#it’s almost like this a story with thematic elements

[thecatsaesthetics]

It’s almost like in the world of ASOIAF bastards have a negative stigma and Martin plays on that theme several times throughout the story…

i’m so annoyed at people who criticize every single thing that comes out Tom’s mouth related to Aegon.

They’re trying to say he’s stupid for saying Aegon values his children with Helaena, like what’s not clicking? A prince values his legitimate children rather than his bastards? Wow so shooking

[vaguely-concerned]

Origins is of course the DA game most closely in conversation with and playing around with Tolkien (right down to the walking talking poetree haha) -- and even more so than most works in the larger western fantasy tradition derived from Tolkien's work that DA:O also hails from and owes a lot of its Stuff to, what makes the game so great to me is that it's doing so very deliberately, and is subverting and deconstructing those tropes and entrenched ideas in some very interesting ways without at all denigrating what it's commenting on. (it doesn't have the almost disdainful undertones of the vein of fantasy that seeks to make the world more 'realistic' ala the more tedious reactions to G.R.R.Martin's work, for example, despite having the darker fantasy bent to it.) among other elements it adopts, what I find the most fascinating is the choice to use the same literary device/conceit Tolkien did in ostensibly only having in-universe biased sources and works to deliver the world through (which I feel is an underappreciated thing about his approach but is part of what makes his world so enduringly compelling and real-feeling -- the feeling of real scholarship devoted/applied to a made-up world. the grounding effect of a good diegetic footnote about source criticism, truly).

many things to be said there, and I'm glad each following game has taken on different perspectives and lenses and traditions to view the world of Thedas through because if you stick with that one too closely for too long I fear we could teeter precariously close to Pratchett's famous and bitingly accurate accusation of most modern fantasy of that era just being about rearranging the furniture in Tolkien's attic lol. and while you could accuse DA2 (my perfect wife who has never done anything wrong in her life to be clear) of many things, that's not one of them, they are pulling on some completely different strings for that one and both the game and DA overall is better for it, to my mind. as so many things in this series: worth staying with and exploring for an installment even if it might get stale if all of it was like this! people are understandably sad about the elements from previous games that they liked which were lost along the way, but that capacity for reinvention is to my mind a huge strength of dragon age as a whole.

(I think Veilguard is coming in as a close second in Tolkien conversation-ness if only in outlining/revealing the worldbuilding that indeed may have been planned since DA:O around the animosity that SHOULD by all rights exist between dwarves and elves in this universe (as per Tolkienesque tradition standards). but doesn't really because you see: politics and the many pitfalls of conservation of knowledge over the ages. our ancestral enmity got semi-intentionally lost between the floorboards of history and you know what. maybe for the best. the humans are already up to so much shit you gotta keep your eyes on them at all times you can't be brawling with each other in the deep roads while they're still around getting up to their nonsense or they'll just pile up even more of it)

[tossawary]

There has to be a term already for when stories accumulate this... "narrative debt" that they end up not paying back. When stories fail to stick the landing when it comes to character development or thematic development, a mismatch between what the beginning of the story apparently constructed and what the final scenes ultimately ended up being.

I want to compare it to "The Empty Mystery Box Problem", almost, where the story lays on twisty element after twisty element to pull you into some great mystery, only to ultimately reveal that the writers never had a cool explanation for any of this and were pretty much just jerking the audience around to keep them watching for as long as possible. It has a similar feeling of investing your attention, only to get nothing satisfying and to feel betrayed for caring.

There's a disconnect between author and audience. A sense that perhaps the author, who has their own visions in mind, is not even aware of what they ended up depicting in the execution. As an audience member, I do sometimes have to ask myself, "Was I just projecting my own arcs onto this while the author wanted to do something different? Am I upset just because I didn't get the resolution I anticipated?" And sometimes I come to the conclusion that, no, if the author always intended for the story what they claimed, then they did it badly, and the parts that I found resonant were definitely there, just... perhaps done accidentally and/or carelessly.

Like, let's say that there's some show that ends up depicting a protagonist who has substance abuse issues.

The show repeatedly shows the audience that the protagonist feels dependent on alcohol, we see lots of shots of them drinking, often at very inappropriate times. As the plot goes on, the show even appears to be showing us the consequences of this addiction, in that the character's relentless over-drinking apparently negatively affects their job performance, their love life, their relationships with friends and family. The character is miserable, perhaps even explicitly expresses some of their depressed feelings, and it seems obvious that taking a known depressant is a big part of this tangle. There may even be some looming threat that if the protagonist doesn't get this issue under control or get help, there will be even more serious consequences.

So, we've spent aaaaall of this screentime dwelling on this obvious character problem, but then... well, one way for the story to handle it poorly is to just not handle it. It's just never really addressed. A potentially great character arc about someone struggling with addiction just fizzles out because the plot climax takes up so much space that you think... maybe the writers... somehow forgot that they made unhealthy alcohol dependence an enormous part of the character's life? Maybe???

Like, there's not even a visual cue at the end that the character is now making an effort to tackle their addiction or something. There's not even a single line of dialogue in the epilogue to tell us that the protagonist went through rehab and they're sober now or something. What you may have read as a very serious problem just vanishes overnight. A story element that ate up aaaaall that screentime just never gets any satisfying resolution.

I'm not saying here that I need to see the story handhold a character through the rehabilitation process. It's not a requirement that all characters overcome their addiction by the end of the story. Sometimes, a story ends a little sadly, yeah, or is an outright tragedy. Sometimes, one problem is solved and another sticks around. I just think it's disorienting when I THOUGHT that the story was trying to actually say something about substance abuse, they spent all this fucking time showing us scenes that revolved around that element, and it turns out that the writers were like, "Oh, yeah, I guess! We weren't really thinking about that as a serious problem. We mostly just had the protagonist drinking all the time because it looked cool, and I guess that part ties in pretty well with how they were fucking up their life, actually, but we dropped it because we didn't think it was important."

The OTHER way for a story to handle an arc like this poorly is to do a total reversal at the end. The author is not only blissfully unaware that they have been telling a nuanced story about substance abuse until now, they don't even think that addiction is real. The ending yells really loudly: "Not ONLY is this character's drinking actually NOT a problem! It helps them save the day! And also every other character has been super mean to them about this; everyone else needs to grovel at the protagonist's feet and apologize for saying super mean things like, 'Don't you think it's inappropriate to show up drunk to a child's birthday party?' Because the WORLD would have ENDED if the badass protagonist hadn't been doing the objectively correct thing of being hammered all of the time."

At which point, the only thing to do is leave the show behind, because caring about it is a waste of time. But it's hard to stop thinking about it because the show paid all of this time... into a narrative element that felt SO obvious and crucial and like it was going somewhere... and it was an accident??? Like, the story was good when it was making all of these interesting promises, until the end came around and it turns out that it couldn't pay the bills and/or never had any intention of paying.

