#must write it immediately

[sysig]

I was inspired from on high (Patreon)

[russell-crowe]

house and wilson seeing each other for the first time in months in s08e02

[stupidspacerobots]

my megop opinion is that they should not ever be in an actual relationship. them being arch-enemies is the ship. they dont have to kiss

[hanzajesthanza]

i don’t mean to jump the gun on witcher 4…

but it’s slowly sunk in for me over the past few months that ciri will be the protagonist of this new game, a new face of the brand, with an updated, witcheress design for her character

and i know the shift for her character design ignited outrage in misogynists across the internet, and i don’t mean to give credence to their arguments by saying that ciri does look different, she has changed

i don’t think it’s legitimatizing their complains by acknowledging that the character design is indeed different, the voice actress is different, it’s a new concept for ciri

and i feel the opposite way about it that they do…

because … holy shit, we’re going to actually have a GNC, not traditionally feminine female character as the very face of this new witcher trilogy, and it will be her trilogy and her story

like actually

asides from the jokes about how “she’s so gender” and “i want her”

i feel like mainstream fantasy right now (and perhaps forever) has always emphasized feminine women, and obviously i’m not against that, insert “i love femmes” meme here, i’m a man (gender-neutral term) of good taste, i can appreciate womanly women :)

but what i mean is that it is sometimes very difficult to see a space for GNC women in fantasy (… as also in society)

despite when they can “fight like men” or “just as well as men,” even when they can dress “like men” or “as a masculine dress”…

like consider even ciri in the witcher 3; she is a powerful witcheress and skilled swordswoman, but she still has to wear a shirt that exposes her collarbones or an armor piece that shows her midriff, and her face is often smiley and pleasant, even when she cries (… not saying that some of this isn’t in character for book ciri—she had the face of a perennial girl)

but watching the witcher 4 trailer over, seeing her expressions, her skin texture, the dirt and sweat, looking at the armor design they’ve given her, the ripping and tearing, the messy, dirty work of a witcher, blood and grime and magic and steel…

maybe i have a very low bar, but when most “women of fantasy” right now look like ballgowns, pristine makeup, fighting in high heels…

(and i’m not saying that there hasn’t been GNC women as protagonists before in gaming and in fantasy. ciri’s braid even reminds me of kassandra from AC)

and when to be “a woman in fantasy” or “interested in fantasy” means that you often have to conform to these gender expectations, aesthetics, which are mostly plastic and mass-manufactured anyways, no matter from what side

like just look at fantasy booktok and what it means to be a woman on fantasy booktok. i’m happy for these women and i’m happy for them genuinely enjoting their interests, but it’s like the farthest thing that i’m interested in, in fantasy, and it feels weird to be lumped together, it feels like there’s an expectation to be a certain way, to fit in with what is consumable and feminine, ascribed to my birth gender

and considering ciri who was a princess, who was raised for ballgowns

you know—and again, asides from the story implications and book lore—seeing ciri redefined for this title, given such a real, witcher design, not altered because she’s a woman, it means something.

because it’s not just one trailer, it’s going to be the whole game, she’s the protagonist, in every cutscene, there’s going to be different armor, animations, it’s going to be real. she’s going to be in the stream of pop culture, people will know her and her image, and this will become part of the contemporary fantasy genre, of the public perception, of women in fantasy, just as much as a court of fae and fuckall is

like this 👆 is a woman too. deal with it. enjoy it. bcuz i will be

[squarebracket-trickster]

You've heard of using AI to write a novel. Now, get ready for the (infintely better) sequel: using a human to write an AI!

Join me in a hell of my own making, where I intentionally try to write sentences that sound like they were pasted straight from ChatGPT.

Why am I doing this? Because I hate myself. Why not just use ChatGPT to write the AI parts? Because I respect myself. The machines are not better than me! I can do everything ChatGPT can do, even sound like ChatGPT. It wants to take my job. I'll take its first!

[metamatronic]

I wanna make fanfic for your AU but idk what it would be 😞

first off,ahhhhhhhhh thank you,

secondly, well, I tend to just…rewrite the plot points of the games, tbh??? they tend to all have little narrative arcs of their own.

alternatively, for smaller stuff, you could also do what I do—a million and one dumb ways michael could accidentally reveal his identity to VR gang.

