#putting it under a read more anyways because this is really just ranty

[bugsbenefit]

got prompted by seeing a horrible Billy-lover take in my notes so feel free to ignore this, just me ranting about Billy's character and how all this apologism is genuinely infuriating to me

because the treatment Billy gets in fandom is so incredibly bizarre to me, especially because it ruins the actual intrigue his character has. when i first watched the show and didn't get involved with the fandom a few years ago i actually thought Billy was quite an interesting character because it was a realistic portrayal of a horrible person.

he was abusive towards his sister and a raging racist, an absolute piece of shit. but i think it's interesting that the show doesn't just turn him into a one dimensional cartoonish monster, he's one of the human characters after all. so there IS some human aspects we can see, some black and white. like how he also has an abusive relationship with his father and how genuinely scared he was by what the MF was doing to him in s3 (also leading to his death)

because that was Interesting to me. irl horrible racists and pieces of shit are still human. they're also scared of things like spiders or are scared of monsters etc. and so many properties make the mistake of portraying the "bad guy" like an evil caricature. like a guy you can see coming down the block and you already know he's evil without ever talking to him

and that portrayal is so SO dangerous. there's real people today that struggle with picking up on irl racists or homophobes or nazis Because the person doesn't seem cartoonishly evil the way they were taught they Should look like

i'm from a german speaking country and we spend multiple years of our school time going over ww2 over and over again, and something that my teacher kept bringing up is how dangerous some of the education regarding it can actually be. there's this very easy trap you can fall into where you ignore the horrible people's humanity. where hitler just becomes a cartoonishly evil monster you learn about in history class, that you would immediately recognize as such would you meet him irl. when in reality, he was human, which was the whole danger. because today there's multiple politicians i know that are emulating his views and rethoric, but since so many people struggle to recognize that Anyone could be a nazi, and that it's not something you can just "see" like in movies, it's largely ignored. the whole danger that hitler Was just a regular politician at some point and superficially blended in to the mix of other right wingers at the time is often forgotten because people think you should be able to recognize a monster on sight

and that boils down to the problem i often have with books and shows. the bad guy is just... bad. there's no realism there no nuance. when the real danger actually is that you often Don't recognize a monster, or that you do but other people don't believe you because the monster looks normal and human enough. and real people's views often get twisted as a result, to the point where they expect to be able to "clock" real life horrible people just by looking at them, because it has to be obvious right? if a person's only personality trait isn't violent homophobia or racism and they have real fears and wishes, then people often don't recognize how horrible they really are, or don't Want to

and that's what i originally actually enjoyed about what happened with Billy. most people in their school either didn't pick up on it or didn't care about his views, he was actually quite popular. and there is depth to him, it's just that he's still a horrible person regardless. the abuse shown in his family maybe explains things to some degree but it doesn't excuse anything. he torments Lucas specifically because he's black, even the actors and showrunners have spoken out about this by now. and he never makes amends for anything, doesn't even try to change, there's no actions he takes to improve. he lives and dies a racist. he dies scared, yes. but he's still just as racist and abusive as he was when he walked into the show. he doesn't even apologize to Lucas or even Max. he is and stays a racist, no matter how "human" he gets to be, because some humans are just horrible people, see Billy

so now imagine my disappointment when i actually joined the fandom and had to realize that that Wasn't the popular opinion and that the irl phenomena of "but he's scared/he was abused/he's just a kid he can't be a bad person" still happened here. the actual nuance of his character is Gone the moment you start trying to apologize for his actions

he's a walking red flag of how not every monster Looks like a monster. how monsters can have friends, be poplar, be scared. but despite all the things that make him human and that might make you sympathize with a person, he still chooses to be a vile and horrible person regardless. and now in order to "redeem" Billy's character people are making that exact same real life mistake that is so so dangerous irl, where you only see the human aspects of a character and then go "but they're (insert a thing that shows you that they're human) they can't be a horrible person, it was a mistake/misunderstanding/he changed"

it essentially boils down to me originally being interested in Billy's portrayal in the show because he's one of the few examples where monsters aren't portrayed as one dimensional evil guy number xyz. which, in a show filled with real supernatural monsters, getting a guy who acts like a monster but looks like just an ordinary guy is all the more scary. because that is a REALISTIC monster

so then seeing that there's so many people dead set on apologizing all of his actions because they bought into all the things that make him human, but don't realize that that's the Point, that people can be human and still Horrible. is just endlessly frustrating to me

[alongtidesoflight]

also on another note i just read through the cp2077 endings i didn't get the chance to play yet and i do think the tower ending is one of the worst endings to pick in terms of what it means for a very self-reliant and anti-corpo V (and maybe this has been discussed and disCOURSED to death already, but i had the tags blacklisted for years so i'm just adding my thoughts to the void). under the cut because i get ranty lately for some reason.

so you survive the relic. but as a tradeoff you can't keep your cyberware. on your way there you pissed off just about every faction there is to be found in night city for one reason or another. there is no surviving a city full of mercs and gangs decked out with cyberware when you don't have cyberware yourself. maxtac is gonna wipe the floor with your innards if you ever cross them. viktor says the FIA doctors are wrong, so let's put a pin in this i'm not done yet.

you hand songbird back over to reed. you lose each and every friend you've had in this city except for vick and misty who realistically can't protect you from any threats that might be headed your way, and there's mitch when you call panam, but realistically he's also too far away to help you immediately. kerry, the only one who's willing to catch back up with you is currently in space and won't be back in a while.

and sure you can say the FIA looks out for you, but let's loop back around to what viktor says. he thinks their diagnosis is wrong. whether that's just wishful thinking or he's right, i can't really determine. but for the sake of this argument, let's say he's right and there's a way for V to use cyberware again.

you're telling me the FIA doesn't know that? i don't buy it and i don't trust myers. it all seems very solid at first. they kept their end of the bargain, they kept you alive. there's a tradeoff but they did what they said they'd do. but let's look at how they acted with songbird and go off of that. songbird was only useful to myers as long as she could keep her in check. as soon as that went out of the window so did myers's goodwill. AND if V attempted to help songbird escape before handing her over to reed, what's guaranteeing that they don't try that again? i suppose there's no guarantee, unless she makes sure they too can't stand up to her anymore. and what better way is there to do that than to rid V of their cyberware?

reed being the one who relays all of that to you is as much a comforting presence as takemura is in the devil ending. you can grow really close with them. they're gonna break it to you gently, you're gonna be more willing to sip that poison. if you end up working for their respective factions, you essentially sign yourself away to the FIA or arasaka after they both influenced you to sign a contract in exchange for help (that doesn't even fully deliver on its promises. mikoshi kills you entirely and the FIA doctors take your cyberware. with both of them you lose johnny and your friends). and maybe there's Vs out there who are fine with that, or wanted that even and in that case all my points are kinda moot. like i said, i'm going off a V who isn't really about sympathising with them.

anyway, slight tangent. back to reed. you might want to think he's a friend to your V. maybe he is. but looking back at his history with alena and songbird... is he? like really? even if he truly considers them friends and i like to think he does, he DOES put duty above them every time. myers points and he shoots.

IF in the tower ending, myers is acting as i'd expect her to, and by that i mean keeping V on a short leash, then reed is helping her do that.

and IF viktor is right and the FIA doctors are wrong about you using your cyberware ever again, then they're only "wrong" because myers told them to feed you false information. and now you're working for her and how are you gonna get out of that when she's the president of the NUSA and everyone around you has cyberware but you don't.

i kept on hearing that the tower ending is one of the "best" endings if you want to hear - with certainty - that V survives. and maybe it is. but really, at what cost man. how much longer are you gonna keep going in night city when half of its citizens hold a grudge against you, your cyberware is gone, your friends are gone, and the faction you're working with might or might not have hired you and taken your cyberware from you just to make sure you don't ever act up again.

how fucking awful of a future would that be to a nomad V. spent 2 years in a coma? they didn't just choose the quiet life over a blaze of glory, they died in their sleep.

[haldenlith]

Two thoughts on reading the Unforseen Consequences loretab:

Big Yikes, Oh no.

... Really? Cayde's what he wishes he could change? Not the "I waged a genocidal campaign against my own people" part?

Anyway, further elaboration under cut:

On the first item, I'm going "OH NO!" because the last time Crow wished for something (unwittingly) with Riven around, shit went south extremely fast for him (and everyone around him), and the loretab's title does not help with that worry.

And before anyone goes, "but he was just talking to Mara" -- no honey, that wasn't Mara. The "O, brother mine" gave it away. Honestly, I'm almost surprised Crow doesn't have PTSD with that particular phrase, given that Riven has said it to him before when she was posing as Mara.

I've seen people lamenting how Mara and Crow interacted in the loretab, so that's what drove me to go give it a read, and at first I was like "ugh, Crow got cool with her awfully quick" (which I still feel) and "oh of course Mara only has regrets because her plans didn't go her way," BUT THEN they had to put in the "O [noun] mine", which is explicitly an ahamkara thing. Not gonna lie, I immediately went back up and reread stuff and went "OH SHIT" when I saw that Crow did indeed say the phrase "I wish."

As we all know, just about every ahamkara wish functions in a monkey paw fashion -- there is always either a cost to the wish, or a drawback, an "unforseen consequence", if you will. While I'm curious what that would be with regard to bringing Cayde back, I'm exceedingly worried about Crow now. Riven has twisted him up and broken him to pieces before. Hell, I think that's why she appeared here. She's the big cat that sees the canary she ate last time, and sadly that canary is still not wise to her tricks.

As an aside, if this is indeed the reason Cayde comes back in Final Shape, I will be a tiny smidge disappointed. I liked the idea of him being our Vergil, our guide through Hell, brought back by a last gasp of the Traveler or something. I just felt like that symbolism was more fitting.

Speaking of Cayde, the second note is where this gets a bit ranty. That point feels so hamfisted. I get that Crow would have regrets and shame about killing Cayde, especially since that's been why Guardians (and Amanda) treated him poorly. It's the "loudest" consequence of his actions as Uldren Sov. However, it's far from the worst thing he did. In fact, I think it's probably the most unremarkable item, in the grand scheme of things.