"The Empty Mystery Box Problem" except the box is wide open the entire fucking time and there's cool stuff in it, but the writers apparently aren't paying attention to the box or what they're putting in it!?!?!

[the-crooked-library]

Alright so it seems that I'm not quite done beating the horse that is the Bacon triptych - because the potential layers in its presence have me absolutely enthralled. As a visual element, it illustrates the "currently unfolding" part of the drama, but also appears to allude to a story that's yet to come; and, granted, that may be the brainrot speaking, but my art history fixation is insisting that there's gold in them hills, so bear with me here.

As tenuous as it may seem at first glance, I firmly believe that the writing itself supports my fascination with this piece. It demands to be noticed. It is a vivid splash of red in a box of brutalist grey; and, furthermore, unlike the other paintings in the Dubai penthouse, it's written into the dialogue. The camera lingers there - hence, the series wants us to pay attention; and, while its subject-level significance is not to be discarded, I cannot help but see another, similarly emotional allusion within the same frames.

Instead of drawing from the painting, this story layer connects more to the artist himself. One of the most notable periods of Francis Bacon's personal life was his relationship with George Dyer, which lasted from the 1960s to the early 1970s. Unlike his previous paramours - who were largely older (and, in the case of the last, abusive) men, Dyer was a young addict. Described as someone who could "throw a decisive punch," he was nevertheless vulnerable and trusting; as such, Bacon took on a dominant role, and Dyer became his muse. Among Bacon's portraits, he was ever-present; and though the relationship was tumultuous, often overwhelmed by their shared addictions, those paintings are uncharacteristically tender.

The story ended with tragedy - it's an account of drugs, alcoholism, neediness, dependence, classism, friction, and Dyer's eventual suicide; and within the context of IWTV, this framework is undeniably thematically relevant.

From the beginning - a decade-long involvement, addiction, an uncharacteristic tenderness - beat for beat, the book version of Devil's Minion is the same story, happening only a few years off. The presence of the Bacon painting within the Dubai penthouse is, in my opinion, an indicator to it having happened in the show as well. Just like Dyer, the TV version Daniel met Armand in a pub (or bar); just like Dyer, he is compact, athletic, pale, working-class - and, when under the influence, boisterous and active.

There is, naturally, one key difference; unlike Dyer, Daniel survives.

In the Doylist sense, the painting, therefore, acts as a visual cue - almost as evidence, of sorts. The memory of their entanglement may be effaced, but the blood-red stain of it is impossible to ignore, as is this placement:

I don't believe it is accidental that the painting is sold almost as soon as Daniel arrives in Dubai. It is an indication that the Devil and his Minion are no longer locked within a determined ending; their story continues, and memories are replaced with the real, living thing.

Edit: it bears pointing out that, while I had this post hanging in my drafts, convinced that I was reading far too much into something that already had another reason to exist, it's been announced that the relationship between Daniel and Armand is, in fact, going to be explored within the series. My every wish has been granted, and I can hardly wait.

[blueskittlesart]

did u not like totk?

i LOVED totk. i think it was well-written and did its job as a sequel to botw very well. HOWEVER. i do think it suffered slightly from the commercial success of botw. as i mentioned in my last post, nintendo does this. thing. when one of their games gets popular where every game after it has to be Exactly The Same so they can make all the money in the world via comparison marketing. (and this is a problem with the wider game industry in general but also a very observable pattern in loz specifically.) I know it's been a pretty long time since botw came out, but before (and immediately following) its release there was some pushback from longtime fans who worried that the open-world and lack of traditional dungeons meant that the game had strayed too far from the classic formula that makes a game a "zelda game." this is to say, botw was EXPERIMENTAL. and the devs had no idea if what they were doing was going to be successful or not. the open-world of botw wasn't a gimmick, and it wasn't the devs jumping on the open-world bandwagon. it was what CREATED that bandwagon. the open-world was a deliberate choice made specifically for botw because it reinforced the story that botw was designed to tell. the game is about exploring a desolate world, about making connections, and rebuilding both the broken kingdom and the player character's shattered sense of self by traveling and learning and building relationships. a large open-world map with only minor quest guidelines and lots of collectibles and side quests lends itself perfectly to this specific story, which is specifically about exploration and rebirth.

the problem is, botw was. almost TOO good. it was so good that every other game company on the planet started scrambling to build giant open-world maps into their next release, regardless of how much sense that actually made narratively. and because of that, when it came time to release a sequel to botw, the devs had a lot to think about. they had HUGE shoes to fill in terms of fan reception, but they were ALSO being asked to follow up one of the best-performing games of all time, commercially. totk needed to SELL as well as botw. And, likely because nintendo was worried about that potential commercial value, totk needed to keep people comfortable. I don't know for certain, but I definitely get the feeling playing totk that the devs were specifically told not to stray too far from what made botw marketable and successful--that being the open world and the versatility of gameplay. so in order to follow that up, they made... 2 more huge open maps, and new gimmick gameplay which was explicitly super-versatile.

do i think that the extra maps and ultrahand were BAD choices? no. however, i don't think they necessarily ADDED anything to the game as a narrative whole. one of my favorite things about botw was how everything seemed to be designed AROUND the narrative, with gameplay elements slotting neatly into the story thematically. totk just. didn't really have that, imo. there wasn't a huge narrative benefit to the gigantic, completely unpopulated depths and sky maps. ultrahand was cool, but within the context of the story it meant basically nothing. in some ways, i almost think totk could have benefitted from a much more linear approach to its storytelling, a la skyward sword, because there are a lot of story beats that have to be found in chronological order in order to have the right emotional impact, but because of the nonlinear open-world it kind of became a struggle to hit all the important story points in the right order. an easy example of this is the dragon's tears in comparison to the memories--the dragon tears have a very specific set order in which they happen, and finding them out of order can make the story you're seeing in them feel confusing and disjointed. the order in which they should be found is technically displayed on the temple wall, but most players aren't going to pick up on that or follow it--more likely, they're just going to explore the geoglyphs as they come across them organically, and therefore will likely witness the story in a completely disjointed way. compare this to the botw memories, which ALSO technically have a set order--the order in which they're displayed on the sheikah slate. however, because they're largely just small moments in time, and not one continuous story, finding them out of order has a lot less of an impact on how you as the player experience the narrative, and it's not hugely detrimental to your experience of the story if you find them naturally as you explore rather than explicitly seeking them out in order. If TOTK had been allowed to deviate from the botw formula a bit, i think we may have ended up with a more cohesive game in terms of narrative beats like that. as it is, i just think the game is torn slightly between wanting to be its own new game with new gameplay and needing to be botw, if that makes sense.

[marsprincess889]

Vedic astro mini post_ look at your moon rashi and nakshatra

Creativity, depth and connection to yourself.

🌙🌕

There's a good reason why moon is considered the most important placement. Even if on the surface another element, sign or nakshatra dominates, nothing will resonate with you quite like your moon placement.

But another placement rivals its personal significance and depth, and that's Ketu.

