#platonically gay not gay for each other but gay adjacent to each other

[el-beau]

𝐛𝐧𝐮𝐲 and 𝖍𝖔𝖓𝖘𝖊

gayest pals in this part of discord hits @vsc-art/@jersey-devil-speakz over the head with a frying pan :3c

[sodasa-was-taken]

How subtle is the romance of G-Witch really: The language of romance and the bias in interpretation

First of all, I want to express my gratitude for all the feedback I've received. You guys are awesome. When I posted my first analysis, I had no idea how it would be perceived. Throughout my life, I've mostly been met with confusion, if not a bit of curiosity, when I've told people about my fascination with the romance genre. Even people who like the genre don't treat it with the respect I do but rather see it as something they can turn their brains off to. I was scared that people who saw my analysis would think that G-Witch, I dunno, had too much else going on to be considered a romance. I can't tell you all how validating it's been to get this much praise for writing about one of my biggest passions. Thank you so much.

This post is less an analysis of G-Witch as it's an exploration of the hypocrisy in how straight and gay romances are interpreted even by the queer community. I've engaged with a lot of female/male romances, especially when I was younger and thought I was straight, so it's quite surreal seeing similar stories being interpreted vastly differently based only on whether the main characters are queer or not.

There's been a lot of discussion about how explicit same-sex relationships in fiction should be. Many agree that the minimum for the characters to be unambiguously into each other is for them to kiss. That would be an ideal metric if the same applied to a man and a woman being into each other. It does not. For the vast majority of history, since people first started portraying characters in romantic relationships, explicit depictions of physical affection between those characters haven't been a thing. Depicting that sort of thing didn't become commonplace until the 20th century. For example, you would be hard-pressed to find any of the somewhat indecent positions Miorine and Suletta get into in a Jean Austin novel. Like, usually in a platonic hug, you lay your head on someone's shoulder or clavicle, and Miorine's burying her face in the upper part of Suletta's cleavage. How scandalous!

Of course, these views are centuries old, and the expectations of what should be included in a story about people getting together have changed drastically since then. Except in a lot of ways, it hasn't. Especially in manga, light novels, and anime, it can take real-life years for two characters to show affection through physician touch. Still, it’s expected that the characters are or will become attracted to one another and that they’ll end up together before the end of the story. Unless they’re the same gender, where not only is that not an expectation, but due to tropes such as Bury Your Gays, people are more likely to think one of them is going to die. That’s messed up. Being a main character in a romance or something adjacent shouldn’t be a death sentence for any character. Then there’s the fact that same-sex couples-to-be in fiction can be as forward as they want in their physical and verbal affections. Still, a straight couple-to-be that does nothing but bigger or just be the most prominent characters in their respective genders will still be perceived as less ambiguous. A man and a woman who get a bit flustered around each other are hopelessly in love. Yet, two girls sharing an intimate hug after a conversation about how neither wants their engagement to just be a transaction; that’s “totally platonic.”

Better yet, Hollywood has fine-tuned this to the point that the male and female leads only need to look at each other for about five seconds, and it’s enough to infer that they’re attracted to each other. This has become so ubiquitous that people have gotten confused when the leads are implied not to have gotten together despite having shown zero romantic intent. Having the character show romantic intent isn’t generally considered a requirement for them to end up together in a Hollywood film. No, seriously. All this is to say that literary and visual shorthand have always been and continue to be a major part of romances. Yet, the bar is much higher when it comes to the confirmation that two characters of the same gender are into each other. An author can use the exact same narrative tools that have become a staple of female/male romances/romantic subplots, and someone will tell you you're being led on for picking up on them.

The main reason for the high standards placed on same-sex couples is the desire for representation. If straight couples are allowed to or even expected to kiss at some point in the story, the same should be the case for same-sex couples. That said, kissing neither is nor should be the be-all and end-all of good representation. Yeah, straight couples get to kiss and have sexual relationships, but by all accounts, a significant amount of straight representation is absolutely abysmal. Lots of straight romances reek of sexism, outdated gender roles, and stereotyping, are toxic, and straight-up have a reputation for romanticizing abuse. If kissing or an “I love you” is the metric to which good representation is judged, two straight people who have zero chemistry or are downright abusive would be better representation than a same-sex couple whose relationship is built on mutual respect and support but who doesn't get to kiss or say “I love you” and that's ridiculous.

It’s also worth noting how people who tell others they’re crazy for seeing a queer story where according to them, there aren’t any, get characterized as needing to see something explicit to pick up that a story is or even just be interpreted as a queer romance. The thing is, most of these people aren’t dense; they’re willfully ignorant. They can pick up on the signs just as easily as they can in male/female romances; they’re choosing not to, even if it’s likely an unconscious decision. There seems to be a need among queer people to have depictions in media that even bigots can’t deny are queer. Why though? Representation is vital in helping to normalize the existence of various types of people, but for so many queer people, it just doesn’t seem to be enough. So what if some people wouldn’t get it unless the characters kiss? Those people will just start complaining about how they’re having queerness forced down their throats, and that’s their problem. There’s so much more to the queer experience than displays of physical affection, and this representation gatekeeping isn’t helping anyone. Normalizing same-sex couple kissing is important, but normalizing people of the same gender kissing is only going to normalize the kissing itself. If, for example, two people of the same gender get to kiss and then one of them gets killed off, that's the opposite of normalizing same-sex relationships.

Pulling from my own experiences, I've never been told that there was anything wrong with two people of the same gender kissing. Still, I saw same-sex relationships as inferior and believed being in one couldn't give me the life I wanted. I tried so hard to convince myself that I was straight and was only attracted to someone with a different gender presentation than me – because I was also an egg who told myself I was wrong for feeling uncomfortable for being referred to as my assigned gender at birth. Honestly, I thought that I would be happier if I didn’t even entertain the idea of getting together with someone with the same gender presentation as me. So, imagine how much it meant to me to see a show about two girls where one of them didn’t even think that getting engaged to another girl was an option, both of them having young men interested in them but asking each other to spend their life with them, and ending the show being married and being all the happier for being with the other. That's the kind of representation I've been looking for.

On a less serious note, I’d like to share an antidote from when I watched episode one for the first time. When Suletta sees someone floating around in space who appears to be in danger I didn’t initially consider that the person in question might be Miorine. The visuals planted the idea in my mind and the thing that confirmed it was the framing of the two inside Aerial’s cockpit. I couldn’t explain what I was picking up on, but to me, it was a dead giveaway.

[mrprongsandhisthreemalewives]

"platonic", in its current definition, refers to a feeling and relationship that Is nonsexual and nonromantic in nature (and not just nonromantic).

It's a relationship that's affectionate, but not passionate.

If you look up platonic in any English dictionary you'd see they explicitly define it as excluding sexual feelings.

Where am I going with all these? Well, if your "platonic" prongsfoot headcanons include them being sexual to each other, that "platonic" prongsfoot isn't as platonic as you think it is, even if you describe them as friends (which they are). Sexual and romantic friendship are actual relationship types, distinct from platonic friendships.

Also, is that m/m ship actually a friendship or are you calling it that because you see vincian relationship as dirty and morally inferior in comparison to the heteronormative (platonic or plato-adjacent) male friendships that y'all are idealising?

