#it is actually bonkers the kind of fics i've seen

[vadersaber]

there's been a little bit of talk again surrounding dark fics, particularly for joel miller, and i think we should discuss some things.

these are just a few people who have addressed their concerns this past year regarding dark fics. others i have spoken with privately & they'd like to remain anonymous.

and why is that?

they're afraid of publicly saying how they feel about these fics. they are afraid of possibly being bullied by writers of such fics, which is INSANE. the fact that the go-to response when someone is critical of someone else's work is to bully or be mean or laugh in their face and say "it's just fiction lol just don't read it" is INSANE. being critical of someone's work DOES NOT MEAN they bully the writer or the fic itself and IT DOES NOT MEAN that they are being "the fandom police".

there does seem to be a huge influx of mostly dark fics in the tlou fandom. not sure why that is, but regardless, people may write from a place of trauma that they experienced themselves or from a place of simply wanting to explore the dark genre, and that is okay. it's very valid.

me personally, i don't really get how writing about your favorite character and non-con is any way helpful or good, but that is the way that I feel. it has nothing to do with the people writing it. i find it very, very odd, but again, that is how I see it. they see it differently, and that's okay.

maybe it would be more productive if writers who do post dark joel content would give an insight into their thoughts & ideas for those fics if they are asked about it or if the topic comes up. it would be interesting to understand their pov and such, instead of being met with bullying, mockery or being called names & harassed because they disprove of incest/SA, like it recently happened to one of my mutuals.

i think there are way more fitting characters to explore for dark fics but i understand why it is explored for joel; he suffered the biggest possible loss & has a rough past, so it does make sense from this pov to explore what would happen if he'd go down a darker path. but once again, before anyone gets mad, this is MY opinion. i don't think portraying joel, a caring, protective man, as a stalker who assaults you & makes you afraid of him is any way hot.

however, that is not to say hey, stop writing this. write whatever you want, tag it & warn it accordingly! but also try to understand & remember that when people say they are triggered by these fics, that they find them bizarre or gross etc. they are not attacking you. it's how they feel, and retaliating with bullying over their personal feelings is not helping the matter. it makes them more afraid to speak up or even be a part of the community they once loved.

[gffa]

Dearest gffa, you are the only person I know whose been reading Batfamily comics. (Though I do read some of the fanfic haha). The destiel meme informed me that Bad Things just happened in the latest comics. Is there a primer to the latest drama? (Everyone seems upset). Are you ok?

Best wishes, your fandom neighbor on Star Wars Street

I assume this is about the Batman #148 leaks? I haven't seen a ton of drama (other than a couple of posts, including the Destiel meme notification that got me to go see what was happening) but if that's it, it's kind of funny, because okay. As far as I've seen (the issue isn't even out yet, so I can't read it until tomorrow, I'm only going on the leaked panels I've seen) what happens in the issue is that Failsafe-- okay, let me back up. In the current Batman run (written by Chip Zdarsky), awhile back Bruce created a super powerful robot that was meant to be activated in the case of him going rogue so that it could take him down, and it's very coldly logical, based on his patterns, so it knows him extremely well and is hard to beat. It's powerful enough that it apparently took out the Justice League awhile back (I haven't read that arc yet, so take that with a grain of salt), which means now that Failsafe has gone rogue in the current Batman series that Zdarsky's writing, Bruce is having a hell of a time fighting it, especially with his "backup personality" Zur-En-Arrh (Bruce is a paranoid shit and I love him the most) is also running amok in his head and he's fighting back against that. Back up further--in late 2023, there was an event called "Gotham War" that was basically, "Bruce has been through a lot of shit lately, so he was out of commission for several months, in that time Selina stepped up in Gotham and started training crooks to be cat burglars instead of rogues' goons, Bruce woke up, thought this was bullshit, despite that crime was down, and they basically had a turf war while Bruce was losing his goddamned mind because of what he'd been through and because Zur-En-Arrh was literally ratting the bars of the cage of his mind, and part of the fallout being that Bruce dosed Jason with a gas that basically made his adrenaline go wild any time he would do anything dangerous, so that he could no longer be in this life of crime or vigilantism, because Jason had killed a lot of people, but Bruce couldn't bear to send him to jail, so this was the only way he could live with taking Jason out of the life they lived". Gotham War was extremely controversial--I had fun with it, because it was BONKERS and I fuckin' love bonkers stuff in the "punching people in the face solves crime" genre, but a lot of people were really angry about how Jason was treated in the arc. Zdarsky co-wrote Gotham War, so this is a continuation of a lot of people's frustration and anger towards how Jason has been treated by DC especially by this author.

There's also a lot of lingering frustration and resentment in fandom because Jason is not always written well or frequently. He doesn't have his own solo book these days, half of what's written about him is written by authors with VASTLY different takes from the other half of the writers out there, and there's a lot of fanon that goes around with Jason's sub-section of fandom where I think it furthers the divide because the fic that's written about Jason delves deep into his character in specific ways that the canon doesn't match and I think it can set expectations for some fans that are just not matched by DC themselves, either because they see Jason differently or because Jason just doesn't have a lot of fans at the company itself, I couldn't say for sure. So, now comes Batman #148 leaks (it's not actually out until tomorrow), where Failsafe kills Jason and Bruce has a dramatic reaction to it, and a lot of people are furious that DC would kill Jason at all, much less with such little fanfare, after how little focus he's gotten over the last several years. The thing is, though, that Jason doesn't stay dead, he's alive again by the end of the issue (I've seen panels from later in the issue) and I'm not sure how many people are reacting just to seeing the posts flying around fandom versus how many people have actually seen the whole context. Because context is slowly rolling out, but people generally aren't soothed by that, given the lead-up to this moment. Basically, years of Jason not getting much focus in the comics + the events of Gotham War have led to a powderkeg of a situation and the contextless leaks (ie, without the panel where Jason's alive again) took a match to the whole thing. And that's what's going on, as far as I know! I personally am having a great time because I was extremely skeptical that they would actually kill Jason without any fanfare and also I like Jason as a hot mess with crunchy relationships with people and that he's done bad things and had bad things done to him/been a victim as well, so all this messy drama in the story has me living for it. (This would have been a very different situation if I'd thought Jason was really dead, but I didn't, so I'm doing fine right now. Also, my Blorbo is Dick Grayson, so I've already been through this wringer and I'm still mad at DiDio for it, so it's Jason-Blorbo's time now.)

[hellofeanor]

Fanfiction Author Interview Game

Fanfic writer interview

Tagged by @niennawept. Thank you!

