#it’s always a certain characters fans who get that rep and not another’s too….

[mickeym4ndy]

Why does the shameless fandom see everything in black and white sometimes. It’s always if u criticize a character at all then you must hate them entirely, or if you defend a character or talk about the reasoning behind something at all then you love them blindly and can’t admit they’ve done any wrong

[bakersstreetirregulars]

ROMANCE KINGDOM! ~SUGAR SWEET DESTINY~

☁️ You found this game in the trash…?

🍓 Yeah… why not give it a try?

☁️ Sure…!

Synopsis

Sugar Sweet Destiny is Cookie Run: Kingdom’s newest April Fool’s Day event for 2023 based on countless PC games about finding love in high school. This post is not exhaustive yet, and it will be updated with time as I- the Editor- play the mode more and more. There will be spoilers for the endings here below the break, as well as a few pointers on how to win their hearts.

In order to start a new game, you need 15 Blooming Hearts. These Hearts will restock over time, and you can always buy more with Crystals, ads, or in packages

The Gifts and Album menus will open after your first playthrough

Clicking the “Minimize” button or desktop bar will minimize the game and show the desktop, and you can return to the game by clicking the icon on the bottom bar or the desktop

The red X button will close the game and take you back to your kingdom

Protagonist: You play the role of the protagonist, in which you name yourself. Choose carefully, that name will appear throughout the current run through the story. You are a reasonably popular student of Kingdom High, Class 1-C, going about your day, when you suddenly find a box of chocolates in your locker! Your choices will determine whether you make your feelings known to your classmates and win their hearts, or fall apart in a blubbering mess trying. How do you make these choices? When multiple blue buttons appear in the middle of the screen, choose one to determine your character’s next action.

If you make a choice that results in a Bad Ending before choosing to express your feelings to someone at the end of Day 5, you can choose to spend 15 more Blooming Hearts to go back to the scene and try again with another option

Your Classmates

🌟 Marcus Madeline: The Student Council President. Comes from a very wealthy family and has an official fan club that spans half the school. VERY popular and makes his fellow classmates freak out when they see him.

🌿 Herbert Hoo: Your longtime childhood friend, and an avid gardener. He’s soft spoken and likes plants, and they seem to like him too. The Gardening Club just had to have him as a member, and he enjoys doing it. Although he enjoys his time being together with you too.

🗡️ Rachel Raspberry: The Star of the Kingdom High Fencing Club, and the Class Rep. A child prodigy in swordsmanship, she defeated a high school student in a fencing competition while she was in middle school. She also fended off multiple bullies from a neighboring high school who didn’t know who she was, and took them all on with just a stick… and WON.

🌊 Serena Faire: A class senior, famous for her otherworldly beauty and quiet nature. The last member of the Astronomy Club, she has her sights set on the moon with genuine feelings and love for it quite frequently during her moon-watching sessions at night. Known for her frequent shutdowns on other students’ attempts to date her. Also known as the Ice Princess for seeming so cold with her perceived ignorance, but actually quite compassionate and kind.

⚔️ Derek DaChoco: The thuggish super-bully, rumored to be the son of a shady corporate bigwig. Doesn’t pick fights, but when he does, he swings a 2x4 (a two-by-four wooden board, most likely) with a raging flurry. Known as the Dark Tornado of Kingdom High. “Public Enemy Number One” of Kingdom High. Rumored to have flunked junior year for a full decade, can make almost everyone quake with fear.

Album

The Album contains memories of every ending and certain moments that take place in the game. Each memory and ending has a picture and a reward associated with it. Get all the Happy Endings to unlock a Special Memory Painting.

Happy Endings

“Looking at You” - Visiting Serena Faire on the roof during her moon-watching sessions, and even showing her how to turn a bowl of dough that looked like the full moon into moon pancakes, you could understand her and her fascination with the moon… and you were the only one who would accept her for it as you would also look up to her. (300 Crystals)

“No. 1 Fan” - Seeing you being hounded by the fans for trying to cut the line to express your feelings without a gift, Marcus Madeline had to tell them to stop and shoved his way through the crowd. It was there when you mustered all your courage to ask him out on a walk by the lake. In front of EVERYONE. In a gasp and shock from the crowd, Marcus was seemingly just as confused as he wanted to give everyone his love. With unanimous approval from his fans, he reached out to you for the way YOU saw him: as himself. In a burst of emotion, the two of you express your true feelings for each other as the fans erupted in thunderous applause and entrusted you with his love. The two of you run off to the lake, smiles all around, hand in hand. Your high school love life is just beginning…! (300 Crystals)

Memories

“Leave me Alone” - Upon uncovering the curtain in the nurse’s office, you find Derek DaChoco in bandages and bad shape and tend to him with fresh bandages after he awakens in front of you. The nurses tried to object, but Derek was alright with it. He even suggested that you should be a doctor! You share a moment as he talks about what his father said about trying not to get other people involved with his own path. (100 Radiant Shards)

“Rooftop Serenade” - Following your friends cautiously through the unlocked door to the rooftop while simultaneously knowing that Serena Faire could be up there, you remain there after they disperse upon seeing nobody- and no ghost- there. You know where she is, and you call for her… and she responds back warmly. She remains there quite often to stare at the moon and feel her worldly concerns and whatever weighs her down melt away. The two of you share a moment in silent tranquility, nobody to witness it except the stars of the night sky. Words cannot express the feelings the two of you shared that night as you comforted each other and held each other’s hands, feeling the stars travel across the sky. (100 Radiant Shards)

“The Great Cream Explosion” - Visiting a classroom with a lot of noise, you find Marcus Madeline and his world-famous madelines being swarmed by his fans and their recommendations for pastry pairings. It’s hard to cook in this, but sprinkles in some whipped cream was enough for the cream to practically explode and cause you to turn into a creamy mess in 3… 2… 1… not. Because Marcus was there to protect you from the brunt of the blast! As the two of you share a moment and embrace before a teacher helps guide everyone with the cleanup process. (100 Radiant Shards)

Bad Endings

“No. 0401 Fan” - Getting rejected by Marcus Madeline in front of his fans in the name of student camaraderie as you tried to express your feelings by week’s end, you soullessly accept the offer to join his fan club from other classmates while collapsing into a crumpled heap in front of everyone. You weren’t the first one either… and you even considered transferring away from Kingdom High. (3 Epic Soul Essences)

“Locked-up Heart” - Leading your classmates to the rooftop door to uncover the truth behind a ghost story of a blue-haired girl on the roof, the door was unfortunately locked. Forget it. Don’t get their hopes up so quickly. It usually leads to disappointing not only them, but also yourself. (100 Rainbow Pearls)

“Disappointment” - After giving the senior bullies from the day before some money to stave them off, your attempt to approach Derek DaChoco was brushed off as he looked away and pretended to not know you. Faith in humanity shattered. Probably shouldn’t have tried to ask Derek about his age, especially the second time around. (5 Arena Tickets)

“Delicious Nonetheless” - Looking for Derek DaChoco during the annual baking day since you talked with him twice, you instead see his handiwork instead: chocolates! It’s unknown whether it was meant to be a dented snowman or a heart, but it was too good to be thrown away. Thinking- no… hoping that someone would show up and ask what you were doing, you kept eating the chocolates Derek made. Nobody came, so you left the room with a satisfied appetite… and a disappointed heart. Perhaps you were too quiet with those chocolates, hm? (30 Topping Pieces)

Gifts

Accessible after experiencing someone’s Happy Ending, you can give your classmates gifts (from your Kingdom inventory) to increase your affection with them. Each person has their favorites and preferences, so looking for context clues is important. Increase their affection high enough, and you’ll get a special Title and even their Profile Picture! Unlock all 5 Happy Endings to interact with Someone Else…❔

[shana-reviews-tmblr]

I have never seen a more mean spirited list where its options misunderstand the series

1- Rushed AF. look guys, S1 for most streaming services get the 8-10ep treatment because that's what gets order, unless stated, this is NOT always in control of the creators, also the series has 1 season to its name, you can label it as rushed when it's completed, otherwise, you don't know what a slow burn is.

2- Racism, WHERE TF DID YOU EVEN SEE IT IS S1?

3- Graphic Sex Scene - WHERE!? if this is in ep 4, we didn't see any dicks going around outside of seeing Val grind up on Angeldust and even then, it wasn't graphic and used to show how awful Val treats Angeldust, if it's not to your liking that's fine, but many SA victims within the fandom and some outside have at praised ep4's rep.

4-Painfully bad songs, man you must not be a musical stage show fan then and it shows.

5- "even more r4pe jokes" WHERE? you mean the scene with sir pentious at the bar called CONSENT where he emerged unharmed, clothes intact because any rationally thinking person can tell he said no, and they let him go?

6- Lute get completely forgotten. Dude SLOW BURN, Lute won't be the main antagonist this season, but we'll definitely be seeing her

7- "5 + new characters who add nothing" At this point why do you even watch the show? everyone who is introduced in this season is being set up so future seasons won't be saddled with trying to introduce them. and even then, half the cast outside the hotel staff ARE SIDE/MINOR/SUPPORITNG characters they aren't the main focus

8- Adam never gets brought up apart from jokes" - oh no the misogynist gets laughed at also kinda hard for him to be brought up when he's dead outside of flashbacks

9-"an actually good song" - you must have ignored how most of the songs in the show actually hit the top lists on spotify

10-"rushed redemptions" Pentious's redemption was shown in the season and was believable, his small acts of kindness and his willingness to put his life on the line to beat adam earned his redemption it wasn't rushed, but even if it was, again this goes back to the order Prime gave to have 8eps, until we know for certain, we can only guess it wasn't in the teams control.

11- "pentious contributes nothing" i'm beginning to think this list is biased against Pentious and is just looking for reasons to put a bingo

12- "Only 1 real Chaggie Scene" Sapphic-phobia must be blinding this person because Chaggie has moments throughout the season, they don't need a makeout session, the simple gestures, eye contact, hand holding, etc. all show they are a couple and there are couples who act this way. just say you hate sapphic couples

13-Alastor's backstory sucks" - picking something just to fill the hole

14- Ace/Arophobia - idk man this list is against sapphic couples so i'm going to go with this just being something random they wanted to put

15- Vee's get too much focus, AGAIN" Oh my god this one hurt, out of all the Vees, Val and and Vox got the most screen time and even then they're establishing ep was just that, ESTABLISHING them so they don't feel like they come out of nowhere when S2 comes since Vox is the big bad there. Val got his establishing ep in ep4 so we know what is at stake and what is Angeldust's situation, his guest spot in ep6 was to establish that Angeldust can resist Val and took a stand against his abuser, which showed he was someone who can be worthy of redemption, but oh guess an important character peiece is too much. Vel has the least screen time, but her enterance was memorable and she'll probably get more. so idk WTF this is about.

Gonna be honest i was going to do all of these, but 15 is where i got my limit because everything else after is just repetittive dribble that's insult a character who hasn't shown up yet and insulting another character who plays an important part

Antis of this show really are just Lily Orchard wannabes because they assume the worst of something just because they don't even like it.

if you are anything like this or follow this type of mindset you need to reevaluate your view points.

[dolphs-world]

Being Young has never been this Refreshing

I am a big fan of Super Smash Bros, I have been since 2011 playing Brawl. In 2014, I was so hyped for Sm4sh and chose to experience the hype for Brawl. And of course, Ultimate blows those 2 out of the water. Now, I haven't played the original nor Melee but I will. Despite being such a big Nintendo fan their 5th and 6th generation of consoles are the only eras of gaming I am lacking in experience. This is especially funny because a) I have a lot of knowledge about 90s Nintendo anyways and b) I have played significant amount of PS and PC games from this era. But back to Smash. I am so glad I was not aware of the competitive scene outside of comps at high school so I'm very aware of what the game fully has to offer. i.e I can enjoy it on a very casual level. And look I get it, a lot of items are very B.S but I love B.S. Assist Trophies and Pokemon are cool as hell. But I understand turning them off. But Smash Balls? Get out of here. My point is, though I don't regularly play with items I always have an advantage against my opponents online when the rules allow them. Also, some items like certain bombs or the S-flag are great additions that can spice the game up. Another aspect that is ignored in the competitive scene are the stages. For a little anecdote my friends play CS:GO. Personally I can't stand the game but even less can I stand their behaviour when playing. What especially bugs me is whenever they complain about the map they end up. Collectively, they hate about 4 maps ... which is half of them. I can't imagine playing a game where I hate half the maps or find them mediocre, it's partially why I don't play MK8 too much. Thankfully, in Ultimate, there are only 6 bad stages out of 100 and they're mainly due to gimmicks. Initially I was going to write about how lackluster the new maps felt but honestly they're pretty decent. The Odyssey, BOTW, and Splatoon are all great maps with the Castlevania one being one the best. And with the DLC the Persona one is also one of the best with the Fatal Fury, Tekken, and FE: Three Houses stages being great and surprisingly the Xenoblade one aswell. The issue is that's it, 15 stages with most of them being pretty generic showing off the world they inhabit. And there were only 4 new stages on launch! Only a third of the stages are great with the rest varying from bad to decent. I feel like I'm coming off across a bit wish-washy. Competitive smash has bled into the stage design and I don't understand how they can ignore stages like Fourside or The Great Bay but at the same time who would want to play The Great Cave Offensive? But of course the most important and most speculative aspect of Smash is the roster. You can definitely tell the newer characters from the old but that's not a disservice to either, although the DLC do feel a little busted. The initial new roster are all standout choices and feel very unique with the exception of Isabelle. I get that Animal Crossing is very popular and it should have probably had a new rep but do we really need Villager 1.5? Can you imagine if they added Louie from Pikmin or Ninten from Mother? There would be no problem. Smash has always had a problem with clones and I draw the line at Luigi, Lucas, and Ganondorf, the rest (Dr. Mario, Pichu, Falco, Young Link, Roy/Chrom, Lucario, Toon Link) can go! Sadly, I think the DLC characters are a bit worse. Min-Min and Pyra/Mythra are just bad. Bad characters and bad reps. Most of the rest suffer in one way or another. Sora is boring, Byleth is a good character but suffers from the FE effect, Terry and Kazuya are good choices but I'll go into them a bit later for now I'll just say it would have been nice to have a female fighting character, and Hero and Steve (and Pyra/Mythra) are a bit busted. Only Joker and Sephiroth are the only perfect DLC. (I've neglected Piranha Plant and Banjo but I will be bringing them up in the next post. For now I will say that Piranha Plant is perfect.) So, what would my ideal roster be?

♪ ~ Band on the Run

📽️ ~ Rocky

🎬 ~ Powerpuff Girls

📖 ~ La Planète des Singes

[supergirl9130]

Kinda pissed/fed up due to the fact that this is still happening with both shows (which ended how many months ago) are still getting that good ol' every media must have villains killed bs going around

[calzona-ga]

In her unauthorized book, Lynette Rice explores the stories behind some of the ABC drama's biggest moments, including — in this exclusive excerpt — the factors that led to McDreamy's shocking death.

