okay? I fully admit it. I think it’s an insult to the well-written character we were given and it only happened because she didn’t meet the flowery expectations of thirsty fans.

It personally annoys me that over time fans stopped caring about Minerva as she’s portrayed in the game in favor of turning her into a caricature who’s main character traits are that she likes girls and she’s mean. She is an excellent, complex antagonist with one of the most memorable death scenes in all of TWDG. She’s a tragedy. 

She’s an example of what the delta does to its recruits and.... I don’t understand how you can say you love her as a character when you erase everything about her except her sexuality just so that you can ship her with someone she canonically hates and attempts to murder more than once, or force her back together with Violet which Vi doesn’t deserve that, I’m sorry, but she doesn’t!  

Actually it kinda reminds me of what some DA fans will do to Anders. Listen, I shamefully, bitterly admit to being a serial Anders romancer in DA2, okay?  And uwu-ification happens to him and it makes my brain mad!

I know uwu-ification happens to most characters to some degree within fandoms and it’s usually fairly harmless. I’ve heard every counter-argument and excuse you could possibly throw at me to justify it with Minerva. And look, I’ve definitely taken part in uwu-ification of characters in the past and I’m not proud to admit that, I’m trying to be better at appreciating characters for what they are while not being overtaken by fanon, y’know? So I get it, but at the same time this is an exception where it makes me physically uncomfortable due to the attitude of the Minnie crowd and I hate it.  

Minerva's a goddamn tragedy. She was traded away with her sister and the raiders broke her! They broke everything about her!

Y’all wanted her to do a 180 and turn on the delta for us and that was never going to happen! We knew that from the moment we finally met her! She’s too far gone, she’s only in two outta four episodes, there isn’t enough time to develop a redemption arc for her! She wasn’t ever going to have a change of heart! She’s not the Grinch, you can’t just say some pretty words and then her heart grows three sizes and suddenly a years worth of brainwashing and trauma are gone! She is a broken person now who would need years of professional therapy and god knows what else to recover! She considers the delta, the people who forced her to murder Sophie, her home now, her FAMILY! She is a tragedy we were never going to save! 

She’s surrounded by a shit ton of walkers, shooting and chopping away as she watches the raiders, the people she now calls family, fall one by one. She’s yelling at the walkers to get away from them, she doesn’t give a single shit about the Ericson crew, she doesn’t even wonder where Tenn is. 

Then a walker bites her and she keeps going! A fucking walker bites off part of her face! And she just fucking shoots it and touches the wound! This girl was so far gone from reality that she’s turning into the undead herself but instead of giving up, she wanders through the forest, singing Don’t Be Afraid, all because she wants to find Tenn so that she can murder him so they can be with their family again and y’all don’t care! Why don’t y’all care?? Erase it, none of that actually matters!! 

She’s such a great, complex character but hardly anyone gives a shit about her unless it’s in the context of her sexuality. It is so goddamn frustrating that I know only one person willing to have a discussion with me about her actual character instead of just going “no, you’re wrong!” and then refusing to elaborate on why I’m apparently such a piece of shit for thinking clemerva is toxic. 

I just- what else can I say that I haven’t already said? This playthrough made me appreciate her so much as a character and as a “final boss,” so to speak, and knowing in the end that she got what she wanted because I chose to trust AJ makes my skin crawl and I love it. What a good consequence to that choice, as tragic and unfair as it is, holy shit. I take back any shit I might’ve said about it being a shitty choice, I was wrong and dumb. 

God, what a tragic antagonist, she’s so good and I wish she had more actual appreciation. 

Dude, Marlon’s pretty great ngl

I have an entire character analysis I wrote for Marlon already, so I won’t spend too much time on him.

I believe Marlon holds up wonderfully as ep1′s secret antagonist. He’s a great character and the writers did a great job of establishing him as friendly but cautious when Clementine first meets him, then elaborates on how he handles his position as the group’s leader. He’s stressed, he’s holding a lot of guilt, fear, and shame for what happened to the twins, and now he’s brought two more mouths to feed into the group. We get an idea of his longtime friendship with Louis, how he butts heads with Aasim over the safe zone, and how he handles his frustration and anger… as in he usually doesn’t handle it well and opts for the “everything is fine” route when things are clearly not fine. 

And I know I’ve said this a million times… but the final confrontation with him at the end of ep1 is perfect. The rain, the thunder and lightning, the confusion, everyone rushing outside to find AJ pointing a gun at Marlon who is covered in Brody’s blood, so many emotions and accusations being thrown around, god it’s so good. 

Though there is one thing that has changed for me after doing the replay after all this time: I’m glad Marlon died in ep1. 

I know that sounds terrible coming from someone who used to always go off about, “Man, Marlon should’ve been determinant! AU where AJ shoots him non-fatally and he survives the season! He gets kicked out of the school and picked up by the raiders and has a redemption arc!”

Not so much now. I think Marlon’s role as it is in ep1 is perfect. The only things I would change would be a bit more information on his friendship with Louis and the other characters commenting their feelings about his leadership. But other than that? They nailed it. 

This season didn’t need a Marlon redemption arc. Sure, it would’ve been nice, and I would’ve liked more Marlon just for Ray Chase’s performance alone. However, this season isn’t equipped for something like that which would need time and great care to do well. Three episodes wouldn’t be enough, and it wouldn’t be important enough for the overall plot that it’s entirely possible it would’ve ruined an already great character, or taken away from the other great elements of the story and its characters. 

Just like Minerva, Marlon was never going to get redeemed. He wasn’t built for that. 

His death is great, though. He, Brody, and Minerva have the best executed deaths this season for sure. It’s built up well considering it’s the confrontation in the rain that ends with a confession, only for AJ to shoot him in the back of the head and kickstart a huge conflict within the story. 

Marlon’s a great character, he serves his purpose well and once again, I found myself truly appreciating him for what he is rather than being butthurt that he didn’t get a redemption arc that wouldn’t’ve worked anyway. 

James is so damn interesting, where is his spin off story? Oh wait, Skybound nO, IGNORE THAT-

Dude, I fucking love James. 

This guy is fascinating as hell and if I had any faith in Skybound producing good content related to TWDG, I would ask for a spinoff story about James.... but they made the Clementine comic instead and so I’m politely asking them to keep their stinky, greasy fingers off of him instead. 

God, where do I even begin with James? How about the fact that this dude is an ex-whisperer who wanders around wearing walker skin so he can blend in with herds? He keeps a barn full of walkers as a means of “protecting” them from harm? because he’s so alone with his own thoughts and memories of who he used to be that it warped his perception of the walkers? to where he now views them as “something in between” and he believes being a walker sounds peaceful? and when you consider that walkers don’t think, they don’t remember, they just wander and eat and exist? that’s something that would sound appealing to someone so lonely and full of shame? 

Like… James is so sad. I feel bad for him. Even if I don’t agree with this idea that walkers have something human in them, more so because I hope they don’t, I still respect his wishes to not kill the walkers when he asks. I’m willing to listen to him explain how he thinks, and I try to respond as politely as I can while also keeping my Clementine’s attitude in mind. 

And he’s STILL sad in the end no matter what his fate ends up being. Either he’s stabbed in the back by Lilly and left to become a walker, or he witnesses a child kill Lilly and it breaks a piece inside of him where he loses it and tries to separate AJ and Clementine. 

Which can I just say that while I understand not liking James because he’s a hypocrite if he makes it to the cave scene, I can’t agree that it’s poor writing. 

Yes, you’re right, James IS a hypocrite and that’s the point! 

It makes sense with his character! He’s pulling the “I will make peace with violence” card and it’s irrational, it’s bullshit. It’s a huge breaking point for him. This whole time he’s been on about wanting peace, that walkers are something in between and that’s why he protects them, why he feels conflicted about giving his aid to Clementine to save her friends. It’s like he’s so worried and afraid that he’s going to revert back to who he was, or that others are going to become like he was that he’s overcompensating. It’s bad enough that it blinds him to the danger Lilly still possesses even if she’s down with a gun pointed at her. It’s as AJ says, James didn’t see what she did, he has little context for who she is, and he’s more concerned that AJ is the one with the gun. Though, I would argue that he’d still try to stop you if it was Clementine holding the gun, but either way. 

In the end, he’s either killed as your friend, or you’re forced to confront him as a friend turned antagonist and try to convince him that his argument isn’t as cut and clear as he wants it to be. 

I find him compelling and I love what they were able to do with him in such a short amount of time. 

Also, in my playthrough, I spared Lilly so James died and came back as a walker and I can’t look at him like that without remembering the nightmare that was half the fandom talking about how hot walker James is and how they’d let him eat them........ that happened and I wish I could pretend it didn’t hhnnngggg-

Rosie is best girl

Telltale giving us an animal companion and NOT killing her off for dramatic effect? Nawwww but it worked soooo well in MCSM with Rueben!

Oh wait, no it didn’t, Rueben’s death was hilariously bad. Whoops. 

I want to kick off getting into the Ericson crew by informing everyone that Rosie is best girl and I am forever thankful she survived to the end of the season. I love that they brought back Clementine’s trauma with dogs from S2 and allowed her to warm up to Rosie at her own pace. 

I like to think of Rosie as an apology to us from Telltale for what they did with Sam in S2... y’know, forcing us to deal with a smaller Clementine getting attacked by a dog and forcing her to either kill him or leave him to suffer.

Instead of that, we have Rosie who mostly chills out around Ericson, fights off walkers, bites the shit outta Abel, and goes on a fishing trip with AJ at the end. 

What else can I say? She’s a lovely addition, thank you.

Omar exists

Omar is a character who exists in TFS and really, that’s about it. 

I mean, sure, he’s the group cook and he gets shot and kidnapped, and he survives to the end, which good for him.

Yeeeeeeah so I don’t feel strongly about Omar one way or the other. The most entertaining thing about him is knowing his history as The Chef God Omar and how Telltale got in on the joke by actually thanking Omar in the credits alongside Clementine’s eyebrows. That’s a lot of fun. 

I do have my own backstory for him that I wrote forever ago but just Omar in-game? Meh. He’s there. He does some stuff. He survives. That’s about it.

Unfortunately Willy is a character I don’t feel that strongly about

I feel bad for not liking Willy as much as I used to while doing this replay. Really, he only becomes interesting in ep3 when we get development with him coming to terms with Mitch’s death. 

I don’t have any real complaints about Willy, other than maybe the chronic masturbation joke which was pretty cringe. Though the game still got a chuckle outta me for Clementine pointing at Louis like “Don’t you dare” when AJ asks what that is, only for Tenn to lean over and tell him anyway.

