#like fucking CHILDREN get more romantic development and happy endings than the gay couples. CHILDREN

[saltycharacters]

God I am so tired of modern media slightly evolving bury ur gay tropes to be like "yeah ok i guess it could be worse, but why are most of your cishet couples still well and alive and have their physical affection get plenty of attention and screentime, while all of your queer couples have at least one party dead / get to be the "tragic romance" story progression fodder and are not only outnumbered by all the other couples but also get their time together significantly stripped"

[ghooostbaby]

Reading the MDZS novel

A high octane journey through the final extras chapter

• ahh LWJ and WWX role playing they've never met before?!

• Lan WangJi, sir, I frankly cannot believe that you, an educator, are lying to children about math

• I got very excited when I first thought this was in Gusu Lan sect, and that they hang out with the little kids there! Logically if they teach the juniors as teens they MUST also teach younger kids and I just want to see it!!!!

• Ahhhhh wei ying feeding Lan Zhan things ... just all of it

• wwx sticking a sweet thing into his mouth and lwj just letting it stay there, and then wwx is like do you like it? And how lwj says nothing. And how wwx says I'll take back if you don't say if you want it! So lwj bites it (oh how he loves to bite what we wants)

• Honestly its one of the most romantic things in my opinion, that knowing lwj has trouble saying what he wants, wwx doesn't try to fix him, and just playfully gives him snacks to try, while teasing him

• The two of them just sauntering around a market together omg the domesticity im MELTING

• "When [Lan WangJi] finished [the snacks], Wei WuXian would always ask, 'How was it? How was it?' Sometimes Lan WangJi replied 'fine', while other times he replied 'excellent', yet more of than not, he would reply 'strange'. Whenever that happen Wei WuXian would laugh and take it, not letting him have any more." AHHHHHHHHHHHHH

• Lan WangJi being the baby oh my heart!

• Lan WangJi sneaking off to secretly learn to cook Wei WuXian's favourite soup for him it hurts

• Wei WuXian: you're a virgin who can't cook

• Lan WangJi: *is silent*

• 1 minute later

• Wei WuXian: plzzzzzz hanguang jun cook for Meeeee

• Love how they bully each other. Love how wwx has no poker face. Love lwj loving to win and being all big and good and getting kissed. Love wwx loving losing to lwj and being all small and bad in his lap.

• Also wwx calling lwj "my dear" (as the translation goes) !!!!

• OK there's just too many little back and forths that I am HOWLING over! WWX begging to be cooked for about to jump in his lap! lwj then correcting his posture!!! The "Er-Gege you can't treat me like this"!!!! And then finally holding wwx's hand and saying he cooked for him already!!!!

• But also hasn't it been months?? Atleast?! What have they been eating all this time?

• Wei Ying!!! No sex in the restaurant!

• Ohhh WWX being serious and he's just so earnestly overjoyed that his husband is a good cook fuck they're sweet

• Ahhhhh smile lan zhan, smile! It would send your wei ying through the roof

• Oh nooooo now they're playing a CARNIVAL GAME?!?! I am dead. They're winning toys for each other ahhhhhhhh help me

• Lan WangJi repeated, "Whatever it lands on is mine." We all know what you're thinking you possessive bitch

• Yeeeeeee forehead ribbon tugging in public. Who belongs to who now?!

• "I want whichever one you get." Oh lwj and your beautiful pure heart

• Ahahahahaha "Look at you. What are you doing in front of all these people?" Lan WangJi, "What?" Wei WuXian, "You're flirting with me." Lan WangJi's expression was calm, "I am not."

• The gentle teasing, the deep familiarity, the sense that they are that old married couple at the farmers market so in love after 100 years oh my god

• Ahhhh if wei wuxian can throw from that far away that must mean he developed mo xuanyu's golden core this is too much goodness

• "The jinshi is a peaceful place only for playing the guqin and burning incense"!?! Wei WuXian I've read about many other things occurring there ...

• Aghhh you never see LWJ as a normal teacher so the image of hanguang jun standing up at the front of a normal classroom as the juniors file into their desks ... "good morning class" ... with the new souvenir their teacher's husband got for him on their recent romantic getaway on display

• Honestly these two being teachers is the sweetest thing. Imagine having this hot gay magical power couple be your teachers.

• Ohhh they're actually in lotus pier!? Ugh my heart

• so adorable and dramatic lwj! wwx: "don't tip the boat sweetie." lwj: "do not worry. I can save you if you fall."

• "Yes! We can come again." Ugh these two. So gorgeous

• The way wwx reacts to lwj's smiles ... they are so so so in love (and the fact that Lan Zhan smiled at Wei Ying saying he wanted to trick him into getting beaten by the angry lotus farmer!)

• Oh Lord!!!! The serenity of lwj when they've fallen in the water, and he takes the blame for tipping the boat, so then wwx takes the blame, and they laugh and kiss!!!! SO. IN. LOVE. I am so happy for these sweet little lambs

• "Back then, all I really wanted was to play with you." Ajhh wwx you're going to end me.

• LWJ just scooping him up and putting him back in the boat, its too much!!

• Did lwj retrieve wwx's hair ribbon from the water or does he just keep a supply of red ribbons incase wwx needs one?!

• Oh no LWJ now you've DEFINITELY killed me: "you can try now to see if I would reject you over anything."

• And then wwx's reaction "please warn me before you say anything so romantic, or else i won't be able to take it." ahaaaaa you little shit. But honestly SAME

• And then lwj's little "ok" !!!! Imagine that he takes this seriously and from then on periodically says, "Wei Ying, I'm about to say something really romantic." And Wei Ying takes his hand and says, "OK, I'm ready Lan Zhan."

• So glad they get to have endless laughter and hugs now. My sweet darlings, you deserve it

• They really are so perfect

I love them so much

[ffamranxii]

Favorite Fruits Basket ships?

~Canon OTPs~

1. Tohru Honda and Kyo Sohma

I’ll be honest. I NEVER like the canon ship. When I read Furuba at the tender age of fourteen, I liked Tohru well enough (another surprise - I also never like the cute, ditzy heroine), but I wanted her with Yuki. (I’m sorry, Machi!) I couldn’t see Kyoru for what it was, and there is so much on tumblr right now about Kyoru and what they are to each other that I’ll just sum it up: I couldn’t at fourteen see that that Tohru needed Kyo as badly as Kyo needed Tohru. We all know that the Sohmas needed Tohru, each and every one. Tohru is the only one who ever treated Kyo like a person, who saw his curse and loved him in spite of it, who loved him more because of it. And Kyo in return is the only person who ever looked at Tohru, REALLY looked at her, and saw someone cracked and hurting. Kyo is the only person Tohru confides in, the only person she feels comfortable confiding in. All of Tohru’s friends and all of the Sohmas treat her almost with reverence, like she’s a living angel, and Tohru is almost afraid to shatter that image, to admit that she gets scared and lonely and angry and disappointed. But with Kyo, she can open up. He never once fawns over her, or worships her for saving him. Her friends don’t do it to a creepy degree or anything, but they do it enough to make Tohru want to keep up a certain image. But Kyo is different. With Kyo, Tohru can be herself. They fell in love hard and fast, and couldn’t admit it even when it was obvious to everyone else. Out of everyone in the entire series, their love is the most believable, the most likely to last.

2. Hatsuharu Sohma and Rin Sohma

Hoo boy, I ship these two so hard. Forever my OTP of this series and my first Furuba OTP. Rin has long been one of my favorite characters, because I’m a horse and Rin is very much like me; and Hatsuharu has always been tied with Kyo as my favorite character. These two together are passion and fire. Haru loves Rin so much, it’s evident on every page - the page could literally burn with the fire he feels for her. And Rin is desperate to protect him, from Akito, from the curse, that she lashes out at him, breaks up with him, chases him away, to try and break the curse herself, so that they can be together, they can be happy. She knows that no matter how cruel their break up is, Haru will always come back to her, but if she gives in, even a little, she won’t be able to protect him. She left him for his safety, taking the brunt of Akito’s attacks and not telling Haru a thing, because Akito would probably have killed Haru if Haru tried to go after her. Them reuniting and having twins was beautiful, and their children are so much like how I imagine them as children would be.

3. Yuki Sohma and Machi Kuragi

I admit it. When I first read Fruits Basket, I hated Machi. I didn’t see the subtly of their romance (even though it’s sort of glaring obvious now), and I didn’t quite understand Machi’s character, being in a lot of denial about the similar treatment I myself was going through from all sides of life myself. Coming back to the fandom after the announcement of the reboot, I find myself in love with Machi Kuragi and wanting desperately to apologize to her for the vile things my teenage self said about her, because I see a LOT of myself in Machi. She’s my favorite non-Sohma, and she’s easily in my top five favorite characters, period. My ex and I watched the series together and I legit screamed when she made her onscreen debut in the reboot. Like myself, Yuki also seemed to underestimate Machi - but Machi did not underestimate him. She wasn’t obsessed him like the rest of the girls (and her brother.. and Makoto Takei) in school, but I believe may have developed a crush on Yuki pretty quickly after he joined the student council. She didn’t think he was a prince and never did - she saw him as a person, a flawed human being - and that’s what drew Yuki to her. Yuki, like Machi, had always HAD to be a perfect person. For Akito, his mother, the extended family in the know about the zodiac. But Machi saw him and kind of scoffed like “pfft, some prince he is,” and Yuki’s attention was kind of immediately seized in a different way than how it was by Tohru. Tohru sort of forced her way into Yuki’s life, but Machi... Machi was going through so much shit, she didn’t have time or mental energy to devote to stalking boys or mothering them. Boys were just boys. Machi had her own shit, and I think the first time Yuki really truly noticed her was when she trashed the student council room, and he just wanted to know why. And by the same token, the first time Machi truly acted on her feelings was when she smashed down the door to let Yuki out. They started really reaching out to each other then, and their relationship - in a romantic sense - truly became something then. (And Kakeru, the little shit, shipped it all along.) They eased each other through their faults and anxieties, and they were truly two damaged people who came together to make one whole. *tear* It was beautiful.

4. Arisa Uotani and Kureno Sohma

(CONDITIONAL: Uo MUST be out of high school. )

I think I’m one of the few people in the current fandom who likes Uo and Kureno. I’m not the biggest fan of them as a couple while Uo is still in school - Kureno is nearly ten years older than she is, after all - but I LOVE shipping them a little later, maybe when Uo is in her mid twenties and Kureno his mid thirties, and they meet by chance and feel that same spark they felt all those years ago when they were younger and Kureno was cursed-yet-not, and Kureno takes the leap this time because there’s no Akito holding him back this time. I like to think he used the time in between the end of Furuba until that meeting to travel, do normal people things he wasn’t able to do under Akito, settle into his own home and experiment with having CHOICES, and Uo maybe went to university, or went straight into the workforce - maybe she manages that cafe she was working at where she met him the first time. They’re both older now, and more experienced in life, but they still feel that pull towards each other and can’t and don’t want to resist it. That’s what I live for with this pairing. 

~PREVIOUSLY CANON~

Hatori Sohma and Kana Sohma

Oh break my fucking heart. All I wanted in Furuba was Hatori to have a happy ending with Kana somehow. That was ALL I WANTED. (Don’t even @ me with Mayuko.) Their love story breaks my heart and I cry every time I read it or watch the episode. I hate reading fanfiction where Hatori is with anyone else, and it seriously bothered me that Kana married some rando. They belonged together. She wasn’t even fazed he turned into a goddamn seahorse. She loved him and wanted to marry him without even being able to hug him - THAT is love.

~NON-CANON~

1. Sawa Mitoma and Shiki Sohma

Okay this is cheating. If you read Fruits Basket Another, Sawa/Shiki is basically canon. Literally the whole damn family ships it. Shiki has been talking about Sawa since he was a little boy - how fucking cute is that? He saw a lonely little girl one day, who then hurt her arm, and he couldn’t stop thinking about her for literally YEARS. Mutsuki spends two and a half books trying to set the two of them up because he’s a little shit like Shigure. This ship is so soft and precious.

2. Yuki Sohma and Kakeru Manabe

My ex likes to accuse me of “making everything gay,” but I like surprisingly few gay ships in Furuba. (Oh there are plenty I enjoy, but not many I would actually be happy with being canon.) If Yuki had not married Machi, I would have loved to see him end up with Kakeru. Kakeru My Sexuality Is Always In Question Because I Have Hit On Every Single One Of Yuki’s Male Relatives And Also Yuki The First Time I Saw Him And Several Times After That Manabe very openly loves Yuki, and their relationship is very much like Kyo and Yuki’s, without quite as much violence. Kakeru was Yuki’s first real friend he made on his own (after Tohru, and Tohru kind of... happened. Yuki pursued student council, which Kakeru was on) and they became extremely close. Despite all of Kakeru’s nagging, antics, laziness, and even Kyo-like behavior, Yuki was never entirely serious with any threats and actually enjoys the interaction. I really, really love these two.

BONUS: Ritsu Sohma and Mitsuru! The anime gave us some Ritsu/Mitsuru interaction, and I LOVE their newfound friendship. I do hope they show another scene or two because I kind of ship it now, but I don’t know if I’d call it an OTP yet.  

[supergenial]

The Byleth Diatribe

clickbait title: if you thought Byleth was creepy, wait until you read this!

Intro

In the past couple months it's really gotten my attention the fact that some people cannot stand looking at images that depict the teacher character from fire emblem three houses (Byleth) with their students in a romantic manner. They arrive at this disgust due to the parallels it traces with real life teachers who take advantage of their students. While I don't share this sensibility, I do think it's an interesting topic to think of so I'd like to explore why these people are correct in their conclusion that Byleth is creepy, but entirely wrong in their logic-path to it.

1) Byleth is just not an actual character

To address the elephant in the room, Byleth is literally a non-character. In a game filled with wonderful dialogue that fully exposes character motivations for a massive cast, it's hard to think of this one silent teacher as a real character that normally exists in that world. Byleth's "character" is purely an afterthought to their role as the Player Avatar. Surely enough in previous installments of the series you had Robin, Corrin and Kris, but their situation was partly different.

Robin and Corrin were proper characters as much as every other character in their game. They held conversations with the other characters, they expressed themselves in regards to the events that happened to them, some would even dare to argue they were better written that some other characters in their respective games if only because their heightened importance to their respective plot lines inevitably helps them have more dialogue, and even a bad writer has to stumble into writing something good eventually which means in some scenes they’re able to overcome the barrier of being bland by design.

Byleth however has none of this. At best they're given 2 or 3 text choices at any given time, and any bipartisan conversation that involves them is more of a soliloquy by the other character, with the player input being largely irrelevant to the flow of the conversation aside from changing the very immediate reaction that follows that same input.

As such, the notion that Byleth is a creepy teacher who's grooming their students to be their personal sex slaves is misconstrued in the fact that Byleth simply has no real motivations, hence no intent. It is equally as valid to assume they could be a straight laced no-nonsense teacher or a deviant who preys on children, because no conjectures can be traced to their personality, as it doesn't exist. We can't deduce what is it that Byleth wants out of life because the avatar has no life and exists purely as a videogame terminal. We don't know what they enjoy outside of the very few things we the players are allowed to do as the character, which is why so much Byleth fanart involves fishing, cooking, or drinking tea, the few hobbies we indulged in while playing as them.