How many works do you have on AO3? Ten??? That sounds fake but okay.

What’s your total AO3 word count? 709,876

Your top 5 stories by kudos/likes:

Distance, Space and Time (technically a series but I'm counting it as one story here because it's late and nobody can stop me): very standard Tony/Loki canon divergence.

Ghosts in Amber: something I wrote because Crimson Peak made my so angry I had to fix it.

Window to the Soul: the only explanation I have for why this is in the top five is that it was the first thing I ever posted on AO3?

Hallmark Christmas Movie: exactly what it says on the box.

Counterpoint: everybody's favourite genre: a 17th century baroque music AU!

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? I try to but unfortunately I am uhhhhhh bad at things?

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending? Huh. This is a good question. Um. I don't know if I've ever written an angsty ending? Maybe Ghosts in Amber, which is technically a happy ending for the protagonists, but not necessarily due to happy circumstances?

What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending? For reasons that I hope are made obvious in the title, Hallmark Christmas Movie.

Do you write crossovers? I've considered it a few times, but never really got into the idea.

Have you ever received hate on a fic? LOL yes, one time somebody went through an entire fic of mine and left negative comments on almost every chapter. I have to admire their commitment to the bit. I don't have the time or inclination to bother leaving hate comments, and also I know how to use the back button when I come across something I don't like. The last comment was something along the lines of, "I don't know if I'll bother reading the sequel." MY DUDE, why did you bother reading past the first chapter of this one if you clearly dislike it so much??? Kids these days, SMH.

Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Sssssssssssometimes??? (I say, eyes darting nervously down to the task bar and the open document icon of my terrible Mirdania/Sauron WIP.)

Have you ever had a fic stolen? Yes, but in a totally bonkers way? Somebody took screenshots of one of my fics and then reposted it on tumblr as a series of low quality JPEGs??? I have no idea what that was all about. The internet is a strange and wonderful place.

Have you ever had a fic translated? Yeah! One into Russian and Japanese, and more recently somebody asked if they could translate one into Chinese, but I haven't seen the finished product come up yet.

Have you ever co-written a fic before? No, but that might be something fun to try in the future.

What’s your all-time favorite ship? I... don't know? Probably my two OCs, about whom I will never write anything. :)

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will? Fuck. The Gods of All Things. I know exactly how I want it to end, but just can't bring myself to get back into the bloody MCU fandom.

What are your writing strengths? Dialogue and jokes.

What are your writing weaknesses? Actually writing at decent speed.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic? I'm not a huge fan, and will only do under specific circumstances, such as conveying that somebody in the scene (and by extension the reader) isn't meant to know what's being said.

What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to? Elrond/Gil-galad. Sigh. I complain a lot about how this ship isn't nearly as popular as it should be, while sitting here doing absolutely nothing to further it.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written? Hallmark Christmas Movie. It's so dumb. I love it. However, due to minor swearing and allusions to sex-having, I really should have titled it Lifetime Christmas Movie.

Who else wants to participate? @elrohare? @littlethingwithfeathers? @lordgrimwing? @plotdesigner?

[ewanmitchellcrumbs]

Let's spread some positivity! Tag some of your fellow content creators here and let them know why they are absolutely amazing!❤️

This is a really sweet idea. I'm going to put my list below a cut, because it will be long.

@em-writes-stuff-sometimes - honestly, Em's fan fiction is better than actual published books I've read. You should be doing this professionally, bub, not publishing it for free for us morons on Tumblr. I'm forever amazed that someone with your brain wants to pal around with an idiot like me.

@valeskafics - your tenacity and the sheer volume with which you are able to write will never cease to amaze me. You're a powerhouse, Babybel. You don't have a masterlist, you have a fucking library, it's incredible.

@barbiedragon - your modern Daemon has me in a chokehold. You're also one of the few writers flying the flag for Vizzy 3 and I gobble up everything you write for him like I'm a shark and you've put chum in the water. Can't wait for Kinktober to see what you create!

The rest of this list is just ordered by date of when I followed the person, and expresses no particular favourtism:

@flowerpotmage - not quite so active in fandom anymore, but they're one of the few writers giving gender neutral readers some much needed representation, and their Aemond and Daemon fics are amazing.

@paintb0x - an amazing artist - some of the best I have seen for Ewan and his characters.

@sapphire-writes - I love Jo's modern AUs and her ability to put my heart through the wringer!

@timetravelingpenguin1066 - Eli is one of the sweetest people I've ever met. An incredible gif maker and a great fic writer.

@aemondx - Sili's gifs are wonderful and the kindness she dedicates to this fandom by making icons and headers for people is admirable.

@alicentive - Killy's gifs are insane and I love that she writes for the characters that don't get as much attention from fandom.

@marthawrites - Midnight Passages, you will always be famous.

@exitpursuedbyavulcan - Studious, my beloved. UPDATE WHEN? (sorry)

@targaryenrealnessdarling - I would die for Liz. She's not just an insanely talented writer, but an all round amazing person too, she makes this fandom a much nicer place to be.

@st-eve-barnes - Eve is out here giving the Aegon girlies the content they desperately need. I love her Aemond fics too!

@bottlesandbarricades - one of the funniest fuckers I've ever had the pleasure of speaking too. Only has one fic, but it's a banger, and her edits are unmatched. I will never get over space buns Aemond.

@toms-cherry-trees - more content for Peaky Blinders than HotD, but the Aemond fic is gold.

@just-some-random-blogger - a Daemon girlie, we love to see it! If entertaining reblogs were an Olympic sport then Hani is taking home the gold. Her fics are bonkers, and I love them.

@humanpurposes - Gee's writing is top notch, some of the best Aemond fics I've ever read.

@assortedseaglass - Hilde is one of my favourite writers. Ever. She could write instructions on how to put together IKEA furniture and I'd eat it up, she's that good.

@oneeyedvisenya - another of my favourite Aemond writers. Education is one of my top five fics of all time. So well written.

@lya-dustin - the speed with which Juli produces chapters is mindblowing. All Is Bliss is a great series.

I can only tag 20 accounts at a time, so I shall continue this in a reblog. I wasn't lying in previous ask, when I said my appreciation post would be phonebook sized.

[lil-melody-moon]

Melody, my dear? Tell us 10 songs that remind you of 10 different people in your life 🤍

10 songs that remind me of 10 different people... I hope you don't mean people I know personally, because I will mention someone I don't know, dear Anon <3

Love Ain't for Keeping by The Who - I hear it and I think of Keith Moon right away. Could be because that was the song that made me listen to The Who or it might be because of the lyrics that I associate with my feelings to him or maybe both, it's hard to tell.