(Also, arguably, the Scorn were more responsible for Cayde's death -- the one guy is the one that killed Sundance, afterall, which is the entire reason Cayde got beat up and put in the situation to begin with.)

Uldren had a reign of fuckin' terror across the Reef before he even went into the Prison of Elders with his merry band of Barons. And then he continued it after breaking out, torching Mara's throne, putting many Corsairs to death, and causing a great deal of havoc. There's a reason Petra had an axe to grind with him, and it wasn't because he shot Cayde. It was because he betrayed his people to the absolute nth degree.

And what actually really gets my goat that the thing Crow would want to change being "not killing Cayde", is that we know how much he loved his people. He was severely not okay when he worked under the House of Kings raiding the Reef. It's mentioned how wracked with guilt he is over attacking Awoken. It took Riven posing as Mara and scrambling his grief (and Black Garden corruption) addled brain to make him okay with it. So it's just bizarre to me that as Crow, he'd sit back and look at all of that bullshit he committed and go "yeah killing Cayde was the line in the sand and the worst thing, yup yup."

Not to mention the whole "let me team up with the Scorn and kill everyone" thing was the actual first domino in the chain of shitty things he did in his downfall-arc, which led to killing Cayde, but okay, whatever...

Making it about Cayde feels super forced. Like sure, we The Player care most about Cayde, not about stuff that happened off-screen, but as far as the character that is Crow is concerned, I just feel like it doesn't fit him to pick that particular event (when forced to pick one thing). Granted, I feel like Crow would honestly not want to pick -- he'd want to fix everything, because he's a guilt-ridden sweetheart like that, but still.

[letstrywritingmaybe]

I’m behind on reading/commenting ugh. I did read one of the fics that updated but it made me sad. But like it wasn’t even really a sad fic, it was more open.

This is getting angry and ranty so I’m hiding it under the cut

But idk I’m just so so so tired of my queen being given the short end of the stick. Again it’s why I hella overcompensate and make him suffer. But it’s v annoying to me that he can do whatever and my queen will still love him? Fuck that bullshit. I’m sick of it. I’m sure it’s cause I’ve never been in romantic love so I don’t get it, but if that’s what it’s like I don’t want to understand. All these stories I hear of women staying in toxic relationships where as the men are always able to leave their shituationship and find better matches, is so difficult for me to wrap my head around. This is just in regards to the people in my real life and from some podcasts I listen to (and social media shit) but I swear the percentage is heavily skewed to women trying to save their shitty relationship while the men are able to break out of it.

Anyways, yeah it’s why I absolutely loathe fics where he’s a scumbag and my queen suffers but ultimately he gets to keep her. First that seems very ooc to me, but I also write him ooc too but just way opposite from that. So I guess whatever. But again I ask why must my queen suffer? Hasn’t she suffered enough? Why are we putting her through all this bullshit and tearing her down and making her believe she can only love this one man? Is this supposed to be romantic? Like what? Like oh wow, guess she’s so fucking lucky he decided to choose her after fucking around and being an absolute dick. Grody.

I swear I’m just too American or at least too much of a Vegas gal to be okay with this. Because I see this shit so much in fics and irl I am fucking terrified of it happening to me. To lose my complete sense of self for an underserving asshole who makes me question love? I would rather die. Like kill me please. Cause if there’s anything I know, it’s love. I’m Lots of Love for crying out loud! All forms of it! It’s not just romantic, but the rest of the world seems to think it’s the only one that matters. And I know I’m guilty of that too, cause I am to my core a hopeless romantic. But when it is pure. Not this brainwashed mess where men can be whores but women aren’t allowed to even look at another person.

Back on my fuck first love being the only love bullshit. I fucking hate this trope when it applies to only women. Not super fond of it with men either, but that’s more of a dig at my main fandom I can’t even enjoy anymore.

Would love to read a fic where she’s the player instead of him and it’s perfectly fine. Make him the one who wonders for fucking once. Does she love him? Maybe. Is she enjoying her life and fucking around? Absolutely and as she should! Not caring that she’s stringing him along cause he’s the back up that she knows she can always go back to, and maybe she does actually love him. Go figure.

Some days I get so angry I just want to write a fuck you fic, but also I don’t cause I hate writing and I have too many other projects I would rather finish so I never have to write again. But then I think about having to read these fics and noping out or sticking it out and being pissed even though I knew where it was going and I would hate it. And I’m like hella judgey but at least I’m not an awful person who leaves rude comments for a fic not meant for me. Yeah if you do that shit you’re a fucking asshole and I want nothing to do with you.

I didn’t intend to start this post off so angry, and now I don’t even remember my main reason for trying to make an update here. I’ve just annoyed myself and I need to leave or else I’ll be too tired for my hopeful boost of serotonin tomorrow (or today rather). I’m probably just irritated from being at the airport like all day. I love traveling but some airports and airlines suck.

Anyways main point, let Shiho bejeweled! Don’t keep her locked up in the basement! She’s a diamond, so let her shine damn it!

[nikibogwater]

A Needlessly Intense Analysis of Claire Nuñez

As I find myself with nothing to do on a dreary Monday afternoon, my mind has returned, not for the first time, to something that has irked, bewildered, and befuddled me ever since I first watched season 1 of Trollhunters back in early 2017. And that thing is the character of Claire Nuñez. 

Now this probably goes without saying, but the following rant/essay is going to include criticisms of how Claire was written throughout the entirety of Trollhunters: Tales of Arcadia. If you’re someone who absolutely loves Claire as a character and are easily upset by people disliking or criticizing the way she was written, then please by all means just scroll on past--I’m writing this simply to air out some of my own long-dormant thoughts, pass some time, and perhaps spark a friendly discussion with those who are interested in such a thing. I’m not doing this with the intent of attacking or shaming anybody who likes Claire, or causing any unnecessary stress. Kapish? 

Good. 

With that out of the way, I’ll put the short version of everything right here for those of you who don’t want to read the mile-long essay under the post: In terms of writing, Claire Nuñez is a bizarre mish-mash of contradicting elements. On the one hand, certain aspects of her character and her arc in Trollhunters are very solid examples of Good Character Writing, and she has the potential to be a great secondary protagonist. And yet half the time, she also comes across as the most very poorly-conceived character in the entire franchise. In all my time in the fandom, I’ve observed these two most common reactions to Claire as a character: fans either adore her (mostly because of her relationship with Jim), or they are thoroughly disinterested in her--even greatly annoyed by her in some cases. In my own experience, I’ve swung from absolutely loathing her, to thinking she’s great, to landing somewhere in the middle. But anyways, that’s the jist of my analysis. The more detailed, slightly ranty version is under the cut.

I think the most telling thing about Claire as a character is that I honestly struggle to list more than one or two personality traits that she displays with any sort of consistency. When she’s introduced to us in Trollhunters, she’s Cute and Sweet, and not much else. A few episodes in, she suddenly swings around into Petty and Self-Centered with no warning. Then suddenly her defining character traits become Angry and Badass. Now there’s absolutely nothing wrong with a character changing/evolving over time--actually, that’s what we call a character arc, and it’s pretty much always something you want to have in a story. And all those traits and the way they change into something else over time are the ingredients of a really good character arc. The problem with Claire’s arc is that it’s less of an arc and more of just several loosely connected dots. And in order for a character to feel grounded in reality, they do need to have at least a few core personality traits that they never fully lose, no matter where they are on their emotional journey. For example, although Jim’s arc involves overcoming his timidity and becoming confident in his new role as a hero, he never loses that sense of compassion and self-sacrifice that he exhibits within the first few minutes of his character introduction. Jim changes and grows, but he remains kind, because kindness is one of his core character traits. Claire only has one core character trait that remains consistent throughout the entire show, and it is the one core character trait that you should absolutely NEVER give to a character if it is to be their only core character trait:

Extreme Competence. 

I’ve heard the phrase Mary-Sue used to describe Claire a lot, and while I don’t think it’s an entirely accurate summation of her character, I understand why it comes to many people’s minds. The one thing about Claire that remains consistent is the fact that she is prodigiously good at pretty much everything she tries. Even things that she logically should not have any prior knowledge or experience with. The audience is constantly being bashed over the head with just how Cool and Capable Claire is, how much Better she is than everyone else. And without any clearly-defined flaws to counteract this, Claire comes across as the one type of character absolutely no one can relate to.

Now, when I say “clearly-defined flaws,” what I mean are moral/logistical failings in her personality/behavior that have very real negative consequences that the audience can clearly see. There was a seemingly half-hearted attempt at giving her a character flaw when she snuck out to the Papa Skull concert, but this ultimately failed for me because she is never called out for her behavior and doesn’t suffer any visible negative consequences. Worse still, Jim and Toby act like what she did was totally fine, and that she’s completely justified in her anger at Jim after the house gets trashed. Even though the normal human response to this would be “Hey wait a second, you’re at least partially to blame for that too!” 

Now, there are two moments in the entire Tales of Arcadia series where it’s briefly insinuated that Claire feels bad about abandoning Enrique like she did, and one of them isn’t even in Trollhunters. There is never any substantial attention drawn to this, and never a moment where we can clearly see her acknowledging her fault and making an effort to be better. Now I’m all for hiding little details and bits of subtext here and there in a story, but when it comes to something as big as one of your major characters going through a character arc, I believe that you need to communicate that stuff clearly. You’re not being clever by glossing over it and hoping astute audiences will be able to sniff it out. You’re being lazy. It is not your audience’s job to make the character for you. Like, imagine if the writers of Avatar: The Last Airbender had skipped all of Zuko’s internal struggles, and then one episode he just shows up going “I’m going to teach the Avatar Firebending because I’m good now!” I don’t think that character would’ve been as beloved as he is had they only insinuated his growth happening off-screen. Just so in Claire’s case, skipping over her process of growth and maturing makes any future changes to her character feel spontaneous and unearned. Add in that problem of her only core character trait being the absolute WORST one they could have picked, and you have a perfect caricature of a nine-year-old’s fanfiction OC--which you probably don’t want to have in your multi-million-dollar tv series helmed by one of the most prolific storytellers in cinema. 

