#or 14-year-olds being kind of cringey

[captainjonnitkessler]

I would love to know what the venn diagram of "people posting about the importance of compassion and solidarity and choosing kindness" and "people who immediately resort to telling everyone they disagree with to kill themselves" looks like

[babybabymerrychristmas]

No why do you think folkmore are her worst albums????

Okay, so when I say folkmore are her worst albums, I am speaking in terms of replayability and taylor-ness. I do not mean the quality of the albums themselves are bad, I just find that I never seek out folkmore to listen to if I'm trying to listen taylor swift. I find folkmore to be albums that you need to be in a very, very, very specific mood for. I also find that folkmore was kind of like her attempt to be taken seriously musically and I just really enjoy glitter gel pen taylor and I find that while she can write critically acclaimed "serious" music, taylor shines the best when she is using simple imagery to paint a very, very vivid picture of complicated emotions.

I think what makes taylor so awesome in terms of songwriting is how accessible her songs are. She really understands how to use simple language to make you feel a specific way and I find folkmore to be too flowery. In short, folkmore feels like she was trying too hard to be a serious 30 year old popstar and it kind of shows in the type of music she wrote for those records.

Since folkmore, Taylor has received this reputation of her songs being high-brow, complicated lyrics and that has never been her MO. Ironically, it's always why I get angry at the idiots who call tortured poets a cringey title because the way taylor's music is set-up works exactly like poetry. The best poems have lines that, if isolated, are regular ass sentences but put together, the poet has managed to make you view such sentences in a different light.

Despite how much people overuse the phrase "14 year old girl poetry," I find that folkmore is more accurate to that than any other of taylor's albums because the connotation of 14 year old girl poetry being bad comes from how hard children try to make their work be taken seriously and thus, overusing purple prose and metaphors to make themselves sound smarter. In reality, good poetry is simple at its core. It understands how to convey a message in a language that appeals to a broad audience and doesn't hide behind sat vocabulary to make its point because it doesn't need to.

Let me stop it here because I could rant for ages about how much I hate the overworship of folkmore because they really are mid taylor albums imo. But if you want me to explain in greater detail, I will. Hope this answered your question.

[twenty-eight-stabwounds]

Sailor Moon

This show has been recommended to me by many of my older friends who watch anime and the style is really unique in a way that is very retro, but is still captivating. From what they've told and showed me, I didn't actually expect the main plot to be that a 14-year-old girl discovers that she is a reincarnation of some intergalactic space princess. Her motto being that she fights for "love and justice" was kind of cringey, I will not lie, but I think it makes sense in the show. One of the main and obvious points in the show is the topic of femininity and how the Sailor Scouts all fought the villains in a way that highlighted their feminine attributes. This sort of male-viewer-pandering type of animation and style can be seen in many of today's anime with the term "fan-service" where the animators specifically put girls in provocative or unnecessarily sexual poses when doing generic actions. In Sailor Moon, the girls all adhere to a similarly thin body type, big round eyes and traditional feminine outfits. Even when fighting, they still fight in a way that is traditionally seen more as "feminine". While there's obviously nothing inherently wrong with wanting to present as more feminine, the way that the anime presents it is in a way that is somewhat meant for the male watchers to enjoy watching the feminine girls defeat their enemies while looking pretty. There were also other topics highlighted in different episodes such as the concept of weight loss and adhering to the beauty standards presented by society. I would argue that this definitely had an impact on the young girls who would watch this show in the 90s. It presented them with an "ideal" body type and standard that they would so desperately try to apply to themselves, which in turn, led to an unhealthy mindset of weight loss.

[solofanatic64]

You know what NO

This is my 2 year anniversary of being on here (it’s the day after the anniversary as of posting this) AND I’m gonna be late on the final 3 presents, you guys don’t deserve JUST a concept! So how about her:

THIS

Is my tmnt 2012 oc Valerie that I made in 7th grade after listening to iHasCupquakes Notice Me Senpai music video too many times (I did not draw that knife hand I asked someone else to do it for me because I didn’t know how to draw it). She was a highschool girl with bright magenta hair and a schoolgirl uniform, but she was also a yandere who had a massive crush on Raphael and, in yandere fashion, would stop at nothing for his love.

Now here’s the same Yandere oc 5 years later

Valerie Doyle, born and raised by two people who were bad parents and an even worse married couple, the two being incredibly abusive towards each other and more often than not neglectful towards Valerie. That plus unrestricted access to dark romance on the internet and limited access to good romance movies (her mother always hated them) led to a harmful, messed up perception of love that plays a bigger role in her life when she’s 16. It gets worse when at the age of 14, she comes home from school to police surrounding her apartment, learning that her parents have killed each other in what she thinks was an act of love (it wasn’t). This tragedy leaves her to live on her own with no one else to properly take care of her (how? I don’t know, blame NYC authorities).

She’s always been a wallflower in her peers eyes. Quiet, introverted, nervous, always seemingly in the “background”, she didn’t have any real friends and she never talked to anybody outside of group projects (not like they really heard her anyways). She was also just kind of….bland?? Not in the way she looks but in the way that her life was just…basically the same thing everyday. She gets up, she goes to school, she goes home, she does her homework, she has dinner, and then she sleeps. Sure she has her hobbies and her odd jobs, but it’s still just one continuous routine, nothing interesting.

That is until one night while walking home from babysitting, she hears a commotion coming from a nearby alley. She takes a peak and see’s a lone mutant turtle in a red bandana beating up robot ninjas, which is a bizarre sight to see in the street of New York, but at the moment that almost didn’t matter to her. All that mattered right now was him. The violence, the rage, the fire in his eyes. He was perfect. She didn’t care that he was a giant mutant turtle, in fact I don’t think she fully noticed until she took a picture and the did a double take, but it didn’t matter. He was the one.

She continues to admire him from afar, taking pictures, writing about him in her journals (it’s become the only thing she writes in her journals nowadays), and dreaming about their future. And then one day, she discovers his enemies, the Foot Clan, and decides to join them in hopes of getting “closer” to him (or at least her perception of closer). The other henchmen, to say the least, are concerned about her newfound bloodlust (not knowing it’s linked to her obsession, which they also don’t know about), but it’s not their place to judge so they don’t say anything (they really should).

Who knows where this bloody new road will take her…

(btw the reason I decided to redesign/rewrite her was because I listened to Kikuo’s Hitowagari and thought “ykw this could be so her, let’s do her justice”) (she really went from being a cringey old memory to one of my pride and joys and I love her for that)

[creature-pond]

About me

Hello! My name is Hollace and this is a blog I made to mess around with a wild kratts au I came up with. This isn't a serious thing and it will be flawed since I'm new to tumblr but I think this au is kinda neat and if you want to join me either by doing rp or enjoying the random art/fics I make then that would be cool! I'm also going to make this an ask blog so if you'd like to ask them questions then feel free! Info about me is below!

