#mostly doing lack of tropes bc doing ONLY tropes would be hard as a lot of tropes conflict with each other and would be hard to program

[stealingyourbones]

Gonna start making another DPXDC writing challenge where I’ll make a bingo card generation that contains super popular tropes in the fandom.

The goal is to not write said tropes. Bingo of tropes to avoid and even more of a bonus if you do a blackout board on the tropes you didn’t do.

Reply with the most common DPxDC tropes ya can think of so I can add them to the Blackout Bingo List :)

[wickjump]

I’M SO GLAD THAT I’VE FOUND SOMEONE THAT ENJOYS CREPIC. THEREFORE YOU ARE GETTING A HC.

I’ve recently seen a trope somewhere that if partner A has noticeable scars, partner B will kiss them as a small romantic or comforting gesture. Ever since I’ve seen this trope I have not stopped thinking about crepic. IT FITS SO WELL???

Like, obviously Epic has the scar on his eye. His magic eye has caused him years of suffering and awful nightmares. It’s been nothing more to him than a burden. And the scar is just another reminder that he can never let go of everything that’s been done to him. But whatever, he’s gotten over it. But imagine Epic going over to Cross’ house for a sleepover, and late at night the two are just lying in Cross’ bed talking about something stupid, when their conversation suddenly turns more personal. This slowly leads to Epic opening up about how much of a struggle it is to live with his eye. Of course, he doesn’t go too much into detail, since he was never really one to speak about his personal life.

And Cross can’t help but feel so guilty for his poor best friend after listening to him talk about how much pain he had to endure for so long. Epic keeps insisting that he’s fine and that it’s not a big deal, but Cross wants to give the person he cares about so much the desperate comfort he needs. One way leads to another and Cross ends up leaning over and kissing the scar on Epic’s eye while gently cupping his face or something. (bonus points if Cross also kisses the scars on Epic’s hands). AND EPIC WOULD PROB BE HOLDING BACK TEARS THE ENITRE TIME BUT WOUDL EVENTUALLY CRAKC CUZ SOMEONE ACTUALLY FINDS BEAUTY IN HIS INSECURITIES AND UHHUHGH.

I’m so ashamed that this became a huge rant when it didn’t need to be 🙏🙏 (But seriously I’m so starved of crepic that it’s becoming torturous. I need to be fed more fanfics bc there’s only 30 on ao3. Nsfw or not I need to be fed.)

WEEPING CRYING YES!!!!!!!!!! epic is so ignored in crepic fics mostly because people don’t bother to read his au’s comic (it’s… a long one… so i get it lmfao), and i might be one of those people though not because a lack of adoration for his canon but because cross is my favorite idiot and epic is hard to write. BUT!!!!!! I LIKE THIS A LOT.

scar kissing can go one of two ways, very very good, or very very bad. personally if anyone tried to kiss my scars they’d get clocked, but it depends for the character (and person). some people think it’s cringe worthy, other people think it’s sweet. EYE SCARS HOWEVER? OH HO HO. THOSE NEED TO BE KISSED RIGJT FUCKIJG NOW… ABSOLUTELY YES. epic’s whole eye ordeal like ruined his life and made him damn near suicidal. i haven’t read the side comics in a little while for epic but iirc when he’s killed he thinks something along the lines of ‘isnt this what ive been waiting for?’ or something? could be wrong idk i haven’t read it in a few months. but either way that eye, and that scar as a reminder, really fucked him up. and epic’s the kind of guy to gloss over that entirely. but cross is an overthinker at his core so when he catches wind of this it’s going to be on his mind forever probably.

i love. i love the idea that cross just holds epic’s face and kisses his scars. holy shit i love that so much. dear god. he absolutely should get to do that. cross cares sososo much about epic but epic never tells him anything!!! so when cross gets a whiff of his internal turmoil he is gonna DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!!! and epic is gonna FEEL EMOTIONS!!!!!!

I LOVE characters cupping someone’s face while kissing them while paying mind to their traumas and letting them know that you treasure them and and and combusts into a superbillion molecules

goddd this idea. /pos. AND YOURE SO REAL ABOUT THE FIC THING THEY SHOULD HAVE MORE FICS LIKE??? WHAT???!!!!! there’s barely any fics out there for them compared to so many other ships. every night i pray that i wake up and someone dropped a 200k+ word slow burn crepic ‘forbidden’ (because cross’ job and epic’s residence) romance best friends to lovers au fic. but those prayers always go unanswered. ive scoured the entire site for them, ive started going to WATTPAD, DAMNIT!!!!!!!!! bleh. i don’t even care about ratings or tags anymore as long as it’s consensual and legal im fine please give me more content with them 🙏

[fecklesheckleshacklesschmeckles]

"on the town with the league of gentlemen" thoughts!

(bearing in mind that i have not fully [re-]watched the tv series yet)

i almost prefer it to the tv series? which is weird bc no visuals. but the immediacy of the audience connection makes it feel a bit less uncomfortable. (yes i am a wuss, what am i doing in this fandom :P)

ditto the fact that literally all of the parts are played by them, inc misc small children, etc!

LOVE the way in which this ends up subverting chloe and radclyffe away from the classic creepy twins trope XD mark is having so much fun :'D

general fascinated nerding-out over the ways certain scenes/characters/arcs do/don't change/evolve between the two versions/to suit the strengths of the different media 8)

soft spot for some of the characters that don't appear in the tv series, e.g. Answerphone Man, Reg Ingleby :D some delightful voice work <3

i am worse at telling apart their voices (when the characters are unfamiliar) than i thought i would be :P i think i mostly got it though

two whole scenes which reece carries by having a duologue between himself?? (stella/reg, bernice/benjamin.) which rarely if ever happens in the tv series? even though they could easily get around it with camera angles/lack of live audience? FUN.

(maybe sometimes the others too but lbr i'm only paying attention to reece)

feels like getting the makeup on really helped reece round geoff out properly :P

the way the lack of visuals means that when a reece character is suffering he properly goes hard on the whining and whimpering in order to sell it :3

i feel like barbara is a bit more humanised (/less dehumanised) in the radio version!! she gets a romance arc and everything. justice for barbara < / 3

you know when you consume a media when you're like 12 and you pick up a meme from it that just becomes part of your vocabulary forevermore without really remembering the origin? OH SO THAT'S WHY in my head it's mandatory to mock-argue about whether the trivial pursuit counters are wedges of cheese or pieces of pie :D that was a pleasant little brain clunk :)

(for the record i'm with stella)

hoist by my own pet toad THEY FUCKING WENT THERE XD can't remember if this ended up in the tv series too, but if it didn't, they're cowards :P

all in all, strong recommend, lots to enjoy, wish there was more meta about it :')

[roseworth]

As one of the most Rose Wilson blogs (excellent taste) what r ur thoughts on the first issue of her Knight Terrors ?

my biggest thoughts on it are just that its not very interesting </3 there are a few things i dont like about it (the lack of lili 😔 but ill circle back to that in a sec) but overall ?? it just didnt really do a lot. theres not a lot to dislike but theres also not a lot to like

but i can excuse the fact that theres not a lot in it given that this is the first time rose is getting the spotlight in like 15 years so not a lot of people are gonna know anything about her backstory so they had to make it accessible to people that dont know her. and i get that

like batman's knight terrors tie-in could delve a lot deeper into his backstory and feelings bc. its batman. everyone knows batman. he has arguably the most famous backstory in western media. but not everyone knows ravager so they had to make it very new reader friendly and i understand that, especially since her biggest trauma (getting drugged by slade) isnt even canon right now (😔) and her other big trauma (her mom dying) is a little more complicated than the story they wanted to tell (mostly because. wade.)

but i wish they had gone a little deeper into like. her feelings. being trapped in a nightmare that you have to escape from is one of my favorite tropes ever so i was soooooooo excited when this book was announced, but it just,, didnt really do anything. there was so much that could've been done with rose protecting and subsequently being betrayed by her younger self, not to mention the whole idea of slade hunting her down. but they didnt really use it? i was hoping for more like,,,, character exploration. but it didnt really deliver

on the other hand though. this one was def trying to do more of a plot than some of the others. like for example the jason & tim one has the basic plot of "theyre in a nightmare" but other than that its really just being used as a way to make them go through their fears n give them some character exploration (side note i wish they had been given two separate ones but thats a whole other post) whereas the ravager one is talking about murder man using rose as a conduit and trying to get into the waking world and making it like. a story instead of just introspection. so it definitely felt like the first issue was setting a lot up for more that will (hopefully) happen in issue two.

anyways back to her mom. again part of the reason that it would be so hard to incorporate lili into the story is that the circumstances surrounding her death would mean reintroducing the story from 30 years ago where she died, which slade wasnt there for so they couldnt wring out her daddy issues, and the fact that its only brought up like. 3 times ever again after that make it hard to reference her. not to mention deathstroke 2016 sort of retconned it that slade murdered her ????? then that was also never brought up again. so once again i understand that it would be very complicated to bring her into the story, not to mention if she showed up she would show up just to die 3 seconds later so i cant be.. too mad.

HOWEVER. they taunted me by mentioning her one (1) time then bringing up the foster parents instead. it seems like it's sort of working toward bringing her pre-52 origin back. but the foster parents were the worst part of her pre 52 origin. and also as my roommate (who hasnt read a lot of rose) pointed out, the foster parents are a deep cut. they showed up for like 3 pages 20 years ago then died and were literally never brought up again (not even a passing mention) until now. and while the story doesnt hinge on knowing who they are, i feel like theres definitely a feeling that youre missing something when you dont know the parents. so the fact that they were there at all seems really weird to me given the fact that im trying to excuse the fact that lili wasnt there. idk. its just hard to understand why brisson chose to put them there instead of lili, who had a major impact on rose's life and her death is the whole reason rose even joined slade at all. at least to me, the fact that lili wasnt there was extremely noticeable and felt wrong (not to mention the "i grew up in a brothel not a foster home" line is kinda iffy to me but maybe im reading too much into it). im still hoping she'll show up in the second issue, especially since they did specifically mention her in the first issue so maybe thats setting her up to show up in nightmare form later (<-delusional)

ok i think thats all my thoughts for now. tldr: its fine, it doesnt have a lot necessarily with it given the fact that rose isnt a well known character so they couldnt dive too deep into her character, but i felt like it wasnt really trying to do anything and it wasnt interesting. the only real problem was the fact that her mom wasnt there. but mostly im willing to wait until the second half before im too harsh on the book

[mcalhenwrites]

I think your writing is great, and I wish I could write as well as you! I especially love your worldbuilding.

If anyone is giving you concrit that makes you feel demoralized, then they don’t know how to give concrit. Constructive criticism should always in the end leave you encouraged to keep writing and improve. They probably just aren’t your audience and don’t realize that their tastes aren’t objective truth.

I can only really talk about ao3, but it’s really difficult to get readers for original works that aren’t straight up porn. Even with fanfic, stats will always be better for a poorly written fic in a popular ship with popular tropes than a masterfully written fic in a dead fandom or unpopular ship. I really wish there was a place with the openness of ao3 for original works! But as it is, please don’t let stats affect your confidence in your writing.

