#just in RP stuff or fanfic or whatever

[dawnleaf37]

I JUST WANNA WRITE FANFIC ABT RIP AND IT NOT make me feel weird :(

[babycharmander]

I feel like the people who are super into character AIs just… really haven’t read enough fanfic. Like, so much of the output of those things is just generic sludge, like, the most basic, boring response to whatever you typed in. It’s not in-character, it’s just an algorithm coughing up the most obvious response it can think of.

If this is the stuff you’re enjoying, I highly encourage you to read literally anything else.

The most poorly-written OOC fanfic is better than a character AI by virtue of it at least having been written by a human. It’s not the most obvious algorithmically generated sludge—it’s something a real person wanted to write.

Or like, if you want to write stuff yourself while playing off another person… maybe join a roleplay group, or find an RP partner? It’s not like they’re hard to find these days. Of course you need to learn basic RPing etiquette, which might seem intimidating, but once you learn it I promise you it is SO much more satisfying than receiving sludge responses from an AI.

Please engage in fandom in literally any other way—I promise you it will be more fun than what you are currently doing.

[mellybabbles]

Masterpost?! Me?! Never

so anyways have a masterpost

Hello! A masterpost has been due for a long time- but I've finally gotten around to making one!

Things Change - Chapter 1/Prologue (Bill Cipher x Reader) Dreamscape - Chapter 1/Prologue (multi-sanses x fem reader) Misplaced Royalty - Chapter 1/Prologue (bad sanses x nonbinary reader) Just Add Water - Chapter 1/Prologue (Dust + Killer x Siren!reader) From Me To You (Hiatus) - Chapter 1/Prologue (error x fem reader) Ao3 acc Several other fics on my acc! (mainly dust💀)

Tag List! #melly's silly talks - basically any post that isn't a reblog #melly's silly reblogs - reblogs #melly's reblogs - serious reblogs #my art - my art/drawings/sketches #my animations - my animatics/animations #my writing/my fanfics - writing Tags may differ, I'm really bad at sorting tags LOL

1K FOLLOWERS DITYS HERE!!

Do's and Don'ts!

DNI: Incest, pedophiles, proshippers, dreammare or frans shippers, homophobes, etc

This is a SAFE PLACE. Adults and minors alike are welcome, but please do not make it weird.

Requests are: Open!!

Please refer to this post if you're interested!

Boundaries!

I'm open to talking with anyone, followers mutuals or randoms. My discord is mellybabbles, alt is melatonindepicts, and you can also message me on here! I'm a-okay with being pinged in posts! Tag games, art, etc. Tag me in it all! If I don't respond, don't take it personally, it means I forgot or already have seen it/did it Sexual jokes/flirty jokes are okay! I tend to make them, so please let me know if it makes you uncomfortable. Okay, so this one is a bit weird, but if you are an rp account or impersonate a sans (THAT'S COMPLETELY OKAY, i do it as well), please do not say "guys it's me!" or things along those lines to my art/writing. Especially if it's implied sexual/flirty! This makes me extremely uncomfortable, especially if I don't know your age. Unless you're a friend of mine, then go ham, cause chances are I've already flirted with you relentlessly lol

A lil about me!

Hello! You may call me Melly, Mel, Jynx, or Sharpie! Friends call me whatever hehe I'm pansexual, genderfluid and extremely fuckin flirty and chaotic. I have ADHD and heavily struggle with understanding tones and stuff. I have a small emotion range, so I'm sorry if I'm constantly hyper and happy and that bothers you. I'll be constantly cracking jokes, and if it offends you, please let me know! I'm just mapping you out to figure out what's best for the both of us. I don't tend to approach people first, so if you wanna chill and be broskis, sadly you'll have to extend the olive branch. Then I'll probably cling to it like a desperate bird idfk I swear. A lot. Sorry if that scares you I'm Korean-american! Fuck yea, I'mma come eat your dog- /j /j Anyways, so yea, feel free to come poke me whenever :D I'll be happy to breakdance for you hehe

I HAVE A DISCORD SERVER!!! COME POP IN AND SAY HI!! we're almost at 100 members !! HEEUHUHEUHE

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for telling someone that roleplays are a two-way street and refusing to re-engage with them?

Occasionally, if I'm in the mood to write but I don't really know what, I'll browse ship tags on Omegle. Its become synonymous for roleplays, and I've found its (typically) pretty fun.

As with every social thing, there's the odd... Less than pleasant experience. Last night was one such experience. I connected to someone on a ship tag, they sent a prompt, and it was actually a pretty interesting one, so I responded.

It was an AU prompt, but I generally kept my characterisation as close to the character's canon as I could, while still matching it to roughly what someone's personality in that profession and location would be.

(E.g; if the character was a proper old-country style cowboy, or a socially awkward secretary, ect.)

It became very clear, very fast, that the other person had very, very specific ideas about the roleplay, what happens, what my character was supposed to say/do, ect. To the point where (as I later told them) they should've just written fanfic so they had complete control.

Near enough every time I responded, they'd "correct" it or argue against it both in character and in brackets as themselves. For example if I noted something about the background or story of my character, theirs would immediately say "no that's not what happened" or they'd say [hey actually can you change that, it doesn't fit/I don't like it/its not what I envisioned].

After about fifteen minutes of this I got incredibly vexed and decided I was done. I don't mind a roleplay having certain goals/main points/guidelines, but they were literally trying to control every tiny aspect of what I did. So I sent them this:

[I'm sorry, the RP sounded interesting in the prompt you sent, but its rapidly becoming clear you don't actually want a roleplay, you want to be the sole one dictating everything that happens. Honestly I think its best you turn this idea into a fanfic and not a roleplay. It kills off any enjoyment of the roleplay when I have you contradicting every tiny detail I include or dictating what I'm allowed to do or say. I'm not going to sit there waiting for you to approve of everything I intend to say. Thank you for your time, but good night.]

I disconnected, and decided I'd spend another fifteen minutes browsing the tag before I did something else. Well apparently, the other person decided they were going to spend fifteen minutes stalking the tag trying to find me again, spamming every connection with messages ranging from extreme insults and threats to demands I 'speak up again, bitch, I wanna talk' and so forth. After connecting to them for the tenth time, I sent:

[I'm not going to re-engage with you. I said what I did, and frankly, it was a valid statement. If you can't handle the fact that roleplaying means a 50/50 creative allowance with someone else, and that you can't micro-manage or bulldoze every single detail, then you shouldn't roleplay. Frankly, knowing how vile you can be from simple criticism, I'm glad I disconnected. Take a breather and re-evaluate yourself. I'd be embarrassed.]

Well. This morning I logged onto Tumblr and after some browsing, I actually came across them again. Here. By means of a post where they included screenshots of everything and are even going so far as threatening to stalk Tumblr and AO3 to 'match up the writing' so they can find me and presumably say their piece or whatever.

I talked to a friend about it, and surprisingly, they think I'm an asshole. Not for what I said in the first place, but for not re-approaching the other person (through DMs) so they'll stop filling the ship's tag with negative stuff. (They've made 3 posts about it all so far.)

I don't want to do that because it means opening up my private social media to this obviously unhinged individual. I know I can expect to be spammed, sent hate mail, have them try to track down my other socials, ect. I could make an alt account for it, but honestly that's effort I don't see the point in making. If they can't let this go, its not my problem.

AITA? Should I make an alt account just to let them get it out of their system? I don't know how to proceed with this.

What are these acronyms?

[teastainedprose]

Intro / Master List

I made a place to shake out all of the writing blurbs free instead of leaving them to rot in my e-mail drafts. Fics, drabbles, nonsense musings, headcanons and whatever else falls out will go here. Side blog to @tearueful

I am here to WRITE because creativity DEMANDS it, and this is low enough energy that chronic pain can't steal it from me. Unless it has an A03 mirror link, the writing is RAW and probably full of errors. Real fuck it, we'll do it live hours.

I loveloveLOVE interactions on my posts and in my ask box. PLEASE add replies, reblog with your comments and/or and go HOG WILD in the tags. IT FEEDS MEEEE and further fuels my inspiration.