There is however something innately perverse about Byleth, it's just not the fact they're a teacher, but rather the fact they're the player.

2) Player avatars are inherently creepy, and so are dating sims

Fire Emblem is a fantasy game. In Fire Emblem games you will not only find unreal things like dragons and magic, but also straight up impossible things such as kind-hearted rulers that care about protecting and improving the lives of their constituents. The three real main characters in this game all have pure motivations and genuine desire to improve the world (yes... even Edelgard). As such, we can expect the same purity and lack of reality from a hypothetical Byleth that has a personality. It's fair to assume they'd be legitimate teachers with no creepy intentions who, through the vicissitudes of life, end up inadvertently falling in love with their students. In a fantasy land where every "good guy" is pure in nature there is no concern of Byleth grooming Dimitri, or of Edelgard forcing some ill intentioned quid-pro-quo with her right hand strategist whom she is obsessed with, because it's simply fantasy where everyone is nice and pure so things just magically always work out.

There is however an insidious factor lurking over this fantasy land, and that is the player. An omnipotent being who decides who lives, who dies, who gets married to who, and who stays alone because we just don't like them that much. The player can send Ashe to get the last hit on Lonato, just out of morbid curiosity to see what is the special dialogue that they have in that situation. The player can recruit Felix and then have Felix kill Rodrigue in the crimson route, just to see what hilarious quip will the son bark at the father. And of course, the player gets to decide who gets married to the lifeless slab of meat and bones with no emotion that is the Player Avatar. If anything breaks the idea that these characters are well written or realistic, it is the fact that they can all fall in love with someone who cannot communicate with them, all because of the emotions they magically choose to believe the avatar has, or rather, we choose to make them believe it.

In a "set" story like fire emblem echoes or path of radiance, the epilogues have little to no variety because the characters will just be themselves regardless of the player's input. No matter how much you want to see Celica's reaction to Faye getting together with Alm, that is simply not going to happen because their bond is set in stone, it cannot be altered, it is a "set" story. Likewise Nyna in new mystery of the emblem will never, ever fuck Sirius regardless of what she or the player wishes. Three Houses on the other hand is more like a playground than a book, the player will mess with the lives of these characters until they get bored of them, seeing every possible unlikely combination programmed into the game just out of curiosity to see what the characters will say, to squeeze out every last bit of "Content" that the game has until they get bored of it and move on to something else, effectively reducing the characters from "characters" to mere consumables. 

Hence why I can't help but laugh at the notion that Byleth is creepy by nature of being a teacher when they're so much more than a teacher and so much more creepy than a creepy teacher. They're an in-game god (hell, lore-wise they're also a god in every ending except crimson). Byleth can quite literally mind control other characters into loving them as long as they're given enough flowers and tea. Look at Sylvain's C support with Byleth and tell me if it's natural for a guy like him to fall in love like that after saying he wants to murder Byleth (surely enough, it's even creepier for players to fall in love with him because of that support, as Sylvain is an extremely interesting character but only in his other supports).

This is why you see people saying that Felix and Annette are a great couple, or that Marianne and Dimitri are made for each other, but you don’t really see people saying that Byleth’s pairing with x is cute. When two proper characters interact all the way to their A support and fall in love that way, you’ve actually seen their story develop, you can feel happy for them. Pairing Byleth with a proper character fulfills your desire to monopolize that character and get a neat special artwork of them, but has it really been a good story and feel like this is a good conclusion for them? No. (I’d be willing to say Byleth and Dimitri do make a somewhat good couple though, but that point would be much easier to defend if Byleth could actually communicate properly)

It wouldn't matter if Byleth was a 15 year old teacher, or a 17 year old student that's a peer to the classmates, or if all of the classmates were older than Byleth AND teachers instead while Byleth is a student. By the mere nature of the player input and Byleth's lack of character, the pairing is screwed up to begin with. 

What I'm getting at is that pairing Byleth with Catherine or Shamir is equally as fucked up as pairing Byleth with Dimitri (I would argue moreso because come on... Shamir and Catherine are totally girlfriends and you're just squeezing yourself in, have some respect).

In other words Byleth is only creepy because you are creepy. You're playing a game where you can date people who cannot possibly refuse you. Even if you remove that factor, you'd still be playing at making children fuck each other in whatever way you see fit. Something is wrong with you. You're the only impure factor affecting this game.

3) Fire Emblem will always suck

This is my favorite series of games but come on guys, you know fire emblem will always suck if you care about this kinda thing. In fire emblem fates Corrin has a wide variety of about 9 flavors of incest to choose from. In fire emblem awakening Robin can marry an amnesiac woman with head trauma who can't even speak complete sentences and is entirely dependent on him to subsist. The fanbase has grown so twisted they actively wanted Byleth to get married to Alois, a married man with children, and were disappointed when they didn't fuck in that paired ending (though I understand getting upset about the lack of gay supports, but hey that's just yet another way in which fire emblem chooses to suck).

Hell this is the fanbase that considers Berkut and Rinea to be a cute couple, what the actual hell guys. Go ahead and criticize the games but as long as the shipping simulator is included in the series, the games will always be creepy in their very nature, and guess what: the shipping simulator happens to be one of the most popular features and the one that people say it's the best written part of every game, so go figure if they're going to remove that.

ps: if you want a fire emblem with no paired endings, path of radiance has your back, it is my favorite! and if you want to avoid supports altogether, try Radiant Dawn, that's some good stuff.

4) Just for fun: the actual most fucked up ships in the game

-Lysithea with Linhardt, Byleth or Hanneman, or anyone.

When I recruited Lysithea in my first playthrough I didn't know she was a strong unit, instead I simply did it because I saw this sassy lost child wandering the halls and just really didn't want to kill her. I wanted her to live on and see her have a happy epilogue. Imagine my surprise when I reached the epilogues and it turns out she just simply dies shortly after the story if you don't pair her up with anyone. The exact one thing I wanted to avert was having her meet an early death, yet the game simply has her die anyway.

At the end of my deer playthrough I was all set to click on Hilda when I realized, wait a minute, Lysithea is going to die if I do this, right? And that is in fact the case. She can only live by supporting Hanneman, Lindhart or Byleth, and I had not recruited those two. So I click on Lysithea but it's kind of a tainted click isn't it? Not that I dislike her or anything, but once you throw in that additional motivation the scales have been irreversibly tipped in an unpleasant manner. I have effectively been guilted into picking her.

On to a third playthrough. I see Felix has really cute supports with Lysithea, but I can't have them supporting each other because I know she still meets an early death with him. And Lindhart, well his supports aren't bad and he's a great guy but they're certainly not as fun supports as Felix's. Hanneman fortunately doesn't seem interested in that way when you pair him up with Lysithea (not that he has any restraints when it comes to his supports with Dorothea...) so you can still have that as effectively a "solo" end for her in which she lives, but it's still kind of messed up. By giving her the Hanneman ending I'm condemning her to miss out on love for the rest of her life so that she can live on, but isn't love the reason we live on to begin with? Overall, I'd say Lysithea x Lindhart or Byleth is certainly a creepy support in the very nature that you have to do it or else you're a murderer, because you had the power to prevent this death and chose not to.

-Flayn with literally anyone

Imagine if a grown adult man could disguise himself as a high schooler, infiltrated a school and got married to a girl less than half his age. People would hate it, people would riot, Intelligent Systems would be over. But that is Flayn everyone! Fire Emblem is no stranger to the stupid trope of "little girl who's actually hundreds of years old", but I'll argue that Flayn is markedly different from Nowi. Nowi is most definitely a cartoonish fantasy character, who still acts like a little girl despite being hundreds of years old. She's literally bait for pedophile nerds with a flimsy shield in her supposed age, which she and her fans openly flaunt as if it really meant anything when the intent of her character is so transparent.

Flayn on the other hand is a legitimately mature character (as far as maturity goes in this game...) who is pretending to be a high schooler to get hitched with a student, all while hiding her real age entirely on purpose. An actual wolf in sheep's clothing (or dragon in sheep's clothing in this case...). And she can s-support literally every single male student except for Hubert (for story reasons) and Sylvain (for Sylvain reasons). Not only that but she doesn’t support any females other than Manuela, her fellow cougar, and she doesn’t support any of the older men like Hanneman showing she’s only interested in young blood.

But hey everyone! Flayn is just the little meme fish girl trapped in the mcdonalds playplace so we all give her a pass right. Overall though I'd say her creep factor is still significantly lower than Nowi's if only because her design isn't a chore to look at.

-Rhea x Byleth

This is some galaxy brain 5D chess grandmaster type of shit I tell you. Capitalizing on the sickening mommy fetish that's been rising up recently internet the crackhead team of geniuses at intelligent systems decided to pull Joker's Trick on people who are into that kind of thing. First they have her be the oldest non-wrinkled character, then they give her Kikuko Inoue as a seiyuu (famously known for often playing mom roles), then they give players that one scene where Byleth rests on her lap like their kid, and then? Then the game tells you Rhea is the daughter of Byleth. Wait a minute, what the hell? I can't even begin to think this one out because at this point my brain has turned to tofu and I am forever perplexed by this turnaround, hats off to intelligent systems for their ultimate jest.

After fates and this I positively cannot wait to see what new incestcoaster they'll turn my guts inside out with in the next entry of the series, Fire Emblem is truly the finest series of horror games disguised as jrpgs.

Obviously, this post was written in jest. I don’t actually believe you’re an inherently creepy person for playing fire emblem, nor do I think Flayn is a predator deviant (hell I don’t even think Nowi is that bad). I just found it truly interesting how people’s sensitivities can activate in these fictional settings (and do think those sensitivities should be respected) but when I try to activate those neurons my mind ends up in a whole different place. So yeah, just having some fun.

Also check out the rest of this trilogy with Three Houses sucks actually and Three Houses is good actually. I seriously hope I never feel like writing anything about this game ever again.

[blayzez]

I'm sorry, I know I don't usually post discourse on my blog. I'm just... really hurt right now.

At the age of 24, after spending my entire childhood forcing myself to believe I was straight because that's what my family and religion said I was supposed to be, I finally acknowledged that I was bisexual. Even then, I was still second-guessing myself: What if I only think I'm bisexual because the internet/social media makes it seem like the "In" thing? What if my sexuality is just a mask and not who I really am? What if, what if, what if. It was hard.

Then I saw Voltron. Lance seemed to have a bisexuality arc laid out for him, and it was obvious that he didn't quite know he was bi and/or wasn't emotionally ready to acknowledge it.

That was just so validating. It made me happy to know that being confused about your sexuality -- not being sure if you're the sexuality you think you might be -- was common enough to include it in a kid's show and it made me feel so much better! I was so happy, and with Lance's help (and the help of my friends and therapist), I was able to finally accept my sexuality for what it was. And I'm an adult. Think about how many kids his arc could have helped! Kids who were questioning, kids who were unsure, kids that might not being surrounded by a good support system and have to hide who they are. Lance was shaping up to be someone kids could really look up, admire, and in turn accept themselves for they are because of him.

And now that's washed down the drain. It meant so much to me, perhaps meant so much to a lot of kids that needed that role model, but it clearly meant nothing to the writers and that is just so disheartening.

This isn't even about shipping. I love K/ance with all my heart, but I would be okay with any endgame ship so long as it was written well. This includes keeping the characters in-character and allowing the romance to help in their character development. Keith was the most likely candidate -- he really did make Lance a better person and vice versa -- but if someone else filled that role and filled it well, I would have been perfectly fine with that! But that's not what we got. Instead, the boy who has been insecure ALL SERIES has to spend his only romance building up his partner and have that not be reciprocated. That most-likely-candidate boosted him up more than Lance's actual romantic partner, and that is just bad writing. That's not a good relationship. Relationships are two-way streets; you can't have only one of the partners be supportive -- they have to be EQUALLY supportive. And A//urance was not that. A//urance was rushed, did not help the characters develop in the slightest, and took away TWO great role models.

I don't like Allura. I think I've made this clear before, but I really don't like her. I was neutral to her in s1, then the whole Not-All-Galra arc happened in s2 and my opinion of her started going down at that point.

But she didn't deserve the hand she was dealt. She was the only woman of color in the main cast, and they KILL HER??? WHY????? I may not have liked her, but that doesn't mean she was a bad character! On the contrary, she was a great role model and I'm sure many girls of color looked up to her. And then they just kill her? First they take away the great role model Lance could have been as a confused bisexual character, and then they take away the only woman of color on the main cast. WHAT. THE. FUCK. You can't just do that! I feel so horrible for the kids who looked up to those characters only to have it all ripped out from under their feet.

Oh, but there was a random gay wedding at the end, so that makes it alllllllll better~

Except it doesn't. Adding in a gay wedding/kiss with little-to-no build-up is more likely to cause confusion than anything else. And it doesn't erase how dirty they did Lance and Allura. Both characters deserved better.

On the topic of shipping, yes, it was queerbait. I refused to believe the showrunners were doing that -- I absolutely refused because I trusted the showrunners completely. Surely they wouldn't have ALL OF THESE ROMANTIC PARALLELS between K/L with other canon romantic couples for nothing. Surely they wouldn't have developed K/L's relationship more than any other relationship unless there was a really good reason for it. SURELY THEY WOULDN'T BE OKAY WITH VAGUING ABOUT THE SHIP MULTIPLE TIMES AND BEING OKAY WITH DW USING K/L FOR MARKETING PURPOSES IF IT WASN'T GOING TO HAPPEN.

But nope. All of the media techniques to subtly hint at a romance used specifically for K/L meant nothing. It was just bros being bros nothing gay here.

And that is BULLSHIT.

Honestly, the whole season just screams, "SHOCK VALUE," to me. They wanted to shock people, but I don't think they really considered the repercussions of how they were doing it. I get shock value, bringing up the interest and encouraging audiences to rewatch the series to understand why the shock was actually built-up from the beginning, but there's right way to do it and a wrong way to do it. Voltron took the wrong way and screwed it up royally.

To be clear, I am not against straight ships. Far from it, some of my favorite ships are heterosexual. Nor do I fetishize mlm relationships -- K/L is only the second mlm relationship I've come to really love (the first being Hau and Gladion from Pokemon Sun & Moon). It's just that K/L really struck a chord with me and with so many other people, and to take that away for the sake of a straight ship and some shitty shock value? Dirty thing to do to the show's audience. Don't build up proper LGBT+ rep UNLESS YOU ACTUALLY FUCKING HAVE IT. The only rep? Shiro, and a hastily-added Zethrid/Ezor ship. Blaytz, too, but that was glossed over tbh and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the audience (not on tumblr because we analyze everything to death lol) completely forgot about Blaytz's interaction with that make Galra. That's not proper rep. That's throwing it in and thinking, "It exists so our job is done."

Media in general has being doing LGBT+ rep dirty for SO LONG. Even when we had positive LGBT+ characters in media, they were still characters based off of gay stereotypes. They were good positive characters, but were still perpetuating a certain bias against LGBT+ by displaying these stereotypes as fact. Times are supposed to be different now. We're supposed to be progressing, making it BETTER. I really thought Voltron was going to be part of that progress, that it would give us a well-written, well-developed, well-loved LGBT+ representation for kids of this generation to look up to and admire and learn acceptance -- about themselves and about others -- from. Instead, the showrunners three half-assed, tacked on LGBT+ reps and called it a day.

THAT'S NOT COOL.