-Your fan :)

Thank you ;A; I don't think the intention is to leave CONcrit so much as just tear me down. I know with the fandom situation (will not go into it too deep, but that affected tons of authors of the same ship) was more about a territorial pissing contest that made it hard to want to publicly share anything I wrote for the ship. Other writers were viewed as a threat and competition to be smothered out... and I just don't have the spoons on any given day to do more than crawl backwards into my cave and let them have their damn spotlight. Wasn't in it for the spotlight when I used to have panic attacks (and still do) if I get TOO much attention. xD; (I want my writing to be popular, but also I do not want to be perceived, and I want my writing to be just enough to make a living.) Funny enough, that experience was such an outlier for fandom experiences. I spent a lot of time in the Tales of Xillia fandom, where most of the artists and writers were cheering on others and inspiring them. It was such great energy. I was so clueless for someone in his 30s that fandom could be that hostile, which is saying a lot since I've been into FF7 and Kingdom Hearts since the early '00s... (iykyk...) My AO3 stats are mostly fine. Seasons didn't even have any smut and is my most popular work ever, even over anything I wrote in fandom. I noticed a dip in readership as it continued, but that became more about my worries that it had gotten too big, plus... I have been told frequently that my endings are always messy and often rushed. I've worked hard on fixing that, but maybe now they're too slow. Or I just haven't done as good at improving my endings as I thought I had? I don't know. And yes, there's a huge lack of comments on AO3 too. That's a general thing, not just my experience. One reason why I'm determined to always leave comments as best I can, even if I have low spoon days and can only just leave a short one. (I also... postpone reading a lot if I'm low on spoons, bc if I am too out of it to comment, I won't read until I CAN do that...) But like... the kudos and bookmarks are not bad. Generally. Especially for my original works. They're better than expected in some cases, disappointing in others... I don't think reception is ever consistent to be fair. :') The main thing is that I post to the void of social media, and social media never interacts. My average interaction to my writing-related posts is 0 notes/likes/etc. That should say something about how much it's worth to other people. (To myself, it's the world. I think the only thing that bothers to keep me alive, is that I can write.) I really wanted to publish some of my original stories and at least contribute a little to my financial situation, but if no one is showing interest in my writing, why would they buy it? Not really difficult to think they wouldn't. (And as far as the whole "why not just write as a hobby and get a job" argument: I'm disabled and have no skills, and I do not handle being under pressure with serving the public whatsoever, I just cry or get flustered and break down, and if I see anyone get mad at a child in a store, I just SPIRAL. As for the skills, I'm not kidding: I do not have any. I never went to college or trade school, I've never had a single extracurricular... I'm honestly surprised I went to public school, considering my dad didn't want to buy school supplies and said education was stupid. So almost everything I've learned is by sheer willpower, because I struggled in school with almost nothing but Fs from 6th grade until my last three years of alternative high school... and I went an extra year.) I'm just desperate to survive at this point, and writing is the one thing I can do... (Or thought I could...)

I want to add that I'm still writing. I've been working on my stories and even editing some of the older ones to polish them. A part of me doesn't want to give up the dream of at least self-publishing and selling even 50 copies of each book I release (better than nothing), but... another part of me is also like... Hahaha keep it to yourself, Cal. I've been told that I should plenty of times. That it should be enough that I even wrote in the first place. But... weird, that comes from people who constantly post their own writing. As if they also want readers. Huh.

[cielospeaks]

it would be just. pure and utter fanservice. but

aime getting taros-style possessed by different allegrofaces in the unnamed crossover thing, and kinda being out of sorts the whole time (the focus is on kind of “lost souls finding their way home” which. to be fair is literally every one of my aus/stories/etc. but this ones focusing on being able to work through trauma to be able to live a somewhat fulfilling life in specific)

which under cut bc it can get rambly. i think is uh. lacking. in a lot of media at least thats been popular recently. ok ill say it im salty at f h and its consumer fans for acting like trauma is just something that can be “erased”. like (x character) being literally murdered by their parental figure but hey theyre wearing colorful clothing that means they have no depression now, or (y character) being tortured so hard that her “heart” went away and was basically a weapon, only to regain a slight bit of happiness after being spared by two people and befriended by another, but haha now lets make her act ooc and speak in full sentences and the fandom acts like “lol she has no depression now” its not that fucking simple you assholes.

anyways i think the whole main cast are both reflections of canon characters that have trauma and also their own thing, i noticed when writing up the bios. kr vel is very sal energy, like sal he’s partly a spiteful, violent person and partly someone who accepted responsibility and was the better person in a hard situation, and because of this merging he doesnt like to accept praise as being for him, since he attributes it to his “better half” but now theyre the same person. idk its hard to explain. i think its a bit fantastical but it is relatable i think to some extent to me personally. tbh i think its a feeling that anyone whos ever been objectified for like. one talent or skill and then hated once they showed other sides of themselves can feel. you like. have trust issues of whether people are being kind to you because they only know that side or whatever.

for laurie, shes similar to ai, she lost someone she was extremely close to (in laurie’s case her rival) and feels a lot of survivor guilt plus a feeling of wanting to sacrifice herself, but she tries to maintain a giving and optimistic personality on top of this. like she still thinks shed be better off dead/erased and still feels immensely guilty abt what happened to her rival.

for the allegros i think its a mixed bag. this was the only option for them that lead to all of them surviving, but its not the best. i mostly wanted ana to tell off someone or tell off the sort of trope at least, bc i feel like ana would tell off a divinity that tries to use people for selfish reasons, but would also tell off equally so any humans that claimed to be liberators and heroes when they actually just wanted to usurp said divinity in manipulating others. ana is a good boy. best boy. i also think ana possessing aime and doing a saisho kara saisho made climax daze would be hilarious (he instantly gets the copyright bonk w laurie)

tuley is more of a mentor to these idiots (affectionate). she can see theyre going through a lot and can sympathize but she also needs them to get their shit together also.

[dekusleftsock]

To continue on the hair/androgynous discussion: Glad you're in agreement! I feel like long hair and a wiry frame like he has now fit Deku a lot better as a person, and I just plain think he looks prettier like that. Honestly, for a man who says he's not well versed on the subject of romance and isn't good at drawing pretty characters, Horikoshi seems to rock at both. Even when it comes to making looks for guys that are actually androgynous and characters who have both masculine and feminine traits, he's a lot better than many shows/media that try to portray that. I'm guessing that's because he's great at character design. I'm concluded that Horikoshi either purposefully misleads people in his public statements or has a low self esteem, because he tends to way better at these things than he gives himself credit for. Which, coming from a writer, would make sense. I often have a really hard time looking at my work objectively, no matter how good people say it is. As for Deku not having a fashion sense: Fair. I like how Katsuki appears more traditionally masculine but is better at fashion and more open about emotional conversations generally, where Deku appears more traditionally feminine but is horrible at fashion and bad at emotional conversations. Part of why I can only see their future being as a duo, even years ago before the manga started hinting at that. Their personality traits, appearances and narrative roles often hint towards them being equals and partners. I don't mean this in a romantic way, but they often parallel/compliment each other perfectly. Also: Those photos you had were epic 😍. Watch me spread my long haired Deku agenda to the rest of you XD. I suppose I could be a bit less vocal about it, but over the years I've learned that if you want something done you have to do it yourself. Therefore, I'm spreading this agenda with the thin veneer of it being a cool parallel to Shigaraki 😁. To be fair to Deku, I think his recent look is pretty cool though. Obviously it needs some cleaning up, but it has a good aesthetic. Additionally, it pays homage to All Might while allowing Deku to be his own hero. My problem with his old costume was that it was paying homage to All Might without incorporating anything from Deku as an individual. I also think it would just generally be a good message that both of our favorite wonder duo boys go to extremes and need to change. Often when shows have a character like Katsuki, the pressure is all on that person to change while the protagonist stays the same. I was thinking, if Deku made the ears of his costume look more purposefully jagged and made it darker instead of just dirty/stained, he'd have a good thing going. The ears are like All Might, but incorporating the jagged look is a reminder to the war and everything associated with it. Finally, Deku's not a fashionable person but I like to think Katsuki's influence would help. He's changed his outfit up the most out of all of the characters, his parents are in the fashion business and he tends to criticize/comment on people's looks the most out of everyone. Imagine: Bkdk dating post war, Katsuki keeps getting annoyed at Izuku's lack of fashion sense and keeps interfering. It reminds me of an old married couple fussing at each other for the millionth time, and it would show that they've become much closer. Therefore, as Deku gets older his outfits gain more of a sense of fashion, mostly due to the real hero here: Katsuki XD.

HSVSIJD I LOVE THAT HC SM LMAO

They really do act like an old married couple in so many ways (another trope perhaps 👀) even in canon. I love them sm

I think his best hero outfit was actually his undercover outfit from the newest movie

Bc it still fits the bunny aesthetic he’s got going on (and subtly paying homage to allmight) but separates itself from his other outfit which is very… allmight to say the least lol.

It’s very obvious that Katsuki helped him with it in some way, or at the very least he worked with other designers to make it fit well.

I think the hood and color scheme is my personal favorite parts. (I’m a color nerd lol) the colors also match his hair and the grey accents match it really well to not make it SUPER STARK in the color difference.

Though, the goofy calf part always makes me giggle a bit bc it looks like he has chicken feet ISBKSJDKD

I think the main reason why this version is so lacking compared to his current version is because of the color and also just like, the actual symbolism he has within his outfit?

And I don’t mean Izuku’s symbolism within his hero suit TO US

I mean that his actual hero suit is designed to be practical over actually meaning anything. (I’ll probably make a post all about how Izuku’s outfits are important symbolism wise throughout the series at some point but not rn lol)

Anyway, with this version he’s actually giving homage to other people! Aside from all might.

There’s the Gran Torino cape, and then the added red accents for Katsuki, and the ripped up dirtiness for the war.

Before it was more of internalized symbolism for how Izuku views himself. Now, it’s actual symbolism that he CHOSE, showing that he’s becoming his own hero.

[phoenixyfriend]

The Catboy Valois AU

This one is a little cursed, and inspired by this Totally Spies post.

This AU does contain some nsfw content, which I will place at the end of the post and mark for (it’s right after the dog pics). Once again, this was brainstormed on the GG server, back in October of 2019. Biggest contributor other than myself was @atagotiak​.

So I decided that, at some point, I need to see one of those inexplicable and very horny modern catpeople AUs.

Where a fraction of the population just happens to have cat ears and tails etc. for... minimal reason.

Tarvek def has them. Bc twink. Sticking to the tropes, you know.

All the Valois are catpeople because most of history didn't have the option of interbreeding, just coexisting. Something something sterile hybrids because chromosomes.

Andronicus Valois, Catboy King

Lucrezia was full human and Aaronev never had a chance.

"Most of history" because recently they scienced up ways to get around it, so there are catperson/human hybrids, like Gil and Zeetha (Klaus is human, Zanta is not).

Klaus is kinda glad Gil has cat ears bc this makes people automatically assume he can’t be the dad even if they realize it’s technically possible.

This means Agatha gets her boys.

The human (Lars), the hybrid (Gil), and the cat (Tarvek).

Anevka's initial robot body doesn't have the cat features just due to the fact that Tarvek was aiming for Bare Minimum, and then when he added them in later she decided she liked being able to pick when she had them.

I am morally obligated to reblog the callout art @mercurialvoid​ did for me a few years ago.

We’re not gonna talk about that, though.

human Othar/catgirl Anevka

SCENT MARKING

It's considered Undignified but everyone still DOES it, just... discreetly.

Agatha thinks nothing of it when Zeetha rubs their cheeks together while training and then someone looks at her funny and asks if that's her girlfriend or something.

And Agatha Realizes that she's currently got Belongs-to-Zeetha scent on her and has to scramble to explain that Zeetha kind of adopted her as a little sister because it's the closest approximation she can come up with that still has Acceptable Connotations.

I think platonic marking is a THING but mostly within families, children, and really close female friends, like holding hands. (Toxic masculinity does apply.)

And kolee-zumil is effectively family relationship.

Agatha can't SMELL the scent markings but she gets used to them.

Also like. There's probably different levels of scent marking depending on the body part. Wrists and cheeks are different.

Jagers that used to be catboys have better senses of smell, and are the ones sent to find a Heterodyne.

Agatha and Lars make out but don't go all the way because Agatha is not ready. (Meanwhile, Zeetha can literally smell how horny these dumb kids are.)

TINY BABY GILVEK FACE NUZZLES WHILE STILL ON CW:

(Imagine how much more dangerous the baby gilvek airship-exploring shenanigans would be given one is a catboy and the other is half catboy.)

Gil just kinda scent marks on literally everything/everyone. The boy is affection-starved well into adulthood. He probably purrs too. And purring is probably considered kinda undignified.

Tarvek purrs when he’s designing clothes in his head. He’s embarrassed when he realizes. Everyone thinks it’s cute tho.

Also when crafting super-complicated diabolical plans.

Purring isn’t very diabolical. So it’s embarrassing and doesn’t fit with the aesthetic at all.

It’s hard to do an evil scheme while being an image-conscious catboy.

Gil only. Sort of knows how to cat. He's not very good at it. Zulenna helped but...

Is Von Pinn a cat? Gut says yes. Though it makes it less likely she'd be mistaken for Lu as the students did, but hey! She’d appreciate that.

She probably wouldn’t know how to cat.

Or maybe she would, given we’re assuming hereditary and she was made for Andronicus... She probably knows a bit abt how to tell other people how to cat, but she doesn’t know how to cat herself.