🔞 18+ content. I say fuck. I will write smut. The situations will be adult in nature more often than not. There will be problematic content as my favs are problematic.

The ask box is open and I encourage sending requests, inspiration, or just chatter.

Feel free to send ask requests on or off anon.

Current brain worms are focused on Homelander of The Boys with a mild Fallout invasion.

Archive of Our Own Link

Prompt Requests / Fandoms / Tags / Master List of Writing

I have no issues with prompts that are open ended with what characters are involved or ones that specify. Within the fandoms that have captivated my brain, I'm up for writing any relationship romantic, sexual, or platonic and x reader writings are ones I'll happily engage in.

Sending something in is no guarantee I'll write for said prompt or when I'll get to it. My mind is fickle and sometimes a prompt grabs me by the throat, or I let it simmer for a hot minute. That or I'll simply delete it if it doesn't spark joy.

I've been writing and RPing for a very long time, but only recently delved into anything canon adjacent and then writing actual fanfics for it. Thus what fandoms I'll write for are currently limited to things I've been hype fixated on or am currently fixated on. Obviously, the main one right now is Homelander. He's my poor lil meow meow, but I will happily slip back into writing OCs from my years of RP or other characters in fandoms I adore.

Fandoms I'll write for:

The Boys

Fallout, TV series

Wildstar (OCs)

World of Warcraft (OCs)

Given how long I've been writing for and what sort of dark stories I've written with friends, there's not much that I won't explore if it has an interesting concept that I can get a good story out of. Dark themes, kinky fuckery, violence, and sexual situations are all well and good. That being said, there's plenty of things that squick me out that I rather not touch but as I'm an adult I'll either delete the prompt or explain my thoughts on the prompt related to whatever character it is.

i.e., Homelander sure as shit has a lactation kink but pregnancy stuff is body horror to me. Can I write it? Possibly, it wholly depends on the prompt.

Writing

Fallout:

🔞Explosion (Lucy x Maximus)

🔞Too Sweet ( Cooper x Reader, WIP) : Chapter [1], Tag

🔞 Gash (Cooper x Reader)

🔞Take It As It Comes ( Pre-War!Cooper x Reader, WIP)

The Boys:

Fanfics

Play with Fire (Homelander x f!reader, plus sized, WIP) : Chapter [1] [2], [3] Tag

One Up (Homelander x f!Reader) : Chapter [1] , Tag

No Bad Dogs (Homelander x Kimiko??? besties!???!?!) : Concept stage, Tag

General Drabbles:

🔞Two Player Game (Homelander x f!reader)

🔞Lonely Together (Queen Maeve x Homelander)

Pinky Promise (Ryan Butcher & Homelander🥺)

Mark You Pretty (Homelander x reader)

🔞THC Gummies (Homelander x f!reader)

Introducing the 'wife' (Homelander x Billy Butcher)

Girl Dad (Homelander & Zoe)

Rainy Day (Homelander x reader)

Mix Tape (Homelander x reader)

Plushie (Homelander x reader)

Sugar Daddy (Homelander x reader)

🔞Making a Mess (Homelander x f!reader)

🔞Blackmail, Play With Fire side fic (Homelander x f!reader, plus-sized)

🔞Crusty.. (Homelander x reader)

Driving Lesson (Homelander & Ashley Barett)

🔞Over Eager (Homelander x f!reader)

Tampons (Homelander x f!reader)

Emoticons (Ryan Butcher & Homelander)

Flower Picking ( Homelander x reader)

🔞Office Tryst (Homelander x f!reader)

Breaking Point (Homelander x reader)

🔞Pet Play (Homelander x OC, WIP)

🔞Choke (Homelander x Reader, WIP)

Tags

General Tags

Drabble / Ask / Anon Ask / Fanfic Planning / Fanfic Chapter / Worldbuilding / Canon x You / Plus-Sized Reader / Brainstorming

The Boys

The Boys FanFic / The Boys Smut Homelander / Homelander Headcanon / Homelander x Reader / Homelander Writing / Homelander Smut Queen Maeve / Maeve Writing / Maeve Smut / Maeve x Homelander Kimiko / Kimiko Writing Frenchie / Frenchie Writing Ryan Butcher / Ryan Writing

Fallout

Fallout Fanfic / Fallout Smut Maximus / Lucy MacLean / VaultKnight / Cooper Howard / The Ghoul / Cooper Howard x Reader / The Ghoul x Reader

18+ Banner Source

[princesscolumbia]

Ranma 1/2 Thoughts, Meta Edition

I have consumed...a lot of Ranma 1/2 content.

I mean, this is kinda what happens when you're a repressed transgirl who discovers the manga a year into a marriage that you got into to "fix" being trans and be "a real boy" in a desperate bid to fill the hole that you wouldn't learn for two decades could only be filled by living as your true self.

I've encountered precisely four (4) types of Ranma 1/2 fans in that time:

Transwomen who see Ranma as their idealized expression of the gender experience ("I'm not like this because I want to be, it's a curse. A curse that gives me a smokin' hot body and HUGE tits! But it's tooootally a curse, for realsies! I'll find a cure any day now, see how hard I'm looking? I'm trying sooooo hard to find a cure...")

Transmen who see Ranma as their perfect representation of their gender experience ("I'm a guy, damnit! This body...it's a curse! I hate it and I want nothing better than to be cured, but all sorts of Life Bullshit keeps getting in the way!")

Lesbians who kin either Ranma (butch NB lesbian) or one of their love interests (Akane - comphet closetted butch lesbian, Shampoo - Strong, smokin' hot bad bitch who goes after what she wants, Ukyo - transmasc coded genderfluid NB)

Completely clueless nimrods who miss the FUCKING POINT and are only into the show for the martial arts and think it would be better if Ranma got cured and they stopped having funny stuff happen.

(In case it's not obvious, IMHO the last group are the worst parts of the fandom and need to Go Away. Most of the toxic stuff that exists in R.5 fanspaces is because of this group of assholes which includes the incels that think everything would be better if Ranma just did stuff that's questionable from an ethics and morality perspective and chased after Shampoo because she's the closest thing to a Barbie-doll these closet fascists can allow themselves to fantasize about playing with, completely ignoring that she's a complex character that's a subversive pastiche to the Japanese racist stereotypes of the 1980s.)

I'm not kidding when I say that in the early days of the public Internet (before Facebook and Twitter ruined it for everyone), Ranma 1/2 was the SINGLE largest fandom by a MASSIVE stretch. I once checked my math on this by going to Fanfiction.net (before the massive purges) and brought up the Big List of All Fandoms and right there at the top with a MASSIVE number of fics was Ranma 1/2 by a HUGE margin. It took three fandoms (Star Trek, Doctor Who, and I believe Naruto if I'm recalling correctly) to have their combined total number of fics exceed the number of R.5 fics on FF.net...and that was JUST FF.net. There was an entire separate index (The Penultimate Ranma 1/2 Fanfic Index) that had the single task of listing, not even curating or reading or reviewing, ONLY Ranma 1/2 fanfics. Not fanart, not commentary, no RP blogs or chat transcripts or whatever, JUST fanfics. And only about half of those linked to FF.net, meaning that if you dig up the archives you'll find at least 60% of all fanfics that people had managed to index in the Ranma 1/2 fandom are missing because they were never properly archived and just...faded from the Internet as the public servers and places like Geocities started disappearing. You can find teasing, tantalizing hints of larger works that all we have left, like scraps of ancient papyri revealing a quote from a missing book of the Bible, are single chapters backed up on niche sites that managed to get spider-crawled by Archive.org, but many great works are just...lost. (There's an ero fic called "Playing with Water" that was SUPER hot and featured elements that we have tags for on porn sites but didn't really have proper words for back in the day...but even back when it was first being written finding the thing was hard...and today? Nearly impossible.)