Total Eclipse of The Heart by Bonnie Tyler - I associate this one with my mom. She's a big fan of Bonnie, heck we both are, but this is the first song I heard by Bonnie and the first song that mom played for me when I was tiny. So that's my mom's song <3

Tea For One by Led Zeppelin - dad's favorite, he goes bonkers when he hears it, as in the volume goes up and there's no way somebody will turn it lower. Also the first song by Led Zeppelin dad wanted to show me and he kind of did. I just wasn't swayed by it until I grew up enough to let this masterpiece carry me with its notes.

Hysteria by Def Leppard - song I associate with @jimmysdragonsuit13 She brought me into Def Leppard and this one just makes me think of her each time I hear it. I love this song btw, but shhh...

Hey Joe by Jimi Hendrix or any other song by him - makes me think of Anja. She loved Jimi to death, actually the last fic that I wrote for her was with him, she loved it a lot. One big happiness for her in the last few weeks <3

Lazy by Deep Purple - this is @fiammee song. Whenever I hear Jon Lord playing I think of her and her amazing drawings I've seen published here. She's really talented, go check her blog out!

Tangerine by Led Zeppelin - I associate this with @groovyysav Not only for her deep love to Robert Plant, but the vibe of it I somehow associate with the vibe she gives. Country peacefulness with a lot of love and yapping <3

Boris The Spider by The Who - this is a stupid association, but our friendship is stupid as well, so @juliearchery107 that's the song that makes me think of you because of your arachnophobia XD

Love Never Dies by Julian Lennon or any other song by him - @peaceloveandstarrs is such a big fan of him that it's difficult for me to not think about her when I hear his songs.

Girl's Eyes by The Who - and maybe that's a bit not by the rules of the ask, but I can't help it. This song hit me like a train when I heard it and so, this is the me song, as in, I think about myself when I hear it. Simple lyrics, nothing too big of a song for this band, but I've never felt so called out by a song. So it gets a spot here <3

[lesbiansforboromir]

Okay so I'm not sure if I missed something while reading the silmarillion and what not but, when it comes to the fic I read I noticed a common trend, author's make elves go absolutely bonkers over children, like, they view children as precious gems to protect and value etc but was this ever stated in any of the published works or is this just a prevalent headcanon? I've seen it literally everywhere and I'm starting to question my sanity.

So, what I assume such ideas are being extrapolated from is the various canons we have surrounding elven birth. It's been most specifically solidified in the recent NoME book, but we had something approximating these canons before scattered here and there, though not in the Silm as far as I recall.

Essentially elves tend to give birth as a group, choosing a 'time of children' during peace and settling down to concieve, birth and raise those babies. Mothers also apparently have like... 40 year long post-partum depression and self-isolate for this whole period which is insane to me but to keep on track, this all makes elven children kind of 'rare' already.

And then we come to the third age, in which canonically elves have kind of stopped having children, at least the Sindar and Calaquendi. They're all too depressed by living in a world that has decay and pining after Valinor to get in the mood for child rearing, panda ass people. So all this creates a kind of scarcity to elven children that one could assume would make them pretty excited to meet a few, and protective of them.

HOWEVER I actually fully agree with you, like there is a negative amount of evidence to say that elves treat their children any better or are any more protective of them than anyone else. It's not like the feanorians displayed particularly child-valuing behaviours! And since the 'higher' elves by the third age already know they aren't staying and are just kinda messing around until they decide they're ready to go to heaven, it's not like maintaining a population with new generations is a priority to them. So yes, once again, this is a kind of vaguely canon-inspired piece of fanon that just falls into the 'elves are the superior race' narrative as far as I can tell.

[cha-melodius]

Fic Rec Friday Fun

Yeah it's not anywhere near Friday, but my weekend was bonkers and this is the first time I'm sitting down in front of an actual computer since Friday morning. But I'm definitely still doing this! Thanks to @rmd-writes and @three-drink-amy for the tags!

So wanted to get some hiatus rec lists going and encourage some self promo in my friends so how about sharing your top fics no matter how big or small - give us the links to your wonderful words with the Most hits/Most kudos/Most comments/Most bookmarks /Most words/Least words

What's wild about my AO3 is that each of these is genuinely a different fic, which seems to make me kind of unusual! Everyone else I've seen with these has a decent amount of overlap on top stats.

Most Hits: Do You Promise Not to Tell? (The Mandalorian, CaraDin) Written after the first season, this is a kind of crazy canon-at-the-time continuation that took me deeper into Star Wars lore than I ever thought I'd go (and will ever go again lmao). Also fun fact I think this is the last long fic I didn't plan out, and I'm kind of amazed it's still reasonably coherent.

Most Kudos: What Makes A Good Man (Loki Series, Lokius) The little 5+1 Art thief/CIA Agent AU that launched a novel-length series. Amazing that I thought I'd get away with just this fic at the beginning.

Most Comment (Threads): A Good Man Is Hard To Find (Loki Series, Lokius) The aforementioned novel-length continuation of the art thief/CIA agent AU, where Loki is now working with CIA.

Most Bookmarks: Nova, Baby (RWRB, FirstPrince) CIA/MI6 Agent AU! Are you sensing a theme? Apparently my spy AUs are popular lol. I just love reluctant partners to "I'd die for you" to lovers (yes, usually in that order).

Most Words: Love is a Losing Game (TMFU, Napollya) My beloved 1960s chess AU; Napoleon and Illya are rival chess grandmasters competing in tournaments and falling in love. I still think this is the best thing I've ever written (it also has the highest bookmarks/kudos ratio!). My only single fic to top 100k.

Least Words: It's Your Birthday (The Mandalorian, CaraDin) I have a drabble collection and a few ficlet collections, but this is the single work with the least words (648). A little fluffy birthday fic in which Din gets a gift for Cara.

Again, not anywhere near Friday, but if anyone else wants to jump in on this little retrospective, tagging @cricketnationrise, @orchidscript, @sherryvalli, @14carrotghoul, @mirilyawrites, @loki-is-my-kink-awakening, @dewdropreader, @heytheredeann, @adinarj, @nicijones, @afewbulbsshortofatanningbed

[cursedwithwords]

What if mpreg in hp fics works magically sort of the same way magic works pre-hogwarts like how Harry willed the glass to disappear to release that snake, or how Neville bounced safely to a stop after he's thrown from the balcony (bonkers example i know but bare with me here). So basically what I mean is when they're shagging maybe one of them is like "well if you wanna make me pregnant you better try harder" just a random throwaway comment but they both get into it and uh-oh, should've been more careful after all cuz magic can be unpredictable and if they want it enough it may actually happen.