I like how Willy’s reaction to Mitch’s death was handled even if their relationship was severely underdeveloped. They’re both side characters so I give it a small pass, especially with showing Willy mourn and lash out at Tenn. I do appreciate how Willy came to the conclusion that it wasn’t Tenn’s fault and that he shouldn’t have shoved Tenn down, and he knows he should apologize. It’s good to see younger characters admit when they’re wrong, be sincere in their apologies and move forward in a better way. I also like that he takes over as the Ericson crew’s bomb maker, following Mitch’s notes and doing research in books, all that. 

Y’know, I would split the Ericson crew into two categories, with the first being the more fleshed out, essential characters who fill an important role, such as Louis and Violet. You can’t remove one of them without removing a huge part of the story. 

The second is the category Willy falls into, which is characters who are given a bare minimum of development but don’t carry as much significance, they’re there to fill a seat at the table during the happy ending. If you wanted to, you could switch characters around, or remove them, and not much would change about the plot. Willy could’ve died and Mitch lived, and things would’ve played out the same just with Mitch mourning Willy’s death then making a bomb to blow up the boat. 

Willy’s fine, he’s likable enough. That’s all I got. 

Mitch is.....not great uh oh what the fuck

.........................no seriously what the fuck?

Yeah, so Mitch isn’t a great character, and as I type that I can feel myself taking a sledgehammer to a huge chunk of the foundation holding this blog up. 

Aside from Louis and Clementine, y’know who was a big player in my blog content? Mitch! 

Y’know what other ship along side clouis had a big impact on my blog? Jamitch! 

Now I’m sitting here with a lot of questions.

He’s not a bad character, that’s not what I mean when I say he’s not great. No, he’s a fine character who fulfils his role in the game. He can be a dick, he’s the one who calls the vote to get Clementine and AJ kicked out, but he can also be quite funny at times. There is a moment of softness with him that you only get when you choose to burn Ms. Martin. It’s interesting that he knows how to make bombs... but then he dies so that we can have a kill count and it’s like.... huh. I remember being a lot more pissed about that.

His death is still dumb, don’t get me wrong. Running at Lilly like that was a stupid thing to do and it lead to a gruesome, painful death for him. 

But someone had to die and Omar wouldn’t’ve impacted anyone soooo.... Mitch got some development so that we’d feel bad seeing him get killed, a true The Walking Dead death. 

One thing that’s apparent to me now that I’m revisiting this after so long is how bloated my head was with canon, fanon, headcanon, “I don’t like this so it’s bad and it should’ve been this instead,” fixating on things outside of the game rather than it in, building off of each other and creating au’s....

It’s me taking off those rose tinted glasses to look at a game with characters I adore and knowing I only thought some of them were so great was because I projected my ideal version onto them. I have fics written about Mitch that explore his character because I liked him, he died, and I was like, “I don’t like that, I can fix it, I can fix everything I don’t like and then it will be better,” so I did. 

But now I look at Mitch and he’s in the same category as Willy, but he’s also just another tally on the death quota. He’s not a favorite anymore and that’s kind of a bitter thing for me to swallow. 

I will say, I’m still curious about the idea of jamitch as far as “what would these characters say to each other if they met?” but would I say it’s a big ship for me now...? Not really, and not just because they’re two characters who never canonically meet or because I no longer think them meeting would be interesting.... it’s just, I’m no longer attached to Mitch so any ships with him hold little appeal to me. It’s actually bizarre to go back and read my jamitch stuff because it doesn’t even feel like it came from me. I don’t think I ship it anymore.

Oh look, my foundation is crumbling, aaaaaaaahh-!

I like Mitch, he’s a jackass, he didn’t deserve to die, but he’s definitely not a favorite anymore and it gives me a lot of mixed feelings that I don’t quite know where to put yet.

Brody is… okay

So… it’s probably not a great sign when my favorite Brody scene is when she turns into a walker and hunts Clementine in the basement, huh? 

Here’s the problem with Brody… you only get more character development with her if you go fishing in ep1, which I never do. Because of this, my interactions of her consist of her introducing herself, then the next day she panics and calls me stupid for pushing Abel out the window… then she tells me the truth about the twins and Marlon kills her…. So I can’t say I’m invested in her character until we get down in the basement, and by then it’s too late. She’s another character who exists in this story to give crucial information before dying.  

But damn, fighting off walker Brody is one of the best parts of the game. The atmosphere, the guttural groaning, the thunder, moving through the dark with only a flashlight as a defense, wonderfully executed scene. 

Other than that, though… I can’t say she really compelled me. I even watched Violet’s full romance on youtube for her section, and it obviously included everything for when you go fishing and yeah, Brody’s nice and she does have a great purpose in the episode. You get a sense of loneliness from her but this scene isn’t really about her… well, it is but the main focus is on Violet and us interacting with her to help repair the relationship with Brody more so than the scene being about Brody herself. 

And yes, her being the only other person to know about the twins and keeping the secret with Marlon is interesting. You can tell she’s reaching a boiling point that Marlon’s trying to keep a lid over but the steam's rising, water’s boiling over, and Brody confesses everything to Clementine… then Marlon kills her and tries to pin it on Clementine. 

I do think there’s a discussion to be had about why Brody didn’t come clean before and what that says about her character. I just wish the game wanted to have that discussion a little more before she died. 

She completely points the finger at Marlon whereas he claims they’re in everything together. So, is Marlon lying or is Brody unwilling to accept she’s just as responsible for not stepping in or coming clean earlier? Did Brody keep everything a secret because she was scared of Marlon or was it to save her own ass? Perhaps some of both? I dunno, and I’ll never know because she died.

Oh, also... this is probably the point where I should mention my history as a briolet shipper.

I don’t think it’s a good ship anymore. 

You can’t hear it, but I’m laughing... I’m laughing because aside from clouis, all of my other ships are just crumbling and I can’t save them. 

Looking back I’m pretty sure I only shipped it because I felt pressure to give Violet a girlfriend after all the shit people gave me. Sure, I genuinely liked it at the time but let’s be real, it’s another case of slapping two pretty girls together and saying, “look, girlfriends” because we’re dumb and easy and like to pretend as if that’s enough... which I don’t believe it is. I hate when people do that and here I am... just slap a walker mask on my head and call me James because whoops, I did the thing I hate! I am shame! I’m trying not to do that anymore!

But yeah, Brody’s fine, she served the story fine, and her walker scene is bitchin’. 

TWDG where everything is the same but Aasim wears a shirt that says “wasted potential”

I’m actually kinda mad about Aasim. 

No, really, I’m mad. I still look at this dude in ep1 and say, “wow they really set you up as important and then did nothing with you, huh?” 

Because yeah, why have a character who pointedly challenges Marlon,  who you can choose to spend time with, who stood in between extremes when it came to the vote,  why set up an interesting character with pay off when you can just NOT do that? 

Why pay off his conflict with Marlon by having him act as leader, effectively leaving both Louis and Violet out of the leadership position to bring in more balance? I’m sorry, I know the Violet crowd hates me for saying Aasim should’ve been leader instead of her but I truly believe he was the better option.

I don’t like the direction of putting her in a leadership position because I believe that should’ve gone to a neutral party between her and Louis..... y’know, Aasim.  I understand a lot of people look at that as part of Violet’s arc of a not liking people to suddenly being in charge of a group, and fair enough, it should make sense but I look at the way she's written and I can’t help but think she’s not a good leader, I’m sorry. 

She doesn’t have the skillset and she doesn’t gain the skillset over time. Yelling and belittling people, not trying to level with them or see things through their eyes, not taking the entire group into consideration when having Tenn bring Clementine and AJ to the funeral, it’s not good and it unbalances things. 

Aside from Clementine, no one wants to talk to her when there’s an issue. It’s actually one of the funniest moments in ep2 when Aasim and Willy are arguing, Violet yells at them “guys, what the fuck!?” and instead of telling her the problem, they immediately turn to fucking Louis who is just standing there like “I don’t... you don’t have to scream at each other? stop looking at me, I’m not in charge??” They should feel comfortable talking to their leader but they don’t and that’s a problem! And it doesn’t even get better in ep3 because Clementine pretty much takes charge from that point no matter what! So?? What are we doin’ here??

“Oh but Aasim would be a bad leader because he got mad at Willy! He doesn’t have the skillset!” 

Character assassination might be too big of a term for this case... but I’d call this character abandonment, as in they set Aasim up for this position and then didn’t follow through with it so he’s left behind in a puddle of mud to sink slowly. 

In ep1, Aasim does show some leadership qualities in the way he puts the group first and develops back up plans. He challenges Marlon about the safe zone, he’s not unkind to anyone other than Louis, but you get the sense that that’s just their dynamic and it’s nothing malicious. Aasim’s responsible and he clearly cares about the group’s future. The dude keeps a journal to document everything so that they don’t repeat their mistakes. 

When it comes to Clementine and AJ, he isn’t blinded by his feelings of either “AJ murdered Marlon! He’s dangerous!” or “Marlon sucked anyway, it’s fine, I want them to stay.” 

He votes for them to stay because he knows Clementine and AJ are capable survivors and them staying increases their odds of surviving what’s to come, but he doesn’t just brush what happened under the rug or pretend it’s all fine and dandy. 

Don’t you dare tell me no one else stepped up when you made it clear Aasim was willing to stand up in ep1. His character made the most sense! Plus, he always ends up getting taken away by the raiders. If he were the leader, then that’s another blow to the Ericson crew- they’re without a leader once again, and now it’s Clementine’s turn to step up. 

But noooooo, instead we get “Oh uh.... I guess he has a crush on Ruby now... and he’s mean to Willy.... that’s about it. Oh and there he goes, getting kidnapped byeeee Aasiiiiiim~”

Nonsense, I say!

I like Aasim, he had a great start and no pay off. He and Brody were characters partnered up with Louis and Violet, suggesting they’re both important. Brody’s character had a pay off, and Aasim’s didn’t.... unless you count him getting together with Ruby as pay off but rusim is a bland ship. 

Yeah, I said it, rusim has very little going for it and I don’t know why any of us shipped it. I mean, they don’t talk to each other. We never get an actual conversation between them. They don’t flirt. They don’t have chemistry. He gets dared to give her a kiss and she punches him. She never shows any affection toward him and his affection toward her comes outta no where because they didn’t know what else to do with him and I think that’s a waste! 