Who am I?

I'm Hollace, I'm a 17 year old with a love for science and sci-fi! I do a little art here and there and I really enjoy creating OCs based on my hyperfixations. I have several conditions such as autism, adhd, and fibromyalgia, so please be patient and understand that I'm doing my best.

Rules and Boundaries!

I'm okay with roleplay! But I ask that you please keep it appropriate, sfw, and non-aggressive. If you break this rule then you will be warned, if you persist then you will be blocked. I also ask that you please be patient, my chronic pain and autism can leave me very exhausted most days so it's hard for me to have the energy to socialize for long periods sometimes.

Please only interact with me if your 14-19 years old, I'm not comfortable talking to anyone outside of my general age range. Anyone 20 or older can view my content but please do not message me. Anyone 13 or younger, please DNI.

Absolutely no slurs will be tolerated here, they make me extremely uncomfortable and I ask that you please keep them away from my blog.

Any and all hate or trolling will result in being banned, I made this blog for fun and as I stated before, THIS IS NOT A SERIOUS THING. I don't expect many people to see this or interact with me and I really don't expect for me to post very frequently. This blog may be cringey to some people but I'm only doing this for fun anyway.

Any homophobia, transphobia, racism, ableism, or any discrimination of any kind will immediately result in a ban.

I do not tolerate pedophilia, I am a minor and so are a lot of my OCs. If I feel like your being creepy you will be banned. Proshippers or anyone who supports incest will instantly be banned. No exceptions.

Please do not criticize my posts unless you ask me first, I have a hard time reading tone and if I'm not in a good place then it'll do more harm than good. If you ask then I'd be happy to listen, possibly even DM or become friends if you want.

You aren't required to but tone tags help a lot! :)

Don't spam please.

Feel free to ask questions or DM if you'd like to! ^^

[shigayokagayama]

actually ive decided to be mentally ill open this to gaze into the abyss (my ageswap au)

ok so the main driving premise is kind of a roleswap like

mob <-> serizawa

tome <-> reigen

teru <-> toichiro

instead of finding mob or ritsu, dimple found teru and gave him the whole “if you team up with me you can become a god” schtick and teru was like “oh boy godhood!” and formed an organization that i am calling claw just for convenience but is functionally kind of a combo of claw and LOL? the absence of mogami and mob means that dimple is still full power so theres a lot less violence involved in maintaining their structure and a lot more brainwashing espers by making them feel happy just by being around dimple which dissuades them from leaving

mob was kind of their golden ticket to moving forward in the whole “taking over the world” thing. teru was going around recruiting espers and in his research learned about an extremely powerful esper who caused some sort of accident that left some girl dead (ill get to this in a second) then disappeared years ago. turns out its mob and he’s been in his room for 14 years ala serizawa. teru tracks down ritsu, convinces him that he works with an organization that helps troubled espers, then takes mob for the purpose of being a normal claw member.

at some point during the “assessing his abilities” part of this process they discovered mob has the power to give/take energy and teru and dimple’s plan shifts to “take over the world by brainwashing people the old fashion way” to “take over the world by convincing everyone theyre godsents who have the ability to give people psychic powers”

also during all this theyre still doing the whole “kidnap and brainwash kids” thing with the added bonus of teru being able to learn the powers of people he fights. so hes just. collecting powers like pokemon cards by beating the shit out of kids. and teru really really wants to learn how to do that energy thing mob can do so he starts trying to get closer to him to see if he can learn it through observation (cause he knows if he actually fought him he’d get his ass kicked) but slowly starts to become actual friends with him and is like. wait. is this what human connection feels like???

meanwhile on the non-claw side of things we get reigen, serizawa, and tome. tome and serizawas dynamic is essentially reigen and mobs from the normal universe. in this universe mob did join the telepathy club because he didnt really have enough personal agency to choose to join the body improvement club, so he and tome were friends and when he went missing they lost their fifth member and the club got disbanded which led to her becoming very jaded and giving up on her alien dreams (which she generally looks back on as cringey and embarrassing :( ) and without really having a clear direction ended up starting s&s, with serizawa coming to her for advice after losing control of his powers and hurting his mom as a kid.

reigen is a super troubled adhd “gifted kid” who is seen as a general nuisance by just about everything. he switches fixations constantly, hes always quitting things after getting super invested in them for short periods of time (which is REALLY pissing off his parents), and his newest fixation is psychics. after serizawa saves him from a spirit in that haunted ass forest that was created by that one weird psychic accident mob caused years ago he ends up convincing tome to let him work for spirits and such, partially because hes interested in the paranormal and partially because he needs money after his mom cancelled his WOW subscription in retaliation for him quitting kung fu.

serizawa, who spent most of middle school just trying to do his work and keep his head down, ends up not only getting reigens attention but also toichiros. toichiro is a transfer from another school who got expelled for attacking another kid and is generally surrounded by a lot of bad rumors. he immediately latches onto serizawa as the first esper kid he meets at this new school and starts trying to convince him that theyre better than other people, which serizawa doesnt buy. also, his esper gang from his old school is disappearing, as are all the other esper kids around town, which is kind of scaring the shit out of him

i deliberated over what to make toichiro and shous relationship for so long. like, it feels weird not to make him his dad but it feels even weirder to make shou randomly like 10 years older than everyone else. so my compromise was that hes his older brother and legal guardian after their parents died in an accident which shou is pretty sure toichiro caused (i chose sibling and not uncle because shou and toichiros normal relationship is supposed to be a direct parallel to mob and ritsus).

shou is a character i feel is done super dirty by every ageswap. guys. look at me. there is no universe where shou is the leader of claw. if shou being brought up by toichiro left him a generally good person if a bit inconsiderate of other peoples feelings and kind of “ends justify the means”-y, shou being brought up by literally anyone else would leave him a normal well adjusted person.

just to give him some connection to claw instead of letting this poor guy live his dreams of drawing dragons and shit im making him a government esper spying on claw. ritsu also works with the government but since he never went through big cleanup or met dimple he has 0 control over his abilities and instead just works in the division that knows they exist and deals with them. hes friends w shou and they both fuckin hate their jobs but feel like its their duty to make the world a better place. also ritsu is desperately trying to reach mob but mob has spent too much time with claw and become convinced ritsu is just trying to hold him down.

also that accident ive been mentioning? yea im going to try to lead people to think its the confession arc gone wrong for as long as possible before throwing in a minori curveball. yea tsubomi is not involved in ANY of this, she isnt mobs tragic backstory and she gets to live her own life.

this is just all the set up not getting into the actual plot uhhh what did i leave out? oh mezatos a reporter investigating the claw stuff and gets involved with tome (this happens a bit into the story so i wont get into detail) and emi is a ghostwriter. takenaka is basically a spy for hire at claw because most jobs dont let you just wear earbuds at work and overstimulation sucks, the awakening lab kids at claw because there are not a lot of other options there are so few kid espers in mob psycho.

also while im here ive been consuming so many recently so im curious

favorite mp100 au ?? if u have one !!

ok so im going to preface this by saying i am the pickiest person in the world when it comes to fanfiction. like. i am not joking, i have closed fanfictions before because i thought that the writer made a character's music taste ooc.

im a big fan of ageswaps IF they acknowledge the far reaching consequences reigen not being present in mob's early life would have on him and everyone else in his generation. the vast majority of ageswaps are not to my taste because theyre a bit too generous with how everyone would have grown up without the influence of a mob who met reigen.

specifically teru is generally made like, kind of a self obsessed celebrity when like.

i mean.

come on.