(If you wonder why I'm such an absolute RABID advocate of AO3, this is why)

For me, Ranma will always be the transfemme coded genderfluid hero that we needed in the late 80s and early 90s. We were on the tail end of the AIDS pandemic, and just like COVID-19 there were a bunch of assholes who used it to ride to power and marginalize queer folk. It was easier to do with AIDS, of course, given the absolutely massive numbers of queer cis men and transwomen who contracted it and died. (Sidebar: the reason "L" comes first in "LGBTQIA+" is because it was the Lesbian nurses who were the caretakers of the Gay men who were dying in numbers large enough to be counted as a tragic statistic instead of a mere tragedy) and while the world was starting to acknowledge (again) that gay men was a thing that existed and they weren't actually trying to corrupt the youth, what we now call "transgender" was still listed in the DSM as a mental disorder that required treatment to "cure." According to the cultural majority in damn near every field you can imagine, the Gender Binary was the only way to exist and if you didn't fit neatly into one or the other then you were Damaged™ and had to be Fixed™ for The Good of All People™ (but specifically so cis-het-white folks, usually men, could feel comfy and not be confronted by things that made them feel icky and might have cooties). It's a truism that's treated as a joke that transwomen get into coding and wind up doing IT work in such massive numbers that between us and the furries we ARE the foundation of the modern Internet. And into the fanspaces packed to the brim with closetted AMAB transwomen who hadn't yet had their egg cracked came this plucky martial artist that gets to swap their gender with a splash of water but somehow still winds up the best of the best, the finest martial artist of their generation. (Goku can suck it, Ranma would turn the Kamea-meha right back on the over-muscled, braindead loser with a food fetish and still make it home in time for Kasumi's dinner)

I'm no sociologist, anthropologist, behaviorist, whatever, but I suspect that the reason Ranma Saotome spawned such a large fanbase so early in the modern Internet's history was specifically because the series created a safe space where people could talk about gender issues with a degree of separation that helped strip away the stigma surrounding feeling like you were in the wrong body.

I get why people like the martial arts aspect. I mean, Ranma kills a demigod. This is NOT something to sneeze at. I also understand the transmen who latch onto Ranma as a kin because I get the feeling like you have no control over what your body's doing and you're going through your days in existential dread of what might be dragging you further and further away from what you always knew was right and correct about yourself. It's a terrifying thing and here's someone who (esp. the anime version) IS a guy trapped in a girl's body.

For me, though, and for a LOT of transwomen out there, Ranma is transfemme. And, yes, canonically Ranma states right near the end of the manga that they're both and they kinda forgot about the 'cure' when they had to pick between that and the really important stuff and that they're okay with being fluid ('cause water, gettit?!) about their gender and it's a damn shame this was the 80s 'cause a continuation might wind up showing Ranma embracing being both...

BUT, and this is a transfemme thing, I know, if you continue the parabolic arc of Ranma's character development, the logical conclusion (for us) is that she eventually decides that she's a woman and just lives in her "cursed" form the majority (or all) of the time.

And yes, this is because that's the transfemme story arc. In the manga in some distant part of the multiverse that peers into our universe and for some reason decides to make me the MC (god, that must be a FUCKING BORING manga by our standards, I weep for those fans), my story arc is the gradual progression of uncracked, closetted transgirl to transitioned out and proud transbien mom. At one point I swapped back and forth between gender presentations because it was safer for me to appear in some spaces as the male that they thought I was. Now I would prefer to die before being forced to go back to pretending to be a man again.

Ranma has the choice, and good for them. Until the Kaisufuu is permanently destroyed, even if the "curse" is locked, they have the option of going one way or the other based solely on their own, personal desire. I can't say I'd be comfortable with that option being available. In that theoretical manga where there's a reboot that gives me a condition like Ranma's, I'd probably wind up destroying the equivalent to the Kaisufuu just because of the threat to my mental wellbeing it presents.

So it's not a stretch to imagine Ranma making the same choice. She's a woman now, she has the life she never realized she wanted because she never had the choice so didn't know she was allowed to imagine it, but now she's happier than ever and why would she ever go back to that struggle of being a guy that only ever brought her pain and challenges and heartache?

[macsimagines]

ASK BOX IS OPEN

NOTICE: Ask box is open! Please check the rules. Be respectful and lets have fun!

leave the actual ask open in case anyone has questions other than making requests so you're allowed to hit me up so long as its not imagines or headcanons for the time being!! But if you disregard the MANY warnings I have posted for this then I will not do your request and be very rude about it.

I do:

Matchups

Headcanons

Imagines

Discussions

A/B/O

AUs

RPs as your faves

FOR:

Tokyo Revengers

Kengan Ashura/Omega

Bleach

RULES: (I know my tone in this sounds rude I just want it to be taken seriously)

I delete asks with poor grammar. This isn't me saying your spelling has to be perfect but i take it as a red flag that maybe you're not old enough to be looking through my blog.

I do not do asks that are super specific. If in an ask you're basically just describing what is obviously an OC then you need to write your OWN stuff and not ask me to do it. And if I think the request is has a way too detailed scenario, like you're own fanfic that you should write, then I will also not do that.

Keep it 3 characters or under when making asks. I get a lot of asks a day so try to keep it the max amount I answer

I'll do more parts to an ask if you want but I expect you to wait 3 days before I do sequels to older asks.

I reserve the right to do whatever asks I please in whatever order I want. If your's was not done please don't take it personally I just didn't want to do it at the time and might reserve it for later!

[fanfic-inator795]

WoY: A Decade Later (A personal retrospection)

Wander Over Yonder… for a time, it was - in my opinion - the best cartoon ever. It was my number one, and I wasn't sure that anything else could top it. While I don't necessarily feel the same way these days, it's still a cartoon that very much lives in my heart and I don't think I'll ever truly leave it behind.

From a personal perspective, it was probably the biggest and most active Fandom I had been in at that time. It wasn't my first fandom/hyperfixation - prior to WoY, there had been Cartoon Network's Chowder and Regular Show, as well as Disney's Phineas and Ferb. But Chowder was short-lived and RS and PnF were both shows I had lost interest in due to them beginning to dip in quality.

WoY, however, was new, fresh, exciting and growing rapidly. It inspired me to write probably at least a hundred fanfics. It was a blast live-reacting to new episodes with everyone and seeing all the art that would come afterwards. It brought me into the RP scene and, if not for that, I might have never met my best friend of 10 years (and counting! Love you, Tessa).

Looking back on it 10 years after the fact, I can't fully say that WoY is still my favorite cartoon (shows like Kid Cosmic, The Ghost and Molly McGee, Big City Greens and Craig of the Creek have all outshined it in one way or another), nor can I claim that it is/was a perfect show. But man… It sure was a hell of a ride.

(Keep reading for all my admittedly VERY LONG personal thoughts or opinions regarding this one of a kind show)

Humble Beginnings

Pretty sure I've mentioned this before, but I actually didn't care for WoY at first. It was the summer right before college, and I remember watching the sneak peek - The Picnic - early one morning after not being able to go back to sleep. I remember not really laughing much or even seeing the appeal… and yet the episode stuck in my mind, to the point that I ended up watching it again during a free moment I had from Freshman Orientation Week. I had a similar reaction to the show's proper pilot, The Greatest - not loving it, but not hating it either.

The fact that people/friends from my RS and PnF days were also posting about it helped keep the show in my mind (shoutout to Taylor, Erin and Darkwing). But it wasn't until two specific episodes - The Fugitives and The Good Deed - that I managed to finally start to connect with the characters myself. 

I started to see the appeal in this little furry orange spoon who just wanted to do good and make others happy, even when it was a struggle. I really liked the show's core theme of not just optimism and positivity, but also just being kind. I also started to really enjoy the show's sci-fi and space aesthetic and grew to adore its animation and gorgeous backgrounds, as well as laugh at its wacky sense of humor (I still laugh at The Fugitives/Good Deed quite a bit, even though I probably have their entire scripts memorized at this point).

So, it was official. I was hooked. Whenever there were new eps, I'd either try to watch them on the basement TV in my college dorm or wait for a livestream or FreeCartoonsOnline upload. If we're being honest, the first half of season 1, while being much more low-key than the wackiness that the show would end up eventually shifting to, was probably when it was at its most consistent. Other eps later on would reach higher highs, but getting stuff like The Bad Guy, the Prisoner, the Troll, the Pet, the Box and The Little Guy back-to-back just made my love for the show grow more and more.