Oftentimes, Ketu is present in every part of a native and their life, because it's quite literally their "foundation". As a result, when people creatively express themselves(putting their essence in something), Ketu placements show up thematically, and usually as the true, core meaning of whatever they made. But Moon is there too. Consider this: if creativity is a state of flow and play, then it requires a state of comfort and ease to access it, which is the Moon.

Moon can be seen as the "key" to Ketu's world. Moon's sign, house and nakshatra placement can indicate experiences or anything that pushes a person into a mode of comfort and ease. And that can trigger creativity. (Claire nakti has a great video on YT about Ketu and creativity. She also touches on how moon's nakshatra shows up more obviously or in terms of the general "setting" of the story in that or another video)

Inspiration itself is seen through 5th house, Venus and Ketu.

You can definitely use this to analyze your own creative process, or just how you go about life in general, esp regarding flow, ease, enjoyment and playfulness. You can also spot connections between your and your fav astrists'/creative people's charts.

You can obviously connect with people who have your big three nakshatras in their big three, also with their yoni consorts. You're also almost certainly will feel a familiarity or a "knowing" with people who have your ketu nakshatra in their big three. You might resonate deeply to the creative works of people who have your moon nakshatra as their ketu. (I definitely go "wow" when I read a Kafka quote or listen to Hans Zimmer, both have Bharani ketu).

Anyways, the connection you have to your moon's sign and nakshatra is literally the first thing you should look at. For me, I keep forgetting I'm an Aries🔥🐏 with a Venus nakshatra💕. Fire_ this is important to me, even if my Sun and Asc are in Earth signs and I have nothing else in the fire element. I do relate to the theme of fire strongly and it touches a way deeper part of me than for example, themes of Earth and abundance, as relevant as they still are. It's about the personal significance and the depth of it_ that is what can't be recreated.

[les-gnossiennes-fantomatiques]

An Unorthodox Fic Recommendation

Hey, everyone.

So I’d been wanting to write this post for a while, but I’d had a hard time finding the words to articulate my exact feelings for a good long while now. But in the spirit of the holidays, goodwill towards all, and so on and so forth, I’ve somehow managed to catch my breath.

I dipped pretty suddenly from fandom earlier this year for multiple reasons, most of which fell under the umbrella of a very real and very unfortunate truth: I was sick. Stupid sick. And fandom, while obviously not the only thing contributing to this by a long mile, was not conducive to me getting better.

My drinking, you see, had gotten bad in a way that is honestly humbling to think about now; it was at levels that were both physically and mentally dangerous and unsustainable. Moreover, it was beginning to affect the people I love most in this world. And, unfortunately, pounding back a glass, a bottle, two bottles of wine, hey maybe I can run to the gas station for a few mini bottles of whiskey to end the night went hand-in-hand with writing and my fandom experience in general.

I won’t go into the details of my actual rock bottom, besides that it hit in March of this year and that I’m grateful it was relatively minor compared to many of the stories I’ve heard in my recovery journey. But suffice to say, I checked into rehab and everything had to go on the back burner from that point on. I’m lucky that I had the unwavering love and support of my husband, my family, my work, and my friends (including a bunch of people I’ve met through this fandom specifically--put a pin in that) to start down that path, because all the same, it has often been a very lonely, very dark, and very isolating place to be. But so is addiction.

So here I am, hours and hours of group counseling, enough EMDR therapy to relive every childhood trauma in the book, countless tweakings of my meds, endless bottles of Coke Zero later, and I’m almost ten months sober.

And I find myself asking now what?

One of the biggest challenges in early sobriety, you learn quickly, is redefining fun for yourself in a world without your substance of choice, without the very thing that feeds your ego and silences your self-criticisms, without what feels like the only thing propelling you from one bleak day to the next. And for a long time, I worried that fandom had stopped being fun. That the joy of writing had been permanently ruined by the associations I’d made with drinking and negative related experiences.

But, back to my fandom friends. I worried so much they would lose interest in me as a person--that I’d become too boring or depressing or unfun in this next leg of life to want to stick around. I’ve found the opposite to be true--from the countless yapping sessions up and down 8th Avenue and booze-free hangouts, to the endless DMs of advice and memes, to the long heart-to-hearts over pots of tea, to… watching whatever the fuck is going on in the David Staller version and having a good long laugh. I didn’t expect this coming into 2024--I don’t know what I expected, honestly, besides maybe the hospital and divorce papers and more loneliness--and leaving this year behind me knowing I’ve got that means the world to me.

So all this is to say, one of the other things that helped me pull through this challenging period of life has been, surprisingly enough, fan fiction.

Particularly Battered Dove by BattyDings.

Modern AUs are always really hard to pull off, at least to me, in a way that feels satisfying. (This is why I am a coward and don’t write them lol.) More often than not, there’s a tendency for the story to get caught up in retrofitting the more melodramatic, antiquated elements (I say this with love) into a world where they can’t really exist with a straight face, and often at the cost of the characterizations and plot. The best modern AUs, for me, lean into the framework of what is there thematically: the ideas of loneliness, manipulation, dependency (themselves all negative aspects of addiction) balanced against the possibility of redemption, love, and making amends.

And in Battered Dove, BattyDings has rather brilliantly transposed these things into the context of substance abuse and addiction. If Phantom is a story about two lonely broken people getting caught up in a shared passion that brings out the best and worst in each other (particularly Erik lol), then Battered Dove sees our dynamic duo thrown together by a mutual past in drugs and hopefully redeemed by the music they make together.

It’s often a hard and unflinching read, and one that in other hands could easily come off as crass or edgelord-y. But in Batty’s hands, Battered Dove is a thoughtful, sensitive, tender unraveling of the Erik and Christine dynamic that keeps me coming back: that is, the only way they can “get well” is by going through something that is arguably more painful and terrifying than the present reality they live in: giving up what they think they love most.

I’ve read this story multiple times over the years and was always tremendously moved by the simple but powerful interpretation laid out in this fic; in pre-contemplation, when I’d be crawling into bed drunk every night and wondering if this was how I was going to die, bits and pieces of it would come to me. Me in bed, on the verge of blacking out, thinking about Phantom of the Opera fan fiction, wondering if I could do better (nah, no, I couldn’t. Not me.) Rereading Battered Dove for the first time after starting rehab and getting well into this journey was all the more astounding.

Phantom of the Opera, for me, is not the story of a monster who brutalizes women and we’re somehow supposed to feel bad or glean some larger, cynical message about the world from it; for me, it is a story of bittersweet hope--a slow, sad hope that the ones we love and that the ones we’ve hurt will feel peace and sunshine, without the guaranteed promise or reward we will feel it for ourselves. But that, in our selfless kindnesses born out of real love and care for others, we can at least begin to see a better version of ourselves staring back at us--no matter how broken, how lonely, how downright used and ugly we feel.