[quacka-quacka]

Have you seen the magazine article where Paul makes a comment about women being closer to nature because of their periods? It’s reminded me a lot of the playboy interview where a lot of what was written was kind of unsettling and chauvinistic. The article’s from 1984, a year before the playboy interview.

If not here’s a link:

https://floatupstream.tumblr.com/post/688453393547706368/scanned-from-mccalls-august-1984

Hello anon, thank you for sharing this article. I found it here:

Yeah, the compliment he came up with actually sounds cringey. As the journalist pointed out, Paul doesn't understand women, nor does he bother to figure out. He seems to be quite proud of such a theory that, as far as I know, it was brought up again on another interview 14 years later:

I think that the fact that women give birth gives them a better connection to the universe than men. God bless them, men are lovely and you can’t make babies without them, I’m proud to be one — but I admire women perhaps more. They’ve got a rough deal — they go through the pain of birth.

I used to joke with Linda, I’d say, “I’ve had four babies and it didn’t hurt a bit.” I’d have to duck quickly before she’d throw something at me. But that’s a bit of the male attitude: hey, we just give out cigars, it’s great! Whereas women are going through all this pain and anguish. Anyway, I think being a mother gave Linda a deep connection with animals.

— Paul McCartney, interview w/ Chrissie Henderson for USA Week-end: Tears and laughter. (October 30, 1998)

Paul's obsession for procreation is well documented. I suppose it's broadly inarguable that the ability to breed is the female quality he values most. The fandom is keen on preaching Paul being a "weirdo" - a fashionable lad in Swinging London who was open to everything but neglect the fact that he has always been the old-fashioned man from up North who has clung ferociously to his working roots and attitudes. I've never been a fan of "weirdo Paul" - as we see, this is the kind of unusual idea that fits his freak-out image.

[wanderlust-in-my-soul]

Currently watching

June 2022

KinnPorsche (13/14)

Discover me, absolutely pulled into the world of KinnPorsche and every week amazed at how the show manages to not only surprise and emotionally devastate us all (positively and negatively), but also convince us all again week after week that next week VegasPete will finally start - instead we get Vegas who tries to make VegasPorsche real...

Dear Doctor, I’m Coming for Soul (12/12)

Discover a doctor who apparently has never heard that people must die and who tries every week anew to protect people from the evil but in his black suit very attractive Soul Reaper and who finally found the courage to kiss his beautiful reaper before this one disappeared into the underworld.

Fukou-kun wa Kiss Suru Shikanai! (8/8)

Discover a colourful world where an unlucky guy and a fortunate guy balance each other out, while the unlucky guy is a wonderful anime character come to life, full of bubbly energy and inward dialogue directed outward, and the fortunate guy is a reserved and quiet young man who reminds me a hell of a lot of Jungkook from BTS

– I really enjoy this one, it is full of life and the story is sweet.

Plus & Minus (12/12)

Discover how two best friends, who have known each other since childhood, have never spent a moment without the other, kiss when they drunkenly fall onto each other and finally told each other about their feelings and now are a cute couple with problems...alongside there is a gooey side couple who go from zero to a hundred in a matter of moments – still kind of intrigued with the main couple, not the side dish

That’s my candy (3/6)

Discover a long-term relationship where kisses are apparently not normal and you still have to be shy about it after three years of dating - I have made it to episode two after one month and I still think it is bad.

Dark Blue and Moonlight (3/12)

Discover a series where everyone cheats with everyone else.

My Secret Love (5/12)

Discover how the cool and the reasonable, who of course can't stand each other, are forced to form a BL Couple, only to find out that maybe they do like each other and everything is topped with accidental kisses and silly pranks. And we have a secret but established couple, which is nice to see.

Star and Sky: Sky in your heart (5/8)

Discover a setting and a story reminiscent of A tale of thousand stars, but a little different and with great chemistry between the two protagonists so far - Prince is just pure sugar.

To my Star 2 (10/10)

Discover heartbreak and pain!

History 3: Trapped (10/10)

Discover a world where a cop can spy on a mafia boss without being killed by him, even become his bodyguard, and in the end they fell in love with each other. I am delighted.

Oxygen (13/13)

Discover when the worlds of two people collide and we can watch them falling in love with each other while one side couple is really cute and the other I don't really understand, yet.

Check Out (4/12)

Discover Daonuea and Nine's story, which is supposed to be so sexual that youtube has refused to broadcast it even with a paid subscription...

Mama Gogo (2/10)

Discover how I'm going to wallow in secondhand embarrassment with every episode.

2 Moons 2 (12/12)

Discover a Uni-BL, nothing new, just something sweet and cringey, but sometimes I need things like that.

Update after finishing it: It would have been an 8 or 9 for me, if KitMing or ForthBeam were the main couple, especially ForthBeam, I love them!

Be loved in house: I do (13/13)

Discover a drama so great (at least in my opinion) that I can't say anything negative about it.

Love Mechanics (4/10)

Discover me becoming obsessed about Vee and Mark...

Old Fashion Cupcake (4/5)

Discover a story about learning that you are never too old to enjoy life and have fun with it, and maybe along the way fall in love with someone you never expected. This series gives me so much hope!

Unforgotten Night (2/12)

Discover...a cringe fest with spicy dialogues, sympathetic characters, gorgeous sex scenes and of course a non-existing plot. Love it!

Senpai, Danjite Koidewa! (2/8)

Discover the sweet lovestory about two collegues falling in love with each other.

He's coming to me (8/8)

Discover a wholesome and beautiful lovestory with some supernatural elements. Grab yourself some tissues and dive into this beauty! It is so worth it!

Theory of love (12/12)

Discover one of the most iconic shower scenes I ever saw on my screen. And can I say that I don't like Khai without everyone hating me?

Together with me (13/13)

Discover two muscular men on their journey to themselves and to each other.

Color Rush 2 (8/8)

Discover me being disappointed...but not really surprised by it.