The writers just pointed at them and said, “they’re holding hands,” and the fandom went “ohmuhgawd they’re holding hands!” because we’re easy and dumb and predictable!

They could’ve had chemistry if the game didn’t wait until the last five minutes to show them holding hands and feeding each other. Sure, it’s cute that they hold hands [though the feeding each other thing is weird] but any npcs could hold hands? Ruby could’ve held hands with Omar and I still would’ve gone “oh that’s cute.” 

Hell, now that I say that, Ruby and Omar getting together would’ve at least been funny after they set up Aasim liking her.... well, okay not funny for Aasim, but I would’ve laughed and I’m more important, buddy. 

Aasim is yet another case of this season almost having it but falling short. Should’ve had him replace Marlon, both Louis and Violet would’ve benefited from it. 

Ruby is great, I reeeeeeally like Ruby

I’ve always liked Ruby but I feel like this time around I truly appreciated her. 

She’s a character who teeters between the two categories I’ve talked about. She’s one of the more fleshed out characters in the Ericson crew, but she’s not quite on the same level as Louis and Violet, y’know? We see her consistently throughout the season, we learn more about her each episode, and she lives to the end to fill a seat at the table… where she spoon feeds Aasim and I quietly judge them for it. 

Ruby has one of the best introductions, too. She literally stomps up to us like, “��Bout time you woke up! yer little boy bit me! >:[ shoulda took a boot to his head!” and then she stomps away! It’s so good! Plus, AJ’s apology scene with her is sweet. 

Ruby’s a charming character with a lot going for her. She’s established as the groups nurse, she learned to patch people up from Ms. Martin and that scene where the two are “reunited” in the greenhouse is heartbreaking. Ruby was a little girl with anger issues and you feel her grief when she looks at Ms. Martin’s decayed and overgrown corpse and says, “I just wish I could make her look like she did.” 

It’s a great character moment to show us how deeply Ruby feels things, y’know? She doesn’t try to hide her feelings, she wears her heart on her sleeve and there’s no shame in that. 

She throws a party [”hootenanny”] in ep3 when we’re at our lowest point. She wants everyone together the night before a dangerous rescue mission so no one has to be alone and scared. Hell, she even tries setting up some games so they can laugh and forget reality for a little bit... only for it to bite her in the butt when she brings out the student records and the reality of how many students have died since the start sinks in, then Louis/Violet share their backstories and Ruby is just like “....I guess I’m not a game person, I’m sorry” like she’s so damn sweet, I can’t. 

I loved having Ruby around, what a great character. 

Weirdly, I don’t have that much to say about Tenn but I feel like I should since he’s one of the more important characters in TFS

I think Tenn’s a sweet kid albeit naïve and somewhat of a screw up, but I don’t think those flaws are “bad,” y’know? 

Lots of people put Tenn in the same category as Ben, Nick, Sarah, and Gabe and act like the flaws these characters carry are poorly written or straight up bad just because they don’t like that character. 

The character gets in the way and messes things up for the group, therefore they’re a bad character, all that. I disagree with that logic. A character can be a well-written screw up. I believe Tenn is the more well-written “screw up” of the bunch since he has a lot more time devoted to him and you never get the sense that the writers dislike him and just want to kill him off quickly. 

His potential death was well-thought out and makes sense for his character- Minerva’s beckoning him to come to her so they can “go to the place where everyone gets to be a person again,” like he knows she wants to kill him and he hesitates before AJ tackles him to the ground. He refuses to cross the bridge because goes back for Minerva and fights against Louis or Violet.

And yeah, people still give him shit because it’s easy to look at this and call him stupid rather than looking at the inner turmoil he’s going through in that moment. He’s witnessing his sister- who he thought was dead-  being eaten alive by walkers and he wants to save her even if she’s unsavable at that point. There is no logical thought, he’s not listening to Louis or Violet, Tenn has tunnel vision where his sister is at the end... but so is death and we don’t know if Tenn’s actually aware of that or not. 

Everything happens so fast, and a quick decision from AJ seals Tenn’s fate, as well as the fate of Louis/Violet. Someone has to die on the bridge, otherwise you’re going to lose both of them and it’s not fair, it’s bullshit... and it’s great as far as a scene and consequences of your choices go. 

For me, Tenn always dies on the bridge. Not only because I’m a selfish hoe who refuses to let Louis die, though I will admit that’s a pretty big part of it... but for me, it makes more sense for Tenn to die on the bridge rather than Louis or Violet. I hate giving Minerva what she wants, but my Clementine would trust AJ and that’s what leads to that decision... and it’s brutal. 

Tenn left a big impact on AJ, he was his first real friend and believe me, I see the appeal of the ending where Tenn survives at the cost of Louis or Violet’s life even if it’s not for me. 

Tenn’s idea that one day the walkers will be gone is a fun one, if not bittersweet. Sweet because it’s refreshing to meet a character who has an idealistic hope for the future, but bitter because that future may never happen, and if it does, it won’t be anytime soon. 

He’s a neat character to have thrown into the cast, as well as a tragic addition to the kill count. 

Violet and I have a long history together

Ruh roh, Shaggy, we’ve reached Violet’s section. I’m sure some of you scrolled right over everything else to get here and since you’re in such a hurry, allow me to not waste your time: 

In my opinion, Violet’s okay. For me, she’s at her best in ep1, but after that she loses me. I can’t even say I like her anymore because her character falls flat, especially in Louis’ route. But her route doesn’t hold up any better. I can’t help but compare her romance with other wlw romances in games I’ve played and they beat her out by an alarming amount... well, with the exception of Chloe and Rachel from LiS. Those two are some of the shittiest love interests I’ve ever come across and Violet is leaps better than them. So... a point to her, I guess. 

I don’t see the appeal of her as a love interest and it never feels like her scenes are hers. They feel more like things the writers jotted down and said, “hey that’s cute” but they don’t tie into her character well and I think that’s a waste. In fact, give Violet a “wasted potential” t-shirt, too, she and Aasim can be twins.  

There it is, take it and run. For the rest of you, allow me to go more into detail. 

And just as a note: when I refer to the “Violet crowd,” I’m not talking about ALL Violet fans. Like with the Minnie crowd, I’m talking about certain fans that irritate me. They’re the ones with an agenda to convince people Violet’s the only valid character/love interest/route in TFS while ignoring or romanticizing her flaws/mistakes in an unhealthy way but try to convince you they’re ideal. They’re incredibly hostile to everyone who disagrees with them. They’re the ones who have blown up my inbox for years. 

Violet and I have a long history together that goes- “Oh yeah, I love Violet, I just prefer to romance Louis!” to “I like Violet, she’s a good character but she has a lot of flaws, I wish I liked her romance as much as you guys do but I get it,” to “yeah, she’s fine, I like her...” to now where I’m like, “......yeah she’s not great, I don’t really like her.” 

I’m aware that my dislike of her has a lot more to do with the Violet crowd than Violet herself. Y’know, all the anons calling me names and telling me to delete my blog, the one time my discord server was spied on, and vague posts that would cause people to send me like “hey, I think this is about you :/” asks because of who it was and how the timing added up too well. Of course I’m going to associate Violet with that shit and that’s going to affect my overall opinion of her. 

I tried, okay? It’s not like I looked at the surface, decided I didn’t like her, and then actively chose to be an ass. I genuinely tried to see her the way Violet fans do but I believe this is just a matter of liking different things, y’know? 

It’s been a year, I went into this replay wanting to like Violet so much. I wanted to write this post like, “I finally get it, y’all! I love Violet and I love violentine! Hooray!” and then there would be peace, we’d all hold hands and sing together until dawn! ...but no, that didn’t happen, I’m sorry. 

I’ve been away from the shitty side of the Violet crowd, I don’t have pressure on me to be overly nice just to keep the peace in a thriving fandom or fear that my followers are gonna be upset that my opinions have changed or the worry that I’m gonna get Violet anons yelling at me to just admit I hate her and fuck off as if it’s important to them that I say it.

Which now that I think about it, y’all really did the self-fulfilling prophecy thing, didn’t you? Thanks for that, here’s a gold star for your effort⭐I’m sure it was worth it. 

And y’know, it doesn’t make any goddamn sense. In theory, I SHOULD like Violet. I should be more into her romance route but I don’t feel the chemistry and Violet’s character is another case of this game almost having it but not quite. 

And in the name of being fair, I even rewatched her full romance with Clementine on youtube [sorry, I didn’t want to sit down and do another 10 hour playthrough okay I had no time] because in Louis’ route I’m obviously not going to spend as much time with her. You miss a lot of information which results in her character feeling unfinished. 

But before I talk about her romance route, let’s talk a little about Violet’s cell scene in Louis’ route since my opinion has shifted on that: I don’t hate it for what it is because it does it’s job. 

Violet loathes you after you let her get taken. She hates and blames you for everything, then she attacks you so that you don’t fuck up again. Because her trust in you is completely broken, the consequence is she stays on the boat with Minerva only to be blinded in the explosion after Minerva ditches her. Her end card even straight up tells you she hates you. 

No, I still don’t believe she was brainwashed/tortured on the boat, I still think certain devs are full of it for that. If you wanna interpret the scene that way then you’re welcome to, just don’t get pissy when I don’t.

I feel like I shouldn’t need anyone who worked on TFS to tell me crucial information outside of the game rather than showing it in game. There are signs of manipulation from Minerva, and Violet’s clearly pissed off and in a vulnerable state after being captured. She’s been told that if anyone steps outta line, they’ll kill someone she cares about, so she complies. She’s bitter, she’s hurting, she feels hopeless and betrayed and Clementine is there to take the brunt of those feelings. 

If the intention of this scene was to show us she was brainwashed and tortured just as bad as Louis [because remember, the Violet crowd will insist this is the only valid interpretation] then why didn’t it? 

Why is she behaving like she’s just pissed off? Why aren’t Aasim and Omar as scared as they are when Louis’ gets his tongue cut out? Why doesn’t her end card say she was traumatized after her time with the raiders like Louis’ end card? Why does her end card say she despises Clementine? Why are you allowed to tell her off when you’re not allowed to tell Louis off in his cell scene? If Violet isn’t just mad then why isn’t that reflected in how Clementine treats her versus how she treats Louis in his scene? Why did you also need to blind her in ep4 if her torture was just as bad if not worse than Louis losing his tongue? Doesn’t trauma dumping onto Violet throw off the balance of things? Why aren’t you making it clear what happened like you did with Louis? 

You didn’t need to clear up what happened to Louis outside of the game so why do you have to do it for Violet? 

