#my most beloved fandom

[sammaggs]

Stargate is my first and most dear fandom and I was on the GateWorld Forums way back in like 2001 and at all the Gatecons but the fandom kinda died and I’ve been so alone…

ONLY TO DISCOVER THERE IS A HUGE STARGATE FANDOM ON TUMBLR??????? IN 2024????????

I AM SO HAPPY AHHHHHH

Here’s my Stargate tattoo and me in front of the actual Stargates when I was 18 🥺

Kree 🫡

[lordgrimwing]

I did it! Finally finished up another Rowland Sinclair Series WIP and posted it! Thank you, end of year reblogs for giving me the motivation to get it done.

On the slim chance that there are other fans interested in fics, here's a link.

[random-stitches]

GNU Terry Pratchett.

pratchett will write an entire book about the grim reaper pretending to be santa claus while the grim reaper’s granddaughter goes about hunting down the dumbass who decided to kill santa, and then right when you think you’re done and the oddly pointed shenanigans are winding down he hits you with “humans need fantasy to be human. to be the place where the falling angel meets the rising ape,” and knocks you into next wednesday

[aliceisaperson]

I think about this so fucking much

[itty-bitty-sunshine]

"You said you love me exactly the way I am"

[lcs-scar]

Mandi & also her bf

[toonsforkicks22]

I may or may not be working on a smut fanfic with these two…

[randomness-is-my-order]

okay, buckle up, this pjo rant-post will be a bit long! this is gonna sound a bit melodramatic but what genuinely saddens me about percy’s characterisations and portrayal by the narrative over the years since the last olympian was out is that... the very nuance that was written into this character in the original series is slowly being stripped away and moulded into the caricatures that percy has been flanderized into in popular fanon. i remember having debates over the whole “can’t function without annabeth”/“has one functional braincell”/“is constantly self-doubting himself into a pithole” characterisations and opposing these perceptions with canonical content. because the beauty of percy’s character is how his strengths have always balanced his weaknesses. he’s impulsive but battle-smart, he’s ignorant (about the greek ways) but has a tough as shit skin, he’s new to everything but he’s mindful enough to keep up with the new inlet of information. he’s loyal to a fault, but brave beyond measure. he’s a smart guy, a wisecracking guy, a loving, caring, wonderful person. the aspect of himself that doubts himself always read part-trauma, part-humility. his perception of himself was generally skewed, yes, but we had a counterbalance of it in terms of how people reacted to him, even in the original series! annabeth sure as hell didn’t fall for him for being a dumbknut who can’t tie his shoelaces without her assistance. their competence was implicitly and explicitly shown to be equal! percy had opinions that went against annabeth’s all the time, he had stances on matters that he remained so firm on he gave up immortality for them. he respected himself enough to respect his own views on different matters.

and towards the end of the series, i always got the impression that percy’s self-doubt had been improving and that is exactly how an upward progressive arc for a main character should be! and i did think that was rick’s idea too during the heroes of olympus, especially because the outsider perspectives were heavy on appreciating percy as a powerful, capable demigod. but i think, in hindsight, the seeds of what we now see in the new trilogy had already been planted. the constant pointed remarks about percy’s intelligence are irksome enough but the backpedaling of percy’s self-perception is probably the most egregious to me. because how do i argue my points from above anymore when the newest canon supports that fanon pov?

when the people surrounding percy have been reinforcing views that undermine him–primarily his intelligence and his competence–the very same people who you’d think would know better because they actually know percy the most intimately, it makes sense that percy himself is still stuck in the routine of undermining his ownself. but also... this should, from a writing-continuity perspective, make NO sense whatsoever. because this kind of superficial reading of percy from the other characters only made sense at the very start of the original series. by the end, i do not think annabeth was in the dark about percy’s “surprising intelligence”. that’s a laughable notion to have. and she’d be the first to shut down anyone implying that percy couldn’t function without her because again, so much of their original fascination and bonding with each other was about how well they could keep up with each other! they don’t need each other and that makes it all the more wonderful that they’re gonna help each other out regardless!

ugh, i just do not understand the logic behind having the protagonist revert back to self-esteem issues that he has already been shown to overcome to a noticeable difference by the conclusion of his original arc. i get regression in self perception is not some uncommon, unfathomable concept. but i cannot wrap my head around the fact that this view of percy of his ownself is not treated with enough gravity by the narrative, instead it’s just a part of his pov now. i do not think rick’s trying to paint annabeth or the friends as enablers of this self-perception and if he is, that’s bullshit. someone like sally would not allow her son to continue thinking of himself in such a manner anyway.

also, like, forget everything–the writing, the logic leaps, the plot holes. is it too much to ask for percy, a beloved main character, to have a confident outlook and have that reflected in the books explicitly meant for “fun”? if this series is how we send-off the golden trio and say goodbye to them, why do we need to see percy with a self-deprecating perception? why can’t we have banter that doesn’t horribly contradict established characterisations in the past? the fun of percabeth was, for me, that even if they were on some pedestal, they were on it together. but lately, it’s like rick is trying his best to throw percy off that pedestal from all directions possible and i think that’s such a disservice to this character we all have cherished for decades now. there are ways to go about writing, what is essentially, an “unserious” trilogy without compromising on character traits and interpersonal dynamics. it was never dumb vs smart, clumsy vs competent, grumpy vs sunshine, whipped vs unbothered when it came to percabeth. but slowly, so many of these black-and-white popular tropes have been bleeding into their canon dynamic and at the cost of sounding crude: fuck this, just fucking FUCK THISSSS.

