#it’s the only moongene story I found and liked

[rubykgrant]

(So, I was looking at @bonkalore Moongene stuff again, and it reminded me of a whole DREAM I had a few years back while half-asleep with the Tangled series on, and some of it was also definitely influenced by her Tangled 2 story, which I still love) I think I was partially asleep during the weird episode with the memories, so I was partially aware that it was revealed that Cass was Gothel's daughter, etc... HOWEVER, my dream went in this other direction, where it was still a secret that Cass is ALSO from "another dimension".

That is, from a different time-line where something different happened with the flower, and so Gothel never knew Rapunzel at all (unclear if my dream decided Cass was her biological daughter, or just a kid she took in to do chores for her, whatever). I think Gothel was trying to get a "new version" of the flower, and she found the notes left by people who studied with Demanitus and Zhan Tiri, so in this time-line, Gothel tried to open a portal to a world where the flower still existed, but she was worried it was unstable, so she sent Cass in first to test it... the portal didn't stay open, and being in a dimension that wasn't her own caused little Cass to become disoriented and lost her memories.

The Gothel from that dimension presumably just withered away with no flower, but this was also going to be a big set-up for Cass feeling rejected; not that her mother, who literally kid-napped Rapunzel, didn't love her enough, but she was used for a DANGEROUS experiment, then disregarded, and trapped in a world where she technically hadn't been born. Slightly more intense Cass-angst. Anyway, that was all in my dream. Later, my imagination added more when I was awake, watching the finale of the series-

When things eventually come full-circle with Zhan Tiri, who herself was from a dimension that had no magic and such, and that's why she's so determined to consume as much as possible. When all that gets resolved, Cass decides to not only go on a quest for herself, but she wants to explore these other words (and I guess she got somebody like Varian to stabilize a portal for her to use, with safety precautions and what-not). This is was would turn into Cass finding other worlds where things were slightly different, or VASTLY different (like a world with no Eugene, so Rapunzel never left the tower. also, a world with no Rapunzel, and Eugene has lived a very painful life alone). Cass can't help but want to help her friends, even in these time-lines where they don't really know her. She also winds up helping lots of other people in general. She's just cool like that!

The problem is, being a universe-hopper who keeps changing history, this creates a weird ripple-effect in other dimensions Cass has been. She's spent the most time in the universe where Rapunzel and Eugene met, then fell in love, so it gets hit extra hard; now all the different potential out-comes from this world, had Cass never gone there to begin with, start over-lapping with reality. THAT is what creates the concept for Bonka's Tangled 2 scenario~

[princeeugenefitzherbertofcororna]

Random! Eugene do you love Rapunzel?

*sighs*

Of course I love Rapunzel! The only reason I took the moonstone is because I don’t know what It would have done to her! I didn’t want her to get hurt..

[Eugene grows a black rocks from the ground]

I’m doing this for her..

((This is based on @tangled-lover-165 mooneugene story credit goes to them))

[bestworstcase]

Hi, im a bit lost in fandom in general and just found your blog, i hope you dont mind my asking this. You mention every now and then there being some hatedom-y niches, is it related to any political or significative offline division? Not trying to make you single out anyone, just curious whether this was a bigotry problem as in star wars, hp or other bigger sagas or just people being rude (not that its very good either). Thanx

kind…of

ok

so

the hatedom-y side of the tts fandom largely exists in this weird intersection between 1. people who are outraged that the nerdy teen boy wasn’t the protagonist of the disney princess cartoon, 2. people who wanted tts to be the sweet slice of life adventures of eugene and his girlfriend, and 3. people with a bone to pick with the sexism and (more rarely) racism inherent in the narrative itself; which creates this…odd dynamic where like, you get people furiously and correctly condemning tts for, say, sidelining the only living mom in the whole series or treating the only character of color in the main cast like an idiot manbaby who needs to be babysat by a child half his age—but then those exact same people will turn around and seethe because cassandra had the audacity to be the deuteragonist instead of their male character of choice gmfjdkdh