The Little Guy specifically is one that is just incredibly well-crafted in its dialogue, story-telling and pacing, being both enjoyable and heartfelt. (Also the last time I watched it the ending made me bawl so, there's that, lol). Shortly afterwards, The Hero was another ep that I distinctly remember sticking in my head for whatever reason (Dracor and Demurra are still adorable, ngl). Then we had another favorite of mine, The Nice Guy.

I know I may be in the minority on this one - I remember my parents being annoyed and frustrated when they watched it with me, haha - but I absolutely love this episode. I find the jokes funny enough - the cashier is one of my favorite minor characters tbh - and the space gas station appeals to my aesthetic. But what really sells this episode for me is how it handles and portrays its moral of "being nice isn't always easy, but it's still right and still worth doing". Its ending never fails to get an "awwww" out of me, and honestly I could probably go on for an hour about all the little details and things I like/appreciate. I've also grown to really like its sister episode, the Time Bomb.

But no show is perfect, and right around here is where the show, in my opinion, started having some misses. It was mostly just "meh" affairs like The Night, The Toddler and The Big Job (weird, since I usually like heist eps… though I haven't rewatched this one in a while so *shrugs*). Other eps like The Tourist and ESPECIALLY The Helper (which I consider to be the show's worst outing, the vibes are just SO WEIRD on this one) I just didn't care for at all. 

Nothing terrible (save for the Helper), just cases of the jokes not landing or the stories being boring. This was also when the show really started leaning into the wackiness - which wasn't BAD persay, since it led to some really funny jokes and memorable moments when it was used well - it's just that looking back, I sorta miss the simplicity of early s1.

Thankfully, the season put out some real bangers by its end, with my personal faves being The Epic Quest (that ending will never not make me cackle. Again, it's a case of the wackiness actually working incredibly well), the Halloween/Christmas special, and the Rider, which is a great adventure to cap off the season and also the Horse from Horsin’ Around guest stars in it! (and does a pretty good job too. Will Arnett is def one of my favorite celeb VAs at this point, ngl)

So yeah, between the two seasons, s1 is easily my favorite. Call it nostalgia or personal taste, but for me it's all about that consistency. Adding in the fact that s2 has some pretty notable flaws and is thus a lot harder to look back on without noticing those flaws, and it's really no contest for me. 

New season, New problems

I certainly remember the excitement - as well as the fandom's stir craziness - in the lead-up to s2. There were crackships that were invented, silly RP blogs were rampant, Craig McCracken and crew (back when they were still on Tumblr) kept us fed with cool behind the scenes info as well as sneak peeks of the new season, and while I can't recall when it specifically happened, I also vividly remember the 'Bad End to Episodes' phase that the fandom was in at one point. Ah, the joys of still being in your angst phase.

Come that year's Comic Con, and a new round of hype came from the reveal that our new villain of the season was going to be a girl! …yeahhh, it sorta sucks recalling how hyped we all were about Dominator now that we know that she didn't quite work out the way we were all hoping for…

But regardless, s2 had a very strong start. Outside of the premiere, my favorites of this first batch would easily be The Boy Wander and The It for both just being incredibly funny. Although, if you had asked me at the time though, I probably would have said the Skeleton Dance fueled eps that were The Big Day and the Fremergency Fronfract - and like, yeah those eps can still be funny and enjoyable, but I've definitely cooled on the Skeleton Dance ship since these eps first premiered. (Still love a lot of the cute fanon stuff though)

Skipping past the next tent-pole episode for right now, this season had two of my favorite episodes of the ENTIRE SERIES - these being The Cartoon and The Black Cube. The former is just hilarious while the latter has a unique visual presentation and feels like an early s1 ep, and I mean that in the best possible way. I also really enjoy the Eye on the Skullship as well as the Hole… 'Lotta Nuthin' (this one especially, as it's another instance where, for as good as the ep is as a whole, it's the heartwarming lesson and hilarious ending that makes it such a winner in my book).

But for as much as the show was still putting out hits, I'll admit that there were also quite a few meh or just okay eps, especially as the season goes on. Some eps I found funny when I first watched them, but that humor doesn't hit as well when I watch them now. I also feel like there were points where it tried to be TOO silly to the point where it inhibited the actual humor and made the characters flatter and a bit flanderized compared to how they were in s1 (Hater especially got hit bad with this, where it’s less about him ‘softening up’ to show that he has the potential to be a good guy, and more just him constantly leaning into him being a bratty teenager instead of having that mix of dumb/bratty teen boy and legit evil conqueror).

Other times, it was just another case of a story not being as good as it could have been - and by this point in the season, while there are still enjoyable eps with fun concepts/jokes in the latter half of the series, the only one to get near the peak of the show's typical high quality is the musical ep, and if we're being real, it's Andy Bean's impeccable songwriting that saves this ep and makes it so good to rewatch despite its connection to the season's flawed overall story.

And I think it's about time we talk about that…

Not Quite Ready for Serialization

Being a show that was made right after Gravity Falls but before stuff like Star VS, Amphibia, and Owl House, s2 of WoY felt like a show with one foot stuck in episodic stuff and one foot trying to step into serialization. Because of this, the season’s overarching plot feels incredibly underbaked.

Now… Am I saying that I’d want the show to be like ATLA where every episode had to relate back to either the overarching story or one of the side-arcs? No, absolutely not. We’d be missing out on some of my favorite one-shot episodes if they did that, and if I had to choose between the season we have now and the season we could have gotten had the WoY crew gotten more freedom and were allowed more serialization, I’m going with the former each and every time.

HOWEVER, I still have to acknowledge just how poorly done the structure of this season was when it came to the overarching story. Basically we got four tentpole episodes acting as the season’s beginning, arc shifts and ending. During the season’s second and third arcs, there would be certain episodes afterwards reacting to the change in the show’s status quo.

Now, I get what they were TRYING to do but in my opinion it just really didn’t work as well as it could have. I’ll talk more about this in a bit but the season’s second arc (the “romance” arc) definitely got tiring after a while, meanwhile the third “Stop Dominator” arc felt like it was sort of killing time given that it was mostly just the main 4 trying to find some sort of weapon/figure out some sort of plan that ultimately resulted in some ‘funny’ failures and some quick lessons, with the occasional character piece thrown in here or there.

Now, I didn’t hate these episodes. By this point, it should be evident that one of my favorite elements of WoY are its morals and lessons, so even if the episodes themselves didn’t amount to much in the grand scheme of things and were essentially filler, I can at least appreciate a message like “being sad doesn’t mean you’ve given up hope” or “allowing yourself to laugh even in the dark times can help a ton”. So yeah, not completely pointless.

Unfortunately, even with a few bright spots here and there, the overarching plot of s2 still feels underbaked somewhat - and that’s ultimately because of the new character its focused around.

Dominator’s Dilemma

Okay, fess up. Whose idea was it to completely exclude Dominator from the first six episodes of the season (after the s2 premiere)? Because WOW does this decision backfire a lot. I don’t even like Dom that much and I can still acknowledge that she needed much more screen time and focus than she got.

I don’t know if this was to build up the ‘mystery’ surrounding her or because they wanted to get back in the groove of writing the main 4, but this was the crew’s first crucial mistake. Hell, in the first two episodes she plays an active role in, she’s nearly silent in both of them, only having her little fangirl rant in The Greater Hater and a small handful of lines in The Battle Royals. (Which, if I’m being honest, is still a really fun episode for 90% of it, having both great action and absolutely hilarious jokes that still make me laugh, but I get the ending of it making people sour on the episode as a whole.)

Again, it felt like trying to build up this artificial mystery surrounding her when it really wasn’t necessary. Dominator was meant to be a MAIN MEMBER of the cast! Yet I’m pretty sure Emperor Awesome got more significant screen time than her in the end!

Things got a teeny bit better as the show went on, with Dom at the very least getting more lines and more moments to be both badass and totally villainous, but she still felt more like a goal/obstacle than an actual character. I’m not sure if the writers MEANT to do this persay, or if it was just an accident.

Ultimately, it wasn’t until The Night Out when Dom finally got a spotlight episode… which was a little over 3/4ths of the way through the season. You could argue that she also got a bit of characterization in the musical episode, but it was really more emphasizing what we already knew or could infer about her. 