[mlady-magnolia]

The Flower of House Black

[stormbreaker-290]

so I drew sun from @suntimeswolliw's Candy Store au :]c

they're actually in the process of making a visual novel of this au! i highly recommend you check them out cuz they're an amazing artist and i love their stuff <3 i plan on drawing their moon design as well but i just couldn't wait to show this guy off :3

[seinfeldyke]

As deerlottie was bullied off i think its pretty important to look at the kind of blogs and content we are engaging with and whether we are creating a safe space for trans/nonbinary folks so on that.... it's pretty clear that @ jokeson-u is behind the harassment Josh got based on these posts made Right after Josh deleted. I blocked, feel free to do the same.

[dearmyloveleys]

svsss fans what do we call ourselves?? like blackpink has blinks and taylor has swifties, are we scummies??

[nachosncheezies]

In defense of late-canon x files (including the revivals)

I was thinking about this poll after I commented on it, and I kinda want to be brave and say more.

Short answer to the poll's question before I go any further: If you're a new fan and a sensitive sort who thinks you'll struggle with your blorbos Really Going Through It and you really need a happy ending, I suggest you stop at the end of season 8. Do not pass go, do not look at spoilers. Disregard this post entirely, close the internet, and go look at something that makes you happy. (Also fuck every part of society that characterizes sensitivity as inherently weak and bad and some kind of personal failing, you are valid.)

That said, "quality" as a concept is entirely subjective, and the question of whether or not there's a decline in quality for any story is wholly subjective, too. In the case of x files? I'm not convinced there is a decline. I am going to be upfront that I haven't yet watched past season 8, though I am almost completely spoiled on events after that - and the reason I haven't watched yet is not because of how I know events are going to unfold, but simply because I don't want it to end!!! Ohh, the tension between "I CAN'T WAIT!!!" and "Nooo don't be over D:"

When I first came to txf fandom on tumblr and gradually became spoiled about what happens in late canon though, I was often left uncomfortable and tbh kinda queasy about it. As I said in my comment on the poll, the hate for especially the revival and IWTB, or to a lesser extent even seasons 8 & 9, is very well documented. But! There are other takes to be found here on tumblr if you figure out where to look, and my feelings have changed!

The thing is, I have yet to find myself in any fandom where there isn't a vocal subset of fans who dislike the story after a certain point. I am not joking when I say that no one hates the things they love as passionately as sci-fi and fantasy fans. In my experience, it often hinges on the extent to which a viewer has strong notions on where they would like the characters to end up. In particular with series where shipping is a dominant component for the bulk of a fandom, I have almost universally found that there comes some turning point in the story where "let them be happy you cowards" is the dominant view, and things that compromise the attainment of a degree of romantic stability and/or domesticity are, to many fans, annoying at best and despicable at worst. But! As one tagset on the linked poll said:

and I think for any fandom, that last tag especially is so so so important. (I think that's harder for people watching a weekly series live, bc you have so much time to analyze and speculate and dream before the next breadcrumb drops, but I digress.)

So why am I saying this and how do I apply it to x files? Well, I eventually found that there are also a subset of fans who find redeeming things right up to the very end and actually quite like the whole thing! The things that I had seen people rage and ventpost so much about honestly never quite sounded to me as "out of character" or "untrue to the story" etc as those same ventposts made them sound. And I've discovered I'm not the only one who felt that way. Do I love that the spooky squad had to go through all of those things? No, those poor guys D: Life is hard and they have been through so much trauma. But do those events and their choices make sense to me in light of everything that came before? Yes! And I honestly can't wait to see them fight to overcome those things, breaking, healing, always learning, always growing, always getting better.

So if you're wondering "where does it go wrong"... well, I'm a completionist, as many people who've answered that post are, but also my personal opinion is that I don't think it does go wrong. If you're new and interested in exploring why I've gone from "vaguely queasy" to "excited" about the whole thing, or want to maybe balance out the impressions you're getting about the later seasons before deciding whether or not you want to see the whole thing, I'll put a few blog names in the comments.

Final admission: even once I started feeling a little more confident in the possibility that "actually ok maybe I'm not crazy, maybe this all kind of is in character and does make sense", there was one big plot point that I was NOT looking forward to and I thought I would never be comfortable about. In hindsight, I think my discomfort came from the negative responses being SO seemingly universal that I hadn't stopped to let myself truly consider other possible interpretations on that point. (I mean my initial instinct when I first read about it was, why are we mad about this?? CSM is literally the most unreliable narrator in history???? it's obviously fake news?????? this must be either a fever dream someone's having or it's a misdirection ploy against whatever shadowy forces might still be lurking?????????????? but for whatever reason I guess I had halfway written that off.) Happily, just last month there's a new post-s11 novel out, and although reviews for the book as a whole are mixed, it seems to have laid the groundwork for resolving that plot issue in a way I think most fans would be broadly happy with. If you're interested in being spoiled about that and seeing how, I recommend searching #perihelion on @agent-troi who liveblogged reading it with receipts, scroll back chronological-style to the first post on the subject and see how it unfolded. (And never forget that Dana Katherine Scully is the queen of denial as a coping mechanism lol)

Everyone's mileage will vary. Each person can feel however they want! But for anyone new, I wanted you to know that the very many ventposts you might be seeing are not all there is to this show or its fandom. Some of us love it despite - or even because of - all the things that went "wrong". I think we just don't talk about it as much.

[panboba]

I have constant thoughts of these two interacting with each other

[fantastic-nonsense]

I think I've watched maybe three episodes of Teen Wolf total but I remember being absolutely baffled at Stiles/Derek being so popular when the concept of Scott/Stiles exists

[arson-09]

This actually isn’t just Tamlain, this is Eltamcien (lucien is just off page grabbing snacks for the picnic trust me)