And the most frustrating part about all of this is that Claire’s character could be fixed so easily. As I stated above, the raw elements of her character and her arc are the perfect ingredients for creating a truly good character in a remarkably short amount of time. Claire is brilliant in theory, just not in practice. So then how should these elements have been put into practice? Well, there’s a host of different methods, but here’s the first one I’ve thought of that would require the least amount of change to the show:

Step One: If one of Claire’s core traits is being Good at Everything, then you need to explain why that is. Have Jim mention early on that she’s always busy, always involved in even the most niche of extracurricular activities at school. This will also have the added bonus of making your audience curious about her--why exactly does she feel the need to do all these different things? Because I’ll be honest here, Claire’s canon introduction did absolutely nothing to make me want to learn more about her. 

Step Two: Focus more on her love of acting. Acting is the only interest/hobby that canon Claire has apart from maybe rock music(?), and it’s barely given any time or explanation. We don’t know why she enjoys it, and once the Romeo and Juliet play is finished, this interest of hers is basically never brought up again. So during that Iconic Audition Scene, let her and Jim have a little conversation. Doesn’t need to be long, just enough so we can hear Claire say something to the effect of “Acting is my only real escape.” There. Now we know why she enjoys acting, and now we have even more questions about her: what exactly does she need to escape from? And if acting is the only thing she enjoys, why is she doing all these other activities after school? 

Step Three: EMBRACE. CLAIRE’S. FLAWS. Don’t ignore them, don’t gloss over them because “Well she’s the female love-interest and if she’s anything less than Perfect that’ll be sexist or smth.” Flaws are extremely important in Claire’s case because you’ve already established that she knows a heck ton about a heck ton of different things and has amassed a huge array of crazy skills. So lean into her pettiness, her self-centeredness, her pride--and don’t excuse it. Have the other characters actually be bothered by the way she treats Jim after the babysitting incident. Have her be called out for her behavior. And most importantly, show us how she overcomes these flaws. Again, don’t jump from one point in a character’s arc to another and expect the audience to fill in the blanks. That moment when Claire realizes her brother’s been replaced by a Changeling? That would be the perfect time to show her having that painful realization: that she was so intent on being Perfect all the time, so intent on getting her way, that she lost sight of what was truly important. As it is, her grief over losing Enrique feels very unearned in canon, since there’s no attention drawn to the guilt that she should also be feeling over it. 

Step Four: Reveal how she got here in the first place. Let her have a serious talk with Jim. Again, doesn’t even need to be that long. She could start by apologizing to him for how she treated him, and then explain herself. The reason she feels the need to do everything, and to do it perfectly, is because she is the daughter of a councilwoman. She needs to be exceptional because her behavior directly reflects Councilwoman Nuñez’s parenting. And if she’s anything less, not only will Councilwoman Nuñez look like a failure as a parent, Claire will be a failure as a daughter. That’s why acting was always Claire’s great escape--because she could become someone who didn’t need to live up to that standard, even if it was just for a little while. But sometimes she gets sick of it--she breaks. She wants to do something for herself, and nobody else. That’s why she snuck out to the Papa Skull concert that night. But in the end, none of that mattered. All her studying, all her practice, all her achievements at school, this obsession with being perfect--it cost her the one thing that did truly matter. And with that, she has acquired some new character traits: loyalty and protectiveness. She will do anything to get Enrique back, and is determined to never take her loved ones for granted again. Also get rid of her pestering and guilt-tripping Jim into going into the Darklands because my goodness, was that unnecessary and completely destroyed what little investment I had in their relationship beforehand. If you absolutely HAVE to have it in there, then again, have someone call her out for this. Please don’t teach kids that there are no consequences to treating people like this, the world already has enough self-entitled jerks as it is.

Step Five: I don’t think there even needs to be a step five. My only other suggestion would be to maybe keep bringing up Claire’s interest in acting from time to time, much like how the writers frequently bring up Jim’s interest in cooking. Maybe there could be a plot thread where the Trollhunters actually use her acting skills for infiltration or the like? Or perhaps any time there’s a lull in the action, she can be seen reading a script or a Shakespeare play in the background. 

Now probably the biggest question anybody has after all of this is “Niki, why the heck does any of this even matter? This is a show for children.” To which I will reply with “Children deserve to have good stories too.” And in the case of Trollhunters, I’m of the opinion that it is a good story, in pretty much every aspect, except for Claire. I think that’s why I’m so fascinated with her, and also why I’m so frustrated. It’s actually very similar to my feelings regarding Rise of the Titans. I’m morbidly fascinated with how a series as consistently good as Tales of Arcadia could have suddenly and inexplicably produced such a steaming pile of dumpster fire right at the very end. And likewise, I can’t stop wondering why, in a show with otherwise fantastic and well-written characters, it’s only Claire Nuñez who is so polarizing. 

As for the essay you’ve just suffered through, well, yeah, that didn’t matter very much, it just felt good to write. But I hope at least one or two of you enjoyed hearing me rant. Again if you have any additional thoughts or want to politely counter one of my points, feel free to share. I’d love it if this turned into a bit of a discussion.

[cowboyjen68]

hi cowboyjen! how are you doing?

I (23F) was wondering if you'd be up to helping me with something. my girlfriend is coming to meet my parents next weekend. it's my first relationship, I came out to my parents three years ago, and told them I've been in a relationship (almost six months now) two months ago. my dad seemed pretty fine with everything. my mother however, coming from a more conservative background, has had her reservations, particularly about where we're going to sleep (as she'll be staying the night here). she asked me, "she'll sleep in the spare room and you'll sleep in yours though, right?", and I had just assumed beforehand that this wasn't gonna be an issue and we'd both stay in the spare room, as we usually spend the night at each other's houses anyway. so I said I thought we'd both just sleep together, and asked her if that made her uncomfortable. all she said was, "whatever you want", in a dismissive, disapproving tone.

now, my question lies in whether I should stick to what I want, which is sleeping in the same room, or given that my mother's probably gonna be uncomfortable enough as it is with the whole situation, give her this one thing, and sleep in separate rooms. my dad said it didn't have to be a big deal, and that it didn't matter, and I agree! I'm just overthinking now and don't want to give her any reason to hate my girlfriend or make her feel unwelcome or something...

sorry this is long and ranty and silly, it's okay if you never get to answering, I understand you're a busy person dealing with their own hardships and I do wish you the absolute best in everything! I've just always admired you and your blog and thought I'd turn to you in the hopes you might get a chance to read this in time and maybe answer :)

again, wish you the best and hope you're doing well 🤗 thanks for reading!

I am on a bit of a time crunch with a quick break between picking Jr up from school and my part time job but I know this weekend starts today.

When I was finally out to my parents and with my first girlfriend in my early 20's we did have the occasion to spend a night or two due to bad weather. My mom was clearly anxious about having us be in the same room over night and dad was like yours... he didn't see why it was a big deal either way. In my mom's mind she was thinking "they are haivng sex in my spare room" and dad was like "one less room to to mess up".

My brothers and sister had always been allowed to have their SO in the same room ONCE they were committed. If they were just casual or maybe not serious I think she would have had a bigger issue. We decided to stay in the same room. Bascially my thought was that mom was going to be uncomfortable either way since me being a lesbian was fairly new to her BUT I really didnt want my girlfriend to feel alone or isolated. Having her be in a strange place (room) by herself did not sit right with me.

We did decide, out of respect, to not have sex while under my parent's roof just to keep any weird vibes out of the air. Mom was fine the next day. She greeted us at breakfast and even talked with Jen (my ex) about some family stuff while dad and I went outside to putter in the garage.

If it was me, and you can even put it to your mom this way, you don't think it is appropriate for your girlfriend to be alone in a strange home and you want to be with her both to make her feel "at home" and because you love her. Your mom is already uncomfortable and adding the weird stress of your girlfriend feeling isolated over night is not going to help. I think your mom will be fine and dad might be helpeful since he is not giving her fear any energy.

Do be respectful and maybe keep phycial contact around her to a little less than you are used to having. And probably no sex because you might think you being quiet but we all know how that can go.

Not wanting to hear your adult children having sex is not homophobic.. it is being a normal parent. (I can say this from experience LOL).

I hope this helps. Let me know how it goes.

[lilyliveredlittlerichboy]

there was some kind of baby terf in my notes this morning and she didn't even wait long enough for me to actually read whatever she wrote before blocking me. great job, showing all your cool radfemmy pals your burning hot take on a trans persons post complaining about terfs. did you secure the likes. did you get the applause

anyway with all of this bullshit going on i really wish we could make ppl see that gendered oppression affects pretty much everyone, and that the fights against misogyny and against misandry overlap, are not opposites, are not enemies.

you think you'll hate men out of being violent? when was the last time hate stopped you being violent?

certainly not this morning when you found a ranty post of mine and interpreted it as hate and decided to double down on your brainrot radfemmy ideals.... why do you think it will work on men?

anyway I'll die on this hill forever but we have more in common than we don't. and the fight against gendered oppression needs to be a multi-pronged approach.

yes of course we need to fight misogyny, it still is one of the most pervasive forms of oppression in the world. we've come super far since the beginning of last century though, especially in Western countries, and to uphold womanhood as "the most oppressed" in the UK or US isn't just myopic, tone-deaf posturing (playing oppression olympics has NEVER served ANYONE), it's also an ideal base from which to ignore countless other forms of oppression (or participate in them and make them worse - great job TERFs on that one!!)

Anyway. Yes misogyny exists and needs to be fought. No one is saying that we should stop fighting for the women.

But we need to fight for the men too. Toxic masculinity and misandry are part of the problem. The way men and boys are raised and socialised leaves them little option to be anything but violent.