In How to Save a Life: The Inside Story of Grey’s Anatomy, author Lynette Rice recounts the ABC medical drama’s eventful 16-year history, revealing new details behind some of the show’s biggest departures. Included in the unauthorized, 320-page oral history (St. Martin’s Press, Sept. 21, $29.99) is a chapter that offers new insight into leading man Patrick Dempsey’s shocking exit in season 11 of the Shonda Rhimes-created drama. In the chapter, Rice speaks with Dempsey’s co-stars and exec producers who were present during filming of his final days on Grey’s Anatomy, and reveals claims of “HR issues” that contributed to the death of his alter-ego, Derek “McDreamy” Shepherd.

“There were HR issues. It wasn’t sexual in any way. He sort of was terrorizing the set. Some cast members had all sorts of PTSD with him,” recalls exec producer James D. Parriott, who was brought back to the series to oversee Dempsey’s exit.

In more than 80 interviews with current and former cast- and crewmembers, Rice, an editor-at-large at Entertainment Weekly, also explores the show’s early days, recounts the thinking behind some of its more polarizing storylines and offers exclusive details about the show’s behind-the-scenes culture.

“After 17 seasons, fans still can’t get enough of Grey’s Anatomy,” Rice tells THR. But what went down behind the scenes was just as dramatic as what viewers saw every Thursday. I’m excited for fans to read what I learned about those early days, along with what it was like to work for Shonda Rhimes, and why the drama was so freakin’ headline-prone.”

Below, The Hollywood Reporter shares an excerpt — the full eighth chapter — from How to Save a Life, and tune in Friday to TV’s Top 5 for an interview with Rice about her book and the other big reveals she uncovered in her reporting for it.

(Reps for ABC, ABC Signature, Shondaland, and Dempsey declined comment on the reveals in Rice’s book.)

“He’s Very Dreamy, but He’s Not the Sun,” Or, How Grey’s Anatomy Loved — Then Learned to Live Without — Patrick Dempsey Ellen Pompeo may have played the titular role, but for many fans over many years, Patrick Dempsey was the real draw to Grey’s Anatomy. Some of it had to do with his celebrity: Dempsey was the most famous member of the original cast at the time of the pilot and brought with him quite a cult following from his 1987 movie Can’t Buy Me Love. But a lot of it was due to the way Rhimes wrote her McDreamy and how Dempsey depicted him. James D. Parriott I would say, “The guy would never say that,” and Shonda would say, “He’s McDreamy. He’s the perfect man. He would say that.” I’d say, “Okay. It’s your show.” Eric Buchman Shonda had a very clear idea of how important it was to keep Derek as this almost idealized love interest, not just for Meredith but for the audience. Naturally, the writers—especially writers who had been working on one-hour dramas for a while—were like, “Well, maybe have McDreamy make a big mistake in surgery and kill somebody. Or he develops an addiction of some kind. What is his deep, dark secret?” Shonda was very insistent: that’s not the character we do that with. Even when you find out he’s married, that was done in a very sympathetic way that kept him being a hero. He was wronged by his spouse and in spite of it all he was still gonna give his marriage a second chance. Stacy McKee Shonda was protective of McDreamy, but it was really with an eye toward being protective of Meredith. I don’t think the two were separate from one another. I don’t think she wanted to put something out there that maybe on the surface might seem a little frivolous. At its core, there was something really substantial that she wanted to say. She wanted to be very specific about the type of relationship values that she put out there. Tony Phelan I was in editing with Shonda once, and it was the scene where Meredith and Derek had broken up. He comes over and she’s like, “I can’t remember the last time we kissed.” And he says, “I remember. You were wearing this and you smelled of this …”

Joan Rater “Your shampoo smelled like flowers, you had that sweater on …” He described their last kiss. Tony Phelan Typically in editing you start on Derek, then you cut to Meredith for a reaction, and then you’ll go back to him. I noticed that we weren’t ever cutting back to Meredith. I asked why. Shonda said, “Because the woman in Iowa who’s watching this show wants to believe that Patrick is talking to her, and if you cut back to Meredith, it pushes them out of it.” In those special moments, we would just lock into Derek and let him do his thing. Joan Rater And he was a master at it. Patrick Dempsey He’s the ideal man, and that’s what Shonda constructed. There’s a projection [of him] onto me when you come in contact with fans, certainly with the younger and older fans. There is a certain amount of expectation. There is a responsibility to it. It made me grow, too. There were good qualities [of his] that you work on to obtain. Off camera, Dempsey was equally as charismatic to his fellow actors, crew members, and anyone who would come to visit the set. Lauren Stamile I was going in to meet him, and I remember I had this little cardigan sweater on and I took it off before I got into the room. Dempsey is one of those people—it’s almost like there’s a light shining around his body, and you feel like you’re the only person in the room. I got so hot and I remember saying, “Gosh, I would take off my sweater if I had one on because I’m so hot, but I took it off.” I was just babbling. He said, “You look nice,” and I said, “You look nicer.” I felt so awkward and he was so gracious and lovely. I was having a nervous breakdown. It’s like this “it” factor. I was like, God, whatever he has, I wish I had. I think it was very obvious how nervous I was, and he went out of his way to make sure he introduced me to everybody and made sure I felt comfortable, which he certainly didn’t have to do. But he did. Joan Rater He knew I had a giant crush on him, and he loved it. And when we’d go to table reads—I was an actress at one point in my life—they would always give me Meredith if Ellen wasn’t there. And I’d be getting my chicken tenders at craft services before the table read and he’d come up behind me and say, “Are you reading Meredith?” in my ear, like, so sexy. I’d be like, Oh my God. I mean, I could barely … I could not look at him. Tina Majorino I worked with Patrick a ton. I love him so much. We had a really great time working together. I think he’s such a great actor and he really made me laugh a lot. I feel like we had a good dynamic in scenes together, and it was always fun to play opposite him. Yes, he’s that charismatic in real life. Yes, his hair is that awesome. Yes, he is dreamy up close.

Chandra Wilson Patrick Dempsey will forever be known as Grey’s Anatomy’s McDreamy. Derek Shepherd is a permanent part of television history.

Norman Leavitt He is a big, personable guy.

Jeannine Renshaw We all love Patrick. Patrick is a sweetheart. If I saw him on the street, I’d give him a hug. I love the guy.

Mark Wilding I’ve always had a soft spot for Patrick. He really does try to do the right thing. Brooke Smith, who played Dr. Erica Hahn, remembers how Dempsey defended her when the decision was made to fire her from the show in 2008. Brooke Smith I remember calling him and saying, “Oh my God, they said they can’t write for me anymore, so I guess I’m leaving.” And he was like, “What are you talking about? You’re the only one they’re writing for.” Which at that time, it kind of did feel that way. But I guess someone didn’t like that. They gave me a statement [to release, about her departure] and I never said it. Patrick said that he actually took it out of his jacket on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and read the statement. He won’t let me forget it. He was like, “I defended you, see?” And it was true.

By season eleven, however, fans saw a disturbing break in MerDer’s once unbreakable bond. Six episodes had gone by without a peep from Derek, who was supposedly in Washington, D.C., where he had apparently made out with a research fellow. Fans began threatening to bolt if their hero didn’t return soon to Seattle. “I have never missed one episode,” wrote a fan on Dempsey’s Facebook page. “But I swear if [Rhimes] kills you off I’m done.” But there was a critical reason for Derek’s strange absence: behind the scenes, there was talk of Dempsey’s diva-like fits and tension between him and Pompeo. To help manage the explosive situation, executive producer James D. Parriott was brought back in to serve as a veritable Dempsey whisperer.

Patrick Dempsey [That] was the first year that I haven’t been in every episode. I [was] in every episode since the pilot— close to 250 episodes. That [was a] huge run. James D. Parriott Shonda needed an OG to come in as sort of a showrunner for fourteen episodes. There were HR issues. It wasn’t sexual in any way. He sort of was terrorizing the set. Some cast members had all sorts of PTSD with him. He had this hold on the set where he knew he could stop production and scare people. The network and studio came down and we had sessions with them. I think he was just done with the show. He didn’t like the inconvenience of coming in every day and working. He and Shonda were at each other’s throats.

Jeannine Renshaw There were times where Ellen was frustrated with Patrick and she would get angry that he wasn’t working as much. She was very big on having things be fair. She just didn’t like that Patrick would complain that “I’m here too late” or “I’ve been here too long” when she had twice as many scenes in the episode as he did. When I brought it up to Patrick, I would say, “Look around you. These people have been here since six thirty a.m.” He would go, “Oh, yeah.” He would get it. It’s just that actors tend to see things from their own perspective. He’s like a kid. He’s so high energy and would go, “What’s happening next?” He literally goes out of his skin, sitting and waiting. He wants to be out driving his race car or doing something fun. He’s the kid in class who wants to go to recess.

Patrick Dempsey It’s ten months, fifteen hours a day. You never know your schedule, so your kid asks you, “What are you doing on Monday?” And you go, “I don’t know,” because I don’t know my schedule. Doing that for eleven years is challenging. But you have to be grateful, because you’re well compensated, so you can’t really complain because you don’t really have a right. You don’t have control over your schedule. So, you have to just be flexible.

Longtime Crew Member Poor Patrick. I’m not defending his schtick. I like him, but he was the Lone Ranger. All of these actresses were getting all this power. All the rogue actresses would go running to Shonda and say, “Hey, Patrick’s doing this. Patrick’s late for work. He’s a nightmare.” He was just shut out in the cold. His behavior wasn’t the greatest, but he had nowhere to go. He was so miserable. He had no one to talk to. When Sandra left, I remember him telling me, “I should’ve left then, but I stayed on because they showed me all this money. They just were dumping money on me.”

Patrick Dempsey It [was] hard to say no to that kind of money. How do you say no to that? It’s remarkable to be a working actor, and then on top of that to be on a show that’s visible. And then on top of that to be on a phenomenal show that’s known around the world, and play a character who is beloved around the world. It’s very heady. It [was] a lot to process, and not wanting to let that go, because you never know whether you will work again and have success again.

Jeannine Renshaw A lot of the complaining … I think Shonda finally witnessed it herself, and that was the final straw. Shonda had to say to the network, “If he doesn’t go, I go.” Nobody wanted him to leave, because he was the show. Him and Ellen. Patrick is a sweetheart. It messes you up, this business.

James D. Parriott I vaguely recall something like that, but I can’t be sure. It would have happened right toward the end, because I know they were negotiating and negotiating, trying to figure out what to do. We had three different scenarios that we actually had to break because we didn’t know until I think about three days before he came back to set which one we were going to go with. We didn’t know if he was going to be able to negotiate his way out of it. We had a whole story line where we were going to keep him in Washington, D.C., so we could separate him from the rest of the show. He would not have to work with Ellen again. Then we had the one where he comes back, doesn’t die, and we figure out what Derek’s relationship with Meredith would be. Then there was the one we did. It was kind of crazy. We didn’t know if he was going to be able to negotiate his way out of it. It was ultimately decided that just bringing him back was going to be too hard on the other actors. The studio just said it was going to be more trouble than it was worth and decided to move on.

Stacy McKee I don’t think there was any way to exit him without him dying. He and Meredith were such an incredibly bonded couple at that point. It would be completely out of character if he left his kids. There was no exit that would honor that character other than if he were to die. Patrick Dempsey I don’t remember the date [I got the news]. It was not in the fall. Maybe February or March. It was just a natural progression. And the way everything was unfolding in a very organic way, it was like, “Okay! This is obviously the right time.” Things happened very quickly. We were like, “Oh, this is where it’s going to go.”

So that was that: McDreamy would die in episode twenty-one of season eleven, even though Dempsey was in year one of his recently signed two-year contract extension. Rhimes wrote a script that was befitting of her lead’s heroic persona: she began “How to Save a Life” by having Derek witness a car crash and helping the injured. Once it appeared everyone was out of harm’s way, Derek continues on his road trip but is suddenly broadsided by a truck.

Rob Hardy (Director) The paramedics leave. He’s there by himself. He’s having a moment. The nice music is playing, and all of a sudden, bang. It comes out of nowhere, which, you know, is how accidents happen. So as opposed to watching it as a viewer, we saw the accident happen through Derek’s perspective. Derek ends up at Dillard Medical Center, a hospital far from Grey Sloan and the talented doctors who work there. His eyes are open, but his brain is severely damaged. No one hears his plea for a CT scan; he can’t speak. To help keep the episode a secret, the scenes were shot in an abandoned hospital in Hawthorne, California, about twenty-two miles from the show’s home studio in Los Feliz.

Mimi Melgaard It was really hard on all of us because it was so secretive and we had so many different locations. We shot at this closed-down hospital that was absolutely creepy haunted. All the scenes there were so sad anyway, and in this yucky-feeling haunted hospital? It was really weird. His whole last episode was really tough. Patrick Dempsey It was like any other day. It was just another workday. There was still too much going on. You’re in the midst of it—you’re not really processing it. Rob Hardy Here’s a guy who’s immobile. Now you’re inside of his head. We were trying to make that feel scary from the perspective of a person who’s used to being in control, from a person who usually has the power of life and death in his own hands. But now he doesn’t have the ability to speak on his own behalf.

Samantha Sloyan When I went to audition, I didn’t recognize any of these doctors’ names. I assumed they were just dummy sides so people wouldn’t ruin the story line or anything like that. All we knew is that we were dealing with a man who’s been in a car accident. I had no idea that it was going to be Derek. I just figured I was going to be a guest doctor and that whoever this person was who was injured, was going to be just a character on the show. Once it became clear what we were working on, I was like, Oh, my gosh. I can’t believe this is the episode I’m on.

Mike McColl (Dr. Paul Castello) I signed an NDA before they would release the script to me. I was reading it in my house, and I was like, “Oh, my God.” I didn’t tell anyone, including my agents. I just said, “This is a really great booking. It’s a great role on Grey’s.” And they didn’t know anything until it aired.

Savannah Paige Rae (Winnie) The first scene I shot was actually the sentimental scene when I’m saying, “It’s a beautiful day to save lives, right?” I’m in the hospital room with Derek and talking to him. Even though I never watched the show, I recognized the value of the episode I was in and just really took it to heart. It was so special that I got to be a part of it.

Rob Hardy [Patrick] had a lot of emotions during the whole shoot, which evolved. I think when we first started, he was very calm and cool … the same Patrick that I remembered when I worked on the show a year or so before. With each passing day, he was a lot more emotional. A lot more was on his mind, and that would show itself in different ways. The finality of the episode and for his character was setting in. You’ve become a global icon on this show and then in five, four, three, two, a day … it’s over.