[snowglobe-system]

hi okay so elaboration on this post

i'm 19 years old and i was in fact the chronically online teenager who "needed to go outside". like my parents literally implemented screen time restrictions to force me to get off of tumblr and discord and ao3 because at the ripe age of 14 i had like no fucking social life lmao.

so now for the big question: did limiting my screen time make me go outside? the response to that is a resounding lol no not really.

here's what it did do. it made me absolutely miserable. my friends, my life, my hobbies were all on that goddamn computer screen. it was COMMON for my screen time to just run out while i was in the middle of drawing something. and that was actually really frustrating! like would you not also be frustrated if something you like doing and is therapeutic and fun for you was consistently interrupted by an authority telling you that the light from the screen is bad for you or whatever? like, it's not like i was spending ALL of my time on the internet/my computer doomscrolling. it was actually a pretty small part of my technological activity. i had a lot of youtube hours but that's because i have adhd and i was using it as fucking background noise for the most part. most of the time i was chatting with my online friends, drawing or reading (also, like, i think i was kind of entitled to my few hours of doomscrolling, it's not like my parents didn't watch the news or check facebook every morning).

so like basically everything i liked doing was on the internet because i was a queer audhd kid with emerging bpd in a small backwater town and i just did not have friends. and taking away my screen time didn't automatically give me irl friends it just made me more poignantly aware that i didn't have any and like. what was i gonna do, walk around the neighbourhood by myself for 6 hours? it's not like i had a car, i was like 14 and couldn't legally obtain a drivers license, so i couldn't just go places, and even if i could, where would i even go? everything costed money, and at that age i didn't have a job yet. so i still stayed inside, i was just also really bored because like honestly there were only so many books in the house that could catch my interest and i'm a really fast reader. and eventually i did just figure out how to get past screen time limits (my dad could have stopped me because that man is a computer programmer and absolutely could have outsmarted me, but in this case he chose to let me get away with it because he believed in my personal freedom a lot more than my mom did lmao).

so at 19, has my behaviour in accordance to technology changed? well, that's a question with a really complicated answer. like, yeah, it kinda did, but it also didn't. the core of my engagement with technology didn't change, but my environment did. i left my hometown and went to university in the big city down south. and suddenly, there were other queer audhd people around, some of whom i had shared interests with, and whom i subsequently became friends with. so i do get out sometimes and hang out with them, and during those times my phone is put away for the most part. so i use less technology in that aspect- but i also use more technology in that i use my laptop to take notes for class now, i type my homework on it, and sometimes i play a little video when i'm eating a meal because hey man i live alone and eating supper on the couch watching TV is one of the best kid experiences ever and i don't see a reason not to recreate that whenever i want.

that being said i actually think my relationship with the internet and with technology in general is a lot better than many others my age who would be considered "chronically online"- and, well. guys. i'm on fucking tumblr of course i'm chronically online. i know all about the drama and the latest queer discourse that only matters on twitter and tiktok and about all the kids getting called cringey mental illness fakers- and by the way, whether or not some of them are really faking is actually none of our fucking business, because we are not their therapist or psychologist and we cannot accurately say whether they do or do not have something based on a 15 second clip. i mean jesus christ guys, i’m going to a psychiatry appointment on monday and the time slot is 90 minutes, 15 seconds is barely even a FRACTION of that. anyways, i'm getting a bit off topic, hi i have adhd and i really like to have super long yap sessions as evidenced by this post. anyways back to my relationship with technology. i see all of these things all of the time, i read them, i even interact with them. but generally i think i’m pretty good at acknowledging nuance, and the people i know in real life don't tend to know i'm chronically online just based off of talking to me a few times; it takes friendship and some deeper conversation for people to know that about me. i'm generally pretty calm and chill about co-existing with people i disagree with even on pretty intense ideological differences, because honestly i don't care that my friend's dad is a conservative, we're both just here to watch them sing a damn song on stage and losing my shit because he said something off colour is going to cause a whole scene and make it awkward and uncomfortable for everyone. i'm not friends with these people, because i don't want to be and i don't have to be, but when we have to be in the same space for a mutual connection or goal, i don't have any issues being pleasant and polite, because generally starting a fight accomplishes nothing but making it weird for everyone. i see technology and the internet as a tool, which i can use to engage in hobbies, watch some videos, read some social media posts, help with research and my academics, and connect with other people from a distance. that's all. to me, the internet is kind of like a glorified combination of a telephone and a public library.

did limiting my technology and making me go outside contribute to this at all? lmao. no. not in the slightest. i didn't start developing the ability to see nuance until i was like 17- and THAT'S what so many people are missing. teenagers aren't being cringey and annoying and saying bad political takes because they're on their phones, they're doing it because they're teenagers and it's developmentally normal. like, gods, imagine if all of the dumb shit you thought and did when you were 15 was broadcast to the world forever. tiktok and twitter did not make teenagers bad at nuance, it just gave them a fucking megaphone. granted there are still some people my age who act like that, but hey, development isn't a linear path that everyone follows at the same rate, and also, to be totally fair, i spent a lot of time actively developing my critical thinking brain. my major is a hybrid french linguistics/literature program, and my minors are english literature and disability studies. critical thinking kinda comes with the territory. so does a lot of reading, including of older works that don't align with modern moral principles. also, philosophical discussions were commonplace and encouraged in my house and that continues to hold true in my friend groups. like ffs literally 3 days ago my friend was telling me about Kant's theories in a casual hangout setting in the goddamn uni cafeteria. so i think it's fair to say that i've had a head start. and also notice how none of these things have anything to do with how much time i'm spending on tiktok.

tldr; modern teenagers now are not uniquely annoying, cringe, or bad at nuance compared to previous generations, we just gave them a goddamn platform, and taking away their phone and telling them to go outside is not, in fact, going to solve their tech addiction, because it's not addressing any of the underlying factors that inform why they spend so much time online, and i know this because my parents tried this on me and it didn't fucking work. literally just wait a few years and most of them are probably going to become better adjusted people because that's just what happens once you gain life experience outside of high school.

i know it's popular to shit on teenagers for spending too much time on tiktok or twitter or whatever the fuck and to say they need to go outside but like. have we actually considered that maybe they're on the internet because there isn't anything to actually DO outside anymore? teenagers getting stuck in online echo chambers is definitely a real problem but. idk. i don't think going outside is going to necessarily fix that, when there aren't any places to go that don't cost money (which most teenagers do not have a lot of).

[hotdadsdrawing]

My Unpopular/Opinions about Miraculous LB

Yes I'm Categorizing this leave me alone,

SHIPS:

-Ladrien, is only good in fanfictions, cannon Ladrien would be LB using her superhero status to date the guy she likes knowing that he doesn't romantically like the girl under the mask

-MariChat, one, the stans are so toxic and two, MariChat should just be a platonic ship and would be horrible in cannon. MariChat works out 100x better when they're just best buds who do best bud things together.

-Adrienette, Adrienette has been really unsettling for the past 2 seasons, Mari is being super creepy obsessed.

-Ladynoir, I fully agree with the cannon that they shouldn't date in mask before they defeat Hawkmoth, it could lead to a lot of danger to both parties and a lot of emotional damage.