The Muses... not designed to look like catpeople. Ruined the minimalist bodies RVR was going for, going by canon's lack of consistent ears or noses

Agatha does not realize at first that Von-Pinn is a cat-lady because her ears match her hair and every time she sees Agatha her ears go back, and the tail is hidden under the hobble dress.

Otilia is very happy to go from catwoman body to Giant Metal Cat body

KITTY BANGLADESH DUPREE

She's got a faint pattern to her fur that's, on closer inspection, very much indicating she's a PANTHER.

Consider: Tarvek starts working himself up into a frenzied panic and the nearest Trusted Person starts petting him to calm him down and he like. Melts.

TBH tho, a good portion of canon Tarvek’s behaviour can already be described as “cat does something stupid and immediately after attempts to pretend he has dignity even though everyone saw the stupid thing.”

Once Tarvek calms down... Lazy Cat Time.

OH

NECK PINCH

CH would be ecstatic that Agatha snagged two suitors, then swing around to devastated that they’re both catboys, and maybe delusional enough to attempt to cut the ears/tails off like that’d solve anything then come around to “well there’s always science” once it’s fixed.

All Valois have high necks on their outfits, at least at the back

So nobody tries to Deactivate The Cat

(One less thing for Anevka to worry about.)

Because, you know. Canon decided to cut Agatha in half to acquire an heir, so we can’t exactly say the Castle is all that sensible.

It does calm down once Agatha mentions she has Lars, though.

Per @lyratalus​: Krosp could be... so much more dangerous in this AU. What if he was designed to be emperor of all catpeople?

Cats never do what they're told anyways, and you can’t really control people without wasps, but the attempt was made! Vapnoople was ambitious!

Long story short, there's a spark of Something but then they just bat him off the table.

Imagine Seffie making Martellus Stop by deactivating the cat

Violetta is the cutest lil catgirl...

SHE GETS REALLY BRISTLEY WHEN SHE'S MAD

HE'S NOT A TWINK AND IT'S WEIRD. Not even a twunk???

Martellus is

So fucking ODD for a catboy

Like it HAPPENS but it means that human women are more likely to find him attractive than catgirls (and even that's a bit of a long shot on the basis of personality).

(Gil excused from the catboys-are-twink-to-twunk rule on the basis of being half human, and his dad being Basically A Wall.)

That said, for Andy I’m gonna go with "buff as fuck but sooooooo charismatic that all the catgirls, and human girls, flocked to him anyway."

So that’s at least two Bara catboys in this AU

Tarvek is canonically more or less the same size/shape as Gil, but... in my heart, Tarvek’s a twunk. He’s got muscle but he's not AS big, and he's got intense Twink energy, especially since Tarvek actually is queer.

(And they're both straight so they're not even technically bara, just Buff.)

(Not twinks either but...)

(Twink is a fun word.)

Colette is human and Seffie isn't but they'd need science for babies ANYWAY so who cares? It's a lot of Seffie laying her head in Colette's lap and purring as she falls asleep because Colette just keeps petting her.

Catboy Martellus still makes sparkhound shapeshifters. He's a catperson...  but he's still a Dog Person.

Martellus and his dynamic with the sparkhounds:

He loves them, they love him. But they’re embarrassing sometimes.

THIS MARKS THE BEGINNING OF THE NSFW CONTENT

ANYWAY back to the point, which is that a lot of these catperson AUs are just... really super horny.

Which is valid.

Ears are technically erogenous zones for everyone but for the cat people... it's a Lot. It's also not like. Inherently sexual? But it can be. Like spooning. It feels nice ALWAYS but with the right person it's also HORNY.  Or like brushing someone else's hair. 

Ear rubs and headpats that result in like, intense sensation? Good actually.

Also I’m declaring that catpeople have heats. Or at least like. Heightened mating seasons? Extra horny times.

So you have Agatha and Lars normal, Gil kinda horny and confused, and Tarvek rubbing himself against the nearest spouse in hopes that someone's going to fuck the living daylights out of him.

Valois probably take suppressing things as a matter of course bc it’s hard to stay alert to assassination attempts when overwhelmingly horny. When Tarvek deliberately forgoes them eventually, everyone is touched by how much trust it shows.

Without suppressants, the horny is either something you can cope with or something that is intense but comes in Very brief periods. Either one day a month, or a week twice a year? Something like that.

Honestly though, imagine if Gil tried to hide being a catperson for the sake of the Empire or some nonsense, and had to just suffer when in heat?

Agatha likes to watch the boys go at it because there's something about Fangs On Neck that's super pleasurable for cat people and she can't provide that for Tarvek but Gil certainly can.

Bonding marks aren't a thing but possessive biting is.

(Since birth control is so easily accessed in GG, I feel like Lu’s opinion of catboys would be a super gross objectifying thing.)

(Which. Yeah.)

(Lucrezia basically has that opinion on any man in canon that isn’t immediately useful to her for science reasons.)

[inmyarmswrappedin]

[1/3] Wow uh didn’t know my ask to Flora would rile you up so much :) You can call my message ‘embarrassing’ all you want but I really was just curious to hear her thoughts. I never called Isak’s season ‘perfect’ either btw? I just find it hypocritical a bit that fans of certain remakes scream about how good their rep is without usually mentioning some of the issues that I included, while Skam fans apparently can’t even praise the show

[2/3] anymore over having a well-written gay storyline bc of the lack of diversity. So my question to Flora was basically just starting a discussion over whether people (as in the Skam fandom? Again not sure why that caused you so much consternation) have decided that simply adding more queer characters of all kinds takes precedence over the quality of the writing, etc. Is that not a valid

[3/3] question? I think so, but you can disagree obviously. And as I pointed out, the ideal would be to have both a large variety of queer characters AND quality writing, but the only one to hit both fully so far is Druck’s new gen. Anyway, thanks for publicly calling me stupid :)

Hi anon! 🍄 God I love this ask. 

I didn’t publicly call you stupid, I called your ask “fucking embarrassing” and lowkey called you an asshole for your very disingenuous question. You know, if we’re going to correct each other on what words we actually used and what not.

Also I wouldn’t pat myself on the back so hard if I were you, I mean for riling me up and/or causing me consternation, because being cranky about things is like basically my whole shtick since I first joined tumblr. I could fart and then make a post full of consternation about my farts and it’d track with what I usually do here, tbh.

I will give you that many eskam fans don’t give two shits about the lack of ethnoracial and size diversity on eskam. (I rarely go one week without mentioning it again, but we’re talking fandom at large.) But to boil down all of Lucas R’s time on the show to the (shitty af) Lucas/Kasim relationship is disingenuous, when in s1 he challenged the trope that gay dudes are underhanded little shits who want to ruin his crush’s relationship, a trope Eva invoked and he rebuked. And then, on his youtube channel, he covered things that even Skam didn’t cover, and on the topic of gay/Muslim relations, he and Amira had the best take on the bench scene on said youtube channel. 

I really don’t agree with you that Druck fans don’t criticize the show enough. I’ve even seen posts saying that Druck stans are so fucking intense and obsessive about calling out every shitty choice that it makes casual fans feel bad about enjoying Druck without noticing the flaws lmao. I really have no idea which Druck fans you’re talking about that “scream about how good their rep is without usually mentioning some of the issues” that you included, because that’s not at all my experience with Druck fandom. Hell, this was a fandom that had to be told to stop saying they liked s6 “despite its flaws” gvhvh. Druck stans will talk about David’s public outing until the cows come home, and lol Druck breaking winterberg up and including an eleventh hour female LI for Mia was such an unpopular choice that saying you like Victoria gets you side eyed.

Skam France is shit, but like, most of its stans know that and roundly mock the show for it? I think it’s mostly Elu stans who have claimed elu is better than evak. I honestly can’t think of many current Skam France stans who would defend the writing. (Either way I don’t really hang out much in the skamit, skamfr or wtfock fandoms.)

Once again, you’re making your question about quantity vs quality, because it’s not difficult for you to relate to/project on cis white mlm boys. So, for you, all these storylines are created equal and are equally relatable/projectable. And, once again, I will tell you that some people prefer to see storylines that reflect their own experience closer, such as a wlw or a trans dude sl. And yes, they will consider that better because they will like it more. I just can’t get over you calling people hypocritical for hyping up a storyline they see themselves in. If we all judged the writing in the Skams the way you judge the writing in (only) the remakes, none of these shows would pass muster. Not even Skam. In fact, Skam wouldn’t be near the top because, throughout the whole show, it kept mocking wlws in a way that a lot of the other remakes didn’t (including Skam France!!!). Like, you’d think for a show as praised as Skam for its gay rep, sexualities other than gay men wouldn’t be mocked (not even talking about queer women here!), and yet pansexuality is treated as the punchline to a joke in one of the two occasions the word is uttered! Once again, not mocking other sexualities is a low bar that a lot of the remakes you mentioned managed to clear. 

You know, in the end the thing here is that you don’t want anyone to tell you, “Skam really only covered one experience” when you’re hyping it up, and like. Fine. We all have pet peeves. Like I said, I like Victoria (I just find Tijan Marei such a delight tbh!) and I would like to see approximately 99% less legit criticism of her. But like, when people criticize Victoria (which is every time Mia’s bisexuality or Druck s4 is brought up btw), I think of Tijan Marei’s little face, I don’t go sending asks like, “huh so do you dislike Victoria because you have something against women of Circassian descent? :) hey I’m just asking a valid question here. :) didn’t think that would get you riled up. :)” 

[cr-darksienna]

hello hello! i’m here to bring you an idol group’s absolutely trash of a leader, rapper and vocal, jeong jaehyuk. he’s a jack of all trades, master of none with a bit of an anger streak and anger issues that he’s been learning over the years to handle. darkly charismatic and with a open history due to a big scandal that he had few months into riot’s debut, hyuk is a performer with a 150% effort and attitude, living like he can burn out in a single day and not live to see the next sunrise tomorrow. incorrigible, possessive and with a slightly petty streak, he’s not one to pull his punches (esp with his members) with anyone that offends him, though he’s been taming himself under bc’s watchful eye until more recently. call him a cesspool of moral filth or a festering pool of toxicity, he’s as deeply insecured behind his antagonistic nature, and has worked ten times as hard for 13 years in his company to get himself to where he kinda is in right now, neither here nor there, halted in his steps by a company that feels he’s not up to it due to his loose handle on emotions and a desperate attempt to quell down on the various scandals that knight has had.

his company has played into the image of the bad boy of the group for him, especially after his first (and only) scandal, and he plans to make the most of it, especially with the reins now loosened on his end. he’s spent quite the time being a tamed tiger, and isn’t going to hesitate upon wreaking havoc once he’s been let loosened.

do hit the like button if you’d like to plot with him, and i’ll pop into your discords / dms! hyuk’s a muse that i prefer brainstorming for instead of having plots ahead of time, so feel free to go ahead and throw anything in his direction when we discuss!

profile / background 

about stuff : (tw: abandonment, anger issues, violence)

he says he doesn’t have parents, which is partially true, considering he spent almost all of his life in the foster care system, until he aged out at 18. being bounced around from foster house to foster house in the adoption system didn’t do well for his own personality and view about himself, and he came away with a really bad anger streak and violent tendencies, especially when someone tries to poke him / agitates him.

if he wasn’t an idol, hyuk would have gone on to do some petty crimes, because prior to the age of 13 (when he was casted by bc for his face), he was sliding towards the dark side of the law, running from school, getting into street fights, doing little things that never set a juvenile record, but still wasn’t all that clean either.

he was casted one day when running away from school when he was 13 (his results needless to say were trash), and was offered a contract because of his face. his company was looking for someone with similar vibes to his own, and was willing to train him as long as he remained committed to the trainee path. he took up the offer with the insistence of his then foster mother--the orphanage’s owner, who honestly couldn’t wait to get rid of him, due to all the trouble he made.

so jaehyuk became a trainee just through a scrape of luck--his rapping skills were pretty okay, and so were his vocals, and bc felt as though they could polish him more if he did became a trainee, and so he started 13 years of his trainee life. being a trainee actually directed a lot of his excess energy from his angered self into his personal commitment to master a single thing--and he eventually became known amongst trainees as one of the most competitive, even if he wasn’t the best at what he did.

he was like a blackhole, constantly desperate to learn, and when he learned something, he was equally as desperate to master it, just doing things in the way that he knew how to do--and that was to knock on it until he either punched a hole through and understood it, or the door opened on itself for him. rapping became that particular outlet that he felt he moderately achieved some success with, but it wasn’t enough.