James D. Parriott Patrick was very cooperative and good.

Mike McColl When I met Patrick, he’s lying on a stretcher and we’re rushing him into the ER. I just introduced myself, shook his hand, and was like, “Man, I cannot tell you what an honor it is to be the guy to take you down.” He loved it. He could not have been nicer to me and was funny through the whole shoot. He was on the table in front of me there when I cut his chest open and all that stuff. He gave me a hug at the end. It was a real privilege to be a part of TV history in that way.

Samantha Sloyan I remember him being incredibly kind. They had his neck in a brace, and he’s strapped down to the board, so there wasn’t a ton of chatting. I remember him being really kind, but it was clearly intense for him.

Stacy McKee It was such a beautiful piece of storytelling. I knew this event was going to be a really sad, horrible event for Meredith, but I also knew it was going to be the beginning of such an incredible chapter for Meredith.

Dempsey completed his final hours of shooting on a rainy night. There was no goodbye party, no goodbye cake. Maybe that’s because some cast members were left out of the loop. James Pickens, Jr., told ABC News that the cast “didn’t know a whole lot. It was kind of on the fly. So whatever information we got, we pretty much got it kind of right before it happened.”

Caterina Scorsone (Dr. Amelia Shepherd) I didn’t get to say goodbye to Patrick when he left. I do think that helped, because I’ve been using the character of Derek in my internal landscape since Private Practice. Derek was the stability in Amelia’s life. He became a father figure after they watched robbers shoot their father. When he was suddenly gone from the show, we didn’t have that closure, so I got to play it out. She’s about to use drugs again before Owen confronts her in a way that she finally talks about her feelings about losing Derek. She doesn’t end up using.

James D. Parriott The day he left, that was my last day. There was a certain sadness to it, but I think he was relieved. I mean, I think it took a toll on him, too.

Rob Hardy I didn’t see other actors showing up and saying, “Hey, it’s the last day! Wanted to come and wish you well.” I didn’t get that. It was more the Patrick show. We were in the Patrick world, and then Ellen came, and there was definitely a lot of emotion that both of them had individually … not necessarily together. It was more so her being there on the day that he died. He had his own way of being with that, and the same thing with her. It was like two people who grew up together and … here we are. They had their own way of reflecting.

Patrick Dempsey I very quietly left. It was beautiful. It was raining, which was really touching. I got in my Panamera, got in rush-hour traffic, and two hours later I was home. Big news like this doesn’t stay quiet for long. Both Michael Ausiello—who left EW in 2010 to launch the news site TVLine—and Lesley Goldberg of The Hollywood Reporter learned two weeks prior to Dempsey’s final episode that he would be leaving the show. No reporter worth their salt wants to sit on a scoop—least of all one as huge as this—but Ausiello and Goldberg didn’t want to spoil the outcome for fans, so they agreed to hold the story until after the episode aired. I eventually found out, too, but in the nuttiest way imaginable: I was standing on the set of CSI: Cyber, watching Patricia Arquette talk about some droll techno-criminal. Unfortunately, the publicist also cc’d Dempsey’s manager and ABC publicist while trying to give me a major story, so I couldn’t immediately report the scoop. But I did use the information to successfully negotiate the one and only exit interview with Dempsey. Two weeks before his final episode, I met him and his publicist at Feed Body & Soul in Venice, California, for a story that would hit newsstands on April 24. He seemed a little shell-shocked and at one point choked up, but at the time he said nothing about how his on-set behavior may have contributed to his ouster. My editor, Henry Goldblatt, wanted to put him on the cover of Entertainment Weekly, but he couldn’t guarantee to ABC that no one would see it before the episode aired. Good thing we didn’t: some subscribers got the issue on the morning of Dempsey’s final episode— and one actually tweeted the story. Our PR department tried to get the tweets removed, but the cat was out of the bag: some fans found out early that McDreamy was about to be McHistory. Outlets like Variety reported how the story got out early, while our PR department released this statement: “We are surprised that an EW subscriber may have received their issue a day earlier than planned. We always try our best to bring readers exclusive news first. We would like to apologize to fans of the show that learned the news ahead of time.” Dempsey’s final episode was watched by 8.83 million viewers—the show’s largest audience since the premiere that season. Variety even pontificated whether the ratings boost was due to my exclusive with Dempsey.

Lesley Goldberg (The Hollywood Reporter) I’m used to working with networks to hold news as part of their efforts to guard against plot spoilers. But the way Patrick Dempsey’s exit was handled involved a layer of paranoia and secrecy that has been unlike anything I’ve seen in my reporting career. News that he was leaving, and his character being killed off, would have been a major story considering how big the show is domestically and internationally. However, it also would have meant spoiling the episode and, more important, damaging key relationships I’ve worked hard to build. At some point, publishing the news of Dempsey’s exit before the episode aired became an ethical question of what was more important—a big story and its subsequent traffic, which would have come no matter what, or the relationships and trust that it took years to craft. Ultimately, I still published early because EW subscribers received the issue with Lynette’s Dempsey interview before the episode aired.

Mike McColl The morning after Derek’s last episode aired, my daughter sent me a link that was on YouTube or Facebook or something. I actually pulled it up to look at it, and it was a Grey’s Anatomy showbiz cheat sheet. It asked the question “Who is the attending doctor who killed Derek ‘McDreamy’ Shepherd?” It included a photo that I posted from the set. I had on a bloody rubber glove and was in my scrubs and mask. I never obviously would have posted this before it aired. I posted it well after the episode aired, and I [captioned it] “McDeadly.” This writer said something like, “Kill McDeadly.” Maybe that’s why the producer didn’t choose a big-name actor to be the one who killed our beloved McDreamy! I want to be ultrasensitive to these hard-core fans because it means so much to them, and I certainly didn’t mean in that case to make light of it. It’s just, I’m an actor, and I recognize it for what it is. Is everybody clear on the fact that this is just pretend and Patrick knew he was going to be leaving the show? It was just like, “God. He’s okay. He really is okay.”

Peter Horton Derek was going to be there forever with Meredith because you went through a whole journey with them. That was incredibly fulfilling. So even if he’s not there, he’s there. I don’t think any of us really worried about that going away because by then you were so invested in it. The show can last as it has for years.

Patrick Dempsey Lots of people [miss him]. “It’s good to see you alive” is the comment I get. I’m like, “Yes, I’m very much alive in reruns.” People were really invested in that relationship. I knew it would be heavy. Very happy to have moved on with a different chapter in my life.

Samantha Sloyan The montage just killed me, when Meredith says, “It’s okay, you can go.” God, I’m getting choked up just thinking about it. The chemistry they have as a pair and the way they were able to build that and sustain it! So many of these relationships are, like, “Will they, won’t they,” and then it wears thin. They sustained it for the duration of their relationship on the show, and it’s just, I think, a testament to what those two created. It was just unbelievable.

Pompeo addressed Dempsey’s departure with a tweet that focused solely on his character, not on how she spent eleven years working side by side with him: “There are so many people out there who have suffered tremendous loss and tragedy. Husbands and wives of soldiers, victims of senseless violence, and parents who have lost children. People who get up every day and do what feels like is the impossible. So it is for these people and in the spirit of resilance [sic] I am honored and excited to tell the story of how Meredith goes on in the face of what feels like the impossible.” Meanwhile, fans futilely created a Change.org petition to reinstate McDempsey, while other, more desperate ones simply tweeted “We Hate You” to Rhimes.

Shonda Rhimes Derek Shepherd is and will always be an incredibly important character—for Meredith, for me, and for the fans. I absolutely never imagined saying goodbye to our McDreamy. Patrick Dempsey’s performance shaped Derek in a way that I know we both hope became a meaningful example— happy, sad, romantic, painful, and always true—of what young women should demand from modern love. His loss will be felt by all.

Talk about the mother (father?) of all postscripts: In November of 2020 Dempsey reprised his role as McDreamy in the season opener—but only in Meredith’s dreams. Stricken with COVID-19, an unconscious Meredith “imagined” reuniting with her husband on the beach. After talking exclusively to Deadline and saying how it was “really a very healing process, and really rewarding,” Dempsey would return for more beach-based episodes that would ultimately stand out as the best moments of season seventeen. “It was a second chance thing,” one ABC executive told me at the time. “Shonda likes a comeback. Also, they wanted him in their last season.”

[musclesandhammering]

I'm not fond of the pairing but from what I've seen General public actually loves Sylki very much. Even the trade reviews called the relationship "genius" which,,,ok. Someone did a poll on various platforms, yt, reddit, fb, twitter etc comparing which ship is better (Lokius or Sylki) and it was Sylki who won by large margin in the end. I suppose mostly they just don't care because it's sci fi and a pairing in a totally unrealistic show, and after Wandavision I guess weird ships are 'in' but yeah it makes you think. But the writers already said they won't give in to the fan pressure bc they have their own story to tell (which ok, valid, you do you) but idk. I guess we will get even more Sylki in second season. Tom already said Loki won't stop searching for her

Sometimes I think casual fans are the most irritating thing about being in a fandom :/

Just as a disclaimer (bc I don’t want people coming for me): I think lokius is really cute, and I love fics/art/headcanons about them, but I never thought they were canonically romantically interested in each other. I never thought lokius was gonna be canon, and I never wanted it to (because I didn’t want ANY romance in the series), so I don’t even include it in my argument against s*lki.

Ok so….. listen. This is gonna be a long ass post, so I’m putting it under a cut. Sorry, anon, but you’re the one that opened the Worm Can.

The viewing public, in general, tends to heavily skew towards heterosexual-presenting ships. Partially because a portion of the general audiences are homophobic, and partially because a lot of non-tumblr fans are so sick of hearing tumblr stans go on and on and on about how they were queerbaited by certain gay ships not becoming canon, when in reality, said ships are trash.

Listen. I sympathise with that. I get that. I know I’m beating a hornet’s nest with this, but…. D*stiel? J*hnlock? St*cky? None of those were written in any way to invoke queer undertones, they were always supposed to be platonic, and tbfh even as platonic relationships the first two are literally toxic and abusive as hell, anyway.

So I definitely understand how a casual straight fan on Twitter or Instagram would see some of those same crazy “we were queerbaited” tumblr stans ranting about lokius not becoming canon and how much s*lki sucks and……. it makes sense that they’d be like “These people are just pissed that their gay ship isn’t canon, that’s why they hate s*lki.”

But here’s the thing. I don’t think those people realise how callous it is to say something like that when the only reason queer kids are so quick to ship any two male characters who express a modicum of affection for one another, is that they’re so fucking starved for representation in the first place, they’re willing to see queer romance in any same-sex interaction. They’re just that desperate. That’s where the whole crazy gay stan thing comes from. And yeah, it’s annoying that these people put their whole chest into defending gay ships that are total trash, but you have to realise why they do it.

So, what I’m saying is, for s*lki shippers- who are already winning, because their straight ship had the privilege of easily becoming canon despite all its flaws- to look at queer people who are frustrated to the point of tears that they were once again conned out of any form of queer rep (for the mcu’s first canon queer character, for gods sake) after actually genuinely being queerbaited this time (with his bisexuality/genderfluidity)….. and to essentially gloat that their straight ship became canon and taunt queer people by saying “oh you’re just desperate for two men to kiss”………… idk, man. It just seems real cold to me. Reeks of straight privilege and heteronormativity.

Ok, so with that being said.. let me respond to your actual ask lol.

I’m not surprised at all that s*lki won the popularity polls. I think a large reason for that is the fact that it was pitted against lokius, which sorta rubs a lot of casual viewers the wrong way for reasons listed above. I’m also not surprised that casual viewers liked it outside of its opposition to lokius- because, um, casual viewers aren’t very smart.

They tend to analyse exactly nothing, they don’t look any deeper than the surface, and if the writers of a show stick a hot man and woman together under a blanket, they eat it up. Because the narrative tells them it’s sweet. Just like the narrative tells them Loki is a greasy asshole who had no character development up until this point, and they eat that up too. Just like the narrative tells them that sylvie’s the best thing since sliced bread, and they eat that up too. Just like the narrative tells them it’s completely in character for Loki to try to subjugate a group of 3 random Mongolians in the middle of the dessert for absolutely no reason other than his “narcissism”, and they eat that up too. Just like the narrative tells them that one throwaway line about liking “a bit of both” is somehow this groundbreaking example of lgbt representation, and they eat that up too……… See the pattern here?

And as far as being concerned about the pseudo-incest angle, I don’t even think casual fans even dug that deep. They literally just saw two main characters- a pretty white woman and a hot white man- doing cool fight scenes together and giving each other goo goo eyes, and they were automatically sold.

And the writers saying “we won’t give in to fan pressure, we have our own story to tell” is honestly complete bullshit. What the hell is the POINT of working for a corporate film company and telling a story on screen if not to please the fans??? They do what they do to get people to watch their shows to get lots of money. That’s literally what they’re there for. Mike Waldron must have a pretty damn inflated sense of self importance if he thinks his own “artistic vision” or what the hell ever is the priority here lmao.

And I wanna be mad about Season 2, I really do. But at this point Season 1 ruined the character so much for me that I legitimately don’t even care what direction they take him in.

[lochnessies]

I'm pretty tired of certain edelkinnies projecting on her that she's some kind of grand sapphic rep we were all waiting for or something... As a non-edelstan wlw who enjoys pretty much every f/f ship in this game (that doesn't involve the few female characters I don't care for) I get really tired of the argument that not liking her means you hate gay women. Her story and character have nothing to do with telling an LGBT story of any kind, you could literally play as M!Byleth and she comes across as yet another waifu meant to pander to sweaty Reddit dudebros, but some people have decided that she's primarily meant as queer rep above everything else and decided the rest of us should view her that way too. It's already bad enough that "progressive" male fans will call you sexist for not liking their pixel waifu, now I have to deal with people from my own community acting like her being S-supportable by the female avatar erases all her flaws as and I gotta be okay with her bigotry and imperialism because she can be gay (also IntSys is like, SUPER woke and was totally thinking about people like us when creating her, yup!) I should just resort to using the same strawman whenever they talk shit about Rhea, who they don't seem to hold to the same ridiculous standard (and who has substantial f/f subtext in the game that doesn't involve the avatar). "You guys just hate to see a sapphic girlboss winning" will be my mantra from now on.