This isn't about ships. This is about proper media representation for the LGBT+ community -- something that is really scarce, even now -- and how it affects the LGBT+ community when it's done badly. This also goes for racial rep. You can take two misrepresented groups and treat them horribly and then call it good rep. IT ISN'T. The poor representation of the LGBT+ community has proved to be detrimental in society's view of them. THIS DOESN'T HELP.

*sigh*

Off the topic of that, can we talk about how shit the writing was? Because it was really shit.

I'll admit that while I like s7, it wasn't written amazingly-well. Still, it wasn't bad and did have plenty of interesting episodes. Even with all of the asspulls we got in the last episode, it was still awesome because we got to see Shiro back in his element after losing almost everything in prior seasons. It was a mix of good writing and bad writing, but the good writing made up for the bad.

The seasons previous to that were well-done. Maybe not s4, but the other seasons were well-written and really enjoyable! There's a reason the show took off; the plot maybe standard, but the characters, character dynamics, and relationships were fantastic and were the true driving force behind the series and its success.

So why was s8 so all over the place? Why were plot threads that had been hinted at or outright confirmed left hanging or tied together hastily? So many things were alluded to in previous seasons only to lead to NOTHING. WHY???

Why did everyone BUT Lance get an arc?

What was the point of Lance getting a sword if it was never going to be brought up again?

Why was Keith's arc suddenly thrown to the wayside?

Why did Allura have to DIE for her arc to reach its conclusion?

WHY?

So many people complained about bad writing in Voltron, but I had always believed that the writing in Voltron was relatively good. Sure, it had its problems (like the entirety of s4, and the MFEs being boring as shit), but it was mostly a well-rounded show with well-rounded characters.

And s8... just threw all of that away.

All of that potential, all of those good arcs -- wasted.

The writing went downhill SO fast, and it's just such a shame. Something that meant so much to me has dissolved into the mess s8 was. It's disheartening.

I also want to apologize to all of my followers who followed me because my K/L optimism and metas. I'm sorry if I got your hopes up; I really thought K/L was the logical conclusion -- everything was building up to it, right from the first episode and even continuing in s7 (hell, even s8 added to it) -- and I truly thought the writers were going to follow through with all of the logical conclusions the previous seasons built up. I had faith in them, but I was wrong. For that, I apologize. I know it's just a cartoon show, but I also know how influential and meaningful media can be -- especially for marginalized groups -- so if my hype bringing you up made your fall harder when s8 was released, I am so sorry. You didn't deserve that; nobody in the fandom did.

I'm so jaded and disillusioned right now. Voltron has been a major inspiration for me; I originally decided to be a cartoonist to bring LGBT+ representation to children's media because of Steven Universe, but it was Voltron that really motivated me to reach that goal. I looked up to Voltron -- it was my muse, my main inspiration. I've learned so much about writing -- writing character arcs, relationships, etc. -- from Voltron and all of the analyzing people did. Seeing it devolve into what it did is upsetting. Something I loved so much has let me down, and I'm hurt and disappointed.

But more than ever, I want to create cartoons that don't do this; cartoons that tie up its loose ends, follow through with obvious character relationships, puts the main characters through complete arcs, and give proper development to them all. Cartoons that have proper LGBT+ and racial representation -- with LGBT+/characters of color that can be admired, that won't fall flat, that will teach the children of the generation about acceptance of others and acceptance of yourself regardless of sexuality, skin color, gender identity, etc. Voltron failed in that aspect; it was a compelling show that failed in everything it needed to succeed in. I refuse to make that same mistake.

With that, let's all look ahead to future and enjoy the fanworks that do these wonderful characters justice. Let Voltron's failure inspire you to create and make something better, something that will be much more impactful, much more meaningful.

Don't let it get you down; let it bring you up.

[the-amaryka]

Unpopular Opinion:  I enjoyed season 8

So first, I’m mostly doing this to sort out my own feelings, but I DO think there are some things worth considering here.

To be clear, Enjoying something and thinking that something was perfect are different.  I enjoy plenty of things that are garbage and I do think this season had it’s fair share of flaws, but it’s not nearly as awful as some of ya’ll are ripping into it over.  In addition, regardless of if it is bad or not harassment of the creators is never justified.  EVER.  So if you feel the need to take out your frustrations on the cast/crew stop what you are doing then DON’T.

Sorry in advance if you’re on mobile cuz this is a long one under the read more.

Why I was able to enjoy it:

Three major things I always keep in mind going into a new season:

1.  Don’t watch it FOR the ship, enjoy the show for what it is.  I think the primary thing that has allowed me to enjoy each season is I try to watch it without shipping goggles.  At the end of the day, shipping is fun but it is for fandom and not the reason I’m watching the show, especially a show made for 7 year old boys.  

2.  I (along with most of the fandom on this website) am not the target audience for this show.  Voltron may be an abnormally good kids show, but it is still a kids show.  I have never walked into a season thinking that it is content made for me, and the things that are important to me just aren’t important enough to 7 year olds to have the time I want spent on them.  I have to be okay with that because as much as I would love to have a whole episode of Shiro really struggling with what it means to be a leader, and the weight of Adam’s sacrifice, the 7 year old this show was made for is going to be bored shitless and decide “I don’t want that Voltron toy for my birthday after all.”  So yeah, that is going to change the choices the crew makes when they create these episodes.

3.  This is a reboot.  Several different companies have BIG stakes in Voltron.  Things like LGBT rep are only going to go as far as ONE important old white man who thinks (insert your fave here) is straight.  Anybody who has followed me for more than 3 seconds knows I ship Sheith, but knowing how the entertainment industry works changed how I thought the direction of the series was going from day one.  If it was so hard for them to get even ambiguous ‘Takashi, how much do I mean to you’ when both Shiro and Adam are legally original characters, there is NO WAY the powers that be will allow them to gay up big names in the franchise like Keith or Lance.  For that reason I never expected a canon gay relationship between any of the main characters.  No Sheith, no Klance, no Pallura, no Hance.  I do believe it was important to the creators and they did they absolute best with what they had, but ultimately it was not their decision and a lot of ya’ll need to stop acting like you are performing some kind of holy service by harassing them about it.  They did their jobs as best they could and the fandom was pressuring them the whole time to make promises they didn’t know if they could keep.

For these reasons I was able to enjoy the new season for what it was: a reboot aimed toward children that I shouldn’t expect a primary romantic plot out of.  And honestly?  Thats what I got.  The only big romantic plot revolved around Lance and Allura and even that was only a handful of scenes.  I think the main problem with this fandom has always been people putting unrealistic expectations on a show that wasn’t aimed at them.  Why people chose to put all of their expectation eggs in the Voltron basket specifically is beyond me, and frankly a bit unfair to the people who made it.  But we don’t have to get into that right now.

Things that I enjoyed:

1.  Hunk is best boy.  I loved his and Lance's friendship shining through and when he turned into team mom.  Some highlight include:  “It’s happening tonight, young man!” “I’m sorry I yelled at you.  I’ll make you dog treats later.”  When he made that Altean dessert because he is so sweet and knows how to bring people together.  What a star, what a diplomat, what a fine, fine man. 2.  BaBy LoToR 3.  Seeing all the paladins in their under armor.  I would feel robbed because Shiro was left out but the entire series has been Shiro fan service so I’m not even mad. 4.  VERONICA AND AXCA BONDING?  NICE.  Didn’t expect to ship them?  I do.  Nice. 5.  Everything about Day Fourty-Seven.  A filler episode I genuinely enjoyed.  MY only wish is we could have gotten Keith and Krolia in an interview together and she went out of her way to embarrass him like “while we were in the Quantum Abyss-” “Mom, why are you doing this to me?” “I have 20 years of Mothering to catch up on, young man.” 6.  Shiro feeling like a bad ass and looking cool during the arm wrestling competition.  What a good. 7.  This was really Allura’s season, wow, what a queen. 8.  Keith giving Lance a bunch of pep talks and opening up to become not only a good leader but a good friend. 9.  Keith YELLING at the Zarkon mech because he had leadership responsibility feels. 10.  I did not expect to have FEELINGS over seeing young Zarkon. 11.  Honerva’s motivations were honestly....so honest.  So realistically human, you know?  It seems so fitting that this whole thing began with a rift into another reality, and a broken family.  And it ended with a rift into another reality, and that family finally being able to be at peace.  That is the theme that has been following us form the beginning: family.  And even the final villain just wanted to fix the damage that had been done to hers.  Though I do feel like her turnaround was a little quick, I can forgive it for kinds show reasons. 12.  Allura getting to hug Alfor again. 13.  Lance getting the stamp of approval from the dad. 14.  Speaking of which, even I thought the Allurance scenes were pretty cute despite not being a huge fan of the ship. 15.  The character development that is evident.  If you compare all these characters to who they were in E1S1 they are all vastly different.  The only exception to this is Coran, though I do feel like Allura’s is mostly internal and she has a way of conducting herself that can make it difficult to perceive. 16.  I am VERY SAD about Allura dying...but you know what?  I think this ending actually suited her.  I don’t think she would be satisfied withotu making a grand reality wide sacrifice.  She restored Altea, and returned into the fabric of space-time itself with her family.  This has been being foreshadowed since Season 1 to be honest.  She is always taking risks and wanting to keep moving and bettering things.  She is perfect and we don’t deserve her and in my heart she is the goddess of reality itself. 17.  The scene where the lions all came to life and flew away, and then that lovely art of them going into the rift.  I really think they went back to Allura, and the next time the Universe needs Voltron, it will be her spirit leading the way.  And honestly?  I don’t think she would want it any other way. 18.  The MFE Pilots grew on me... 19.  MMMMMBIG ROBOT PRETTY 20.  We got Shiro and the rest of the paladins piloting all together again. 21.  ALMOST Galra Emperor Keith.

The things I didn’t think were great:

1.  What the fuck happened to Ezor’s voice?  She only said one word and I thought she was dying? 2.  Keith and Shiro like...didn’t even talk.  And even without shipping goggles that just seems wrong to me.  Their bond has been one of the points the story has turned on.  We got all the build up but none of the payoff.  No shoulder touches, no ‘I’m proud of you, Keith’, none of the usual friendship or dynamic they usually have with each other.  It felt kind of empty honestly :(  And whats more is...Keith has been sacrificing and fighting and loving Shiro for 7 seasons now, and Shiro never got to repay him.  Like he wasn’t in his hospital room when he woke up and nobody can fucking tell me when Shiro said “spend time with the people you love” Keith wouldn’t be spending time with Shiro.  It just....feels so dissatisfying to see one of the major emotional bonds in the show not even be acknowledged in the end.  It makes everything Keith worked for feel...not...there.  Like what did all that mean in the end?  As many times as it takes but he gives and gives and gives and the only one who returns what he gives is Krolia.  It used to be Shiro returned it too, but now...  Even without it being romantic, their relationship was done a dirty.  I didn’t need canon Sheith I just needed some kind of acknowledgement that all the suffering they endured was worth it.  I wanted to see them happy. 3.  Despite what I said above I am sad Allura is gone. 4.  Shiro was hardly in the season at all actually :((((((((((((((((((( 5.  Yeah, as cute as the scenes were I’ve never felt Allura and Lance have a chemistry that makes their relationship sit well with me.  But I guess it was necessary to show how Lance has matured as a person.  I always thought they have the POTENTIAL for chemistry but it’s always fallen short for me.  Allura just takes her life too seriously and her walls never actually came down enough for me to see a connection there. 6.  James and Keith never like...talked?  I would have liked for them to have had a reconciliation like Keith and Lance did. 7.  Lack of Krolia. 8.  Something was off about Kolivan’s voice 9.  TBH, I feel like The real fulfillment for Keith’s arc would have been his teammates encouraging and lifting him up as well.  Display his emotional availability which was completely closed off at the start.  I feel like they may have just dropped the ball on a couple of character’s arc resolution but...eh.  You gotta pick and choose what to focus on when you have an ensemble cast, and 7 year olds just aren’t always interested in that. 10.  Woulda been nice to get a bit more detail on the nature of the rift creatures and some more clarity for a through line from the beginning thousands of Years ago to now.  Along with that exactly what kind of entity IS Voltron itself?  A lot of seeds planted that made a half attempt at being resolved but weren’t quite clear enough to create something cohesive. 11.  I can’t put my finger on why but overall it just feels...Incomplete.  Like there is still a pit in my stomach that doesn’t feel satisfied by the ending.  I’m not sure how much of that is the season itself, and how much is I’ve been involved in this show for nearly 2 years and it’s hard to let go, especially on something that doesn’t quite feel like going out with a bang.

Highly unpopular opinion in my neck of the woods:

That wedding at the end?  I’m happy about it.  Do I think its bad writing to marry off one of your main five to a rando we don’t even know the name of?  Yes.  Am I annoyed that the fandom was SO awful and so accusatory toward the showrunners they felt the need to shoehorn in a last minute wedding because they honestly felt bad when the truth is this has always been a glorified ship war?  MEGA YES.  They shouldn’t have felt like they had to make this bad writing decision on the behalf of fans who have treated them and their efforts like shit.  Shame on the people who treated them this way.  They tried so FUCKING hard to give us something and ya’ll threw it away and called them evil.  I get how you feel but damn why don’t YOU try to make social change happen in the entertainment industry and see how well your LGBT paradise vision goes over when there are dozens of other people with a say.  (I could go on about how poorly that was handled on both ends, but that is another point altogether.)

More than anything, I’m happy that some 7 year old kid who LOVES the badass Captain Takashi Shirogane is going to see him get married on screen and kiss a MAN.  Like holy shit, that is HUGE.  Do I think it could have been written better?  Absolutely.  But This show wasn’t made for me it was made for the 7 year kid out there is going to think “Shiro kissed a boy, maybe I’m not weird for wanting to kiss boys” and THAT is what Representation in children’s media is all about.  I’m going to celebrate this and everything else related to Shiro’s LGBT status because what matters to me way more than ships or satisfying romantic arcs is maybe when my little nephew sees his favorite character is gay he will be a little more open and comfortable when I bring my girlfriend to family dinner.

I think it would do the fandom (especially the Sheith shippers) some good to step back, take off their shipping goggles, and recognize this for the stride in Children’s media that it is. That being said I’m gonna be reading and writing the fix-it fics along with the rest of you, because fandom and how I enjoy the show can be whatever I want.

The conclusion and why I still love Voltron:

You know what?  Yes I felt a little let down by the writing, but Voltron is one of the first fandoms I’ve been so involved in and I have had such wonderful experiences while enjoying this show.  I’m never going to let some dissatisfaction ruin this for me.  The nice thing about fandom, is I can enjoy my version of the show however I want it, and it doesn’t have to effect how I feel about canon at all.  And when I take off my fandom goggles, this season was actually pretty enjoyable.

I encourage anybody who has enjoyed the show up to this point to put your bitterness aside and do what you’ve been doing from the start.  Create some content, consume some content, ship what you want, and don’t you dare let anybody ruin this for you.  You have good memories with this show, keep them good and move froward.

Peace out my dudes, I’m gonna be hanging out in Sheith hell for at least another 6 months.

It was an honor flying with you all.