hungry for more he turned his eyes to producing, composing, even took acting classes and variety classes, just to fill that gaping hole of inadequacy that he felt made him out to be just not enough. while he knows he’s not the best, he’s proud of his unique vision for performance, and is pretty insistent about his artistic vision, which he gradually found a talent for.

but well. its not enough. he wanted--no he needed more.

and so when riot came and he became their leader by some crappy stroke of fate, he set what he felt was the lowest boundary  for all of their members : respect each other, give your best to all that you do for riot, if not, i will sock you in the face. from the beginning, hyuk was very clear that he wouldn’t be the best leader, because he knew he had more than enough flaws in himself, and even felt that he lacked the qualifications to be one, but since his own fate relied on riot being successful, he expected everyone else in the group to at the very least, treat it with the same respect and effort he does, because one way or another they’re all in this whole thing together.

funny thing is: a few months after their debut and their first scandal (that wasn’t his), he lands himself in hot water for a violence scandal, having punched a male bystander in anger. bc was chagrined enough to put him on notice and probation for a while, and desperate to claim back a bit of a credibility, a press conference was held for him to apologise publically.

hyuk abandoned his pride (for various personal reasons as well) that day and went on his hands and knees in front of the reporters, apologising for his scandal and promising to be a better person. unfortunately, that sealed quite a lot of opportunities for him from his company.

his company felt that he needed to get a better grip on his emotions and anger issues before coming out again to the public in other areas apart from his group, and so he wasn’t able to do any variety or act , or even produce any songs (he still wrote lyrics and produced for his group occasionally, and could still produce his own songs, but those songs he produced wouldn’t be selected for a solo), and so to pacify his company hyuk literally abstained from creating another scandal from himself (though he did still cause a bit of problems in his own group), and held himself back until much recently. apart from that, his company publically disclosed much of his history and background to the public--thus rendering it open knowledge that hyuk was an orphan (abandoned by his mother), and from the foster care system, with a slight history of not going well in school etc.

his image is not particularly clean and bright, instead he’s known for the nitty gritty stuff, of which most of his fans have taken to his bad boy image, liking to imagine him to a particular trope because of his apparently rather cute face.

some plot ideas:

he’s a lone wolf by nature, and so he has little (only 2) friends around him, unless you’re mostly from bc and have trained with him for a set amount and a good period of time. these are the people that know him the best, who sees past that angry battered child inside of him to the blackhole that’s yearning for approval and desperate to make himself feel whole again. they’ve seen his self destructive tendencies, watched him careen over the edge and violently fall, do things that he knows clearly isn’t good for him and then suffer the repercussions all over again. ( note: cannot be from his group..he probably doesn’t have a good relationship with most of the riot members)

exes, flings, fwbs : god, he has so many. none of them are consistent, and none of them last between a month to two months really. he simply treats them as if there’s no option of anything further beyond just the wrestle of bodies in bedsheets, and the fierce scratch of his nails against their backs. more often than not, its not him that gets hurt, because he has the tendency to leave before anything further happens. has he fallen for any of them before? probably not. only one, really. don’t get your hopes up, he tells them with a cigarette dangling from his lips and puffs of smoke in the air. because he’s just nothing but the biggest jerk when it comes to feelings and relationships.

the bad influence: he does a lot of vices, from smoking to drinking, to just..a lot of things that most people won’t attempt to try, chasing after that fleeting moment of a thrill and desire. perhaps you’re looking for a kindred spirit who likes the thrill of danger as you do, or you’d like him to spoil you for the worse things in life, open a door to destroy and ruin you completely just like he feels that he’s done to himself.

rivals: ...yeah i don’t think i need to say more, because he’s someone that rises up to the challenge so fully and completely its almost as if he’s itching to have a fight or a challenge. perhaps he’s punched you before, or you differ in your philosophies and values, one way or another, it’s hyuk’s fault that he’s offended you, and you’re both just going to go down because of it.

connection:

the girl he’s in love with (possibly his endgame ; arnd 26 yrs old?) : an idol from a group as well, she’s one of his few closest friends, and he’s known her for around 13 years. they have a on & off friends with benefits thing, with him meeting her after she left his company for 10 years. he’s the one she always gravitates to back again, and they’re equally, broken, twisted and carnal--that’s why they’re perfect for each other, since they’re the only ones that can take and survive each other.

[betelgeusing]

I’m caught up on the Stand here r some opinions (OBVIOUSLY spoilers thru episode 6)

good:

Glen Bateman, Tom Cullen, Nick Andros, Larry Underwood casting/rewrites/adjustments

(Jovan Adepo deserves full credit for me not only tolerating Larry but actually liking him most of the time cause hoo boy I hated his guts in the book)(also!!! he played Teenager Michael Murphy in The Leftovers and it’s TRIPPING me out because he is OLDER than me and I never would have guessed it watching that show!!!)

(also it’s SO nice to see Brad Henke playing a teddy bear of a guy bc he is shaped like a friend but I’ve literally only ever seen him play absolute monsters)(I luv Tom Cullen)

dayna jurgens best character in the book best character in the series

I wasn’t sure about Owen Teague as Harold bc book Harold is overweight and pimply and kind of greasy and off-putting and Owen is skin and bones and good-looking but he projects creepy and sus very well. he is doing my boy Justice

speaking of, odessa young REALLY sells "girl stuck with a creepy guy who has an unrequited crush on her" like you can feel the discomfort and borderline contempt streaming from her pores

appreciated the rewrites of Rita to make her whole deal not horribly sexist and weird (same goes for most of the women tbh). Heather Graham did great

updating it to 2020ish works well. Glen vaping all the time = legendary

they did a good job of trimming and conflating some of the stuff so the story stays focused. things they cut MOSTLY weren't super important

alex skarsgård scissors stab neck smeared in blood sexy

J! K! Simmons! CAMEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

meh:

james marsden is fine (actually better than I expected in this) but he always fails to excite me. gary sinise in the OG miniseries was a better vibe for Stu and they should've gone for someone with more of the everyman energy. Marsden looks like a catalog model and doesn't seem to be able to bring an observable personality to his roles (sorry man)(on a more positive note this is why he was a perfect Scott Summers)

Whoopi Goldberg is a fine actress and apparently in contrast to a lot of critics I’m actually fine with her casting but mother abigail is SUPER under-used and way less developed than she should be-- we know literally nothing about her outside of her occasional appearance to scold and/or guide and that lack of personhood plays heavily into into the “magical negro” trope which. ugh. at least in the book she had a ton of backstory and family and stuff to do outside of “be the magical prophet for everybody else”

I love the whole Skarsgard family and am always happy to see one of them. that said, Alex lacks Randall's bouncy gleeful chaos energy and sheer malevolence. also he whispers all the time and I'm not sure what that choice is all about (no lbr that’s just an askars acting habit and outside of Eric from True Blood it’s not a great one)

bad:

not enough dayna screen time

pacing is weird and makes it really hard to get invested. starting at the free zone in Boulder and only jumping back to how they actually started/how they GOT to Boulder in pieces every episode feels really disruptive. not that it’s hard to keep track of, but it’s hard to really feel anything for anyone with such a disjointed narrative. the trip to Boulder is half the novel and it’s super important for establishing character dynamics, rivalries, motivations and personalities and if you meet these people mid-story after their arc is half finished and only get fragments of the VERY IMPORTANT ESTABLISHING STORY every now and again it feels like being robbed of setup and then payoff? idk. I hate it. I think they should have started at the beginning and gone thru chronologically, the story works way better that way

for that matter, playing all coy and mysterious with Randall and only showing Vegas for the first time in episode 5?? when the book has us there every step of the way? I don’t need a 1:1 adaptation but I do think following Vegas developments is super helpful re: understanding stakes and how much of a threat your enemy is, and with so little focus ON the enemy, it’s just not scary?

SPEAKING of Vegas what the actual hell. apologies for going “but in the book!!!” so many times but literally in the book Vegas would be a very appealing prospect for just about anyone. there’s electricity, there are supplies, there’s peace, there’s structure and organization. iirc Dayna is even tripped out on her recon mission because she makes friends with people and is struck by how normal and decent everyone seems? WELL this adaptation just threw that out the window and just went full fledged hedonistic sin bin full of just deeply unpleasant people that are more caricatures than characters. everyone there sucks turds. lacks any kind of depth. HUGE swing and a miss bc it hits so much better if you’re like “these are largely decent people lured in by the promise of stability, making moral compromises because they’re scared and trying to survive and Randall’s leadership is a huge temptation” vs “every single person here would roofie my drink and not feel a twinge of conscience about it”

every single choice made with regards to Nadine. badly miscast, robbed of the kickass witch’s streak aesthetic, set up as a consummate villain from the beginning (her constant struggles with her fate are totally omitted till it’s way too late for them to be in any way believable), relationship with Larry is basically nonexistent, and the planchette incident from her childhood is revealed much too early so it’s devoid of any real sense of horror (portrayed as a catalyst for lifelong villainy rather than a late-in-story revelation that she was set on a path against her will). done right she’s complicated and sympathetic at least until her complete heel-turn, in this series she’s just 2d and dull

randall beating bobby terry to death instead of ripping him apart with TEETH was a stupid change made to spite me personally. I mean can you IMAGINE how good that scene could have been

[shoreabove-moved]

JESSICA RE: HER IN GAME PERSONALITY TRAITS.

underneath the cut is a meta i wrote a long, long time ago about what jessica’s in game characteristics ( confident, trusting, irreverent ) mean re: my portrayal.

CONFIDENT;

i’d like to think that the confidence comes the easiest in terms of how i write jessica. it’s obvious throughout the game that she’s proud of who she is, even if most of it (in terms of physical looks) is a front. which makes sense, because she’s a teenage girl, and you’d be hard pressed to find someone who’s completely confident and happy with who they are at age seventeen. still, it’s a delicate balance – she’s strong willed, and she knows when she’s got the upper hand. and when she does, she rightfully uses it to her advantage. she doesn’t try to pretend to be good at things she’s not, either – when it comes to academics, she’ll rightfully admit that she’s out of her league, and her confidence mostly stems from the things she knows she can excel at – her looks, for the most part, and her ability to use body language to get what she wants. this sort of thinking often translates into annoyance when she’s face to face with someone who’s too afraid to get what they way – like chris and ashley, for example. if she were around for that discussion, i imagine plenty of eye rolling and scoffs from her corner of the room, if only because she can’t understand someone wanting something and doing absolutely nothing to get it. she’s has a lot of untapped ambition, and i think that makes her a strong person before the events of the mountain eventually break her down. though, it should be said that post-mountain jess loses her confidence due to the fact that her body is physically harmed beyond repair, and her strength was pulled from her looks (with plans to be a model post high school). so, she changes a lot in the sense where she needs to learn how to rely on things that aren’t her looks – she works on her personality, she becomes more empathetic, and she tries to better herself without becoming someone else.

TRUSTING;

this one is a little harder to manage, if only because people want to assume that someone like jessica is a natural gossip, and therefore has loose lips because of it. i think it works in two ways – she’s trusting because she’ll easily put her trust in other people. it’s part naivety, because growing up she didn’t have a lot of stable relationships to rely on. she didn’t have the chances to make mistakes, so she never learned how to protect herself from terrible things, or a moral code in the sense that her version of a joke isn’t always everyone’s versions of a joke (re; the prank). because she made her first friends in high school, she’s desperate to please them and fit in, which means she’s eager to latch onto anything they say, and any promises they make, regardless of their intentions being good, bad, or in the middle. i also think it works in reverse, too – despite her tendencies to appear as someone who’s ‘selfish’ and ‘manipulative’, i honest to god think she means well. she just doesn’t know what to do with the information she’s been given. she wants, more than anything, to be that person that someone confides in, and she doesn’t spill secrets or spread rumors about her friends, because she wants them to trust her, and like her, and support her. and, if she betrayed them like that, nothing good would come of it. the prank is another situation entirely – it’s not a secret that hannah had a crush on mike, and through a lot of headcanons and writing things out, i think it’s pretty clear that jess and hannah weren’t very good friends, if only because jess finds her quiet demeanor off putting, and her pursuit of a taken man disrespectful. the person she’s absolutely the most loyal to is emily, and when/if emily expressed a concern about that, jess would be willing to toss a minor friendship aside to keep her best friend happy. it’s how her brain works – she doesn’t know any better, and doesn’t understand the repercussions that could (and would) occur.