“certain edelkinnies” i feel like i’m missing out on some drama lmao but oh yeah anon i completely agree.

i can see why some lesbian/bi women would latch onto edelgard since wlw rep is pretty much always a welcome addition but it’s not a shield for her (or rather her stans) to hide behind when someone makes an argument they can’t go against and it’s definitely not cudgel to use against other people to attack their morals just bc they don’t see her in the same holy light u do. also being a villain doesn’t negate her sexuality in any way. she can still be in the wrong and have a crush on byleth of either sex… it’s not two exclusive traits.

personally, i’m not naïve enough to think that intsys made edel bi in an attempt to be more inclusive- it was a marketing ploy 100%. and guess what? i would say the same thing for rhea, dorothea, yuri, lin, etc. does this make me dislike them or view them as less bisexual? of course not but let’s not delude ourselves lol

and i find it kinda telling that i only see this behavior from one section of the fandom. i don’t see yuri or lin stans acting a fool (sometimes doro but not to the same extent). i might joke that rhea is a gay pope and if you hate her ur homophobic but never in a million years would i use that as an actual argument. rhea is bisexual and she still definitely torched those bitches at the end of cf.

[t0wnspersonb]

Love and Gains (Bokuto Koutarou x Reader)

Word Count: 2,657

Summary: After dealing with an intense breakup you find yourself in the gym in hopes of distracting you from your heartbreak. You end up running into an interesting character, and after the brief interaction you find yourself attending his volleyball game. But when you run into your ex once more, a certain owl headed player decides to help you out of the uncomfortable situation.

Warnings: FLUFF, making out, bad language, cheating, angst, Bokuto being a perfect angel

~~~

I hope you guys enjoy this one! I had fun writing it! I love Bokuto so much it’s absolutely ridiculous. Hopefully I did our boy some justice! I apologize if the writing is shit though lmao. I’m sorry I haven’t been updating more, I’ve just been busy with a broken foot and work now smh. I’ll probably start opening up requests again soon but I will let you know when I do! Anyway I hope you guys had a wonderful 4th! Please enjoy!🤗🤗🤗💕💕💕

~~~

You grumbled angrily to yourself as you walked out of the locker room. Today wasn’t your day, and all you could think about was blowing off some steam.

 There weren’t that many people in the gym right now considering the time, so you easily found an empty treadmill, planning on doing a quick run as a warmup.

 This is what you needed, the burning in your legs as you ran was gladly welcomed, it distracted you from the burning that rested in your heart.

 You had gone to surprise your boyfriend at his dorm and had caught him cheating on you. 

 The image of him and that girl flashed in your mind, causing you to grit your teeth tightly, your fists clenched tightly together, and your legs started to carry you faster on the treadmill.

 You had done your crying a couple of hours earlier. Heart break wasn’t easy, the devastation that you felt was soul-crushing, you couldn’t help but wonder if he had cheated because it was something that you had done. 

 Maybe you weren’t spending enough time with him, maybe you weren’t satisfying his needs, maybe you were too clingy, too annoying, too emotional; for him to handle.

 You couldn’t help but think that it was all your fault that he cheated. 

 If you had just chosen the same college as him… then maybe he wouldn’t have cheated.

 No.

 You shook your head. You were done with these thoughts. You weren’t sad anymore, you weren’t blaming yourself anymore, you were angry now. You were fucking pissed now.

 How dare he. 

 He was the scum beneath your shoes, the rotten garbage at the very bottom of the trashcan and… and… and, fuck why did he do this to you?

 You felt tears sting at your eyes. You guys were together for three years, you never would have guessed that he would do that.

 That he would rip your heart out and stomp all over it. 

 You wondered if he was trying to get a hold of you, you had turned off your phone, wanting to hide away from the world.

 Boisterous laughter distracted you from your thoughts, you looked up to see two males stretching and doing light warmups.

 “Hey hey hey! Tsum-Tsum I’m going to beat you at reps today!” one of the males declared loudly.

 You looked on curiously, his hair reminded you of an owl. How strange.

 The other male smirked at him, getting up from the floor. “We’ll see Bokkun. We also have to do legs today.”

 You couldn’t help but notice that they were incredibly attractive, tall and muscular. But that was the last thing you fucking needed.

 No more boys, no more relationships, you were done. 

 After you had finished your warmup on the treadmill you started fishing out the headphones in your pocket. You headed over to the stairs next, you were going to drown yourself in workouts tonight, you needed the distraction.

 After finally finishing your exercises on the machines, you went over to the punching bags. Carefully wrapping your hands, you stared down at the red bag full of sand, and then started beating the shit out of it.

 This was the steam that you needed to blow off. But after a few moments, something caught your eye out of your peripheral. The owl-haired guy that you had noticed earlier was on the stairs and… oh. You couldn’t help but notice how nice his butt was.

 But then you started to notice how nice his entire body was. His back was strong and muscular, the muscles in his legs rippling with each step and…

 What were you doing? 

 You shook your head at the thoughts and started focusing more on your punches. That’s right. You weren’t going to get involved with another boy, you were going to focus on yourself and on school.

 Fuck boys.

 Fuck your ex.

 Your ex, your nostrils flared in anger and your punches became more intense; you couldn’t help picturing his stupid face as you punched the bag.

 “Wow your punches are really intense!” a voice said behind you. You yelped and suddenly the punching bag was thrown back into you, causing you to stumble back and fly into the chest of the voice behind you.

 It felt like you hit a brick wall. Warm, rough hands grabbed your bare shoulders steadying you as you regained your footing.

 You looked up and saw the owl-haired male staring down at you with a wide grin. You felt your face heat up and you stumbled out of his arms, stuttering apologizes as you put space between the two of you.

 He was so much bigger than you, you couldn’t help but to feel incredibly small as he stared down at you.

 “Umm. Did you want to use the punching bag or…” you trailed off awkwardly.

 “Oh! No not at all! I just saw you going crazy and I had to come over and compliment you.” he grinned widely, giving you a thumbs up. 

 You felt your face burning in embarrassment at his praise. “Oh umm -”

 “My name is Bokuto! Bokuto Koutarou! But you knew that already, didn’t you?” 

 Your brows furrowed in confusion, what was he talking about? He was a complete stranger to you, a hot stranger, but a stranger no less.

 Before you could say anything else his friend walked over to him. 

 “Oi Bokkun, we have to get going, Coach changed the practice tomorrow it’s earlier.” His eyes slid over to you, but he didn’t say anything else.

 “See you around punches!” Bokuto waved goodbye as they took off.

 You blinked after them.

 What?

 ****

 It had been several days since the incident at the gym, and your breakup with your boyfriend.

 Right now your best friend was dragging you to a volleyball match, much to your distaste. 

 She was a big volleyball fan, it wasn’t that you didn’t like the sport, but it was because your ex was a volleyball player.

 “You can’t let that asshole ruin the sport for you! There are so many other hot guys that play! Like the team we’re going to go see!” She chided you as you guys went to find your seats. 

 You rolled your eyes at her, “I don’t care, I’m not planning on dating anyone else right now.” 

 “You can’t - oh my god! There they are!” she said excitedly grabbing your arm and pointing towards the floor.

 You looked over at the team, and then gawked. Familiar gray hair stuck out, his broad back sporting the number 12 with his name clear across.

 Bokuto Koutarou. 

 What were the fucking odds?

 “You’re kidding me,” you said under your breath, of course you would be attracted to yet another volleyball player.

 “Shhh! It’s starting!” your friend shushed you. The game started, and honestly you were completely surprised.

 They were incredible, all of them, and Bokuto… holy shit. Bokuto was on another level, the raw talent and strength left you in awe, and he looked like he was having fun, a lot of fun.

 The entire game you couldn’t take your eyes off of him, and when they had won, your friend rushed you out of the gym in hopes of meeting up with them.

 However, a detour to the bathroom left you standing out against the wall as you waited for her. You lazily flipped through your phone, completely unaware of the tall figure approaching you.

 “Y/n-chan.”

 Your blood ran cold, your eyes shot up to stare back at the man that broke your heart. 

 “What are you doing here?” you asked coldly, heart racing in your chest as you stared up at his face. 

 “Me and some teammates wanted to scope out the competition, we play MSBY in a couple of weeks. What are you doing here?” he took a step closer to you.

 “Why does it matter?” you asked shortly, pressing yourself closer to the wall, your eyes flickered for a way to escape.

 “Don’t be like that, I’ve missed you. I know you miss me too.” he said, resting his hand near your head, he leaned in closer to you. “Come on, what we had was good. We were good together, let’s get back together.” He grabbed your chin, forcing you to meet his eyes as he leaned in closer.

 Anger and fear swelled into your being and you shoved him away, moving yourself away from the wall and putting distance between the two of you.

 “You cheated on me. You did that, you broke our relationship. I don’t miss you. I don’t want to be with you. You treated me like shit.” you stated angrily, tears gathering at the corner of your eyes, but you bit them back. 

 He stared down at you with an unreadable expression and then it turned amused. “I’m the best thing you’ve ever had, will ever have. You’ve always been so ungrateful; you barely would put out for me. Of course, I would cheat on you, you weren’t satisfying my needs, you fucking prude. No one is ever going to date you.” he sneered and grabbed your arm, squeezing it painfully.

 “I’m already dating someone.” You blurted out, yanking your arm out of his grasp. 

 “Oh yeah who?” he rolled his eyes.

 Fuck. Why did you say that? Why did you lie like that? But then you noticed a familiar person out of the corner of your eye heading your way. You turned and all but threw yourself into his arms.

 Bokuto easily caught you, his strong arms wrapping around your figure tightly as you clung to his broad shoulders.

 “Please play along for a moment.” You whispered against his ear.

 “Punches!?” he exclaimed, but never pushed you away.

 “Kou-kun!” you cooed loudly, finally releasing your grip on him, you turned to look at your ex who was staring at you with a dumbfounded expression.

 “I’m dating Bokuto. You know, the Wing Spiker from the MSBY Black Jackals.” You stated proudly, gently resting your hand against his left pectoral and - holy shit it was like touching thick steel. 

 It was then that you became entirely aware of his large hand resting on the small of your back. Heat burned you through your shirt, but it was comforting, safe, reassuring. 

 “You’re fucking lying.” your ex scoffed, but you could see the nervousness shifting through his eyes as he looked between the two of you.

 “I’m not. We met a couple days ago at the gym and we hit it off.” You said simply, well it wasn’t a complete lie.

 “Her punches were killer and I noticed her nice butt right away.” Bokuto threw in, carefully pulling you into his side tighter.

 You ignored his statement and the rising blush that wanted to coat your cheeks, he was just playing along with you right? He didn’t mean that at all.

 “I don’t believe you, Y/n-chan. I need more proof.” your ex said smugly.

 You gritted your teeth in anger and peered up at the tall volleyball player that was staring down at you with curiosity and worry.

 “I’m so sorry. Please hang on just a bit longer.” You mumbled softly and then you grabbed him by the front of his shirt, yanking him down to your height and kissed him.

 A surprised noise escaped Bokuto’s lips, but he kissed you back immediately, carefully grabbing your jaw and fitting your mouth against his better.

 His lips were warm and damp as they moved against yours urgently, his other arm wrapped around your waist and pulled your body flush against his. The hands that were gripping his shirt traveled up against his strong chest and across his broad shoulders until your fingers threaded through the back of his hair. The hair at the back of his neck was damp from sweat, but still incredibly soft.

 You lost yourself in this kiss. No one has ever kissed you this way before. It was perfect, there were so many mixed emotions being felt in this moment.

 “Whatever.” you heard your ex mumble and the shuffling of feet. 

 You should stop kissing right? You should pull away and apologize profusely right?

 The kiss didn’t stop, if anything… it got more heated. 

 Bokuto dragged his tongue across your lower lip, begging for entrance, and you granted it immediately. A pleased noise escaping your mouth as your tongues swirled together. 

 The grip that Bokuto had on your body tightened at the noise, and his tongue battled against yours harder. 

 His smell, his taste, the way he felt pressed up against you… you couldn’t think about anything else other than this moment.

 How could a complete stranger make you feel so good? 

 A stranger.

 That’s right. You didn’t know this guy, not really anyway, and - oh - you reluctantly pulled away, you guys were in public, you guys were making out in public.

 Bokuto wasn’t done though, when you pulled away, he immediately tried to follow; attempting to capture your lips once again in another kiss.

 It wasn’t until you heard the loud throat clearing that you guys moved apart. His expression was dazed with lust as he stared down at you with gold eyes. 

 You were still pressed close to his body, his arms never leaving you, even after you made eye contact with your friend who was staring at you in amusement. 

 Your face burned red as you gently pressed your forehead against his thick chest. But when you had realized what you just did, you leaped out of his arms, eyes wide in embarrassment.

 “Bokuto-san I’m so sorry!” you apologized bowing. “That was my ex and he -”

 He held his hand up, stopping your explanation. His face was red slightly, his hair mused from your fingers. But his eyes were wide and bright. “What a way to greet someone, punches!”

 His boisterous laughter eased the worry that was creeping into your being. 

 “It’s fate that we’re meeting again! Listen punches, I was going to ask for your number at the gym before Tsum-Tsum pulled me away. But after a kiss like that I definitely want to take you out on a date!” he grinned widely, fishing out his phone and handing it to you.

 You blinked at him in surprise and then nodded slowly. 

 “Yeah… that… that sounds good. I’d like that.” you said, putting your number into his phone, a soft blush coating your cheeks.

 “Hey, hey, hey!” he cheered loudly, his arms up in the air in triumph. “I got the pretty girl’s number! Oh… um,” he scratched his cheek sheepishly, “what’s your name?”

 You blinked at him, you made out with the poor guy and he didn’t even know your name yet. “I’m so sorry I should’ve told you earlier… it’s Y/n.”

 “Y/n.” Bokuto repeated and then grinned widely. “I like it! I have to get going punches! I’ll text you later tonight! I’ll be at the gym later too if you want to meet up!” 

 When the tall player was out of your sight a large smile began to stretch across your lips, your friend screeching at you about what had happened was a sight to see to the people walking past you.

 Maybe you weren’t going to swear boys off after all, or at least, Bokuto would be the exception.

 ****

 “Tsum-Tsum!” Bokuto called out angrily.

 “What is it Bokkun?” the setter looked at him in confusion, where was this anger coming from?

 “This guy sucks!” he said bluntly, pointing across the net to the other team, but his finger was pointing at the one guy he didn’t want to see ever.

 Your ex.

 It had been several weeks since that second meeting with Bokuto. You guys were dating now, and it was everything you could ever dream of.

 “I’m going to crush him for hurting my Y/n!” he declared heatedly.

 Your ex went home crying that day needless to say.