The Night Out, meanwhile, gives us something new - that she’s lonely - and we get a teeny hint of this again in The Robomechabotatron before being told outright in the series finale. Ultimately, it truly does feel like too little too late - especially when her secretly desiring friends just sorta feels like it’s aping off Hater’s secret motivations of wanting to be liked/admired and to have friends/people who love him for who he is.

So yeah, the crew completely dropped the ball on Dom’s characterization, using her as just a goal/threat/obstacle/etc. for nearly all of her appearances. Not only does it make Dom feel like a shallow character, but it also just feels unfair in general. Practically everything we know about Dom is for the sake of other characters.

She’s a test for Wander, an enemy/temporary love interest for Hater, an obstacle for our main four to overcome, and a threat to the characters we already love. Again, there’s nothing wrong with having a character that’s only meant to serve a purpose in the narrative, nor is there anything wrong with a character being shallowly evil… it’s just that the WoY crew hyped her up so much and claimed that she was a fifth main character (implying that she would get about as much development as the main four), so it just felt all the more disappointing when we didn’t get that. Add in her character design - a mix of goth/punk girl energy with Hartman Hips - and it does feel just a tad misogynistic.

There were things I liked about Dom - her cool lava powers and gadgets, her excitable personality, her villain spotlight moments, and her fun vocal performance provided by Noel Wells were all excellent. But unfortunately, these were all surface-level elements, and the crew just didn’t put in enough time to give her much else, essentially saving all her deeper character stuff for the never-made season 3…

A love-hate relationship (leaning towards hate)

Of course you can’t talk about Dom without discussing the season’s second arc, which many see as both a tumor on the plot and the absolute low point of the season. Admittedly when I was watching the season for the first time, I didn’t mind the romance arc all that much. I didn’t care if Dom was getting short-changed, I was too busy laughing at Hater falling all over himself like a dork and thought all the ‘critics’ of the arc were just focusing on the wrong thing and didn’t know how to have fun with a silly cartoon.

Obviously, this was the wrong perspective to have about this sort of thing (I was in the mindset of “I don’t want to accidentally make myself hate this thing I love so I’m going to ignore all criticism of it”. Definitely not the right approach), one that I still apologize for because the critics were totally in the right. From both an objective and a storytelling standpoint, this arc was just the worst - and for several reasons.

Leaning into the overall problem with Dom herself as mentioned previously, this arc was focused solely on Hater and Wander (and to an extent Syl and Peeps as they tried to talk some sense into their respective friends). Whenever Dom was brought in, she either used Hater’s crush to mess with him or just ignored it entirely, being obviously annoyed - and that was the extent of focus that her feelings got.

Outside of those moments, however, Dom’s feelings are relegated to the background, deemed as ‘unimportant’. Sure, in the climax of the arc, she gets this big whole musical number about how she’s “not the damsel” and isn’t interested in Hater’s affections - but again, it’s at the VERY END of the arc and the moment is less about Dom standing up for herself and more about emphasizing just how cruel she can be, as instead of simply rejecting Hater’s advances, she laughs in his face, continuing to mess with him to try and make the rejection as painful as possible before ultimately trying to kill Hater.

But while the arc ends in a showy (and admittedly still kinda fun, thank you Andy Bean and your musical talents) way, the way it starts sorta proves why this idea was so rotten to the core. The ONLY reason why Wander tries to get Hater and Dom together is ONLY because he knows Hater wants a GF and believes that a ‘positive’ thing like love could only ever result in the two villains finding happiness and no longer being evil. Nevermind the fact that Wander is shown only really caring about Hater’s perspective, not once considering Dom’s feelings or even asking if she wants a BF or romantic partner in general.

We get Syl calling him out on this a couple of times, but it’s in that ‘oh that Wander, always with the crazy ideas’ way. You’d think Sylvia, the icon that she is, would be just a bit more blunt and maybe even a bit harsh about how Wander’s treating Dominator - it’s not just a matter of it being a dumb and dangerous plan, but it’s essentially objectifying Dom, treating her like Hater’s missing piece. But hey, it’s fiiiiine, because Wander learns his lesson in the end, right? Except, no not really.

Because even when Wander FINALLY realizes this and feels guilty about causing so much trouble, Syl is more concerned with comforting Wander about it, because he TRIED to do what he thought was right and that “acknowledging you messed up is the first step towards making things right”. Like… yeah I guess but you could have let Wander actually acknowledge what he did was wrong and super messed up, focusing more on the personal aspect of how his whole romance scheme affected Dom AS WELL AS Hater (not JUST Hater) instead of how his scheme broke Hater’s heart and inadvertently made Dom more powerful.

(Also we see Wander shipping and actively pairing up the little Pikmin things in “The Sky Guy” soooooo no I don’t think he fully learned his lesson)

I also have to bring up how there are fans who view Dominator and her whole anti-love thing as aphobic. As someone who only recently figured out she was almost definitely aromantic, I’m certainly not the authority on this, but I can certainly understand the critiques.

What I THINK the WoY Crew was trying to go for was a ‘strong female villain who don’t need no man’, but between Dom constantly being described as ‘heartless’ and Peeps saying that he “doesn’t think she likes anybody” and her cruelty being turned up to 11 whenever someone expressed romantic feelings towards her, it does sorta imply “She can’t love and THAT’S why she’s a villainous monster” rather than simply “she’s a villainous monster”. And because we don’t get any real development or strong characterization with Dom, it’s hard to say where exactly her cruelty comes from, so it’s hard to really argue against these implications without simply inserting headcanons like “Dom is a lesbian”.

Now to be fair, I have seen some aromantics see Dom as good representation - I recall a month or so back when I saw people praising her after she was included in one of those Tumblr polls, with this one being focused on aromantic characters, saying that they liked how she didn’t sugarcoat her rejections and seeing her as this strong, cool, badass villainous who didn’t need romance. So yeah, obviously not every person who shares an identity is going to agree on representation and whether or not it's good, but considering all of Dom’s baggage and the inability to determine whether or not her heartlessness is the cause of her evil or simply a by-product of it, I personally feel like she’s just too messy of an example of a potential aro character.

(Honestly, Syl feels like a better example of an aromantic character to me, given that she and Ryder seemed just as platonic as she and Wander are, as well as her multiple rejections of Awesome and general disinterest/discomfort with romance. Buuut given that those latter examples are specifically with villains and thus it makes sense why she’d reject them regardless of her orientation, it’s still just a vibe/headcanon).

Before I close off this section, I do wanna acknowledge that beyond the potentially aphobic nature of Dominator, WoY’s LGBTQ+ rep isn’t nearly as great as I thought it was once upon a time as a young shipper. Some parts are still pretty okay, like Wander being coded as genderfluid/agender, but overall it still feels more like an old Looney Tunes cartoon than an episode of “The Owl House”, if you get what I’m saying.

In Craig’s defense, the man has never been all too interested in romance in his shows nor has he claimed otherwise - he either uses it as a joke while portraying it as a negative (see Ms.KeenexProf.Utonium, BlooxBerry or, obviously, DomxHater) or it’s a wholesome relationship that ultimately still stays in the background because it’s not all that important (see DracorxDemurra or Ramona and Carlos Flores from “Kid Cosmic”). 

BUT given that there were LGBTQ+ crew members working on the show in s2, such as N.D. Stevenson, as well as LGBTQ+ allies, it is a shame that no proper representation came of that. We got a whole episode where the joke was “oh, Wander and Hater are planning Wander’s execution like it’s a wedding”, an episode where Peeps and Hater essentially break up when Hater fires him, and an “I just can’t quit you” sort of moment from Peeps in the s2 finale when he goes all heart-eyed over Hater deciding to continue being a villain. That’s it, all jokes but nothing substantial. Even the show’s number one lesbian/wlw pairing of SylxDom got a quick Girls Night montage and one sweet moment between them, nothing else.

Again, it’s fine if you’re just looking for jokes, and yeah the WoY Crew never outright promised any romances… buuuut given how much they chose to lean into the Skeleton Dance and DeathGlare stuff while at the same time never outright confirming any of these characters as LGBTQ+ (they didn’t even have to make any ships canon, they just had to say whether or not Wander/Hater/Peeps were gay/bi/pan/etc), I’m not gonna invalidate people who feel just a bit queerbaited about the whole thing.