[tinteacosplay]

Couple Headcanon: Toshinori/All Might x trans!reader + EraserMic

Well I wrote this at 4 am.. but I had a flow so, here we go ;3

A bit of background: Toshinori, you, Aizawa & Hizashi all went to A.U, Class A at the same time and became best buddies. You are Aizawa’s cousin and only relative (you two lived in the same house as kids). Toshi have had feelings for you ever since early years of high school and the same thing goes for Mic, but for Aizawa.

How they got together:

(Toshi x trans!reader): You started transition and had after time developed feelings for Toshi as well, but were afraid that he would not like you after transitioning (you have had a hint that he liked you before transitioning). Toshi was 110% supporting friendo and were secretly studying to know more about LGBTQ+, because he started to question his sexuality. After your transition, his feelings became stronger seeing you more confident in yourself! 

  When the two of you graduated Toshi had realized he was pansexual and would not wait a second to confess to you. You as a demi-sexual approved happily and you were soon attending as Pro heros to teach at A.U high School together. 

(EraserMic): Hizashi had been crushing hard on his best friend (only friend) Aizawa in years before actually confessing. He made friends with you and Toshi along the way and were already sure about himself being gay. Although, the thing that brought Hizashi into hiding his feelings were because of fear of ruining his friendship with Aizawa.

 Many times he were to talk to you a lot during this period. Hizashi knew you two were close and wanted to know if Aizawa could possibly be gay (he had never seen Aizawa shown any interest in girls). You became some sort of psychologist to him, but also to Aizawa. As his cousin and best friend you helped Aizawa realize he was gay, while at the same time you were helping Hizashi to calm down his nerves. In the end Aizawa surprisingly did confess to you at one point that he were gay and had also developed feelings for Hizashi. With a relife but mostly with joy, you encouraged both parts to talk to each other about their feelings. After graduating they were to be a strong bonded (but private) couple ending up taking the same path as you and Toshi at A.U.

How they date: Nowadays the four of you hang out a lot together during both work and on your free time. Conveniently as it sounds all of you live near each other as well as to A.U high school. It’s common for the four of you to have double dates, but to Aizawa it’s just a “friend hangout” because he is a private person in general (even among the once he love). Usually the two couples are to end up separating in the end of the dates (to give it a chance to get steamy, if wanted).

(Toshi x trans!reader): Separately Toshi would spoil you and take you to places or activities (which you are up for, as long as you get to do the same for him). He’s a hopeless romantic and will make sure you have a good time. You have no problem telling people you know you can trust, that you two are a couple and especially to the ones who can understand you and toshi are apart of the LGBTQ+ community. Toshi is slightly more careful because he’s the nr 1 pro hero, but he can’t deny it sometimes (he’s too much in love). Both of you want things slightly private (mostly for safety reasons). 

  Even though it’s rare you tend to have secret “dates” or “moments” in public while during work. Something small like; sharing looks, holding hands, inocente touches in hallways or the staff room, that would be enough for the two of you (but as All Might he would hug you a bit more than anyone else, even kiss you sometimes). Both of you are weak for cuddles and kisses and highly prioritize all the quality time you can get. 

(EraserMic): When they are alone, and I mean entirely alone - Aizawa can lighten his brakes. It’s not that he’s afraid to show affection, he’s just not a public person. Hizashi have huge respect for that while still being a cuddle monster and trying real hrad not to make his love too visible. They manage to hold their relationship private for a few months, but after Hizashi accidentally mentioned he were in a relationship, it leaked. Aizawa was like: “ah.. fuck it”, and could slowly begin to hold Hizashi’s hand and except Hizashi’s touch at work (only because people seemed to accept it). Aizawa would also let Hizashi a bit loose on the subject about them being a couple (it’s not a secret anymore, if there ever was one), but would personally only address it if necessary or being asked kindly.

How they proposed/got engaged:

(Toshi x trans!reader): Toshi had always had in mind that he would never be able to get married and settle down, but being with you felt right and he never wanted that to end. On your hand, after being with Toshi for a while you grown to have the same mindset, but at the same time you wanted to get married and have always wanted that connection. You two never doubted your love for each other and you would be okay not getting married because you would always have that connection with him anyway, married or not. After a long thinking process Toshi surprised you with actually proposing, telling you he couldn’t live without you and that it sounded good in his head to call you his wife/husband. You were so shocked you couldn’t get anything out of your mouth, but for Toshi he only had to look at your eyes to get the answer: a clear “yes!”, and both of you would slowly burst into a teary laugh. 

(EraserMic): Hizashi wanted to get married while Aizawa had always been sceptical. He did love Hizashi very much but didn’t need a marriage as proof of that. The fun part of this argument has always been how Hizashi would respond on this. What Hizashi would do were to propose to Aizawa not only once, but three times. Everytime Aizawa had told him no, but Hizashi had kept asking. It was Hizashi’s way to really show how much he loved his boyfriend and to Aizawa it could have been annoying, but he got the massage (He would smile every time Hizashi propose). After the third time Aizawa even turned himself to you to ask on your thought of marriage (you and Toshi had been married for about year). Your honesty and way of seeing it succeeded so well that Aizawa told you he would think it over. A few months later Aizawa got himself on one knee and propose to Hizashi who at first thought he was joking, but started tearing up when Aizawa said something like: “Since when do I make jokes?”. The crying mess would said yes a million times over and couldn’t believe his eyes or ears when he would embrace a satisfied Aizawa. 

How they think about the future + Relationship status:

(Toshi x trans!reader): You and Toshi are more than happy with your relationship, infact you’re happily married and have sort of adopted Midoriya as well as a dog named: Nana, after Toshi's master (a person you have met and highly respect). The fact that Midoriya has taken over the title as the nr 1 hero you two have got more time to spend together, while teaching at A.U and Midoriya (of course). Your future looks bright but you take one step at a time.

(EraserMic): They’re a married couple as well, they’re very happy to live together in as much price they can come across. They’ll still be teaching at A.U and work as Pro heros until they retire (just like you and Toshi). Aizawa has had his life long wish granted by adopting 4 cats, but they’ve talked about children (Mic mostly). The conclusion was animals was the right thing for them (they have all the students to take care of as well!). Their future looks brighter than what they could ever imagine. 

There will be married couple dinners but also fight scenes as power couples (in secret). They’ll keep a strong bond to each other and hopefully have a continued good time at A.U, and where else life will take them.

[deeeepsteep]

Alright now that I had like an hour or two to process what actually happened I think I can summarize my thoughts and feelings on Kingdom Hearts III...though it may be all over the place lmao

This is full of spoilers and it’s also very long so take that as a warning

This isn’t new and people have been complaining about it all over the internet but LMAO THEY REALLY DID KAIRI DIRTY DIDN’T THEY?????? She and Lea get this ENTIRE FUCKING UNIVERSE THAT’S ALSO SUSPENDED IN TIME so they can train and meet Riku and Sora’s skill levels but we hardly get to see them do anything lmao plus we don’t even get to play as her even though we briefly got to play as Riku a couple times. Also Nomura really pulled a Luna on Kairi and fucking killed her off for the sake of plot development - which shouldn’t be surprising at all because it’s Nomura we’re talking about and this isn’t the first time he’s given a female character the short end of the stuck but whatever, I guess that means he lied to us after all and KH3 won’t be Sora’s final journey...but maybe this also means that this is the beginning of Kairi’s, and the next game will be about her saving him for once???????? I’d like to think that’s what he’s planning but I can’t keep my hopes up because lol it’s Nomura

Now that I think about it, Namine and Xion were kinda useless too. Aqua’s the only female character out of the main roster who really had an impact on the story and actually did shit in KH3 - and even then, she was kind of in a “damsel in distress” kind of deal where Riku and Sora had to save her. I mean, there’s a good reason why they had to save her, but still. Again, I think Nomura just doesn’t have a fucking clue what he’s doing when it comes to writing for female characters lmao

I don’t necessarily think the Sora/Kairi stuff was forced, but I do feel like it was unconvincing seeing as they barely got any screen time together. It was established from the very first game that the both of them have a special bond - whether it’s romantic or platonic I don’t really care lmao, but I can’t deny there’s a unique closeness between them - and it’s reinforced up until KH3 for some reason. Like...suddenly Sora and Riku kinda just forget they’re best friends with her???? And Riku and Kairi didn’t even talk to each other the entire fucking game!!!! Sure, Kairi pretty much saves Sora from death and it’s obvious she’s the “guiding light” in his life but like...........there’s no substance to that at all. At least not in KH3. I dunno. It just felt very hollow to me. There wasn’t any buildup that made their last scenes together look or feel significant. 

Also, I know Roxas and Namine only briefly interact with each other in KH2 but it’s obvious that they still share a strong bond since they’re reflections of Sora and Kairi - so it was weird not seeing them interact in KH3. They promised they’d meet each other again and that they’re looking forward to seeing each other again, but that never fucking happens. It’s almost like at the end, Nomura suddenly realizes he created way too many fucking characters and he’s overwhelmed with trying to find conclusive, happy endings for all of them so a lot of shit just slipped through the cracks during the writing process.

So in the ending, Kairi’s the one that stays and Sora’s the one who disappears. Does that mean the beach scene is set after Sora goes and rescues her????? Nomura decided to fuck things up further in KH3 when he introduced time and space manipulation so literally anything is fair game at this point. I swear to God though if this is a “there’s multiple dimensions” sort of thing I’m going to fly over to Japan and hunt Nomura down myself

Aside from all of that bullshit, the ending was wholesome. Everyone partying on the beach???? Xion and Namine looking for seashells together????? A frisbee game??????? Ven accidentally breaking Donald’s sand sculpture of himself???? So wholesome!!!

Isa coming back to the light and returning to Lea!!!!!! They can finally be the gays we all knew they were meant to be!!!!!!! And they can raise their children Xion and Roxas in peace!!!!

I hope Aqua keeps Terra chained to a basement or something so he doesn’t run out and do dumb shit ever again - other than that I’m so glad the Wayfinder Trio are finally reunited

Soooooo the secret ending shows Sora and Riku in Shibuya????? At first I thought that they were going back to TWEWY but then I saw that Verum Rex dude so idk...but if that’s the case idk how I feel about it lmao, it’s kinda corny. I’d rather we just see them reunite with Neku and the gang - which reminds me, I should really replay TWEWY lmao

I stopped playing KHX a long time ago because the game got boring really quick, but I quickly read up on it so a few things make a little more sense re: The Dandelions, Ava, the Unions, why Ven hugged Chirithy etc. So is Xigbar gonna be the new bad guy now??? ALSO WE NEVER FUCKING FOUND OUT WHAT WAS IN THAT GODDAMN BOX....guess we gotta wait another 17 years for the next game!!!!!!

I find it weird that Corona and Arendelle were basically just re-hashes of the movies, but all the other worlds had their own original storyline that feels more like an add-on to their original sources. I’m assuming there’s a licensing/legal thing with Disney, but it really doesn’t explain much. I thought Elsa would’ve been a fun ally to have; it would’e been neat to see her ice powers in combat alongside Sora. And it’s lame that you lose Rapunzel as an ally after her hair is cut; that would’ve been avoided if Corona got another storyline so that she could develop abilities outside of her magic hair. Meh. 

Toy Story actually was the worst world for me??? The story dragged on a lot longer than it needed to and I got SO bored with the gigas shit. San Fransokyo was my favourite, not just because BH6 is one of my favourite Disney movies but also because the world was JUST SO BIG and I felt like I could spend forever just roaming around the place. It had an open-world feel to it. 

I actually didn’t mind Arendelle so much lmao, the mountain climbing was kinda fun - but I have bad memories tied to Frozen (I worked at the Disney Store when the movie came out so I was forced to put up with the hype, the annoying children, and their unbearably demanding parents...not to mention I had to listen to Let It Go a billion times a day) so that dampened my experience a bit.

Ok all in all the game was enjoyable for the most part. I loved the actual gameplay; the battle system was great and so delightfully chaotic!!! There were like 3249872 things happening all at once and it was so fun. The attractions were annoying sometimes but they’re a quick fix if you’re in a bind so I quickly got desensitized to them, and they finally (sort of) fixed the camera issue by giving you the option to re-centre the camera on Sora when it moves away which I was eternally grateful for.

This is just a jumbled mess and I know I’m leaving stuff out but I’m sure I’ll complain about them later when I remember lmao

KH3....maybe a 7/10??? Idk that feels a little generous. 6.5???

[heckolve]

i understand you’re somewhat past the vld thing but i’m still simmering with this utter rage like what the Actual Fuck? they claim lgbt rep in a children’s show, to a main disabled poc character & then they bullshit their way out of it. they’ve been leading us on w klance Ever since season one & i love bi lance but fuck allurance man. where’s my fucking lgbt rep? & than they have the fucking audacity to imply lesbianism in the show but make the fucking lesbians the torturous villains. fuck vld

hetero vld stan’s really our here telling us not to be utterly pissed off about being queerbaited & trying to tell us we’re being unreasonable for wanting representation. pulling this bullshit card that “he’s still canonly gay even tho he isn’t in a relationship” bitch give me a wholesome homosexual kissing scene & i’ll believe it 

KDCKSKFLGLFSV Why are the heterosexuals acting like we’re savages for asking & being actively upset about wanting representation. They say they support us but the minute our community mixes with their precious straight shit they unleash their hetero claws, sink them into the relationship & drag them down into a hetero hellhole. Bitches be playin their ‘Don’t be mean to the creators!’ card & ‘Stop having ship fights! Deal with canon ships!’ BIGOT THIS ISNT ABOUT SHIPS THIS IS ABOUT REPRESENTATION

two fucking words voltron, representation matters.

It’s just disgusting to me that a group of powerful people could give a community hope for representation, allow they to thrive and get all jazzed up about it, and literally kill off their fading heart-beat hope of rep. Voltron & the Dreamworks Studio impacted our community So Much by saying that and imagine being cruel enough to rip that from a community’s hands & than play victim. I think that i speak for many and we can collectively say Fuck You Voltron.

im assuming these are all from the same person :”)) and i didnt include the one that was vaguely nsfw lmaoanyways……… yeah…….. like, for adashi? i didnt have…. big expectations… i didnt really expect them to portray them being romantic or anything, but killing adam for no real reason and then saying “its bc its war and ppl die”, when pretty much every other one of their het ships are happy and healthy? fuck off?? 

and i like allurance!! but only the idea of it at this point, canon allurance fucking sucks. up until these last two seasons there was no indication that they would end up being a couple, but s6 suddenly had them interacting more and implying that they were getting crushes on each other; it was forced and out of nowhere and it just dosent feel natural At All!! like, bi lance still lives even if he gets w/ allura, but its such a shallow relationship in canon and i Really dont like it– they both deserve  a better developed romance

and yeah i totally get what youre saying about het people being all like “youre making a bigger deal out of this than it is” i saw some ppl saying that on instagram and it just. made me so hurt and upset? theyre all like “its not abt the ships” and yeah!!! youre right!!! i could give a less fuck about the ships, its ABOUT the creators thinking its fine to hype up their lgbt audience and qbait them and then kill off one of their lgbt characters Right After that?? disgusting lmao!! 