You're not "protecting male friendship" (which is normative), you're being an androhomomiser and using platonic and plato-adjacent relationships to harm gay men. Because y'all love to talk about "platonic shipping" but rarely portray the characters as aspec (you know the people most likely to have relationships that are nonsexual and/or nonromantic in nature), nor you have an actual interest in exploring neither platonic (and adjacent) relationships, nor other types of nonsexual nonromantic relationships, like sensual relationships, alterous relationships, intellectual relationships, etc.

[celestialsun123]

Link Click has ruined my life /VERY VERY VERY POS

so... Yes. I'm almost done with season 2, and here's some stuff I'd like to share with the class.

Some of this (like half the stuff down at the bottom) was made with the help of @anulithots! I (unfortunately) do not pay as much attention to Qiao Ling as I do CXS and LG

These lovable idiots are gay for each other in every single platonic/romantic way you can think of. They simply are, y'know?

Like you could tell me they're best friends. You could tell me they're best friends who kiss on occasion. You could tell me they're dating. You could tell me they are childhood friends and are dancing around the fact that they are so in love with each other (platonically or romantically). I will completely agree with you in any of those ways.

(just do not even think of telling me that they're just kinda friends. That is a complete lie and I will not tolerate it)

Cheng Xiaoshi has tripped getting up cause his shoelaces were untied, and Lu Guang fell right after him cause yes.

"Cheng Xiaoshi, wait- your shoelaces-" (gets up to stop him)

(my guy IMMEDIATELY trips and Lu Guang has to lunge to save him, but they both fall on top of each other like the platonically/romantically lovestruck idiots they are.)

(Qiao Ling comes over, very exasperated)

"Get up before the clients see you! All the customers will come and go and see this mess!" (She grabs some broom/stick adjacent object and whacks them both till they get up)

(Cheng Xiaoshi complains the entire time, stuff about 'no not the face!' and the a customer walks in. Show begins, etc.)

[kentuckyfriedmegumi]

i'm making a comprehensive post to pin my favorite posts and writings, as well as my socials and a silly discord server

FIRST THINGS FIRST IS MY PRIDE AND JOY:

i have made a comprehensive list as to why i think that itadori yuuji and fushiguro megumi love each other and are soulmates (platonic or otherwise): this was my pinned for so long. i read the entire series in 6 hours for this. everyone bow down to ME. anyway… READ THIS!!! THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS!!! READ IT ALL. RIGHT NOW!!!

hey there!! there's so many things that i want to pin and promote that i thought it would just be easier to make one big, comprehensive, megapost. also, here are my…

SOCIALS:

twitter: @ttessska ao3: @/kentuckyfriedmegumi tiktok: @/kentuckyfriedmegumi strawpage: kyfriedmegumi

okay, now let's get into it...

AO3 WORKS:

series:

Itadori Yuji’s Totally Foolproof Plan to get Fushiguro Megumi to Fall in Love with Him (Teen, Ongoing): 56.1k words; a canon-divergent series that strays prior to the shibuya incident and weaves in a lot of canon scenes and interactions. The first work, Itadori Yuji’s Totally Foolproof Plan to get Fushiguro Megumi to Fall in Love with Him, is my first fic and is a long fic, with 10 chapters and a series of one-shots that follow after the end of the story. Walking the Path and Reaching the End (General Audiences, Completed): 7k words; takes place during and after JJK chapters 266—268. Contains two works, Walking the Path (chapter 266), which is a hurt/no comfort fic that acts as a character study for itadori and fushiguro and fleshes out the intricacies of their relationship, and Reaching the End (chapter 268), which is a hurt/comfort post-canon fic that dives into the minds of both itadori and fushiguro post-battle.

long fics:

Itadori Yuji’s Totally Foolproof Plan to get Fushiguro Megumi to Fall in Love with Him (Teen, Completed): 38.6k words; my first fic ever! WARNING: spoilers for the anime up to the ending of the first season and also the first half of season 2, episode 6 (but not really plot spoilers). itadori finds himself hopelessly in love with his best friend and ropes in kugisaki to help come up with a plan to get fushiguro megumi to fall in love with him. he is 80% (maybe 78) sure that it WILL work. Closing the Distance (Teen, Ongoing): 16.9k words; a modern college AU story that follows the trio who are online, childhood friends. itadori and fushiguro ~love~ each other, but when they meet years later in college, they have no idea who the other is. yuuji is down bad, megumi is pining, and nobara is done with them both.

one-shots:

is it gay if our pinkies are intertwined? (General Audiences, Ongoing): 2.1k words; a spontaneous crack fic that @sunnyyflowerrs and i came up with on a whim. canon adjacent, with no real series spoilers, just fun times and vibes. itadori and fushiguro find themselves dealing with a curse that causes an AWFUL headache.. unless they're touching. wink, wink. what ever will happen between them??? The Car Ride There (General Audiences, Completed): 2k words; this was an original work that i wrote based on a dream. it's a sad one, i won't lie. the narrator has a dream that they are reunited and speaking with a long lost relative. they talk about life, grief, and moving on. not super popular, but that's okay. it was my first creative writing piece i had done in five years.

part of IYTFPTGFMTFILWH (NOTE: each of these one-shots CAN be read as standalones, you do NOT have to read the full series to read any of these):

First Dates are Hard (or Maybe We Just Have Bad Luck) (Teen, Completed): 7.4k words; a cute 5+1 that takes us on itadori's and megumi's first date. itadori had everything planned out, but of course nothing can ever go right, so i present to you: five ways the date failed and the one thing that went right. cheesy, corny, frustrating, but sweet all the same. Too Soon? (General Audiences, Completed): 3.4k words; itadori and fushiguro have their first mission together ~as a couple~ when itadori decides to get himself injured. this one-shot follows them during and post-battle, with itadori demanding cuddles from fushiguro, and fushiguro being annoyed but not really. i was CRAVING some tooth-rotting fluff, so i scrapped my original idea of having it be battle-centric and focused more on the relationship. I Have to Protect You (Teen, Completed): 3.2k words; WARNING: there is a throwing up scene, but it is not very detailed. this is a sadder one-shot, acting as a hurt/comfort where fushiguro supports itadori through a particularly rough night after sukuna decides to plague his dreams with nightmares. there is angst, there is comfort, there is a small fight scene, but overall a sweet, tender moment for my favorite couple. Just Cause (General Audiences, Completed): 3.3k words; a fic that i wrote just cause, and named it accordingly. fushiguro decides to do something special for itadori because he's a good boyfriend and wants to cheer him up. i wrote this completely out of the blue and felt the need to post a super sweet, fluffy, comforting fic. there is some angst. like. the tiniest amount. overall, a very cute one-shot, i literally just felt like writing something sweet.