Wait I kinda love that. I've seen mpreg through potions and spells before but that's kind of delightful. It's the whimsy for me 🤌 I may actually adopt this headcanon, thank you anon.

[sehtoast]

soooo…..ben’s thoughts on web weaver? IM SORRY THAT WAS LIKE MY FIRST THOUGH WHEN HE SHOWED UP 😭😭😭😭

Hehehee i love you for asking this anon!  I’m not exactly sure yet how Ben would feel about webweaver since we’ve only seen him boof drugs and black out.  With what we’ve seen of him, I think there’d be a healthy layer of disdain with perhaps a touch of sympathy that he’s such a mess.  Like the sloppy coworker you can’t help but appreciate for their whimsy but also would love to keep a distance from since they’re so out of sorts. Extra hard on the keeping a distance bit since they're so parallel to one another given they're both arachnid-like supes and it wouldn't be hard to blend the cross streams in the public eye. In fact, now I wonder if I could play with some fun lore with my little in-verse JJ parody I've been cooking up in my head and have there be instances where Ben's reported as doing some wild shit but it was actually Webweaver, and maybe JJ has to do retractions-- idk, lots of fun to be had with these guys.

I do imagine Ben would go bonkers if he found out WW has an ass spinneret. Side note, is that his only spinneret???? How does this man swing from anything? Does he like.... swing from his ass? Do ass webs have the tensile strength to support the weight of a full grown human? Kind of baller, not gonna lie.

I think it’s funny to see him now and see what a hot mess he is after writing a fic where Homelander slaughters WW for trying to compete for Ben’s seat in The Seven.  Seeing him now, I doubt he’d ever be a candidate 😂😂😂

[thisliminalspacedaydreams]

For the fanfic writer asks let’s do M A and R for our names lmaooo

Hellouuu

M: What’s the weirdest AU scenario you’ve ever come up with?  Did it turn into a story?

I think TISAYCTM. I've always loooooooveeddd a good soulmate AU. The Star Wars fandom was overflowing with them, there were SO MANY I couldn't even read them all, but god knows I tried. So I really wanted to write my own little version of soulmates AU but I wanted it to be original and not like the other girls.

I've seen the Hanahaki disease trope, the tattoo trope, the sparks fly when you touch trope, the A/B/O trope, and they're all fun and games, but and I wanted it weirder.

I was reading Plato's Symposium at the time, and I love aliens, and it kind of started from there, the idea of having monsters/aliens/humans as soulmates and being separated by Gods because of their power, long ago.

And it just...SNOWBALLED into whatever the hell I'm writing now.

A: Of the fanfic you’ve written, which is your favorite and why?

My fave solo fanfic is Heartless, even though she's full of holes and I'm editing her to all hell as we speak because I see all of her flaws and I want to fix her and make her all pretty.

My non solo fave is currently under works and I hope to god we get to release it at some point because it's been something I've been loving for a year, and we recently started writing it and I think it might become my best duo work, when it's done. I hope so anyway.

R: Which writers (fanfic or otherwise) do you consider the biggest influence on you and your writing?

There are a few fics out there that are written in a way that drive me bananas.

Choices is one. @sophsicle writing was the one to push me into writing fiction again. I think they have such a weird effortless beautiful way with words that cannot be replicated. It's so simple but always somehow packs a punch and I don't know many long stories where all the words are needed and everything matters?

Pledge is another by @ellabesmirched. The writing there is also phenomenal and so different from what I've ever seen. I couldn't believe my eyes as I was reading that fic. I was drawn into the world and the characters and I think there is something about how the intentions are rarely really explained, and it leaves a LOT of room for interpretation for the reader, and I love that stuff. I like not being spoon fed my fics.

Annihilation by had me sobbing because the writing is bonkers???????? and I actually will never recover from this fic. NEVER. The companion fic was just as crazy. This line comes from Apocrypha : The man’s eyes are the sort of incomprehensible color that’s only ever mentioned in descriptions of horrors and God.

I don't know what to say. It's insane writing.

Living in border lines and every work by inthesquare @aboutnavi is so criminally underrated. There's an effortless poetry about her writing that strikes me just the right way.

There are SO. MANY. amazing writers everywhere. In all the fandom spaces I've ever been in, there are at least ten or twenty writers who I think are absolute game-changers. These are just off the top of my mind, but that doesn't diminish other writers' worth.

I think the beauty of fanfic writing is that it's so obviously un-edited and so much less palatable than "mainstream" fiction, which makes finding writers that are original and weird and wonderful much more easy than through mainstream books where books are edited to all hell and (imo) all end up looking the same.

I like the rawness of fanfic.

Yes. Give me your brain movies. That you thought up in your mind. While pretending to care about your 9/5 job.

This ask game

[mischief-and-tea-by-the-sea]

Fanfic Writer Emoji Ask

✅🫢🥰

✅ What’s something that appears in your fics over and over and over again, even if you don’t mean to?

Food and cooking. I don't know that I ever started out planning on food/cooking being in my fanfics - it certainly didn't show up in the early stuff, the pre-Marvel stuff, but once I wandered into the X-Men/Avenger traffic lanes, I found it trickling in. Bobby eating strawberry ice cream (a lot - seems to be his preferred - even in X2 in the dickfruit scene with Logan, he's eating ice cream right out of the carton, and if you look really closely, it's Baskin-Robbins strawberry) and popsicles. Logan eating the WORST things when he's got pregnancy (it wasn't mpreg - it was Emma's telepathy because Logan pissed her off, he wasn't actually pregnant) cravings or when he's got no taste because his soulmate connection with Scott hasn't kicked in. Tony trying Logan's pregnancy cravings in the fic where Thor tries peanut butter for the first time and reacts to it like a golden lab getting peanut butter stuck to the roof of his mouth and freaking out and thinking Loki's cursed the peanut butter. I have a whole bakery AU fic that I went bonkers out of my way describing pie and bread and cookies and pastries. Big Sandwich Night is all about constructing a giant sandwich as a holiday tradition. Bonding over food is HUGE - either ordering massive amounts of take-out or cooking big meals together, the food is important as a symbol of feeding the found family's comfort with each other. In another, Tony learns that his college roommate Loki knows how to cook, and he gets to help in the kitchen over Yule when Loki and Frigga fix a meal together. Restaurants are thoroughly researched - I know where so many good-sounding (and sometimes really fuck off expensive but not always) restaurants are in so many cities, and I've seen their menus, and choosing those places and the meals are just as important to my fics as the actual characters.