-Adrigami, Adrigami is toxic. All Kagami wants is some TLC but Adrien is so in love with LadyBug that he barley notices her and makes her feel shitty, I'm glad they broke up.

PLOT: There is literally no plot progression for any ships so far, Adrienette got the reverse umbrella scene yeah yeah but besides that no one has showed interest in anyone yet (besides Chat obviously). I understand that it's complicated cause of masks and identity but it's been FOUR SEASONS, mf jim and pam were dating by the fourth season.

CHARACTERS:

-Marinette, love her to death but the way she spies on Adrien and constantly stalks him is disgusting and cringey. It's so invasive and if I were Adrien she'd already have a restraining order.

-Tikki, sometimes I feel like she's putting more stress on Marinette. I understand that sometimes everyone needs to hear the hard truth but Mari is 14 years old she does not need a little red god telling her about every mistake she's made.

-Alya, I feel like she's still got that vlogger and reporter mindset when it comes to identities. The fact that she's taking selfies and telling Nino stuff behind Mari's back. She'll get better as the season progresses but it's making me real stressed out rn.

-Adrien, this mf has got to get another personality that isn't "simp for ladybug" and "cause world destruction", I get that it's probably a good distraction from his trauma but he needs to get a hobby istg, maybe collect rocks or smth.

-Nino, perfect character rn.

-Just because Chloe is a disliked character doesn't mean you have to like her, she's a racist, backstabbing, untrustworthy person and her mommy issues don't justify that.

-Zoe is better.

AKUMA VICTIMS: Bro the costumes for so many victims are so bad. Bright colors does not equal good costume.

The names are bad too, "malediktator" nah cause what was that

"befana" is just hag in Italian and it connects to Christmas folk lore, wtf does that have to do with old candies.

SEASON 4:

No complaints for season four but the filler episodes are horrible.

MIRACULOUSES:

-The pig miraculous is so corny. "The Power of Kindness" NAH

-When the Butterfly miraculous isn't being used for evil it'd be kinda useless

-Max uses the horse miraculous so well and they need to use him more often

-Aspik. Just Aspik.

-Mylene is great for the mouse, the costume is VILE though.

-The Snake miraculous' accessory is completely useless for any type of climbing or jumping that the rest of the hero's do. This also applies to the turtle, pig, horse and peacock.

-Monkey miraculous is extremely useless to any enemy that has WORKING LEGS, they can just walk away from the very small toy banana.

-I know Ladybug has her magic compact but where does Chat keep all his stuff, how does he just pull out the magic camembert that can transform them. Does he have magical cat pockets?

-Lila looks amazing in the fox miraculous, I'm sorry someone had to say it, she rocks it so hard and the character design on that costume is too good for a bad person.

-Zoe looks 10x better in the bee miraculous than Chloe, the mask on Chloe makes her face look all wonky and Zoe's transformation is so much cooler.

[system-of-a-feather]

i didnt know you guys were chinese!

First-generation from my dad's side. We are half Chinese half white mix. We hadn't talked too much about it on this blog because for a while we had a lot of internalization and parts that would get really really aggressive about us overstepping our bounds because we are "basically white and uncultured and saying anything else would be basically the cringeist Chinese-aboo" and it'd make us anxious and stuff but like

Over the years we kinda worked on it and at this point, some of us take a lot of pride in it and give proper credit to both that we ACTUALLY have been cultured in it - albeit not as hard as some of our other Asian American friends / friend groups - and that honestly a lot of our childhood and teenage years were really affected by it XD

We actually used to help run and be a part of the Asian Club in our highschool partially on the account that all my friends either were from marching band or Asian

Yet our trauma brain that thinks us breathing is taking up space we aren't allowed to take up (same thing with being nonbinary or even LGBT even though we were 'queer out of the womb and everyone knew it') and just said we were faking. .... yes faking being Chinese.

Honestly though, like, I've been doing it for like a year, but me specifically as a part, holds reverence to the Chinese Dragon. I don't like to say worship because I don't really believe in it, nor do I see myself as below it, as much as it is kind of a cultural spirit guardian relationship to me? I've always been really closely tied to it and had a tradition of every Chinese New Year buying 1) a fan 2) some form of house hold decor relating to the dragon that I didn't have before 3) any new dragon coins if I can find it and 4) a coin for the zodiac year it is since I was like 12 or 14 cause I found it a lot of fun.

Lately this year upon reflecting about it like... I was born into an actively severely abusive household that had been really abusive for at least 4 years before I was born and my mom has clearly stated it that the reason I was born was because they wanted a dragon born on the millennium (2000 was both the turn of the millennium and the year of the dragon, the luckiest and most respected zodiac) and so lucky old me got to live a life in a hellscape because, well, my parents wanted a dragon

It was something I used to have a lot of mixed feelings about, but lately I've kinda decided that firstly, I will reclaim it as my own because fuck yeah being a dragon is cool and secondly, because the cultural reverence to the dragon is a really powerful thing. It has the power to make children be born when they otherwise wouldn't be because people hold a lot of hope and faith into those born into the year of the dragon. It's sucky and it doesn't justify the way we were born, but it also means that I am one of the many that is held culturally with a lot of like... hope and support and spirit.

So like last year I had officially decided that I am reclaiming my relationship with the idea and culture of the dragon and taking it personally to be an idea of guidance and guardianship from the faith, spirit, and hopes that come from what a lot of people believe to be the dragon and using that a bit as a centering thing. Recently I just decided to be honest and say I myself pretty much hold a lot of reverence to the dragon and WILL stab white people who wear it as an aesthetic and reduce the value of the dragon to an aesthetic.

Like yes, the dragon is aesthetic af and its fine to see it that way, but respect it and all the meaning behind it or I will murk you personally.

But ANYWAYS, even if its kinda cringey, I take pride in being a dragon even if I don't actually believe any of it truly is real. Personally, cultural beliefs and shared ideologies have power of their own in the world and I see it kind of similar. At the very least, the idea gives me strength and pride and happiness so honestly, call me cringey but I'm gonna be unapologetically cringey with this cause bitch ass, if the culture around the dragon made me live a shitty childhood / life, then bitch ass I deserve and hold the right to have this intimate relationship with the concept of the dragon.

but ANYWAYS, most of the system doesn't care as much about it as me XD The only one I think who cares much about the dragon or anything is Jii and Jii is just the part that really got me out of denial about being... half Chinese.

I KNOW ITS DUMB TO BE IN DENIAL ABOUT YOUR BORN RACE / ETHNICITY BUT I WAS

-Riku (Host)

[satanfemme]

pre-made killjoy name generators r good and fun but personally I think the best way to come up with killjoy names isn’t to (completely) rely on any kind of fill-in-the blank with generic words. so if you��re struggling with coming up with names, here’s some things I do/keep in mind when coming up with good killjoy names quickly:

(though ofc these r just what work for me personally, I’m not saying there’s a right/wrong way to writing killjoy names!)