[purebloodprincess]

001 hakyona and ren x kyoko 002 kyoko and yona

Hak&Yona

when I started shipping it if I did: Definitely not right at the beginning, I needed some time to get into it. Although to be honest that’s usually the case most of the time. I need to see the interactions, the dynamic and all that before I can ship something. With that being said, early HakYona was cute, however I started to really ship it only after Hak went through his character development and stopped being overprotective of Yona. I was also not necessarily a fan of his flirting early in the series. Honey scene anyone? To be honest, it makes me sad that people who saw the anime only have no idea about how amazing their relationship becomes later on.my thoughts: I FRIGGIN LOVE THEM. I know that I say this way too often, but it’s the healthiest shoujo ship I’ve ever seen.what makes me happy about them: They are just… oh God, they love each other so fucking much, it tears me up everytime.Honestly, one of the best aspect of their relationship is how much pride and faith Hak has in Yona later on in the series. He wants to show her accomplishments off to everyone, and he knows that she has the ability to defend herself. He is just so damn supportive of her, it’s beautiful.And Yona… the first time she saw how happy and proud Hak was after she hit the bull’s eye with the arrow, she thought to herself that she has to work harder and practice more so he can smile more often. ;__; In ch 152 when Hak finally confessed, he did not expect an answer from her. He is genuinely fine just staying friends if that’s what she wants. He is not pushy or forceful like most shoujo guys are. It’s amazing. There are thousands more reasons that make me happy about them, they are legit perfect okwhat makes me sad about them: THAT THEY ARE NOT OFFICIALLY TOGETHER YET. They are VERY close though, so hopefully it will happen in the next couple of chapters. C’mon Kusanagi, they need to become official so we can see all the adorable fluff we will most probably get.things done in fanfic that annoys me: That there is not enough fanfics lol. I think I read all of them, I need more. But other than that, most fanfics are pretty good.things I look for in fanfic: I usually look for canon compliant or canon divergence fanfics. I don’t like AUs, but that’s true for any fandom I follow. And if I were to be perfectly honest, I totally look for smut as well lol.who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: No one. They belong together lol.my happily ever after for them: Happily married, preferably with children. :’) Since I don’t want Yona to get the throne back, I want them to live in the Wind Tribe in a nice house. :))who is the big spoon/little spoon: Hak is the big spoon, Yona is the little spoon. I mean look at their size difference lol.what is their favorite non-sexual activity: Training together. :)

Ren&Kyouko

when I started shipping it if I did: Again, not right at the beginning, because to be honest I didn’t like Ren that much at first. I think I started shipping it after it turned out that Ren is actually the fairy-prince Corn, and they used to know each other as children. I found this adorable lol.my thoughts: This is another shoujo ship that’s incredibly well-written and healthy. I love it.what makes me happy about them: I think I’m sort of in love with the fact that they are destined to be together. I don’t usually like this sort of thing, but it’s done really well in Skip Beat. They met as small children, got separated, then against all odds Kyouko ended up in the showbiz world and met with him again. I think this is beyond amazing. I also love that they really do help each other in their professional lives, and of course, with their own personal issues as well. They just click.what makes me sad about them: THAT WE ARE AT 250+ CHAPTERS AND THERE IS NO INDICATOR THAT THEY WILL BE TOGETHER ANYTIME SOON. C’mon Nakamura…things done in fanfic that annoys me: There are… loads of weird af fics, there is no better way to put it. I personally don’t like crazy AUs, so when people write about aliens kidnapping one of them or stuff like that… well, I’m not sure what to say. No offense, of course, but it’s not my cup of tea.things I look for in fanfic: Just like with HakYona, I look for canon compliant fics mostly. And the smut is a must.who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: No one. They belong together.my happily ever after for them: I want both of them to be international stars by the time the series ends. It would be amazing if they could build a career in Hollywood. That would also mean that they live together in America, preferably close to Kuon’s parents! :)who is the big spoon/little spoon: Ren is the big spoon, Kyouko is the little spoon.what is their favorite non-sexual activity: I would like to think that on their days off they like to go out and act as random characters. Actually, I read about this in a fanfic before. They would always show up in the same restaurant, but dressed as a different type of couple everytime. One time they would be the hot girlfriend with the the science-nerd boyfriend, the next week they would act as a gay couple etc etc. I think this is something they would totally do.

Kyouko

how I feel about this character: I LOVE HER. She is very relatable and an amazing role model.all the people I ship romantically with this character: I ship her with Ren only.my non-romantic OTP for this character: Kyouko and Kanae! Their friendship is really precious.my unpopular opinion about this character: I don’t have any. Everyone loves Kyouko in the fandom so…one thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: By the end of the series I want her to be an internationally famous actress. I want her to be able to buy all the cosmetics and makeup that she wants. I want her to be loved by all her friends, and I want her to be in a happy and stable relationship with Kuon! This girl deserves all the happiness in the world, literally.my OTP: Ren x Kyoukomy cross over ship: None?? I don’t do this stuff lol.a headcanon fact: I don’t know if this counts as a headcanon, but I’m pretty sure that Kyouko subconsciously already put together the puzzle pieces and knows that Ren=Kuon=Corn. She probably is just going to deny it until he spells it out for her. But that is why I think that she won’t be surprised at all.

Yona

how I feel about this character: I LOVE HER. Just like Kyouko, she is very relatable. She didn’t become strong overnight, you actually see her practice and do her best. I love this, I love that she is not a damsel in distress.all the people I ship romantically with this character: Hak only, although I do have some weird… attraction to Jae-ha x Yona lol.my non-romantic OTP for this character: Lili and Yona I guess? I also really like her relationship with the rest of the HHB too. AND OF COURSE, I totally love the friendship between Hak and Yona!!! They are literally best friends with probably loads of inside jokes lol.my unpopular opinion about this character: I don’t have any? Well, maybe the fact that I don’t think Yona messed up in the Xing arc. Making Tae-Jun start the fire tribe beacon was a bit irresponsible, but she had no other choice, it was a last resort. Su-Won was, after all, hell bent on solving the conflict with war… he had to be stopped.one thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: I just want her to be happy, married to Hak and all that. I also do not want her to get the throne back, she is not suited to be the leader of Kouka.my OTP: Hak x Yonamy cross over ship: None?? I don’t do this stuff lol.a headcanon fact: I think that none of her children will have red hair. Simply because the only reason she has it is due to being Hiryuu’s reincarnation.

Send me a ship or a character

[horrible-monstrosity]

Those last three episodes of Steven Universe: a mini-essay

JUST FUCK ME UP

kevin party, donner party, what's the differenfe

hey guys, remember when lion disappeared? i legitimatedly don't. he ran off with connie or something and even though lars is probably in mortal peril and lion's the only way to get to him... naw don't need him. even though now steven's all worried bout lion he didn't give a shit enough earlier to search for him just for lion's own sake. nothing matters.

the party sadie and co fucked off to in the last episode and the tit-ular kevin party are not one and the same. why not? because none of this matters. nothing fucking matters. just... some stuff happens and none of it ever fucking lines up or amounts to fucking anything. why is this show still airing?

Kevin thinking Steven's name is Clarence is the best if not only joke this show has produced in the last like twenty episodes. Or thirty. How long has this season been going for? How many episodes does this show have?...

kevin is allergic to dog but lion is still here ok. the joke is he think lion it dog but the fact he hasn't like broke out in hives should maybe tell him something?.......

So the crux of this episode is, Kevin gives Steven this patriarchal man male romantic advice which basically amounts to "have a good time and don't be a sniveling soyball" and is entirely reasonable. But since this is Steven fucking Universe, it's clearly absolutely fucking terrible. I mean, maybe it's not the perfect solution for *this* particular situation, but why the fuck would he know that? Is he supposed to read Steven and Connie's fucking minds? Why does the feminist solution to problems so commonly require the male reading peoples' fucking minds? It's a perfectly fucking reasonable piece of general advice, and Kevin even seems to be at least the littlest bit actually concerned about Steven's love life issues beyond getting the cool quantum-tranny Stevonnie at his party... but no, he's gotta be wrong, because he's the designated small-time patriarchal oppressor and 84opposition to the gender revolution.

connie assumes that steven doesn't want to talk to her not because she's been bitching at him and been doing shit like accusing him of being friends with kevin leaving him to wonder what he's done wrong... but because he's friends with kevin, obviously. female accountability and logic at 0%

kevin doesn't know how to friends. are we supposed to hate him or feel sorry for him? ... never mind, both of those options are equally depressing with the way the show treats him.

connie likes steven's maximum soy pink polo shirt, because the way to get grils is to treat yourself like a defective woman who needs re-estrogenizing and soy yourself up. just fucking go cry at her and wear the soy clothes she bought you and drip snot upon her. bitches love snot and then even though steven said kevin had his heart broken and it looks like they have some sympathy for him connie goes "lol ofc he did" and he falls in the pool and they shit on him. fuck this gay earth the rebellion was a mistake homeworld did nothing wrong

So... what the fuck was the conflict here again? Seems like the only thing keeping Steven and Connie from making up was bad timing and mutual awkwardness. Did anyone learn anything from this, aside from Steven discovering he needs to get even more soyful if he wants to inject his gem cummies into a strong big-nosed short-haired minority female someday? Did any of this fucking matter?

Also, I've no idea if this is just fan conjecture or what, but apparently the "Sabina" (because yeah that's a name normal people hsve) who fucked Kevin up is actually the le mysterious pink-haired person mute lesbo who hit it off with Pearl forever ago and probably showed up again at some point in the last X episodes but I don't fucking remember it. You... you... how did you manage to make this even worse? So not only is Kevin terrible and wrong and evil for existing, and for hitting on hot five-gendered quasi-minority manchicks at parties, and for giving reasonable advice... he hit on a thicc pink turbo-lesbo and we're supposed to hate him for that, too. Just... how the fuck do I put this? It's like... stupid fucking cis straight normal fucking a white male, thinking this world is full of other normal people like yourself- the real Earth's population is 99% minority queer demigender faggosexuals, how dare you think you can get into a normal heterosexual relationship with a female of the species? He tried some normal human courtship instead of feminist-approved all-gendered-yet-female-oriented interactions fit only for mentally-deficient degenerate aliens, so he deserved to have his heart trampled on. She's a stryng fymyle fat womyn person, you fucking piece of shit, not some thing for you to treat like (an object/your property/an animal/whatever) by treating her like a normal human being. You're shit, normies are shit, and treating a transcendant gender-goddyss as equal to yourself is oppressive. Or... some fucking shit like that. fuck i don't know whatever

-

c'mon plot it's time to go the fuck back into space already!!! It occurs to me that Connie (probably, I don't fucking know) knew all this time Lars was trapped in spacedanger and Lion was the only thing Steven or anyone else on Earth could use to rescue him, but she decided to fuck off with him anyway. Because why? Because her selfish little emotional snit over Steven valuing her life is more important than Lars' own fucking life? Remind me, why are we supposed to like Connie again? Also why did Lion stay with her this entire time anyway? Usually he just fucks off and does whatever he wants. He never wandered back to Steven?

Connie immediately shows her ignorance and downplays the situation as a fun and funny adventure, steven and connie in space o ho ho! an attitude which hey you know might be conducive to PEOPLE THINKING YOU'RE NOT FUCKING FIT TO HANDLE YOURSELF IN SPACE AND THEY SHOULD LEAVE WITHOUT YOU TO PROTECT YOU... Pretty fucking retarded thing to say after all that bitching about... no, wait a minute, Connie never said anything about being treated like Steven's equal or being coddled, did she? I mean, she barely said anything about anything because this was an underdeveloped aborted fetus of an arc, but the entire crux of this disagreement really was just... #

god fluorite still creeps me the fuck out. She's basically some magna-tranny that's gone through eight different transitions of like three genders each and gained a new fat roll for each one. Is this supposed to make me like "diverse" people? Because it's not working. Every single second of her vocal drone grating across my eardrums makes me want ever more to perpetuate a holocaust against the legbutt people. Eugh. two children are all we need to save lars, don't bother bringing garnet or any of those other fucking main characters we have lying around or anything naw fuckit

On some level I almost enjoy how few fucks Lars has come to give, even doing shit like spouting the aesop he was just given as a kewl one-liner as he (kind of) trounces the bad guy... but still, it's all off-screen development that raises a lot of questions. Maybe it's just the change in environment and the lack of anyone to try and impress (the shitgems sure as hell aren't the cool kids) that's brought this out of him- that almost makes sense, but there's nothing indicating that's the case... or anything's the case, really. Maybe it's just some kind of tangential stockholm syndrome where I'm happy to see something actually fucking happening, I don't fucking know.

also how did they steal the ship? they """explain""" but... they really don't. They're just that good because take our word for it lars is really happy for those clean pants. how much did he shit himself over the past couple weeks

And then shit gets terrible again. Lars is more triggered over sadie than his own parents... because of fucking course he is. No, she wasn't worried sick, she was faffing around whining about having to do your work for you or having to work at all and then fucking quitting her job to go become a marxist rock guitarist. Hey, remember the purple cake incident? Lars was legitimately fucked up over his social anxiety and his inability to hang with the cool kids despite wanting so badly to do so, so Sadie just fucking around with them like it's nothing because she really is barely worried about his wellbeing... yeah, I think that shit's gonna fuck him up a little bit.

But no, Steven basically just... tells him to get the fuck over it. Because, like, he's not there so she can do whatever the fuck she wants, immediately. Fuck is this shit? Like all of five minutes into the episode Steven just starts fucking explaining this shitty twisted aesop to both Lars and the audience. Yeah man, you go die in space, your gf can immediately go do everything you ever angsted over with ease and I'll come rub it in your face and you should just fucking get over it because u totes love her that much, lol. *You* aren't entitled to your own emotions.

Oh and then Steven compares Sadie's faffing to Lars's fucking comandeering a space ship in order to keep himself alive. Because the woman's feelsies are equivalent to the man's fucking life. Guys, what the fuck am I watching?...

I think this is one of those... things... this show does, where it at first vaguely approaches something that would pass for a normal human cognitive outputting, but then turns, farts in your face like that sexy alien from Star Wars and flits off like Tinkerbell leaving you confused and asmellied. Where in an attempt to create an unthought new aesop never before cognizized by mankind it ends up with a bizarre twisted mess.

At the very least Steven maybe shoulda thought twice before bringing some of those photos. "Oh, look how well your abusive not-gf has been doing without you! Befriending everyone you ever wanted to befriend but couldn't because you need a fucking therapist! Yeah that'll make him feel better". Hey, remember when Steven was empathic, you guise? I mean that being thrown the fuck out was part of what defines this arc, but come on...

It also severely hurts the thing that it's played out so fast. Lars is #triggered by the photos, okay, but then Steven immediately gets on his case and REEEEEs at him for... trying to destroy Sadie's something or other, because I don;t fucking know feminism is the radical idea that a man's emotional freedom is so disgusting it'll destroy a pure beautiful deserving woman from a distance of a thousand light-years in a fucking instant- Calm your fucking tits, Steven Sugar, we're in the middle of fucking space, Lars has no way of destroying Sadie's whatever the fuck it was he was supposed to be destroying. Let him have his knee-jerk reaction. Also, all of a week or a month away from your best friend slash romantic interest is enough you should expect she's moved on from you completely. Okay.