🤭 Do you have a favorite tag to use when posting your works?

Ones I tend to use a lot are "[Character name] needs a hug" and "[Character name] is a good friend/boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife." I don't know if I have a favorite tag I use, but those are pretty regular ones.

🥰 How do you feel about reader interaction? Are you open to receiving questions about your fics?

I LOVE reader interaction - IF the readers who are commenting are being encouraging, positive, kind, enthusiastic, emoji-laden, key-smash excited, and if they tell me actual things in the fics themselves that really got them laughing, crying, screaming. If the readers want to comment with hate bullshit or con crit or to tell me how I'm not using punctuation to *their* standards, nah, they can pass me by. But the people who just want to love on the fic I post for free will be given free unconditional love and a metaphoric kitten. I'm always open to receiving questions about my fics! Sometimes it makes me think of things in a way I hadn't and will open the door to more creative brain moments in the future.

Thank you for your asks!!!!!

Fanfic Writer Emoji Ask

[dimiclaudeblaigan]

I'm glad you're talking about the whole fandom perception of Dimitri and Claude’s relationship thing, because a lot of time people say stuff that's just... wrong? Like I don't understand where they get stuff from.

Claude being a flirt/"experienced". Dimitri being hostile towards Claude. Dimitri not trusting Claude (and vice versa). Claude using Dimitri for his own gains.

Literally none of this is anywhere in 3H??? But a lot of the fandom (either inside the dmcl circle or just the general fandom) seems to have just... made assumptions about their dynamic without actually LOOKING at how they act around each other (or even just as general characters). Like you might would think Dimitri wouldn't like/trust Claude becaudr of how Claude acts or that Claude uses Dimitri if you just looked at their bare bones characters.

Really saps the enthusiasm to read from authors I don't already know get their characters right, because I want to read dmcl for... Dimitri and Claude’s relationship, not Dmitri and Clawd know ehat I mean?

I don't either. I think it's more what they want him to be like versus what he's actually like. For their relationship, same thing.

I wouldn't be surprised if some of these people just didn't play both routes, some of them didn't like one of the two or some just wanted to slap on their kinks for them.

Normally I don't mind when people just have wild perceptions as long as they don't downplay other people's views, but a lot of them from what I've seen do downplay other people's views and treat their views are The Right View. In general that's a huge problem in Houses' fandom, but with dmcl it's especially tiring because I want to enjoy a ship I really love (probably more than any other ship out there at this point), but then I see people who treat the characters like they didn't even play the game.

If people mention in a fic they wrote like, this is ooc because I just want to write this, that's fine. I don't care what people want to see happen and write in their fics. Unfortunately it seems like the "my way or the highway" people got a bunch of other people to go along with their "this is how this ship actually is" ideas and now there's a bunch of people like that. It really doesn't help when some of them as seen as "fandom authority" in the respective ship, so whatever they like people go along with (and yeah, that's unfortunately a big problem in the dmcl fandom).

Personally I never write characters outside of their actual behavior. Like, sure, I personally hate EdeIgard, but when writing Dimitri I understand that he has mixed feelings because they're step siblings and he cared about her as kids. Even if he's my favorite character, I wouldn't want to write him as totally bonkers levels of ooc so he could do what I wish would happen and things like that.

Modern AUs and stuff it's mostly whatever and a free for all so I never really minded those. That's kind of a situation where you can just let your creative outlet do the writing and alter things as needed (I myself prefer changes as long as they can fit somehow into the character/their story and readers can be like oh hey yeah I could see that, so I do that for my own writing). It's when I see canon based concepts where for some reason they make the characters have this strained relationship that they never had, and it didn't come from canon so I guess somewhere along the way someone wanted to write their relationship their own way and it just... got picked up on?

My main annoyance is that the most popular idea of their relationship seems to be a very toxic, unhealthy relationship. That's just... not my idea of loving this ship lol. If I wanted that, they just wouldn't be the ship I would go for. Even in Dimitri's darkest moments, he wouldn't kill Claude just after announcing he wanted any enemies/anyone who stood in their way killed.

Other than one or two people having that as their determined writing/viewpoint of the ship and people taking to it and it becoming popular, I really don't know how else that general view of them got like it is.

I just wish people wouldn't shove it in other people's faces and laugh at other shippers who view the characters/relationship differently basing off what they see in canon (which yes, I have outright seen on Twitter), acting like it's/they're stupid. Mind you, it's always the people who have warped perceptions of the characters/their relationship who say things like that and push others away.

Kind of dryly ironic. Some of the people who enjoy the toxic relationship perception are in fact toxic people. Do I know this from experience? Why yes actually. Most unfortunately. 😒

[beansterpie]

For the character bingo: Griffith, Farnese, The Fool, aaaand your favourite Eyeshield 21 character, whoever that may be.

<3 <3 <3 tyyy for the ask! most of which I will putting under a cut because this is quite long lol so GRIFFITH:

Oh were to start <3

Griffith is such a wonderful character who's been living rent free in my brain for the past? Several years?? But I also haven't encountered a character who incites quite so much vitriolic hatred like he does, especially considering that he's written to be quite sympathetic imo. The amount of terrible takes out in the wild web is bonkers, thus the 'everyone but me (and my friends) are wrong about him' and 'done dirty by the fans'. Regarding being done dirty by the creators, that's still up in the air-- depends on how his arc ends. But seeing as the whole moonbaby thing uh exists, I think my choice is valid.

I love Griffith and Guts equally, in large part because of the way they orbit one another, so they both work better as a dynamic (which each other <3) and he's one of the two best characters in the work imo. There's so much wrong with this boy, but I'm adamant that he's never done anything wrong ever in his life, and this opinion really IS like swinging a bat at a hornet's nest lmfaooo. Fight me about it!!

That being said though, in large part because of his Issues™ and Actions™, no I would not want to meet him irl. Even if the eclipse didn't happen, he's just too intense and messy man, I don't wanna deal with that. I just wanna watch and poke him from afar.

FARNESE

Farense is one of those characters where I really like her potential as a character, but I'm largely disappointed with how she turned out lol. I think her initial character traits were really fascinating, and quite unique! Plus her complicated relationships with her half brother is also really frought with tension, but then halfway through her personality basically does a 180 and all the things that were interesting about her mostly up and disappear. AND, so far anyway, the issues between her and Serpico have just been left hanging. So yeah, loved when there was something deeply wrong with her, and never want to meet her because of it, so I like the version of her that I wish she had been.