RAMBLINGS:

i analyzed the songs that gege akutami assigned to the first year trio and i how i think they relate to their characters (2.3k words): it's exactly what it sounds like, i made a stanza by stanza analysis of each song that gege identified as theme songs for the first year trio. i wrote an entire analysis on yuji's and megumi's parallels throughout the series (814 words): this started as a message in the aformentioned jjk server and it quickly spiraled into an analysis of the in-depth complexities of yuji and megumi and their dynamic. i wrote a short 300-word megumi analysis in jjkcord and i forgor to share it with the class (305 words): as you can see, there was a megumi discussion going on and i just HAD to jump in. bruce offers some really cool insight into megumi's motives and i expand on that in a short (lol) 300-word message reply. it was great, i had soo much more to say, i'll probably expand another time. i’m PISSED about the way gege handled megumi’s character and i wrote an entire 1k-word analysis/rant on it (1k words): i did another megumi analysis, but this is more going into where his character was leading up to and where it ended up at, and how that makes the entire ending of his character feel so very underwhelming and frustrating. i broke down someone's complaints about the jjk series, calling it "disney kaisen," and this is what i said (444 words): i'm in a huge jjk server and someone made a complaint about the series ending, which there is lots to complain about, but i felt that their complaints were misguided. they asked me to tell them what about what they said was wrong, i delivered. my thoughts on chapter 270 and why it feels like a slap in the face to megumi's character (665 words): yeah so 270 actually made me soooo mad i won't lie. had me so upset that i had to type all my feelings out into a PC sticky/post-it note and then i pasted it into the jjk server and then posted it here. i have a lot of feelings about megumi's character as a whole, he is my FAVORITE!!! the way gege has handled him makes me soooooo UGH

MY ARTWORKS:

just cause:

>i headcanoned that yuuji was probably the one to bring megumi off the battlefield because he was the only one left standing ❤️‍🩹 >blah blah blah MEGUMI'S SMILING (manga spoilers) >baseball kaisen >this was such a cute headcanon, i had to draw it even tho i didn't have my ipad at work >render study of megumi >render study of yuuji >render study of kirara >bad megumi sketch >bad megumi sketch pt. 2 >OC art for a writing competition >coffee time >i'm just a cog >boogerkuna (chapter 268 spoilers) >kugisaki nobara (chapter 267 spoilers) >megumi with his hair down

for my fics:

>cooking scene in IYTFPTGFMTFILWH >rabbit scene in IYTFPTGFMTFILWH >final scene in IYTFPTGFMTFILWH >holding hands from Walking the Path

for @sunnyyflowerrs:

>firefighter yuuji with a cat >firefighter yuuji >detective megumi >firefighter yuuji and detective megumi!!! >Cats in Love

for @yearnwormwrites

>Concussion Induced Homosexuality

for @jujutsushiboat

>stay a little longer

[bonefall]

What are your favorite ShadowClan-adjacent changes you've made for the rewrite, whether that's changes to characters, plot lines, clan culture, etc?

I really love my Brokenstar and his Runningnose.

"Are you gay?" "I'm scheming" "Do you like men?" "I like manslaughter." "Ok but are you dating?" "We have a date set for destroying WindClan."

On a serious note though I am just very fond of them... the shared atrocity. The reliance on each other, knowing that every scheme and plot is to benefit the other. Brokenstar wanting to water ShadowClan with the blood of its enemies and knowing that Runningnose is by his side to give him everything he wants. The willingness to abandon all, honor, respect, even love itself for the other. That true happiness is to be by his side, no matter what form that is in.

Looking between the two of them and not knowing which one of them is the curse made manifest, and which was the man all along.

What do you do with that, as Runningnose? That you gave him everything he ever wanted. He had power, he destroyed WindClan, you became a Cleric in the first place to serve him fully with knowledge beyond anything anyone else in your Clan can fathom. And yet, you couldn't save him from the poisoning. You had to let him go with Firestar, couldn't even keep the necklace.

What do you do with your hands? How do you handle the fact that the blood soaked into them is all you have left of him?

ShadowClan in general is my favorite though, I'm fond of all my changes for them. Their dour sense of humor, the craftiness, the new biome which is a wetland instead of a pine forest. Characters like Stumptail, Tangleburr, Deerfoot, Heartstar, Blackstar's platonic love of Russetfur and how her loss destroys him.

I like MisunderstoodClan a lot, man

[deramin2]

If we're going for the definition of Christmas being "Movies that happen around Christmas where that setting frames some of what's happening in the broader narrative," then I have 3 gay Holiday movies to check out.

Directly Holiday Movies:

Bros (2020):

Romcom, 115 minutes

Bobby Lieber is a successful New York City queer history podcaster, failed children's book writer, and rejected screenwriter, who's just won a community award for Best White Cis Gay Man. He announced he will be the first curator of a new national LGBTQ+ history museum in Manhattan.

His new coworkers are deeply passionate about the work but also squabble over everything, escalating it with intra-community discourse squabbling about who's the most oppressed and therefore should be the person that gets what they want. As someone in Very Online queer communities I can't emphasis enough how accurate and real this is and is very well-handled as an affectionate joke from within the community. The subtext is that they aren't wrong and what they're experiencing is real and needs to be factored in, but also they're stopping anything at all from actually happening that could materially help their community because they're too caught up trying to perfect the details.

He prefers Grindr hookups to romantic relationships. He regularly hate-watches Hallheart movies while secretly longing to be truly loved in more than just passing.

Bobby goes to the launch party for his friend's new queer dating app. There he meets Aaron Shepard, a hot but boring estate lawyer and they hit it off and kiss. They ultimately meet up again and the romcom unfolds in unconventional ways.

Bros both play into the romcom genre and resist it, especially how it erases what queer relationships are really like even when the characters are the same gender. It's a queer movie really made for the queer community and not the straight gaze. It's our jokes for us. It has some of the funniest sex scenes I've ever seen. The ending is absolute perfection. Overall extremely funny and intelligent movie.

Holiday connection: Bobby and Aaron celebrate Hanukkah and Christmas together at one point.

Spoiler Alert (2020)

Medical Death Memoir, 112 minutes

Based on the memoir 2017 Spoiler Alert: The Hero Dies by Michael Ausiello about his partner Kit Cowan dying of cancer after being together 14 years. (The movie tells you this is the end at the beginning.) It's basically in 3 acts.

Act 1, is a romcom about how Michael and Kit met at a gay club, and instantly connect. It's about the comedy of trying to integrate into each other's lives, insecurities, and weirdness. Like Michael's secret all-consuming fandom. This is the first long-term relationship either of them have had.

Act 2, the relationship 12 years into it and where they are now.

Act 3, Kit is diagnosed with cancer and they reconcile with mortality and running out of time.

This is a very poignant film about love, lost, and how relationships are never as perfect as movies and TV make them seem. One way or another they all end, and you have to reconcile what all those feelings mean. It's about the string of platonic and familial relationships that come along with romantic ones and how important that love is, too. How our networks hold us together. It's about forgiveness and making sure you really talk to the people you care about while you can.

Respect if you can't handle another film about queer medical death. But it's nice to have one that's not about AIDS. It's also a really good study of the reality of cancer for anyone. I found it to be a really powerful film that made me come away wanting to actually live my life.

Holiday connection: Christmas is Michael's favorite holiday that fills him with magic and wonder and the passage of time is marked by Christmases.

Holiday Movie Adjacent:

Big Eden (2000)

Romcom, 117 minutes

One of the first gay romcoms ever, and hugely influential. This isn't a holiday movie, but it's directly engaging with most of the tropes of Hallmark movies, so I think it deserves to be here.