Oh wait, you did make it clear- she pissed at you, no longer trusts you, and she stays on the boat as a result of that.

The end consequence of not saving Louis is he loses his tongue, and not saving Violet results in her being blinded. Violet’s consequence just happens to come later, and because of that fans got pissed that Louis was maimed but Violet was “fine.” And instead of just saying, “There’s one episode left, wait and see,” certain developers got defensive and tried to appease players. 

If you look at the scene the way it was written, it’s good. If you look at it the way certain developers told you to, it’s poorly done. And you can argue with me all you want, this is one of those things that you’re never going to change my mind about. We can agree to disagree. 

Moving away from that, let’s talk about her romance route. 

I give credit to Violet in ep1. I genuinely like her. It does a great job of establishing her character and hinting that she’s a potential love interest. 

I still stand by Violet being full of shit that she didn’t know Clementine and AJ were staying in the twins room and used Sophie’s pencil box as an excuse to check on them after things ended awkwardly in the card game. I like that, it shows that she’s not really opposed to us being there even if having someone in the twins’ old room brings back painful memories. 

You can tell she hasn’t had anyone else to really talk to since the twins died as she ends up saying a lot more than you’d expect. This is a rare moment where I do feel some chemistry between her and Clementine as they’re sitting on the beds facing each other, especially when you have Clementine admit that she’s not great with first impressions or people in general, too.

I’ll even give Violet a pass for being a jerk to Brody. Yeah, it’s poor behavior. It makes things awkward when Brody is just trying to be friendly with Clementine only to have Violet throw in an unnecessary, sarcastic quip, but it’s the first episode. It’s good to establish flaws so we get to see growth. You understand why there’s tension, and Violet making things weird fits in with her whole “I’m not exactly a people person” thing.

Oh, and when you appeal to her against Marlon, he tries to manipulate her with his bullshit, “they were my friends, too!” and while I heavily disagree with bringing a weapon into the mess as that just escalates things, it makes sense with her character and acts as juxtaposition with Louis deescalating things by stepping forward without a weapon.  

So yeah, I actually really like ep1 Violet.... but then the rest of the season happens.

First of all, I love Minerva as a character but god does she hold Violet back. It’s always one step forward, two steps back with Violet and her deal with Minerva. The mentions of her ep1 were fine, but then it just makes me roll my eyes when I realize what they’re doing here. 

And to be fair, I think I’m just sick of the whole “queer girl love interest has an ex-girlfriend who causes trouble and gets in between the couple we’re supposed to root for” plot point in games and books that when I see it, I make a disgusted noise so strong that even Cassandra Pentaghast herself would be impressed. 

My grievances about that aside, I don’t care much for the star gazing. As a concept, it’s sweet but it never feels like Violet’s scene. I get that the bell tower represents the isolation Violet has from the rest of the group, and we’re supposed to feel special that she’d bring us there... but the mini-game fucks with the pacing and the scene feels disconnected from Violet. Hard to explain, but lemme try. 

I made this post about how I think Violet should’ve been into basketball and how a better alternative to the bell tower scene would be her and Clementine shooting hoops together, how an activity Violet’s interested in [and I mean genuinely interested in, she doesn’t actually know anything about stars despite what the Violet crowd claims and that’s why they make up their own constellations] would’ve benefitted her. The writers never seem interested in telling you anything Violet likes, it’s always things she doesn’t like or the things she sad about so it’s hard to get to know her. 

That’s the problem, I think. I feel like I never got to actually know Violet as a person during her romance and that’s a problem. I know her backstory, I know she’s conflicted about Minerva, that she’s not a people person, I know she cares about Clementine... but what does Violet like? And I swear on Andraste’s flaming knickers, if you say “chicken nuggies lmao” I’m gonna be very disappointed in you-

Ahem, I mean, what does Violet want? What aspirations does Violet have for the future? What did she want prior to the apocalypse? Why doesn’t she have anything to call her own the same way Louis has music? 

It’s like they focused too much on her deal with Minerva that they forgot to make her more than just a romance... if that makes sense? She doesn’t hold up on her own and I believe that’s a waste. Louis stands on his own as an interesting character outside of Clementine and Violet should as well. 

The walk back to Ericson starts strong with her admitting she was stupid about Minerva and how she tried not to care about Clementine. That felt like a good character moment... but her wanting to rename the school is meh. 

Again y’all, this close to an overall great scene but then it nose dives. She says Ericson never felt like home, she couldn’t picture it as a home, because of the name and then just decides they should rename it and it’s lame. I’m sorry, it’s LAME! Hate to break it to you, Vi, but the name isn’t the problem. You didn’t want to leave because of the name, you don’t want to stay because of a new name.

I like her freak out on AJ after he shoots Tenn, because yeah Violet it turns out excusing murder baby’s actions isn’t so easy when he kills someone you actually care about huh? But, her final talk with AJ at the end isn’t as impactful as it could’ve been, especially when compared to Louis’.

Speaking of which, love that double standard of “Louis is a shitbird for being mad at AJ for killing Marlon and taking two weeks to apologize, he put them in danger, Clementine would never date him!” and “oh my god let Violet be mad at AJ! He killed Tenn and she’s really sad about it okay! She doesn’t have to forgive him after only a few weeks, stop invalidating her feelings, THIS is how Louis should’ve handled things!” yeah because they’re the exact same character in the same exact situation therefore they should react and handle things the exact same, mmhmmm, you’re not full of shit or anything, go off.  

Huh? Wha- yes, I know Tim’s on my shoulder and he thinks it’s dumb too, hush-

Violet’s fine, she just isn’t for me and I don’t think that’s ever going to change no matter how much time passes. I wish I liked her more. 

Louis is the best non-playable character TWDG has given us, it actually makes me emotional

Look, this post is long. I still have Clementine and AJ to cover and a final thoughts section to write and I don’t have time to give you the in-depth analysis of Louis that you deserve, but I can give you a more tame version while linking some to other posts I have. 

Here’s a post diving into his actions in ep2 and why everyone hating him for voting Clementine out is really dumb, and a post ranting about how heartbroken he would be if the Clem comic were actually canon, and this T5F I did of my top 5 favorite Louis moments, and honestly just scroll through the Louis tag on my blog, there is so much that I can’t link without bloating up this entire post. I just... I don’t have time to give you everything and I don’t want to be more repetitive than I already am. 

Louis is my favorite character in TWDG across all games. I fucking love him. I was reeeeally worried that I would replay TFS and not be as invested in his character or route but oh my god, his story holds up so fucking good. I’m struggling to put it into words. Even today, Louis remains one of my favorite characters across all the games I’ve played and his romance with Clementine? I die, don’t bother burying me, just toss me into the ocean to be fish food, I cannot handle it-

If I were to make a tier list of all of my favorite male romances from games that I’ve played, he would still be in S-tier with my other absolute favorite male romance, Alistair from DAO. And given that I haven’t been around for about a year, this is a TWDG blog, and I haven’t been comfortable enough to begin gushing on my dragon age blog yet, you don’t know- you don’t have ANY idea how strongly I feel about Alistair fuckin’ Theirin, okay? You have no idea, and if I told you, you’d think I were a crazy person! Which fair enough, I may be BUT that’s not what we’re here to discuss! My point is, my S-tier has two slots and in those slots are Alistair and Louis, THAT is how well Louis holds up. 

Louis’ back must ache after carrying this season because without him, TFS would’ve been significantly worse... okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration. In reality, Clementine and AJ’s backs must also hurt because the three of them carried this season. 

I’m excited, can you tell I’m getting excited? I fucking adore Louis. 

I just- where do I even- I want to talk about everything but I can’t. From his introduction to his backstory to his romance route, I have few complaints. As a character he grows so much in a way that feels like natural progression and not once does anyone have to actually say, “Wow Louis has changed so much” because no one has to, we actually get to experience it. 

Louis starts off as fun but unreliable, he doesn’t take most survival tactics seriously which annoys characters like Marlon and Aasim, he values living among surviving and knows that any day could be their last so might as well make the most of it, even if that causes him to neglect chores and responsibilities. He’d rather keep his head down and not deal with conflict, he places all of his trust in Marlon, doesn’t ever question his leadership, and let’s face it, he’s a little dramatic. 

But god, he breathes so much personality in every scene he’s in. Even if he’s just somewhere in the background, you feel it. He’s a kind person who doesn’t want to fight. Disagreements, sure, he’ll have those with Aasim or Clementine, but he doesn’t want to hurt anyone. He doesn’t want the life they’re surviving for to be wasted away and sees the value in enjoying it. He plays piano and music is so heavily weaved into his character and I love what that brings to his backstory and the romance scene in ep2. 

Everyone gives him shit and he just takes it, y’know? This dude has self-esteem issues and that is one of the beautiful things about his character, he grows into someone you can depend on, someone who will step forward for what’s right, risk his life to save another. He begins to see the value in his abilities and it’s an uphill struggle for him. 

Louis, one of the kindest people at Ericson, was sent to that school in the first place because he caused the divorce of his parents over music lessons. He was a spoiled rich kid who didn’t get what he wanted, he didn’t want to hear what his father had to say, and he was vindictive. He calls himself that, he calls himself a “vindictive fuckhead” with so much bitterness, so much disgust with himself.

For a YEAR, this little shit used his father’s wealth to make it look like he was having an affair and made sure his mom saw everything. Then when they had a big fight, he played right into it. When the divorce was final, he fucking told them everything! That’s awful! Holy shit!

And so they dropped him off at this school and that was that. 

If you stay silent after he finishes the story, he even says he doesn’t know the person he’s talking about, it’s like all they have in common are the same name. He has so much shame welled up inside him for who he was and knowing that he’ll never see his parents again, never get to tell them he’s sorry. It’s so well-executed. 

Shocking, too. No one could’ve predicted that would be his backstory based on what we knew of him. Hell, most assumed he came from an unkind family and that’s where his self-esteem issues came from but nope! The opposite, actually! Wealthy family, loving parents, and Louis was a brat. 