THE FOOL

It's them!! I love the Fool (or Beloved, his true name), he is so precious. He is put through so much shit, though that isn't the reason why I think he was done dirty (well, not the only reason). That's for lack of follow through with FitzFool as a ship lmfaooo I just wanted them to be happy together and I was so mad to learn that doesn't actually really happen. I would love to see the Fool in every book in the series, and to be more prominant in the ones that he IS in because he's great and that's that. And he really DID nothing wrong ever in his life, and I'm not even being all that tongue and cheek about it lol. Usually characters who are just Good™ can be a bit boring, but he's just such an endearing mix of mischevious, mysterious, and genuinely kind, that I can't help but love him.

EYESHIELD 21 CHARACTER: HIRUMA

YA-HA BABEY!

I've been rereading es21 lately and ugh, I love him your honor. He's kind of a strange character to describe, because in a lot of ways he starts off less as a character and more just this narrative force of nature that exists to make crazy, badass things happen since our protagonist is like, the meekist of meek in personality, and nothing would happen if it was left up to him lol. But as the series progresses you do see glimpses of his humanity, and he loves football!! and his friends!! And he's just UGH so over the top but so relatable and inspiring? Weird combo but there it is.

But yeah he is a difficult character to capture I think, because bluffing is like breathing to him and he's also at least half a loonytoons character. (He and Bugs Bunny should really hang out) So while I have definitely seen good depictions of him in fic and art and stuff, I also see looootsss of stuff where I'm like 'he would NOT say/do that' hfhfh. Plus I have specific hc's about him that I'm pretty adamant about. Also he's the fandom bicycle, and I think the ships are all fairly valid, but the really popular ones are the ones that I actively don't ship so.

He is such a fun character, but I would hate to meet him in real life because he'd probably blackmail me into doing menial jobs for him with no reward soooooo that is also why there are many things wrong with him lol. He's the kind of character that works because the story he's in is also really over the top-- if you met him in real life, he'd just be in jail.

[grey-lark]

Hi! U might have seen me lurking but I just wanted to shoot u an ask and say, JU is one of my absolute favorite fics I've ever read for so many reasons. It's such a heartfelt and kind character study on top of just a well paced and thought out retelling of the show, Steve is flawed and sweet and funny and just Good, with such a bonkers way of thinking and it makes me love him so much more than I already do (which isn't Hard honestly haha) he also comes across autistic/adhd, something I've hc'd him being for a long time bc I'm that myself, so i see elements of that in JU. I'm also a fan of your prose, I think you have such a way with building relationships that come across as very human and soft while also having a Bite to them, like Steve and Billy, a character I've never totally liked, but he has such a voice in JU that it's like Of Course Steve can't help but try to be kind even though he's cautious, not just bc he's an empath. I can't wait to see how that relationship, as well as Dozens of other relationships progress, Steve and Robin(!!), Hopper, El (sibling dance 🕺💃), Tommy-Carol, Nancy, Jonathan, Dustin, Max, all the other kiddos (maybe Eddie too?? *wink wink*) and now that I'm thinking of it Joyce!! Listen if his new dad is Hopper, Joyce gets to be his mom by virtue of association with Hop. Another thing I wanted to say quickly was, and obviously this was intentional, but every mention, or allusion to, comparison to, just general meta about Rabbits is chefs kiss. Like the callbacks to Watership Down, It's such a good narrative tool, its always given me the chance to pause and think about the work, especially with the killing of the rabbit, which conjured thoughts to me about the loss of innocence in that moment, like is the rabbit something he's killing within himself? Or is Steve himself the rabbit? And what does it mean later that he can regulate his emotions enough to live within the rabbit, and it's babies? Besides lying to himself that he's "normal" He also has given himself (?) Room to grow? In other words, though it may be scarred, since you alluded to the dead rabbit again, Steve and his innocence, (and I'm using innocence as a way to define a lot of things here like self love and a life where he'll allow himself to grow something in the planter boxes), are allowed to take root again, since you also stated that the grass above the buried rabbit is growing green and prospering thanks to this dead rabbit, not to mention the lives those babies will now get to lead, so its like, Steve's past experiences don't have to harm him anymore, they can lead to Growth. Steve is both the rabbit, and the thing that can kill, and protect the rabbit, Run Bunny indeed Billy Hargrove. ANYWAY I hope to Heaven that any of that makes sense, thank you so much for posting Jackrabbit Underneath, it's been a real light in the darkness and I have serious writers envy, I'm wishing you well, and extending an unlimited invitation to reach out for literally anything you need in the future, yelling about Steve Harrington being one of those things of course 💖💖💖

I have no clue what happened with Tumblr, but for some reason this ask kept appearing then disappearing in my inbox? So sorry for it being almost a month late (ooofff) Also this reply got long so it's under the cut!

I'm really happy you've been enjoying!!! It's so nice to hear that you enjoy the pacing and that my portrayal of Steve is coming across well! I head canon Steve as ADHD and I've tried to incorporate that into JU so I'm happy that's working. I really like the description of "soft with some Bite to them" for the relationships!! I feel like that's how I try to write Steve in general, so it makes sense that his relationships would also follow that.

Haha I am definitely now picturing Steve and El doing the sibling dance video with Kali. I wish I could shove Eddie into the main plot - he'll probably make a cameo because I love him. I actually originally thought Joyce would be in this more, but I realized talking to the mom of the guy your girlfriend left you for would probably be weird for him, so Maggie ended up taking up more of the role. But now he has the excuse of Hopper to hang around her!

I'm glad the rabbit motif is working! Steve killing the rabbit was definitely supposed to be a death of innocence moment - or at least a death of ignorance. It marks the start of him getting involved in the upside down and thus moving away from his high school persona and the (slow) break down of his denial. The return to woods emphasized both how Steve's gotten better with his powers after practicing but also, like you said, his potential for growth in the future (both in his powers and personally). He takes comfort in the (literally found) family of rabbits and protects them even if it's from himself as a sort of "future Steve goals". Meanwhile past Steve, the dead rabbit, is helping the grass grow - while he can't go back to who he was or change the experiences that hurt him, they're still important parts of his life that he can use to create his future.

Also don't worry - it definitely made sense and it was really interesting to read your thoughts! Thank you so much for reading and sending this ask <3!!!