IRREVERENT;

this is something that’s also kind of hard to balance. i’ll be honest – when i first watched the game, i had no clue what irreverent meant. i was like these game developers are making shit up right now bc they’re lazy as fuck what the heck. but!! the google machine cleared away the clouds, and then it all made sense. irreverent means 'showing a lack of respect for people or things that are generally taken seriously’, and we see that on more that one occasion in the game (i.e.; 'are you guys having a really weird stroke?’ 'who needs grades when you have all the natural advantages you can handle?’). it’s in the way she speaks, and thinks, and was raised. she didn’t have parents who were big on discipline, therefore she was never reprimanded when she said something out of step. she gets it from her mother, too, no doubt, who tends to be judgmental of the smallest things. jess doesn’t have that same sort of stance – she doesn’t care about things like money, for example, and won’t think less of someone for being lower class – but she follows the same sort of pattern where she’ll say something without thinking it through. crass comments are often made without realizing or knowing the context of the situation, and her phrasing tends to be a little.. poor. there’s also a line, though, that i often have to debate in my head. because she’s so tactless in the way she speaks, would she say offensive things without knowing that they’re offensive? as a writer, you want to stay true to who your character is, and a large part of that is doing so without censorship. however, you also have to know your audience, and i’m afraid that – when i make her go through with the thoughts that i know she has – people will think it reflects on me, as opposed to on her. and, furthermore, i don’t want them to stereotype her, either, as nothing more than a dumb blonde. because she learns – it doesn’t help that most of her time is spent with mike, who’s also a little questionable with what he says, but if she said something and someone called her out on it? she’d take note to not repeat herself. she just needs the chance to grow!

i try to implement these things into my writing, both pre and post mountain. it’s a tricky balance, and i never want her to turn into a trope, or a stereotype, even if that was the intention with the game. because i can totally respect and understand that, and i get it! that’s the point. it’s a horror game w/ cliches, and that’s why it’s so cool. but, in terms of bringing these characters to life and expanding them outside of the twelve hours we play them in the game, it’s important to me that i showcase the kind of person i think jess could be. and i don’t want to make her perfect, either, or victimize her, because she does some shit. the prank was her idea, and she had a very heavy involvement with making sure it went off without a hitch (i think she wrote the note??). she also dates her best friend’s ex-boyfriend like, a week after they break up, and that’s not cool, either. that’s where irreverent comes in, and that’s where confidence helps her get past the nasty things emily says about her, and that’s where trusting becomes muddled because she wants to trust mike due to the way he makes her feel, but her trust with emily is broken by giving into something she wants. it’s a vicious circle, fam. but! it’s fun. and i love my tiny daughter so much, so it’s always worth it.

[kinkymagnus]

I love you (no Romo though) also do you have omega Magnus ideas

flkgjdgkdjfg mood anon

hm... ok this will probably be messy but let’s get on some highlights

OK THIS GOT SUPER LONG HAHAHA

set up and worldbuilding my guys

ok so first of all i feel like i gotta talk about how this interacts with trans magnus. i promise i’ll get to the fun stuff afterwards!!

i know some people like to go more into like, the realistic dynamics of a/b/o (trans a/b/o people, as in, a trans alpha who was born an omega, or like, sexism that has to do with a/b/o and those different new stereotypes, as well as like “non traditional a/b/o dynamics” like alpha/alpha or omega/omega relationships, how this interacts with new different sexualities (being attracted to only alpha females? alphas and betas and all primary genders? etc.) and how it intersects with REAL transphobia and sexism and sexuality) and like.... i have two takes on this i guess:

one: while this is not inherently wrong i guess, it’s just. not what i get from a/b/o. for me a/b/o isn’t a complex worldbuilding set to play with necessarily, although i def am one to ask questions and overthink worldbuilding even in the stupidest of shit. but like, i come to a/b/o for fluff (nesting, fluffy heat sex, maybe scenting and/or “mates” if i’m feeling it), smut (knotting, heats/ruts, etc.), and MAYBE angst but that gets into dodgy territory sometimes. (i’m a slut for arranged marriage aus tho ngl dfgkldjfdg.) like. that specific set of tropes is combined perfectly in a/b/o, and it’d be hard to do that in a coherent au as this is already established and saying “au where alec has knots and magnus has heats” is weird. the only other au that gets close is very specifically like a werewolf au which has its own trappings, you know? it’s a specific coherent and established au and it’s hard to separate the tropes i like from the other stuff.

two: again, i don’t think it’s inherently bad. but i do think that a lot of people who do this are basically just reinventing real issues like transphobia, homophobia/queerphobia, and sexism... without actually dealing with those things or the characters they would involve. and i think that it often strays into yikes territory. so like. i don’t love it. (also it does have some yikes stuff people do like going really, really hard on the oppressed omega angle, or worse, reinforcing the gender roles of omega = submissive soft weak baby, alpha = strong dominant and scary man. or sometimes they establish other roles but either way like, all their characters fall into that. and i think sometimes it kind of works for this feeling like a guilty pleasure trash romance novel where it’s just uncomplicated fantasy of being taken care of, but like.... even then it just gets dodgy, you know? also it does tend to get INCREDIBLY rapey.)

i often used a/b/o for the things i mentioned, and before i started writing trans magnus smut, also ironically as a way to sort of write trans magnus in smut without actually doing it out of fear of backlash/lack of popularity. and while backlash hasn’t been much of a problem, my popularity has definitely gone down fics-wise. (i get much less in the stats area on ao3 now)

and cis omega magnus is in a way basically trans magnus but he has a penis and there’s knotting. like i said, in many ways, a/b/o is sort of a way to write porn with trans characters while keeping to cisnormativity. i, as a trans person, took advantage of that to get more comfortable with writing it, but a lot of cis people use it basically to just. do that. you know.

so how do i reconcile this with trans magnus?

basically i say “fuck you, he’s trans AND an omega, i want heats/ruts and knotting and nesting and shit” and then ignore it lmao

like ok he isn’t cis. he’s afab and gnc and all the shit i normally write, it’s just like. he also gets heats and his ass doesn’t get wet dlfkjgdfg (god it sounds So Unappealing when you say it like that. now that i allow myself to write smut with real trans characters i could never go back to a/b/o--although, like. some a/b/o aus actually do have male omegas have a pussy but that feels even more slimy in the sense of just. make them trans.) and like alec’s an alpha and so on you know.

i basically just ignore all the complex worldbuilding shit and trying to figure out how sexuality and gender and the various -phobias and -isms would be effected by the addition of secondary genders and their trappings, and just go “fuck you” under the guise of an a/b/o au

tl;dr, so i have a lot of complicated feelings on a/b/o and how it generally is something i do not trust people to write properly. but i also am a total slut of a lot of tropes that are sort of entrenched in a/b/o specifically. namely, heats/ruts, knotting, nesting/scenting, etc.

let’s get into the fun stuff.

magnus and heats :)

ok so heats are super like. vulnerable, you know? i’d think magnus would take heat suppressants (ah another plot convenience in this au) because he doesn’t want to spend his heat with someone he doesn’t trust. that’s not to say he’s never had a heat with someone, or even that it’s been all bad experiences, but it never clicked super well i think and like, it’s something that’s very hard for him. because there’s a lot of vulnerability and trust involved, and he loses control and could so easily get hurt

also possibility: while he can take suppressants to lessen how many times he gets a heat, taking them consistently for literally centuries sounds like it could fuck someone up. so. perhaps. magnus occasionally spends his heat with a trusted friend like meliorn (not someone who feels like Family and therefore would it feel incesty, but def someone who is a close friend) and while he still doesn’t love the feeling of being that vulnerable, and it can be uncomfortable--it’s not like he’s looking forward to it--but like... he definitely does trust meliorn (and possibly other non canon characters?) and it’s not like it’s disgusting and miserable. it’s not like, The Same, but it satisfies the biological side of it and sometimes it’s even like. fun, you know? it’s nice.

ngl i actually kind of like the idea of meliorn helping him with these heats and being like a trusted alpha he knows would never hurt him like that. that does mess with any angst you want to go with him not trusting alphas or not like, having good experiences with heats/ruts (like in “stuck in a rut”), but like, different aus different stories, and anyway you could probably work something in there about meliorn specifically being different and someone he trusts

this is on and off, he sometimes does have heats with whatever romantic partner he’s with, although it... doesn’t always end well. so he has a lot of bad experiences, but at least with meliorn he has a good experience to look to, as well.

also camille was a TERRIBLE alpha. i can 100 percent see her using his heat against him to hurt him (and being like oh baby dont you trust me? you cant go to this seelie for your heats, you cant cheat on me, and why are you taking suppressants, dont you trust me--?) as well as potentially her ruts (actually a) im not sure i want to go into the logistics of a female alpha--would she... have a penis? because i’m not making camille a trans woman nor am i touching those transmisgyonistic vibes with a ten foot pole. b) actually, maybe she’s a beta. she could use that against him, as well--being like she doesn’t understand why it’s such a big deal, you know? also i refuse to believe only an alpha can satiate a heat even tho it would work the best because like--fuck i’m overthinking the worldbuilding again this is EXACTLY what i wanted to avoid. fuck, never mind.)

but like...........when he gets it (namely with alec, because yes, i am a slut) with like someone he honestly is a viable “mate” or someone he trusts and like, has actual romantic feelings for, too...............it’s literally mindblowing. magnus had no fucking idea heats could feel this good. obviously he had fun with meliorn and felt safe even if he felt kind of awkward/uncomfortable (not bc of anything meliorn did but his own issues with being vulnerable) but like............... alec just fucking makes him melt???

like he felt safe before, he did know meliorn would never ever hurt him or take advantage of his heat, but now he feels so like... free and safe and open? it’s not just the normal vulnerability that comes with but the complete lack of discomfort, just feeling absolutely safe and like. not worried at all? again i want to emphasize it’s not that he felt unsafe before or that meliorn necessarily did something wrong, but bc of his own like. readiness to be vulnerable + while he does trust meliorn, it’s like. it hits different with a romantic partner (in this specific context!! this is not a romantic > platonic thing), if that makes sense.

an y wa  y THE POINT IS. magnus is like. Mind Blown. having sex with alec during his heat is like. amazing. alec is so intent on taking care of him and just worshiping his body (alec!! ravishing him!! pressing warm kisses all over his tits!!! big hands all over his body!! caressing him everywhere and giving him physical affection all over and just making him squirm and moan!!!!!!) and like. not only is he absolutely intent on taking care of magnus and making him feel good and making sure he’s comfortable, but like also it’s just??? really fun?? and alec gives him so much affection and so many kisses???

magnus is not the best conversation partner during heat because he is a little. busy. but it doesn’t stop alec from talking to him and helping him stay grounded and just like... treating him like a person? he hadn’t realized one of the reasons he was so comfortable with meliorn and now alec wasn’t just bc he knew them well and trusted them with this kind of thing, but because like. they treated him like he was present despite him being mostly non-verbal and incoherent beyond vague pleading. like, they always made sure he was comfortable and talked to him and didn’t just do what they wanted with him. it didn’t feel like he was a doll--getting satisfied and fucked hard, yes, but like. also sort of just being used. and not in the fun sexy pre-planned way, but like, in a way that just made him feel more distant and disconnected.

but alec very much doesn’t do that. he keeps talking (and there is a lot of praise! so much praise and gentle affection and teliing him how beautiful he is and how good he’s doing--and of course dirty talk wink wink) and even narrating what he’s doing/his intentions, you know, and not only his voice generally soothing but it’s just nice you know

and like again i would just like to go back to alec ravishing magnus’s tiddies with kisses and holding them in his Big Hands and massaging them and like kissing his nipples and just making him feel so good??? iconic. we stan.

and alec like. is the perfect mix of gentle and rough, you know? he knows when to pin magnus down and fuck him nice and hard and rough and get him squealing and begging, but he also knows when to be gentle--particularly at the beginning and when he’s coming down. not to mention even when he is fucking magnus hard there’s a lot of gentle touch accompanying it

also not to just be a slut but

Also It Feels Good Because Alec Has a Huge Cock

that’s not to say meliorn doesn’t or even that you need a big dick to pleasure someone well but like.

alec has a big cock.