[toxintouch]

Headcanon that Ais never feels fully rested. He doesn't feel tired, but he doesn't feel right either. Not since joining the groupmind.

He sleeps, but his mind is never really at peace. When and if he manages to fall into a deep enough sleep, he's in a constant state of something akin to lucid dreaming.

He gets flashes of the other members of the group mind in place of any real rest. Their current actions; errant memories; whispers in long-dead languages he's leaned to understand.

[brainrot-jikan]

im not the biggest alhaitham/kaveh shipper (because im a rare pair ho) but it seems to me that in alhaitham/kaveh getting-together fics tend to be... unequal.

the beautiful thing about alhaitham and kaveh is that they're both equally right and equally wrong and equally dicks about it. but the writers for alhaitham/kaveh much more frequently seem to give alhaitham the burden change (the burden of the character flaw) instead of kaveh.

in any good character arc, the main character has a fatal flaw or misconception, and by the end of that arc they have addressed that flaw in some definitive way. scrooge was a scrooge and learned that being that way was detrimental; merlin from finding nemo was overprotective to a fault and had to learn that he couldn't (and shouldn't) control everything and to let go; the wolf from little red riding hood learns that you should stop while you're ahead.

stories centering around romance tend to lean heavily on character arcs, which makes sense. and since romance generally requires two individuals to be vulnerable and open and emotional with each other, it makes double sense that alhaitham/kaveh authors zoom straight into alhaitham's lack of emotional vulnerability.

this bothers me.

in society, individuals are expected to experience and present emotions in a specific way. if someone dies, you cry. if someone smiles at you, you smile back. if you're at a party, you're supposed to be having fun. if you don't do these things, you're seen as impolite at best and a inhuman freak at worst. when these behaviors are frequent it's often viewed as emotional immaturity, or a lack of ability to feel at all. the inability or lack of willingness to conform to societies emotional expectations of you is seen as a flaw and a reason for exclusion.

alhaitham is canonically disliked and avoided for being the way he is. he prefers it this way, but that doesn't mean the people perpetuating this avoidance are in the right. they are the societal pressure to conform that alhaitham blows off. alhaitham could be the way he is for a lot of reasons: avoidant attachment style, trauma, following someone else's example (eg. his grandmother), or just his base personality. it doesn't MATTER. he is the way he is. kaveh having to accept that should be part of the story.

putting the burden of the fatal flaw on alhaitham, making the way alhaitham treats kaveh and the people around him the problem, feels invalidating. it implies heavily that alhaitham's way of interfacing with the world, alhaitham's very SELF, is incorrect. my suggestion is to flip a larger portion of that burden onto kaveh. kaveh 👏 character 👏 arcs 👏

some examples/recommendations:

- make kaveh project his insecurities onto other people but especially onto alhaitham; he's overly reliant on other people for his own self worth, and he perceives alhaitham's lack of positive feedback as a direct reflection of how alhaitham feels about him. but learns along the way that alhaitham doesn't hate him, kaveh's actual struggle is with hating himself and being unable to his own self as worthy of love. maybe throw in how you are responsible for your own recovery, other people can help but you can't rely on them to carry you through self actualization.

- or, kaveh tries to make alhaitham behave more like a "normal" person, to be more pleasant and emotive and forthcoming, and then realizes he's in the wrong for trying to make alhaitham into something he's not, possibly for all the wrong reasons (not because he likes alhaitham better like that, but bc society says that's healthier and a better/more conforming way to be)

- or you could go ahead make alhaitham's issues the main problem but they're too complicated to overcome in a short period of time, so kaveh has to accept alhaitham is doing his best in his own way and not push for unrealistic and unhealthy changes. he could alter his own behavior to give alhaitham space and time and a safe place to land.

that got sappy so it's past time for me to dip out. go forth and ship things; but maybe consider letting alhaitham be a rude stone-faced bastard if he wants to be.