( which imo is one of the reasons why a lot of moonvarian / moongene content isn’t… especially good; the au concepts in and of themselves have lots of potential! but more often than not they end up kind of awkwardly railroading varian/eugene into cassandra’s narrative role bc they’re coming from a place of thinking she “stole” that from one of them gkfhdks. see also, the “chris changed the story to spite varian fans” flavor of moonvarian conspiracy, in defiance of all evidence that moon!cass was the plan from the very beginning. )

and then sort of parallel to that there is a lot. A LOT. of fandom racism vis-a-vis how the separatists of saporia are handled in fanworks, particularly in varian-centric circles where they get twisted into cackling sadistic monsters in order to facilitate varian angst. but that’s not exclusive to the hatedom-y side, the whole fandom does it /:

to an extent i think the tts hatedom is kinda… like there’s always this underlying misogyny in the way hatedomy folks interpret and talk about cassandra (and often, rapunzel) but it’s also largely comprised of people who are at least nominally socially progressive and have seized on the, very real, issues tts has with its portrayals of women and people of color as a way of legitimizing their hatred of the show (and of chris sonnenburg, who of course gets blamed 100% for everything bad and given zero credit for anything good, because god forbid we acknowledge that anyone else involved in the creation of this show might have a smidgen of agency or responsibility for how it turned out! lmao surely tts would have been perfect if only the crusty cishet white man who is sort of abrasive on twitter weren’t the one in charge 🙄)—so delving into the hatedom often ends up feeling like “lol okay, nice views you have in this glass house of yours”

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

worth noting here is that 9 times out of 10 when hatedom-y fans start talking about sexism or racism in tts itself it’s for the sake of shitting on sonnenburg vs like, trying to have meaningful or constructive critical discussions of the text or of trends in fanwork—as with any hatedom, when the focus is on proving the validity of one’s hatred for a piece of media, eventually the cynical hatemongering subsumes everything else and it all starts to feel more than a little unhinged. the most egregious example of this is of course the tangled salt marathon

[kingreywrites]

I might want to try writing Tangled fanfics! Do you have any advice for starting up? (Also do u just type stuff on a word document or... somethin)

Oh please do!! I'd love to read what you write!! 🥺 I'm not really sure what kind of advice you want, but here are some general ones:

My number one piece of advice is to simply write what you want to write. It sounds cheesy, but it works: think about the fanfics you'd love to read, the tropes you'd never get tired of, the characters that always make you happy and... well, if you mix all of it, you'll probably find THE fic you'd have fun writing. The first Tangled thing I've ever published was my self-indulgent take on the moongene AU because I found the concept cool, sometimes that's all it is.

Other piece of advice: know what motivates you, and what saps your creativity! I enjoy doing some light research, but I kinda hate writing right after doing it, because I always feel like I sound too formal since all the informations are still fresh in my mind. I'm not much of a planner, or a worldbuilder, but maybe you are! The important thing is to be aware of this stuff because if, let's say, I started a really huge writing project which required a lot of worldbuilding, I'd end up struggling and (probably) failing, which could discourage me from writing. Fanfiction is supposed to be fun, you don't have to force yourself to do the things you don't want to!

Also what's fun (and frustrating sometimes) in Tangled is that the general setting is really vague and inconsistent. It's in "vaguely Europe", "vaguely before our time", and there's magic so... You can kinda do what you want with it. Also the characters are amazing in any setting so AUs are good too 😌

Basically I'm a cheesy motivational speech fgjsksk but yeah starting up in anything can be really intimidating, and writing is hard, but I know that at the end of the day I enjoy writing a lot, especially for Tangled, and I only wish that it'll be true for you too!!

For the where uhm, I write in Google Docs on my phone because 1. I often don't have access to a computer when I want to write and 2. Autocorrect is a gift and I owe it my life. But opening Word can work just as well (be sure that the font looks good to you and that the writing isn't too tiny!! be comfortable with your medium 🥺). Also I know that when I'm stuck, shifting mediums can help me a bit, so I do write stuff by hand sometimes (also on my note app because it feels less committed than google docs in my mind fhdjdkj)

I'm not sure if that helped at all, giving out pieces of advice isn't my strongest suit, but I hope it did!! And I hope I'll read your Tangled stories soon, don't hesitate to send me a link!! 🥰💖

[aikoiya]

I Demand Moongene! (Pretty Please)

I've yet to find even a single Moongene or Dark Prince Eugene fic as of yet despite a decent amount of fanart for both.

This disappoints me deeply & in a very personal way. Also, yes this is a tantrum & I'm sorry for that, but c'mon guys!

What does it take to get a Dark Prince Moongene fic where King Edmund erred on the side of caution regarding the Moon Opal & everything was... quiet until Eugene reached the age where he learned to crawl. At which point, he made his way into the Chamber of the Moon Opal, Edmund found him, but upon trying to get close, black rocks erupt from the ground, destroying the bridge making it impossible for him to cross.