[fansplaining]

Hello! I'm curious to know your opinion. I've been working on this long fic for months. Ever since I started writing there has been a bunch of anon's under different names telling me how to write each chapter. Saying things like "make (A) do this", "(b) needs to do that." "I expect this to happen to (C)" Etc. On one hand I'm grateful for the feedback, after all what writer isn't, but of 10 comments, 9 are like this. I'm starting to feel my writing isn't good enough for my readers.

Hello anon! Elizabeth here. Hooooo boy let me tell you, as I was reading this I went on a **journey**. When I reached “9 out of 10,” I went, “WHAT.” I have a few thoughts, and without knowing the full context (what your story is like, what fandom it’s in, etc etc) some of this might apply and some might not. But I think it’s all generally useful for fic writers and readers to think about.

This actually got pretty long, so I’ll put my thoughts under a cut.

 1) The story vs reader expectations

This is something I think about—and talk about—a lot. Here’s a bit of what I said while discussing what “OOC” actually means a few episodes back: 

Humans act irrationally, and I think that you can write a character acting irrationally well. But to me, that’s not a character acting out of character. That’s a character acting against character, irrationally... I think when we say “out of character” about characters we’re actually saying something different, which is: “Have you done the work to show why the character would respond to this situation X way or Y way?” And if he responds Z way, and you haven’t done any of the work to show why he might do that or any of the consequences if it is truly out of character the way we would say a real human acts out of character—then very often it is bad writing. It is people taking plot ideas and then imposing them over their characters without earning it.

These conversations are a huge part of our discussions about media in recent years—whether writing choices are good, whether they are earned, whether they are “in character,” whether they conform to what we expected. But the last one is where things get really murky—because there are *a lot* of readers and viewers these days who are kind of doing what I’m accusing bad writers of doing in that quote—imposing their expectations over the story without really grasping what’s been set up by the writer(s).

There are a lot of parts to this. We often pinpoint Lost as the place where the modern audience’s inclination to “solve” a show was born, and this has spread throughout viewing/reading cultures over the past two decades. The rise of “spoiler culture” is a huge factor here, too—as if knowing plot points is the only thing of value when viewing or reading a piece of entertainment. My least favorite thing in all of this is TV Tropes and the kind of rewiring of peoples’ brains to *only* look for those concepts (which are often weirdly narrow and reductive, unlike, say, the more categorical tropes of fic or the romance genre). 

Here’s an example: in 2017, Gav and I made our love of Black Sails the centerpiece of our fandom newsletter, The Rec Center, and in the process got a lot of people to watch it. And because we were the ones that inspired them, I had a fair number of people in my mentions/messaging me to give their real-time reactions as they went through the episodes.

While not every single writing choice on Black Sails is flawless, much of it is meticulously done, and so many of the plot points are carefully well-earned. But the things people were guessing would happen next in my mentions...were bonkers. Not everyone! But it was enough people (guessing different things) that I was kind of floored. I would think, If that’s what you think is going to happen next, I feel like you aren’t paying attention to the show? I should clarify that this happened with *a lot* of people, not trying to call anyone in particular out. But so many of the guesses felt like they came from expectations imposed by other media, especially stuff that’s signficantly more formulaic and tropey. 

This instinct—to predict, to vocally desire outcomes, to try and get ahead of the writers, to impose the structures of other media over the thing you’re watching—is *deep* in a lot of viewers’ and readers’ minds these days, and it comes out regardless of the quality of the writing. I think it’s not a great turn of events, to be honest—and it leads writers to make some really foolish choices in an attempt to “trick” viewers with something they never could’ve guessed. Which...generally makes for bad writing overall. 

2) Expectations within your fic

So this is the part where I falter a bit without context. Because some fic writers make it clear that they are posting as they write, and that they’re open to suggestions for plot choices. I assume you haven’t done this, or you wouldn’t be unhappy that people are trying to dictate what comes next. 

I’m curious if you are signalling that you’re...OK? with these kinds of comments by, say, writing nice replies that don’t make it clear that you know where you’re going with the story and you’ve already made choices about what happens next. There’s definitely a way to strike that balance, like a very polite evasion, something like, “Haha, thanks for the comment! I have the whole fic plotted out, so you’ll just have to wait and see!” If you start to signal that you’re in control of the plot, not the commenters, perhaps they’ll chill out a bit—because I gotta be honest, the fact that this is 90% of the comments...is wild to me. And I’m wondering if people are doing it because they see other people doing it. 

Again, total speculation without any actual context. I think that this sort of thing is likely more common in certain fandoms and with certain age groups. Even on AO3, fandom is not a monolith—I wonder if you’ve noticed this with other longfics in your fandom. It might be worth checking out how other writers have handled it, if they’re getting flooded with comments like these. 

I posted a longish fic recently, 75K over the course of three months, and let me tell you, no offense to any of my commenters, but a few of them reminded me of those Black Sails folks: What story are you actually reading?? I politely pushed back with one who asserted a whole bunch of stuff that was not in the story at all and tried to predict what would happen based on what was frankly bad reading comprehension. With others who expressed expectations about where things would go, I went the, “Haha you’ll have to wait and see!” route.

Talking to other people who’ve posted chapter-by-chapter longfics, I know that some of the bad predictions are par for the course: being absolutely certain the trouble in a section won’t be resolved, being convinced that any hint that the ship may not stay together will come to pass, even when, what, 95% of all shippy fic has the characters staying together? There’s a sort of performativity of immediate reactions in fic commenting, “OH NO, OH NO, ARE THEY BREAKING UP?” Like, duh, not forever. But commenting as real-time reaction is clearly the way a lot of readers engage with fic. Which is fine! That’s different from dictating the plot to you. 

3) The commenters vs your story

OK, so conceptually swinging back to the first bit, while my immediate response to, “I'm starting to feel my writing isn't good enough for my readers,” is NO NO NO JUST BECAUSE AN AUDIENCE IS SAYING SOMETHING DOESN’T MEAN YOU ARE BAD AND THEY ARE CORRECT. But! I think it might be worth spending a liiiitttle bit of time with them to see what they are saying, and how you think that connects back to what you’ve written. 

When folks came at me with, “I think X will happen next in Black Sails,” I, as a person who’s watched it several times and also professionally deconstructs texts as a critic, can go through and be like, “Here’s why I think that’s a misreading of what you’ve seen so far” (though mostly I would just say things like, “Why try to predict the plot! Just enjoy it!” because I’m trying not to be a dick). Rewatching the show, I can see all the things the writers carefully laid out, and how they pay off eventually. Can I imagine alternate choices for the characters? Sure! But I can see why, with the specific context and stakes in which characters made decisions, the writers had them do what they did. If they made other choices, I’d want that similar sort of work-showing. 