Bittersweet Goodbyes

As I said before, I was starting college when WoY first premiered. It’s the show that led me to my best friend and it’s the show that helped me through those first two years of college (easily the roughest part of college). It was a show that made me laugh and got me excited, even during the times where I was stressed out or worried. For all its flaws, it was one of the brightest lights in my life at that time.

So, needless to say, when I heard the show was canceled, I was devastated. I remember crying about it that night and even the day after, and I remember joining in as many online strategies as possible to try and get the show back, from letter writing to petition signing. Of course none of that worked, but as a bright side, going through this helped emotionally prepare me for the next time one of my favorite shows was suddenly canceled (looking at you Nickelodeon. Though considering how the RotTMNT movie turned out maaaaybe it was for the best…)

Honestly, for as much as I can look at the show through a critical lens nowadays and point out all the ways it could have been better, I think there will always be a small part of me that wishes we could have gotten some sort of continuation, whether it be through a special, a TV movie or a comic - or hell, I’d even take the plans for s3 leaking at this point. Now, given that the end of WoY brought about the creation of “Kid Cosmic”, I feel like this part has faded a bit, but I’m always gonna want closure on things like Hater’s arc as well as his origins given how much they were teased.

But that in itself is another critique I could give the show. Whether it be Wander facing a different type of threat that wasn’t just another villain, Hater’s transition into becoming a good guy, Peepers getting fed up with his boss and striking out on his own, or Dom’s true characterization that the crew kept insisting was there - the show simply saved a lot of it’s most interesting ideas for a potential Season 3. It was a gamble, and it was one they ultimately lost. It sucks, but it is what it is.

There’s a few more things I could critique about the show, such as its take on the idea of character redemption and Wander becoming a bit of a karma houdini that the show pretty much stopped calling out, and while these critiques are valid I feel like there are other fans who could do a better job talking about those points. But in the end, while season 2 was both a let down in some parts and a bit of a mess in others, I still feel like there were ultimately more good things to be found within the show than bad things.

It’s not a perfect show, far from it. Frankly, I don’t look down on anyone who fell out of love with this show or enjoyed s1 but hated s2. But for what it’s worth, the memories I got from the show are still ones I treasure, and episodes like “The Good Deed”, “The Little Guy”, “The Nice Guy”, “The Epic Quest”, “The Rider”, “The Boy Wander”, “The Black Cube”, “The Hole… Lotta’ Nuthin’” and “The Cartoon” are ones I still love to bits and will probably always love as I watch them over and over.

Disney Channel itself may not care all that much about this show these days save for an occasional rerun or a quick cameo in their Chibi-Verse shorts, but I’m always gonna remember it - for better and for worse. So here’s to 10 years, WoY. I may not always like you, but I still love you.

[drunkenskunk]

Earlier in the year, I deleted my deviantart account.

I did this because they were going all-in on AI theft bullshit, and I wanted no part in it. And I'm pretty sure I know what you're thinking: big deal, right? And on some level, I kinda get it. It was a deviantart page, who cares, nothing of value was lost.

Despite that, I do remember going through most of my entire account, and trying to save a backup of whatever I could, just in case, y'know? I saved almost everything, before deleting every individual piece, and then once the entire account was empty, I fully deleted the account. I did everything I could think of to avoid letting the idiots running that site into the ground scrape what little I had for their fucking theft algorithm.

But there were a few things that I forgot to save. I had a few fanfics that I had posted there. The big one was the entirety of the New Vegas fanfic that I wrote over the course of 5 years. 174 chapters, just under a million words, it's notable in that it's the only project that I've ever actually finished to completion.

But the thing is: that wasn't actually lost. I have the entirety of that story, including several earlier versions, saved on my hard drive. According to the file properties, it's 50mb, and 1376 individual files. And not only that, but the "mirror" of that story is also still preserved in public with my account on fanfiction dot net.

But there were a few other stories that, in my haste, I forgot to save. And, again, it's a case of "Who cares?" because they were short, almost one-shot, fanfics based on the characters I played... in World of Warcraft.

Sheason Fisher and Tuera Ashama were my rogue and warlock characters, respectively, and I wrote a lot of short stories involving the two of them. Snapshots of this extended cat-and-mouse espionage game of super-spy versus super-villain, with a backdrop of whatever drama was going on with the RP guild I was part of at the time.

Thing is, the reason I didn't think to save them while scrubbing my deviantart account was because I assumed that I already had them saved somewhere. But recently, I went through some of my files, looking for something else entirely, when I suddenly realized: no.

They're not there.

All these things that I wrote about these characters that have existed in my head since at least 2005, and it's all just... gone. It's like all the stuff I wrote on warcraft guild forums for those characters - back when forums were still a thing - and which now no longer exist, because not only do all those RP guilds no longer exist, the forums themselves no longer exist. And I never thought to preserve what I wrote.

I kinda remember what most of the stories were about, vaguely. I kinda remember the general idea of the one-shots I'd written. But the actual words I wrote at the time? They have vanished. I could probably rewrite some of those old stories, and they'd probably be a lot better now. After all, I'd like to imagine that I'm a much better writer today than I was 10, 15, 20 years ago...

But the originals are still lost.

It wouldn't be the same.

I know this probably seems like I'm being overly dramatic, and I'm fretting over pointless bullshit. And, yeah, on some level, I acknowledge that I kind of am. But... still.

It's reminding me of just how ephemeral existence is. Moments happen, and then they're gone.

The only evidence that any of these events ever happened at all is my failing memory.

And, eventually... even that will disappear.

[neurotonic]

agent gene, 23, she/he! this is where i post all my ieytd stuff now. known enjoyer of women. Ask box is open!

I post suggestive stuff once in a while. Nothing extreme by any means, just the occasional sex reference and crude jokes lmao! Posts are tagged as #nsfuu if you want to avoid/block.

IEYTD oc info | main blog | main art blog | prism ask/rp blog

tags and other info below the cut:

#gene art - my art

#gene ocs - my ieytd ocs

#gene rambles - personal stuff, maybe headcanons and whatever rants relating to ieytd

#gene answers - asks

#gene writes - fanfic things

#others art - art by others

#others ocs - ocs owned by others

MAIN SHIPS: I'm Very Loose with shipping and I don't really have a set storyline for these guys. Mostly romantic but can also be interpreted as platonic *sits all niceys*

Triple Threat (Solaris/Fabricator/Prism) and all the duos that come with them! Solaris/Prism is a bit more platonic for me

Kinetic Mocktail / Creator and Me / Bluebird (Prism/Phoenix)

Starstruck (Juniper/Crane)

Smokescreen (Phoenix/Juniper)

[samthes1lly]

-Shut up and sleep with me- 0:27━●─────── 03:12 ⇆ㅤ ㅤ ◁ㅤ ❚❚ ㅤ▷ ㅤㅤ↻ ᴠᴏʟᴜᴍᴇ : ▮▮▮▮▮▮

Basic Info: <3 - Name: Sam / Sammy / Spoilers

<3 - I'm a Minor!!! <3 - Pronouns He / They / It / Ze / Xem / + Xenos <3 - Gendervoid

<3 - Otherkin, Fictionkin, and System

Fandoms (+ Interests) <3 - Communications <3 - Ghost and pals <3 - Vane Lily <3 - Vocaloid <3 - Eddsworld <3 - Omori <3 - The disastorus life of Saiki K <3 - Bugbo <3 - Lemon Demon <3 - Tally Hall <3 - Dying mind Macabre (Current fixation)

<3 - Fionna and cake

<3 - Halloween / Horror related stuff <3 - (i am not really into the fandom but i like the characters and the game concept + artstyle) wandohara and the great blue sea

Interact please!!!