New York City gay artist Henry Hart suddenly leaves his home and career to go to the remote mountain town of Big Eden Montana to care for his ailing grandfather Sam after a stroke.

Through the church gossip he hears his high school crush Dean Stewart has moved back to town with his boys after getting a divorce, and Henry realizes he still has feelings about him.

The widow Thayer offers to help cook for Henry and Sam. The meals are delivered by shy Native American general store owner Pike Dexter, who's been harboring a crush on Henry since high school. He's been ordering Henry's fine paints for him. The general store has a flock of old men who spend the whole day gossiping there.

Widow Theyer's cooking is dreadful 1950s white bread Americana stuff. Pike decides he wants to make things nice for Henry, so he teaches himself gourmet cooking and makes increasingly elaborate meals. Then more romcom stuff happens.

One thing I love about it is that Henry, Dean, and Pike are closeted. Henry and Dean both express fear about coming out. But everyone in the town is friendly with the open hardware store lesbians. As their being queer becomes more obvious, it's shown that everyone around them would actually love and respect them and would appreciate being let into their inner lives. It's outside societal conditioning and outdated assumptions that's made them scared. In 2000 this message was a big deal. Everything else we had was tragedies about how society hates us. This resisted all of that.

This movie leans into a lot of tropes with so much love and sincerity, but also interrogates them and makes them queer and really has something very intelligent to say about how we deserve to be viewed in stories. Gay Hallmark films attempt to recreate stories like this on the surface, but lack any depth or real queerness and just end up being a warped straight parody. Seeing the real deal makes you really see what absolute garbage lesser films are.

[roweclementine]

Getting ready to end my Spotify subscription when it expires at the end of the month but I’m keeping the account up so here’s all of my playlists that I’ve made since I joined back in summer 2020

Downloads (the Big One)

2023:

March 2023 (v proud of the cover for this one; can’t believe I’ve been doing these for a whole year)

April 2023

May 2023

June 2023

Fourth Of July 2023 (Rowe’s Version)

august 2023

September 2023

October 2023

November 2023

December 2023

March-December 2023

2024:

January 2024 (platonic breakup season woooo)

February 2024

March 2024

The monthly playlist idea was stolen from @trenchcrows. Each playlist has as many songs as there were days in that month (except when they don’t because some of them used to have Lovejoy/Wilbur songs in them). They were my favorite/most listened to/most looped songs from each month. It was a fun project and I think that it’s cool that I can look back and figure out exactly when I got into certain songs or when certain things were happening to me. November-January was certainly A Time.

Queer Playlists:

Aspec (aro and/or ace songs)

🏳️‍⚧️ (trans/nb songs)

🏳️‍🌈 (gay gay homosexual gay)

Podcast Adjacent Playlists:

Favorite SFBO Episodes

Favorite Podcasts

Songs from Let’s Learn Everything!

Playlists For Specific Artists/Albums:

GLOOM DIVISION (new idkhow album go stream it)

We’re Not Panicking! At The Disco Anymore (by Fall Out Boy)

Everything by Jon Walker (all of the songs/bands mentioned in Everything)

Jon Walker favorites

Waterparks songs named after colors

Waterparks Songs Named After Pixar Quotes

Sparrow Sleeps

Infinity on High but it's my favorite parts (by fall out boy)

Local Dreamers (the Wait I Need to Listen to Twenty One Pilots More So They Show Up on My Wrapped playlist)

American Beauty/American Psycho, but with 9% more Demi Lovato

Razzmatazz, but with 9% more Tessa Violet

Playlists For Specific Situations:

Songs to listen to at the end of the year

Beachy

Therapy :( (Rowe is not having a good time)

Therapy :) (Rowe is not having a good time but she’s trying to be optimistic now)

✨ Seasonal Depression ✨ (Rowe is not having a good time part 3, now with more Christmas)

Christmas Songs That I Actually Like (We’re going to ignore the fact that Every Snowflake is Different isn’t technically a Christmas song ok?)

Relationships:

Breakup songs

Show Me The Door (break up songs; a playlist dedicated to my mother)

/ (love songs)

Hopeless Romantic Bittersweet Yearning (more love songs)

& (songs about friendship)

Spotify Wrapped:

Rowe’s 2020 Wrapped

Rowe’s 2021 Wrapped

Rowe’s 2022 Wrapped

Rowe’s 2023 Wrapped

Rowe’s Wrapped 2019-2023 (I had Spotify in 2019 but was using a different account at the time)

Minecraft:

Fallen Kingdom Saga

Minecraft Songs

The Minecraft Archives:

TMcA

tmca!Tommy

(The Minecraft archives was a mcyt (dsmp/Hermitcraft season 8) tma au that I was working on which I am no longer writing because of Current Events)(I also had a TMcA!Wilbur playlist but I deleted it back in February along with all of my other Lovejoy playlists because fuck Wilbur)

The Rest Of Them:

Saturday Saturday Saturday Saturday (sometimes you just wanna listen to songs with Saturday in the title; here’s a playlist for that)

Favorite Covers

Walmart Radio but it’s the songs I actually like

# (songs with numbers in the title)

Duets & features

Inside you there are two wolves (aka Fall Out Boy are liars)

Eurovision Favs

and finally,

Some Songs That Aren’t Lovejoy:

When did this happen why are there so many of them this post took like an hour to make

[hopeds]

rambling about ships/dynamics i yearn for while i sit in the car

peko/tenko:

saw a post in the tags saying how predespair tenko probably idolized peko and now i've just been thinking about them — especially in the sense of having adjacent enough interests but tenko encouraging girls to outwardly express their emotions while peko does the exact opposite. i think tenko would absolutely adore peko's fondness for cute animals and i think she would do wonders to help peko regain a sense of autonomy :')

gundam/mikan:

thinks about their drs interaction where he calls her the lamb and lets her hold the devas so she can be less anxious with animals...

idk if my thoughts are coherent at all about them but i just think they can be . so cute.

nagito/mikan:

but specifically ♠️ like they are in the trial for chapter 3

idk how much i ship it apart from that sort of dynamic because they're both such unstable individuals that i can't see much between them really being that healthy nor enjoyable tbh?

but them bitching each other out ohohhohoho

tenko/mikan:

i will talk about characters other than tenko and mikan i promise. but ohhh my god i think mikan would make tenko's protective instincts go HAYWIRE

and again with the expressing emotions thing like i briefly elucidated upon for peko and tenko but i think mikan has a lot of shame about her emotions and also isn't sure entirely how to express them normally (like when she randomly screams/yells or when she says really. weird shit out loud unprovoked) and i think tenko could do. so much for that

hiyoko/fuyuhiko:

another one of my dearly beloved ♠️ moments

idk how many thoughts i have about them offhandedly but i like them and i like them antagonizing each other

hiyoko/sonia:

this one is more platonic in my mind ( ... sighs.. ♦️) but i think they'd get along so well because of their mutual interest in horror/crime/occult etc

like yeah hiyoko canonically dislikes her but as much as hiyoko torments kazuichi i think she expected a pervy gross guy like him to give her all the attention (as per her track record with her fans unfortunately) so someone else getting that attention kinda. sets her off