[i-did]

hi hello i couldn't sleep last night so i was scrolling thru all ur asks and stuff and ur opinions and analyses are so interesting!!! and then afterwards i was thinking about what u were saying about mlm smut and i'd also been thinking about such things a little bit recently bc like.....at a certain point it becomes quite clear that the vast majority of smut-writing is just imitation. like there's the sex noise verb list and all and the whole general mechanics of the sex and those things just .... replicate over and over. and the whole thing w people writing mlm vs wlw smut regardless of their own sexual orientation..... like i feel like a big part of that is just a self-perpetuating thing. like if u have not had sex and u r getting all ur (pleasure-related) sex ed from fandom (even if u do watch porn, that doesn't rlly tell u how to describe stuff? idk) regardless of What fandom , the majority is going to be mlm smut. which is itself majority imitation of other mlm smut, imitating and imitating back to whoever knows what the first smut fanfic was etc. there's just way More to mimic than there is on the women side of things. which then becomes a self-perpetuating thing, bc the mimicry continues and generates more and more. and---if there are fundamental misunderstandings of anatomy involved---those self-perpetuate as well. and maybe even exaggerate. and yeah. does this all make sense? idk i was just thinking about it. like all the stereotypes and stuff continue bc writers are getting their inspo from other writers rather than their own brains. or something. idk!!!!! it's just all... divorced from reality? bc words. or something!! i hope u get what i'm trying to say. just thoughts i've been thinking. anyway i think ur thoughts are cool. and ur writing. ok bye have a good day!!

Okay yeah this is kinda messy but hope u see this, uhh yeah I think you're right about the echo chamber effect fr about stuff. I think it's a mix of projecting too sometimes. talk more under the cut and also link to a video essay since I love video essays.

Here’s a video that sort of touches on this topic: 

“Gay fanfiction” by Sarah Z. (has CC)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8E_C00dKwI

This video begins to talk about fetishization at the end, but also… not really. The words “gay fanfiction” is used as a catchall, when really gay fanfiction is largely mlm written by non-mlm.

Fandom is a largely women's space dominated by the female gaze in a media industry world that is dominated by men and the male gaze. I'm really glad women have this space to explore creativity and queerness, and I don't expect the female gaze to go away, but I am still ultimately bummed out I can’t read most fanfic or interact with most fandom spaces without having fetishization in my face. 

So about 80% of fandom is women, and most of those women aren't straight, but 90% of those women prefer mlm ships. Why don’t they prefer wlw ships? Well definitely part of it is the fact that queerbaiting is centered around white straight men, and then there is also the fact that women tend not to be written as well charcter wise. But the fact still remains that you get jerjean getting priority over Layla and Alvarez who are in canon just as much and are a canon wlw couple who actually interact as well as Alvarez could likely be a woc because of her Hispanic last name. Korasami doesn’t get nearly as much hype as zuko and saka, despite the fact that they are 2 fully dimensional characters who canonly kiss and hold hands, something the creators fought for and ended up having to sacrifice another reboot for. 

I do believe the fandom echo-chamber is largely responsible for… a lot of things, like you're saying. But what's interesting is that the complaints I've heard about visual porn from non mlm in the fandom space is that they can’t get off to it because its for the male gaze and misogynistic usually. But they also don't seem to notice how the mlm smut circles has the female gaze and is also… almost always mlm. If it was a pure anatomical not knowing thing, I get that, but I also think that leads to the question of “then why the male body for porn, and not your own? The one you know and are familiar with?” 

I know some people want to get outside of their own body for porn and don’t want to think of their own anatomy at all, but overall I'm still uncomfortable. If an anglo said “well I watch porn of only Mexicans so I don't self insert” I'm gonna be like … hhhh in a similar way. I understand people “like what they like” but I wish they also noticed said patterns in the first place. I understand the t4t tumblr porn circle, and how it's different from cis people who only watch trans porn. 

I actually wished that instead of fandom focusing on mlm ships where some asshole guy hits on bottom troupe charcter for top troupe character to save, was instead… a wlw character experiencing said shitty getting hit on and other wlw swooping in. what's interesting is fandom writes a lot about misogynistic experiences without often realizing it. Ive read fanfic where guys get called sluts for sleeping with people or called bitch for speaking their mind, these arent things men usually experience, but rather women. Fandom has a lot of internalized misogyny and also queerphobia imo. Women characters often get pushed to the sidelines and men become the canvas for female fans to project onto. 

There is this natural inclination to mlm. When people are talking about “gay shipping” or “gay books” or “gay feels” or even just “gay” mlm is what’s largely in mind. I honestly am kinda saddened by this because if gay fanfiction was really solely about writing more to feel represented, then you would see a lot of bi and ace and lesbian rep, but this isn't the case. Queer women are seriously underrepresented, and I want to hear their stories and read them in fanfiction as well as published. 50% of lgbt literature is mlm, and of that its largely written by women. Becky Albertalli, Rainbow Rowell, Maggie Stiefvater, are the YA big names and are all women writing mlm. Red white and royal blue is written by Casey McQuiston and Captive prince (which is not YA) is written by C. S. Pacat, who is non-binary, but is also TME and not mlm. These are all the big names in mlm lit, behind them is some gay men, but honestly their stories aren't preferred, they're not the right “flavor” for the consumers usually, who are largely women. In general YA consumers and authors are women, but I wish that they… just wrote about women too. I think there is a certain… snowball effect to the overrepresentation of mlm representing the whole LGBT community that leads to fetishization, as well as misogyny playing a factor in: less women characters being written well to write fanfic on, when they are written well they're taken less seriously or the audience struggles to relate to them, they're less marketable then men. 

Idk I never feel “seen” or “represented” by any of the books above, which don't address boyhood and manhood and queerness intersecting really, and AFTG doesn’t either. I relate to AFTG as a trauma victim who has experienced a lot of what many of the characters go through and have gone through in the EC as well as them just overall being very well written characters, but I don't relate to it as a mlm really. I've never seen like.. gay voice or being straight passing or femphobia or how boyhood can be affected from a young age by those around you sensing you're ‘other’ or if you didn't experience this you feel outside the mlm community. Let alone sub cultures like bear and leather and pup, at most you see the word “he's such a twink” in fandom which... i fr hate non mlm using that word because it's usually used to replace the f-slur essentially, used derogatorily or to call him “such a bottom” and stuff like that. It’s like a joke or an insult.

Long story short, idk mang this was a ramble and I think I'm coning down with something. I wanna see more queer women rep and women authors writing about being a queer woman too. I think it's a complex web of fetishization and a bit of forbidden love yaoi culture (or it used to be in the BOYXBOY days) as well as misogyny on an industry level, creator level, as well as reader/consumer and fandom level. I don’t think it’s inherently wrong to explore other peoples stories and what we read has to be segregated, “only mlm are allowed to read and write mlm, only wlw are allowed to read and write wlw,” but I also think author’s intent and audience and background is telling, as well as overall statistics. Like about an hour ago I was looking for cookbooks in spanish or in english, and I was looking for some mexican food cook books, but I had to look for them using words in spanish because otherwise what came up was a bunch of “fiesta party, easy as uno dos tres authentic cooking!” and I was like… hm. Since I could tell they were marketing to anglos. (also the author’s last names were like michelle smith, james cooper, and this could be for a variety of reasons, but I trust Hispanic names more tbh and deadass would look at the authors pictures and if they had other books in Spanish or what their specialties were.)

anyways. not sure how to end this. uhm if anyone has any book recs (my to read list is like 500 books tho no joke) preferably not YA white mlm written by a white lady, hopefully queer women written by queer woman, LMK, I need more wlw and queer women stories on my list. I have a decent amount but always looking for more. I kinda wanna link my goodreads or my storygraph but I also don't want to get doxxed and it has my legal name on it so.

Also, I'm dyslexic and using spell check but if there's like some wild typos my b.

[flashfuture]

Okay so I have a question. Is Oliver Queen a particularly shitty dad or something? Because I've seen him in a few comics, one of them with Connor, and honestly he seemed fine. Like I know him and Roy don't have a particularly great relationship, and Ollie kinda fucked up with him, but like is this just the case with Roy?

I'm asking this because people generally ignore this thing about Bruce, who has a been a mostly shitty dad for a while now, and generally make excuses for him, citing the fact that he wasn't always like this. Most fics featuring him show him as a good parent. But fanfic authors go out of their way to show Ollie as a terrible father, and an asshole in general, especially when pitted against Bruce? Why is it this way?

PS. I haven't read many Green Arrow comics.

Okay so this is gonna get long lol

Snowbirds Don’t Fly is where Roy is on heroin and there are many many misconceptions about this particular issue

#1 this was a PSA which means certain characters have to play a role even if it seems out of character 

#2 That is the only time ever that Ollie has hit Roy. And Roy hit him back later not that this excuses it but yeah nowhere near anything like Bruce

#3 The whole kicked out of the house thing. Roy was an adult. A full-grown adult who lived on his own. Roy only got into heroin because Ollie left on a road trip thinking his kid would be fine

#4 Ollie himself is an alcoholic so say what you will but personally, I know addicts in families can get pissed when other people also get addicted to things just based on personal experience 

#5 After fucking up Ollie went out of his way to learn everything he could about addiction and recovery. He went out of his way to earn Roy’s forgiveness and then a few years later Roy agreed to reconciliation. All this happened in the 70s and by the end of it Roy and Ollie were fine and firmly in the father-son category without much lingering animosity

But then the 90s and Chuck Dixon happened. Dixon hated Ollie. He wanted to kill Ollie. So he made Ollie as unbearable as possible. For example, Ollie who loves kids, always wanted kids pushed away Connor Hawke as soon as he learned it was his real son, ran off with eco-terrorists, and blew up in a plane crash. Really dumb story

Anyways after this Roy was heartbroken he’d lost his dad. Like they were really close and people really hang on to an argument/ fuck up that happened going on 50 years ago. While conversely as you said waving away arguments that have happened consistently and recently. And Bruce started being abusive in the 80s like full-on horrible dad after Jason died. 

Then in 2001 ish Ollie is brought back to life. And he’s handed off to Judd Winick. Winick is a racist, sexist, and all-around bad writer. He’s noted for creating a black love interest for Ollie just to kill her brutally because of an argument with a Black Lightning writer. 

The other thing is Winick played Ollie like a womanizer and a cheater. Birds of. Prey also ran with this because that series had a nasty habit of bashing men. 

So basically Ollie was called a cheater for that time he was drugged and assaulted, kissed against his will by a teenager who he pushed off, and slept with a woman while he and Dinah weren’t dating. Cheating.... I can’t even explain the level of devotion to Dinah that Ollie displays. She is it for him really he isn’t even a flirt. Hal is the flirt. 

Winick also whitewashed and sidelined Connor a bunch cause screw him right. 

So that series did not shed a good light on Ollie and it’s sort of done damage to his rep when we should be ignoring it like we do with King’s work because it was that bad and ooc. 

What was valid from that series was Ollie adopting Mia Dearden after seeing she could use a hand up from where was in life. What was valid was Ollie spending all the time he could with Connor because he missed out on his son's whole life. And spending time with Roy and his granddaughter Lian. Like Ollie loves kids he loves Dinah and he loves his family. 

That’s who he is. 

New52 is another reason. So Ollie got shafted and shafted hard. 

He and Dinah weren’t dating at the start? I don’t think they were

Roy was no longer Ollie’s son but his co-worker

Connor and Mia just didn’t exist. Mia showed up for 6 issues and hasn’t since. Connor has only recently re-appeared in the Robin comic. 

Ollie and Roy didn’t get along because Ollie fired Roy for drinking on the job and that was sort of it. They weren’t father and son here so it’s a weird idea to compare them to Jason and Bruce and if you look at canon Bruce is still the worse one

But Rebirth has reset Roy to being Ollie’s son and Ollie was crushed when Roy died. Is still crushed cause i don't think he knows Roy is alive. 

Also Ollie is just like a generally good dude. He’s a genuine socialist and environmentalist. He uses his money when he’s got it to promote these things and sometimes blackmails corrupt rich people into supporting social services. 

Like you know Dick saying he wants to be Blüdhaven’s safety net? That is a page right out of the Oliver Queen playbook. 

Ollie funds most of the justice league really always has since like Zero Hour. Bruce and him probably are the two who do but it’s remarked upon multiple times that Ollie was the first (in some timelines) and main benefactor. 

I’ve noticed what you have in fanfics too and it drives me crazy. With the addition or I should say lack of Dinah and Hal. Dinah was absolutely like a mother to Roy. She’s his mama. She got him through his detox. Hal was the one who brought Roy to her. 

(Most people gloss over that Hal was like an Uncle to both Roy and Wally)

So yeah whenever I see Ollie bashing plus no mention of Dinah I know that the writer knows next to nothing about Ollie. 

Also Bruce likes to say Ollie is just as bad as him when Ollie is categorically a better person in like every way lol. 

This isn’t to say there is anything wrong with fanon-ing Bruce. But I just don’t understand why Ollie is essentially fanon-ed in the opposite direction. 

Roy will always get along with Ollie better and be safer with him than Jason would be with Bruce. But fanon wants to play off like Roy hates Ollie and is terrified of him or whatever which even in the darkest New52 pits of hell that wasn’t even true. 

I’m not sure why it’s gotten to be this way tbh. Bruce, Dick, Ollie, and Roy are the golden ages boys who got to stay young and they’ve all been slandered by writers but fans seem really only capable of ignoring when Bruce is written badly which is so odd. Like Dick gets called out for things that are so wildly ooc it astounds me that Bruce out of all people is the one people want to ignore is just sort of the worst. 

Lol yeah I got ranty. As you can tell I am very passionate about this and I just wish more people would even try to find out about Ollie before assuming things that are not true. 

Hope this helped somewhat 

[phynali]

Canonization and Fandom Purity Culture

I wrote a 1k-word twitter thread (as proof that I am Not made for Twitter and it’s goddamn 240-character limit) and am pasting it here with edits and updates (it’s now 2k words). 

I have thoughts to share (which I know have been stated more eloquently before by others) about this trend of demanding/obsessing that certain ships become "canon" and how it overlaps with the rise of fandom purity culture.

Under the cut.

Here in 2021 there is a seemingly large and certainly loud and active contingent of online fandoms who desire (or even demand) "canon validation" for a given interpretation of a source material. This is more true with shipping than anywhere else.

First, it is important to note that the trend is not limited to queer ships or to any single fandom. In the past few years I've seen it for Riverdale, Voltron, Supernatural (perhaps most extreme?), The 100, etc., and less recent with the MCU, Sherlock, Teen Wolf, Hawaii 5-0, etc. It is a broad trend across ships, fandoms, and mediums.

So if it is more common for queer ships, it is hardly unique to them. Similarly, pretending that it is about queer representation is a clever misdirect to disguise the fact that it is most often about ships and shipping wars. If you ever need proof of that, consider that a character can be queer without being in a given relationship or reciprocating another character's affections. Thus a call for more/better queer rep itself is very different than a call for specific ships to be made canon.

Also note that when audiences frame it as wanting to recognize a specific *character* as queer, it is almost always in the context of a ship. Litmus test: would making that character queer but having them *explicitly reject* the other half of the ship be seen as a betrayal?

(Note: none or this is to say we shouldn't push for more queer rep and more *quality and well-written* queer rep! Just that that isn't what I'm talking about here, and not what seeking canon validation for a specific interpretation or a specific ship is almost ever about.)