and it feels. hhhhh. good

magnus when alec first slides into him in heat: [straight up just immediately goes incoherent and whining with pleasure and kinda just mewling and clawing weakly at his back or the sheets on either side of him]

and alec fucks him so well :) like they’re honestly both feeling so fucking good like just AAAAAAAAA im such a slut for alec taking care of magnus in heat

also. uhh. K N O T T I N G

alec sliding into him nice and slow to make sure hes ok and like hes loving it, alec fucks him, and when he’s about to knot him magnus is somewhere in the back of his mind expecting that usual queasy sort of anticipation like he does Want It but usually he does kind of feel a little discomfort and again just... apprehension. this is The Moment, and he’s really giving up control you know

but it. doesnt come (but magnus is about to AHAHA)

and he just wants.

like he honestly just really really wants this and it’s kind of a revelation how much he genuinely wants this

alec knots him and magnus is Losing His Mind it feels so fucking good he comes almost right away and he’s just right there again

hes so Full and everything about it feels amazing

and like after alec has like. made him come a dozen times squirting and came inside magnus’s cunt and kept him knotted full there’s just this moment where magnus is exhausted in the best way, lying on his back, legs spread, alec still knotted inside him, his cunt is full of cum and he’s panting and moaning a little and alec is just on top of him and it’s warm and amazing and he’s coming down from the high and he just feels.... incredibly relaxed actually

like he’s like wow have i ever been this melty and relaxed and floaty, like, ever?

the answer is no, not really.

alec is just gently stroking his hair, pressing soft close-mouthed kisses to his skin, and they just sort of cuddle for a bit while waiting for magnus to come down completely from his heat and for alec’s knot to go down and honestly just lying there entwined is really, really nice.

magnus is full and relaxed and he genuinely loves this feeling in a way he’s never experienced before

even when alec pulls out and magnus is pretty much back to himself completely again magnus is so exhausted he just sort of lies back and lets himself breathe and alec is like Pamper Mode Activate(TM) and magnus tries to be like its ok to relax i do like cuddling with you and i can clean up myself its ok and alecs like But I Want To Take Care Of You and like helps clean him up (just... magnus lets himself relax as alec gently uses a damp cloth to wipe away cum and slick you know? idk there’s just something intimate and sweet about the dom helping clean their sub up in the aftercare) and gets him water and a snack and then once they’re both tidied up pulls him into his arms and he strokes his hair and they just cuddle and it’s great :)

i wonder if magnus talks to meliorn about this either. hm

and from then on, alec is the one he goes to for heats. and alec, of course, becomes immortal, which means he can take care of magnus for the rest of their lives :’))

whether magnus would stay on suppressants is another matter because on one hand heats can be inconvenient and like he might still want to minimize them, but on the other hand Hnnnnnnggg Alec Feel Good. so i could see them going either way here.

also i mean................that’s not to say that meliorn would Never help magnus either..... two possibilities here: 1. for whatever reason magnus’s heat is coming and alec can’t be there. meliorn is happy to help. it’s good to have back up i guess lkjfgh fuck idk. but the real fun one....

2. as magnus has more heats, they may or may not have a little Fun with it. perhaps roleplay (whether this be like “oh..... oh no..... im a poor little maid and i’ve gone into heat.....Looks Like My Boss Will Have To Fuck Me” or like even pretending the heat isn’t part of it and he’s Just That Slutty and we love to see it, etc. obviously they alec is sure not to push it too far, he teases magnus but probably a lot less than he normally would bc he’s so sensitive and needy and eager-to-please, but like.... they sure do have some fucking fun with this.

and also. i mean.

threesomes. y’all knew i was going here.

look idk how i got so far on the magnus/meliorn (as close friends and fuckbuddies not romantically) train but HERE WE ARE.

magnus getting absolutely wrecked by two alphas and LOVING it is not something he ever thought would happen, particularly while he was in heat, but it’s happening and he absolutely loves it.

also there are other fun possible scenarios like in “goldenrod” where alec doesn’t know that magnus is an omega and Shenanigans Ensue or whatever like just....both fluffy and angsty possibilities.

i’m a total slut for friends to lovers “oh no magnus is in heat :( but alec can help him through it, gently and lovingly, just completely as a friend :)” which can get into dubcon territory but if you fuck with it it’s doable. and i’m just a slut for pining pre-relationship heat sex.

even like in an au, alec playing the role meliorn did in the previous bullet points but blended with how i discussed their first heat together so like... helping his best friend through his heats, showing him a really good time, making sure he’s comfortable and magnus is just like wow i’ve never felt this good and safe during a heat before :) guess it’s because we’re friends and definitely no other reasons :)

i’m not sure how to word this right but i feel like there’s a potential angst here of like a mundane au of some sort wherein magnus has only had a few relationships with alphas and none of them great so when alec is helping him through his heat he assumes it’s different (as in, alec is so gentle and caring and treating him like this, and he feels safe) because they’re friends and it’s a different dynamic, and that being treated Badly is just like, the normal way alphas treat their mates. or something. look. let me have my whump ok

but the point is alec sets him straight obviously

but like anyway i just like.........i adore friends to lovers malec and heat sex it’s got so much fluffy potential with magnus just feeling Utterly Safe (and pining angst) and alec is both a) incredibly turned on/helplessly in love with him so he’s loving every second (even tho Pining Angst) and b) just in awe that magnus trusts him that much??? (also sad he’s SURPRISED at being treated gently flgkhfjghgh)

malec and ruts

ok as i explored in “stuck in a rut” i think it makes sense that magnus would not feel incredibly secure during ruts. it’s not something he would have sought out with say, meliorn, although he would have been willing to do that meliorn has other partners more than willing to help him with that and actually love it while magnus is. very wary of it.

like a heat, it leaves him feeling very out of control and it seems kind of scary--but it’s almost worst, because rather than feeling needy and helpless (which is a good thing when with a trusted partner but not so much when he’s less sure, or when they take advantage of that) it’s like. he’s cornered totally sober with a similarly out of control alpha, except with more Dominance(TM) and potential aggression you know?

so maybe he’s had some very bad experiences before. and i doubt it’s been literally all terrible, but i think he would likely avoid relationships with alphas, so he wouldn’t have a lot of experiences to draw from overall anyway

but like okay let’s get to the fun stuff

i’ve been over the angst of magnus not being sure how this is gonna go but wanting to Tough It Out with “stuck in a rut” although it’s probably a bit exaggerated for fun angst purposes but idk aaaaa

but anyway the point is here. alec gets his first rut with magnus and like, he probably hasn’t been with anyone during a rut (suppressants?) so this is wild for both of them

but even Feral(TM) alec’s entire goal is just taking care of magnus

i mean obviously there’s an element of like wanting to get his own satisfaction and all but it’s just like..... mutual pleasure you know??? like he wants to fuck magnus nice and hard and make him feel good and magnus is just a mewling mess in his arms letting alec take control and ravish him and they are both having a great time actually

but like ok let’s just. move away for a moment from angst

just................... alec fucking magnus nice and hard and rough, pinning him down and “”making“” him take it, and there isn’t really much teasing because he’s too busy wanting to fuck magnus and fill him up :) 

but like it’s also fluffy bc even all needy and desperate alec still takes the time to make sure he’s ready and prepared and wet and into this before fucking him, makes sure he’s comfortable and checks in on him and if magnus safeworded or told him to stop you know he absolutely would, without hesitation, even if it literally hurt to do. which is basic decency obviously but the like.... the just trust and care there? the fact that even in a literal fucking rut when he’s supposed to be out of control he’d force himself to stop if magnus needed or wanted him to is just.... comforting and good and i love it 

and magnus is like hm i have never felt this safe when with an alpha in rut before! time to examine this trauma later.

nesting (ft. scenting)

AAAAAAAAAAAA

i love the concept of nesting so much it’s so fluffy and sweet and dkgjfklgjg 

you build a pillow/blanket/clothing nest that smells like the people u love and u feel safe in 

and then you get ravished in it sometimes

iconic.

like magnus just piling a fuck ton of soft things (ranging from blankets/pillows to just like spare sheets and shit like that) and stealing alec’s clothes to put in there and curling up in the middle of it feeling safe and in heaven tbh 

especially once they key component of the nest arrives: alec

*magnus yoinking alec into the nest and immediately curling up against him like a particularly insistent cat* 

alec is just like This Is Precious and wraps his arms around him and strokes his hair and magnus is purring (purring!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! we Will discuss this later) 

and it’s just nice and somft??

fluffy cuddles?

i feel like nesting would be a particular urge either during or near heats so im just imagining pre heat magnus being like *suddenly stands up* I Must Gather Soft Things (Meaning Pillows, Blankets, And Alec) 

and he just makes a nest, all aesthetically pleasing and arranged nicely, maybe a candle nearby with a nice scent that kind of helps, and just..... curling up in alecs arms all content

and alec ADORES this like the first several times magnus was scared of coming off as clingy so he suppressed nesting instincts let alone cuddly needy clingy instincts but alec was sort of like hey baby it’s ok if you just don’t want to but do u need to nest? 

and also he just made a point of being more touchy/affectionate when his heat was coming up/dying down and he watched carefully to make sure it didn’t magnus uncomfortable but he melted into it even more than usual

so like just....alec cuddling the fuck out of magnus in his nest and it’s warm and safe and smells like home????

scenting i feel is kind of weird and i feel weird being like “mm he smells good” or whatever but like also it can be so cute when done right you know lkgjdgfg like omg just...... Alec Smells Like Home

their scents kinda mix and both of them have the others’ lingering on them and people can tell they’re super close 

and just.....................again..........alec like scenting him, marking him as his in a sort of gentle soft way? and like, burying his nose in his neck and nuzzling him and he smells so nice and good??? 

especially if you’re going with true mates think their mates’ scent is just the best thing ever flgjlkjlfkgjfgh

but anyway ok

back to nesting

and specifically, because i am a whore, to S E X

magnus feeling absolutely safe there and it smells like home and alec’s holding him and it’s so--

hey so i know i said i was going to do sex,

but hold on a sec

ANGST

magnus has nested before. but generally not with romantic partners. 

not sure if familal nesting is a thing--i feel like it’s possible, but given a general association with heat (i mean one could either feel the urge to or simply enjoy nesting outside of Heat Time(TM) but like) it feels a little weird

so let’s go with it’s more romantic except for maybe like really young kids or something idk 

but anyway moving on from that

magnus has nested before

but almost always alone

and an empty nest is just not the same?? it’s still warm/safe but like... it feels empty and sad too. especially if he DOES have a romantic partner they just don’t want to nest with him--saying he’s clingy, or it’s time consuming/boring to just sit there, or whatever else. 

camille was particularly guilty of this, he had to basically hide his nest and cram it in a closet or something (the enclosed space was actually kind of nice but it was too cramped for his liking and it felt even more empty and sad than usual)

and then he would just be there alone in his small empty nest and it was still reassuring but it was just......not the same 

also he didn’t have anything to ground him so he got all fidgety (adhd magnus? adhd magnus.) and like it was a lot less comforting than normal you know 

but with alec OH BOY

not only does he feel all warm and grounded in alec’s arms like he can relax and doze off and feel good and alec is stroking his hair and it’s just. nice

but like also 

BACK TO SEX

alec making sweet love to magnus in their nest and it’s just like wow this is the most safe place possible

it’s not even heat sex they’re just having fun and magnus is like this is my dream come true

and then obviously there is also heat sex

it is the most mindblowing thing either of them have ever experienced

also i feel like while it’s not an instinct thing to build nests for ruts, they still do it because they’re soft and it helps them relax anyway

PURRING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PURRING

ok i absolutely love the a/b/o headcanon i’ve seen before where like, omegas purr only when feeling completely safe? particularly around alphas?

so like. 

magnus doesn’t purr that often.

or he didn’t but then he fell in love with alec “his arms feel like home and safety and love” lightwood

it is not uncommon to see him cuddled in alec’s arms purring contently

or like in his nest leaning into alec’s side or head resting on his chest, PURRING

also i have this fic somewhere but au wherein alec doesn’t know magnus is an omega yet and then finds out because magnus dozed off on his chest and BEGAN. PURRING. BECAUSE HE FEELS SO FUCKING SAFE AND TRUSTS ALEC SO MUCH. 

even if he hadn’t told alec about being an omega yet for whatever reason

anyway just alec stroking magnus’s hair while he purrs away and its adorable and also soothing for both of them so they fall asleep like that 

magnus’s purring is like a soothing thing for alec big time its good sensory time and also just generally nice so its easy for him to conk out with magnus warm in his arms and purring loudly 

it’s very nice 

and also he loves that magnus feels that safe with him

MATES

this one will be short but like 

basically the whole mates for life thing is cute

and it can just kinda be like soulmate aus

which are all vaguely problematic but just really cute/fun to have and not think about too hard 

so them being mates is just cute idk man i like it 

ok that’s it for now (i’m gonna add more in a separate reblog for reasons but that’s only on one topic, you’ll see--i think i’ll do that tomorrow bc im very tired rn) that’s the omega magnus manifesto (some parts not included) 

[gayregis]

Oh yeah that reminds me of another question I've been meaning to ask (sorry to jump on you like this haha) but which vampire canon change in B&W annoys you the most? For me it's the whole 'even touching silver will harm a vampire' (when it's explained that Syanna figured out Dettlaff was a vampire because he wouldn't directly touch a silver candlestick). I just choose to ignore that detail bc I don't think it makes much sense haha

omg this is such a good ask im so excited to answer

first of all, i really agree with you, even when i hadn’t read the books fully i had read that one passage in lady of the lake where regis gestures with a silver fork at the banquet, and blood and wine tries to make it so like regis and dettlaff are the same “kind” of vampire, so this obviously doesn’t make any sense, and since it’s just such a small detail i tried to ignore it, like, maybe dettlaff just wanted to keep the silver candlestick fingerprint-free, ever consider that, syanna? you’re gonna pawn something, you don’t want like a billion fingerprints mucking it all up... and then syanna thought this made him a vampire, when in reality he was a vampire but the candlestick had fuckall to do with it

but yeah i think i’m gonna do like a top 5 style: TOP 5 THINGS CDPR GOT WRONG ABOUT THE VAMPIRES. im not gonna do a countdown because im a very direct person and think its best to get the worst out of the way.