BUT when she realizes that sonia didnt even really want kazuichi's crush on her to be a thing i can absolutely see her softening for sonia

especially because sonia was kind to hiyoko and shows a great deal of respect for traditional japanese culture, something very close to hiyoko's heart

hiyoko/kazuichi:

on that note...:)

not a ton of thoughts about them to prattle about right now to be honest but i have a soft spot for them and a soft spot for hiyoko antagonizing him

any combination of peko/maki/mukuro:

they're all similar personality - wise but i just think. idk. a lot of themes of dehumanization overlapping that makes me want to see them kiss

hajime+izuru/mikan:

sry combining them into one but. god the thoughts i have about hajime and mikan are unreal and i like them

even with hajime's self loathing for his lack of talent i still think he's stable enough all things considered to support mikan in a way she needs?

ugh when she mentions wanting to harm him so she'd need to take care of him and he just says she doesn't need to do that. emotional

chiaki/mikan:

i just feel like. i don't know i just feel like they can be so cute

gentle/soft spoken/kind person just the kinda person that mikan needs... and i think she could show her so many video games and it can something that is so sweet

mukuro/sayaka:

hmgmghmh ladies...

socially awkward x social butterfly like what if i cried.

also their drs interaction is SO cute and i just. weeps

mukuro/kyouko:

self sacrificial x unable to depend on others... oh they're foils your honor

i've mentioned this in ims before but omg drif/other adjacent scenario where kyouko notices something Off about disguised!mukuro and then they just. they're gay your honor

tenko/touko:

oh i just feel like tenko can get through to her. i just know she can. even if it takes ten million years

peko/fuyuhiko:

dare i say something controversial?

hm. well. ♠️

in the sense of like. fuyuhiko not wanting to be reliant on the kuzuryuu clan and peko being the embodiment of it because she's his Tool/object as per the clan. and i can just see it getting warped somewhere down the line and i'm so fascinated by that

also like. normal romantic stuff but that can also go without saying i feel

tenko/angie:

okay so. jealousy over himiko aside. i'm so intrigued by the idea of like. tenko confronting angie about hiding her emotions behind her religion in a sense — but i can also see it going in a ♠️ sort of way tbh

kaede/miu:

ohhhh how i love them so. not a lot of cohesive thoughts but i LOVE them so much

other:

nothing cohesive again but god am i a sucker for possessiveness/predator+prey dynamics teehee

also this isn't comprehensive! tbh i'll ship pretty much anything and i love writing ships, very rarely do i care about chemistry so you can just ask me

anyways if you're interested in writing any of these perhaps PLEASE hit my line or lmk in any capacity because i'm dying to tbh

[ofthenoseclan]

@kitsake simple answer to solve, really! first four are taken up by the protagonists hakurei reimu and kirisame marisa, who have insane amounts of subtext for each other and massive fan content surrounding their pairing, as well as usami renko and merry hearn, who are textually in a relationship.

theres only one spot for the gays left and its the hard part here. despite its overwhelmingly yuri-adjacent fanbase, in canon touhou is an extremely romance-light series that barely acknowledges gender and sexuality at all—hell, the two i mentioned above, renko and merry, are dating, and its still a reading comprehension test to notice it given how little they bring it up between each other. you could call touhou the platonic ideal of a platonic story. so what im saying is i get to pick a character i like and call them sapphic because its my post and i get to make the rules. and i say its kanako and suwako as a unit. theyre living together theyre textually sanaes moms they had a kickass sukeban rivalry in their past and they decided to make out about it. thank you for coming to my ted talk

the homophobic spot is taken up by meira, second stage boss of the second game, who is the only character in the entire touhou franchise to utter anything homophobic in the text. this happens when meira says she "wants [the power of] the hakurei [shrine's god]." reimu, an innocent child who knows not of class-s and never will, says "hey you dont have to fight me to ask for my hand in marriage yknow", to which meira responds with "i didnt mean you i meant your god! besides, we're both women! thats gross." reimu completely doesnt get why that is. she then defeats meira and we never see or hear from meira again. her entire character is to exist, be a class-s trope, and die. and touhou has never seen an explicit mention of relationships in its setting happen ever again in its aro-as-hell franchise's run from that point on. the end

[oldbutchdanielcraig]

Oh lmao theatre school kid here. Cult like space w sleep deprivation, weird intimacy exercises, stuff happened. Apart from actual romantic showmances were the Weird ones where our orientations didn’t mix so we couldn’t just fuck about how obsessed we were w each other. (I’m a kinsey 6 so this happened frequently) I did (platonically) attempt to conceive human life w one friend years after school ended, but the weirder one was being so in mutual obsession w this one guy, we’d have to drive for HOURS every single night after rehearsal talking because we couldn’t leave each other alone, got drunk on a family member’s grave together once. Guy he was seeing at the time wrote me a really beautiful love letter. Like again, platonic but also a strange and different thing like a spore of mold that only grows in black box theaters. INTENSE, always. Everyone was in at least three or four of these before graduation and that’s a conservative estimate. I don’t think my experiences are unique I think that’s just what theatre school is like.

im so. this is so. asdjbsdjfbhjbdfjhbdsf. this is literally everything i wanted to hear. thank you. as a band and debate kid my weird high school relationship dynamics were only theater adjacent although i want to say that the stuff going on in my theater department was more exclusively nasty rather than psychosexual in this way. or if it was psychosexual it was in the way of like. almost everyone in my circle was gay and closeted as hell so we were all just Doing Our Best.

anyway i do believe you've summed up the shennant dynamic completely because they are at the end of the day two theater kids who want to be bisexual so they could fuck each other. reflecting.

[bloomshroomz]

Looking up terms you don't know is always a good place to start, because typing up a long list of definitions is a lot to ask of anyone. But here's a brief description of each term:

Abrosexual: Having a fluid sexual orientation. For example, being asexual at one point, straight at another, and bisexual at another.

Achillean: Being a man who is attracted to men, or a nonbinary person whose identity is adjacent to that experience. This is an umbrella term for gay men, bisexual men, pansexual men, nonbinary people who are gay for men, etc. Also known as MLM.

Agender: Having no gender, having a neutral gender, being neither a man nor a woman, or having another experience adjacent to these things. Usually not having a gender at all.

Alloace: Being alloromantic and asexual/ace-spec. In other words, experiencing romantic attraction regularly,* while experiencing little or no sexual attraction.

Aplatonic: Experiencing little or no platonic attraction, or having little to no desire to form platonic relationships/friendships.

Apl: Short for aplatonic. Pronounced "apple"

Aroace: Being both aromantic/aro-spec and asexual/ace-spec. In other words, experiencing little or no romantic attraction, and also experiencing little or no sexual attraction. This is not a synonym for "a-spec" and should not be used as an umbrella for all aces and aros. Asexual people are not always aromantic, and vice versa.

Aroallo: Being aromantic/aro-spec and allosexual. In other words, experiencing little or no romantic attraction, while experiencing sexual attraction regularly.*

Bigender: Experiencing two distinct genders, whether simultaneously or varying between the two.

Demiboy: Being partially a boy, but not fully. A type of demigender.

