#shadowhunters essay

[emmalovesfitzloved]

Last question, who are your fav downwolders and why?

Ahh… well it has to be….

The one….

The only….

💫Magnus Bane! 🥂

(Art credit: @cassandrajean )

Queue the music!

Now. Reasons reasons reasons. Where to begin.

I took my time thinking about this question bc there are quite a few downworlders I have an affinity to. But the showdown where it was REALLY hard to pick one or the other was the battle of the warlocks…

Tessa or Magnus.

On the one hand, I love Tessa So much (wrote a piece on why you can find here hehe) and I truly think she is a timeless character (well before she became literally timeless ie. immortal) and her influence throughout the shadowhunter world is iconic, relevant and enduring.

(Art credit: @giannyfili )

However… her choices and inner narrative became a bit clumsy dealt with and a bit inconsistent unlike Magnus’s, as the shadowhunter novels went on. Of course, characters are allowed to change, grow, develop at any age, but her character felt slightly manipulated in the writing? All for the sake of peddling the plot. Not to get TOO into the whole herongraystairs touchy topic but I do think as I’ve grown up and done over a handful of rereads I do spot the slight manipulation that started then, which kind of set a precedence in her character throughout. I adore Jem but he as well was felt a bit clumsily. Topic for another time.

Meanwhile Magnus, while through his own self discoveries and through his own immortalities feels more cleaner in plot. He’s necessary, vibrant, witty and is that character that you ALWAYS look forward to reading. He is That character that just lights up a room and you wait with baited breath on what he’s going to say next. His air of lightness that he brings into every interaction makes you be able to read and listen to him all day long. With long promises made of laughter, sage advice, experience, history and adventure.

“I've got a stele we can use. Who wants to do me?""A regrettable choice of words," muttered Magnus (City of Ashes).

And because of this, when he is being serious, his words strike you when you least expect it and leave you stunned.

“You endure what is unbearable, and you bear it. That is All” (Clockwork Princess).

His bisexuality was handled wonderfully, and was truly one of the first stories I think our generation read where the sexual identity wasn’t about coming out but already at the stage of acceptance and fun loving. He remains respectful and doesn’t want Alec to rush out of the closet but rather does the best thing- inspire Alec to be the best version of himself in life which is finite. That’s the best thing a partner can really do for you.

However he isn’t a Mary Sue bc in every series he stars in the reader sees his vulnerabilities in pure daylight. And also has a plot line that challenges his Yodha immortal dogmas. Will being one weakness of his in TID, Camille and how she mistreated him and being alone in a very sad world. I don’t think these topics were explored nearly as well with Tessa.

“You left me. You made a pet out of me, and then you left me. If love were food, I would have starved on the bones you gave me” (City of Fallen Angels).

And of course, his relationship and development with Alec is my top 3 relationships in all the shadowhunter world. It felt natural, wonderful, sizzling, exciting and steadfast. Didn’t feel too young or naive like I sometimes feel when reading Clace, but new enough to feel like the honeymoon will never end. And I think in part it’s because of Magnus bringing out the best in people, and how Alec chose him. Of all the people Magnus helps out, he actually doesn’t really ask much in return. But for once Alec did a double take on him and let Magnus take the reins of where their relationship will lead them. With great readership payoff 🥹💍

“You could give me the past,“ he said a little sadly. “But Alec is my future” (City of Fallen Angels).

(Art credit: kasirose)

In fact, he has SO much to offer we got standalones, his own mini series with his partner and constant features in further novellas stories. There is no other character in the Shadowhunter chronicles who has been that centre stage as him. And he deserves all of it.

Favourite Swiftie songs that r HIS:

• BEJEWELED

• Begin Again

• Welcome to New York

• You’re in Love

• Karma

• You’re Not Sorry

• Ours

• I Know Places

• You’re on Your Kid

• Castles Crumbling

• The Last Great American Dynasty

• The 1

• Hoax

So yeah the superlative for the best Downworlder has to go to the delightfully and wonderfully written…

Magnus Bane <3

(Art credit: kasirose)

So yeah! I hope the answer makes up for the wait @imabitchforjemcarstairs ILY! And thank you so much for the lovely ask!