... Hey, wait a minute, I thought Kevin Praty taught us that sniveling was the way to get all the pretty wymyn? What might have changed between then and now, a difference of one entire episode? ... No, really, I have no fucking clue. This time, the contradiction is so fucking incoherent I can't even turn it into "because Sugar and feminists like her place female emotions above all else". The only way I can see it is if shitting on certain types of males is equal to or higher than muh womans, as the Kevin Party incident was twisted specifically to work at Kevin's expense. ... It's funny how this runs completely opposite what I'd think most people would find healthy. If the person you're hurt over is nowhere fucking near you then get it out of your system, but don't go dumping all your emotional baggage on them at a fucking party. This show wants us to bottle up our emotions when there's no fucking reason to at all but mainline emotional diarrhea in the most inappropriate of situations. what is this shit?

lol the crew are made so fucking useless just by a single fucking photo phone just take it from him One of the shitgems calls Stevvie "friends"... plural. they aren't a singular "they". SOC JUS FAUX PAS

man i can;t believe stevonnie;s fucking dead to bad the show ended here guys i guess homeworld can just go take over the world now. it's better this way

-

This was apparently some sort of special event called "Stranded", but the stranding only lasts one episode. Oooooookay.

This one is entirely just a nitpick, but I find it so strangely interesting from a writing perspective that I just can't leave it out... The "everything is broken" joke is like three lines long and two lines two long. Stevonnie is like, man what's broken and we're shown the readout from the ship showing everything flashing red, okay... and then she's like, ohhh man wow look almost everything it broken?? who expect that ha ha. And then she says, at least the screen works... and that immediately gets broken. Ha haaaaa. I dunno bout you, but I woulda laughed more if they'd just cut it short- have Stevonnie see the screen and go "oh, everything" or even just "oh", in that high-pitched, slightly breathy tone of voice that says "well, shit". Then crash. Boom, short sweet and to the point and gives you like ten more seconds this episode to spend on the plot of the epi- oh wait

Stevonnie is stranded on spaceplanet because no communications, but... xei have magic. Just... shoot some magic fireworks or start a magic fire for smoke signals. Or a normal fire, even. If the problem is that random new green gem will also find you if you do this... actually mention that. Steven and Connie don't even seem to consider sending a physical signal of any kind, even though it should be an obvious idea.

And then Stevenconnie just... finds a random alien species? And casually eats it? This... this just raises so many questions... Throughout the entire run of this show up until this date, the only alien species we've seen has been the gems. The center of the entire show, something that's been continually developed (if not consistently, coherently or well)- there's a decent amount of thought put into how these lifeforms that're completely unlike anything on Earth function, both in biology and society, with some degree of interplay between the two. The show was kept focused on the effects of Rose's rebellion and events related to it, and we avoided all the extra thought, logic and possible scientific plot holes that would be brought into existence by trying to create and balance multiple forms if alien life from multiple different origins. But now they just... dumped this stuff on in there? Because why

This is at once the first new alien species we've seen since the very beginning of the show, the first organic species, the first animalistic/non-sentient species, and the first found in it's alien habitat... and not only are a fucking bunch of them all introduced at once, they're thrown in casually and Stevonnie fucking eats most of them. What the fuck? There's no thought put into these things either, they're just a bunch of wacky squacky animals mainly comprised of random Earth animal parts. There's no logic to how they work, why they exist, how they evolved like this, they're just... wacky funny animals for no reason. Fuck you. After the series up until this point has focused on developing one species with an entirely different biology, history and culture from humans, with all of those things to at least some degree influencing or connected to each other, seeing these critters introduced just at random with no logic or context is incredibly jarring. This was such a fucking bad idea...

Also Stevonne eats the fucking fruits and animals and drinks the water because all planets just have human-compatible food species and good old motherfucking H2O I guess

stevonnie has more stubble than steven ever did because i hate life and i hate everything. this is disgusting. It's even distributed weirdly; instead of being on ziouir's chin it spreads up either side of zoidrgh's face and actually on to the cheeks. And we just have to see it's fugly little cheekstubble for the entire fucking rest of the episode. gagh

And then we get to this... really weird dream sequence where some really weird writing decisions are made. It starts off in Connie's house with Connie's mom... uh, rising up out of the carpeting, but Stevonnie identifies them as "my house" and "my mom". Stevonnie is both Steven and Connie, but given we're used to Steven being the main character and usual viewpoint throughout the entire series this comes off as though it's Steven saying this is "his house/mom". But, you know, they're not. And for any fan who's not devoted enough to commit to memory which character's household interior this is, it's misleading until Connie's mom shows up and then confusing after that. Why the fuck did the writers decide to write the scene like this? Why not have Stevonnie go "my, uh, your, uh, Connie's house" or some shit? Or just remove this part entirely because it gets really weird when the mom starts talking about EXTERMINATING ORGANIC LIFE and setvonnie notices nothing. Then the mom turns into this... weird brownwashed minority fusion version of YD with a big ol' jellyglob of Conmom's hair slapped onto the back of her head. What is this shit? if you're going to make it a meaningful dream you can't just do random shit like that. stop mixing messages. Just... stop. why did they choose to do this, and with Conmom specifically? If it's supposed to imply PD and YD's relationship is like Connie and her mom's... well first of all, that doesn;t fucking work because PD is nothing like Connie at all. But ignoring that, if it's supposed to imply YD is some sort of a parental figure to PD... why Connie's mom? She's not particularly important, and we don;t know her all that well. If it's not a comparison to her specifically and it's just that she parent... why Connie;s mom? Of all the parental figures in the show, because... I don't know, this is dumb fuck this

Though once that shit stops I actually almost like this dream sequence. Having our main character taking the place of PD in the dream, reliving her memories, it not being clear we "are" PD and that Stevonnie is acting out this memory rather than acting under xfer own will until we get to the mirror scene, where Stevonnie punches the reflection of PD while their own appearance remains the same... that's pretty fucking nice. This might also be a manifestation of that Stockholm syndrome I mentioned earlier, though. PD wants things and is frustrated with her current situation. She tries to get what she wants by bitching at someone else to give it to her, sure, but the way she storms off on her own and punches the mirror implies she wants to change things, there's just something holding her back. She has a trajectory. Apparently the fnadom hates her for being a brat, but I almost like her. ..... bets are open on how long it takes for the writers to completely fuck this up.

and then steven and connie just go home and who fucking cares nothing mattersfuck this show

... It seems the fandom has latched on to PD being an off-color because she's small (because height is a color what the fuck is that term why is it that). Like the rich family that hides their embarrassing retarded offspring in the basement, I guess. (i still crackship lars with kevin by the way)

[lordnelson100]

More Khazâd Meta in the Form of Fic

Writing the Gimli half of Traveling Bodies may have been the most fun I’ve had writing Tolkien fic.

Because I slashed him all over the landscape (before he ends up with Legolas, of course).

With a Dwarven male/female couple, with a human lady, with a male Dwarrow non-romantically; long-term friends, one-night stands; happy casual encounter, unhappy casual encounter.

I said to someone last week that I really don’t write effective meta: it always comes out in story form, instead. That’s kinda how this happened.

There’s about fifty reasons why the Dwarves are my favorite Tolkienverse people to write, but a big one is gender/sex/identity--as is true for a lot of fans these days.

But one place I have a different take than a lot of fics is in assumptions around romance and monogamy. It’s *fascinating* to me that a lot of readers take these ingredients and make the cake they do!

The Dwarves are a people who we’re told . . 

Have a radically different gender split than Men: something like a third female, two thirds male.

Far less sexually dimorphic than humans, in exterior physical appearance (phenotype).

Other races have a hard time making visual distinctions, so any reports from non-Dwarves are inherently unreliable.

When they do find that soulmate equivalent, they do so only once, and marriage is both for life and singular (no remarriage if widowed). They jealously guard  their spouse (but also true for everything important to them so . . .)

They tend not to settle: if they can’t marry their OTP, they don’t marry.

Some are so wrapped up in their craft that they have less interest in marriage. Alternately this could be “aren’t interested in marriage, more interested in their work.”

So in total the number of male/female married with children is a small percentage of the total population, thus their numbers increase very slowly.

In fan-land, lots of people intuit that this leaves a *lot* of room open for stories exploring everything from m/m and f/f relationships  to trans identity.

BUT there seems to still be a fairly prevalent assumption that what you’d get from “marriage is rare/one true love” ideal is lots and lots of repressed single people, yearning for that Big Romance. Thus the widespread fanon idea of “the One.”

The ideal gets extended to include same sex couples, but it still assumes a pretty total conflation of romantic ideal and sexual pleasure. A lot of fics extend this to assume that everyone who hasn’t found “their One” is celibate/waiting around.

Then a character meets that one amazing Dwarf, Elf or Hobbit, and blam!  Sexual and romantic “on button.”

I kind of take it in the opposite direction. When opposite sex marriage is idealized but rare (like, you may never meet your soulmate rare, and they may not be available when you do), why wouldn’t you end up with a culture where friendship-sex and casual sex are the norm?

With a totally different read on gender differences, would concepts like straight/gay/bi even develop? Why would people necessarily be attracted to “either/ or” and not “any”? Maybe some individuals would be consistently attracted to only people of their own sexy parts, or only the opposite, but would it be a notable “thing”?  (Asexuality and aromantic would be other possibilities, of course).

And why assume that folks who *at some point* will meet the partner with whom they want to be monogamous,  did not have sexual and/or romantic relationships before that point? Or that the folks Tolkien mentioned who couldn’t marry the one they want, would never get in bed with anyone else as consolation? And, ok,  so married couples are notable for fidelity in this culture: why have this rule out mutually-agreed on third-parties?

Well, partly I can answer my own question. Legolas/Gimli and Thorin/Bilbo are the characters we have as principals, and they’re fantastic, and Legolas/Gimli have one of the most romantic endings ever (happy version) and Thorin/Bilbo have one of the most romantic endings ever (tragic version). Having their story center on the suspense around, and eventual fulfillment, of Romantic Tropes can be incredibly satisfying to writers and readers both.

But, well, the questions and assumptions itch at me . . . and I ended up writing a two-parter in which the prevailing norm for Mahal’s folk  is:

“So long as you wrong no one’s vows, fuck who you like!”

[ghostofmoriarty]

Fictional Favorites Tag Game

I was tagged by @yourgoodfriendraichel so here goes  I am going to follow in Raichel’s footsteps and put this under a break, because oooh boy did it get long  1. What is your MBTI? It changes every time I take the test, but  INTP /INTJ are my most common results 

2. What is your Hogwarts House? Ravenclaw. I’m quite the academic these days.

3. Are you a book person or a TV person? I love books on principle, but I love tv so much and it’s so much more CONVENIENT.  (this is @yourgoodfriendraichel‘s answer, but it’s so 100% accurate, I’m keeping it) 

4. What is your favorite book series? Harry Potter will always have a special place in my heart, as will Percy Jackson and Cirque du Freak. I love Dirk Gently (Douglas Adams was an amazing writer through and through) and Sherlock Holmes because I am garbage for a good detective story.  ASOIAF and the entire Tolkienverse (LotR et al) are some of my favorites. Oh! And The Sparrow, there was a sequel so it counts as a series. I haven’t read the sequel yet, but The Sparrow was legitimately one of the greatest books I have ever read and I am super excited to check out the sequel when I have a few days off of work that isn’t dedicated to mowing the lawn (it's been raining sooo much here)

5. What is your favorite TV series? I love so many tv series. Aquabats! Super Show! will always be in my top 10. I am garbage for TURN: Washington’s Spies even though I think it’s kind of terrible, oooh and Dirk Genty’s Holistic Detective Agency, can’t believe I forgot about that one, I was literally just talking about the books. And no matter how angry I get at Doctor Who, I will always return to watch the new season (this last season was really good, thank god) but I think Classic Doctor Who is a thousand times better than the reboot

6. Which fantasy universe would you most like to live in?  I don’t know, because in any universe I won’t be the hero (I’m not even the hero/protagonist in THIS universe, so why would it be any different in a fictional one?) so I would need one that I could live happily and not be incinerated by dragons or forced to fight some nobleman’s war. Yeah, I’ve managed to talk myself out of every fantasy universe I could think of. How about Harry Potter? Yeah, sure Hogwarts has a scarily high student fatality rate for a high school and there’s a massive war every couple of decades that wipes out half the generation, but magic would be fun. I think I would take a short life with magic over a long life without it (assuming that I don’t end up a muggle or a squib, of course)

7. Favorite character ever? Finn from Star Wars, Sansa Stark from ASOIAF (note: ASOIAF and NOT GoT), Prince Charles Edward Stewart from Outlander…. That’s a really weird one, but Outlander was one of the most horrible (and uncomfortable) shows I have sat through but I really loved Bonnie Prince Charlie?? He was just an idealistic ray of sunshine in this bland, bleak wasteland of a tv show. He wouldn’t make the list if my hatred for the show was any lessened, but because I hate the show so much, my love for him is exemplified immensely. Anyway, Theodore “TBag” Bagwell from Prison Break, the entire cast of Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, Pietro Maximoff (and 99% of all XMen), Sauron, etc. So many.

8. Character you would like to personally slap in the face: Abe Woodhull from TURN: Washington’s Spies. He’s terrible, through and through.

9. Character you would like to personally murder: CHLOE FROM LIFE IS STRANGE. I WOULD HAVE MURDERED HER SO HARD IF MY GAME DIDN’T GLITCH ON THE LAST LEVEL.  *she’s a terrible human whose manipulative and abusive. WLW deserve better options in both general representation and romanceable wlw characters in video games

10. Character you would gladly intern under:  Any of the Xmen (can I be a plucky assistant who has a really lame super power but still tries to help, please???)  OOOOOH and Larten Crepsley from Cirque du Freak (I LOVE HIM, YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW also he is in my top 5 favorite characters of all time, so I can’t believe I left him out in the fave character section)

11. Character you would totally have tea with: I don’t drink tea, but I’d probably go on a late-night coffee run with the entire Star Wars cast or Aquaman. Aquaman probably hates coffee though, so The Riddler? Edward Nygma seems like an “up all night anxiously drinking coffee while finishing up some project (probably a criminal scheme)” kinda guy.