<3 - LGBTQ+

<3 - Uses Neos/Xenogenders <3 - Fictionkins / Otherkins / Therian

<3 - likes it when I ramble about my silly hyperfixations

<3 - Other systems

Erm..... Thin ice... <3 - IRLS (Irls in recovery are okay) <3 - Rude to people <3 - Hates on my interests <3 - okegom fans <3 - helluva boss/hazbin hotel fans

Please stay away from me and my silly content..... <3 - people who like my ex (I dont want to be assosicated with them anymore we moved on) <3 - Basic DNI criteria <3 - Proshippers / Comshippers ( stay tf away from me you guys are so gross ) <3 - Anti Therians / Otherkins / Fictionkins / Furries <3 - Xenogender antis <3 - Demonizes Disorders / Sterotypes / Romantazies

<3 - ppl who hate SAFE oc x canon ships

<3 - NSFW

<3 - kinks / fetishes <3 - Fakeclaimers

<3 - Endogenics <3 - cringe blogs <3 - Okegom/funamusea supporters <3 - vivzepop supporters <3 - ranfren <3 - chrisken shippers <3 - simoncest shippers

Other things abt me!!! <3 - I will post fanfics a lot so feel free to request em I might be slow since I forget a lot lol <3 - I also do art so yea and flags, banners, whatever u want I can make as long as they are okay with me <3 - I also do rps just ask me and I do have permission to say no to it <3 - I also like really uncanny things / disturbing things <3 - carrd: ☠

[tidemoonchild]

Do you wish your oc's would become canon?

Puuuuhhhh that's actually a though question... so yeah long post under the cut

There was a time where I would have said "YES! BIG YES!!!" right away. Like how cool would this be to have your own character become canon? To see them in comics or screen? To see what other people think about your character, the fanart, fanfics, headcanons etc.

And that's exactly also the part which is why I don't want them to be canon. Because where there are also nice and wholesome fanstuff there is also the other side. And I'm not necessarily talking about character hate...

I'm also talking about things like shipping especially about problematic shipping.

I would hate it so much to see this specific part of the fandom ship my Maggie with her father or anyone else. I mean the ship with her father is self-explanatory! Pedos stay away!!! Beside that, in my head she's aroace. She's not interessted in such a relationship and tbh it would make me sad to see people just ignoring the fact. But I know the fandom. I know that they just don't care about that stuff. I know as long as the character isn't gay they don't care and do whatever they want. I saw so many aroace characters being turned gay by the fandom, which as an aroace annoys me so much. Like they're always screaming about representation while at the same time stealing our represantation away. I mean for Katya I wouldn't mind that much (as long as it's not with her dad or anyone she sees as her family). I'm already considering to maybe make her bi or pan and also have my shipping headcanons with her... but with Maggie it's just different. For her it's so much more complicated to find a ship where I would say yeah that's fine, that fits. I know being aroace doesn't mean to never be in a relationship but there are some other things which is why I don't see her in any realtionship. Or more like why it's so much harder for me to see her to be in one.

I also wouldn't like to see my characters in someone elses hands. I know that in Marvel each run is written by a different author and sorry... but I just don't trust everyone to write my character (Hank's the best example for what can happen...)

As much as I would love to see my characters becoming canon and interacting with canon characters etc. I just don't trust the fandom and other writers to respect my creation like I created them etc. Ofc there will always be the part of the fandom who would make beautiful and amazing additions and fanstuff and omg how cool would it be to see my characters becoming bigger and maybe even people starting to make rp and fan accounts for them etc. But the risk of seeing my characters getting destroyed by people who think they know them better then I do... no thank you...

So yeah that's my take on this while I really would love to see them becoming canon I'm not sure if I would really do it....

[enigmalea]

Why I Contributed to FujoGuide

If you follow me here or mastodon you may have noticed that I've been reblogging/boosting a lot of posts for something called The Fujoshi Guide to Web Development (@fujowebdev). There's a good chance you followed me or know me from the Dragon Age fandom where I run communities, events, and zines and write fanfic, and you might be wondering why the sudden and drastic departure from my normal content. Why would a writer contribute to something related to webdev? Why have you stopped seeing thirst for Dragon Age characters and started seeing… whatever a FujoGuide is?

The answers to those questions (and more!) are below the cut.

My Coding Journey

I wrote my first lines of code in 1996 (yes, I'm old AF). It was the early days of the internet and tutorials for how to make your own websites were literally everywhere. You couldn't go more than two clicks without finding a how-to written in plain language. But it was painstaking and tedious. CSS didn't exist yet (literally, I started coding about six months before it was released) and even when it appeared it wasn't widely adopted or supported.

It was the "glory days" of Geocities, Myspace themes, Neopets, and Livejournal. If there was a cool site, you could use HTML and/or CSS to customize it. I honed my skills by coding so many tables character profiles for RPs, creating themes, painstakingly laying out user info pages, and building my own site.

Gradually, things changed. Web 2.0 showed up with locked down profiles and feeds you couldn't customize, free website hosts became more difficult to find, and point and click page builders became the way of the web. Shortly after, I took a long break from fandom; frustrated and disappointed with site closures, lost communities, and general fandom wank… it felt like it just wasn't worth it anymore.

I eventually came back, and when I did it meant customizing themes, figuring out how to create tools for my communities, coding tumblr pages (and learning they're not really supported on mobile), and looking at automations for my common tasks. One day, I woke up and thought, "I'm going to make a Discord bot… it can't be that hard."

So, I did it.

An Unexpected Friendship

About a month after I launched my bot to the public, I received a random Discord message from @essential-randomness. A friend had told her about my bot, and she was working on BobaBoard which needed volunteers. I was shocked. First, people were talking about my bot. Second, I wasn't a real coder. I didn't know anything! I just googled a bunch of stuff and got something working. I had no idea what I was doing.

She assured me it was okay. She was willing to teach me what I didn't know - and most of all, that she wanted my help. I took a day or two to think it over, and fatefully filled out the volunteer form. I didn't know if I could be useful or how I could be useful, but I wanted to try.

Programming Is Awful

In the years months that followed, I spent a lot of time in @essential-randomness' DMs complaining about programming… at least once I realized she wouldn't judge me. I was still very much doing things the hard way, taking hours to update a site to add a single link on all the pages. I knew there were easier methods, but I either couldn't find them or once I found them, they were filled with dense jargon which was terrifying.

"An all-in-one zero-javascript frontend architecture framework!" Is that even English? "A headless open-source CMS." Cool. Sounds good. "A full-stack SSG based on Jamstack extending React and integrating Rust-based JS." Those sure are words. With meanings. That someone knows. Not me, though.

I spent so much time looking at what sites claimed was documentation and losing my mind because I had no idea where to even start most of the time. With @essential-randomness' encouragement, I kept at it, experimenting with new things, and jumping in headfirst even when I had no idea what I was doing. And I was so glad. Where I used to struggle keeping one website updated, last year I managed to deploy and update 7 websites. Yeah, you read that right. It was amazing.

The new stuff made it all much, much easier.

An Idea Is Born

Meanwhile, we spent hours discussing why it was difficult to get fandom to try coding. Part of the barrier was the belief you must be some sort of genius or know math or that creative/humanities people can't do it. It is also partially coding communities being unfriendly to newbies and hobbyists; a culture which often thrives on debasing people's choices, deriding them for not understanding, and shouting rtfm (read the fucking manual) and lmgtfy (let me google that for you)- all of which are unhelpful at best and humiliating and abusive at worst. The tech dudebro culture can be unforgiving and mean.

The number of coding-based Discords I've left far outnumbers the ones I've stayed in.

We determined what fandom needed was a place for coders of all skill levels to come together to help and support one another; where they could learn to code and how to join open-source projects they love, and where they could make friends and connections and show off their projects whether they were new or experienced programmers.

And thus… Fandom Coders was born.

What About FujoGuide?

Of course, running a coding group and working on BobaBoard together means we spent a lot of time talking about the state of the web. We both lamented over poor documentation, jargon-rich tutorials, and guides which assume a baseline of knowledge most people don't have. What we needed to do was provide tutorials which start at the beginning… from the ground up (what is a terminal and how do I open it?) without skipping steps. What we needed to do was make those tutorials fun and appealing.

I don't remember exactly the journey it took to get us here if I'm honest. I have no clue who said it first. But I do remember I first started thinking about anthropomorphizing programming languages when we attempted to cast the languages as the Ouran High School boys… and again when I suggested we do a [TOP SECRET IN CASE WE DO IT] group project in Fandom Coders to help people learn about programming.