1. their society and relationship with humans.

the thing that upsets me the most that cdpr changed is how vampires exist on the continent. stuff like tesham mutna and the unseen elder breaks canon lore so hard it makes me physically upset. 

this is a bad thing because not only is the trope of “vampires control everything from the shadows as a secret society so they can feed on human blood” incredibly boring and overdone (it’s a trope, so it’s something that the witcher should stand to invert since that’s pretty much the purpose of the witcher), but it also has origins in antisemitism (the myth of the illuminati or “reptilians/secret societies controlling the world”, blood libel), so it’s super gross! i don’t want the vampires to be that trope, that’s completely unfair.

they already were something other than that trope, they already HAD their own society (or lack thereof) as part of the canon lore. maybe it is personal preference, but i think that their “anti-society” is super interesting. how does something like that function with no rules or figures of authority or customs? it’s incredibly different to the ways humans function in this universe, who are mostly bound around their nation, city/town/village, and home unit, and abide by strict custom and systems of authority. it’s really something to be explored from a lore perspective, there wasn’t a whole lot explained in canon (for good reason: see #2) so it has perfect potential to be elaborated upon in the adaptational spinoff that is the witcher games.

it makes them super boring and trope-y to have them all kowtow to One Figure Of Authority in the area. plus CDPR states that the reason toussaint is so perfect is that this secret society controls toussaint as an area to perfect blood, when toussaint literally existed as a fairy-tale duchy to be an OBSTACLE to geralt and his hansa in the saga. it was the “leave-your-quest” test. think of the island of the lotus eaters from the odyssey. it’s a perfect place, there’s no reason as to why it is perfect, it just is, and it keeps the company hostage there for months so they will get distracted and eventually forget what they came there for. 

in canon as well, vampires do not seem to care much about humans. regis certainly does, but he is regis :). there was little conversation about how vampires view humans, rather about how humans view vampires and project their innermost fears and desires to them. further breaking some vampire tropes. in blood & wine. instead of that trope-flipping, we get... “vampires tortured humans out of curiosity and selfishness.” what? why would they do this? there is not much to gain, and it would take a lot of cooperation and effort to get to this point, which leads me to ask, HOW could they do this? as regis says in bof, there were only about 1,200 vampires when they arrived on the continent, so they were completely and utterly outnumbered as they were likely scattered around. they wouldn’t be able to build a castle and re-engineer toussaint to fit their needs. i understand that he is massively biased, but i feel like regis calls these first vampires “hapless survivors” for a reason, and also since regis is regis, i do not feel like he would feel this way about them if they committed massive crimes against humanity.

tl;dr for this point: not only is it fucked up for no reason but to be gross/shocking to the audience, but it also removes their purpose as a metaphor, which is #2.

2. the removal of their purpose as a metaphor in the story.

originally, the vampires are not meant to be the focus of the witcher series or even a smaller part of the series at all. they are simply a metaphor for aspects of human society so that regis can have a backstory. the vampires are nothing more than a fictional means of exploring the effects of alcoholism, and a thought experiment as to what an authority-less, family-less, custom-less society would be like. the question “what do youth do when they have no support and no guidance?” already is one of the witcher’s major questions as a saga, the vampires and regis’s backstory serves to be another one of the stories within it that fits this theme. except we add more conditions to the thought experiment this time, like “what if these youth never aged and were powerful enough to survive on their own?” there would be no reason for them to ever change or grow out of their behavior. it’s quite interesting, because it’s meant to reflect upon human nature, the vampires are metaphorically humans. there is no reason for regis to even be a vampire, except that he needs to be able to survive death and learn from his mistakes. a human would have died had he hit rock bottom like regis did, but since regis wasn’t human and could rise from the grave, he had the chance at a new life. humans don’t get second chances. this is the point of the entire story being about vampires.

now, i understand that the purpose of the witcher games is to entertain, unlike the point of the witcher book series, which are like any other books and serve an author’s message. so, it stands to reason that the vampires do not have to prove a strong point here, but they should retain their essential traits and serve as the metaphor which was already really interesting and deserves more explanation and thought. i think using a fictional lens to take a look at real-world issues can be helpful sometimes, when done respectfully and when still using creativity. even if it’s just to entertain, that doesn’t mean it should be brainless and throw all of the commentary out of the window.

the vampires as a subject for the game to focus on should really be a vessel for thought and critique. it should mean SOMETHING for them to be there, because they were originally a message and a metaphor.

but in blood & wine, they are incredibly shallow, only there to exist for the attention-getter of gore.

does it MEAN anything that dettlaff regenerated regis from his own flesh and blood? or does that just happen because we needed a convienient way to bring regis back and tie him to the antagonist? does it MEAN anything that dettlaff cuts off his own hand? or is that just because it’s cool and kinda gross. does it MEAN anything that the vampires attack beauclair? or is that just because there needed to be some violence and conflict.

there is no deeper meaning! it’s all just flashiness to shock the audience! it’s incredibly shallow and because it is shallow, it becomes boring and forgettable.

blood & wine focuses on details about the vampires that are gross, gorey or bloody, uncomfortable because of how nasty they are. and these elements have NO PURPOSE to the story other than to gross you out, like regis being regenerated, dettlaff skewering regis like a kebab, dettlaff cutting off his hand and that hand being handled by the bruxa, geralt, and regis, regis going crazy in a cage, syanna also getting skewered, etc. ... it’s this focus on the physical action that is happening on screen with little thought as to any deeper meaning that makes me tired and nauseous. why treat the vampires as savage animals?

as a mention in this topic, i am going to comment on how they deliberately changed the lore to “make childrens’ blood taste better than adults’ blood,” because that is mega-gross. why change it to focus on child endangerment? that’s nasty! why make orianna feed on children when it was LITERALLY canon that the “best” blood was that of strong adults? if you want to make orianna morally grey, she could have owned any other kind of place to get blood from. see #2 for more discussion of this.

3. their focus on the conjunction of the spheres.

the vampires never had this obsession with “returning home.” i... have no idea where this comes from. remember how i just said that i appreciate a metaphor for real-life when it is done respectfully? CDPR gave us this awkward metaphor for the vampires “wanting to go home” because they have to “assimilate” in this new world, apparently every vampire ever misses their homeland. ... it’s the story of immigrants who didn’t have a choice to be born in The New Land, but they were anyways, and now they want to go home. and it’s the story of minority groups, who are overshadowed by the society they live in, but cannot be themselves in, because it would mean violence. 

this is an incredibly awkward metaphor just because it’s not done well, but also CDPR literally just focused on how extremely violent the vampires are, and how they also control everything so they can use the humans they were thrown in with to their own fancies. this is... i didn’t know that the metaphors for fantasy racism in the witcher could get any worse than sapkowski’s were.

also, there’s some weird lore-breaking moments when regis says he misses the vampire homeworld or whatever, and i just am left staring at my laptop like. you’re only like, 4 centuries old, regis. the conjunction of the spheres occured more than 3 times your age in the past. plus the fact that regis in baptism of fire calls himself a “descendant,” it’s obvious that someone at cdpr just didn’t do their research when writing those lines.

4. their power level and exactly how powerful they are. 

let’s take a moment to think about a grain of truth. the second story in the witcher books, it was written before sapkowski had a lot of the vampire lore down-pat. geralt says things like “it’s silver, this blade is silver” and “an ordinary vampire couldn’t come out in the sun,” which are incongruent with what we learn in baptism of fire about vampires. but nevertheless, there’s a lot which is still accurate to the vampires, such as that VEREENA ABSOLUTELY KICKS GERALT’S ASS. geralt very nearly DIED in that fight, he was ABOUT to die, but nivellen saved him at the last split-second. geralt finds out that vereena is a bruxa, and he is alarmed, he shouts and then falls on his ass. he scrambles, he’s unprepared to deal with a foe THIS powerful. he manages to land his sword on her during the fight, but it barely harms her. she dodges incredibly, and swipes of his sword that should have hit do not. she screams terribly, and geralt is in incredible, writhing pain. he uses his signs to help him, this is no normal fight with a normal foe. flash forward to in baptism of fire, when geralt meets another vampire, one that is considerably more powerful and unique than vereena was. dandelion asks geralt, if ... potentially... maybe... and geralt responds that he sincerely doubts that he could beat regis in a fight, and he really does not want to have to try.

geralt was BESTED by vampires in the books. he was as close as a witcher can get to being INTIMIDATED by their power. but what happens in blood & wine? there’s like 8 bruxae and alpors ganging up on you and you can easily vanquish all of them with your silver sword and by knocking back maybe a glass of black blood and white raffard’s decoction. it’s fine, it’s easy to kill vampires. geralt doesn’t hesitate to fight dettlaff. he doesn’t worry, he doesn’t tell anyone that he sincerely doubts that he could beat him in a fight, that he doesn’t want to have to try. instead, it’s regis talking geralt out of the fight, trying to advocate for peace. 

CDPR massively nerfed the vampires just to make them easier targets for the player. i think this is unfair to how the vampires were powerful threats to be reckoned with in the books, foes that even geralt, a witcher, did not want to face. not even out of geralt’s pacifism and apprehension to slay innocent and/or sentient beings, but out of not wanting to fucking hit that die button

i also understand that regis was supposedly less powerful now because he was just tired from being regenerated, but vampires like bruxae should have been able to turn into giant bats. there’s nothing stopping them besides cdpr not wanting to code it in, just like how they didn’t want to code in bruxae or alpors wearing clothes (because vampires do wear clothes in canon).

5. their classification: adding new vampire species, distinguishing between “higher vampires” and “TRUE higher vampires”

just plain annoying to me. there’s only seven types of vampires, as regis says in baptism of fire: 

“In the case of higher vampires, never, I agree,” Emiel Regis said softly. “From what I know alpors, katakans, moolas, bruxas, and nosferats don’t mutilate their victims. On the other hand, fleders and ekimmas are pretty brutal with their victim’s remains.”

“Bravo,” Geralt said, looking at him in genuine admiration. “You didn’t leave out a single class of vampire, Nor did you mention any of the imaginary ones, which only exist in fairy-tales.”

so there are seven classes... five of which are higher vampires which can probably be classified by having sentient thought and not harming their victims, two of which are lesser vampires, which are quite violent with their victims and more animalistic for this reason.

also i am confused as to why CDPR made fleders the least likely to sustain flight, when their name i’m pretty certain is taken from fledermaus, the german word for bat, which just means flying mouse (feel free to correct me if i’m wrong, idk german), so “fleder” should just mean “flutter,” or “to fly.” 