I love it so much, and to get it after the build up of getting to know him for three episodes just.... to quote myself on one of my previous posts: “He finally puts it all out there and now Clementine knows what kind of person he was before he arrived at the school, what he was capable of before she met him. That wall [between them] is gone....  Louis knows first hand what can happen when feelings go unchecked, when resentment is held onto, when you don’t apologize or try to repair mendable relationships, when you’re vindictive and bitter and take it out on others. He’s been there and now he’s here, and he holds a lot of that with him. You can see he does in the way he talks about himself and struggles with confidence in his abilities.” 

and then he plays Don’t Be Afraid afterward, it’s beautiful, it makes me emotional seeing how glossy his eyes are and the way he looks up as to not cry, I can’t-

Another scene that I can’t get enough of is when you appeal to him in ep1 and he stands between Clementine and Marlon, hands up, and tries to talk Marlon down... even after a year, I STILL got chills. Appealing to Louis for help is so beautiful, it’s a beautiful scene of conflict. Louis knowing what the right thing to do is vs his loyalty/fear of Marlon, the way he looks at Clementine vs how he looks at Marlon, the moment where you’re holding your breath because it seems like he isn’t going to help you only for him to slid into frame to shield Clementine. Marlon realizing Louis chose Clementine over him, that the one person he thought he had control over has turned on him and with Louis, everyone else does the right thing and steps forward. 

And of course, “Your relationship with Louis has changed.” I CAN’T

Okay, another thing I adore is how much emotional depth Louis has. He can be incredibly funny, and he definitely plays into the persona a lot in ep1. Actually, one of my favorite things about both Louis and Violet are how their personalities subvert how open you’d assume they’d be with Clementine. 

Violet is presented as intimidating, closed off, bad with people, so you’d think it’d take a lot to get her to open up to Clementine when that’s not the case. The first time she and Clementine are alone [well, AJ’s there but y’know] she opens up a lot more than you’d expect with little effort on Clementine’s part, something that’s a trend in her route. 

But Louis is presented as friendly, talkative, and fun, so you’d think he would be open with Clementine right off the bat... except he’s not. Louis doesn’t tell you anything about his past that actually matters in ep1. He doesn’t tell you about his friendship with Marlon, his relationship with the twins, or anything really significant about him. He says small things like how he hates cantaloupe or used to like baseball. You know he likes music due to his introduction. 

In ep1, he doesn’t know Clementine. While he likes her well enough, he doesn’t trust her enough yet and trust isn’t easily won from him when it comes to that stuff. But then you go hunting with him, you choose to deal with the walker with him, and he opens up about his view on survival... then he sends you away because oops, too much sharing, too much chemistry. 

That’s the thing, though, you don’t get that one moment unless you choose him. Like... actively choosing him is a big point in his route. I know that seems obvious, but I’m serious. Every time you choose him after the hunting scene, he’s genuinely surprised. Appeal to him? Choose to help him with the piano? Choose to save him? Every time he gives you the sense that he’s like “...but why” 

He even questions you about it in the dorms if you saved him during the raid. You can straight up tell him it’s because he’s too important to you and he’s still shocked, then pulls a face like “.........but why”

I don’t want to sound mean about Violet, but choices where you choose her feel different, like she’s not surprised you picked her. Especially after ep1, it’s like it’s a given you picked her. She never questions, she never thanks, it’s just assumed “yeah you picked me, of course you did.” and it’s probably because she voted for you to stay, and that’s very different in Louis’ route.

He rarely offers up anything further until you pursue it. That’s a trend in his route. It makes the moments where he chooses to open up unprompted even more significant, like with the piano scene in ep2 or the reveal of his backstory in ep3, and especially the walk back to Ericson in ep4, THAT scene is so fucking good because it’s him finally fully opening up and letting Clementine in and hhhnnnngggggggg sooo goood~

One last thing I wanna bring up that I love: When Louis screams “FUCK YOU!” at Minerva in ep3.... it’s so fucking good. As I said before, Louis is such a kind hearted person, he never wants to hurt anyone and he beats himself up whenever he gets emotional and lashes out at anyone...... but in the cells, he’s fucking pissed. Like, we don’t even see him that pissed off after Marlon dies, and the closest we see him get that upset again is when AJ shoots Tenn. But even then, he didn’t tell AJ to fuck off, he just said, “what the fuck!?” and that’s very different. 

And I don’t blame him for being furious in that moment! He just heard all the shit Lilly said and Minerva just let everything happen. Now Lilly has AJ and they’re screwed.  Hell, he might even be missing a pinky finger now! And he just calls Minerva out on her bullshit and tells her to fuck off, and her reaction is just perfect. 

Oh and then of course, he shoots Dorian and it’s pretty rad... I mean, he doesn’t think so, he’s super upset about that one, too. But I thought it was great. 

As for Louis’ romance route, it’s just *chef kiss* holy shit.

I actually did a T5F on the top 5 reasons I love clouis that is still accurate and covers pretty much everything so I won’t get too crazy.... but lemme gush a little more please?

Their chemistry is fantastic, they bounce off each other so well, they’re not afraid to call each other out on their bullshit, they’re not too proud to apologize and move forward together as better, stronger people. Louis is great with AJ even after what happened to Marlon and that speaks volumes for his character. 

Louis never looked to the future until he realized he could have a future with Clementine and AJ and that’s why him asking her what their dream home would look like is so significant and Clementine always promised that she and AJ would have a home and they finally found one with someone who would do anything to protect them, someone willing to forgive, apologize, grow, and be emotionally vulnerable when needed, I just-

She carved a heart around their initials, he named the song he wrote after her.

I cry... I cry so much

another quote from myself on my T5F: “Their chemistry is strong, deep, and romantic, they powered through so much unavoidable bullshit, they worked hard for their relationship, they’re comfortable and not afraid to lean on each other when needed, they get comfort from being together but aren’t afraid to disagree on things because they know those disagreements aren’t stronger than they are. With AJ and everyone else at Ericson, they’re a family now rather that a group of misfit survivors, and they’re working to change things for the better for Ericson. I love everything about them and damn it, they will be happy together every single time I replay TFS because that is what they deserve.”

Now that I’ve ranted about how much I love him, what I’m NOT going to cover is the whole thing with AJ and the vote because I’ve gone on and on about that, so I’ll just say this: 

If you’re mad at Louis for his vote, valid. 

What’s not valid is trying to convince everyone he is solely responsible for Clementine and AJ getting voted out when he was not the only one who voted. The vote was brought up by Mitch, and it probably wouldn’t have been brought up in the first place if Clementine and AJ weren’t at the funeral. Louis is not responsible for Abel and Lilly showing up, and he’s not responsible for AJ getting shot. He’s not any less of a valid love interest for his vote, his vote makes perfect sense with what he is experiencing the morning after what he witnessed the night before. Stating that any relationship between him and Clementine couldn’t work because he voted against them as if it’s a fact is an ignorant dismissal of his character, his trauma, and his apology to Clementine and AJ, and your agenda is very clear. 

The endgame stats being higher for Violet does not mean Louis is a bad love interest, and no, Melissa Hutchinson saying she likes violentine does not mean clouis is invalid. You can tell someone is desperate to have their choice validated when they use a voice actor’s opinion as evidence in their argument to convince others that their choice is the only valid option and everyone else is wrong. 

We get it, you don’t like him and that’s fine, you don’t have to, but please don’t act as if people who do like him are in the wrong for doing so, and don’t try to cover it up with a “but I DO like Louis though I swear” because it’s transparent. Trust me, I’ve been there with Violet, I understand why you feel pressured to tack that on at the end of your “Louis is a shithead” post but stop, it doesn’t do what you think it does, I can tell you that from experience. 

At least if people were honest, I could go into their posts like, “okay they don’t like Louis so they’re going to be more harsh/critical of him,” but when they say they do like him after not saying a single nice thing, that just tells me you’re lying because you’re afraid of getting attacked. Again, I feel that, I’ve been there with Violet. It’s not fun. 

I also feel it’s only fair that I talk about the Louis crowd, too. Like the Violet crowd, they’re obnoxious and hostile toward everyone, their arguments are usually surface level, and they annoy the piss outta me. I don’t have as many bad experiences with them since we like the same character, but that’s where our similarities end. 

The argument is usually, “Louis is better because Violet’s such a bitch, she BETRAYED Clementine in the cells, she’s a TRAITOR! She’s using Clementine as a rebound and she doesn’t care about AJ and that’s why she stays on the boat with Minerva.” 

So y’know... lame, no nuance, no actual discussion or further explanation, nothing. 

Also I feel like the Louis crowd attacks Violet’s appearance a lot which is gross and a sign that their arguments ring so hollow that they can’t think of anything better to prove “MY choice is the correct one” so they resort to things that don’t actually matter and then act like it proves their choice is the right one.

“Violet? You did her route? but I think she looks weird, so you’re stupid.” 

Like... how is that anything? What is that accomplishing other than making you look stupid? 

But yeah, the Louis crowd hyper-fixate on Violet’s betrayal the same way the Violet crowd hyper-fixate on Louis’ vote. It’s treated as a smoking gun of “this proves that YOU are wrong and why MY choice is the only valid one,” but it’s not, it’s not a smoking gun, you’re just being a dingus. 

There is a difference between discussing how the reasons behind those choices made by Louis and Violet are a result of the inner turmoil and pain they’re going through and it causes them to make a mistake that they eventually turn around from and just.... “Louis is a shithead who voted them out and Clementine could never love him after that” and “Violet betrayed Clementine on the boat because she loves Minerva more and Clementine could never forgive her after that.” 

 Why y’all can’t just chill and agree to disagree, I’ll never know. 

ANYWAY... I don’t wanna leave Louis’ section on a sour note so here’s a reminder that he had a pet turtle named Geoff, he lost the 3rd grade spelling bee to the word “recommend,” and he still remembers his grandma’s phone number after all these years. 

God, I love him. 

Boy am I glad AJ didn’t get cut from this game

AJ’s still one of my favorite characters in this game and I’m glad his relationship with Clementine is at the core of this story.

He’s a fascinating character study and I can’t get behind the complaint that “oh but he isn’t a realistic portrayal of a five-year-old!!” like I’m sorry, do you know what a five-year-old is? They’re dumb and loud and if he was written that way, you’d just complain that he’s annoying like Duck was instead.

Sorry, Duck, love ya but you cannot deny that a majority of players hated Duck  for being a hyperactive child. Players would be like, “Gawwwwd when is this kid gonna die?? He’s annoying, I hate him!” when S1 was released. 

This is a game about zombies, okay? and if everything were realistic then AJ would’ve died in S2. Use your suspension of disbelief. 

I find AJ so interesting because he’s a child who was born into this post-apocalyptic world. He doesn’t know what it was like to live in a world before walkers. He never had a long-lasting, stable home and aside from Clementine, all of his other caretakers either died or gave him up. He’s grown up in a world that is cruel, unforgiving, scary, and where killing is normalized as a means of survival. Whether it’s walkers, animals, or other people, he learns early on that that’s just the way it is now. He knows how to shoot a gun and god, what a fucking thing to have to teach a child. 