Edmund leaves in a panic trying to find Adira or Quirin or SOMEONE to save his boy! They get back & Eugene's, like, right there at the Opal's protective casing & he's already started reaching in to grab at the shiny bauble of mass destruction. This freaks everyone out & Adira is 0.2 seconds away from jumping over the gap, but more black rocks block them all off & all they can do is watch & freak out as the cage around the Opal widens, allowing Eugene to get closer & finally... Grab that sucker.

Man, Edmund straight up faints dead on the floor when his baby son starts knawing on the shiny rock like it was a teething ring. But, you know, Baby Eugene is just sittin' there, chillin', with the Opal & he's just sorta absorbing it's energy?

Yeah, he's absorbing it & then it turns to dust & he starts crying' cause dust tastes gross. Then, suddenly the black rocks become more manageable.

Life goes on. The Dark Kingdom is now habitable. One day when Adira comes back from 1 of her missions, it's with a little egg-shaped kid clinging to her leg. His name is evidently both Ornwaldo Schnitts & Lance Strongbow, newbie theif who apparently found the love of his life in the form of Adira. Kid was basically adopted into the fold, became top-notch archer, culinary expert, animal enthusiast, & all-around nature lover.

Varian is eventually born & the 3 boys sorta become unofficial brothers. He still loves alchemy, but has a better understanding of magic & so also has some thaumaturgical experience. Actually has a mentor to teach him the ways of alchemy & thaumaturgy, so he better understands that sometimes just needs to pace himself.

Eugene still has that ego, it's just not as bad as it is in canon. His favorite story books are still those of Flanagan Ryder, but he also greatly enjoys Robin Hood & even some King Arthur. He likes to pick locks because he believes it to be a practical skill to have along with survival skills. He knows how to play the violin & the lute, because he enjoys it, but he most enjoys fiddling. He's mischievous, an expert of sleight-of-hand, & misdirection. Not only that, but he has a certain skill that allows him to know when someone is lying or what their thinking just by watching them for little details. In mordern times we call it Helstromism.

Or a fic where Edmund sent his people & his wife away before he tried to take out get rid of the Moon Opal, almost the second they knew she was pregnant with Eugene (along with the servant from Destinies Collide) & maybe a month or so later in Greece, she was given a gift of moonbeam flower teabags (the queen didn't know this though) by a mysterious cloaked woman with a silver bow riding upon the back of a giant white stag as thanks for healing her mount.

Resulting in Eugene being born with unique powers of the moon (like seeing in pitch black like an eagle sees in the day & the ability to all but turn invisible by shrouding himself in shadows & having silent footsteps). He has a single lock of vibrant silvery-aqua hair that just fades into existence halfways down & his eyes are a deep aqua that gain a shiny sheen in the dark & further take on shining silver crescents on the edges during the nights of the waxing crescent.

Then, after Eugene turned 1 year old, his mother died & the servant took him to the exact same orphanage the he grew up in. So the story progresses. The events of the movie take place (maybe with some MoongeneXSunpunzel intrigue added in) & Eugene notices that Raps is gone from the castle sooner; later emerging from a bush near the sight of the black rocks before Raps touches 1 of them.

In the end, both he & Raps end up touching the rocks & both get a reaction. Rapunzel gets her golden hair back along with some new powers & Eugene's hair turns silvery-white with a single lock of deep marine blue-green with a silvery sheen, the colors changing with the angle viewed & lighting.

Plus, some new powers of his own, a couple of which he shares with Raps but with his own twist: indestructible hair (for him it acts more as a built-in helmet), shield powers (coming in the form of blue energy taking the shape of a protective bubble; this 1 he uses much more often than Raps does her Hair Shield), & the healing of non-fatal injuries along with a halt of fatal ones for the duration of his own stamina or until a professional doctor can fix the problem (comes in the form of green light emitting from his hands & only requires a magic phrase rather than a song).

In the end, it's his destiny to save his kingdom from the opal by grabbing it, while it's Rapunzel's destiny to guide him there, because they love & trust eachother completely.

The light from the Opal dims in his hand until it goes black, turns to coal, & crumbles into dust. Now Eugene IS the Moondrop Opal just like how Rapunzel IS the the Sundrop Flower.

Anything with do at this point! I'm still callin' the Dark Kingdom, Lacerna by-the-way.