To me, that is recovery. That is what the last ten months have been. There is no guarantee who I will be in a year--what wrongs I will right, what truths I will uncover, or even if I'll have managed to maintained my sobriety (though I feel hopeful). I am promised nothing but the day in front of me and the little, powerful joy I get in doing right by the universe with each passing hour.

And Battered Dove captures that perfectly. Can’t recommend that enough.

Thank you for being a friend and source of light through this hard time, @battydings. Pls accept this humble doodle and biggest thank you for writing such a wonderful, heartfelt story.

[emmcarstairs]

The Ghoul and Lucy MacLean as Modern Orpheus and Eurydice: A Fallout Meta

(art by Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot)

We’ve all heard the Greek myth of Orpheus who ventures to the Underworld to bring his wife Eurydice back to life. It’s one of the greatest tragic love stories that has been retold and passed down to us in different forms of media.

Isn’t it interesting that Fallout begins with The End and ends with The Beginning? It refers to the bombs falling in the first episode, and the past being revealed in the last, but I believe it goes deeper than that. It’s a direct reflection of Lucy’s character journey.

Lucy’s journey begins with the shattering of her perfect world. It's the end of her life as she has known it. The event that triggers her descent (in her case, ascent) is the raiders’ attack. Which significantly happens at her wedding. Lucy is stabbed by her husband who had snuck into her Vault with deception. Similarly, Eurydice is bitten by a snake at her wedding with Orpheus, which kills her and sends her to the Underworld.

Interestingly enough, if we think of Norm's words as Lucy walks down the aisle, the Ghoul is coded as a possible husband for Lucy. And it's only after she goes to the Underworld/Wasteland that we are introduced to the Ghoul.

In a post-nuclear world, hell would be on the surface and heaven under the ground. The Ghoul emerges from the underground like Lucy as if he's coming after her. (It's funny that three men welcome him as if he's Orpheus at the gates of the Underworld and they're Cerberus.)

After the tragic wedding, Lucy resides in the Underworld. (An important note here is that while we learn that the Wasteland isn't dead, it is perceived as an Underworld by the Vault dwellers.) Throughout her journey, there is one person who, by happenstance, is always on her trail.

In the final episode titled The End, we find some thematic and visual similarities with The Beginning. Lucy is again betrayed by a person she considers family. Also, the passage of time in both episodes (midday-sunset-night) is clearly marked by the change of colors in the sky.

Two significant scenes for Lucy happen during the sunset. As a symbol, the sunset stands for transition or even death. The world is changed for the night. It's both an end and a new beginning. It's a meeting between the day and the night. In both these scenes, Lucy agrees to share her journey with another person.

If we rewind back to the Ghoul's entrance in the scene, we see him catching Hank by surprise with his words. In fact, the Ghoul speaks a lot and almost enthralls his enemies with his power of speech/acting. It's reminiscent of Orpheus' gift of music which helps him tame the beasts.

Here begins the deviation from the original story. In the myth, Eurydice has no agency. Orpheus ventures into the Underworld, begs for her soul, and takes her on the journey back. Some modern critics point out she'd already forgotten him and wouldn't want to return back to life.

The Ghoul offers Lucy a clear choice between her staying with the dead (in this moment, they are surrounded by Max's unconscious body and her mother's remains, as well as the soldiers' corpses) and risking that she dies herself. Or going with him to learn more about the world.

Another important element in the myth, is the backward glance. Hades lets Eurydice leave the Underworld on condition that Orpheus doesn't look back at her until they make it out. As they near the exit, Orpheus turns back and Eurydice vanishes back in the Underworld forever.

In this case, the backward glance isn't a condition. Yet, in this scene, the Ghoul and Lucy's gazes don't meet at all! He has his back turned to her and the one time he turns around, she isn't looking at him. It shows their vulnerability but also their newfound mutual trust.

What follows is the scene that inspired this whole meta. The night has fallen. The Ghoul climbs up from a ruined building's dark exit alone. After a moment, Lucy emerges too. They have made it! And the Ghoul still isn't looking back at her. He leads and knows she'll follow him.

Take a look at this bit from A. S. Kline's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses, Book X, and look at the following frame:

"They took the upward path, through the still silence, steep and dark, shadowy with dense fog, drawing near to the threshold of the upper world."

A final note about Orpheus and Eurydice's names: Orpheus means "the darkness of the night", while Eurydice means "wide justice". Well, what can I say?

Looking back on my Lucy analysis, it's interesting that the final scene with them both emerging from underground marks the transition between Act 2 and Act 3, or Death (Transformation) and Emergence (Support). This would've been Eurydice's POV journey if Orpheus had succeeded.

[whetstonefires]

See I don't necessarily disagree with what seems to be the primary reading that Yue Qingyuan's shifu fucked him over, caring nothing for his needs or preferences and only for whether he was useful. That makes sense, it ties into plenty of the generational and societal themes of the story. It fits.

But iirc we don't actually get enough information to know that's what happened.

And the thing is it would be so in-character and also thematically appropriate if Yue Qingyuan absolutely did not explain his goals or why he was working so hard, because it was private and shameful and he didn't expect any sympathy, and there was a high risk of losing everything if he blabbed.

And also if he engaged with the existing ruleset with which he was presented, i.e. 'can't go off on your own on personal business until you've mastered your sword,' in the most negative and controlling manner possible, as absolute commandments.

He's a different kind of guy but he comes from the same background as Shen Jiu! It fucked him up also!

He is very very very not a guy who trusts the system to make allowances for him--even once he has all the power he 'does what he wants' and 'makes selfish choices' as a conscious transgression; not something he has a right to do, just something he can get away with so he's gonna. (And ofc he spends almost all the latitude he grants himself on sqq.)

And even less is he a guy who opens up easily.

He isn't too proud to ask for help or pity, so much as he just doesn't expect to get any.

So in this interpretation, he understood that rule as a non-negotiable barrier in his path, the target to overcome, and focused all his considerable will and talent on overcoming it through the sphere of action he felt he had control over.

And fucked himself up bad.

Whereupon his teacher, possessing absolutely no context for this dumb shit their star pupil pulled, did the only thing they thought might work to save his life, paying in the process no attention to the raving of someone deep in a psychotic break.

Like, I feel like there should have been a better, kinder medical option, but I don't know for sure that there was, so I can't say with certainty this was the kind of cruelty that derives from not caring enough.

And it really would be kind of elegant and so typical of Yue Qingyuan's fundamental tragedy if the real mistake was 'not confiding in anybody' the whole time.

And he was just so deeply sunk into the understanding that explaining and asking were useless that, even looking back, it never really occurred to him that maybe his mistake wasn't 'fucking it up when trying too hard to solve everything on his own' but 'assuming there was no help to be had, and that he had to do it all on his own.'

Like. What if this really could all have been avoided if he'd just trusted and communicated with the adult in charge of him? But of course, of course his history of trauma (neglect, child abuse, exploitation, being the One Responsible for the younger kids whom he could not keep safe) meant he was absolutely not going to do that.