12. Character that you feel really needs a hug: The entire freaking cast of Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency (note: the tv show, not the books)

13. Character you love that you would probably hate irl: Most of them, to be honest. I am drawn to horrible people in fiction. Simcoe, TURN: Washington’s Spies (note: tv show version, not real-life verson); T-Bag, Prison Break; Cesare Borgia, The Borgias;

14. Character you would realistically be friends with irl: Ken, Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency 

5. First character you had a crush on (if any): Jack Sparrow………

16. Favorite ships: ooooOOOh boy where to begin…. DISCLAIMER: when I say I ship things, I just mean I find the dynamic between the 2+ characters interesting and compelling. I don’t necessarily feel that they should be a canonical end-game romance (or even a romance at all), nor do I stan the relationship as healthy for either of the characters, nor do I feel that these relationships (platonic, romantic, or otherwise) should be heralded as a beacon of #goals to aspire to. I literally mean “hey those two have a cool dynamic, I wanna see more of that” -Master/Missy (I’ve been calling it “MASTERbator but I don’t know what the official ship name) (Doctor Who) -Anna Strong/Hewlett (TURN) -Foggy Nelsen /Matt Murdock (Daredevil) -Abe Woodhull/ Robert Townsend (TURN; note: Rob is too good for Abe but Rob’s reactions to Abe are too perfect to not ship) -Sansan (ASOIAF; I ship this 100% platonically) -Jaime and Brienne (ASOIAF; this is 100% not a platonic ship) -Finn/Poe -Han/Lando (we have NEVER heard the details of that card game, is all I’m sayin’) -Edward Nygma/ Oswald Cobblepot (Gotham/ DC; this is legit the ONLY reason I continue to watch Gotham. Everything else is garbage, but these two’s relationship, man. It’s so compelling, they’re so in love and so unwilling to put their differences and murderous tendencies aside to make their relationship work. I have so many feelings about this ship, okay)

-Joker/Batman (LEGO Batman; it was so beautiful, guys)

I have so many more, I don’t even know

17. Series (TV/book) that you feel ended terribly:  Harry Potter’s ending is literally a meme now, so I won’t do overboard explaining that one. BUT, The Hunger Games. Okay, so this fucking series has a female character who is constantly talking and thinking about how she doesn’t want any children, and how she doesn’t feel like she should be a mother, which is pretty progressive right??? Also, 2 and a half fucking books are building up to an end all war/ revolution and It’s gonna be the biggest damn thing ever, right??? WELL how does this book series end??? Katniss, the FUCKING  NARRATOR, gets hit in her head and blacks out, so she (AS WELL AS THE READER) misses the majority of the final battle, and THEN this series reveals that Gail (the less useless of the two potential love interests) may have caused the death of Katniss’ sister, so he leaves and Katniss chooses Peeta for no other reason than “well, I’m 17 so I should settle down with SOMEONE and you’re within proximity, so I guess you’ll do” and they get banished to District 12 where Katniss mothers a bunch of children because what else are you gonna do but fuck, and basically the entire ending is one piece of bullshit after the other (ALSO THE MOVIES FRAME THE ENDING AS “KATNISS IS NOW A MOTHER THEREFOR SHE’S REACHED HER POTENTIAL AS A WOMAN, ISN’T THIS A HAPPY ENDING” and fuck this entire series)

18. Series (TV/book) that had so much potential but was actually an epic disaster: Literally everything I watch. Dr Who, TURN: Washington’s Spies, Gotham, Sherlock, Game of Thrones; But hey, that’s what fanfiction is for

19. Worst book/movie/TV show you’ve ever read/seen: Ooooh I’ve read and watched some TERRIBLE things in my day.  Outlander. Outlander was pitched to me as having 18th Century Scotland and TIME TRAVEL. Some of my favorite things, aaaand it ended up being one of the worst things I have ever seen. 90% of it is just boring, but the other 10% involves, in my opinion, really poorly handled sexual assault. I won’t go into details here, but it was bad.  

Also, Borgias was fascinating, but bad. And TURN: Washington’s Spies. Honestly, I watch a lot of period pieces because I think the clothes are pretty or I am interested in the time period and/or historical events in which its set around, but then 99% of them are all really poorly-written soap opera-y dramas with nice sets and costumes.   20. Favorite book from your childhood: Harry Potter

21. 3 Favorite Tropes: Complex Family Dynamics (I think that’s more of a category of tropes than a trope itself, but I love me some fam drama), Happy endings for gays (that’s not really a trope, but it fills me with love and happiness every time it happens –which is rare), oooh I don’t know. I can’t think of any right now, but I do love a lot of tropes, I promise.

22. 3 Most Hated Tropes: Bury your Gays (killing off gay characters for no reason), Rape as empowerment (ie: when the narration treats a sexual assault as a motivator for women that “makes them stronger”); Man Pain (when a woman is assaulted/ threatened by the antagonist, and the main male-protag uses it as “motivation” to fight the antagonist. The story doesn’t allow the female character who experienced the trauma to be the focus of the story/arc, her traumatizing experience is not about her, it is ONLY there to develop the male character she is close to; the story essentially treats the male as the real victim)

23. Scariest thing you’ve ever watched/read: James and the Giant Peach

24. Anything you’d like to recommend? Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency (please send me a message if you want to know what it’s about, it’s SO GOOD. It’s fun, quirky, unlike anything else, and it has a diverse cast including characters who are poc (and woc), characters who have disabilities, women who are badass, none of the women are ever sexualized at all, it has corgis, and mysteries, and scifi, and it’s just a big adventure. (I also recommend the books, and the 2011 tv series Dirk Gently)

25. Would you like any recommendations? I’m game for anything. I love period pieces, fantasy, science fiction, TIME TRAVEL, quirky detectives, gory things, child-friendly things, honestly as long as it has interesting characters I am game. I don’t even need a good story, just characters.

  Heeey I am terrible at tagging people. If you want to do the thing, please do! And tag me so I can read it :) Also, if you actually read this whole thing, then you deserve all the gold stars, thank you!

[dirtyfruit]

Please please please tell me your thoughts on the ending for Naruto. I love reading your views on writing (whether it's dragon age or homestuck) and I'd really like to hear what you think about it.

ok, to be fair, as someone who grew up with naruto and used to OBSESS over it as a kid, the show itself has always been pretty badly written. the first seasons are like, nigh unfucking watchable, and shippuden is only barely better because the animation quality went way up and we started getting some honest to god character development (but naruto’s first couple of transformations were just … embarassingly bad). 

so, like, as far as writing goes, i never expected much from the ending to begin with? i figured he’d be the kind of guy to make everything super heteronormative so that wasn’t really a surprise. but like, sasusaku just came out of nowhere man. sasuke absolutely has not earned anybody in that entire cast of characters as a romantic partner. he’s BARELY earned them as a friend. i used to ship sasunaru hardcore my guy but frankly sasuke is a self-absorbed asshole who has done some truly irredeemable shit to the people he supposedly cares about. sakura deserves WAY better - hell, even if it’s just a different boring husband, i’d rather her hook up with someone boring and simple in a stupid shoe-horned All Women Get Pregnant marriage than be stuck with the man who has seriously fucked up, controlled, and otherwise negatively impacted her entire adolescence and early adult life. 

naruto and hinata is … okay? i mean, hinata is nice, and she did show some real support to naruto that i thought was sweet, but they just havent really been explored in dynamics outside of a combat situation. like, it really feels more like they were infatuated with each other because times were rough and hinata had a crush on naruto - it’s like naruto just gravitated to the first person who liked him and didn’t try to kill or maim him. we really didn’t get to explore them as an actual couple in a domestic setting, and that makes their marriage and inevitable Affirm Straightness babies really out of left. i really like the headcanon (that kishimoto totally accidentally made semi-canon with his continuity error about naruto’s markings) that naruto is trans, and either hinata is as well, or they got a donor. but i know in my heart that kishimoto isn’t that progressive of a writer, so in reality they’re probably meant to be a cishet couple, which is just boring.

the sheer amount of pairing off and baby making into perfect nuclear families is really disappointing, even if expected, yknow? i like that gaara isnt shown with a wife (as far as i know) and has an adopted kid, which is about as close to an implicitly gay character as i think we’re gonna get, and i’m glad he teased Kakashi and Gai maybe becoming a thing, since neither of them are married off with kids and they have a pretty significant relationship still, but that’s just digging for something that isn’t like a 1950s propaganda poster. all in all, the endgame direction for just about everybody was really terrible and sloppy.

griping about the marriage stuff aside, i could go on a whole tangent about how nonsensical the finale was. all i’m really gonna say is, never introduce your villain midway through the climax. obi and madara were enough of a ‘big bad’ for shippuden, and even they were kind of hamfisted in there. orochimaru was always the primary villain, the penultimate ‘bad guy’. everything after his defeat just felt … excessive? i feel like he should’ve been built into a bigger player and made the final boss, versus killing him off and then going “here’s the REAL puppetmaster, tobi, who is obito!! except, HE’S being puppeteered by madara!! gasp! EXCEPT, HE’S BEING PLAYED BY SOMEONE EVEN BIGGER!! and here’s a whole bunch of lore and prophecy shit you didnt hear about until like, just now, but is totally maybe vaguely hinted at in earlier seasons, if you reach for it?”

it honestly just felt like kishimoto had no idea where his story was going from the start, didn’t plan for the finale, kept it vague enough he could do whatever he wanted when he felt like it, and then shoved as many “tear jerking character climax moments” into it as possible - killing off neji, 5,000 speeches to naruto about how he’s jesus, sasuke having at LEAST 100 “he’s still sort of a decent guy, just tortured!” moments, etc. which is just lazy writing. instead of giving every single character ever made in the show a final resolution at the very end and dragging it on forever with a slew of new, last-minute villains to keep the conflict going, he should’ve utilized some of the literal hundreds of goddamn filler episodes he had to flesh out and wrap up side-characters earlier on, so when it came time to finish off the series, he could pinpoint and focus on who he wanted to really shine.

“every character is a main character”, “reverse matriyoshka villains in rapid succession in the last battle”, “convenience lore to make lazy writing seem less lazy”, and “a woman’s happiness is so pivoted on their ability to marry and have children that she should settle down with any man possible, even if he’s literally tried to murder her multiple times” are all just terrible principles of writing. and that’s just skimming the surface.

[motherfuckingpriestessofhecate]

Ship that you have as an OTP: 🌹Ship that you're indifferent to: 😑Ship that makes you sad: 💔Ship that you find disgusting: 💩Ship that you find cute but don't ship: ✌Ship that you secretly like: 💚Ship that you used to have as an OTP: 💙Ship that you find most sexy: 👅Ship that you can never see happening: 👎Ship that is canon but you don't ship: 💤Ship that is unpopular but you still like: 💘Ship that is taboo: 💦Ship that pisses you off: 💣Ship you're curious about:

Controversial shipping asks

(( Judging by what you sent me over Discord, I’m guessing you didn’t mean to have the last few cut out so I’ll do those as well ovo/ ))

Ship that you have as an OTP: 🌹

(( Medea x Kuzuki tbh. At first I was kind of wary of it because the basis of her falling in love was just that he was one of the first men to be nice to her, but as I’ve read more and more of their stuff it’s just grown on me. They’re horribly mismatched, but at the same time they’re in love with each other to an extent that they’re willing to make things work. They’re not soulmates, they’re not perfect for each other, but they still love each other and are willing to do what it takes to make it work even if it’s not natural. I just really like that about them. ))

Ship that you’re indifferent to: 😑

(( Kirei x Kiritsugu, actually.A lot of people don’t like it and I get it, but I also get how people could ship it seeing as they both spent like half of Fate/Zero obsessing over the other. I guess I’m not entirely indifferent so much as I have slightly conflicting emotions that balance out to say “whatever, ship what you want to ship” ))

Ship that makes you sad: 💔

(( Julius x Mordred. Actually not really, I just wanted to make two of my friends suffer at least once with this ask. If I were to serious though, Kotomine x Claudia. At that point, Kirei was just trying his best and Claudia believed in him even though, in the end, there was nothing to believe in. And then Caren got completely screwed over gg disease mom. ))

Ship that you find disgusting: 💩

(( Pretty much all Avenger ships honestly. Avenger Angra Mainyu, that is. I like the dynamics that he shares with Bazett and Caren, but considering the things he talks about doing to Bazett and does do to Caren… Even if I don’t see that scene as canon, I just can’t ship him with either of them in good conscience. Friends, sure. But romantic partners? No thanks. ))

Ship that you find cute but don’t ship: ✌

(( Medea x Kojiro. I guess I ship it a tiny bit and would be willing to RP it someday, but for the most part I just like art of them. ))

Ship that you secretly like: 💚

(( I’m not so sure it’s ‘secret’ but Jeanne Alter and Saber Alter. Those two are just constantly antagonistic towards eachother and I love it. Another ship that I’ve basically never talked about is Saber Lily x Jeanne Alter, mostly because every interaction I’ve had between my Jalter and Saber Lily’s has been good shit… well besides for one with an AU Jalter but we don’t talk about that one when we’re also talking about shipping. ))

Ship that you used to have as an OTP: 💙

(( Medea x Julius. With my main verse for Medea, she sees him as a younger brother so it’s kind of hard for me to seriously ship them. I still think they’d make a kickass team in a Grail War together, but I don’t particularly desire romance between the two of them. ))

Ship that you find most sexy: 👅

(( I don’t really ship stuff for sex, so anything with Medb I guess. ))

Ship that you can never see happening: 👎

(( EMIYA x Saber, but in the sense of “they’ll never be a happy couple together” and not in the sense of “they’ll never have feelings for one another.” I can see them liking each other but actually getting together? lmao, good fucking luck you angst nuggets. ))

Ship that is canon but you don’t ship: 💤

(( Uhh… Rama x Sita I guess? I’m not saying I dislike the ship, just that all I’ve ever really heard about either of their personalities is how madly in love they are with one another. I’m just not capable of having interest in characters, or their relationship, when all I know about is that they love eachother a lot. It feels like I’m shipping Romeo and Juliet or some shit. I know they both have more to their personalities, but I haven’t heard enough about it in Fate to be interested enough to even try and find that more. Seriously, all I’ve heard about is their love for eachother. I know more about the first two Earthbenders’ personalities than I do these two smh ))

Ship that is unpopular but you still like: 💘

(( Unpopular in the sense that I’ve rarely seen anyone talk about it? Jeanne x Karna. They’re both fucking saints in their own right, let’s be honest here. Also both of them died horrible and unfair deaths but don’t show much anger over it, and in general their interactions from what I’ve seen are just… Nice. ))

Ship that is taboo: 💦

(( Medea x Jason in any way, shape, or form. Disgusting. Gross. Foul. Rotten. Though I wouldn’t mind RPing a Medea that’s still enchanted to be in love with Jason at some point. But actual Jason x Medea stuff? Dude couldn’t even thank her for chopping her little brother up into pieces, screw him. ))

Ship that pisses you off: 💣

(( Any incest ship, really. Illya x Shirou, Hakuno x Hakuno, Jeanne x Jeanne Alter, Mashu x Lancelot… I don’t care if they’re actually blood related or not, if they’re described as brothers/sisters or parents/children then please do Not…. selfcest is also kind of eh to me, but not to the same extent, so to each their own. ))

Ship you’re curious about: 👀

(( Caren x Saber Alter. On one hand there’s no way they’d be able to stay in the same room for more than five minutes without Caren being cut in two, but on the other hand I feel like they’d make a really good master-servant pair and possibly develop something other than mutual tolerance for eachother, even if it’s just respect. ))

Ship that needs more love: 💖

(( Jeanne Alter x the female FGO protagonist. I only ever see ship art of her and Gudao, none of her with Gudako. Well, very little of her with Gudako. Let them be gay, it’s not gonna be the first thing to cause either one of them angst considering they’re fighting to save humanity’s existence. ))

Ship that is most misunderstood: 💢

(( Sakura x Shirou, I think. I don’t want to go at length about it, but basically it’s more of Shirou’s character being misunderstood when it comes to this ship, due to the Heaven’s Feel route.I think they’d make a very cute couple and agree that Shirou would walk through all nine layers of hell for Sakura… But he wouldn’t betray his ideal, at least not like he does in Heaven’s Feel. Him deciding to prioritize Sakura over the hundreds of lives she was taking each night AND possibly all of humanity just feels like a slap in the face after Fate and UBW explore him trying to figure out how to stay true to his ideal without becoming a complete fucking mess. For him to throw away his ideal I can understand, but under those circumstances? Are we really sure that Sakura was the only character to go ‘Dark’ in Heaven’s Feel because jesus christ boy.

TL;DR: Mind of Steel is my personal ‘canon’ end to Heaven’s Feel, but I still think Shirou x Sakura is a great ship when it doesn’t endanger a shitton of other people. ))

[sweetandunholy]

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“Richard Gansey III had forgotten how many times he had been told he was destined for greatness.”

