#my tumblr exists to follow cool artists and like three ao3 authors

[theincognitowriter]

Tales of an Arcadian: A Reflection on Internet Fandom Culture

There’s something hilarious, thinking back on it now, how much my experiences reflect that of the first internet fandom pioneers - happily interacting with each other and the creators of the thing we follow, and in a year’s time about three different controversies occur, the love for the media soured and twisted with resentment or even strengthened in the face of the contention. 

And so yes, perhaps my experiences with my first major fandom, Trollhunters (by famous director and storywriter Guillermo del Toro on Netflix), centralized in the worst-best social media blogging platform Tumblr and current hot and trending voice and text chat app Discord, were not the best. But if I were asked if I would take it all back and change things about it… okay, maybe a few things, but overall I’d happily keep most of my experiences intact. They’ve garnered me quite the friend group, after all, one I’d never let go for anything in the world. And so it is with these collected experiences that I discover some reflections: On a few things to do and not to do as a member of a fandom, especially if you are or are planning to become popular for whatever reason.

The first thing I realized was that it was honestly kind of difficult to have my voice heard on the platforms I was on. Most people just like and click away at whatever seems interesting, and then subscribe to or click to get notifications from certain notable bloggers/people, so if you don’t have cool and eye-catching content (such as art, theories, picture edits, aesthetics, etc.) to show right off the bat, people will just scroll past you. I found it easier, though, to regularly engage and exercise in interactions with others, gaining attention from them. This can be in the form of reblogs (Tumblr), replies (Twitter), or comments (fanfiction hosting sites and art sites like AO3 and DeviantArt). If you consistently show some pretty constructive comments on fanfiction, for example, those authors are more likely to respond and focus their attention on you. Just remember to be polite; I’ve seen weird roleplayers going so deep into their roleplaying that they do it outside of roleplaying zones and bizarrely - sometimes obnoxiously - interacting with non-roleplayers to the point of discomfort.

Minimize participation in any ongoing drama, and try not to be the center of drama, either. Fandom culture is quite deep and complicated nowadays, and the moral ethics of dark and dubious content is currently the hotspot of heated debate. Whether or not your opinions align with one side or another, it’s a well-known fact that you’re better off scrolling past things that don’t nudge you in a good way. Though, do be assertive when people start shoving these things at the faces of the collective, and remember to turn on your blacklists. That’s something my friend, Drew, is very fond of doing, and something I do, too. Not because I like doing it, but because I just really don't want to see that one Alpha/Beta/Omega fanfic with the longest word count rank on the fanfic length filter pop up every time I search whatever’s new in the Trollhunters label on AO3. (Don’t ask.) In the end, just tag your things appropriately with the correct labels and tell others to as well, and you should be good to go. 

Find your people. These are people that align with your interests and what you want from the fandom - they can be anything, ranging from artists to fanfiction writers to aesthetic gif set editors (it’s a specialized set of content creators, bless them for gracing us with their time and photoshop skills). I found a lot of these people on a Discord server for Trollhunters, a few of them being Drew and even Spectrum (see my profile on Spectrum here). A lot of fandom experience is especially tailored through the people that one experiences fandom with. A tight-knit fandom group can encourage growth in many aspects of your person, whether that be in art, worldbuilding, or even in law. Trust me, being friends with a lawyer through Trollhunters has been… illuminating.

Don’t be afraid to wholeheartedly be you. A powerful aspect of the magnetic qualities of internet personality is in the term itself - personality. Certain people are drawn to certain others with certain traits, which helps explain why PewDiePie. (That’s it. That’s the sentence.) My enthusiasm for story and character analysis and theories drew a lot of attention, which was apparently the foundation of interest for some of the people that followed me on Tumblr. (I’m sad to say to these people that I deeply apologize for my current lack of content - without a Tales of Arcadia: Wizards trailer, I’m not motivated to do any more in-depth analyses.) It also probably helped that I’m one of the very few most vocal about a certain underappreciated character in Trollhunters, and have a lot of... let’s say “interesting” fanworks and ideas centered around him. But that’s besides the point.

To sum it up, remember to healthily engage in fandom culture to the extent that you’re comfortable with, and only with the parts and the people of the fandom that you wish to interact with, and most importantly, never be afraid to be yourself. 

After all, as Blinky Galadrigal of Trollhunters once said: Destiny is a gift - some go their entire lives, living existence as a quiet desperation. 

And in my words, when you are given destiny, you make of it what you can and what you will, and in that, you will find happiness and contentment.

Signed, an Arcadian.

[izzy-b-hands]

20-30!

Thank you so much for asking!!!!