It was basically impossible. For the person he was, the person the world had made of him. And that's always been the core tragedy the whole novel circles back upon.

People can only ever be themselves, and so very often the elements of self that let them survive until now are that which dooms them, that means they need someone else to intervene if they're ever going to be saved. Because your personal doom is always the thing from which you can't save yourself.

[quill-and-whetstone]

“The Sniper Problem”

I have a favorite litmus test that I apply to just about everything I write: “Could this entire plotline be resolved by one sufficiently trained sniper?” The hypothetical sniper is there to evaluate the quality of the conflict I’ve set up. If they can resolve the whole thing by taking out their target then I… probably have some rethinking to do, because the test succinctly highlights a few key issues with any story that fails it.

First, the obvious: if the problem your protagonists are facing can be solved this way it’s probably just not as interesting as it could be. A conflict of “big bad evil dude does a big bad evil thing and our hero goes and mercs him about it” can make for a fun blockbuster action film, but the plot of those films are rarely–if ever–the point. Stories with a central villain stand to gain a lot of narrative depth from asking yourself what issues would linger if they were suddenly removed from the picture. What internal struggles might remain in your protagonists? How might the world around them still need to be changed or healed? Which elements or areas of the story just seem empty without the big bad to fill the narrative space, and how can we develop them?

The second facet of the sniper problem is an inverted Occam’s Razor, a call to ensure that there’s a good reason the protagonists aren’t just using a simple and direct route to solve their problems. It’s like how modern horror movies have to cripple the victims’ cell phones to justify everything else that happens, though ideally less contrived. When revising a story through this lens, it’s almost difficult not to improve it. It aids suspension of disbelief, lets your protagonists present as more competent, and gives them more to do outside of biffing people they don’t like which in turn showcases more of their personality.

A great example of all of this is Avatar: The Last Airbender. Throughout the show the bottom line is that our heroes are out to defeat the Firelord to stop the atrocities he’s committing against the rest of the world. So it stands to reason to ask, why not camp outside his house early on with an assassin good enough to score a quick or lucky kill? But the show answers this amply with just its concept, mostly without having to draw direct attention to it. If Firelord Ozai dropped dead in the pilot there would still be a whole Fire Nation pursuing his goals complete with other emotionally unstable royals and military officers. It wouldn’t actually… solve anything. “Defeat the Firelord” is just the mission that sets our heroes on the path they need to take to stop a war that’s destroying the world. The real solution is cultivating friendships across cultures, healing and maturing together, growing spiritually, protecting and empowering victims of generational violence, dismantling fascistic power structures, and ultimately even finding a relatively peaceful / humane solution to the problem of the Firelord. While they do call this out directly in one episode, they didn’t have to, because with the way they structured the narrative it was already evident. As a result of that good planning the characters got to do a lot of interesting, character driven, thematically resonant things and the show isn’t just one long and kind of dry martial arts training montage until they show up at the finale.

So keep the sniper problem in mind as you write! Or even as you read, watch, and analyze other media for what worked and what didn’t. I can’t promise it’ll be relevant to every story, but I can promise that it’s a quick and easy standard that’ll help you layer in a lot of nuance and flavor into your narrative.

[pocketseizure]

I still consider it a crime that the Gerudo sage of the past had NOTHING to say about Ganondorf in TotK. They could have grown up together. They could have trained against each other. They could have been siblings, friends, lovers, or just classmates. Is she sad or angry at him for attacking Rauru? Did she like him as king before he attacked Rauru? Is she jealous that he gets to rule the Gerudo and not her? How does she feel about the other Gerudo joining him over her? So much missed potential.

This is all true. So much missed potential. The same goes for Riju.

The same goes for all of the Gerudo, especially given that anyone can see the giant geoglyph of Ganondorf in the Gerudo Highlands from the walls of the city. A main theme of the development of the Gerudo in Tears of the Kingdom seems to be the reconsideration of their rule not to allow men into Gerudo Town, which stems from "a long-held belief that men only bring disaster." The revelation that the Eighth Heroine was a man in Rotana's "Heroines' Secret" quest could have been used to make a strong thematic statement in this regard, as could the stories of several other NPCs in and around Gerudo Town. Unfortunately, since no one is allowed to acknowledge or discuss the existence of Ganondorf or the origin of the prohibition against men, all of these narrative threads are left hanging.

I understand that a lot of the writing in Tears of the Kingdom was outsourced, and the contracted writers were almost certainly given the directive not to include anything that might inform or contradict series lore. For most of the NPCs in Hyrule, this is fine. In fact, I'd say it's actually quite lovely to be able to see all sorts of small stories that have nothing to do with magical princesses or ancient kings. For the Gerudo in particular, though, the inability of characters to talk about a major element of their history and culture is extremely awkward and frustrating.

[novlr]

I'm currently writing a story where, in the beginning, I want to show something almost like a montage of my character doing the same thing day after day, longing for change.

I know in a cinematic format, I'd show that as a montage (as previously stated) where he's actively shown getting more tired and drained.

Do you have any advice on how to put that into a writing format?

Montages shine brightest during periods of character transformation, whether that’s showing a protagonist developing a new skill, learning hard lessons, or growing into a different person entirely. Other uses that aren’t character related might be showing world-changing events in your story’s world, or simply showing that time has passed between scenes. They are, however, particularly effective when establishing the growth of relationships, showing long journeys or transitions, or highlighting parallel events and themes that echo throughout your story.

Essential elements for an effective montage

Thematic consistency

Maintain a clear through-line that connects all scenes

Focus on a single character trait or story element

Use recurring symbols or motifs

Ensure each scene builds upon the previous one

Keep the emotional tone consistent

Choose scenes that reflect your story’s broader themes

Link scenes with transitional phrases or imagery

Structural Components

Have a strong opening scene that establishes the montage’s purpose

Give clear transitions between scenes

Create a natural progression from start to finish

Have varied scene lengths for rhythm and pacing

End on a powerful closing scene that shows clear progression

Sensory details

Include vivid imagery that engages multiple senses

Use specific details that anchor each scene

Create emotional connection through carefully chosen descriptions

Balance showing versus telling

Descriptively show the passage of time alongside changes in character and setting

Techniques for writing montages

Identify the primary purpose of your montage

Choose scenes that show significant change or progress

Include contrasting moments for dramatic effect

Focus on key emotional beats

Eliminate redundant or unnecessary scenes

Use active verbs to maintain momentum

Keep descriptions concise but impactful

Vary sentence structure for rhythm

Incorporate time markers naturally

Use time-based phrases to connect scenes

Create thematic links between sections

Tips for writing the passage of time

Time is a crucial element in writing a montage. From linear progression to flashbacks and foreshadowing, it gives you complete control of how it will unfold.