And that's a PROBLEM!!!! and you'll agree with me on that!!!! i know you will since most of your entire argument is "men are violent and that violence is making us women unsafe"!!!!

which is a true statement. it also makes other men unsafe. and let's not even get started on trans and gender nonconforming people, who get the worst of misogyny AND misandry combined.

so the culture that brings up men to be violent is making us all unsafe, right? women, men, queer people, children. everyone.

and you won't hate them out of being violent. in fact when people feel hated and prosecuted, they're more likely to lash out!! surprise!! it's human nature.

and we need a wide spread, probably even global strategy to take men into the 21st century with us. like. we can't just put the onus of this on individual men. mostly because it won't work, and men are operating within society, and it is society* that rewards them for anger and punishes them for kindness. so a big societal shift is needed.

one that paints men as loving.

kind.

emotive - capable of experiencing the same range of emotions as everyone else. and allowed to express them.

people who are in pain, who have been hurt and traumatised by society and people around them.

not inherently dangerous.

capable of love and goodness and change for the better.

we need to believe men are human beings. we need to humanise them.

and before anyone says that "men would never fight for you the way you fight for them" yeah and? my little pet cat would probably eat me if she ever got the chance, im still gonna take care of her? people don't have to like me or even be super aware of their oppression for me to fight for them. a lot of men lack the words and understanding to describe the absolute hell society makes life for them but does that mean they deserve to suffer under it forever? fuck no and if your answer would be different please. I'm fucking begging you to reexamine your priorities & start seeing men as people. who deserve better. just like everyone else

*"society" means other people (both men and women and others) as well as systems and processes that structurally prefer angry, violent men over calm, kind ones. policies or culture in a work place for example, which is not usually tied to any one person. there was an entire post about how societally, men who are kind and respect women, are punished for it. it is not just other men doing this, it's plenty of women and queers doing the same thing, and it's baked into society on a fundamental level, where we CAN'T fix it by changing just individual behaviours. we CAN'T fix it by making all men go to therapy I promise. this is a cultural thing that we need to deal with on a cultural, societal level, and we can only do it if we work together, and love ourselves and men enough to believe we are all capable of change. hope this helps

[alirhi]

How I'd have done TFATWS pt 1

Okay, I am such a whore for positive attention that, yes, it literally only takes one person expressing interest to get me to do something lol. So, for the lovely @goblin-tea, here is how The Falcon and the Winter Soldier would have gone for Bucky if I'd been a writer on the show!

Also, shoutout to @gunshou, who popped up showing support when I was in the middle of writing this lol 😘

Episode 1: New World Order

I actually love how most of this episode was handled; it's what drew me into the show in the first place, and gave me such hope for the rest of it. Most of the changes that I'd make here are pretty minor, tbh.

I'd specify the setting in some way for Bucky's nightmare. Obviously, since he was there and knows what happened, when, and where he was, it wouldn't be like the setting changes in movies where they slap a big, bold title card over the scene. Still, I'd probably open with a brief establishing shot showing the city skyline or something; some identifying feature so that viewers can work out where this happened without needing a direct statement from Marvel (note: if you need to directly address your audience to clarify something from within your story, you're a bad storyteller). What year did this take place? I show technology from the time; perhaps a dated cell phone in someone's hand. The point is to establish where and when The Winter Soldier killed RJ Nakajima, without detracting from the emotional impact of the scene. Why does it matter? Because we should know why. Why is Bucky dreaming about this particular incident? Was it his last mission before the events of CA:TWS (a theory I see frequently repeated but with no evidence to back it up)? Was it earlier on? Is RJ only on the forefront of Bucky's mind because of his (unhealthy, but we'll get to that) friendship with Yori? How long has Yori been suffering under the weight of his grief?

I would not have had him crash through the wall, btw. As cool as that shot looked, let's try to remember that The Winter Soldier was a ghost story for 70 years. Ghosts don't leave giant gaping holes in hotel walls. I'm not saying brazen wholesale destruction is out of character for him (obviously not. I've seen CA:TWS lmao. many times. this moment lives rent-free in my brain:

found on google without credit; pls lmk if it's yours so I can credit.

but you don't become a "ghost story" if you always leave that much evidence, ijs)

I'd leave the terrible therapy session alone. That scene was beautiful. Beautifully shot; I loved how claustrophobic it felt, and it really did a wonderful job of showing how Bucky felt on the spot, scrutinized, almost put on display for this bitch woman. This scene establishes Raynor as clearly wrong, and an unprofessional mess, and Bucky calls her out on it. I fucking love that!

lmao gods, I love his painfully awkward forced smile... Guys, this episode is fkn great. (betcha weren't expecting so much praise from me, were you? 😂)

"You're free." "To do what?"

👆👆👆 In my show? That would have more of an impact on Bucky's arc. That question would be one of the underlying issues moving his whole story along. Twice in this show, he's told that he's free, but no one addresses what he's free from, much less what he's free to do next.

It's a minor thing, but when Yori tells Bucky to ask Leah out? I'd have Bucky do more than just shake his head in silent horror. Not much more, just something that matters to me as someone who's worked in the service industry for many, many years and dealt with too many creepos: Bucky would flat-out say "she's at work! that's harassment, Yori!"

Yori can still stomp right past that boundary, and Leah can still smile and agree. I just really want someone to verbally acknowledge that you don't fucking ask someone out when they're at work. Ever. Bucky cringing and apologizing puts the power of the conversation back in Leah's hands; it gives her an out to politely decline if she's not interested, and just laugh off Yori's flirting on Bucky's behalf as a senile old man being silly, so I'm actually fine with how this scene turned out. I just would personally have gone that extra inch there for the idiots in the audience who don't get Bucky's subtle "wtf" reaction and why Yori's suggestion was so bad. If someone's livelihood depends on being nice to you, keep your goddamn distance. Flirting with them or asking them out when they're at that big of a disadvantage and have virtually no power to say "no" is harassment.

Here is where I'd make one more subtle change, too. When Yori sees the mochi and is reminded of his son, and tells Bucky about his death, I'd just slip in a time frame. "x years ago, my son was..." blah. (Guys, it really bothers me not knowing when that scene took place rofl can you tell?)

One complaint I've seen a lot online about this show is how it's a bit murky on just how well known Bucky is in-universe. He can walk around Brooklyn with more or less total anonymity, but he's also recognized as "an Avenger" (when he was never actually technically in the group)... but honestly? I think it's actually pretty realistic. Just because someone's famous doesn't mean every single person on the planet knows who they are and what they look like well enough to instantly recognize them on the street. People look different in photos than in person, and pre-Blip, Bucky had the complete Jesus look - long flowing hair and a full beard. In TFATWS he's a little scruffy, but not this:

Sebastian looks like about 10 different men from one moment to the next just irl with a change in haircut, lighting, expression, whether or not he got enough sleep the night before... 😂 I don't really find it hard to believe that people not expecting to bump into an Avenger would have trouble seeing Bucky post-haircut as anything other than just another attractive white guy.

Anyway! Sorry for the segue lol. On to the date!

Earlier in this very same goddamn episode, it is established that Bucky can remotely operate a car with a tablet. This is not a technologically-inept geezer. This is a 30-something nerd who loves new technology, who, yes, is facing a brave new world and a whole lot of new technology, but has never shown any issue picking it up. The crappy flip phone he handed Raynor earlier? a burner to keep her out of what little personal life he does have (we never see it again in the real show, anyway). The "tiger photos" line? Stays, not to show Bucky's floundering ineptitude with technology, but as a little nod to his bisexuality. (don't like it? don't wanna see Bucky as bi? go watch the show and read Skogland's borderline-offensive interviews. This isn't "how I would pander to a homophobic audience" it's "how I would have written it." the "Bucky is bi" interpretation is super fucking common and has been since TFA so bite me 😁)

Tiny nitpick, but I'd also have the Battleship boards actually set up properly lmao. What even was that? Anyway...

I don't think I'd have Leah get all ranty about Yori and RJ. That's not first date talk, for one thing. For another, let's ease up on the beating Bucky and the audience over the head with that one incident in a single episode, shall we? Instead, I'd have her stick with the date questions - she asked his age, asked about his family; I'd have her follow it with questions about what he does for a living (giving us a chance to not only actually have that question answered for us - how the hell does Bucky keep himself from being homeless? lol - but also set up...)

He shuts down a little when she starts asking about his past; she's innocently curious, just trying to get to know him, but he's flinchy and deflects with questions about her. The date is awkward, but doesn't abruptly end with him running away lol. He walks Leah home, like the old-fashioned gentleman he is, goes home, himself, and end on him grimacing in his sleep, in the clutches of another nightmare: not as much detail as the RJ murder scene, we see disjointed, disorienting images of fluorescent lights glinting off of machinery, the occasional shot of Bucky writhing in the chair, a shot of that damned notebook (to remind the dumber audience members why Raynor's passive-aggressive notebook thing was so triggering for him), and we hear echoes of a couple of the trigger words, and Bucky's screams.

[heraldofzaun]

//Still lurking.

Some thoughts below the cut. A little melancholic. A little ranty. Many thoughts on how Viktor is perceived by the fandom at large. It got away from me.

I think I’ve mentioned it elsewhere, but I have followers here and this is also a Viktor blog... I think it would be nice if people stopped making fun of Viktor’s accent - I saw T/BSkyen’s (I think that keeps me out of the tag) shorts video on Viktor, and it was disheartening that he chose to make fun of Viktor’s accent several times throughout a one-minute video. No other character with a hammy, over-the-top accent, as far I know, receives this treatment. No one makes fun of Caitlyn’s British accent in character analyses of her. No one makes fun of Fiora’s French accent in character analyses of her. (I just checked his videos on them, actually, and guess what - no mocking their accents by doing them! Although Fiora’s accent does get mentioned, at the least.)

Just... stop doing it? We know the accent is cartoonishly bad and not accurate to actual Russian accents at all. But why, specifically, are people - T/BSkyen, in this instance - compelled to make fun of Viktor by putting on an accent and saying “Get reed of all emotions“ and “GLORIOUS EVOLUTION” and “BEEP BOOP ROBOT BRAIN”? (The misspelling in the first is not mine. It is in the actual subtitles for the video.)

I mean, we all know that the answer is the fact that American (and other countries, but we can focus on America for now) media spent the Cold War convincing Americans that Russians and Eastern Europeans were mindless followers of ideology and/or Crazy Insane Scientists, instead of like... people with diverse thoughts and feelings who may or may not agree with their government, but like... I have to ask the rhetorical questions here because no one else is going to apparently. Anyways it’s 2021 stop conflating people and the governments they live under, I guess.