Really think about the lessons Clementine teaches him, too. Some aren’t alarming, like checking for windows or always knowing where an exit is. But then you get into “Always aim for the head,” or “Don’t hesitate,” or the big yikes of, “Save a bullet for yourself.” 

I stand by the fact that AJ was in the wrong for shooting Marlon after his surrender, but c’mon, what did you really think he was gonna do the moment he got his hands back on the gun and saw the opportunity to “stop the monster” to protect Clementine and the others? 

Clementine isn’t perfect and she isn’t always right, but she’s doing her best to teach AJ how to survive the way Lee and many others taught her... but she’s forgetting that AJ is so young and he doesn’t have a fully developed concept of the world before. She also misses crucial point that Lee made with her when teaching her to shoot, like how if it’s a walker, then aim for the head. But if it’s a person, that’s different. Walkers are always the same, they always have the same goal... people aren’t that easy. 

Remember the fight between Javi and David in ANF? Clementine will either point a gun at David to stop the fight, or she’ll shoot him. She doesn’t aim to kill him, she doesn’t want to kill him. She’s aiming to break up the fight, that is a moment where killing isn’t necessary and would only cause more problems with those around her. Gabe would be distraught, Javi would react depending on how you play him, and Kate would freak out, too. 

If you choose to shoot Kenny to save Jane in S2, same thing. She shoots him to break up the fight, but the shot happens to kill him after you share some final words. 

Hell, the one time she does shoot someone in the head during a fight in ANF, it’s an accident [even though she knows better that to point a gun at anyone without the intention of shooting] and is treated as the wrong thing to do and you can either cover up her mistake or you can make her confront it by telling the truth. 

But then you have AJ who doesn’t have the context, that experience. He’s taught to aim for the head, so he does, and it’s a mistake. 

AJ shooting Marlon is complicated. He doesn’t realize he did something bad until everyone reacts and then he’s like, “....but I aimed for the head? Marlon was a monster? He was dangerous? Clem?” and you can either reaffirm that he’s justified, or you can teach him why he was wrong and about atonement. 

AJ doesn’t want people to hate him, he doesn’t want to hurt them or make them sad. He wants to make friends and have a home. He wants to protect Clementine the way she’s protected him. He has doubts, he doesn’t always know the proper words to explain how he feels, and he gets frustrated which causes him to act out. He wants to play games, and learn, and make connections with people. But, I can see why he would be scary, too. Especially with the way he talks sometimes. 

When he calls dibs on Abel, you can express how you don’t like the way he’s talking and tell him it’s not a game, and honestly I don’t think it’s a game to him. He’s had nightmares about Abel, he’s scared of Abel, he’s is a monster and AJ believes that if he can kill the monster, he’ll be gone and everyone will be safer. He’s expressing that in a worrisome way, though. 

Or the one some like to point at when arguing that he’s a bad character: when he says he liked killing Lilly. Yeah, not great, and it only manages to set James off more during that whole fight. But AJ explains himself that killing Lilly made him feel powerful [not a great sign] and it made them safe and that feels good. 

Plus, YOU told him to do it... I know y’all don’t like taking accountability for your choices when they backfire, I feel that, but he looked to you for what to do in that moment and you said to shoot, so he did and it set him off. Half a clip right into Lilly, whoops, betcha she didn’t see that coming. 

There is a discussion to be had about that choice despite it not having a right answer, but I don’t have time to go in depth so just know that I can see both sides. 

But both Marlon and Lilly’s deaths are pointed at as a “See?? AJ’s a bad character!” by the anti-AJ crowd.

Yeah funny enough there is a crowd for AJ but this one happens to be viciously hostile against him to where they go out of their way to argue with everyone that he’s “a bratty, stupid, annoying psychopath who loves murder and is badly written and that’s not even how five-year-olds act lmao you’re stupid” and just like the other crowds, they’re desperate for validation and it’s hard to watch as they make asses of themselves. 

Again, you don’t have to like AJ and you can be critical of his development and choices, but maybe harassment under the guise of “well it’s just my opinion” isn’t the best outlet for your frustrations. Just sayin.’ 

So much about AJ gets lost on those people, usually on purpose because god forbid we don’t always deal in absolutes, and it’s a shame to see a character that the writers put so much time and effort into be so underappreciated. 

Oh and on the opposite side of things, I do want to point out that flipping it so that AJ’s just a widdle uwu baby who should never held accountable because he baby and everyone else is wrong to dare be mean to him or Clementine.... is also not great. It lacks understanding and depth of the character or the characters around him.

To end on a happier note, another thing I love about AJ is how funny he can be. I mean, his apology to Ruby when you tell him to lay it on thick? When he excitedly informs Aasim that he likes fish? The fact that he interrupts your date to throw a gross ball at your head like “look what I found!!” The way he laughs at the Beat Nick joke but doesn’t understand it? When he catches you smooching Louis/Violet and is just like “what’cha doin’ over there??” 

He can be so damn funny. We tend to focus on the more serious side of his character but c’mon, look at his funny little dance during the party. It’s cute as hell! 

There’s so much I didn’t cover about AJ but like with the others, I don’t have the time to give you a huge analysis, I can only give you the things that crossed my mind as I was playing... which was also too much to fit in here but still. 

AJ’s great, I adore that kid, so glad he wasn’t booted from the story, thanks Telltale. 

God what’s there to say about Clementine? She’s complex, flawed, well-written and I adore her 

Alright, last character..... but seriously, what can I possibly say that I haven’t said before? 

I’ve written a lot of posts about Clementine, like this one about why I have her leave Lee in S1 and how that ripple affects her choices in TFS, or how I feel like putting Clementine up on this pedestal where she can do no wrong and saying players SHOULD agree with everything she wants [namely in ANF] is a disservice to the growth and nuance of her character, gone on and on about why I think Louis is the best option for her as a love interest and how that plays into her development, why her relationship with AJ is so important, why the damn Clementine in the comic doesn’t hold up-

BY THE WAY.... tangent, but I actually feel second-hand embarrassment for the Clementine comic which is a feeling I do not appreciate.

TFS Clementine and Comic Clementine are not the same character. I’ve experienced more depth sitting in the kiddy pool I bought my dog to play in during the summer than I experienced with the comic. My salt levels still haven’t gone down after writing that review... Amos deserved better, good god...

The comic rings hollow because it lacks everything that makes Clementine compelling in the games. You can tell it was written by someone who has only played through the games once or twice instead of a writer who worked on the games and understands the character. 

But forget the comic. It’s not canon anyway and if skybound tries to tell me otherwise, I will politely tell them I’ve agreed to disagree. And that they can go suck an egg. Politely.

Back to the one that’s actually good, I believe Clementine is one of the best characters Telltale ever gave us. She’s set a high standard for me when I go into other games. We’re lucky to have four games with her, and while I can’t say I absolutely love all four Clementine’s [I still have a lot of conflicted feelings about ANF Clementine] that’s totally fine because overall? She’s had a helluva bumpy journey and it brings me a lot of joy knowing she’s finally found a home and a family to care for her it. 

I feel a connection to Clementine’s personality this season. She’s come a long way from ANF [thankfully] and I love seeing her more balanced out as a hardened survivor who can be a goof sometimes. Having AJ back in her life brings out a softer Clementine that I missed. 

She cares so much, y’all. Clementine cares so, so much about AJ and everyone at Ericson that she’s willing to put herself in grave danger to protect and save them. She’s fought for so long, had her heart broken over and over again, has faced death every damn day, and now she finally has a home.

And it’s not even a question. Once her friends are taken by the raiders, she doesn’t even hesitate in telling everyone that they’re going after them, that they’re going to end this. 

Then after everything, she gets bit.

Oooohhhh the emotions I feel thinking about the barn scene with Clementine dying and AJ begging her to get up. But she knows, and even worse she knows that AJ now has to deal with her, either by leaving her to turn or by killing her with an axe and just

“I need you.” I CRY

Her bond with AJ is so good, her chemistry with Louis is so good, her determination to fight, her sense of humor, her moments of vulnerability... it’s all so goddamn good. 

Also, the Lee flashback with little Clementine. Look, after already being emotional during Louis’ song, only for it to cut to the train and hearing Lee’s voice again... damn it, they knew what they were doing and I’m so damn easy, it made tear up, okay? I admit it! 

I honestly don’t have that much else to say? This post is long enough as is so perhaps that’s a good thing. She’s amazing, a beautifully written character that I hold a lot of praise for. 

Lemme quote myself once again, this time from my review of the comic because this still sums up how I feel: 

“This isn’t like Clementine in TFS where you do feel she’s mature. She has to be, she has a child she’s raising and protecting. She has to be strong and smart for him. She has to be the adult in their relationship… but she has those moments of vulnerability to remind you that she’s not an adult, she’s a teenager who was forced to grow up too fast and it hurts.

In ep4 of TFS, when they’re in the caves after getting separated from the group, she and AJ get into an argument. She tells him that he’s just a child, and he throws it right back at her- “So are you.” and you can see it on her face… y’know?

You want her to be happy, you want to give back the childhood that was taken from her at the start of the apocalypse, you want her to overcome every obstacle thrown her way.  You understand her feelings about Lee, why he meant so much to her and why she struggled to let him go even after accepting that he was dead.

You remember that she is a teenager who makes mistakes, she doesn’t know everything, she fucks up. She’s doing everything she can to protect those she loves. You feel that she wouldn’t hesitate to give her life for the little boy she raised. She still has a lot of growing to do but you don’t doubt that she’s gonna do it..... TFS Clementine, amputation or not, she would’ve charged that damn boat herself if it meant saving those she loved.”

In conclusion: I still love TFS, even if things have changed for me 

Before I wrap this up, I do hope that everyone understands that my criticisms of characters, story elements, or of the crowds aren’t meant to be a criticism of individuals who may disagree with me. I'm not criticizing people for liking Violet or people who dislike Louis, or even people who view Minerva through an uwu-lense. I'm criticizing the terrible behavior from those crowds that make everyone uncomfortable and accomplish nothing.

Being critical of a character, plot, or of the fandom is fine. If a post is critical or even harsh toward a character, I may not agree and would argue with the points, but that's fine. I’m sure plenty of you will take issue with my points for characters like Violet or Minerva. We all have different interpretations and one of the fun things about fandom is getting to express that, to have discussion and debates, but it’s all in good fun. The point is never to intentionally make someone feel bad or to fight. 