Here are some tips to write the passage of time:

Use the natural world

Describe the changing seasons

Show plant growth and death

Visualise the ebb and flow of tides

Describe the decomposition of flora and fauna

Describe how landscapes change on long journeys

Use the weather to illustrate time jumps

Illustrate the effect that shifting shadows have on a location

Use heavenly bodies like stars, the rise and set of the sun, and phases of the moon

Describe physical activities

Show family gatherings and how they change over the years

Describe the process of finishing a creative pursuit

Create repetitive activities and routines

Have a character engage in an activity, like gardening, that visually changes the landscape

Have your characters learn a new skill

Write a change in location that requires a journey to get from point A to point B

Use your setting’s seasonal celebrations to illustrate a time shift for individual characters and their world

Use sound

Describe the ticking of clocks

Have your characters’ voice change with their age

Illustrate changing musical styles

Have your characters improve an audible skill like singing, swordplay, or learning a musical instrument

Show a character’s conversational style changing as they grow

Use the sounds of nature, like leaves becoming brittle as they crunch underfoot, or rain turning into storms

Use silence to illustrate it getting late

Describe objects

Have food left out go mouldy

Illustrate buildings and settings being overtaken by nature

Show the lifecycle of a family heirloom

Describe textiles fading and degrading over time

Describe the freshness of paint; is it wet and glistening, or cracked and dry?

Illustrate technological change and advancement

Describe the repairs in a beloved object

Show a common object like a pencil to describe how it changes with use

Common pitfalls to avoid when writing a montage

Don’t make scenes too detailed or long

Don’t include unnecessary dialogue — most montages won’t include any dialogue at all, so if you do include it, make sure it serves a very clear purpose

Don’t lose focus on the main theme that your montage is serving

Avoid choppy or jarring transitions

Don’t include irrelevant scenes. It’s far too easy to over-describe, so with a montage, you need to do a lot of self-editing to keep it from being overlong

Always show progression. Whatever purpose your montage serves, there should be a clear difference from how it begins to how it ends

Don’t over-explain changes. Trust your readers to put things together on their own

Experimental approaches

Not all montages need to be written out as narrative scenes. There are lots of different techniques you can try to write an effective montage. Here are some that can work really well:

Diary or journal entries

Letters or emails

Social media posts

News headlines or articles

The passage of time seen from multiple points of view

Reversing the chronology

Parallel character developments

Some writing exercises

Write a short piece showing a character learning a new skill over time

Write a brief sequence showing seasonal changes

Develop a relationship from start to finish showing its most important moments

Try your hand a writing a montage using unconventional time markers. This is also a good exercise for non-linear storytelling!

The key to a successful montage lies in its ability to efficiently show change while keeping readers engaged. The best montages feel natural and seamless while effectively moving your story forward. All it takes is practice and attention to detail!

[tossawary]

Reading the end of "Naruto" on a whim was funny because there was a lot about that final battle that was really Not Good, but I was approaching it with neither investment nor expectations. "This story can't hurt me because I don't care" vibing.

And then I hit the Sasuke/Sakura stuff at the end and I was suddenly struggling with anger and something that felt a lot like nausea. WHAT was that?! It was like getting slapped in the face. Sakura's character development got yanked out of my arms and thrown out the window to die AGAIN.

I don't ship it, but I wasn't necessarily against the pairing as a concept until canon's execution jolted me out of indifference. If I WAS a shipper, I'd be furious at what a crap deal both of these characters I supposedly liked were being given by this ending. Fuck all of Sakura and Sasuke's previous motivations and experiences and growth as people, I guess? Fuck their problems and grievances and arcs, I guess??? Fuck having resolution for all of their previous interactions??? I don't necessarily need either of these characters to have a happy ending, but they and their relationships (and every other character and relationship tbh) deserved far BETTER writing for either a happy ending or a tragic one. Wow. This is sad! The quality of this ending is really not good! Wow.

(This is the kind of terrible execution that I'm talking about when I say that I would prefer Luffy dead at the end of "One Piece" rather than married to a random woman and having bio-kids. If I have to choose between some Sasuke/Sakura type of shit and Luffy going out on a far more thematically coherent and in-character bang, if those are my only options, then I want my boy dead.)

Like, this story element becomes almost compelling because it sucks so much??? I'm fascinated. It's a canonical pairing that's not just failing to stick the landing, it's breaking both hollow legs, and I've been letting it go every time I think about it because otherwise, I will go mad trying to understand just how much a person can suck at writing convincing romantic relationships. It's SO bad. Damn.

[writingquestionsanswered]

Do you have any tips/checklist that can help identifying weaknesses in your writing? I read what I have written and there is always just something that seems off, I go through some of the tips you have given before and try to implement said changes but there is still something that's keeping the story from flowing/developing as intended but I just can't pinpoint what exactly. So if you have some tips for this, I'd love to hear it! Thanks!

Pinpointing Story Weaknesses

Here are some common story weaknesses to keep an eye out for:

1 - Weak Plot - Does the story revolve around a conflict? Does the conflict challenge the characters in ways that will captivate the reader's attention? Is the plot full of clichés and other tired elements that make it predictable and unoriginal? Are tropes used in fresh new ways that offer a twist on their usual usage? Are there loose threads that would be unsatisfying if left untied? Are there plot holes that won't make sense to the reader? Is the plot enriched by the exploration of theme and subtext that isn't heavy-handed but offers the reader a deeper understanding of the story? (See: Basic Story Structure, How to Move a Story Forward, How to Find Your Story’s Themes and Thematic Statement; Tropes, Clichés, & Finding Which  Clichés to Avoid)

2 - Weak Characters - Are the characters three-dimensional? Do they have a compelling internal conflict (in a story that is character-driven or both character-driven and plot-driven)? Do they have a satisfying character arc? Do they have corresponding wants and needs? Do they have an emotional wound or back story that helps the reader understand who they are and why they make the decisions they make? Do their actions, motivation, choices, and dialogue feel authentic with the personality and circumstances you laid out? Do the main characters have a unique character voice? Do they have fleshed out relationships with other characters? Do you get at the heart of the character's emotions and how they relate to the events of the story? Are emotions illustrated mainly through showing body language, facial expressions, gestures, and suggesting internal cues versus telling how a character feels? Does the dialogue feel unnatural or clunky? Is there an over-reliance on dialogue tags? (See: Plot Driven vs Character Driven Stories, Understanding Goals and Conflict, Character Arc Tips, Recognizing a Flat Character, Important Points of Character Personality, Showing a Character’s Feelings, Giving Your Characters a Unique Voice, Avoiding Repetition with Dialogue Tags)

3 - Weak Setting Development/World Building - Is the setting well-developed, relevant, and believable? Does the setting have so much character it almost feels like a character itself? Do you use plenty of emotional and sensory details to flesh out the visuals? Is the setting immersive to the point the reader will feel they've stepped out of their immediate surroundings and into the world of your story? Are there contradictions in the setting that will pull the reader out of the story? Is there an over-reliance on expository info-dumps or dialogue (aka "telling") to illustrate the world, versus "showing" it through action and the events of the story? (See: Five Things to Help You Describe Fictional Locations, Setting Your Story in an Unfamiliar Place, Guide: Showing vs Telling, The Right Amount of Description (5 Tips!), Weaving Details into the Story)