Demigender: Experiencing a gender partially, but not fully.

Demigirl: Being partially a girl, but not fully. A type of demigender.

Enbian: A term for nonbinary people who are attracted to other nonbinary people, whether exclusively or not.

Genderfluid: Having a fluid gender. For example, being agender at one point, a woman at another, and a bigender at another.

Genderflux: Having a gender which fluctuates in intensity. For example, having no gender at one point, being partially a boy at another, and being fully a boy at another. It is similar to genderfluid, but is more specific, as it refers to gender intensity in particular.

Genderqueer: Having a queer gender, or queering gender in some way. For example, transgender people, nonbinary people, gender nonconforming people, and cis people with a non-normative relationship to gender may identify as genderqueer. Often mistaken as a synonym for nonbinary.

Maverique: Having a gender which is not male, masculine, female, feminine, in between, neutral, nor derived therefrom, while also not being genderless.

Neutrois: Having a neutral or null gender.

Omnisexual: Being attracted to all genders, especially when one's attraction is impacted by gender.

Pangender: Experiencing all genders within one's culture and life experience, experiencing too many genders to count, and/or experiencing an infinite gender.

Polysexual: Experiencing attraction to multiple genders, but not all

Pomosexual: Rejecting or not fitting into conventional labels for sexual orientation, instead preferring a loose and undefined approach to one's identity.

Sapphic: Being a woman who is attracted to other women, or a nonbinary person whose attraction is adjacent to that experience. This is an umbrella term for lesbians, bisexual women, pansexual women, nonbinary people who are gay for women, etc. Also known as WLW.

Toric: A term for nonbinary people who are attracted to men, whether exclusively or not.

Trixic: A term for nonbinary people who are attracted to women, whether exclusively or not.

Xenogender: A term for genders which are not strictly defined in relation to manhood, masculinity, womanhood, or femininity, and instead use other terms to describe one's experience with gender. For example, instead of just saying "I'm not a man or a woman," a person might say "I'm catgender; my gender is like a cat."

_

*Regularly as in:

recurring at uniform intervals.

happening frequently.

happening on a habitual basis; usual; customary.

-

This took a very long time to type; please just look up the terms you don't know next time. You can find all of these very easily by looking them up, with the exception of apl and toric, based on me searching each term in Chrome guest mode. For apl and toric, you need to add "lgbt" to the search ("apl lgbt" and "toric lgbt") and then you'll find them just as easily as well.

Also, you're going to find that people use terms you don't know about a lot. You don't need to know every term; just be respectful even when you don't understand.

Imagine

[jjongleurs]

Sometimes I just think about "Pac-Man Fever" (8x20) and feel... a little gutted? Obviously because Charlie has had a hard life and because she holds on to her mom so tightly, but also because of a multitude of other reasons. 

Charlie is someone starved for family and love, riddled with misplaced guilt. Dean understands her because he's also that person. While Charlie was able to immerse herself in fantasy and fandom and developing her tech skills, all Dean had was hunting. That's why they seem so externally different, a juxtaposition, when they are truly a mirror of each other. 

We see that in Charlie's djin dream where both her mom and Sam are in the hospital beds. They both fought long and hard to hold on to them, but ultimately they come to the realization that they have to let go. Charlie and Dean began to let go of the guilt and the weight of responsibility that comes from holding on to their respective loved ones so fiercely.

I think the biggest difference lies in how they cope with the hard parts of their lives. Charlie’s coping mechanisms are relatively healthy, but Deans? Yeah, no. Charlie is the more well-adjusted version of Dean. She is unapologetic in the way she loves both people and her interests. She is this way because she’s learned that things and people can be taken away so easily, so it’s best not to leave anything unsaid, unloved, or undone. She’s nerdy and weird and odd and out—she embraces all of those parts of her. Dean on the other hand? Dean who turned out to love LARPing and all the same nerdy stuff Charlie liked? Dean the painfully repressed bisexual? He has spent his whole life overcompensating and playing up this mostly unfeeling, macho persona. He threw himself into hunting, hardened himself, forced himself not to get attached to anything or anyone that wasn’t family, and modeled a hypermasculine façade for himself after his father.

Dean calls Charlie the little sister he never wanted. There was this inexplicable bond between them from the moment they met. Knowing her made him face himself, learn to love and accept himself more. He saw himself in Charlie, things he hated in himself, but he loved all of it in her. 

In the last scene with them both in the episode, Charlie says to him, so easily, “I love you.” She doesn’t expect to hear it back, but she doesn’t need to. She says it because she feels it and because he needs to hear it—because he deserves to hear it. Dean is still processing and working through his issues, so he can’t say it back yet. He’s also just become the kind of person that has a hard time getting the words out despite feeling them. Instead, he gives her a sweet hug and kisses her head. His actions convey what he can’t say.

[narraboths]

what are the ideal kara and lena fits in your head? and out of all the seasons which one, for you, had the ideal supercorp dymanic / energy?

this is to a degree colored by nostalgia/my pure hatred for the past two seasons but Season 2 hands down – i did write some shitpost about it recently, but S2 is really like.... the only season where largely even with the mitigating het hell, Kara and Lena are just......... so insanely and genuinely obsessed with each other. like there's just this constant outlandish devotion that's extremely compelling and just entirely inexplicable if you don't read them as two very dramatic gay people's courtship. it's incredible. Kara fucking fights all her loved ones bc she doesn't believe Lena to be guilty of a crime she's on tape having committed, then proceeds to literally risk her life to even have a shot at saving her. Lena flirts with the clown cub reporter she's known for two weeks (who by the way is literally about to write a hit on her?) because there's no saying no to those baby-blue eyes and then almost beefs it with said clown's sister who dares to be the unknown woman in Kara's apartment when Lena shows up uninvited. like that's peak #THEM to me more than any lazyass Latin spell chanting could ever hope to be

AS FOR THE FITS, i'm too lazy to do a whole collage now, but Kara's S1/S2 slacks+button downs (occasional cardigan/sweater) was absolutely the best that we lost to nothing but homophobia – it's clean, it's cute, it's professional, it's still comfy, it's very comfortingly gay-adjacent, come on! the ideal Lena fits would also basically be her S2 wardrobe, with some of the better tailored S4–6 suits peppered in (i think 2x05 like cycled through the platonic ideal). but also in my head Kara's properly masc-leaning and Lena's wardrobe is more adventurous at least on the ice cold Fortune 500 CEO front than anything the show's ever served lol

[veinsfullofstars]

To add to my Pride Month sketches, I figured I’d go into a little detail on why I picked these particular flags for this specific characters. (I would’ve done this on the post itself, but I was incredibly loopy from lack of sleep when I posted it yesterday, along with nursing a very sore drawing wrist. There were no braincells left to form coherent thoughts by that point, haha.)

These got a bit longer than I intended, so buckle up. We're headed into real unfiltered brain-dump territory.