(under a cut cause it’s long and just a whole lotta nothing for my followers who aren’t writing killjoys lol)

there’s 3 main “categories” of killjoy names in canon:

first name, last name (ex: party poison; jet star; val velocity)

three names / a title + two names (ex: dj hot chimp; dr. death defying; agent cherri cola)

single name (ex: vaya; volume; newsagogo)

note that when there’s more than one name these are sometimes (+ more often than irl) alliterative, reminiscent of early comic book superhero names (ex: lois lane, bruce banner, ect)

names can be made up of real words (ex: fun ghoul), real* names (ex: tommy (chow mein) ), or they can be newly invented from existing words/phrases (ex: neonfuck). and, obviously, a name could be any combination of those, as is the case for tommy

*your “real names” don’t actually have to actually exist irl! korse has a “real” name from the city, but “korse” still isn’t actually a name. coming up with words that sound like they could be names (especially in a sci-fi future setting) but don’t really mean anything at all irl, would also work for this!

sometime, killjoy names are preluded with “the”, most obvious examples of this are “the kobra kid” or “the girl”.

-

All of that established, where I usually start with a new name, if I have nothing to base it off of already, is fantasynamegenerators.com and randomwordgenerator.com. the former has a wide variety of real and fantasy names (including categories from pop culture) so there’s a lot of choices depending on what specific style you’re looking for, and the latter lets you generate words by syllable count, first letter, or what part of speech it is. I also use thesaurus.com too if there’s a specific meaning I want, and when trying to find a real name that starts with a specific letter I usually google “names that start with...” (sorry I don’t have a website for that lol).

however I don’t one-and-done the generators. I generate words/names to establish a starting point but then build from there.

for example, if I’m looking for a killjoy with three names, I might start with fantasy name generators and use a few of the generators until I get a single name I like. then I might switch to the random word generator and find a noun and an adjective, one of which alliterates with the real name I already decided upon. then after that I’ll still fine tune the name as a whole if the rhythm** is off or if I don’t like how one of the words fits when it’s all put together.

actually doing the above for a minute or two, the names I first generated were robin rotten and tongue, but by keeping the parts of it that I liked and trashing the parts I didn’t, I adjusted it to be “Ruby Rotten Throat”. if I were actually using that name in a story I might further edit it as I want, for example hyphenating the last two names or shortening it to “the rotten throat” depending on what characterization I were giving this character themself (are they genuinely intimidating as a person? or just picking out a name that “sounds cool”?)

** wrt rhythm, tbh I’m not smart enough to offer concrete advice other than “say it out loud and make sure it ‘sounds right’”, but finding a catchy rhythm is pretty important. in canon, killjoy names can be any combination of syllables (ex: 2+1+3; 1+4; or ofc just 1) and with the longer names I wouldn’t even say they have to alternate between stressed and unstressed syllables necessarily (though cherri and dr. d’s names definitively do, so if you’re struggling with rhythm that’s an easy way to make something sound better!), literally just edit it until is sounds good and is easy to say.

-

as with all writing, you want to think about what the name actually says about the character and their characterization. but unlike most writing, most killjoys picked out their own names. this is something to keep in mind, asking yourself what words/names they themselves would be inspired by (killjoys they idolize? things found in nature? sci-fi tech?), what kind of name they themselves would like (fancy names? snappy names?), and what kinds of words/names would be realistic for the character to know or not. (a killjoy in the zones probably wouldn’t be able to name themselves “new york”... unless they collect books and discovered the name in one of those!)

most killjoys are very young. 40 is seen as very old and most of the canonical joys we see are teens/young adults regardless of timeline or interpretation. this doesn’t necessarily have to influence the names you choose for them, but it can.

specifically, don’t worry about a name being too “cringey” or anything like that. if someone had the freedom to name themselves literally anything at 14 years old, it’d make sense for the name to be kinda dumb (and it’d make sense for them to still keep it years later, considering they live in a society where names like that are the norm)

in fact, if you’re struggling, I suggest trying to get into the mindset of ur character given the freedom to name themselves anything with no limits, at whatever age they’d have been when naming themselves!

ok yeah that’s about everything I can think of off the top of my head, I just know killjoy names r hard for a lot of people to come up with, but I find them easy when I follow the above advice, so! hopefully some of that can help some of u too? love and light

[writersramble37]

WIP INTRO - Drowning in the Music

Title: Drowning in the Music  Genre: Romance, Fantasy Current Status: Second draft Synopsis: 

After narrowly escaping death, Clare awakens in what she once deemed a fictional story, the Phantom of the Opera. She finds herself face to face with the Phantom himself. Although he may be a mysterious masked figure, Clare knows exactly how his story unfolds. Fighting to find a way home and to survive in a foreign era, Clare wonders if her presence alone will alter the story for better or for worse. 

Yes, it’s totally a fanfic. Am I ashamed? Nope! I first started this story when I was 14 freaking years old. Was it good? Ummm. . .Nope! I had the right idea, but the writing was just so. . .*shudders* Cringey to say at the least. I had just discovered the Phantom of the Opera, and completely fell head over heels in love with it. I also tormented my loved ones all throughout my high school years by talking about the Phantom of the Opera nonstop. 

But, I’m 23 now. And looking back at my first story, I realized it was in serious need of revamping. I still love the story, but I can look at it in a more analytical way, rather than being completely taken over by fangirly “feels”.

I’ve also since visited the Opera Garnier in Paris, where the story takes place! Michael also proposed to me right outside of it because he knew how important this place is to me. This story has also influenced my career path, as I grew to become incredibly fascinated by psychology. I found myself desiring to understand how/why people tick the way they do. I’m majoring in Psychology, and currently work in the mental health field as a direct support provider. So to say that the Phantom of the Opera has left its mark on my life would be putting it lightly.

My original version is available on fanfic, but be warned, it’s crap. However, it did blow up in popularity much to my surprise. At one point, my story was the second most reviewed Phantom of the Opera fanfic on there. I was incredibly proud, and my readers have always been very kind and amazing. My story has since become a trilogy. I have grown tremendously as a writer, which is why I want to rewrite it.

This WIP has:

Time travel! Clare is from present day, but finds herself traveling back to 1870. She also finds herself in Paris, France! She is unsure how she managed to awake in a completely different time and place. Last she recalls, she was drowning. She wonders if it’s water or death that is a mysterious passageway. 

Homesickness. Although most would be thrilled to awake in a fictional world, Clare is worried about her life back at home. She misses her family and friends, and wonders if she will ever see them again.

A slow-burn romance. Because those are the best. Erik (the Phantom) has his heart set on Christine. Although Clare isn’t actively pursuing Erik, she finds herself caring for him more and more as the story unfolds. 

Hurt/Comfort genre. Lots of feelings are involved in this story. Erik has never been treated like a human being before. Clare is determined to change this.