20. Favorite character to write?

Already answered, but I don’t mind re-answering cuz I thought maybe I’d narrow my three way tie, but alas, no lol. Still a tie between Ahkmenrah, Snafu, and Skwisgaar.

21. Least favorite character to write? 

Ooh-tbh, Larry from NATM just because I feel like I always make him an asshole? Like, I haven’t published all my fic ideas for NATM because I keep making him really mean? And in some it works but in others I’m like ‘jesus chill Lee he’s just a Dude trying his best’ but also at the same time I feel the way Stiller played him and his character arc means he’s got some major ego to him as the films go on? Idk that isn’t a hot take or anything just me being frustrated with Ben Stiller lol

22. Favorite story you’ve ever written? 

Hard choice, because I love all my kids, but I cried after writing this one lol: https://aboutthatmelancholystorm.tumblr.com/post/186781309036/you-know-that-i-love-you

It hit some personal stuff for me, so to be able to have it work organically in a fic so I could also like, mini therapy session myself? Cool af. Also, ppl seemed to like this a lot too, and while that validation isn’t the only reason I write, it’s always cool when my writing makes ppl happy. 

23. Least favorite story you’ve ever written? 

I don’t really have a least favorite, but I do have some I’m more frustrated with, due to how long they took me to write, etc. Currently? The answer to this is my Mark the Date series because A. it is taking me a day and an age to finish it and B. I feel like it kinda flopped, so it’s hard to pull up any energy to finish it, but like...I may as well now lol. I’ll get it done eventually.

24. Favorite scene you’ve written? 

Oh god tbh I have too many I love just cuz like

I can go back to how I felt writing them and yeah

But as of most recent fics, I really this bit: 

-Snafu patted the blanket near his head, and waited for Eugene to put out his pipe and lay back beside him before snuggling close to him. “You could be right. Could be God. Could just be love.” “How’s that?” “I think love has its own way. Even before you meet someone, even before you know you’re fallin’ for ‘em. Love’s just…out there, like the air or somethin’. Finds you when the time is right, and finds who you click with. You gotta do the rest, the stayin’ in love part, but that bringing together, that first spark…that’s love just existing, and doin’ what it needs to so the world keeps spinnin’, so people make it through tough shit,” Snafu replied. “I like that,” Eugene said. “Think love did a good job with us. Makin’ sure we found each other.” Snafu pressed a kiss softly to the corner of Eugene’s mouth. “Sure did. Wouldn’t ever want to be with anyone else. I don’t even know what that looks like, and I don’t want to.” “Same here,” Eugene’s mouth was warm as he kissed him back. “Here’s to love for making sure you found me.” -

from this fic: https://aboutthatmelancholystorm.tumblr.com/post/186926226531/absolution-is-the-taste-of-your-lips

Because I’m sappy af more than I let on, and also this was a chance to like, write out my own feelings via Snafu. And that was a pretty cool and fulfilling thing for me, ya know? 

25. Favorite line you’ve ever written? 

oh god this is another hard one to narrow down but

I always come back to this line and go ‘oh shit did I really write that. Nah, someone better than me at this had to have. They briefly possessed me or something”:  

-Music and talking and shouting and footsteps collide kaleidoscopic in his ears, but none bearing the one sound that he’d run to if he heard it.-

from this fic, mentioned twice now in this post lol: https://aboutthatmelancholystorm.tumblr.com/post/186781309036/you-know-that-i-love-you

I really love alliteration, and for me this line just sums up how it feels to walk thru a city when you aren’t just wandering really, but are looking or waiting for someone, and have that awful yet sometimes good feeling of expecting to hear or see them but it feels like you’re waiting or searching forever and in the meantime the city just lives on around you, a stopped platelet stuck in a vein full of vitality. Like, idk if it hit any of my readers that way, but that’s what I was trying to get across lol, so the line always hits me hard in a good way when I scroll thru my writing tag and see it. 

26. Story you’re most proud of? 

Gosh

I gotta choose just one kid for this aldsfkja I’m bad at choosing I love my gaggle of ragtag goofballs. I have an original piece I’d choose for this, but I’ve never posted it on here, so I’m gonna choose out of my fanfic on here instead.

One I am really proud of is this one: https://aboutthatmelancholystorm.tumblr.com/post/186781309036/you-know-that-i-love-you

and I know it’s the third time it’s been part of an answer on here but

I really love this one idk. Thinking back to how I felt while writing it, how it all flowed in a certain way. The whole experience was just something else, and I’m proud of this one in a certain way I find myself, funnily enough, unable to describe. 