It's when people get into guilt tripping, lying, gaslighting, name calling, using accusations of homophobia/racism against people not because they’re displaying those awful behaviors but only because they do/don’t like a character, sending hostile messages to people, or trying to convince everyone that their thing is the correct thing and the other thing is bad therefore they should feel bad, that's what I'm trying to criticize here when I bring up crowds. 

They’re an unfortunate part of the whole thing, every fandom has ‘em. What's sad is that crowds who would need to read what I’m saying in this section aren't going to. They're gonna scroll to the parts they know will make them mad and then leave. Oh well. 

I want to say that if you made it this far into an incredibly long post, thank you. If I had another gold star I’d put it right on your forehead and then give you a cookie, but I already used my gold star in a comment toward the Violet crowd and then Tim ate all the cookies, so.... sorry about that. 

The Final Season is excellent and I had a lot of fun even if I was conflicted with a lot of my previous opinions and work. I know I’ve somewhat moved on from TWDG and Telltale games, but hell, I’m still here. I’m not going anywhere for a while... after all, who else is gonna read the next two Clementine comics 9 times each to write in-depth reviews so you don’t have to read them yourself, hmm? No one, because they’re not ridiculous! 

But as far as consistent posting, writing fics, and doing themed nights, I have moved on from that. Not to say that I won’t ever pop in, y’all are always welcome to send in asks but y’know. I spent a long time working on this despite it being nanowrimo and I should be working on my project, but I still have some passion for this series that I wanted to share. 

It’s bittersweet, really. While I’m glad my ninja fam held up beautifully, I’m still bummed about the rest of the Ericson crew. Especially Mitch, god he was one of my favorite characters and now I barely feel anything for him, it’s sad. 

I will be home all weekend, supposedly working on nanowrimo, but if this post sparked something then feel free to shoot me an ask. I’ll answer a few if any come in, and we’ll see where it goes. 

If you want to follow me elsewhere, as I mentioned before I do have a dragon age side blog: @stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage, and then my main blog is @cj-writes-stuff.

Thanks y’all  💚

[abyssruler]

Hello! What are your thoughts on the other archons and how would you rank them in terms of how a good a leader they are/were? Love your blog <3

ahh archons, i love em so i’m glad you asked, anon! we haven’t met the other 3 yet so for now i’m only gonna be ranking the four we’ve met so far. so here goes! (disclaimer: this is just my opinion)

in terms of being a good leader, number one is, of course, zhongli.

a lot of people misconstrue his intentions during the liyue archon quest as him abandoning liyue and leaving them to fend for themselves. but that’s not it at all. he wanted liyue to become independent of their god and throughout the entire debacle with osial he was ready to step in should liyue prove not ready to fare for themselves. he was a good leader for liyue, he helped and guided its people from the beginning and taught them everything they needed to know so they can thrive. he didn’t want them to be too reliant on him, he wanted liyue to grow on their own and create a new era without him. he had done everything he can to prepare them. and like a parent sending their kid off to college, he let liyue become its own nation while still keeping watch from afar, as proven in the chasm archon quest.

now i’ve seen people mad about him ‘lying’ and saying he was useless because he refused to tell the traveler anything about khaenri’ah. but he was under a contract. him being the god of contracts, of course he wouldn’t break it for anything. i dislike it so much when people mistake his actions as him being uncaring when it’s evident he cares a lot about liyue and traveler, as seen from our conversation with him at guyun stone forest during his first story quest. yeah, he lied about not being in the chasm, but as stated earlier, he watches liyue from afar. of course he wouldn’t say he was there because zhongli the mortal would have no business being near the chasm during that time.

he’s honestly one of the characters that made me start playing genshin. i saw an art of him here on tumblr that looked amazing and i instantly liked him. in game first impression though? not very impressed. he seemed like a mediocre guy at first and kinda boring to me, even when he was revealed as the geo archon i didn’t really care for him all that much. whenever my friend gushed on him all i could do was 😐. reading fics of him really changed my opinion on him and now he’s one of my favorites. can’t ever imagine not loving that old grandpa.

second in terms of being a good leader is venti.

you can say all you want about him being a ‘lazy archon’ and ‘ignoring mondstadt’ during their time of need, but i’ll be side-eyeing you with a judging look the entire time. venti is so far from being a neglectful archon, like, yes he’s carefree and he isn’t as hands on with ruling like ei or zhongli, but he comes when his people need him and provides for them in the shadows. he didn’t rule mondstadt because he was lazy, he wanted them to be free and to live peacefully. the thing about ‘letting’ the lawrences enslave people and become tyrants wasn’t his fault. he’d been asleep for a thousand years, thinking they’d be alright without him, and when he came back and saw the state mond was in, he didn’t hesitate to help them. in the archon quest too, instead of letting the traveler, diluc, and jean fight dvalin all on their own, he went and fought with them.

venti has and always will have a special place in my heart. he’s the first person in game to catch my attention, and when we had to leave him in windrise to go to liyue, i was so devastated because i didn’t want to. mhy was so right for choosing him to be the first archon we meet because he just has that comforting aura about him. really my number one comfort character. the way he canonically thinks of mondstadt and its people as his children is so 😭❤️ i absolutely adore him and that will never change.

kusanali/nahida is at number three in terms of being a good leader. so you may be wondering, why not ei? i’ll answer it on her part.

so i was ambivalent towards her when she was first leaked, i had some gripes about her design and i thought i would remain indifferent to her when we meet her in the archon quest, but man, mhy did a great job with sumeru’s storyline. it’s become one of my most favorite archon quests to date. i know there’s a lot of issued regarding her design but you honestly can’t say you didn’t at least feel a bit of pity for her during the archon quest. she’s so intellectual while still being so naive, being a young god but still older than her people. kusanali isn’t a leader, she’s more of a guide to her people and prefers to hide rather than show herself. i’d say she has a low self esteem and constantly compares herself to the former dendro archon. the major reason why she’s so passive with regards to issues in sumeru is that she thinks that this is what the former dendro archon would have wanted and that she has no right to change that because she’s only a replacement.

she does help sumeru in her own ways, however small and unseen they may be. and even then, that’s probably how she wants it to be. if she had more courage and less doubts, if she showed herself to the public and dismantled the sages, she would be a good leader. she’s already empathetic to her people, all she really needs is the right push to take matters into her own hands.

overall, she’s adorable but not very leader material. i hope that changes and that she’s forced to be a more active archon in the following archon quests.

now, you’d think that being my favorite archon would grant her a higher position, but no, ei is strictly in last place in terms of being a good leader. i answered an ask a while ago on my thoughts about ei here!

yes she redeemed herself at the end of her second story quest, but the scars left behind by the sakoku decree and the civil war against watatsumi island aren’t so easily forgotten.

first and foremost, ei is a warrior. she wasn’t built to be a leader nor did she ever expect herself to govern inazuma because makoto had always been there to do it. to be so suddenly put into that kind of position would make anyone make a few mistakes here and there, but ei took it to a whole nother level. she was stubborn in her beliefs, she placed great respect in strength which was why it only took the traveler defeating her to make her think on her decisions. ei isn’t entirely heartless, but she forced herself to become unfeeling which led to the state inazuma was in when the traveler got there.

in her eyes, she thought she was doing what was best for inazuma. what she saw in khaenri’ah probably traumatized her to the point she became obsessed with the idea of eternity so inazuma won’t suffer the same fate as khaenri’ah. still, that doesn’t excuse her actions. she inadvertently caused her people to go mad, those whose visions were taken away were literally going crazy. she never resolved the issue with watatsumi, only put a bandaid on it and hoped for the best. she made sara do all the work on rebuilding relations with watatsumi island. she never truly repented for her actions, only realized she was mistaken and resolved to do better. that isn’t good leadership. she let the fatui do their machinations in inazuma, fully knowing how that would affect her people, yet she still did it. i love her, don’t get me wrong, but ei is a very flawed character. she’s learning though, which is better than nothing. she’s actively seeking to do better for her people and trying to understand them, however clumsy she may be.

i would have put kusanali at last place, but she didn’t ignore her nation’s civil war and let the fatui do as they pleased in her country.

[forest-babeys]

howly fuck that took long, uh

Hello! It is the mun!! After like.. way too fuckin’ long, they have returned! Your king has not abandoned you! Mun has found their password again- okay let’s just drop the mun 3rd person talk, this is serious.

So, where to begin.

I thought I lost this account for good after so many horrible things started happening at once. Breakups, familial death, mentally draining and abusive relationships, grooming, the WORKS, practically everything bad to happen to a young teen happened, but i kept on the down low so the blog could thrive. And it worked, I guess but I had a breaking point. And thus, 7 months ago the blog was left to collect dust without explanation. After a while, I wanted to come back, but..

yeah, i forgot my password.

In the end though, I suppose it was worth it, not having the choice to come back early. Without Tumblr I was able to focus on me for once. Improve, branch out, all the jazz normal artists do without the creepy creeps breathing down my neck 24/7 about what I should draw and how I should draw it. (You can’t really escape those anywhere, but holy HELL they were BOUNTIFUL in my time on tumblr) It was nice being away from some of the less than pleasant acquaintances I made and just.. starting fresh again. Off this damn app. Off social media period.

I guess you could say it was what I needed, to be away for a while. Maybe i should have stayed gone. But- in the end, I felt bad leaving everything behind. All of you askers, mostly. It was probably the right thing to do to get away from the app in general at the time, but..

Kitsune, Astronaut, Ghost, Screamer, and let us not forget the man, the myth, the anon, SkateBoard Anon, the thought of you all brought me back one last time. I couldn’t just rightfully leave you in the dark on my status. I mean, some of you thought I died, how could I just let you think that?? Anyways,

You guys built me up to be someone I could’ve never imagined being. I felt like I was someone when I came on this app, which is something I hadn’t felt in years. And even if my stories were bad, and I didn’t really have any clear end in sight, and there were several blogs before this one that I dragged you all through, i had fun with this. My silly little time on this app. I had an absolute blast doing it all with you guys by my side. This was my first taste of internet fame, and it was the best kind of fame a dummy like me could’ve asked for. A small app fame where the community i had felt like friends and family rather than strangers on the internet.

I want to thank you all for sticking through the ramblings and doodles of a sad, young teen and turn it into something a slightly less sad, older teen can look back on fondly. And if you’re still here after all of this, you are absolutely nutty, and thank you for caring so much about the artist.

Unfortunately, I don’t think I will be continuing the ask blog. It was fun while it lasted, but I think I wrecked this train the second i kept going after Millennial Tree Cookie was saved that one time. Slice of life should’ve stayed slice of life, really.