Contrasting upbringings. I wanted to show the contrast between Clare and Erik. Erik grew up abused and neglected. Clare did not. Although these characters still manage to cross paths and have a positive influence on one another. I wanted to highlight that everyone is human and grew up with their own forms of pain and heartache. Just because you come from a different background doesn’t mean you can’t form a compassionate connection with someone. The main message I want to convey in this story is that a little kindness can go a long way. 

Changing events. Although it’s a Phantom of the Opera fanfic, I show how Clare’s presence has an affect on the classical gothic novel. I show that one person can cause entire scenes to disappear, or play out drastically different. On the other hand, some events are fated to happen.

Special thanks to @letswritestories101 for tagging me!

Please send me an ask, leave a comment/tag/reblog if you would like to be on the taglist! Or interact with this post.

Tag List (participate if you would like - no pressure!):

@ambiguouspuzuma

@lady-of-himring

@mindingmyownbusiness

@pens-swords-stuff

@rhikasa

@twst-nadira-oc

@ficsinhistory

@ispeakforthebooks

[calciferous-kelpie]

Breaking Young Artists ft. Kirby

So I woke up today at 8AM (which is highly unlike me) with the extreme urge to write about my shitty experiences as a young creator online. I’ve never really talked about this with anyone before, at least not to the extent that I’m going to now. But yeah. Here we go. Yay.

Today we’re talking about the Kirby fandom, but it’s okay if you don’t know shit about Kirby because we’re actually talking about fandom gatekeeping more than anything.

Most of you probably didn’t know I was into the Kirby franchise at one point, and that’s completely intentional. I’ve put that part of my life far behind me, and let me tell you, I don’t look back on it with much fondness, despite the fact that I was in the fandom for years.

Here’s one of the many reasons why!

This is JP. My Kirby fan character from forbidden days no longer spoken of.

“Wait, so JP? Like… Jigglypuff?”

Yes.

“And this was your Kirby fan character?”

Yes.

“Oh.”

Yes.

My lack of creativity should be apparent to anyone who looks at this character. JP’s creation is lazy and self-indulgent. She is clearly the Pokemon Jigglypuff with some minor redesigns who was then shoved into the Kirby universe for no good reason.

When I first made her, I had no real intention of explaining why she was basically just Jigglypuff, but as I continued to develop her, I began to consider what it would be like to explain her appearance—to create a story where Pokemon and Kirby both existed together on, like, different planets in a vast universe. She was going to be half Jigglypuff and half… whateverthefuck you want to call Kirby’s species.

You can still find art of her buried deep in my DeviantArt gallery (as well as 21 chapters of a story I will never, ever complete), but I don’t talk about her anymore. And this is why.

It all happened back around 2010-2012, which meant I was about 12-14 at the time. This was back when DeviantArt was still the main hub for all artists (lmao) and tumblr was still kind of new on the scene. A cool new trend popping up in fandom spaces at this time was the creation of “your oc is terrible” tumblr blogs, which—as the term implies—existed simply to make fun of artists who had crappy characters. They would reupload artists’ works and laugh at how lame or unoriginal their designs were.

These people were trend-setters, making fun of cringe character designs before “cringe” was even a word used to describe them. And before you fall for the fun hipster wording here: no, this did not make them admirable. They were, in fact, assholes.

Some of these blogs liked to pretend they “poked fun” in the spirit of “constructive criticism” but very few of these people actually offered anything outside of insults. (Besides, even if their feedback had been constructive, none of these artists whose work they’d reuploaded had asked for this and probably should have just been left alone.)

You can probably see where I’m going with all of this. My art of JP was uploaded to a couple of these “crappy oc” blogs, and I was ridiculed for having dared to create a thing.

I discovered my art had been taken from my DeviantArt gallery and uploaded to tumblr (a site I didn’t even have an account on at the time) without my knowledge. My signature had been blocked out (to protect my privacy I guess??? lmfao) and my work had been openly mocked for the enjoyment of an audience. People complained about my shitty character, saying that she was literally just Jigglypuff dressed up to look like an OC. They rolled their eyes at her name and her appearance. And in no uncertain terms, I was deemed a bad artist and a bad member of fandom—a warning to other new artists of what to never be.

I wasn’t told any of this to my face, of course, which I guess was supposed to be a blessing. Rather, I had the lovely privilege of discovering that people were mocking me behind my back for their own satisfaction. It could have even been one of my friends who had brought my work up for mockery. I’ll never know.

But let me tell you, there’s not a lot that’s more discouraging than learning people are ridiculing you just out of earshot.

I wish I had had the foresight to take screenshots of the posts these people made. To document the insults and the way I was treated when I asked them to take my art down from their blog. Unfortunately, I don’t have that. I was young and ashamed and just wanted the experience to be over with. But you know what? The receipts don’t matter, anyway.

I don’t need to prove that I didn’t deserve that treatment.

Today, I acknowledge that my character was lame and kind of uncreative. But that certainly doesn’t mean that the people who made fun of me were in the right. I had never claimed to be a brilliant character creator—some great example of unique OCs and unparalleled storytelling. And hell, even if I had done that, it wouldn’t have given anyone the right to stomp on my imagination the way these people did. I was just a kid.

It’s 2021 now. I’m nearly 23 years old, and it’s been about a decade since this happened to me. I haven’t thought about this horrible event in detail for some time, but I need you to understand that even when I’m not actively thinking about this, my life as an artist is affected by it every day.

I’m still ashamed to share much of anything about my characters. I still worry constantly that I’m being cringey, self-indulgent, or a “bad artist.” Some days I manage to create with beautiful, reckless abandon, but then when the dreaming ends, I look back on what I’ve created and fuss, and worry, and doubt. (Ever wonder why you rarely see my work?)

I know the culture around OCs online has improved in a lot of ways since the 2010’s, but I still want to put this message out there. I want everyone to know why this sort of thing isn’t okay. I want my history to be documented so that maybe some new, excited artist doesn’t have to go through what I did.

TL;DR:

Never make fun of someone for having an uncreative or “cringey” character. It’s crappy to do to any artist of any age, but especially if you do this to a kid of all people—a young artist who is just learning the ropes and learning to be creative. This shit sticks with a person, and it can and will inhibit their ability to create amazing things in the future. If you put down an artist for being bad at design or being cringey, you are an awful person.