---

Dedede & Meta Knight - When I first got into this ship, I think I viewed them simply as “two male-coded characters stand next to each other - therefore ship.” But, the more I turned them over in my head (even picking through media and wikis for inspo), the more I liked the idea of their interests being broader. DDD’s pretty chill about most things in life (food preferences, holding grudges, etc.), so it seemed fitting to apply to his orientation as well. I’ve also seen folks pair him with the Queen from Ripple Star, and, while I don’t necessarily ship it myself, it definitely influenced this push towards coding him Bi. (I do like the idea that they tried dating once, quickly finding the chemistry wasn’t there but staying friends/political allies anyway.) MK is similar in that, while he may have preferences (the Bi angle admittedly influenced by my limited knowledge of the anime, the brief glimpse we get of his camaraderie with Garlude and Jecra), romance is not really his top priority, overshadowed by his ambitions and dedication to duty. That said, he does tend to work in extremes, passionate about the things he cares about and pursuing them with determined fervor. Perhaps that could apply to his relationships? While not close with many people (mysterious loner image and all that), those he does let in - those he forms a strong emotional connection with, be it platonic, familial, or romantic - mean the world to him. He will protect them, cherish them, fight for them with all his might if it means returning the care they gifted to him. KF2 often says how strong and genuine the bond between him and DDD is, their friendship so solid and unwavering it even grants them great power. These are lads who would go to the ends of the earth for each other. These are lads who care about each other. They are so opposite in many aspects, to the point of fights and bickering and even attempted mutinies, yet out of everyone else in the whole starsdamn universe… they still chose each other.

Gryll & Keke - While I’m guessing they were intended to be a femme character, Gryll’s gender has never been stated in canon (I think some Japanese sources might use gender-neutral terms for them, but I’m not too sure on that). I’m simply hopping on the bandwagon with this one, grabbing this little nebulously-canon enby with both of my goblin hands and refusing to let go, haha. Also, I didn’t add it in the sketch, but I think their orientation would lean towards Bi or Pan with a preference for femme folk. Keke didn’t have as much thought put into her orientation beyond “she probably likes ladies” or, in this case, lady-adjacents. They honestly just seem cute together, y’know - a pair of witches wandering the galaxy on their brooms with their little onion children, stopping every now and then to cause some Star-Stacker-related mischief. A nice, simple, healthy relationship (one of the few in this roster not built on “fighting as a love language,” haha).

Dark Meta Knight & Daroach - Oh, boy, these two… Where to start? Well, Dark may be a reflection of MK, sharing a lot of traits with him both physical and mental, but I still view them as vastly different people. Coding him gay wasn’t simply a way to further differentiate them, but because it felt kinda fitting for the darker knight from the start. He seems to me like the kind of person who values traits like strength, confidence, recklessness, ferocity, things often associated with masculinity (and, perhaps, with a certain monochromatic penguin king he serves). There’s, admittedly, not a lot in canon to back this up - it’s a mixture of speculation based on what little trivia we have about him and my own overactive imagination foaming at the mouth to flesh him out a bit more. Meanwhile, Daroach is literally just Ms. Mowz from TTYD if she was a Pan disaster, haha. For real, though, he’s a rat thief with a flair for the dramatic and canonically the most dialogue of any character in the games, and he’s got a line in KMA that says he’s flirted with/dated women before. Is he bluffing or or is he bragging? Both fun options - I picked the latter and slapped a Pan sticker on it for funsies. As for the Aro designation… well, I’d originally considered it for Dark. Made sense at the time considering his edgy demeanor and asocial tendencies, but once I paired him with Daroach, I got to thinking… what if the opposite is true? What if Daroach has no interest in romance whatsoever but enjoys flirting and casual intimacy? What if Dark puts up a front of feeling the same way but then gets the whole rainbow splattered across his scarred little heart at the first sign of emotional connection (unstated DemiRo leanings perhaps)? What if Daroach values friendship more than romance, almost as much as he values family, the only kinds of love he can truly understand? What if Dark has the capacity to care about someone, to love them, but fears what that will do to him if he ever lets himself get that close, the hurt it will bring with it (for himself and for others)? It creates a… complicated dynamic between them to be sure (one I am manically chipping away at in my Kintsugi AU notes), but an undoubtedly more interesting one than just “make the orb and rat kiss for no reason lol.” (Not that there’s anything wrong with that either, haha.)

Magolor & Marx - Ah, my comfort idiots. Full disclosure - most of my headcanons for these two have been heavily influenced by Guessing Games by phoelynfabulous (which I have read several times over and highly recommend if you like silly feel-good Star Allies shenanigans over group chats). To me, neither character seems especially interested in romantic love or physical intimacy, with Marx having virtually no preferences to speak of and Mags (sharing a trait with MK, ironically) being more focused on his personal goals than anything else. Some of this might be tied in with the neurodivergent headcanons I have for both of them (elements of autism and adhd respectively); some of it might be me in the kitchen making my own aspec-coded comfort food. Either way, regardless of their mutual distaste for harlequin-novel drama, they both have this sense of… loneliness to them, big touch-starved energy, which I imagine stems from a lack of real friendships and companionship over the course of their lives, Mags for the aforementioned ambitions and his disinclination to get close to those he views as tools, Marx for similar reasons as well as… well, just being himself and the unfortunate ostracism that comes with that (even in a place as generally tolerant as Dream Land). In this case, a QPR seems perfect for them, the benefit of connection without the amatanormative expectations, a comfortable step above friendship without pushing too far. See, HAL Labs likes to pair them off for surface-level reasons (bosses, tricksters, traitors, etc.), but I like to take those a few steps further. These lads are about as opposite as you can get aesthetically - the cunning, self-absorbed wizard with a need for control and order; the unhinged, mischievous jester with a need for chaos and revelry - and yet they seem to reflect each other just as well. They both have secrets hidden behind their friendly smiles. They share a love of games and chicanery. They’re both powerful magic users with grand (or, rather, galactic) ambitions they would do almost anything to achieve. They aren’t exactly perfect for each other (then again, who is?), but I do think they understand each other in ways others cannot, can see the other’s perspective on things as well as challenge it in equal measure. A Yin to a Yang that, together, achieves balance. Or maybe they’re just funny little guys getting on each other’s nerves in a big spaceship and I just think they’re neat. Maybe both, haha. Oh, and the trans headcanon for Mags is a relatively understated one. I just think it goes well with his secretive nature and his tendency to obscure his past (perhaps wanting to forget it or discard it entirely?). Also, there’s concept art of him as a female character, which did little to stop the brainworms from wriggling.