[evlia]

I need buck x bucky kissing in the rain, I need them standing in the pouring rain, hair, face and clothes all wet, breath heavy as they look at each other, as their eyes lock and roam all over each other’s faces, tracing the droplets trailing down their cheeks and lips. I need them closing the distance between in dramatic motion, hands clutching and gripping their clothes, fingers tangling in wet locks of hair and kissing with desperation and adoration, I need the sound of rain to muffle their whines and moans, rain mixing with their saliva as they refuse to separate from each other. I need them to pull back just a little bit, to catch their breath and to watch the raindrops lingering on their eyelashes

[qoldenskies]

@ the earlier questions if Leo isn’t a twink then explain why I can make “I want that twink obliterated” jokes about him with impunity

if leo werent a twink the fandom wouldnt be treating him like that. for that exact reason

[dizzybizz]

im so

im so .. insane about him right now

I LOVE HIS BIG PEEPERS . HIS BIG PEEPERS WHEN HES SO DEEP IN THE ZONE !!! ITS ALMOST EERIE LIKE AUHGDJJFGGH

look at him hugging his bag. look at his sproing.

i love!!!!! when his eye goes

BOKUTO YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[milolunde]

We all know Timmy is Wanda’s mama’s boy but we need to keep in mind he’s still Cosmo’s kid too and that Cosmo would love him just as vehemently as Wanda

[elisedonut]

Little Percy making cookies <3

my brain was thinking soulmate au again sorry sometimes soulmate brainrot takes over my life for a few weeks

I am a simple person with simple needs and soulmate aus fill so so many of those needs

my brain was thinking about that whole know things about your soulmate concept which in this case also morphed into knowing things they like and such and just sometimes getting an urge to do something that if you were with them would make them happy and so a tiny Percy just walking into the kitchen and making cookies even though a few minutes before he would not be able to tell you the recipe he was about to make

Molly only realizes once he turns the oven on and legit the only reason he doesn't get in trouble is her realizing it's a soulmate vision when he stops her from 'fixing' something he's doing 'wrong'

at which point she starts asking pointed questions to try to pull as much information about who it is out of him before he snaps out of it

because in my mind this is happening when Percy's like old enough to talk well but young enough that no sane person would want him using the oven so he's one of the first to get one and she's excited

my first thought was Moody/Percy again

where Percy outright even tells Molly his soulmate's name is Alastor but she doesn't put two and two together until Arthur comes home and says something that tips her off

like idk them tasting like some he's had before specifically with Moody or something or about something having happened that day to him and she's just oh no- and makes Percy go upstairs so she can break the news to Arthur even if it's still technically hypothetical

[clowningaroundmars]

y'know what i've been thinking about lately for no reason at all?

miles42

yeah, yeah i know but. if his 1610 counterpart is a conflict-avoidant-anxious type who keeps running both physically and metaphorically to and from his responsibilities, always acting like he's got everything under control... then, would miles42 be like that as well?

would earth-42 let him do that at all?

by that i mean... i always thought that miles42 would also be the same way, a boy who always tries to sweep things under the rug and pretend everything is totally normal... until i figured that smoothing over important things that need addressing is probably the last thing he would want to do, at least behind the scenes.

he'd put on the happy mask and conceal his pain on the surface, never arouse suspicions. miles42 would undoubtedly be influenced by his uncle aaron of course

but when a dystopian police state comes marching into the streets of your neighborhood, and the corrupt govt ruling over them plunges your family into poverty, there's only so much you can paint over until the cracks really start showing. problems tend to escalate quickly under totalitarian regimes

both miles42 and aaron42 would have to reckon with surviving in a world like that, where every bill that comes in the mail could be their last before the cops come hauling them away to debtors prisons. every infraction against the law established by evil billionaires and ceos could mean prison for life in general. every rebellious act is undoubtedly at the risk of being captured by cameras posted everywhere

miles1610 was able to run away from his problems, at least for a little while at a time. what would a miles who didn't have that option at all look like?

how would he feel, looking at himself from another-- freer, and arguably better-- dimension?

[hiddenbeks]

oooooo i need to talk abt heidrun so bad. a fun fact abt heidrun is that animals will sense that something is Off abt her. horses will become agitated around her cats will hiss at her farm animals will freeze or flee in fear and it's all very sad

[astra-terrapin]

To all the authors out there on AO3:

If I leave a comment and not a kudos, it was an accident. I get so excited to leave a comment that I forget to kudos. It has happened a few times, and it will almost certainly happen again.