Anyways, also very disheartening that I just checked the pinned comment on that video and he is now saying that Viktor’s endpoint is the Battlecast universe, which is not a canon fact even in current lore. It’s an assumption. I can’t even say that Full Machine Viktor is Viktor’s endpoint, because that was retconned into being a janitor skin that randomly breaks into Spanish in the skin bio for a... “joke”? (Because that’s a cool thing to do. I’d ask how that got past anyone, but that’s a pointless question.) But Battlecast is not stated anywhere to be the end result of canonical Viktor, as far as I know. I suppose it’s not stated to not be the result, but... Like, what other character gets an AU skinline that people then say has to be their canonical endgoal when it is not said to be their canonical endgoal by any official source?

Quothe the loremaster... “The endpoint of Viktor's quest is the Battlecast universe. In case y'all forgot. Read between the lines of his stories even a little bit before stanning him, I'm begging you.”

The entirety of the pinned comment is frustrating. It is frustrating not only because it clashes entirely with the funny comical tone of the minute-long short, which also decides to yet again conflate transhumanism with being trans (we have heard my thoughts on this before. Please stop doing this), but because it is unfortunately true in aspects about current Viktor. He is really not a good man, even though you may be able to argue that Riot’s biased narrator choices mean that a canonical version of the Viktor-Jayce fight does not exist. (Because both lores tell their sides of the story. Biasedly.) But as the story stands, his character getting filled out didn’t make him more morally ambiguous than his original counterpart. The ambiguity that existed originally was due to us not knowing a lot about him and thus being able to interpret things the way we wished. (I’m sure that there is still room for interpretation in the new lore, but it seems lesser to me. Also, his color story is framed atrociously. It’s going for warm and fuzzy when the content of it is giving a kid drugs but this is a long enough post already...)

Riot does not know what to do with Viktor. They’re content to portray him as a Russian mad scientist and buffoon in LoR and in some other media, because... [gestures at the struck-out paragraph above]. But then they have his lore which... could be interesting, maybe, if it weren’t convinced that the way to tell a morally grey story is to have narrators more unreliable than a pull-start lawn mower. Like, they just don’t know what to do with him.

Any analysis of him needs to come with that caveat, not someone deciding that the best way to spent a minute of analysis is to make multiple jokes about Viktor’s accent being stereotypical via... feeding into it being stereotypical... and saying that transhumanism is related to trans rights in any inherent way.

Also, T/BSkyen says that Viktor only has an augmented hand and the third arm, which conveniently ignores the fact that Prototype is probably supposed to be taken as semi-canonical considering its name and the fact it was made when backstory-related skins were a more common thing. (And also because it hasn’t been retconned into being a janitor.) It also conveniently ignores the fact that Viktor’s lower legs clearly don’t look like armor on his model, but this is a side tangent that doesn’t really matter, so...

Whatever, right? I’ve clearly put more thought into this than League’s local loremaster put into that video and subsequent “no guys he really is a baddie stop stanning him and grow critical thinking skills” comment. Sorry if I sound jaded here or am taking this far too seriously or whatever, it’s just... man, it’s a lot. It makes trying to do my take in any public capacity feel kind of like shit, because it’s clear that the general perception of Viktor is currently 1) Haha Funny Accent Man, 2) Trans Rights!1!, and/or 3) He’s Evil :(, and it sucks. I already am writing for a niche audience who will accept a Viktor who never went to Piltover and who exists in old Zaun. I know that that’s niche. I’m okay with it being niche, I think.

But it sucks to build up all this character and do all this writing and try to... I don’t know, present a nuanced view of someone, and then just get another fucking joke about his accent or his design tropes or about what transhumanism is. Especially when those jokes are what people remember, right?

Sorry. This got whiny. But I think it explains why I’ve lost so much steam on writing our favorite Machine Herald, because stuff like this just keeps kind of... happening.

Thank you to the folks that send in anons about my analyses or who like my posts about my artistic endeavors or just... well, interact in general. It does mean a lot to me that you guys are invested enough to hang around and read 2k words of me doing the Pepe Silvia scene from Always Sunny as I connect dots that might not have been meant to be connected. It’s just hard to keep doing it, sometimes, and I guess this is one of those moments.

[romancing-lady-whistledown]

the fandom was exactly like this, every time Lucas or Eliott weren't a perfect human and had flaws the fans here would say they were ruined. like Lucas saying some ignorant things on s5 and s6 doesn't mean they ruined him?? and it wasn't ooc he said some ignorant things on s3 as well. but he apologises. fans are obsessed with purity, they want their fave characters to be 'woke kings' . I read fics where Lucas was super "woke" and honestly it made me cringe so much bc that's not him

Hi anon! I have no idea when I recieved this as Tumblr never notified me about it, so I’m sorry if this response is really late! This got kinda long so I’ll leave my response under the cut.

 Personally when it comes to Elu-fanfiction (which is the only type of fanfiction I read, actually) I’ll enjoy anything that can give me the Elu-feelings, just in different ways depending on the genre/trope, and that also includes when they’re pure fluff and the angst that maybe would’ve happened in the actual show is cut down or cut out. Sure I’ll notice when Lucas or another character says something I could never hear canon Lucas say, but overall as long as the character has enough traits from Lucas, whether it’s more from soft Lucas or more from fiery Lucas, I’ll just take that as the writer using their freedom to make the tweaks to the characters that they wish for their story. With that being said, when it comes to the canon characters themselves and the way they’re created and presented in the show (and this is in general not just in Skam France, but definitely also in Skam France), I completely agree with you. Alot of people do want their favorite characters to be morally pure and fully woke, but that has never been Lucas or Eliott and personally I don’t know anybody in the real world who are perfect in that way either. 

To me personally a well-rounded and well-developed character is a character that on some level feels real and relatable, rather than a character that always pose as an example for the ideal response to every situation they’re put in. The latter will, to me personally, make them feel less real, well-rounded and relatable because nobody has the ideal response to every situation they’re put in. People do mess up and they mess up often, whether it’s in what they say or what they do. People also do grow and change and learn but that takes time. I won’t recognize any real human I know in a character that always does and says the right thing. That’s not to say that every character with flaws is a great character (examples of characters I personally don’t think are well-crafted, relatable or likable on any level are Charles from Skam France and, from the little I’ve seen of her, Kato from Wtfock). I think the key to creating a great character is giving them a combination of flaws and pleasant traits that make them either interesting or lovable or both, in a way that fit with the role they’re supposed to play in the story, whether it’s as an antagonist or a protagonist or something in between. 

What makes Lucas so lovable to me is the combination of him being hot-tempered and passionate and him also being very emotional and incredibly soft and sweet with the people he loves. He wears any emotion on his sleeve, whether it’s sadness or joy, anger or love. He’ll demand an explaination about Lucille multiple times until he gets one, but when he knows it’s Eliott and him he’ll turn into a softie who demands kisses every other minute and buys Eliott flowers and croissants when he’s not feeling well. He’ll lose his temper and he’ll sometimes say ignorant things as we saw in both S3 and in the newer seasons, but he’ll also apologize for things he say, as we saw both with Arthur, Lola and Chloe. Lucas is to me the perfect example of a character with a lovable combination of positive traits and flaws. 

My one big complaint about Lucas and Eliott’s parts of S5 and S6 is not that they were ruined in any way, it’s that I feel like the writers started an arc on screen that didn’t get a good conclusion on screen. They introduced insecurities for both Lucas and Eliott that we got to see them discuss with others (Imane, Arthur, Lola) but never with each other. We actually saw Eliott very rarely in S5 and Lucas very rarely in S6, but when we did see Lucas in S5 it was partly for the part of the storyline where Arthur felt left out and in S6 it was basically to set up the club-incident towards the end of the season (that he understandably got upset about), and in both S5 and S6 his tendency to get angry and speak before thinking (that always has been there) got a bit more focus on screen than his soft and sweet side (although it was still present), but that doesn’t mean that his soft side isn’t there just as much as before. To me that is a problem in the writing and storytelling with them prioritizing showing the angst a lot more than the happy or healing moments, instead of having a better balance, but it did by no means ruin Eliott, Lucas or Elu for me. I saw enough in S3 to fully believe that the conversations that needed to happen did happen or will happen, and sometimes conversations between them were referenced but not shown on screen, like when Lucas told Lola at the video-store that Eliott had explained her and Eliott’s relationship to him.

I think it’s important to acknowledge that Skam is always gonna be frustrating with things like this because of the one POV per season thing. Conversations that we would very much like to see will take place off screen when the main isn’t there, we did for example not see Isak and Even talk about Mikael and Isak’s jealousy or Noora and William talk about their drama in S4, we were always told about this through Sana, and the people we did see Lucas and Eliott discuss their insecurities with in S4-S6 were always the mains of their respective seasons. But the thing with Skam France is that they did break the POV for the Fifi-clip or Basile and Daphne talking during S5, so it’s hard not to wish that they could’ve done that here. I also wanna add that when I say I wish they gave Lucas and Eliott’s arc in S5 and S6 a good conclusion I don’t mean Lucas and Eliott getting rid of their insecurities so they’ll never be a potential cause of conflict ever again, because I don’t think insecurities work like that. I don’t think being in a loving relationship for a year will take those insecurities away. As I said earlier, growth takes time, and deep-rooted insecurities are certainly no exception to that.

Anyway, this got long and ranty and I’m sorry about that, but the bottomline is this: I definitely agree with you that there seems to be a huge need in for beloved characters to remain as morally pure and woke as possible in the fandom in order for them not be concidered “ruined”. In reality the flaws we saw in both Lucas and Eliott in S5 and S6 were, in my opinion, very much present in S3, I think they were very much in character, but the difference is that now we only got small glimpses of the characters, their words and their actions, they were not the main focus and we didn’t get to see them up close with all of their qualities explored the way we got in S3. We only got what we got in those glimpses, and sometimes that was a glimpse of Lucas and Eliott doing or saying something they shouldn’t have, but that doesn’t mean all the good qualities of them as characters and as a couple disappeared, we simply didn’t get to see the full picture on screen the way we did in S3. In S5 and S6 I had some issues with the storytelling for Elu, just like I did for other characters, but to me personally the characters and the couple were by no means ruined.