4 - Weak Narrative Voice - Is the narrative voice consistent, clear, and engaging? If multi-POV, are new POVs switched into only after a scene or chapter break, and is it immediately clear to the reader whose POV they're now in? (See: What is Writing Style?, Understanding POV and the Narrator)

5 - Weak Writing - Is the story well-edited and free from spelling errors, grammatical errors, typos, formatting errors, improper syntax, and punctuation errors? Is the sentence structure clear, strong, and varied? Is there an over-reliance on telling vs showing? Are there problems with the pacing, such as being too slow in places where not much is happening and too fast where important things are happening? Is there an over-reliance on passive vs active voice? Are strong adverbs used in place of weaker ones? Is there an over-reliance on present participles and gerunds (--ing words)? Are contractions unnecessarily omitted, leading to overly formal sounding narrative/dialogue? Is there "purple prose" or description that is excessively ornate/flowery? Is there a compelling beginning, a strong middle, and a satisfying end? (See: Ten Ways to Cut Your Word Count, Guide: How to Skip Time in Your Story, Subtle Scene Transitions, Balancing Dialogue with Exposition and Action, Dropping Hints without Giving Everything Away, Writing Great Beginnings and Endings, The 3 Fundamental Truths of Description, Exposition, Action, and Dialogue, and How to Pace Your Story) You can also see more on my master list of top posts. I hope that helps!

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I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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[silverwhittlingknife]

hi Silver! o/ because that fanart made me wonder - would you happen to know when/where Dick's stuffed elephant plush Zitka turns up in the comics?

GREETINGS CAM <3333 THAT ART WAS SO CUTE

Yeah, I think your instincts are right - it's a truly adorable bit of transformative fandom, but I'm 95% percent sure it's not comics canon. Barbara has canon plushies, but I don't think anyone else does.

I got kinda invested in the investigation (it's hard to prove a negative!) and I ended up typing out an entire History of Elinore/Zitka, so, uh, if you're curious, meet me below the cut for:

Where does Elinore / Zitka - the animal - appear in comics?

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

Where does Elinore / Zitka appear in comics?

We're gonna go in chronological order!

Dick's circus elephant friend was first created for practical reasons: in Batman 436, Marv Wolfman does a big expanded flashback to Dick's circus backstory as a way to subtly show us Tim before officially introducing him (so that we can have a technically-solvable mystery-of-Tim's-identity in LPoD). In this comic, there's an elephant named Elinore who loves Dick:

Aww. Such a cute elephant!

Batman 436 comes out in August 1989. New Titans 60 comes out a few months later, in November, and guess what? When Dick visits the circus, he is suddenly surprised by an unexpected blast from the past! It turns out that even though it's been years, Elinore still remembers him!

Here's the part where Elinore remembers Dick:

SUCH a cute elephant. I love her.

(Guess who else still remembers Dick even though it was so long ago. Guess which other character is about to be an unexpected blast from the past. Guess which character Elinore is directly paralleling guess guess guess sorry everything is about Dick and Tim in my mind but I can focus I swear)

Four years later, in 1993, Batman: The Animated Series retells Dick's origin story. They like and keep Wolfman's elephant, but they change her name to Zitka:

Wolfman doesn't return to the elephant beyond those two appearances, and a few years down the line, New Titans gets cancelled and Wolfman's not writing Dick anymore anyway. So the animal gets abandoned for a while, until Devin Grayson, a fan of both Wolfman and B:tAS, revives the Wolfman-era Titans team in JLA/Titans and then the ongoing series Titans 1999.

Grayson then brings back the elephant in a flashback to Dick's past in Titans 16 (Jun 2000), where she imports the B:tAS name. Sometimes I'm skeptical of TV-to-comics imports, but honestly, I endorse this one. You lose the alliteration, which is a shame, but IMO Zitka is a better elephant name than Elinore.

Here's Dick with the newly-christened Zitka in Titans 16:

Grayson also briefly references the elephant in Gotham Knights 20 and - in a final angsty callback - in Nightwing 88 (Feb 2004), where Zitka tries futilely to comfort Dick in the midst of his trauma conga line:

... And... honestly, I think that's it for comic appearances? The two Wolfman comics plus the three Grayson comics.

Both Wolfman and Grayson are writing multiple titles - Batman, New Titans, Titans, Gotham Knights, and Nightwing between the two of them, spanning a big chunk of Dick's post-Crisis canon - and both writers use the elephant for heartwarming moments of nostalgia, which means if you're doing a post-Crisis readthrough for Dick, Elinore/Zitka feels memorable. But I don't think she actually shows up that much.

For post-2011, I am not as well-informed - throwing this out to the dash? anyone know? - but I feel like Zitka the heartwarming symbol of Dick's heartwarming circus past is, uh, thematically very at odds with the Court of Owls evil!circus vibes, so my instinct is that this story element was almost certainly dropped in the reboot.

Did Dick ever have a stuffed elephant toy in comics?

In WFA, yes; in main comics continuity, no. Technically, I have not read every comic ever published, so I could be wrong!! But I don't think so.

Below, find my rambling reasoning on the tonal vibes of pre-Crisis, post-Crisis, and post-2011, and why this particular story element doesn't seem right to me for the first two.

Pre-Crisis (...okay, mostly the Silver Age): stuffed animal, yes or no?

tl;dr no, requires too much background knowledge on the part of the reader, plus the elephant wasn't a thing until later

Elinore doesn't get created until post-Crisis, but also just generally, pre-Crisis callbacks are more along the lines of this reference in Batman 129 (published in 1960), where, wow, Batman and Robin are hunting jewel thieves - and it turns out Robin recognized this strongman! BUT HOW?!

The comic goes on to recap Dick's entire origin story in flashback, on the assumption that you may not know it.

(BTW, if you'd like to know more about Haly's Circus throughout the years, nightwingology has a great post here summarizing a lot of fun plotlines and characters!)

Basically: Silver Age comics are very self-consciously episodic and kid-friendly; they're not generally gonna do overly-elaborate callbacks because they don't know what comics their kid readers may have randomly picked up or remember.

By the time of post-Crisis, comic books were being written for an adult audience buying from the direct market, i.e. readers who are collecting whole runs & don't need or want Dick's origin story to be recapped to us in full every time it's referenced. That's why in post-Crisis, we get stuff like "hey, neat, this particular soda brand is getting mentioned in several different books!!" or "in order to understand this story arc, buy SIXTEEN DIFFERENT COMICS in FIVE DIFFERENT RUNS and read them ALL ACCORDING TO A NUMBERED ORDER and also you better be following the individual plotlines and recognize these five minor characters who we don't bother to introduce!! Good luck!!" But the elaborate post-Crisis plotlines - and subtler worldbuilding like a stuffed animal callback to Dick's backstory - don't make a lot of story sense UNLESS you're imagining your readers as completionist adult fans.