And to the people responsible for putting my dumbass little timmy’s-first-OC on tumblr blogs to be sneered at and mocked, I mean this will all my heart:

Fuck you! :)

[fkahersweetness]

so i just watched A Royal Affair and YIKES

talk about a fucking downer lmao i blame y'all for ruining my Friday

just kiiiiidding

well sort of

ok i was not looking forward to this at all bc of the runtime mainly and also some other stuff and while i maintain this was NOT a movie that needed to be fucking 137 mins, it wasn't bad!

the acting was good, it was Danish which always highlights Mads so there's that and i appreciated seeing some other often seen Danish actors

but i mean these kinds of renaissance era "affair" movies always make me look at the camera a la The Office bc the members of the affair -- Johann and Caroline in this case -- come off as absolute idiots

like y'all know what's gonna happen to at least one of you -- can't you get your dick wet elsewhere???

at the end when Johann was all beat up in that cell and then went to the chopping block, i literally said, "hope that pussy was worth it, bro"

spoiler alert: it wasn't

Vikander is a pretty girl but damn you're trying to tell me there was no other hot ass in all of Denmark Johann could have gone after???

and don't give me that love shit either, they were not in love, that's called the Fishbowl Phenomenon

on this note lmao

part of Mads' appeal as a grown man is that he looks his age; he's like 40ish or a little over looking meanwhile Vikander looks like a 14 year old girl

i mean Jesus

i feel like i watched a man fuck his niece for 2 hours

i actually thought Christian's actor did a REALLY good job -- he was so cringey but believeably unhinged and lonely, and he really brought the scenes of the three of them together. it was almost kinda cute at times

i remember thinking when Christian first humiliated Caroline at the piano thing, like wow they're really being heavy handed with how awful her life is so she obviously needs a suave and sexy man like Johann to come in and give her good dick

but in the end i think it worked

don't ever make me watch a movie this long again lmao

[emachinescat]

Way Back Wednesday #1

Welcome to Way Back Wednesday! Every Wednesday, I am delving into my past as a fanfic writer and reflecting on and sharing one of my stories… starting from the very beginning, 16 years ago, when I was a 14-year-old kid discovering her love for fandom. ❤️

Today’s story is…

An Unlikely Team

American Dragon: Jake Long & Kim Possible

Summary: Monkey Fist and Huntsman have teamed up in order to defeat their respective foes. With Monkey Ninjas, goblins, dragons, nacos, spy gear, magic potion, secrets, regrets, and tears, no one is going to escape from this situation without changing somehow.

Rating: G

Chapters: 18 | Words: 12,353

Year Published: 2005 | My age: 14

Relationships: Jake Long/Rose | Huntsgirl | Characters: Jake Long, Ron Stoppable, Kim Possible, Monkey Fist, Huntsman, Rose | Huntsgirl, Lao Shi, Fu Dog

AO3 Tags: Crossover, Suspense, Humor

My reflections on and "review" of the story are after the break! :)

Oh, wow. It was an adventure coming back to this story! It marked a lot of firsts for me - my first crossover, my first story above 10k words, my first chapter fic. I don't remember a whole lot about my writing process back then, or about the circumstances of writing this story. I was 14, and a lot has happened since then. I do remember that I was still coming off the review-high from my first story, and that I had no idea what I was doing, not really. And it kind of shows.

I guess I should go ahead and say that this story, like the last one, isn't bad. I mean, the plot, if a bit simple and contrived, makes sense and moves along fairly well, and the characters (except for Rose, but we'll get to her in a minute) are pretty well portrayed, and grammatically, there were no glaring errors that I could see. It was interesting enough; it has been probably a decade or more since I last opened this story, but it still managed to hold my attention well enough, I suppose. It has some very positive reviews (and some critical ones), so I must have done something right.

But I've got to go over the issues with this story. Most of them I think are just hilarious. I'd been writing since I was five, but I was new to this kind of storytelling and still trying to find my voice as a writer. Once again, it shows.

Okay, so first, there's the plot itself - super simple, very contrived, and kind of weird. Huntsman and Monkey Fist team up so that M can help H capture and unmask the American Dragon, and in return, H will give M a talisman that will "undoubtedly" make him the Ultimate Monkey Master? Sure, seems legit, I guess.

Then there's the fact that I had to end every chapter - or nearly every chapter - with a cliffhanger, even if it didn't warrant one. I was dying laughing because most chapters would end with a character saying something hopeful to another character, but then muttering under their breath something grim and suspenseful. For example: "'Let us go. Jake's life is depending on us. He is alive for now...' and then he added almost inaudibly, 'but not for long...'" It's hilarious, and I wish I could remember if I was trying to be edgy or just ensure readers would come back, or if I thought being ominous was a hallmark of good writing. Also, the chapters were overall very short. I think I just wrote however much I felt like writing and then posted. Of course, I was having to post between school and the Boys & Girls Club where my mom worked (and being grounded, like a lot), so I guess I just wrote what and when I could.

Some of the dialogue's a bit clunky, and I had a weird thing with time limits. They capture Jake, and then they have to send Huntsgirl out to get a potion that will make him human because they forgot (???) this very important part of the plan for some reason. She says something along the lines of, "My Huntstick will transport me to the magical black market almost instantly. I'll be back within an hour." That doesn't add up, unless she's going to spend an hour haggling with the seller. Then she gets back, amps up the whole evil villain plot, and then adds, "Oh, yeah, it'll take 30 minutes for this potion to take effect." So she and the baddies just stand there for half an hour watching Jake slowly turn from dragon to human. Then when he's been poisoned (another weird plot contrivance), Lao Shi says, "If we don't give him the antidote in 30 seconds, he'll die!" I suppose I did set the scene, whether intentionally or not, by having a clock ticking in the background, but the way that all of the characters seem to have such an acute knowledge and understanding of time is just weird to me.

The only aspect of this story to actually bother me is the disservice I did to Rose's character. In the show, she's portrayed as a pretty strong protagonist-by-day/antagonist-by-night, but in my story, she's pitiful. I don't know if I just consumed a lot of media with weak female characters or what, but it's super cringey how emotional and weak she's portrayed as once she finds out the truth about Jake. She cries, which is fine, but then girlfriend just up and faints! She cries some more, begs Jake to forgive her, acting like she'll never be able to live with herself or forgive herself if he doesn't, then gets mad at him when he needs a little time to process that the girl he has a crush on is also the girl who's been trying to kill him. Then as soon as he apologizes for... being traumatized, I guess? she turns around and starts spouting off stuff about never being able to forgive herself if he'd died or something. I apologize most deeply to her character.

Oh, I just realized I haven't really discussed the Kim Possible side of things, mostly because it's pretty cut and dry. Those characters all seemed to be, well, in character. I especially feel I had Ron down to a T. It was also really funny the way I had Huntsman and Monkey Fist constantly arguing even through their alliance. The fight scenes, with Kim and with Jake, are very minimal. They're usually one step above just saying, "They fought." On that note, there's not a whole lot of detail or description, but a lot of dialogue. I definitely could have expanded more on the world to make the crossover feel more complete.

All that (mostly light-hearted) criticism aside, it was fun to get to go back and read this, and if you think you'd be interested, be my guest. It's a cute little read, and important to me because it marked the second step in my fan-fiction journey.

Next week, we'll be taking a look at one of the cringiest things I've ever written - yikes!