[sacredslaycdd]

Hi, I have a lot of Dawn introspection tonight because I feel like a lot of people give her a hard time. I’ve seen a lot of comments about Dawn recently and we’re ABSOLUTELY all entitled to our own opinions so i’m going to post alot of the thoughts I have, I’m not saying it’s going to ELEQUENT because hey, when am I ever? Putting it under a read more because it’ll likely be long, I’ll try to put it into points so you can actually take a breath lol. 

Where shall we start? Her childhood.  - Buffy and Dawn have a fairly big age gap, which means, in a sense, while the love is CERTAINLY there, I’d bet things were always strained. Buffy was always older and so much cooler, naturally outshone her.  - And then the slayer thing kick in, Buffy’s always in trouble so she’s still the centre of attention.  - Her parents begin to argue more, and if I remember rightly, Buffy distinctly remembers holding Dawn one time (possibly when their father left?) because she was distraught. The fighting alone can be detramental, it’s not a fun enviroment and I imagine Dawn is still pretty young at the time.  - Her dad leaves and he’s pretty absentee after that.  - They move to sunnydale, because of Buffy, away from all of the friends she has and the school she’s familiar with. She has to fit in somewhere new and make new friends.  - Weird occurances are ALWAYS happening, pretty scary for a kid.  - Going to jump ahead to S5, excuse if this isn’t in chronological order.  - Her mom get’s sick, which is terrifying for both fo the summers girls  - Just as they think she’s going to be okay, she dies. It could be argued this was more traumatic for Buffy since she found her and yeah, I’ll give you that, and Buffy had to step up and become caretaker to Dawn. She was now sister and guardian.  - Their dad is still absentee. She’s grieving her mothers death and likely wants to grieve with her sister who’s saving the world all the time. Probably feels incredibly alone, feels like a burden on Buffy and the scoobies, and to be fair, she’s probably been made to feel like this a fair few times.  - and THEN she finds out she’s not real. Can you imagine how traumatic and difficult that is for a child to wrap their head around? Because yeah, 14 is still a frigging kid.  - so if anybody wants to argue about her reaction to that... i will fight you. (i’m kidding I swear xDDD)  - A god wants to kill her.  - BUFFY DIES TO SAVE HER LIFE.  - Her sister sacrifices herself for her, she’s lost the only family she had left but constantly has to see her sisters face around and hear her voice with buffy bot but it’s not HER. Still, her grief stares her in the face everyday. The scoobies step up and they are like family and she loves and appreciates them but it’s not the same.  - and HAH not like GILES sticks around to help. He’d have just sacrified her and I’m sorry but Giles was a monumental figure in BOTH of the summers girls. Granted, they were never going to be like Buffy and him, but still, he watched Dawn grow up and was the only male authority figure in her life, because you can bet Dawn saw ALOT of him. You’d think he’d care a little more. Not to mention he’s almost a direct link to Buffy, a little care from Giles would have gone a long way. Instead he left Willow and Tara and Xander who are barely adults themselves to take care of her and goes to England.  S6&7:  - again sketchy timeline wise  - Buffy comes back and Dawn DOES care, she does want to help her and be there for her and love her and Buffy doesn’t want / can’t deal with that, which is absolutely 1000% understanable but equally, as time goes on, Dawn is still living with that guilt and her sister is there but she’s not.  - She almost loses her sister again to the black hole she’s sunk into, or at-least that’s what it feels like.  - they deal with things differently. Buffy Internalises, Dawn externalises.  - Not only does she have survivors guilt, she thinks her sister resents her, resents the choice she made. She wants to be there, she wants to help, she loves her sister but she’s extremely conscious of this. Buffy sacrificed herself for Dawn and she worries her sister refrets that and perhaps even resents her for it, for having to make that decision.  - In a lot of ways, I promise you that’s exactly how Dawn feels about herself, because she got her sister killed? everyone around her dies.  - Willow goes all evil and almost gets her killed until Buffy saves her.  - Later, she walks in on Tara’s body. Tara was a surrogate mother and sister figure and Dawn adored her so much. That relationship was incredibly precious to Dawn.  - The feeling like buffy resents her? directly correlates with what the first says to her. Buffy won’t be there when she needs her. and she’s not entirely wrong about that feeling. Buffy says to Giles if she had to do it again, she’d sacrifice Dawn.  So yes, Dawn wants Buffy’s attention? Does she externalise how she feels sometimes into anger? and generally being upset which most people describe as her being a ‘brat’ - que eyeroll here - Dawn isn’t a brat, she’s reacting to circumstances that for the one thousandth time, are beyond her control. Even Xander acknowledges that it’s tough just being normal but acknowledges she’s extroardinary. Any kind of acknowledgement along such lines from Buffy, would have gone a long way to solving a lot of problems. Nobody can say Dawn didn’t communicate, and sure, it was over the top sometimes, but she’s learnt that if she isn’t, nobody cares.  She is constantly treated as a child and brushed off throughout the entire 3 seasons she’s in, you can’t then call her out on acting like it. - le shrug. -  Also, Dawn telling Buffy to leave in S7 is a joke and in my opinion, out of character for her. She threatened SPIKE, you really think she’s going to send her sister off to god knows where when she just got her back and there’s a big evil out there? PUH-LEASE. Dawn would have fought for Buffy and in my portrayal she does. 

ANYWAY, THANKS FOR COMING TO MY TED TALK. I am sorry in advance if this comes off ranty- this isn’t hate on anyone (WELL, maybe a little giles...), ESPECIALLY Buffy. I stan Buffy, none of this is her fault either, it’s all circumstances and dealing with things differently. 

[blacksunisvalid]

( Warning: This is a very long and ranty post. If you’re not curious, I totally get it and you can scroll past it or block it.) 

@blacksunlover6

This post serves as a follow-up post for anyone curious about what I posted last night, about something happening that hurts your feelings in a way which isn’t serious enough for it to matter. I took the time to sleep on what happened, and yeah it does still upset me, so here’s the full story below. I accept that I was maybe in the wrong about it, but I just wanted to vent if anyone wanted to listen/read. 

Firstly what I meant when I said that it was a small thing is that it is an interaction I had with members of the RPC, and a lot of the people I know IRL and would like to talk to about it ( my girlfriend, family, friends, etc.) don’t really know about the RPC and they mean well but they’re very much logic based people and probably wouldn’t understand why it makes me so upset. I understand and acknowledge that issues with the RPC are pretty first world and small in the grand scheme of things 

When I said it trapped me in a loop it was my problem at the end of the day. I have a very hard time letting things go, and things get under my skin. I am definitely the most sensitive person in my friend group, and I have had to learn sometimes that I won’t be getting an apology from people all the time, and so I have to try and learn to let things go and break the loop on my own. 

I have a lot of issues with the RPC in general, and I’m not always the best at articulating things and the issues I have. This is a rant post, and very likely not the most put together. The situation that happened left me very confused and frustrated, and I’m not sure that I understand it fully anyways, so if you have any thoughts on it I’ll listen and maybe I am wrong about all this like I said. With all of that said here’s what happened 

One of my hobbies is to RP for a lot of the fandoms that I’m in. I mostly RP at Wattpad ( but I don’t feel comfortable sharing my Wattpad and I won’t be sharing the Wattpad with anyone involved in this story, I would feel uncomfortable doing it). 

My thoughts on Rp in general is that it has to be a collaboration. Neither of you are going to get the perfect verse that you want, at least that happens very rarely. There has to be a back and forth respect and collaboration when it comes to things like ships, changes to the world and to the timeline, and things like that. But I do have one pretty solid line in the sand when it comes to RP: “ If someone’s OC is involved, you do not have the right to speak over their desires for the OC, and what they tell you about their OC is factually true: It is their creation.”

Anyways one of the fandoms I started to RP for lately was Percy Jackson and the Olympians, and I have an OC for the series named Hokuto. I don’t want to info dump about him but the very basics on him if it helps anyone understand the story better-

Hokuto is Asian-American, and the son of Ares and a mortal woman named Sakura. Once Ares left the family, Sakura threw herself back into competitions to try and attract Ares back, and Hokuto was left alone, until he ran away, meeting Luke, Thalia and Annabeth, and going to Camp Half-Blood with them, until Thalia turned into a tree, and when she came back and joined the Hunters he had some abandonment issues pop up, and other things. 

I had been speaking with someone on Wattpad for awhile and planning a group RP with a few people, and planning how to make it all work with our OC’s and adding them to the story. All of us had decided on an order to present our OC’s in, and I ended up being the last to go, and I have to say they all had really cool concepts for OC’s, and I was excited to have Hokuto bounce off them, and work on this world

In the canon of Percy Jackson, Thalia ends up joining a group called the Hunters, and swearing off romance. I had in mind that depending on how the RP went either Thalia could leave the Hunters to be with Hokuto ( In canon I believe people have left before? This might be an error on my part) or with the two of them acknowledging there could have been a romance between the two of them, but the two of them have gone in different paths in life, and it’s too late for them to be with each other. 

So I was….surprised and hurt in a way when they began to say they weren’t interested in the concept, and more than that, downright hostile in a way to me. ( Like I said I don’t feel comfortable sharing my Wattpad or theirs, and I don’t have screenshots of the messages) And I tried to defend myself against some of them and explain the dynamic I wanted for Hokuto and Thalia. Here are a couple of the things they said, and how I tried to defend myself

‘ The two of them are toxic to each other’- Yes Hokuto and Thalia don’t always get along with each other, and they have a hard time speaking with each other. But the two of them are teenagers, and teenagers aren’t always perfect communicators. Hokuto and Thalia also have an extremely deep bond with each other, and a care is always what underlines their fights, and some of their pettier moments, they love each other at the end of the day 

‘ Hokuto is a boring wangst character’- Yes, Hokuto does have a dark backstory, dealing with survivor’s guilt, abandonment issues, a guilty complex and self-esteem issues. But the point of his character is that he’s working to be more than all of those things, and he’s trying to be better. And as it is, PJO as a series has explored all of those themes with different characters, and so it’s not as though it would be entirely new or out of place 

‘ Having Thalia leave the Hunters to be with Hokuto is heteronormative’- I guess I don’t have a response to this one. That’s why I said that Hokuto and Thalia I would like at the very least to acknowledge they could have a romantic relationship with each other, but that door has closed to them, but they were unwilling to do even that. This one in particular frustrates me because several of them shipped Thalia with a character named Reyna, and one of them had written a fic centered around Thalia and Reyna together, with Thalia leaving the Hunters to be with Reyna, and I don’t understand why her leaving isn’t considered unhealthy for that. 