So IMO a stuffed animal wouldn't be a pre-Crisis thing unless it was The Episodic Story Of the Week, and I don't think a stuffed animal is action-adventure-y enough for the fast-paced storytelling of the Silver Age. (Unless it, like, came to life and tried to eat you or something.)

Post-Crisis: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr: no, Dick's a manly tough guy, he's not gonna have a stuffed animal, that'd be lame, like something Tim might do

Part of the edgy grimdark adult vibes in 80s/90s comics is that some characters who used to be kinda silly & goofy & lighthearted - like Batman and Robin - get reimagined as Serious and Angsty and Edgy in a Tough Cool Manly Brooding Way. This massively affects characterization for Bruce, Dick, and Bruce and Dick's relationship.

(I obviously love this change & love the tense Bruce-and-Dick interactions, but plenty of fans of the earlier fluffy comics really disliked the edgy retcons of Miller / Wolfman / Starlin / et al.)

The upshot is that post-Crisis is a period when you could have a recurring reference like a stuffed elephant, but you wouldn't have a stuffed elephant, not for Dick. I think a toy like that would be too cutesy / childish / effeminate to give a male character in post-Crisis, unless you were poking fun at him.

Now, you could probably let Tim have a stuffed animal, because Tim is sometimes cool but also sometimes a tryhard loser who is faking being cool and not entirely pulling it off (see e.g. the Robin comic where he practices tough-guy faces in the mirror, or the Teen Titans comic where Conner discovers his cringy Enya CD, or when he's fanboying over Connor and it's awkward, etc etc.). A stuffed animal would be deeply embarrassing, and you'd have to be careful to compensate by having Tim do something cool afterward - but Tim's character concept allows for "he's kind of a loser sometimes."

But Dick isn't!! In post-Crisis, Dick's a tough / impressive / "cool guy" character, the kind of guy anyone would want to be, even in the flashbacks where he's Robin, and even in the stories where he's more lighthearted than angsty. It'd be kinda lame for Dick to have a stuffed elephant, so he wouldn't. I feel like Dick would be more likely to poke fun at it if someone had one, like when he's making fun of Wally for liking the Hardy Boys. Dick could have a Batman action figure, at most, and if he had one he would have it ironically.

Basically: in post-Crisis, a male character hugging a stuffed elephant feels more likely to be a punchline to me, not something poignant. (Even with Tim, Tim could have an embarrassing stuffed animal, but he couldn't hug it when sad - that's too far. Maybe Booster Gold might do this. Probably he wouldn't, but spiritually, he would. Sorry Booster ilu! <3)

Instead, Dick instinctively deals with his inner turmoil like the TORTURED ACTION HERO he is: by punching things and brooding and yelling and joining the mob and sleeping on rooftops and going on obsessive secret missions and acquiring Angsty Stubble!! Just like Batman!

(Technically I don't know if Bruce ever joined the mob but you know he would.)

Anyway as you know this is my favorite continuity and I am poking fun affectionately, but uh, yeah sdfsfdsfs. No stuffed animals.

Post-2011 / Infinite Frontier / Wayne Family Adventures: stuffed animals, yes or no?

tl;dr it's in WFA! Probably not anywhere else, but it could be.

Post-2011 stuff tends to be cutesier overall, most of all in the current Infinite Frontier era. So I don't feel like this would be tonally out-of-line with IF comics. Taylor tends to go for more meme-y references rather than fanfic references, though.

So the obvious best fit is WFA, which is aiming for a rough approximation of Silver Age family-friendly vibes - wholesome, episodic plots, Teaching Good Moral Lessons For The Youth, etc. - plus lots of Easter eggs for fanfic readers and some comic references.

And look, here we are:

Aww.

Whew - that's everything I could find!

Anyway as you can probably tell, I LOVE the elephant, so this was a very entertaining rabbit hole to go down, thank you <3

[burinazar]

I've been giving some thought to "what is the best way for a person in 2024 to get into/get back into Sound Horizon" as I reconnect with it myself (the more I do so the more I realize how massively and almost ridiculously influential it was to what i like in storytelling...)

I'd like to post more about some options now and then. Lately I've enjoyed these Youtube uploads by QueenoftheHorizon of the album Elysion, which are bundled with not only translations but tons of additional notes and information.

Elysion is, like certain others of Sound Horizon's albums, a series of interconnected stories with tragic thematic elements in common and a general framing device in the form of one story that connects them; in this case the framing story is that of a father and daughter -- an assassin and his sickly albino child El, both of whom pass away in the events of the first song. The child hopes they will somehow reunite someday in Paradise. After death, the father's soul begins to wander, seeking a person conceptualized as 'Elys' (representing the longing for his lost daughter), and we see the tragic stories of various other girls that his soul perceives, wondering if they are the one he seeks...

Elysion was probably the first Sound Horizon album I heard (i'm 70% sure a stage show video of "Ark" was my actual intro to Sound Horizon; since it was like 15 years ago and I rapidly watched as much as I could of them in the ensuing hours and days the memory is unclear haha.) This channel and playlist first went up in 2010 so, and thus wouldn't have been around when I first got into Sanhora in idk ~2008, which is a pity, because they're a wonderful entry point for a canon that can be inaccessible to those who speak little or no Japanese -- in addition to the English translations themselves in each video, the uploader has packed the video notes with explanation and analysis of each song's associated story.

If you are interested in "Elysion" as an entry point to Sound Horizon, I highly recommend watching the videos on this playlist and reading both the video descriptions and the pinned comment for each list, for both translations and a wonderfully detailed explanation and further analysis of each story. For example, the one for Ark elaborately lists out not just the events that are likely to have transpired within the song but also alternative explanations to the common fandom interpretation as well as highlights of extra material (ex. a two-chapter special manga release) that support the ambiguity of interpretation.

Also, definitely check both the video notes and the top comment, where the uploader put translator notes. Here are some of the uploader's translation notes for "Baroque" -- they really are amazingly thorough and interesting, and are a can't miss if you are a language learner yourself who wants to connect with and understand the original wording as much as possible:

Elysion also has music videos and stage shows (ex., Ark stage, Stardust stage, El no Rakuen MV. 'Probably-scary doll' warning for that last one-- in fact the use of BJDs in their shows and videos is how I first heard of Sound Horizon lol, they were being discussed on Den of Angels.) This is material that I think is wonderful and, as mentioned, this kind of thing is the way I personally first experienced the tales; anyone who enjoys these uploads will hopefully go on to look them up. However, the stage shows and MVs are targeted at existing fans and often assume the audience already knows the story (or at the very least speaks Japanese!), so for anyone who doesn't speak fluent Japanese and wants to get the meaning of the songs, their plot and theme and characters, this is really an unbeatable way to enjoy the music for the first time.