Why does this matter?

the language of representation and social justice should not be co-opted to prop up ship wars

it is reciprocal with a trend toward increasing toxicity in transformative fandom spaces

Number 1 here is self-explanatory (I hope). Let's chat about 2.

Demands for canon validation correlate with a rise in fanpol / fandom purity culture. What is fandom purity culture (and fandom policing)? This toxic mentality is about justifying one's shipping preferences and aiming to be pure (non-problematic) in your fictional appetites regarding romance and sex.

Note that this purity culture is so named as it arises linearly from American Protestantism, conservative puritanical anxiety around thought crimes, and overlaps in many ways with terf ideologies and regressively anti-kink paradigms.

It goes like this: problematic content is "gross" and therefore morally reprehensible. Much like how queer sex/relationships get labelled as "gross" (Other) and thus morally sinful, or how kink gets labelled as "harmful" and thus morally wrong. The Problematic label is applied by fanpol to ships with offset age or power dynamics, complicated histories, and anything they choose to label as "harmful". As such, they would decry my comparison here to queerphobia itself as also being harmful, because their (completely fictional) targets are ~actually~ evil.

(The irony of this is completely lost on them).

This mode of interacting with creative works leaves no room to explore dark or erotic themes or dynamics which may exist in fiction but not healthily in reality. Gothic romance is verboten. Even breathe the word incest and you will be labelled a monster (nevermind Greek tragedy or GoT).

As with most puritanical bullshit, fanpol ideology only applies these beliefs to sex and never to violence/murder/etc, proving what lies at its core. It also demands its American-based values be applied to all fictional periods and places as the One True Moral Standard. It evangelizes – look no further than how these people try to recruit others to their cause, aim to elevate themselves as righteous, and try to persuade (‘save’) others from their degenerate ways of thinking. 

“See the light” they promise “here are our callouts and blog posts to convince you. Decry your past sins of problematic shipping, be baptized by our in-group adulation and welcome, and then go forth and send hate to others until they too see the light.” In many ways “get therapy” by the antis is akin to “I’ll pray for you” by the Christian-right (and ultimately ironic).

(Although it has been pointed out to me that these fans are likely not themselves specifically ex-evangelicals, but rather those who have brushed up with evangelical norms and modes of thinking without specifically being victims of it. In many ways they are more simply conservative Christian in temperament and attitude without necessarily being raised into religion by belief).

What this has to do with canon validation is that these fans look to canon for approval, for Truth. On the one hand, if it is in the canon then it must be good / pure or at least acceptable. The authority (canon) has deemed it thus. It is safe and acceptable to discuss and to enjoy watching or consuming. In this way, validation from canon means a measure of safety from being Bad and Problematic. 

For example, where a GoT fan could discuss Cersei/Jaime's (toxic, interesting) dynamic in depth as it related to the canon, fans who shipped Jon/Sansa (healthy, interesting) were Gross and Bad. The canon as Truth provided a safety net, a launch point. "It's GRRM, not me, who is problematic." It wasn’t okay to ship the problematic bad gross incest ship, but it being in the canon material meant it was open for discussion, for nuance, for “this adds an interesting layer to the story” which is denied to all non-canon ships labelled as problematic.

(Note: there are of course people who have zero interest in watching GoT for a whole slew of very valid reasons, including but not limited to the incest. That’s a different to this trend. A less charged example might be The Umbrella Academy, where a brother canonically is in love with his sister and antis still praise the show, but if you dare to ship any of the potential incest ships then you are the one who is disgusting).

On the other hand, a very interesting alternate (or additional) explanation for this phenomenon was raised to me on twitter. (These ideas aren’t mine originally, but I wholly endorse them as a big part of what is likely going on): Namely, as with authoritarian individuals in general, they see themselves as right and correct, but the canon (which has not yet validated their ship) is not correct, and is in fact problematic, and so they can save the canon from itself.

As mentioned, these fanpol types see their interpretation as Good and Pure. So if they can push (demand, bully) the canon into conforming to their worldview and validating their interpretation, then they have shown the (sinful) creators the light and led them to the righteous path. This only works if the canon allows itself to saved though, otherwise the creators remain Evil for spurning them.

How is this different from fans simply hoping for their ship to be canon?

For a second here, let’s rewind to the 90s (since Whedon has been in the news recently). This “I want it to be canon” thing isn’t 100% new, of course. We saw this trend then for the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but it was different then. At the time, fans who hoped for a ship to be canon might have been cheering for a problematic one to begin with (Buffy/Spike). So shipping was still present, minus vocal fanpol.

(And Buffy fans learned that canon validation...can leave a lot to be desired. A heavy lesson was learned about the ways that fan desires can play out horrifically in canon, and how some things are best left out of the hands of canon-writers).

These days, this is still largely true. Many fans hope for their ships to go canon, as they always have. There are tropes like “will they/won’t they” that TV shows may even be designed around, which a certain narrative anticipation and a very deliberate build up to that.

But while shipping *hopes* occur for many fans, almost all ships fans that *demand* to go canon and obsess over are now the ones deemed as Unproblematic, or as Less Problematic. I’m talking here about the ships that aren’t necessarily an explicit will/won’t they dynamic but do have some canon dynamic that leads them to being shipped, but which the creators aren’t necessarily deliberately teasing and building up a romantic end-game for.

These ships often have fans who are happy to stick to fandom, but there has also been a huge uptick in the portion of fans who are approaching shipping with an explicit lens of “will they go canon?” and “don’t you want them to be canon?” and now even “they have to go canon” and “the canon is wrong if they don’t make this ship canon”, to a final end-point of “if the ship doesn’t go canon, the source material is Wrong and Bad.”

These latter opinions are the one we see more by extreme fans (‘stans’), hardcore shippers, but especially by fanpol-types, the ones who embrace fandom purity culture at least to some extent.

Why them?

In pushing for canon validation, fanpol types seek to elevate their (pure) interpretation of canon. As mentioned above, it’s validation of their authority, a safety-net, and a way to save the canon from itself if only they can bully the canon into validating their right and good interpretation. 

There’s also another reason, which is that canon validation is a tool to bludgeon those seen as problematic. They can use it to denounce other (problematic) ships as Not Being Canon and therefore highlight their own as Right and Good, because it is represented in the True Meaning of the Work.

Canon validation then is a cudgel sought by virtuous crusaders to wield against their unclean enemies. It is an ideological pursuit. It is organised around identity and in groups sometimes as insular as cults.

How does this happen?

Fanpol tend to be younger or more vulnerable fans, susceptible to authoritarian manipulators. As many have highlighted before, authoritarian groups and exclusionary ideologies like terfs are very good at using websites like tumblr to mobilize others around their organizing beliefs. Fanpol tend to feel legitimate discomfort, but instead of taking responsibility for their media engagement, ringleaders stoke and help them direct their discomfort as anger onto others; “I feel ashamed and uncomfortable, and therefore you should be held accountable for my emotions.” Authoritarian communities endorse social dominance orientations, deference to ringleaders, and obedient faith to the principles those ringleaders endorse.

As these fans attach more and more of their identity to a given media (or ship), and derive more and more validation and more of their belongingness needs from this fanpol community, they also become more and more anxious about being excluding from this group. This is because such communities have rigid rules and very conditional bases for social acceptance. Question or "betray" the organizing ideology and be punished or excommunicated. If that is all you have, you are left with nothing. Being labelled problematic then is a social death.

What this means is that these fans cannot accept all interpretations of a media as equally valid: to do so Betrays the ideology. It promises exclusion. And, in line with a perspective around ‘saving’ canon and leading others into the light – forcing and bending the canon to their will is what will make it Good (and therefore acceptable to enjoy, and therefore proof of them as righteous by having saved others). As was also pointed out to me on twitter, endorsement from canon or its creators also satiates that deep need they have for authority figures to approve of them.

Due to all of this, these fans come to obsess over canon validation of their own interpretation. In a way, they have no other option but to do so. They need this validation -- as their weapon, as their authority, as their safety net, as their approval, as their evangelical mission of saviorship.

Canon validation is proof: I am Good. I am Right(eous). I am Safe.

(In many ways, I do ache for some of these people, so wrapped up in toxic communities and mindsets and so afraid to step out of line for fear of swift retribution, policing their own thoughts and art against the encroaching possibility that anything be less than pure. It’s not healthy, it’s never going to be healthy.)

In the end, people are going to write their own stories. You are well within your rights to critique those stories, to hate them, to interpret them how you will, but you can never control their story (it's theirs).

Some final notes:

This trend may be partially to do with queer ships now being *able* to go canon where before so no such expectation would exist. Similarly, social media has made this easier to vocalize. Still, who makes these demands and the underlying reasons are telling. There are also many legitimate critiques of censorship, queerbaiting (nebulous discussions to be had here), and homophobia in media to be had, and which may front specific ships in their critique. But critique is distinct from asking that canon validate one's own interpretation.

[theultimatecrabcake]

Some Danganronpa spoilers ahead for the entire franchise so please don't read if you don't want spoilers, serious topics will be discussed

Ok so a while back me and a discord friend had this au-ish idea where the entirety of danganronpa is just Tsumugi's trauma fanfiction based off of people she knows irl and online as a way to cope because she was abused and neglected at home

These are the main details of the au under the cut, there will be no in depth details about the abuse but it is mentioned, I sincerely apologize if I inaccurately portray these issues just in case I did

Tsumugi cosplays at home and that's why she calls herself the ultimate cosplayer, and she makes herself the mastermind because she likes being the villain to cope with her trauma

All the characters from dr1 and sdr2 and the dr3 anime are all based off of people online that she looks up to (or despises in some cases), and characters with alternate versions of themselves are the combinations of their siblings (ex. Toko and Syo are twins and Izuru, Hajime, and super saiyan Hajime are triplets), with the exception of Junko who is an actress who mainly plays villains but irl is really sweet

Monokuma is Tsumugi's homeroom teacher who occasionally lets his sister substitute and the monokubs are his young children that Tsumugi really hates, he's also Junko and Mukuro's uncle and he and Tsumugi have a father-daughter relationship

Junko helps Tsumugi with her cosplays and makeup which is why Tsumugi idolizes her so much and wants to be like her

A lot of the poor writing in dr is due to Tsumugi not having the proper writing experience or knowledge on certain subjects which is why they come off so poorly

The Love Hotel scenes are Tsumugi trying to work through her own sexuality crisis alone (albeit poorly), and her own LH scene is her projecting what she believes is the only relationship she'd ever be loved in even if it's really messed up

All of the blackened and antagonistic characters in dr are people Tsumugi either hates or fears, and those with redeeming motives are the ones Tsumugi fears but recognizes that they are good people

Most characters in dr are cosplayers irl, streamers/youtubers, or social media influencers, aside from in v3 where everyone is a classmate of hers

The survivors of v3 are Tsumugi's irl friends, and the survivors of the prior games just came down to process of elimination mixed with who she liked

Her insistence of being "plain" in the games is because her parents always called her useless, and a part of the reason she hates Monokuma's kids is because she envies them for having the happy childhood she never had

She made monokuma the mascot because he’s known for his brutal punishments to kids who severely break school rules

All of the backstories for the dr1 and sdr2 characters are based off of one of the following: their main cosplay, their favorite game that they’ve played, or their aesthetic on their main social media account

Tsumugi works a lot of part time jobs to pay for her cosplays and her clothes and food

At some point Tsumugi posted her trauma/vent fanfics online under a different pen name and renaming all of the characters so they couldn’t be tracked (each of the games and the anime were posted as their separate fanfics and each chapter in the games is a chapter in the fanfic) and the fanfic blew up super fast, which she didn’t expect, and then people started cosplaying it for the irony and when she’s asked about if she’ll cosplay from it she says she’s not in it for the irony, she also got jaw-dropped when the cosplayers she turned into some of the characters from dr1 and sdr2 started cosplaying from it

One time Kokichi found her fanfic for v3 and commented about how his character seemed super familiar and she responded “no reason :)” and blocked him because his username was super obvious, he soon makes confused posts about it on tiktok

Eventually during Tsumugi’s 3rd year she reposted all of the fanfics but with much better writing and character arcs because she took online writing classes and the internet BLEW UP EVEN HARDER and so many people geeked out over it

Eventually Tsumugi tells her close friends about how she wrote the fics but it accidentally gets out to the whole class and when anyone tries to bully her about it all of her friends fight the bullies

The Love Hotel scenes were completely separate fanfics she impulsively wrote and posted at 3am when her sexuality crisis hit too hard, even she hates them and deleted them a year after they were posted because she just can’t believe she wrote them, let alone post them, and never rewrote them

The following are her relationships with the characters in V3 since she has no real relationships with the characters in dr1 and sdr2

All of the character’s ultimates are in fact based on actual skills they each have, and if they don’t have a distinct skill Tsumugi deep dives and tries to think of one, Junko was mostly inspired by her ability to analyze super well, which helped with her makeup ability, and because she played villain characters who caused despair

Edit: forgot to mention, but when Tsumugi kills her self insert at the end of v3, it's her essentially venting out how if all the important people in her life leave her she has nothing to live for anymore

Shuichi: They met after being some of the few kids in class who had nowhere to sit during lunch so they sat next to each other, after talking some more and realizing they had a lot in common, they became really close and he would sometimes cosplay with her, he also has a crush on Kaede even though it’s only from afar due to his social anxiety, Tsumugi however feels as though she’s a burden to him which is why she has him hate her in the last trial, when she told him she wrote the fanfic he constantly reassured her that she’s not a burden and was super embarrassed that he was made the protag after kaede, though he did find pregame him a bit odd

Himiko: Himiko is also an outsider due to her depression and general tired personality, she’s one of the few people who don’t judge Tsumugi for her cosplaying and anime interests and they’re both in anime club and will occasionally cosplay together, she was the one who accidentally let it slip about the fanfic thing but Tsumugi couldn’t bring herself to be mad

Maki: Another outsider but on purpose, she met Tsumugi after she found Tsumugi getting bullied and pushed around by some older kids, and afterwards she hung around Tsumugi to protect her and they eventually got pretty close even though Maki is generally socially dead, she also helps get Tsumugi food when Tsumugi’s parents are too neglectful to feed her, she also is the main protector of Tsumugi from her bullies, before and after the fic

Kiibo: An exchange student from being homeschooled, he and Tsumugi used to be pretty close, he was pretty famous on social media so sometimes they would go and do influencer stuff together and he’d cosplay with her, eventually he started dating Miu and they got a bit more distant due to Tsumugi not being a big fan of Miu, but they have no harsh feelings towards each other, even though Tsumugi thinks he hates her, he’s also a top student, he was a little weirded out by how both he and Miu were portrayed in the original fic but after talking it out with Tsumugi he let it slide and they talk more often because of that