This went on for a little bit, and in the end, all of them said they would no longer RP with me, and they would be advising other people they knew about me to block me, and not RP, before I was then blocked by them. 

It’s not a big deal in the scheme of things. It’s really not. But the situation frustrates me, upsets me, and honestly it still does. Like I said in my initial post, what they did is not serious enough it merits an apology, but it made me feel really shitty, and I am bitter about it, and I know that I have to choose to let it go on my own, and just move past it. 

Hokuto is a character I worked really hard on, and I thought and think he is a cool character, and his dynamic with Thalia, at least the way I pictured it was fun and I wanted to do it. But I instead had to defend my OC and the potential ship to people who honestly just seemed dead set on fighting against it. 

If anyone does understand why Hokuto was such a problem for them or has their own problem: Please please let me know, I just don’t understand. 

And for everyone else: If you do RP, please just communicate with people, and do not speak over them about the visions they have for their OC

[lordeasriel]

Let’s talk about The Book of Dust, The Secret Commonwealth and the challenges of The Book of Dust 3. Under the cut because it’s long and a bit ranty.

I’d like to state that I have the utmost respect for Philman’s work and his writing; I think he’s a great author and a great storyteller. That being said, I don’t think he’s beyond making mistakes, no one is and I think he made a big mistake by splitting the Book of Dust the way he did.

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE La Belle Sauvage, it’s my second favourite book, surpassed only by Northern Lights. It has great lore and depth and incredible characters, that sadly, get lost after the 20-year gap we have between LBS and The Secret Commonwealth. That was expected, though, all things considered; Philman is used to creating characters that he end up leaving aside for the sake of the story. He actually abandons lots of things for the sake of the story; logistics, consistency, character development... I mean, there’s lots of debatable things he has done throughout the whole His Dark Materials for the sake of a good story. Whether that’s bad or not, I cannot really say, but he definitely still managed to sell lots of books, so on its own, that’s a good payout.

LBS is a great opener to what could have been an incredible prequel story. If he had decided to write a whole trilogy focused on that, he definitely would have done a good job with that book, except he chose to have it as the first book of a trilogy that actually surpasses the original story too. I’m not even touching the touchy subject of “He has absolutely no timeline” because, I mean, that’s practically an issue on its own. But the biggest problem is time, as in, the amount of time each book covers.

LBS serves to introduce us to lots of different concepts, characters and to go in-depth into the separation of daemons. It introduces Oakley Street, it establishes the Magisterium role in the world, it expands on what it means to have a bond with your daemon, plus the introduction of mythical things. It does all that very well, and on its own, it’s a great book. When we get to TSC, we already know about Oakley Street, about Lyra, about Malcolm, so we know these key concepts from our previous reading; yet TSC fails to do the same.

It has a poor ending, very anti-climatic, and while I get it’s supposed to be a cliffhanger to the next book, it’s not the feeling it leaves us with. Instead, it feels like the story was actually cut right in the middle, after 700 pages of a long and somewhat tedious journey, that expands on almost nothing but pointless trivia. There are a few moments that make the reading worth it, but as a second installment, this book did not deliver nowhere near enough to make up for the lack of a first one. I know this seems crazy, but when you lay down all the plots, and you analyse them all, you notice that there is a huge gap going on in some of them. And I say “a lack of a first book” because technically, Lyra’s story does not have a first book; TSC acts as both first and second volume and it is why it ends like that.

Some of the issues that I have come mostly from characters that shouldn’t need to be lacking all that much. As much as I love Marcel, I find him to be extremely predictable; while he retains some degree of fun, even though you can tell what he is going to do, it’s upsetting when you consider other villains such as Bonneville, Mrs. Coulter, MacPhail, Metatron. He is built to be as terrifying as any of those, and I don’t think being predictable it’s a bad thing on its own, but Marcel doesn’t have the time to live up to his potential, and that’s because, again, he’s written into a second book when all of his scenes from TSC are clearly from a starting POV. And he’s not the only one, this happens with pretty much every new character, from Glenys Godwin to Bonneville Jr.

Malcolm gets away with this because we’re familiar with his character from LBS; that whole book essentially covers his character, his personal Aurora, his daemon separation, how he relates to Lyra and all that. He has a whole book to develop himself, even though we don’t see him getting into adulthood, but from what our perspective of him as a child is, it’s easy to translate into the man he has become in TSC. He essentially stays the same; he’s more mature, but from a behaviour perspective, Malcolm is pretty much the same person he was in LBS. This isn’t bad, but it’s also a little disappointing to me, because I expect adults in this universe to be a little more complex.

With all that being said, I worry for TBOD 3, because Philman now has - technically, as he clearly sometimes doesn’t care about consistency lol - to write a lot to cover all the plots he has started. I’m not even considering smaller plots, but essentially he has 3 main plots going on (this is me saying this from a reader’s POV, so he could totally change this in the future or maybe he is aiming for something else and as a reader I might have overlooked it): Marcel and the Magisterium, Lyra and the Secret Commonwealth, Malcolm and the Rose Oil. These three plots have and will merge or collide, given that Malcolm has already been through Geneva and is currently after Lyra, while Marcel is also after Lyra, and now Malcolm too, and given the three of them are all drawn to the rose oil and the red building, for different reasons and probably with different outcomes.

Philman mentioned Book 3 is meant to continue right after TSC, not unlike TAS I suppose, so in my opinion it’s either gonna be very big or very direct book. I don’t think filler chapters are bad, but when you’re trying to set up new characters like Marcel, Godwin, and even Malcolm, he simply just didn’t give us enough, instead narrating Lyra’s journey even when nothing remotely interesting happened. I like some of these, like Lyra helping the refugees, I think it’s an interesting chapter for worldbuilding, but in essence, nothing there really affected the plot. She later finds out about the rose farmers anyway, so that chapter was really there for the social aspect, which I think it’s important, but it didn’t need a whole ass chapter for it, especially because nothing else happened (iirc, I’m still rereading it).

Another useless chapter is the train assult scene, that was fucking ridiculous and for such an educated man, Philman really did something stupid there. That chapter - and I’m not going into the female character aspect because I’ll get angry again - adds absolutely nothing to the plot. He could’ve used it to expand on Malcolm, to explain how Olivier catched up with Lyra, he could’ve added another scene to establish Marcel closer to the conflict, he could’ve explained what Oakley Street was doing, or give us an insight on Pan, I mean, I could go on forever here, that chapter is a waste of space that could’ve been used for something better and more useful.

My concern, besides Philman’s old age and his frail health, is that he ends up not writing a complete book again (as apparently happened with TAS, when he was rushed by his editors), and that we end up with no answers again. His big promise was to explore Dust in this trilogy, yet so far we’ve only have more questions, or at least I do, and I appreciate  the rose oil because I’m really interested in it, but all this fantasy talk it’s been putting aside what I like the most about this series and it’s the metaphysical stuff, the science and philosophy of it all. I think that, above all things, what I want the most is at the very least a good conclusion, not necessarily tight in all aspects, but something that at least helps us define what Dust is better, and that Lyra gets a proper ending, that isn’t bound to female character tropes.

[hegglespeggles]

How to write an essay you could not care less about in 10 steps

Hello. I have an essay to write.

I am also, (unfortunately) the kind of lazy, apathetic burnout who will only do my FUCKING work if I get really worked up. Usually that ends up meaning all of my papers are spite-fuelled tirades but my profs seem to like them so fine. I hope you find this particular raging tirade useful.

Today, I would like to educate the 4 of you that will actually see this on a fine art I have perfected over the years. Writing a paper, about which, you do not give a single, solitary, crumb of a fuck about. This is (you may have guessed) and excellent way for me to procrastinate doing a paper that *I* do not give a single solitary crumb of a fuck about. For best results, I recommend doing this NIGHT-BEFORE-PANIC like, a week in advance so you can fix all the NONSENSE that your more reasonable brain will undoubtedly find. But if it’s the night before and you are shit outta luck, this will get ‘er done. And with practice, you can even pull good grades outta these bitches.

 Dissociating? I gotchu. Woke up the day of the deadline to feel like absolute utter garbage? Search no more friends.  

  FAILING GRADES ARE BETTER THAN ZEROS JUST FUCKIN DOOOOOO ITTTT

1.    Go get the prompt.

I fucking mean it. Even if you are like 1000% sure you know what the prompt is asking, go to the FUCKING assignment, and copy that shit into your word document. Got the assignment on paper? TYPE THAT SHIT UP MOTHERFUCKER.

(Do you see what I fucking have to deal with)

Boom?

BOOM.

Congratulations, you now have a document, and whats more, there are WORDS in it!! You aren’t starting from scratch anymore kiddo. Fringe benefit, you always know EXACTLY what the assignment wants because its fucking Staring You Down. Not saying you have to do exactly as it says, mama didn’t raise no BITCH and I aint scared of fuckin CALLING PROFS OUT but if you wanna break the rules you gotta know what they are first

(Disclaimer: I have also been kicked out of class on numerous occasions for fighting with the prof and had full classes where the lecture WAS me arguing so maybe take my opinions of conformity with a grain of salt.)

2.    Math THE FIRST

I know, this is an essay and not a fucking calculus test. But some of this shit is USEFUL OKAY

Take the paper in question. How long does it have to be? Mine is 5 pages. A page is generally accepted to be 250 words (double spaced because we FUCKING LOVE OURSELVES) so 5 x 250 = 1250 wds. That’s the goal. That’s the pinnacle. That’s your new holy grail.