“He was a king. And this was the year he was going to die.” The Raven King is the thrilling final installment in the dark and magical series Raven Cycle series created by Maggie Stiefvater. A brooding and omnious novel that will hook you from the first sentence, sweep you off your feet and land you right in the heart of the Aglionby Raven boys adventure to be a witness to its all consuming ending.

4/5 Stars Recommendation: Worth every single page from the first sentence to ends. Prophecies will be will be unmasked, curses will be unleashed, relationships will set sail and terrifying fears will come to life. All wrapped in a poetical ending to satisfy all fans. Flawed for a series ending however, and thus I can’t get myself to give it 5 stars.

How to get Hime to love a book: 

Step One: Be preferentially YA Step Two: Include strong and complex characters with original character arcs Step Three: Give me gay boys, all the gay boys. Bonus Step: Be Maggie Stiefvater

Because holy shit where do I start.

The story is set one week after the events of Blue Lily Lily Blue, with Maura and Artemus back in Fox Way along with the cryptical Gwenllian —the later two who are not exactly getting along well— while the Gangsey & Co are still in the search for their Welsh King of Myth. A new addition to their group is made in the form of charismatic and brave Henry Cheng, who will reach and touch Gansey in more ways than one.

One final kiss will be shared. Two last glimpses of special someones will be given, and without a goodbye they part. Three relationships that will at last set sail.  And one final door will at last close but it will leave so many more open, so many many more.

The Raven King is what the Raven boys’ friendship is for Blue: Breath taking, all powerful, all consuming and engrossing. Maggie’s ever praised prose is better than ever, it makes you feel everything you have never been able to put into words between all of the character’s arc climax, the creepier and scarier atmosphere throughout the entire book, her ever present quirky humor, and the larger than life vibe this book is. Its entire more-ness, because that is what it is. More. The Raven King is more than YA itself, its more than fantasy and its more than The Raven Boys, The Dream Thieves and Blue Lily Lily Blue ever was. It is the ever so deserved end, carefully wrapped up in a satisfying end that leaves open the possibility of so much more.

I had a couple of problems with characters who almost seemed irrelevant with how little participation they had in the final plot, however, I will give my kudos to Stiefvater for making each one of them original and interesting nonetheless.

Click Read more for book analysis and rants and spoilers or you’ll find them below this point, my sweet children. Stuff your faces and enjoy !

  Now here’s the thing, I’ve read a fuck ton of other reviews who talk about how they loved the foreshadowing on Adam & Ronan. From the Dream Thieves and Adam being Ronan’s second secret, to all the mentions of homosexuality by Kavinsky, when I thought it was pure teenage dickery and not a direct criticism on Ronan’s sexual orientation— Except no I, I didn’t pick up on it. Shame on me, I know.

But in my opinion, perhaps that made it all the better and this is why:

“Adam smiled cheerily. Ronan would start wars and burn cities for that true smile, elastic and amiable.”

Ronan is a sensible, sensible thing. If anything the entire opposite of Blue’s sensible, prudent. No, Ronan feels too much, too hard and too deep. He wasn’t your YA charismatic bad boy, Ronan was broken and angry, but Ronan craved for love and affection and most specially handing it to others. It had all been so subtle up until that quote, where I put my book down and had to smile to myself for a good ten minutes before I could pick it back up.

Ronan would start wars and burn cities for Adam Parish’s smile. The power of those words hit me like a rock, and no, I didn’t suddenly suspect they would get involved romantically even then.

Ronan let out a breath, put the model down on the bed beside him, and kissed Adam.

Once, when Adam had still lived in the trailer park, he had been pushing the lawn mower around the scraggly side yard when he realized that it was raining a mile away. He could smell it, the earthy scent of rain on dirt, but also the electric, restless smell of ozone. And he could see it: a hazy gray sheet of water blocking his view of the mountains. He could track the line of rain travelling across the vast dry field towards him. It was heavy and dark, and he knew he would get drenched if he stayed outside. It was coming from so far away that he had plenty of time to put the mower away and get under cover. Instead, though, he just stood there and watched it approach. Even at the last minute, as he heard the rain pounding the grass flat, he just stood there. He closed his eyes and let the storm soak him.

That was this kiss.

IT WAS AMAZING. I will be honest when I say I was half bored and half doing something else when I read this chapter and I missed Ronan leaning in to kiss Adam. Instead, I sat through Adam’s description of a kiss before going back and realizing it was Ronan who had just kissed hi,

I felt my heart stop in joy. Then tears in my eyes.

THESE BOYS ARE JUST SO BLESSED? I’M NOT OKAY HOLY CHRIST. Like, lets just sit back and take a moment to appreciate Maggie didn’t just do this to please all of her LGBT+ readers once and move on? We had three heartfelt kisses between these boys that moved me three times as any interaction between Blue and Gansey could’ve ever. We had several descriptions and accounts for how much they had kissed, and how it felt and the intensity of of their feelings.

My feelings are an oil spill. I am so pleased Maggie reached this concussion between her characters, Adam and Ronan did deserve the best. They grew and changed together, this relationship is the one that could feel the most deserved in the entirety of YA.

Shoutout to Blue and Ronan’s friendship.  This and Ronan trying to dream Blue eye cream in the middle of his life going to shit. I’m so happy to see how their friendship has evolved.

“Gansey asked, “Do you have time to run an errand with us? Do you have work? Homework?” “No homework. I got suspended,” Blue replied. “Get the fuck out,” Ronan said, but with admiration. “Sargent, you asshole.” Blue reluctantly allowed him to bump fists with her as Gansey eyed her meaningfully in the rearview mirror.”

And one last shoutout all the way back to The Raven Boys.

“Ronan said, “I’m always straight.” Adam replied “Oh, man, that’s the biggest lie you’ve ever told.”

We now know you know, Adam. These little details made my day while reading the series.

Thoughts on Henry Cheng:

He…. Happens. And it’s weird. People love him and I don’t…. Get it.

Henry Cheng is an absolutely useless, diversity pick character who Stiefvater decided to throw in at the end of the series. Oh forgive me, he did give Gansey some life changing thoughts on beating your fears and like that’s chill; but it feels like something any other character could’ve done if they would’ve been given the right exposition or backstory. Like Ronan or Adam, who are both characters who have been through some shit and could believably have more to their backstory than what we already know.

To me a golden rule of writting should be to never introduce new, major character on the last book of a long series because everything should’ve been established in your previous books. The Raven Cycle was very guilty about introducing a new villain in every book [Except for arguably Blue Lily Lily Blue] and then have him fade into the oblivion of not being relevant to the series again. This is mildly forgivable in the previous books since its A) Not the final book and B) You’re trying to throw obstacles into your character’s paths so they can continue on with their adventure.

But why would you add a main character who adds nothing to the story and add around 200 pages of filler about him? Not to mention Gansy and Henry became instant best friends The Toga party was by far one of my favorite scenes simply because of the simplicity of it. It was a break from the creepy and omnious tone to remind us: Yo, they’re still kids js and it was a nice andd very welcome addition. The scene that actually made me appreciate Blue and Gansey as a couple too and I had Cheng to thank for that… Now why couldn’t we leave it at that? Robobee and the dream black market arc was just… Odd. And the way he came in, helped Gansey fight his fear, the robobee acted as a glorified GPS was way too convenient in my opinion. The book could’ve done perfectly without and it was absolutely irrelevant and specially distracting. Specially through the end scenes where he just seemed to be mindlessly following and strutting along while getting… Absolutely nothing.

The worst of it is the fact that Cheng got more spotlight than Noah. A character that was long established in the previous books and that fans were actually curious about his development and what was going on with him. We had a Cheng word vomit in exchange for Noah’s ever continuing loose ambiguity.

Thoughts on assorted secondary characters:

Another one of the problems I had with this book that minorly disappointed me. It  doesn’t entire bug me per se, but bothered me enough I’d like to put down my thoughts on it on the review.

There were a buttload of character introduced that honestly lead nowhere. I’m talking about the Dream black market net of collectors, curators and sellers. Seondeok, Piper, Laumonier? (wth— was his name again) and Lumonier x3 and probably a few more. These had a very minor purpose in the story and disappeared in the end as soon as they came. Piper was a bitch for no good reason but yeah okay, she’s a bitch and we must dislike her. Seondeok is as needed in this story as his son, and no matter how many clever chapters you start with “Depending on when you start, this story is about Seondeok” I won’t feel for her, I won’t care about her and I won’t care about any of the other secondaries. And I won’t even dignify Laumonier(s) with a segment— It’s so random and unneeded it doesn’t deserve the attention.

I was waiting until the end while clinging to the hope that it’d be some great mystery Maggie would wrap up and would make sense and MAYBE would be relevant to be story but that was that for expectations.

The Grey man’s character arc was more than done in my opinion and I wasn’t sure why he was suddenly forced to leave. Maura’s goodbye was more than uneventful and was disappointingly unmoving. I would’ve not minded his character just staying the way he was, a retired hit man with a psychic girlfriend who now got his well deserved rest. Him leaving and the novel ending with him unaccounted for was very unsatisfying as well.

Neeve died and I’m just lmao I don’t care but ok.

Then there’s Opal (Orphan girl) too, another of the secondary characters that I very much rooted for throughout the novels. I had so many theories for this character, hoping she’d have some sort of major yet hidden relevance to the plot and Ronan but in the end she felt both like some odd… Unfulfilling filler with no closure either.

In fact, this entire section could be easily summarized in a lack of closure for most secondary characters. While I can’t stop praising how greatly wrapped up the rest of the book is, most secondary characters make me fill unfulfilled. I don’t want to hear Maggie could be getting off if she was just paving the road and setting these characters up for the Dreamer trilogy, because this tweet happened on the end of 2016:

and the series was way more than over in 2015. I would very much appreciate and may manage to forgive Stiefvater if she were to develop and add onto these characters on the Ronan trilogy, but the sad truth is that I just don’t care for most of them and I don’t really feel like learning more about them either. Again, just purposeless filler.

General Gansey disappointment:

Another one of my golden rules in writing is that if you’re going to kill a character: You should definitely kill them. Reviving a character as an intelligent plot device or as a character goal can be a relatable thing and an earned struggle. When characters die simply to revive immediately… Simply does not work for me. I’m more grossed out by the moment and feel much less than the emotion overflow I would’ve had to live with if Gansey had died.

What’s more is the potential of Maggie heading down a great path for Gansey when Cabeswater tried to explain he could not just bring him back but “Make some essential part of itself human-shaped” and  “It was impossible to bring him back unchanged […] But it might be able to refashion him into something new”. This was so much wasted potential, such an exciting idea.

One of the most popular theories I was an avid followed of was the idea that Gansey was Glendower. Think about it as a quick parenthesis:

Reasons why Gansey could’ve (and should’ve) been Glendower:

— A continuos theme throughout the novel was time’s circle continuum instead of a straight line. “Not yet happened” a synonym of “Already has happened”: The present Noah sacrificing himself for 10 year old Gansey to live, the gang finding the aged up Camaro wheels along with Glendower’s shield, Blue’s face in the painting of the three women, etc.  These are all examples of how the possibility of Gansey being both Gansey and Glendower exist throughout the novel, or at least, an incarnation of him.

— Blue recognizing there was something more about him, Gansey’s agelessness as described by Adam:

“Adam knew that she had sensed the otherness to his friend: that sense that Gansey was both young and old, that he’d only just arrived, or he’d always been.”

— Gwenllian calls Gansey “My lord” “Father” in multiple occasions — The constant raven motif repeating itself from Aglionby’s uniform to Ronan’s dream Chainsaw — The women and several others creatures chanting “The Raven King, make way for the Raven King” to Gansey. Glendower being the real Raven King. — In the end scene, Gansey asking the wind to show him the Raven King and raven’s responding to his call. Glendower was known for being able to raven’s. — What if the constant Glendower calls were not a path they pointed him to, but the voice calling his own name? — We never got a clear reason as to why Noah would murmur he would live because of Glendower to Gansey when he was living because of Noah in fact. Noah trading his life for Gansey’s with the knowledge he was a King with a prophecy to fulfill would’ve been a more satisfying explanation. — Maggie constantly compares Gansey to the Raven King, while comparing Ronan to his poet, Adam to his magician, and Blue Gwenllian, the witch, the mirror. — The three Blue’s in the flag have red hands, and when inquired about it, Malory explains that the Bloody red hands are associated with the Mab Darogan, which is a mythic title for Welsh kings known as ‘Sons of Destiny’. These are the same three women that appear in Cabeswater chanting “Rex Corvus, parate regis corvi.” [The Raven King, make way for the Raven King] to Gansey & Co. Gansey, if not Glendower, perfectly could’ve been the next Mab Darogan, after all, the book was swamped with references of Gansey being kingly. The King who died and Lived. — Glendower could’ve also been sleeping indeed. Asleep inside of Gansey, awaiting to be woken up with his death. 

But Glendower was really dead, lmao and Gansey was instead revived right after. So anticlimactic.

I mean, honestly seeing Gansey come back as something else as said by Cabeswater would’ve been way more pleasant. Like Blue having to struggle with Gansey to recover part of himself or Blue seeing him off to change the world. Reclaim his long lost kingdom.

If you’re going to kill a character to revive him a few pages later, what is the point of wasting said pages in the first place? It’s something I’ve always had trouble understanding while authors do it a lot nonetheless —Similar to my latest rant of A Court of Wings and Ruin, when we were subjected to the same death pointlessness—. What’s worse is the unexplained plot hole it leaves by Cabeswater explaining to us how it wasn’t possible for it to revive him, and then proceeds to do exactly that.

I will however, recognize how pleased I was with the explanation of why Blue’s curse worked the way it did. Like in most YA or fairy tales, I was expecting it to go on without explanation and I wouldn’t have had much other problem with that. Two mirror facing each other was such a poetical explanation I can’t help but to pin it right on Maggie’s style.

I have mixed feelings about Glendower being dead, honest. The first time I read the book, I was absolutely thrilled by it, as it was arguably the biggest plot twist of them all. But at this point in my reading (and at this point in my review, causing me to reflect over a lot of things) Final Thoughts I’m too incoherent to add into the review:

That demon unmaking things was creepy af, g fucking g. Just the word unmade seems horribly unsettling. The way he was described was point in case amazing.

Noah’s possesion was also such a heartstopping scene as he gauged Blue’s eye. [Anyone else see it coming though? Ever since The Gray man warned she could loose an eye if they Greenmantle were to die]

No one even mentions Noah in the epilogue, which hurts deep. I was left very confused about what it was of him and found myself rather disappointed the characters didn’t seem to… Care enough? To think about him?

The body count was really high for a book by Maggie Stiefvater. It was all gruesome and great. My heart is very, very pleased.

CHAINSAW SITTING ON ADAM’S SHOULDER?? Why yes.

Adam driving Ronan’s car touched my heartstrings, and him not denying when his father mocked him for driving “his boyfriend’s car”. God fucking bless me.

The ending scene with Ronan was absolutely powerful: “Then he closed his eyes and he began to dream.” 

I love this book, through all its flaws. I just love it.

[Review] The Raven King – Maggie Stiefvater “Richard Gansey III had forgotten how many times he had been told he was destined for greatness.”