Susie & Zan Partizanne - These ladies are relatively new to the rolodex spinning around in my noggin. Not that I think any less of them than the others - we love lesbians in this house - it’s just that I’m starved for good WLW content both in this series and elsewhere in my areas of interest. Susie feels like the most Les-coded one of the cast (aside from maybe Flamberge with all her butch energy), though I could also see her as the type of person to find (or construct) a more “conventional” partner if it was for appearances’ sake or the advancement of her personal goals, an arm-candy suitor she would have no emotional attachment to and - in the best-case scenario - full control over. As for Zan, a part of me kind wishes in hindsight that I’d labeled her as Bi-leaning or maybe having no strong preferences at all (mostly to distinguish her from her sisters, who both fit the Les category better IMO). I also feel like she’d be somewhere in the aspec as well, perhaps having taken a vow of chastity during her time as part of Hyness’s cult (which she definitely didn’t need to do by the way - she was just taking the whole religious devotion thing very seriously). In terms of chemistry, I think they have more than you’d think given how little they’ve interacted in canon and meta contexts. Funnily enough, I like to think Susie’s grudge with Zan’s sisters is what brought them together, first through conflict and mediation, then through small talk after Star Allies meetings, then through group chats and coffee dates and shopping trips and strolls through the (non-darkened, non-mechanized) fields of Dream Land. Perhaps, in the early stages of their relationship, Susie was still thinking of appearances, looking at this woman left listless by the destruction of her new life’s purpose, thinking of how easily she could take the place of that misguided preacher and be the voice that Zan unquestioningly follows. Maybe Zan felt something similar, lost and directionless with a found family slowly recovering from wounds inflicted upon itself, listening to the confidence in Susie’s words and feeling a part of herself reaching for a new dark light to follow, to give her a reason to continue. But then they started to open up, bit by bit, learning about each other beyond just their respective infamy in the group. Both she and Zan held positions of power within a system run by someone they looked up to (perhaps cared for), both of them were misled and mistreated by said someone (out of greed? madness? regret? does it matter?), both of them witnessed the consequences of their actions (be they loyal to the end or usurping control at the last second) and - with great difficulty - sought to be better. In time, Susie sees in Zan not another drone to control but an equal to walk alongside, urging her forward through choices she makes of her own will, helping her rise back to the confidence she had as the Lightning General. Perhaps, in return, Zan softens something in the cold, business-motivated woman, passes on a touch of her own newly-granted curiosity at the wider world to her, reminds her that there’s more to life than one’s own tunnel-vision pursuits. There’s fresh air and thunderstorms and trips to the beach with family. There’s sweets and pretty dresses and karaoke nights with friends. There’s laughter and joy and hope and a billion-billion stars in the night sky, sparkling in her eyes when she stops to gaze at them… Long story short - they’re both girlbosses with daddy issues and I think it would be neat if they held hands.

Kirby - Here’s the Wikirby page for Kirby’s gender because it says just about everything you need to know and these explanations are already getting too long as it is (I’m also running out of steam send help haha). I just think Agender suits our sweet little puffball best, though I’m also fine with interpretations of him as either Non-Binary, Genderfluid, Genderqueer, or whatever gender-non-conforming label he feels like wearing today.

🏳️‍🌈 Happy Pride Month! 🏳️‍🌈

(ID: Kirby series fanart sketches of various Kirby characters, each with scribbled backsplashes of pride flag colors based off of my headcanons**. Clockwise from the top - Meta Knight (Bi, Demi) & Dedede (Bi), the former wrapped in his cape and perched on the latter’s arm, smiling at each other contentedly, little pink hearts over their heads. Gryll (NB) & Keke (Lesbian), holding hands and cozily sitting side-by-side on Gryll’s broomstick, along with the former’s familiars Salt, Pepper, and Sugar. Daroach (Pan, Aro) & Dark Meta Knight (Gay), the latter looming over the former and wrapping him in his tattered wings, the rat gazing up with a sharp grin and reaching up to run his claws down the side of the knight’s mask, a burning heart over their heads. Magolor (Aro, Trans) & Marx (Ace), the latter running in to wrap the former in a one-armed… one-hatted? hug, nuzzling against his cheek as the giddy wizard hugs him back, a yellow heart set against queerplatonic colors over their heads. Susie (Lesbian) & Zan Partizanne (Lesbian), the two holding hands and carrying many shopping bags, the latter looking about in curiosity as the former smiles fondly at her. In the center of them all, Kirby (Agender) leaps up with a big, joyful smile, holding up a heart filled with all the colors of the Pride flag. END ID.)

**Note that these are just my personal interpretations of these characters’ orientations/identities and may not reflect yours or even those implied in canon (they may also be subject to change given my own ever-evolving perspective). If these do not perfectly match your own takes on the characters, then that’s totally fine. I hope they bring you just as much joy and creativity as mine do for me. Part of the fun of this series it how open it is to interpretation, how so many people can see different things in the same piece of art and inspire each other thanks to those differing perspectives. Additionally, all ships shown are of consenting, non-related adult characters.

Sketch start 06/01/24, sketch finished 06/02/24.

[stregoniconiconii]

about the siblingification of friendships, sorry im totally about to make myself a stand in for steve here, but im an only child, i have felt v lonely, and i have this one friend who calls her close girl friends sisters,, and i just do not feel it, i love her, and she is one of my best friends, but i just do Not see her as a sibling. and i think steve would be the same way tbh, also my most sibling adjacent feelings have been for ppl around 5 years younger than me (just like Steve & the kids/teens<3) but unlike steve, i haven't had any intense trauma to increase the chance for sibling bonding.

idk i just think that it would take More for steve to feel sibling feelings for ppl around his own age or older.

i also think that when u have been on ur own a lot it's like, sure u want ppl around, but also u need ur space bc u're used to it, idk maybe thats just me lol. i also have an intense need for personal space and like my things are my things and no one better fucking touch it, (i mean u can but if u pick stuff up I'll be annoyed, sorry) but also i Crave physical affection, and sorry i think this is just a "why i relate to steve/things i project onto steve" list, oops.

but like i guess what i probably wanted to say is, steve is, as far as we know, an only child, and while i think we all want him to have good family times, i don't think that equals sibling type relationships with everyone, and i think it would be interesting if ppl took into account how living as an only child would affect him, and not only in the "his house was always empty so now he is filling it w the sound of his friends 24/7" way. like maybe its just me, and im projecting or w/e but if I had friends over All the time, even my very best friends(except maybe my best best friend<3) i would go insane i think

sorry for talking so much about myself, it's just things that makes me think about steve, and this is the best i could manage to express it at the moment <3

this just made me think of something very funny which is that Steve and robin DO think each other as siblings but because they're both only children they just. genuinely have absolutely no idea how siblings are supposed to act around each other and so they do things together that would make ppl sing 'sweet home Alabama' or go 'wtf' if they were actual real life siblings. like it genuinely is all completely platonic but it's still a line that siblings wouldn't cross lol (idek what kind of things yall can figure it out)

HOWEVER two only children who are very used to doing their own thing suddenly being very clingy with each other?? oh I just know there were growing pains. like they want to be around each other but also being around someone means Being Around Someone. they definitely had to figure out a system to make sure they dont murder each other lol

but yeah I do see what you mean about Steve maybe either not needing or necessarily even wanting?? a sibling relationship with everyone he knows (that isn't somehow a parental figure either lmaoo) the type of person I could see filling that sort of role for Steve might be likeeee an almost queer older sibling? like someone he meets in his 20s who takes him under a gay wing. I know ppl like to imagine Eddie doing that for Steve but that's definitely not a sibling framework with them lol and also Eddie's dead </3 but I can see it happening when Steve and robin move out of hawkins and get involved with the gay scene. or maybe him getting into a line of work that ends up forming these close sibling like relationships. idk lol

idk mostly im fine with Steve being an older brother to dustin and max you know?

alsoooo it's totally fine to talk about urself <333 it helps inform ur head canons!! I mean im the absolute opposite of Steve I have siblings and I grew up so close with my cousins they’re practically also siblings, so hearing the only child side of living Does make a difference you know