What I do know is that as last year ended, @essential-randomness became laser-focused on creating our gijinka and moving forward with FujoGuide… and I couldn't say no.

Okay, But… Why Contribute?

To be honest, it's not just that I was around for the birth of the idea. It's ALL of the things in this post - the culmination of three years of frustration trying to figure out what I'm doing with coding, of wading through dense documentation, of wanting to give up before I even start. It's three years of dipping my toes into toxic techbro culture before running away. All added to decades of watching the web become corporate-sanitized, frustratingly difficult to customize, increasingly less fun, and overtly hostile to fans who dare enjoy sexual content.

To sum all of this up, it's the firm belief that we desperately need a resource like this. Something that's for us, by us. Something that builds fans up, instead of tears them down; that empowers them to create for themselves and their communities what no one is creating for them. It is a project I'm deeply passionate about.

And I can't wait until we can bring it to life for you all.

[mellybabbles]

What's kickin', chicken?

I've decided to finally make a masterpost for this blog

HIHIHIHI!! You can call me Mel, Jynx or whatever floats your boat! This is an UTMV blog, meaning a lot of sanses will be poppin up 'round these parts. Specifically Dust- Pronouns are he/him, I'm a minor, artist, blah blah all that hooby hobby stuff. I have a big ol fanfic called Dreamscape and a few others on AO3. AO3 Acc is MelatoninDepicts I'm a guy!! I go by he/him, but dw if you get the wrong pronouns I really do not mind. My other blogs are @shattereddreamrp and @melatonindepicts !! DNI: Pedophiles, 18+ Blogs, Homophobes, Racists, Proshippers, all that jazz. If you support Israel and the actions, please DNI and unkindly fuck right off. I'm open to drawing/writing requests! Expect a lot of self insert, x reader, etc. I can't really do many ships, usually only on my own terms. I'm Pansexual and Polyamorous(?), and possibly genderfluid but still working on my sexuality and identity, heh. I'm open to chatting about whatever, just don't be a dick and such! Certified Dust Addict. I will never shut up about him. Literally obsessed with him to an unhealthy degree. Anyways, enjoy your time on my blog! Feel free to pop in an ask or anything. Always happy to talk <3 Tags for navigation: Regularly Scheduled Dust Simping = Dust shit. Drawings, writing, etc my art = well, my art melly's silly talk = Me answering asks and just chatting Melly's silly reblogs = reblogs !! Melly's silly sketches = Doodles/sketches Discord is melatonindepicts, feel free to friend me and chat whenever haehaeh This is my discord inv! For my story, chatting, whatever. We vibe and chill here. Positivity space/negative free!! Oh and RP and other many things https://discord.gg/UnpQvhtQfT

[peacockrulz]

dont say sorry we love the paragraphs!! tbh i cant stand a lot of md fanfics because of how they characterize uzi in particular, they just do not do her depth justice. and you're so right about the narration too. its so subtle but a lot of great fics go above and beyond to take narration from just describing the world to actually representing a characters perspective- literally and figuratively. hostile takeover is a masterclass in it tbh. its actually inspired me to try and get into writing for md because you need to be the content you want to see in the world ig- im starting with rp rn though because i find that to be the easiest way to get into a characters head, ya know? also your dollxn piece made me physically ill (positive). im shipping them now but exclusively in the way your fanart is framing it (also great song choice listening to it and staring at the art really sent me) - juzi anon

I think a good narration is like, an unspoken art when it comes to writing. I LOVE fics that make a point to have the characters thoughts be a part of the narration; It speaks volumes to how that person write the character themself and can even make for some really impactful dialog thats not even spoken. I think the biggest strength of Hostile Takeover (from the chapters I've read!) is its ability to make a character's narration show the subtle, unseen things about the characters themselves. (Which is why I love J's chapters so much, J puts up such a large persona that being able to read the thoughts she actually has is so!!! arugh!!!!!)

Also: I'm glad to see you taking an inspiration for writing, I've honestly thought many a time to force myself into writing fics just because theres so many ideas I have that I do not have the time or skill to illustrate lol. I actually started posting artwork because I wanted to see more fanart for my own rarepair!!! And I can understand the whole roleplaying thing (I haven't roleplayed canon characters since my.. *shudders* MMO days /j) I grew up on roleplaying and still do on occasion! (OCs I mean haha) I think its a great stepping stone to writing full blown chapters and stuff, all about practice or whatever!!

oh and: I'm glad you liked that piece lmao. N x Doll is one of those ships I thought about for 2 seconds and went "wait no I get it.". I've honestly thought about making more art of it just because its left such a impact on my skull. (ITs... the only enemies to lovers you could HAVE with N canonically w/o messing w/ his character and i am OBSESSED)

[cosmereplay]

get to know your fellow fanfic writers better ༊ ✧.*

Tagged by @chaos-monkeyy (1000 years ago 😅)

1. when did you post your first ever fanfic?

I started posting in Feb 2021!

2. first character you wrote for:

I think the first chapter of Fumbling Towards Ecstasy was from Shallan's POV.

3. main character(s) you’re currently writing for:

Not much has changed: Kaladin, Shallan, and Adolin take up a great deal of space in my head and in my fic, including my current WIP Plausible Deniability (Explicit), for which I'm currently procrastinating the last chapter as I do this, lol

4. character(s) you haven’t written about before but plan on writing about soon:

I don't think I've published any Elhokar! I do have a Moash/Elhokar I started in 2021 that I would like to figure out and get out there.

5. fandom(s) you’re currently writing for:

Stormlight Archive, my beloved. My obsession for the last three years!

6. platonic pairing(s) you currently write for:

I did an RP with @wanderingchanneler with Kaladin & Szeth reluctant road trip travellers to friends, and xe's been working on editing and posting it. It's updating weekly - Convergence (Teen)

7. romantic pairing(s) you currently write for:

Mostly Shakadolin, but otherwise it's fairly eclectic. Actually now that I think of it, I write a lot of sexual stuff, and I write a lot about love, but I don't write a ton of explicitly romantic stuff. Except maybe Shakadolin 😂

8. your top 3 tags on AO3 (if you post your works on AO3):

If it's only Additional tags, then it's Oral sex, RoW spoilers, and then a four-way tie of Fluff, post-canon, canon compliant, and PWP. If it includes character tags you'll never guess: Kaladin, Shallan, and Adolin, in that order.

9. your current platform where you post your works

AO3, baybee!

10. snippet of the wip you’re currently working on:

Here's Teen-rated excerpt from my draft chapter of Plausible Deniability:

“What do you mean, you don’t feel the same way anymore?” Laran demanded. “We. . . did things together! Didn’t you like it?” “No, no, it’s not that,” Veil said. Storms, how could she describe what had happened to her desire? “I just don’t feel like doing those things anymore. I still want to do other stuff. . . ” Laran crossed her arms, lit from the side by Salas’ violet light. “What, like kissing? Over the clothes stuff? It’s not like you ever wanted to be out with me in public. What’s left?” Veil shrugged. “Okay, we could play Towers at the barracks. Have dinner at your stew–” “Oh, so you can ogle the Highmarshal while I dodge Lyn’s questions about the nature of our relationship? Yeah. Sounds great,” Laran fumed, turning abruptly to look out over the mountains. Veil could tell where this was going. “We could do whatever you want. What do you want to do?” she asked, trying not to sound like she was begging. The tall Windrunner was silent for a while, then let out a long sigh. “I don’t think I want anything else. You know, Veil, some relationships shine like spheres, and others flash like lightning.” She turned to look at Veil. “It was bright while it lasted, but I can hear the thunder now. Goodbye, Veil.”  Without another word, Laran stepped up onto the balcony railing and pushed off, flying at speed into the darkness. “Everstorms!” Veil cursed into the night. She hoped it wouldn’t go this poorly with Ral when she saw her tomorrow.

Tagging @felagund-fiollaigean, @rydiaasuka, @if-one-of-us-falls, @illustraterg, @cosmererambles, @meadowlarkx and anyone else I can't remember at the moment, pretend I tagged you if you'd like to do this!