27. Best review you ever got? 

Okay this sounds cheesy but like

I really do love and appreciate every review or review-like thing I’ve ever gotten so I can’t choose just one for this

Like, y’all gotta understand, I’ve deleted some of it and erased traces of it from my blog, but I’ve written for years on here, I have some stuff on my ao3, and for the longest time I got nothing back, or very nearly nothing. Maybe a few likes, but no comments and not much else. I always just rolled with it and assumed I just wasn’t writing anything good enough to inspire reviews. Idk if that’s true or not, but in any case it means I cherish every comment, like, reblog, and anything review-like in nature because I’m so grateful to have it now, and I know it could well be pure luck that I stumbled up on a really supportive bunch of fandoms with great readers. 

In other words, thank y’all for every kind word and like and reblog and also I may be an immortal feeding off of validation of my art, but we’ll see on that last bit, because I haven’t tested it. 

28. Worst review you ever got?

One from middle school. I’d just finished my very first novel, gave it to a friend to read, and he said it ‘smacked of being too fanciful and childish, something only kids and women would read’ (it was a YA fantasy novel so I mean... what exactly he expected, idk cuz he knew what it was before I gave it to him, like it’s supposed to have those elements as a lot of these sorts of novels/stories do, and that isn’t a bad thing about them at all, so like...what his damage was idek.)

Also this is the same dude who texts me randomly and is really weird abt his friendship with me and happens to be an English teacher now (RIP to his students.) 

Anyway, after he said that I tossed a review right back, because well, middle school and also I was very upset with him because I’d not asked for anything other than a general ‘if you picked this up randomly and started it, would it suck you in enough to keep reading or would you put it down’ like that was literally all I needed him to answer for me. So I told him his latest novel (his second at that point) was essentially just him masturbating to his own opinions (because he’s an arguer, who loves to tell ppl they’re always wrong, and that’s by his own admission) for one hundred pages, and not in a way that anyone else would care to read. He was pissed, but so was I. We didn’t talk for a good week, and we had almost all our classes together lol. 

Like, getting nothing back in review sucks too, but this one has stuck with me forever. Best part? I mentioned it to him a few years back, and he only vaguely remembered it, and followed it with “but I’ve said a lot of rough stuff about your work. I mean, it deserved it at the time, but you might be good at this someday!” 

I didn’t smack him, but I really, really wanted to. 

29. Favorite story/poem of another author

This doesn’t specify on Tumblr or not, so I’ve got two: one from outside tumblr, and one from on here.

A. When I have Fears That I May Cease to Be by John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be   Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain,Before high-pilèd books, in charactery,   Hold like rich garners the full ripened grain;When I behold, upon the night’s starred face,   Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,And think that I may never live to trace   Their shadows with the magic hand of chance;And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,   That I shall never look upon thee more,Never have relish in the faery power   Of unreflecting love—then on the shoreOf the wide world I stand alone, and thinkTill love and fame to nothingness do sink.

B. Again, this Tumblr one could be a huge ass list because y’all on here are amazing, but one I’ve been rereading over and over again recently is @xmxisxforxmaybe ‘s Remnants series, which can be found here: https://xmxisxforxmaybe.tumblr.com/post/186702235396/remnants-complete-work

Like, Ahk as a character is captured so well, and I love the way the plot twines and also when the smut comes up? Very good A+ smut, something I value pretty highly on and off Tumblr because man, sometimes smut is just work to write, so I appreciate it when it’s really good. All around, this series has captured my heart and I legit have a link to it saved on multiple devices so if I need something to read, I can just pull it up right away. 

30. Hardest part of writing? 

Self-doubt. It’s the biggest hurdle for any artist, regardless of the art in question I think, but with writing it seems to double down a lot. Like, you have to really get out of your own head, even as you spend all your time there with your writing ideas. Shit gets weird and twisted, man. 

For the longest time, I really let self-doubt defeat me too, and I regret the time I lost to that. I still get hit with it randomly, cause I don’t think it every really goes away for any writer, not even the big names like Stephen King or Neil Gaiman (who I’m half tempted to @ on here purely because I wanna know his feelings on this stuff because I respect and admire him as an artist and his thoughts very much, but also he’s a very busy man so I’m not gonna bug him by doing that lol.) 

All there is to do is to work with it, push past it, and most importantly keep writing. I have days where that feels like the hardest thing, but each day I manage to get past it and get the words down? I let myself feel proud of that, and mark it as an achievement in my Big Book of Stuff I’ve Done in This Life. 