I’ll leave any other socials I own below in case you still want to follow the works of this ol geezer. I have to warn you, I haven’t gotten much better at the social media thing. And if not, then this is farewell.

This is the end of the Forest Babeys blog. I’m sorry it had to crash and burn before whatever “grand finale” I could make up was made, but I just.. can’t look at this blog the same way I used to anymore. I’ll still leave it up as always, new readers can come and go whenever they please and see the journeys we had, maybe come up with their own, better interpretations of what we made here. I leave that to you.

——

mun’s instagram (currently active) @konjkitkat

[melodygatesauthor]

So firstly, I make an effort to try and respond to every single comment. The only times I don’t respond is when the comment is in the tags (feels weird to reblog a comment like that since to others they only see my response to it and not the comment itself since the comment was in the tags and the tags don’t transfer to the reblog). The other times I don’t respond is if I missed it for some reason, which does happen from time to time.

Secondly, I appreciate the self awareness of what you’re saying. In my opinion, there’s never a reason NOT to reblog something. It’s so easy to make a side blog if my work is too 18+ for your main blog (which is what you’ve done and that’s amazing). I have said it before, I’ll say it a hundred times if I have to, AUTHORS THRIVE ON REBLOGS. There are so many people who leave likes and a comment and don’t reblog but that say they love our work or want us to write more and then they don’t support us. This isn’t coming from a place of greed, it’s coming from a place of care for the symbiotic community we all are part of. Reblogs tell other people who follow you: “hey, check this thing out that I like, you might like it too!” Likes are nice, sure, but they don’t help get the word out and bring new readers to us, and neither do comments.

It’s the same as the difference between telling a street artist that you like their work versus giving them some money for their performance. They appreciate that you like their work, but you’re not doing anything to support them. Your words and your actions are contradictory.

For some, the lack of interaction is enough to drive them away from Tumblr. I’ve literally seen it happen with some writers and it’s heartbreaking, especially when we’re asking for so little for the work we consistently produce FOR FREE. I’m not one of those writers, I’m going to keep writing regardless, but my frustration is still there. So anyway, I’m taking this opportunity to thank you and others who have recognized that reblogging is an integral part of this system and have taken steps to do what writers have been asking for. I hope that others can follow suit.

Just wanted to pop in and say I'm glad you made a blog to reblog from because it's getting really tough out here for us writers and we appreciate the reblogs more than I think a lot of people realize.

It's discouraging when I spend days stressing and combing over a fic to make it as perfect as possible only to have the smallest amount of interactions, so anyway. I just wanted you to know that your efforts are appreciated.

Hello! I’m so sorry, I’m about to ramble- So actually this weird crap’s been going on with this new blog lately and last week I had reblogged some fics and idk tumblr broke or something so they just didn’t end up being reblogged? And then I was having like zero interactions with any fics I had reblogged and it’s not at all like I expect a writer to comment back at my comment but it was just weird like I was getting zero interaction for weeks? I was really confused but thank god I reblogged some of your fics today so now I know that at least it worked for you and that you saw that I reblogged them, cause yeah like, that’s literally all I want ya know, I just want writers to get the support they fucking deserve! I wanted to be so much better than I was before, for so long I was just reading and liking a fic and occasionally leaving a comment and I was like dude wtf this is horrible, this is not helping writers at all so yeah I had to step it up lol I’m glad I finally realized it would be a good idea to make a new blog for 18+ content lmao. And yeah I want to support you and other writers, you guys are fucking awesome and you literally provide content for everyone on this website so you’re like totally saving our goddamn lives so the least everyone should be doing is reblogging and letting you know how we feel about your fics! Anyway thank you for sending this in!

And also ps, I do understand the feeling of not getting any interaction on a fic, even if only slightly, because I did in fact write one fic a while back but it was literally just for me and my friends in that fandom so it’s not like I was expecting a whole bunch of reblogs but still, it was amazing to get comments back from people saying they liked it so I can only imagine how you and other writers who write a lot more would feel when you must literally spend SO MUCH TIME writing like goddamn just, thank you for your service lol

[ruki--mukami]

Hello admin. can I ask a question ?

I wanted to see if you draw Yui and Rukiyui's ship as before? In the past, you used to draw a lot of art from these two people, but now, after almost a year has passed, I haven't seen any new art of Yui from you.

And it's also very sad that I see some of fandom completely forget Yui after joined OC and play roleplay. While she is the main character and heroine

Unfortunately, this is much more evident on Tumblr and many fandoms forgot Yui. But I see on Twitter that all the Japanese fandom appreciate Yui and always draw her arts. Almost all Japanese fandoms are more interested in drawing Yui than OC. Please don't get me wrong, I like OCs.

But I will be really sad if OC's role becomes more famous than Yui's and fandom forget her . I just want the fandom on Tumblr to care about Yui like Twitter and the Japanese fandom.

🧩 Hello, Anon. I've only been in the DL fandom for about 4 years and I haven't really seen what the Japanese side of the fandom is like, but I definitely still adore Rukiyui as a ship and I don't intend to quit drawing them altogether. It's undetermined when my next Rukiyui artwork will be since I mostly spend my days writing than drawing but I hope to draw them whenever I have the inspiration for that. I'm a busy adult too and have many friends I wish to draw for, their OCs included. So, it's less a thing against Yui/forgetting about Yui, and more so I've increased in popularity overall since my last Rukiyui art.

Back when I was drawing them a lot more frequently, I really didn't have many friends at all. No one to gush about their OCs with me, and not even anyone to talk about Yui with, either. Not to get overly sentimental, but it was a lonely time for me. I really adored drawing Ruki and Yui together because I drew her in situations I wished to see them in. For the longest time, I admired them silently while distancing myself from many people in the community for personal reasons. I can assure you these two did, and still do, hold a special place in my heart and they always will.

Also, I really do not think Yui is being forgotten whatsoever. Many, many people love her here on Tumblr. I already know for a fact whenever I did a Yui artwork in the past, that she would get way more attention than my art of the boys ever would. Why? Because Yui is seen through positive light as of right now. If you've seen my art, then you might notice the solo Yui artworks gain a lot of traction.

There are also many Yui accounts that are active in this fandom. I don't want to tag them directly since I don't want to bother people's notifications with this particular ask but @/yuikomorii is an amazing blog for all things Yui. You will see she gets hundreds of likes on everything the admin posts as well, from edits to analyses. This just shows that Yui is absolutely thriving.

There's also @/yui--komori who posts Yui-related content and a really active Yui roleplayer in @/diabolikxyui as well as @/yui-komori-ask and her new account. I suggest you check these out as well.

I'm sorry if my words come off as rude or defensive but, back to the topics of the friends I've made here, I also have LOTS of wonderful besties who draw me all kinds of things even when I didn't ask for it. One day, I really, REALLY want to repay them in some way with an art of my own. This involves their OCs.

And please also remember that this is a Ruki-focused blog. The only consistent thing here on this blog is that everything involves Ruki. That means he will interact with both Yui and original characters. There is no favoritism here on this blog, whether you are a canon character or an original one. That's one of my main purposes for making this blog, after all: so that all can interact with Ruki. This is a safe place for everybody.

I'm sure Yui, if she existed, would support an inclusive idea like this. We all pride her on her kindness and pure heart, right? I just want what's best for everyone. It was never my intention to offend anybody with the lack of Yui content here. If you check out my archive, you'll see there are at least 75 posts under the "Yui Komori" tag. That alone is a lot of content to read if you haven't already.

The reason why people make their OCs in the first place is because they want to forge their own story and live vicariously through their characters. Not all people want to do that through Yui, which is completely okay. All my friends adore her, but they don't resonate with her, if that makes sense? As in, they'd rather project through their OCs than her. Let's try to be supportive of both sides here.

Ultimately, I can assure you that Yui Komori will never be forgotten or disrespected on this blog. At least, not out of character, lol. Because we know Ruki can be crazy sometimes. 🧩

[skepticalarrie]

hey allie! i guess this ask isn’t much of a question lol but i’ve recently come back to tumblr (and really all things involving hl) and even if the time i’ve invested in them have decreased through the years bc of uni and life in general, i don’t think there’s anything that could ever change my mind about them no matter how many stunts have come our way.. lol if anything the fact that the stunts are still happening kinda proves our point! after taking a break last 2020 and your acc is one of my first stops since my hiatus to do some catching up so i’m glad to see that even though most of my old mutuals have kind of slowly disappeared, yours and a couple familiar blogs have remained..

speaking from experience, dealing with annoying stans are easily one of the biggest reasons why people up and leave social media but checking up on some larrie accs on twt on a new account, there is a growing circle among hl stans that do not deal with stunts and babygate. i left my old account and cut off any contact with previous mutuals on twitter bc of our difference in perspective so i have no one to ask, but do you know how and when the shift happened? it was kind of interesting that for the same reason i could have been eaten alive on twitter is exactly why that side of the fandom is thriving now.. (i know it’s kind of an unspoken rule to not bother with annoying twarries so i totally get it if you don’t end up answering this ask, just curious ^^)

Hey, dear. First of all, welcome back 🥰

I could be wrong but I think your question, in general, is more directed to twitter stans behaviour, and I don’t think I’m the best person to answer that but I can try hahaha. What I’ve noticed through the years is that yes, there are more annoying fans now than there were before. The environment has become more hostile towards larries each day and the constant doxxing and bullying discouraged a lot of larries to stick around and actively blogging, although they still support HL.

I think babygate was the thing that tore the fandom apart years ago and, quite honestly, that’s what still does. So maybe that is the reason a lot of larries choose not to engage with it. I mean, talking about stunts is usually what makes our replies and asks to get flooded with hateful comments and regardless of how we take that, it’s a heavy subject loaded with very dense discussions. Closeting, homophobia, PR relationships, marketing moves, fake pregnancies… I mean, it’s not for everyone and I can’t blame people who are just trying to have a good time here instead of engaging with these topics. And as time goes by, it gets deeper and there are more questions left unanswered. It does tire you up.

Plus, the pandemic brought a lot of new fans, and many different kinds of perspectives and expectations. I think a lot of people became frustrated when they realised that this post-pandemic era - where Harry has the most annoying pr relationship ever and is stunting non-stop, and babygate is back with full force - it’s a pretty bad scenario stunt-wise. Harry is more famous than ever, Louis’ fanbase skyrocketed and his career is finally taking a path he seems happy with. And the stunts are still there, we’re still punching bags. So maybe that’s the shift you’re referring to, people are tired.