SO. it’s total bullshit to be like “there’s some higher vampires and then TRUE/REAL higher vampires, which cannot be killed...” and it confuses everyone as to who is ACTUALLY a higher vampire and who is not, when the system we had before wasn’t broken at all!

BONUS. general changes to vampire powers

it annoys me how they turn into puffs of mist/smoke instead of vanishing, simply vanishing. no deeper reason why, it just bothers me because you’re not supposed to be able to see them at all, that’s the point of turning invisible/incorporeal.

there was no mention or demonstration of how regis can hypnotize people, even though that was probably his most frequently used vampire power in the books asides from turning invisible/incorporeal. it showed that even though he was very powerful, he opted to use his passive powers and nonviolent routes of dealing with people.

i think it also makes the vampires way overpowered to be able to regenerate each other with each other’s blood ... and it takes away from the finality of stygga... also them just flying and turning into bats whenever they want, as if regis didn’t say that he can only turn into a bat during a full moon. they made them overpowered and still made it super easy for geralt to kill them. alright

[princessmuk]

HSMTMTS Character Opinions Bc I’m Procrastinating On My Homework:

Nini

She’s a very sweet girl and definitely deserves better. Though, she can be selfish and makes mistakes... but everyone does that! She just seems like a normal teenage girl. She’s right to want to be loved and treated well, and she deserves to be Gabriella. She does need to get out of her own head sometimes, though. But, as we’ve seen in the latest episode, she’s capable of putting her own feelings aside to help someone else, so go her! 9/10 gal

Ricky

I’m a little biased because he’s my favorite character, but that’s for a reason! Ricky made a huge mistake taking a break with Nini... it really hurt her and it’s the reason they’re in this mess. BUT— I understand why he did it. His parents are getting divorced, of course it’s hard for him to say he loves her when he associates love (what he feels for Nini) with how he saw his parents treating each other as he grew up. He’s scared, and that’s okay. But still, he won’t be able to get her back until he can tell her that. He’s dealing with a lot rn but he’s trying his best and I gotta give him props for that. He’s made mistakes but he apologizes for them, and if he ever thinks he’s overstepping he tries to make sure Nini is comfortable! He’s really trying to show Nini he cares and he’s doing an amazing job at the musical, despite his reasons for auditioning. 10/10 guy!

EJ

Where do I even start... EJ seemed alright at first— he was jealous and a bit basic for my tastes, but he seemed supportive and Nini obviously liked him. But, as we have seen, he is NOT a good person. EJ stole Nini’s phone because she didn’t tell him ONE TIME who texted her (which she doesn’t need to do ever if she doesn’t want to! Where is the trust??) He was going to fess up but only because he was told he should, then he chickened out because it would make his romantic competition look better if he admitted to his mistake??? Wtf??? He’s trying to apologize but Nini has the right to be angry. Plus, to top it all off, he admitted to poisoning somebody and didn’t see why it was bad. So.... yeah, that’s disgusting. 1/10 boy.

Gina

She hasn’t had much time in the spotlight, so I don’t have much of an opinion! She is definitely jealous of Nini and willing to be manipulative to get what she wants, but she also seems to come from a home life that demands perfection so it’s not surprising that she’ll go to those lengths... She has some growing to do, but I believe she can do it. 6/10 gal.

Carlos

What’s not to love about this boy??? He’s hilarious, a great choreographer, stands up for his friends (so far mostly Ms. Jenn but still) and overall just deserves better than he’s given. He’s pouring his heart into this musical and I’m so proud of him. He has not done one problematic thing so far. 11/10 boy.

Ashlyn

Her talent is amazing and she is definitely a kind soul. She’s able to call EJ out which is great, but she also thinks Nini should forgive him, which is not so great. She’s very charming and deserves more screentime. 8/10 gal.

Kourtney

Kourtney is a good friend and a hardcore feminist, which I like. Her personality is bold yet she’s real enough to not be able to talk back to a senior, which I think is very relatable. She definitely falls into a lot of tropes, which isn’t always good, and it feels like her role could be a lot bigger. But, as a person, she’s pretty great. 8/10 gal.

Big Red

My. Man. Red is really out here trying his best to cheer up Ricky in any given situation! He’s obviously a bit awkward and doesn’t always know what to say or do, but he does his absolute best. He’s a great friend considering how little Ricky does for him, though he doesn’t seem to have any problems he needs help with atm so for now that’s fine. His lack of knowledge regarding theatre is hilarious and suits him perfectly. Wish he had a little more depth, but there’s definitely a lot to read into with him. (Everyone in the fandom picking up his subtle gayness.... his crush on Ricky.... it might not be real but it is in our hearts... ) 7/10 guy.

Seb

My. Boy. Seb is adorable and easily loveable despite how little he’s on screen. His lines are always funny and sweet, and from what I’ve seen so far, he’s just a cinnamon roll. 12/10 boy.

[jan-uinely]

hot takes continued

here we go. season 12 episode 12. 

so. it’s time to chit chat about drag race. if u dont like my opinions sry. 

this is gonna get bigger than one episode or one season. this is meta drag race. 

but first i guess the episode. right. so. obviously it was a “musical” so obviously i wanted to see jan sing and obviously she did not. I do think that this challenge [not necessarily placed in this episode] would have been a great time to do a like returning queens. but i digress.

i think that it was a little muddled. like it wasn't like any of the “girl group” numbers where it’s just the verse and chorus. all of the verses were placed in different spots throughout the show. I also think it’s ironic that this whole episode is to promote this live vegas show which is obviously not happening right now. but alas. 

i agree with bob in that i liked jackie’s verse the best. 

i did not love gigi’s outfit in the challenge. you couldn't make out the heart as easily bc the red was all the same color. I also think the material used was too chunky- it was quilted. i would have rather had the heart be quilted, not have a corset underneath it, and have the rest of the top part not be quilted. i thought it was a good concept but i would have preferred different #choices. i also would have rather the hair been straight instead of curled.

i did not have a huge issue w crystal’s orange and green outfit. i also appreciated the callback stars and stripes hair. though maybe not together?

jaida was good as per usual. i want her to win, but we will get to that later. 

also let us note the basketball wives hair that made a comeback [gigi, jackie]

runway time.

crystal and ******’s outfits did not fit the way i wanted them too, and the problems were both in the hips. when i saw them i thought the hips should be exaggerated, but instead they both looked weirdly deflated. and crystal’s torso section could have been brought in. [i did see on instagram that the person who made crystal’s look [casey caldwell who is a nyc based designer, works w a lot of neoprene/thick materials- just look up on instagram caseyyalater] actually made it for dragcon and crystal bought it right there, so it wasn’t tailored] 

in the dior v dior battle, i thought gigi won. jackie’s dress was just i think a little too large [not in terms of tailoring, in terms of diameter] but it was very jackie

gigi said that her outfit was quintessential gigi, which i think it interesting bc if you look up showgirls performances, it very much is. however in terms of the character portrayed on drag race i didn’t think it was. it was very well made, etc. but it just didn’t fit the “perfectionist trope” of the show. 

jaida is once again wearing a gown with a presequinned fabric, which i am not mad at. it is quintessential jaida. 

critiques. 

again ooh we have to nitpick bc we accidentally cast too many winners on this season blah blah blah. i was not a fan of when they said oh well we will have to look at report cards. as if they didnt intentionally load up gigi and ****** with wins at the start of the show. 

and then it’s like oh well jackie and crystal have to lip sync blah blah blah. and you know that jackie is going home. bc the judges absolutely love crystal, all because of that mullet. 

to quote bob “I used to be really upset at queens who won the judges with their personality” and that is still mostly true for me. i don’t think her placement is unjust or whatever, but like if ru didn’t like the mullet, she would not have been given the confidence boost to turn her trajectory around, compared to jackie and widow and jan, who did most things right but just were not rupaul’s fave, and must have had a much more difficult time mentally on the show. 

and FWIW heidi falls into this category as well. race chaser i think said it - all of her success comes from ru’s ideas. and being naturally funny and charismatic and having ru like you as a person is a huge gift and huge talent, but the inability to wrangle it...  that being said i think she deserves the world and will grow [and has already grown] from this experience.

and the thing is that crystal also keeps going back to the same stuff which could have been funny if the episodes were more than one apart or if she didn't do it twice in one episode but. idk. 

now, who will win, who should win, hmm hmm hmm. tbh i don’t think it will be crystal. they just crowned the oddball and they like to mix it up, or at least try to. also why looking at the history of dusted or busted scores [and s/o to jan for coming in @ 4 [after the disqualification]] crystal is at a 2, and bebe won with the lowest score at a 3 [w 2nd and 3rd place at 4 and 5], and that was in season 1, which was a whole other ballgame. leaving us with jaida and gigi. i am team jaida. i think that she is much more developed as an artist and performer than gigi, and I think that she will bring us something new.

[here comes the meta part]

the title is america’s next drag superstar. and i think in the beginning of the show, they decided that that had to mean something new and exciting, something that pushed the boundaries of what drag could be [which is rly ironic coming from them but]. which has developed this culture of what is the formula to be successful on drag race. and some people were more overt about this [jan] and some people were more subtle about this [gigi and jackie]. 

but for some reason, the [Black] pageant queens will make it to the top and then never win. - and they’ve had overt conversations regarding pageants and pageant culture on the show before - but balls and pageants were like the building blocks of drag culture in the us [from what i understand]. so inherently that means it’s no longer “new” and exciting. but the thing is that so many of these fashion [/nyc] queens work so exclusively with these high end designers to produce these looks [i think bob said it can cost like 10K to prep all your stuff for drag race] and with that the ability to design and sew falls away. 

and i think that is reflected in the challenges and how they have changed. this season there was one design challenge. and that is just so disappointing to me bc i think the design challenges really separate who has a full understanding of their persona and who does not. 

and with fewer and fewer design challenges, you have more and more designer items, and the ability to create something has fallen to the wayside. personally [and i will probably make another post about this later] i want to bring back the design challenges in one of two ways. 1. have an all designers season. where drag designers work to make elaborate costumes based on a prompt and given certain materials. bc on the show designers are not credited as much [that part comes on instagram]. 2. i want to have a drag race blank slate competition. where contestants audition and are given a list of prompts but cannot bring anything except like a notebook. no prepared outfits. you can sketch designs to the prompts, but all the materials are provided. contestants still have a main challenge and a runway, but rather than 2 days, they are given a full week to execute the challenge and the outfit. this would totally change the game in my mind. like one you wouldn't have to have money or take out loans to compete, you could just come and show who you are. and two the audience could see more of what goes into this stuff. AND if drag race really wants to feed us, they could do like a wed. ep and a friday ep. to spread things out. 

my favorite challenges are design challenges, and while i think the first challenge this season gave us a better introduction to who the contestants are, the design challenge is a really good thing to have at the front. 

i do think that if they had not had the debate that there would have been another design challenge in the mix, but bc it was an election year. 

anyways, i want jaida to win bc she’s excellent at what she does. and at this point there is something new and exciting about making all your own clothes and being polished and knowing who you are.  and tbh gigi doesn’t bring anything new to the table. sure the ability to sew and design is good, but compared to aquaria and violet the designs were not as diverse or inventive. on top of that, the fact that gigi is outwardly apolitical [and doesn’t understand the connotation of “privilege” in today’s times] is just not a good look. I also think that it is interesting that gigi came in as the look queen but actually did better in the acting challenges. 

idk my main takeaway is that gigi is really really good at playing other people, and with that comes a lack of self awareness. striving so hard to be perfect can come at the cost of not knowing who you are as an artist. like gigi’s brand is literally “im that bitch/bitch” which again, just isn’t what i want in a winner. 

and tbh the gigi bug bit early but ended when ru gave her the win on the madonna episode. [i will say that jackie could have won snatch game but tbh i was annoyed w her for being a little dickish to the safe girls that week [though what she said was totally understandable] and also i <3 jackie cox [and chelsea piers we stan chelsea piers in this house] i think there is something so gr8 abt being a nerd and being prepared and being on brand about it. also jackie is always the one to hop on the dolls’ lives and comment their venmo. hashtag cool aunt jackie. [though that here for cox t-shirt and the promo photos make me uncomfy though i get it]]

re jackie coming back to complete the top 4... IDK it’s nice and all but they've already established that they don’t want her to win- otherwise she would not have been eliminated. 

also in my mind there are only 12 places so jan actually came in 7, widow 6, heidi 5, jackie 4. 

anyways these are my thoughts. as usual, raw and unedited.