[liyuesbian]

Ok tumblr decided to erase half my ask so here we go again 😔

I kinda forgot about ei’s friends after her teaser dropped ngl 💀 you are so right that they should’ve been there, like how both Zhongli and Venti’s quests had a “let’s pay a visit to our dead or dying friends” arc /hj in hindsight I also wish there was one of those cool 2D PVs for Ei as well hhh it would be Epic to see her three friends like that!! Ig they thought it was covered by her teaser/demo or something? Since that had way more lore than usual, idk though. still hoping for a second quest about her hh

I’m kinda the opposite about lore digging but it’s probably just me lol, I tend to read lore in game only, but don’t have many of the artifacts/weapons that contain the lore I want to read. But disregarding that, I still want some of the worldbuilding to be put in like a story quest or something, since it would be interesting to see what other characters think about the stories in the artifacts and stuff (do different mondstadters have different opinions on their history? What do they think about the white knight or the gladiator? Also I wanna see Eula interacting with the noblesse oblige set. same with Liyue folk and all the Morax Legends lol. I digress tho)

Big same with the La Signora gripe. Shame on me ig but I didn’t read the crimson witch lore before I did the quest so the spoilers I saw didn’t mean much and there was no shock value during the big reveal in quest 💀 yeah I hope we’ll see or hear about her in Snezhnaya!! Her side of the story would be infinitely more interesting (pls not another artifact set tho-)

About Xiao, Ganyu, and Zhongli: this is why fix it fics exist I guess 😔 I’ve adopted an AO3 fic’s retelling as my version of canon (or at least something the traveler didn’t see)

Mm true it’s strange because I think he said thanked the traveler for being his companion while he was testing out his human life at the end of the archon quest (iirc) maybe it’s just because Liyue’s supposedly a big city so one new person doesn’t really matter to most people (fhdksd if something contradicts this, do tell) I think the fake death was still kinda necessary, at least for normal people to accept that Morax is Completely Gone so that the Qixing can get ultimate authority and total acceptance/respect (that npc who said Zhongli will always be in true control since he’s a god and the Qixing are mere mortals and stuff), but agree to disagree 😌 they’re all shady in some way in the end

I saw you are on genshin twt how is it 😔 (sadly I am on it too but I hate the timeline format because I keep missing posts) the amount of discourse of “whos bad, good, which problematic characters and ships need to be canceled”, and the amount of dissing that goes on there scares me

LITERALLY YOUR 2ND TO LAST PARAGRAPH that was what was missing from the archon quest. Where is my group effort guys?? I missed seeing the resistance… I hope the people speculating Kokomi gets a nice story quest are correct and that we’ll actually wrap up the loose resistance threads there… (also a lot of people are saying morally gray Kokomi? Is there any canon(derogatory) basis for that? I’m just curious because with the way things are going I feel like she’s going to be purely nice dhdkskf)

Im so sorry I think these just keep getting longer and longer aaa anyways, signing off! -mystic

noo i hate it when tumblr does that :((

(2.1 spoilers)

LMFAOOO maybe friendship is not magic after all ahaha but srsly, i agree w you i also want a 2nd quest for her !

ah that's fair enough if u don't have all the artifacts. and it would be easier if it was told to us through a quest of some sort. hmm i never thought about that 🤔 it's a shame that there's so much lore and the genshin universe is so beautifully worldbuilt but players will only notice if they personally read through the archives etc. and go out of their way :( hmm yeah maybe like a historical back-to-the-past type thing with the three clans and they all interact with the noblesse set? or even just diluc/eula/jean tbh

ah i read the lore for crimson before but i didn't remember it fully during the signora part so i had to read through it again after. the way it clicked in my head when it said "crimson witch of embers" and i was like ".....wait a minute....." AHAHA and it was only after that her lines during the fight like "don't call me a witch" or smth made me :'(((( the pale flame piece too 😭 sad hours

yeah at this point, the fanfiction writers should take over the genshin writing lol jk jk

mhm i guess the fake death would've been better and easier for closure ! (and woah u remember so much! i can't even remember that npc... it's been so long 😔 haha)

ah i think on genshintwt i'm usually more on the good side (? if u can call it that lmao) i do see quite a few discourse on ships, western vs. eastern fandoms and other yikes stuff but for genshin, it's mostly art that pops up on my timeline :] i follow wayyy too many artists but they're all so talented and they make such pretty art it's so 🥺 oh do you mean ur timeline isn't organised by latest posts first? if it's not, i can share how to make it that way!

yeah the resistance... :(( mhm! i was rly counting on a morally grey kokomi !!! LMFOAOO THE "canon (derogatory)" took me OUT PWAHAHA (i may reuse that quote ;D) that idea was mostly based on ayaka's last sentence (was it in the 2.0 archon quest?) where she said smth along the lines of the resistance having ulterior motives... and also how baal and co. defeated orobashi, the god they worship (like maybe kokomi was out for revenge?) but no sigh she's ur average good person :( idrc either way but i rly wanna see a morally grey female character where they appear good but are actually super dodgy and evil, that would be chef's kiss. but yeah, after that quest, she's definitely gonna be purely good :')