Kaede: She met Kaede in secondary school and they got fairly close up until Kaede met Rantaro, after they met Kaede started hanging out with him more (romantic or platonic is up for interpretation) and Tsumugi was really hurt and jealous which is why she has Kaede kill Rantaro, she and Tsumugi reignited a relationship after the fanfic thing came out because she was super concerned about how Tsumugi was doing since you don’t just write that stuff without having some sort of trauma, they became closer afterwards and told Tsumugi she was flattered she was made into such a nice girl but also kinda freaked out that Tsumugi technically killed her but they also talked that out, she didn’t hold pregame Kaede against her because Kaede did in fact act like that when she was younger

Rantaro: Him and Tsumugi knew each other in middle school but didn’t like each other, she envied him because of how easy of a time he had making friends, and later on hated him for “stealing” Kaede from her, he is on ok terms with Tsumugi after the fanfic incident because Kaede and Tsumugi reignited a friendship and they tolerate each other

Kirumi: Tsumugi fears and looks up to Kirumi, as Kirumi is head of the student council and class rep but also very strict, one time Tsumugi got pushed down before school and was forced to come with a dirty uniform and Kirumi ripped into her for it and made her cry (although Kirumi quickly apologized and tried to comfort her but the trauma already set in), after she learned about the fic she talked to Tsumugi and gave her a singular pass for it because she did a fairly good job capturing Kirumi’s determination and sophistication

Ryoma: She’s never talked to Ryoma personally but she knows he has a criminal record for some minor crime and that scares her alongside how he one time suplexed a student three times his size after the student tried to pick on him for being short

Korekiyo: He freaks her out and she really hates his sister, and one time he psychoanalyzed her and it hit way too close to home so now she both doesn’t like him and respects him, which is why she just has his sister be the motive/his abuser because she full on just hates her cause she’s a “normie” who made fun of her one time in public, after he learned about the fic he tried to talk to her about the original version of the v3 fic to talk it through because he knew about her issues and now they’re on good terms

Angie: Funny enough she just is way too afraid to talk to Angie because she is a foreign exchange student and Tsumugi was really confused by her religion which is why it’s handled so poorly and why Angie is so focused on Atua, Angie also is super confident in herself and extroverted and that intimidated Tsumugi so much she just never talked to her, after the fic Angie sat her down and educated her on the details of her religion so Tsumugi could fix any accidental misconceptions about the religion and culture

Tenko: With Tsumugi’s constant sexuality crisis, she also has internalized homophobia which is why Tenko, an open women lover, scares her so much, Tsumugi can’t comprehend it so she made Tenko really creepy and oddly violent towards men even though the actual Tenko only beats up men who harass her or other women and not just every single man, she’s also really nice to Himiko and because Tsumugi fears Tenko she warped it

Miu: Miu is also a woman confident in her sexuality, she just comes off a lot more strongly than Tenko and is even more intimidating to Tsumugi, Tsumugi also thinks she’s gross because she’s open about her kinks and her gross ways of making sure she’s healthy, after she and Kiibo started dating she started to resent Miu, but regardless of this she still acknowledges that Miu is a top student, she only really likes Miu because she and Kokichi hate each other, but after it got out that Tsumugi wrote the fic Miu tried to pick on her but Maki scared her off

Gonta: She really loves Gonta and at some point had a crush on him, but he turned her down after Kokichi spread rumors that she was afraid of bugs and Gonta didn’t want to freak her out due to the fact he lives in an area full of bugs and has a few pet bugs, she has no harsh feelings towards him however and still likes him, though not as a crush, Gonta was still super nice to her after the fic thing and doesn’t think any less of her

Kokichi: She absolutely despises him and everything he does, they’ve known each other since they were kids and he’s always picked on her, though to him he’s only friendly teasing and thinks they have a friendly rivalry, he does everything out of childish amusement and doesn’t actually think he’s doing any harm to her even though she actively hates him and has gotten punched on several occasions by Maki for teasing Tsumugi too much, he also is purposely controversial online and has tried to be cancelled way too many times but somehow finds a way to find dirt on the people cancelling him and now everyone is too scared to cancel him, he also “bullies” cosplayers on tiktok by dueting them and mocking them but to him it’s ironic but to everyone else it isn’t, he has done this to Tsumugi on multiple occasions and she hates it, he tried to tease her about writing the fic and blocking him but Maki punches him in the throat, he makes a tiktok about that as well but keeps her identity a secret

Kaito: He became Maki’s boyfriend sometime after she met Maki and, in his stupidity, accidentally insulted Tsumugi’s comfort cosplay and she hated him after that, his death and illness was inspired by the one time he got the flu and gave it to everyone and it ruined one of her wigs, after a while they began talking more and she began to realize he wasn’t a jerk, just really stupid, so she made him a nicer character, after it got out that she wrote the fanfics she asked if he was mad he died but instead he was like “nah man that was a super cool way to go”, he was confused on pregame Kaito until Tsumugi explained that that’s how she used to see him

[angelhummel]

since he doesn’t get enough appreciation; what do you like about tristan milligan (:

So much stuff!! Thank you for giving me an opportunity to rant. I'm gonna hide it under a cut cause it'll probably get long. And keep in mind I'm at the tail end of season 12 in my rewatch so it'll probably focus more on early Tristan lol

For starters, Tristan is just iconic. Period. I mean they had him make an early appearance when Bianca was supposed to be showing future niners around (in s11 ?) and he had like two lines and everyone immediately knew "this kid is iconic, we need to get him back as a main character". So they did! And Degrassi was better off for it

I know this was just pulled out of the writers' asses at the last minute but. The fact that Owen is Tristan's brother?? And Owen is so nasty and rude and THREW ADAM THROUGH A GLASS DOOR and thank god that none of that rubbed off on Tristan. He can be sharp and sassy but he's still such a sweetheart underneath it all. So that’s impressive since we know who he grew up with

Related to that, an underrated hilarious moment is when he's bonding with Adam. (Which was super cute btw and we needed more of that). When Adam is telling him about how being lgbt at Degrassi isn't always easy. And one time some asshole threw him through a glass door. And Tristan is like "oh wow my brother got suspended for throwing someone through a door" and then they're both like .........

And okay, I love this entire batch of niners. They're just all so sweet and adorable. And while I'm not a fan of love triangles/squares, I do enjoy all their friendships together. But none more than Tristan and Tori. Idk what happened to Tori but I'm forever bitter that she disappeared without a trace. Especially bc she played baby Angela and was there before literally anyone else, and was also Cassie Steele's irl sister like ??? she deserved WAY more. But I'm getting off topic there lmao that's another rant

Tristan and Tori’s friendship is one of my faves on the show! It doesn’t feel forced like some people will be like “we’ve been friends since we were kids!” and you’re like no you have not you just met each other when you all got cast in these roles. But nah Tristan and Tori totally feel like they’ve been friends all thru middle school. I love how they both want to do an embarrassing musical number in front of the whole school just bc they like it and they have fun :-) They don’t care what people think

I also love Tristan’s love of performing lol. Like the cute little number with Tori, or wanting to be in the school musical. And I’m glad that Eli could appreciate his greatness. Tbh Eli and Tristan is another little friendship I was sorely deprived of. At least as working musical buddies or something. And the fact that Eli changed Romeo and Juliet into Romeo and Jules with two male leads for Tristan is just great. And Tristan totally killed it

And while I like that Tristan is always unapologetically himself, I also appreciate that he struggles with realistic issues about his self image. Mainly in the way of finding romance. Thinking that no one is going to love him if he looks or acts a certain way. It’s disheartening to see him think he has to change, but it is a very real issue that teens face, never mind gay teens

And I love his relationship with Miles! I don’t care, I really do. Like at first you think the gay guy catches feelings for the straight boy and it’s going to end horribly. And it’s nice enough that Miles is cool about it. But nope, turns out he’s not straight and also he likes Tristan too! And then they have a cute little relationship for a while. And their final scene together at the hospital really made me cry </3

And I know that the biphobia he exhibits is a big deal breaker for most people. But it’s like with Glee. I’m not going to throw the whole character away for something like this, when the whole show exhibits the same flawed thinking bc it’s what the writers think. And Tristan isn’t the only offender so idk why he’s the only one that gets dragged for it. It’s not good, and I’d really rather do without it, but it’s not enough to make me hate him

I really don’t see why he gets such a bad rep in the fandom. Like nearly every other character on the show has done something equally offensive or even worse than biphobia and people don’t have a problem stanning them. But it’s like everything else. People just bitch about what they wanna bitch about, and let things slide what they wanna let slide

But overall I think Tristan is a great character and I’m happy to contribute even a little bit to the general love that’s out there online for him <3 

[kessielrg]

[Kingdom Hearts] Of Memes and Regrets

Summary: In which Lea has a guest star for his YouTube's next Let's Play, and she perfectly steals the show from him.... again. [oneshot][platonic LeaxOC (AxelxOC)]

Rating: K+

Word Count: 2,412 words

If you liked this story, please reblog!

---

Lea glanced at the timer placed by his monitors and nearly tisked at the time.

She was late.

With a rather tired sigh, Lea started to work on making sure his software was still working right. Maybe while he was fiddling around with stuff, Sabrina would join the video chat so they could get a session done. He knew he should have asked Roxas to join again. Xion would be great to bring in too, if she wasn’t too busy working on her next article for her school’s paper. But alas, his subscribers had spoken, and they wanted Miss Priss and her insatiable need to annoy everyone. Especially him, apparently.

Not that he could blame them, she was great on camera.

Lea hummed as he booted up the game they were going to play. It was a review copy he had gotten a few days back, and he was actually looking forward to bumping it. He would be the first to admit to not being a big fan of the original franchise, but the graphics were crisp and the controls were smoother than butter. He knew Sabrina would have an appreciation for it too; as far as he could tell, the female characters were dressed sensibly- not at all designed just for the male gaze. They could have some fun talks about it when she got here. If she got here.

With the game running as expected, Lea started screen recording. He got a few minutes down before turning on his webcam as well. His face appeared on the screen to his left, with the game and recording software on the right. It was a good time to adjust lights while he was at it. Once that was settled, he began recording from the webcam as well. Lea admired himself in the webcam feedback for a moment. It was always better to overshoot, even if you weren’t really doing anything more than vocal warmups and adjusting your lighting.

Lea cleared his throat a bit before going through with his intro. He kept his tone bright and energetic. It was bad form to go in this early at full blast, but if Sabrina wasn’t going to remember their agreement, then he’d have to make due.

“Hey everybody, welcome back to AxelotlGaming! I’m Axel, and we were going to have a guest. Turns out she’s not coming, because at this point, we are well past being fashionably late.” Lea moved a bit away from the mic before grumbling, “It would’ve been nice if she actually bothered to tell me when she wasn’t coming. Could’ve been halfway through a recording by now.” He grimaced before remembering that he was still recording, so he turned back to the camera with a wide grin. He realized he was going to cut out a lot of his annoyance in editing later if he kept this up. The show always goes on, and whatnot.

“With or without our guest,” he went on to say to the webcam, “We’ve been sponsored to play the new-”

He hated to admit that he jumped when the ping for someone joining the video chat chimed. Lea quickly ended his recording softwares and accepted the newcomer. A new face appeared on the same monitor he kept his webcam feedback on, and he grimaced at seeing them.

“You’re late.” he huffed. He swiveled his car a bit just to glare at her feedback directly. Lea then almost proceeded to get knocked out of his seat looking at her.

Sabrina was a natural beauty and knew it. She was always light on her makeup regimen unless she was going to be seen on video or photograph. Today she did not plan on disappointing; her lips were painted a deep red, her cheeks the faintest of pinks to give the illusion of being an absolute sweetheart, and even the color around her eyes make them look more expressive. It was rather impressive- she must have worked on that for a good hour just to make sure she didn’t look like a raccoon.

“And now you realize why I’m late.” Sabrina smoothly told him, folding her arms with a smirk on her face. Even through the webcam, she looked so in control of everything. Lea didn’t know if it infuriated him, or was genuinely impressed.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said with a wave of his hand. “But know this, princess; just because I have an arguably easy job on paper, it doesn’t mean I don’t keep a schedule too. Got it memorized?”

“Just hire an editor.” she told him in the least of caring tones.

“No way!” he argued back. “I’ve got a certain method to my madness, and I’m not going to have someone else get their fingerprints all over it.”

“What a funny way of saying that no one else is as deranged as you.”

“Enough talk,” Lea then said to her with a clap of his hands, “We should be halfway through a session by now. Start up the game and make it snappy.”

Sabrina gave him a little wave of her hand before doing as she was told. She must have known how late she was- usually when someone told her to do something, her instinct was to react with the opposite. As she did that, Lea also went over his recording equipment and made sure he was recording as well.

“I’m ready when you are,” he decided. “Are you recording everything on your end?”

“Looks like it.” she agreed. Her eyes looked elsewhere for a moment- likely to check if everything was running smooth enough. When her eyes went back to the webcam, she settled back a bit in preparation for the next hour or so of recording.

“Are you doing the intro today?” she asked, gently placing a hand under her chin.

“My show, isn’t it?” Lea smirked. Knowing that she was ready meant it was time to start recording again. About time, too.

“Alright princess, put on your video face.” he warned her. “We’re getting serious in three… two…”

Both of them shifted in their spots slightly to appear more presentable. Lea gave them a few more moments of getting comfortable before going through his intro.

“Hey everybody, welcome back to AxelotlGaming! I’m Axel, and today I’ve got a very special guest. Special guest, why don’t you introduce yourself. Not that you need it, of course.”

“Of course.” Sabrina smoothly agreed, even twisting a piece of her hair. She looked at the webcam before giving a double wave to it. Her voice carried a perkiness never seen before as she said, “Hey guys! You asked for me, so here I am! Your favorite Lady Sabi here to show up, ah, I mean, play with Axel today.”

“So humble.” Lea playfully retorted. Sabrina only gave a wide -rather smug- smile in return.

“What are we playing today, Axel?” she cheerfully chirped. For a moment, Lea wondered if he was friends with a bubbly airhead instead of a pessimistic downer.

“We’ve been sponsored to play the new Blue Bomber MMO called ‘Renegade Chaser.’” he said, gesturing his hands to the side. He’ll edit in the box art during post. “Designed with old and new fans alike, Renegade Chaser can be played online and off with both multiplayer and single player modes.”

“Sell out.” Sabrina coughed into her hand.

“Yeah, well,” Lea mused, “Not all of us get free stuff just by looking pretty on Instagram. Of course, with almost a million followers at PrincessSabiAes2012, you’ve almost got enough influence to carry this channel on your own.”

“Nice plug.”

“Why thank you.”

“Bad rep for you though.”

“Why thank you.”