Time to split this bitch up

  3.    Yarrrrrr, CONTENT

And finally, we get to the part that is the reason why you are being an absolute bitch baby about this essay (maybe. I might be projecting. Your life is your life and im sure youre doing your best.) I Hate this part, but now with our magic number we don’t need to pull 5 pages out of the ether.

This part really requires you to know your vibe. Is this something that you have a lot of little opinions (read: evidence) about or like, only 2 or 3 big bois? Look deep into your soul and figure out which is the easiest for you to shit out, a rant or a list. a  great way to do this is to WRITE ANYTHING YOU GOT OUT

Here you can see I’ve put all of the thoughts I have about the question into a list, slapped some standard “opening” and “closing” shit around it so I can FUCKING FIND IT AGAIN and given it a good hard look. Whats the common thread in all of my opinions? That the prompt is fucking stupid and makes no sense is asking 2 different questions. Congratulations: you found your thesis. This essay, like many of my essays, bears the thesis “this is a weird question to be asking” (which falls under my broader category of “bitches aint shit” essays.)

Congratulations you have the bare bones of your skeleton.

  4.    MATH THE SECOND

 The magic number returns. All hail our glorious leader. 1250 right?

So heres how I break this down. Break off a small chunk at the beginning. For this essay im gonna split off the 250. Split that baby in half. Congratulations, now you have a word count on your opening and closing. Personally, I know I like a lil extra space at the end to get all ranty, so Imma split this puppy up 100 for my opening and 150 for the closing. WARNING: You will think that you will be able to write enough in your opening and closing to take up lots of space. You will feel the urge to give them both the same amount of words that you give your points. This is misguided and foolish. Not only will you 1) not be able to do it but 2) even if you did, that’s like getting a sandwich which is all bread. No one wants that. Don’t be that dude. Fight the urge.

 RIGHT SO. We’re still left on the other 1000 words.

If you have an idea that like, is bigger than the others, go ahead and give that puppy more of the word count than the others, fractions are your friend here and you wanna think about how much of your final product each of these babies will be. If you, like me, are an utter buffoon with no clue what youre doing, open your calculator up. Divide the remaining word count by the number of points you have. Congratulations. Youre doing the essaying.

If this is enough to get you started, GREAT! See you at step seven. BEFORE YOU GO I would like to give you this tip

5.    CITE YOUR INFORMATION AS YOU ADD IT IN.

It doesn’t need to be a full citation, just literally a footnote with something that will help you remember where its from and for the love of god WHAT PAGE IT IS ON. The you of 3 hours from now will thank you.

  6.    Filling in the skeleton

 I don’t know about you, but I cant exactly riff off of a single sentence. Like, I know what the VIBE of my point is, but like, I cant pull it out of a hat. The name of the game here is whittling down your arguments into thinner and thinner chunks that are easier and easier to bullshit. This is how you avoid that “burning building found in flames during Brooklyn fire” bullshit that memes. You don’t wanna meme. You wanna pass. So, figure out what the things you are gonna say and in each bit, keep track of how many words you are gonna write. EITHER

a)      You put how many words you think you can write on any point beside the point as you go and just keep developing points and shuffling word counts around until it matches the total for that section

or

b)     You evenly breakup the word count between all the points and keep breaking them down until you look at a subject and a word count and go “yeah that’s doable. I can do that.”

I prefer the second so LEGGO.

Ta-Da!

7.    Write ‘er up

Ahhh glad to see we’re all back together again. Try-hards who can ACTUALLY bullshit papers, glad to see you’ve rejoined us! This is the part where you take all that shit you’ve broken up into nice little chunks and you turn it into something worth reading. You can do it. I believe in you. Try and keep your citations in place.

I like to do this as a question answer thingy, like an exam, so halfway through writing mine is gonna look like this

 The handy part about the numbers is that it gives you a frame of reference for how your bullshit is going. Realized you had a lot more to say here than you thought? Dope! Less bullshit somewhere else, take it out of a weaker point. This point didn’t give as much as you thought it would? Split the difference elsewhere! This way you have checkpoints and you can see how your essay is going

And then you can go ahead and delete your skeleton work. Its time. Its served you well. For extra drama, whisper menacing nothings to it as you send it into the darkness. Personal favourites include “no one will mourn you,” “your fate belongs to me,” and “so this is what you have come to”

  8.    Citations

Theres like a million ways out there to find out how to do your citations and its gonna depend on what kind of a paper you are writing. I use Chicago most of the time, including here. My advice? Use a site like, bib.me or something to do your bibliography, and then plaster that in the bottom of your document. Use that as the building blocks to do your footnotes. Let Purdue Owl be your guide. Purdue Owl Style Guide Is A Mighty Friend Indeed.

 Also your welcome for that, “putting the page numbers in as you put the info in” shit. That took me alarmingly long to figure out. It’s a wonder theyre giving me a degree.

  9.    Proofread that shit, ya bougie bitch.

If you wanna be time effective, getting a friend to proofread while you do your citations is a great way to go. If you have a few days, put your paper away and come back to it. If you are out of friends and time then https://www.paperrater.com/ is your last hope.

  10.       Slap a title page on that shit and GET IT SUBMITTED

 No joke, I have been using the same template for a coverpage all through highschool and my undergrad. There is only one title page and every time I write an essay I take the title page from the last paper I wrote. There is no beginning. Only title page. Title? Topic of paper: point of paper. For example, If I had to title this screed I’d call it Essay Writing: An exploration of mediocrity. slap the date and your name and the course and instructor on there and BAM. YA DONE.

 Anyway submit that shit an go to bed youre done goodnight

EPILOGUE

I’ve gotten this essay back, and when I wrote it, I was barely a human being. Barely capable of human speech let alone a coherent argument. I would forget the end of the sentence by the time I typed out the beginning. But I still for a 70%! is it the best mark I’ve ever gotten? no! but it is a hell of a lot better than the 0% I would have gotten if i hadnt done this. I get it. And i hope this helps. 

[oldbluethings]

1/ “I also have this completely irrational urge to never contradict canon (I know, right? Look at what I’ve written, for fuck’s sake!) which is stupid but I can’t get over it.” NO! IT’S NOT STUPID. It’s awesome genius, actually. Fanfic is a fun hobbie and all that, but I can’t stand fics that jump off the cliff of canon. What’s the point of reading about a character I love if he’s… not going to be the character I love? Know what I mean?

2/ Small breaks from canon, like making a character a cat lover even tho the topic of cats has never come up canon, are ok. But rampant OOC-ness is annoying. Just write original fiction and in the writer’s note add “this character was inspired by this character/actor, enjoy!” don’t sell me your spec script under the guise of fanfiction. Sorry, I got ranty haha. Truth is, one of the reasons why I love your work is because I can tell all the effort you put into following canon ❤️ Also, the kinks.

***

Well, I'm so glad you find my Stephen in character, Anon, because that is something I worry about constantly while writing him.

I know I'm writing him a little too vulnerable for a lot of people’s taste, which I get, because he's a hard character to deal with in a lot of ways. I've ranted before about the issue of ‘magic solves everything’ and how I have to get crazy plotwise to get around that sometimes. 

But I also feel Stephen’s very tricky in general. I see him as such a contradictory mix of arrogant and insecure, of competence and self-doubt. That was my take on him from the solo movie, anyway. And it's still my take after Infinity War and Endgame. He's just really, really good (and practiced) at covering up that fragile ego with cool arrogance. So, when I'm writing from his POV, he’ll seem more vulnerable because the reader is going to be listening in on all of those internal thoughts and doubts. 

It's actually super fun to write Stephen from someone else’s POV because then he can be an arrogant, mysterious asshole wizard 😀

Plus, I like writing him as a bottom, which I guess some people might disagree with. I actually don't have any rigid character preferences—I see him as a switch, mostly, he just hasn't had a chance to explore that—but I'm gonna write what I want, dammit!

Whoa. Guess I ranted again. Thanks for the note, Anon 🤗 

[mikunology]

OK I really feel like laying down some Fukase headcanons but too lazy to make a giant Mikunology File about it so I’m just gonna put em here. Vocal Android setting of course

okay? okay. here we go (read under the cut)

When Rin and Iroha met Fukase, he was living in an underground (illegal) robot circus as a freakshow act where he was often abused (hence the ruined side of his body)

During the ensuing battle between the Vocaloids and the circus’s ringmaster, Rin rescued Fukase from his captivity, which is one of the reasons why he’s so interested in her

Due to some of the damage done to him by the circus and them not knowing Fukase’s original creator, the Crypton Crew were able to generally fix some of his technical problems (let’s just say he’s hit his head a lot and it made him buggy) but they couldn’t fix his appearance since he’s a bit old and they don’t have the tools

He doesn’t care that much though

Personality-wise he’s a very high-octane jokester, he’s always up to something weird, he tends to say creepy things out of the blue and he loves casually grinding people’s gears (particularly Len and Piko’s)

But the other 50% of the time he’s rather sobering and fatalistic

He makes a lot of bad decisions. A LOT OF THEM

But he’s not at all a bad person, he’s actually a rather cunning, friendly and wide-eyed guy

He just doesn’t get a lot of the world’s nuances and many of his experiences have made him sort of desperate for a distraction from his problems (he’s what they call a sad clown)

Though a lot of his more annoying tendencies have made him have very little friends

He’s made pals with Oliver from the elementary school though and Ollie thinks of him like a weird big bro that does magic tricks

The Kagamines have a mixed relationship with him because Len doesn’t trust him as far as he could throw him (and he can throw pretty far) but Rin feels sort of responsible for him since the rescue and thus is a bit nicer towards him (though she’s not sure what to make of his obvious crush on her)

He knows magic tricks and it’s common for him to seemingly “teleport” around town

He tries not to think on how he even got to the circus in the first place (he was activated for three seconds before being closed down and waking up again in captivity) but he’s really determined to find out who made him 

He feels a kinship with Piko in that regard since that’s something Piko wants to know too

I didn’t mean to have this many headcanons for him but welp

A lot of Fukase’s lore in VA is based on “Sekai no Hajimari” and “Circus Monster” since they were two of the first songs I heard of him when he was released! Anyway a lot of this is very ranty and tangential but welp hope you enjoyed