Similarly, when I got the occasional comment like this on the aforementioned fic, I would take it seriously for a moment. Why are they predicting this? Is it possible I haven’t shown my work enough? As I was writing, I thought very carefully about the characters and their motivations and the way certain events shaped their choices, and how changing events would change those choices. Generally, those comments felt, well, unearned: they were more about the reader than about the actual story. 

It helped having a beta who is both smart and scary, and wouldn’t hesitate to tell me if something wasn’t working. A big issue with the “no feedback in fanfic” convo is decontextualized “feedback” from random readers is not really useful! You have people coming from all sorts of backgrounds, all levels of reading comprehension, all sorts of contexts. Everyone can give you their *reaction* to your work, of course, but without that context of critique—the thing you have with a beta/editor, or if you’re in a writing workshop or group—it’s rare that some rando can give you truly useful feedback. 

But! That brings me back to 9 out of 10. I think, with that many people weighing in, it’s worth doing a little bit of serious consideration. Just read back over the story. If you can see ways that you zigged when you were signalling that you were going to zag, then your commenters might have a point. If they’re guessing character X might do Y next, and you’ve planned to have him do Z but actually haven’t done the legwork to make Z seem like a sensible next step, then that might be a fair read. Especially when they say, “I expect X will do Y,” try to figure out to the root of that expectation. Is this about the story, or is it about them? 

Because no audience is some neutral set of readers, and fandom even less so. People might tell you to do something because they hate one character and love another. People might hate your ship and for some reason are choosing to read it anyway. People have a million different contexts they bring to reading a work and not infrequently, they are reading through sets of expectations formed by other pieces of media that have very little to do with your own. 

4) tl;dr

The ~wisdom~ of the crowd is not inherently greater than the wisdom of the writer. Many people in fandom are very thoughtful readers—probably some of the most thoughtful readers out there! But plenty...are not. And that’s fine! They’re obviously still free to comment. I’d love to say, “ignore them, write for yourself, you’re writing the story you wanna write,” but I know how frustrating this must be for you. So give them a little consideration, but not too much. And most importantly, if you have a beta, ask them their opinion of these comments—and if you don’t have a beta, get one! Because a reader you know and whose opinions you trust is so much more valuable than random anon comments, no matter the circumstances. 

[corvixa]

I haven't actually watched these films, my house blew up and my life became chaos and when it settled I was told Tony died and went, welp. Fanfic here I come and fell down a pit of Winteriron. So, I first read this note in a fanfic.

Now. I don't like Steve. It is 100% irrational hatred born from my childhood, being gone for Tony Stark age 5 and not being allowed comics because they're a 'boy thing'. All I had was what my brother left when he moved out (we have big age differences in my fam, so he was married and out when I was 5). Now he, he liked Captain America and virtually nothing else. No range. (Also, I don't really like my brother, and I have soap opera worthy drama there).

So, even when I grew up and held my dad hostage with the computer network he'd had me rig for the pub at 13 to get my own comics (Only just now, writing that, realise that is kind weird.) I'd developed a pretty heavy dislike for Steve.

I went into the Avengers trying to be good. I did. My friend was a bonkers cap fan and he was so excited. I twitched all through the Hellicarrier scene, I managed until that line at Thor. You know the one. My Pagan, Heathen ass just straight up office style glared at my friend who nodded at me, in my favour.

But I legit thought that the letter was a fanfic creation by a person who hated Steve to my level and intentionally wrote it to make him seem like a douche.

Then I saw it again. And again. And by then my partners were watching all the films to make sense of my ramblings and "Philly, it's 4am and you've been talking about vibranium for 2 hours." to "Oh god, she walked past the room when Wanda was on, she'll only rant as long as she can stand. It's OK."

(They each have their own special interests and if I sit through Tolkienesque lectures on the reg, I'm allowed to marvel vomit on them. Our other partner just tolerates our autistic asses and has normal discussions.)

So, I asked them. Was this a part of the film and I was shocked to find yes. Yes it was. I've now seen some scenes, only stuff I wanted to include in my fics, where I watching the clips on YouTube.

This letter is just, all kinds of awful. Also, been on his own since he was 18?!?! So, uh, we just pretend the Howlies didn't exist? Steve has had constant good relationships. A mother who genuinely loved him and used their last penny's to get him medical attention from his dumb ass fights. Bucky had been with him for years and ended up in the Howlies. Which he lead. Despite practically no training.

Waking up 70 years in the future is hard, and, I feel for the dude.

But your problems are never an excuse to dump on other sodding people!

And he had plenty of time to actually learn how the world had changed.

Also. He wasn't sparing Tony. That was a conscious decision he woke up with every day and chose because he was scared of loosing his unlimited resources. In that instance he rated his friendship with Tony as beneath Tony's resources.

Tony isn't perfect. It's why I latched on to him as the strange child who did maths puzzles when handed paper instead of drawing (I was a weird kid, I primarily spoke a language my parents didn't 😂). He was a dick, he had depth. In all the different versions, in different worlds, he was never a flat character. He suffered and persevered like he didn't know how NOT to. Like he didn't know how to stop. Good or bad.

Perfect characters, they suck. They buy into their own narrative. Steve, bought into his narrative in MCU. he bought into himself as an authority. That his opinions were a bit more than anyone else's.

I have read some fanfics where I liked Steve. But those fics, they made him a person rather than a cardboard cut out that MCU came up with, crap like that letter.

So yeah. I legit thought that this letter was written by an author in an anti-cap fic to make him look worse. Which, really is saying something.

When someone apologises to you, they should not spend the majority of that apology talking about themselves, and their feelings, and their intentions.

When someone apologises to you, it should not be ‘because you are hurt’, as though its your feelings that are the problem, rather than what they did. They should be telling you that they wish they hadn’t done it, not that they wished you felt something more convenient about it. 

They should give you at least one sentence that simply accepts that they did a bad thing, and you have a right to feel bad about it - without qualifying it with an explanation of what they meant you to think, or why they were still a good guy when they did it. 

When someone apologises to you, they shouldn’t put it on you to understand their perspective - this is meant to be an indication that they’ve understood yours.

They should not end by saying that they still think *you’re* a good person, in spite of them having to apologise - that implies that they’re treating this apology as a concession to you, or a kindness on their part, rather than waiting to see if you’ll be kind enough to accept it. 

An apology shouldn’t read like a press statement.