Sabrina let out a genuine laugh at his misfortune. But this was the kind of repertoire his subscribers enjoyed between them. Just hearing her laugh gave him a vision of a future comment along the lines of ‘hearing Sabi laugh at Axel adds 9,999 years to my life.’ Too bad the actual object of Sabrina’s -disguised- affection wasn’t on YouTube much, let alone have an account. Which was all for the best- he didn’t want to admit it, but Ventus got jealous real easy. Embarrassingly easy, depending on who you asked.

“Now that you’ve harassed me and we’re not even a minute in, how about we pop into game and see what we’ve got?”

“Let’s.” Sabrina agreed with a sweet little nod. 

Lea stole a look at her as she adjusted some things on her end to make sure her game footage was being recorded. Lea chastised himself for being so focused on her. He needed to stop getting distracted by her Clark Kent-ing her onscreen persona. But the switch was just so… uncanny, to put it in the nicest terms possible. There’s no wonder that despite her near million followers, Sabrina had yet to be recognized by any of them in person.

Lea shivered before continuing with his show. Two minutes of recording down, another 58 to go.

. . .

You could tell Sabrina was having a hard time getting used to the game because for ten straight minutes she did nothing but harass Lea instead. Not that it wasn’t to be expected- she was a puzzle girl, not a shoot-em-up girl. That being said, once she figured out the controls, she was nigh unstoppable. She even managed to figure out the special weapons before Lea could. Of course he called her a cheater for it. As long as it was in good fun, who really cared- right?

Another disorienting thing about Sabrina; she kept going from her usual snark to bubbly sunshine in mere seconds. The true (or as true as she wanted to be) part of her came through when she was at her most frustrated. It was yet another thing that his regular viewers came to appreciate of her. A lot of viewers really hated her bubbly self, even though it was arguably when she dished the most one-liners. Lea knew she was actually having a good time when she let the side of her he usually saw come through. That little lady knew how to be a savage and thrived in it.

One such occasion happened during this session. While the two were playing around with the various modes the game had, Lea had found a one-on-one free-for-all that the two took to immediately. Sabrina got so into beating him that he had to talk directly to her or else all commentary would have gone flat. Every word that came out of Sabrina’s mouth was straight from her mind, with no conscious censoring in the slightest. Lea feared so much for her that he intentionally threw the match. He did put up a fight- but it was definitely one of their shorter matches. Sabrina didn’t seem to notice as the victory screen appeared for her.

“Yes!” Sabrina gleefully declared, slamming her hands into her desk before giving her chair a spin. As the chair slowly came to a halt, she threw one of her hands over her head and gave an absolutely satisfied expression.

Lea knew right away that the moment his viewers saw that reaction, there were going to be memes of it. He could practically see them now- a really poor screenshot of that slightly worrying pose she was making, Impact font saying stuff like 'when bae buys you tacos without asking' or 'when Lea's such a moron and makes winning easy.' He'd have to ask her for her footage. He could emphasize the moment to help make some of those insufferable jpegs look slightly better.

It wouldn't have been so bad, but Sabrina was already the source of one of his channel's memes. 'Scrub my feet, peasant' was a line uttered during one Monopoly match that did not go in Lea's favor. Sabrina had also made a rather memorable pose in her chair, coupled with a rather smug face. It became so popular that Lea had to get her permission to make it into a t-shirt. Both Sabrina and his viewers had yet to live it down; Sabrina wearing the shirt anytime she knew the two of them would be in the same room together, and his viewers still made comments that referenced the line.

Good thing she was more of an Instagram queen and not a YouTuber. Lea would probably lose half his subscribers the moment she actually posted videos of her own.

“Heh, I let you win, my lady.” Lea boasted. This realization came to Sabrina with a slow grimace.

“You did.” she said in disappointment. She then smirked at him (not at the camera, but him directly on the screen), before spitting, “There are other ways to flirt with me than making me look superior to you.”

“Oh yeah?” Lea snorted. “Like what?”

Sabrina then smirked like she was taking on a challenge.

“Oh Axel,” she purred into her microphone. Almost immediately, Lea could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. “If you wanted a mistress to teach you how bad of a boy you are, you could have just asked. This doesn’t have to be hard.” She paused for a moment, just to make it dramatic. “Unless you want to be…”

Lea was dead certain that his soul left his body for a hot second. His face absolutely betrayed him, though. He looked away just to hide how red it was.

“Oh well, just look at the time.” Lea decided, already reaching for the keyboard key to finish the recording. “We’re all gamed out for the day. Thank you for watching!”

“But Axel, we still have ten-”

“Thanks for watching!” he loudly declared before smacking the keyboard key. Not long after, his head hit the desk in both relief and frustration.

“Are you alright?” Sabrina questioned, a teasing smirk still on her lips.

“God I hate you.”

“You gonna be alright with that nosebleed?”

“Shut up.” Lea whined.

Sabrina just laughed at him. To rub salt into the wound, she ended the video chat mid-laugh. It was far too effective in leaving a phantom image of her on his mind. Lea let out another groan as he thought about his viewers’ reaction. This was going to be an episode to remember, he had no doubt about it. It was likely going to fuel even more rumors that the two had the hots for each other- which was the last thing he wanted.

He really needed to stop inviting her back.

[tuiyla]

So I finally watched The Owl House

I wish I’d do this with every show I watch but it seems like only a lucky few get the She-Ra style rant of love treatment. Well, I finally watched The Owl House after my dash having been flooded for the past couple of weeks and I have some thoughts. Slight spoilers below.

First off, I love the whole vibe. I had a faint idea that this show would be about magic but I didn’t know much before watching - except for one thing, we’ll get back to that. The way it builds its world and deals with magic, though, is so refreshing. And I just have to mention here that I laughed out loud at all the Harry Potter jabs, they were hilarious. I expect we’ll learn much more about magic and its users as the show goes on but as far as the first season goes the introduction was really solid. It strikes the right balance between leaving things to the imagination but being more than “wave wand and magic happens”. It’s colourful, it’s creative, and I even like the ovens and school tracks, despite knowing that the story is about not conforming to those. It makes the Boiling Isles unique and make me want to learn more about the world even beyond the characters and the main plot.

TOH also presents a world that’s much more macabre than I was expecting from the Disney Channel, not that that’s a bad thing. I found myself thinking of Adventure Time at certain points and pondering, at scary moments, how kids would react. I think kids love this, though, and besides, nothing can be more scarring than Courage the Cowardly Dog was. It’s not that terrifying, of course, just daring enough to stand out. Overall the show has what I would classify as more of a Cartoon Network vibe than a Disney Channel one, but I admittedly haven’t really been following many Disney shows. In any case, I dig it. I dig the weird creatures and the beautiful backgrounds and I appreciate how alive the Boiling Isles feel. It doesn’t take long for TOH to immerse you in its world so I’m for one am hooked.

I make a big deal of loving the world itself because rarely does it happen that world-building stands out to me so soon in a series. I do love carefully constructed fantasy worlds but for the most part I’m more interested in the characters themselves. Here, I’d say it’s close to being a 50-50, which is something that even Avatar can’t say with its elemental masterclass in world-building (which is mostly because the character depth there is unrivaled but still). So yeah, kudos to The Owl House for achieving this. From Luz’s glyph magic to the covens and the titans, I’m excited to explore this world more.

Now, the characters. The real meat of any story. Starting with Luz, I have seen some criticism that she’s a generic hero so far, the “I’m a weirdo”, heart of gold, upbeat variety. I don’t think this makes her bland, though I do admit that being told over and over again that she’s weird makes me less engaged, even she’s also shown to be weird. I like the message of her arc and that the chosen one trope was deconstructed almost right away. I like that she’s relentlessly enthusiastic and kind to people and I like that she doesn’t have to get more bitter in order to get development. Instead, she learns from her mistakes but keeps being herself and brings her unique spirit to the Boiling Isles. We need protagonists like Luz, not just because she’s latina and bisexual but because her learning process doesn’t involve cynicism. Sure, there is a lot she needs to learn but her heart is presented as an asset and a sort of source of magic. I’m excited to see where her story goes, for sure.

I’m gonna write briefly about the other characters before I get to my favourite one. Eda is super cool and I quickly got over the fact that she’s not Beatrice Horseman, lol. She embodies such a youthful energy but the show also allows her to be a middle-aged woman comfortable in her own body - well, owl curse notwithstanding. Also, her relationship with Lilith is one of my favourite parts of the whole show. Eda subverts so many of the mentor’s traditional tropes and I’m here for it. I kinda thought she was the villain based on her design and when I didn’t know anything about the show but hey, happy she’s not.

I don’t think I’d even seen a picture of King before starting to watch the series and at first I thought I’d get tired of him real quick. He’s the type of character who can get really annoying instead of endearing really fast if he’s not given any depth or charm, both by way of writing and voice acting. Luckily, I ended up liking King and his antics. His design is indeed adorable and Alex Hirsch is a genius. The only time I felt like he went too far was, perhaps surprisingly, in the book writing episode, “Sense and Insensitivity”, but even there going too far was the point. So yeah, King’s also great, there’s much potential in his backstory and general character.

Alright so really quickly, other characters: Willow and Gus are generic best friend characters and though they already have other things going on, I expect more development as the series progresses. I like that Willow is actually super powerful, just not in the way people expected her to and Gus is clearly also talented despite being younger. I’d be happy to see more of the other kids, get more familiar with Hexside. Edric and Emira are fun characters but they were really shitty in their first episode so I was kind of surprised they weren’t more of a nuisance to Amity later on. I’m all for supportive siblings so I wouldn’t mind a good relationship between the three but I feel like it’s more complicated than that with the Blights.

Finally, I also have to mention that Hooty is... well, quite something, isn’t he. Much like with King, I thought he’d be much more annoying but somehow the show is self-aware enough that it makes Hooty tolerable. I’m almost always torn between feeling sorry for him and being thoroughly weirded out, and I think that’s the intention? It’s fitting that he’s the titular character as he embodies the tone of The Owl House well in my eyes. He’s there for the comedy but there’s just enough there to hint at something more. Very bizarre, strong CN vibes, here for it.

Now that I’ve written a paragraph more about Hooty than I expected to, let’s talk about Amity. Listen, no other character stood a chance to be my favourite as soon as I learned Mae Whitman voiced Amity. That woman gave me Katara so now I have a quasi Pavlovian response to her voice. I’d also say that I knew more about Amity going into the show than I did about any other aspect of TOH. I heard somewhere that she started out as an antagonist, I knew her parents were abusive, and the reason the show blew up on my dash and my general online bubble is the Grom episode. Lucikly I only saw stills of Lumity beneath the crescent moon but the pure Sapphic energy of that was enough to gay migrate me to this show. I’d like to note it here though that The Owl House is a good show in and of itself, the queer rep is just a nice extra. I’m gonna spend the next couple hundred words going on about Amity and her crush on Luz but I don’t value only that. The Gay Migration is great and rep is great but I’m also grateful to have a solid show behind it. That being said.

I’m a total dyke for Amity Blight. I was very biased before even being introduced to her character but I genuinely find her to be fascinating and she has great potential. She’s developing quite quickly, like much of The Owl House, but an arc not being stretched out for several seasons before getting a rushed conclusion is refreshing. The progress hits all the beats and the only note I have is that I want more. She starts out as a generic bully but the opportunity to be more is there from the beginning. We find out early on that she used to be friends with Willow, we see that she works hard and values honest work. When she becomes Luz’s rival, it doesn’t last long before Amity shows that she’s open to new perspectives. That’s not to defend or even justify her earlier and nastier moments, Amity was rude to both Luz and Willow. But through all that, she becomes a complex character who does bad things but isn’t a bad person and grows when she gets the space to. I think that’s neat.

Luz’s decision to befriend her might be cartoon logic but as someone who subscribes to the “kill them with kindness” ideology, I can totally relate. Amity’s softer side doesn’t take long to show and “Lost in Language” is such a great episode to show how complex people can be. Again, I was already biased when it came to Amity but she’s consistently shown to be capable of self-reflection and growth when others give her the chance. I think her past and potential future friendship with Willow is a great way to explore many different topics and I’m trusting the show to do it justice. I also can’t wait to meet the rest of the Blights, if only to get me some angst and further develop Amity. I half expected Grom to take the form of her parents. Too dark for Disney? Well, we don’t know Amity’s dynamic with her parents, exactly, but there’s so much subtext and potential. I love what we’ve already seen from her but I’d also say that she has one of the greatest potentials in the show.

Another way in which this potential manifests is Lumity, of course. Again, they’re developing quite quickly but that doesn’t mean it’s rushed. I’d love to explore Amity’s crush more and what Luz means to her. The Grom episode surpassed all expectations, still and gifs don’t do the stunning dance sequence justice. The animation is so smooth, the colours are amazing, the music is on point and the Sapphic vibes complete the picture. Poetic cinema, truly. Molly Ostertag and Noelle Stevenson are really out there giving wlw animation fans everything we ever wanted, huh. It also warms my heart that the crush is made very clear, not just by Luz’s name being on the note but by the delightful gay disaster that is Amity in “Wing It Like Witches”. I never thought I’d ever see such a relatable useless lesbian in animation so kudos to Dana Terrace and the whole crew. Wow, how far we’ve come.

So yeah, Amity is a funky little lesbian and I’m a 100% here for her gay disaster moments, but I also love where Lumity is going thematically. They’re great as foils and I’m hoping that they won’t get together at the very end. Look, I love me some Bubbline, Korrasami and Catradora, but it’s time a wlw relationship had the chance to exist onscreen and not only in the last episode. The Owl House has a great chance to do that. I know the creators don’t want romance to be the main focus and I respect that, I think the world they created deserves to showcased and explored to its full potential. Lumity could be a great subplot though, as representation on the one hand and as a thematically interesting dynamic on the other. Plus, Luz and Amity are just cute and sometimes, it’s as simple as that. Oh, and also the whole Little Miss Perfect thing? One of the best fandom discoveries I’ve made in a long while. Not only is the song truly perfect for Amity, I love that Joriah Kwamé went on to write Ordinary as well. This right here is why fandom is beautiful.

I think that’s about it for season 1 initial thoughts. The moral can be a bit on the nose at times, especially in the early episodes but the show is ultimately for kids and I appreciate its message. Interesting world and magic system, good characters, great potential for later seasons, just a well put together show that I’m really glad I started watching. I’m kind of sorry I didn’t keep up with season 1 as it was coming out but I would not have been able to wait between episodes. The pacing is good overall, deffo moves fast but I wouldn’t call it rushed, and the “filler” episodes still add something to the story. I’m not sure if I would still feel like the show moves at a fast pace if I hadn’t binged it but in any case it isn’t rushed, the necessary beats are all there and have time to sit. I’m going to watch as it comes out from now on so hopefully season 2 will arrive early next year.

Oh, and: I’m very new to the fandom, barely just found out about Little Miss Perfect, so any and all tidbits, fun facts, and fic recommendations are welcome. Also if you just want to chat my inbox is always open!