P.s. if any artist doesnt want to be affiliated, kindly DM me and I’ll remove your lovely art and mention from the post :))

[confusionmeisss]

percy jackson and julian blackthorn are essentially the same in the sense that both their fatal flaws are personal loyalty, and in this essay i will-

[garvalhaminho]

the way most tid characters don't feel whole or like they belong.....tessa being just as much a demon as she is a demon hunter, she will never be fully "pure", will making himself unlovable and feeling like he'll never able to let himself be and feel loved, jem knowing he is doomed and slowly dying, fated to die young, jessamine rejecting everything about being a shadowhunter, even the people she was raised by/with, as it is not what her parents wanted for her, as a lady should not fight this way, as she wouldn't really be her idealised version of being her parents' daughter, an idea she preserves w her dollhouse. and this could be extended to the other series, but i feel this is the one where it is most prominent (translation: it is my favourite series in this universe and i will talk about it as much as i can)

[icyberrydoesthat]

reasons why i think my parents pissed off a fairy before i was born (why i think im cursed)

cursed pieces of media always seem to find me

im not exaggerating when i say ive seen more than my fair share of fucked up stuff. it always seems to land on my cellular device or my piece of paper. ill be simply enjoying a show or consuming a book as one does and the most heinous thing will happen and ill be expected to just carry on. and now i do just that, i keep calm and carry on. more specifically theres one topic that seems to pop up a lot (tw!!) incest.....now now you may be thinking "what!? incest....id drop whatever it was and go reconnect with nature...weirdo" now now lets not jump to conclusions, 9/10 that movie/book/manga/whatever is actually really good (the other 1/10 lands you in therapy) and the incest or whatever never progresses the plot at all, but is a big enough plotwist to give me whiplash. and dont you worry, ive got an example. last year, i needed a book so i went to my schools library with a friend. about 10 mins of searching resulted in no book i felt inclined to read....until my friend gasps, a book in her hands..."Shadowhunters"?? i had never heard of it but apparently it was a big part of her childhood, something that soothed the gaping hole Twilight left...okay ill read i said. reading the first few chapters was great, i could practically smell an enemies to lovers and the big mystery of who and where mc's brother is was lingering in the back, my type of book i thought happily. little did i know....mc and ml were infact revealed to be siblings......i dropped my book. i had already thought it was weird that ml's adoptive brother had a crush on him but that gets crushed quick and now this...? now you may be thinking isnt it illegal or sum to promote incest..? and yes u are right, so you can imagine my deep sense of relief i felt when mc and ml were infact not related... because i didnt know how much more i could take of the ml yearning for his literal sister..(he was relentless...). but it doesnt stop there, for all you sickos out there, the author still managed to weasel some incest in. when the ml and mc are still believed to be siblings by them and everyone, another ml enters, this boy is perfect, maybe even a better fit for mc, girl is feeling it too. turns out this second guy is none other than.....her brother !! shocked you didnt it...(hes completely sick and knows the entire time....he wants his sister). but dont worry guys other than that, Shadowhunters is really good, character development? chefs kiss. i luv isabelle.

all my pens perish

im not exaggerating when i say i probably go through 6 pens a week, either they explode in my school blazer, completely new pens dry out in my pencil case, snap or most common cause, i lose them. i try pencil and the lead snaps in the middle so now matter how much i sharpen it, it will never be useful again. this is a cry for help, any stationary reccs??

i lose everything all the time

would you believe me if i said ive lost my keys a total of 5 times this year? well dont. because ive lost them 7 times and only 3 of the times have they been returned. im a regular at the keymaker.... how many of you can you say that??? i hope none, i wouldnt wish this on my worst enemy. i think this 'losing stuff' thing ties in rather nicely into my fish memory too, im pretty convinced ive got a rare amnesia that hasnt been discovered yet. its almost impossible, scratch that, it is impossible for me to remember everything for school the next day, ill always forget at least one thing. my friends will try referencing a supposedly funny/memorable thing that happened and ill just stare. theyll stare back and then do everything in their power to try to make me remember...nothing works.

my friends always have the same crushes as me

you may be thinking, well thats kind of normal for a group of girls that hang around eachother to have the same taste in people and i i thought so too, until it was such a regular thing i just stopped telling them about my crushes. i do have a story, start scene-its the end of a history lesson and im really happy, its been good lesson and i love history. im abit tired because its P5, the end of the day, for that reason, im lagging just a little, i leave my book usually at school because ive got two and my bag doesnt need any added weight . as im packing, a boy, a desk away from mine, walks over and takes my book to the cabinet, some thing he really did not need to do. and i don't know why but i guess im attracted to people being nice, even if it was just a decent human being doing just decent things... the next day, i realise i do want this boy, sadly. i had noticed him before, hes the kind of pretty that doesnt need to exist in a boy but if it does, he unfortunately becomes an object of envy. long lashes, blonde hair, droopy kinda eyes that make him look sleepy all the time. we had just never talked, seeing as we never had reason to. the next day, in a maths lesson, my friend says, "hey don't you think so and so is cute..." as shocked as i was, partly because this friend had been gushing about a different boy an hour ago and partly because it had happened again, i think i played the "really? maybe if i squint really hard he's meh" role really well....long story short, they're dating now....

now youve read my reasoning, there are more...but i just cant remember, i just know you see what i mean. my parents deffo pissed off some magical being and in return it cursed their firstborn daughter.

xoxo

A

ps: this is actually my second time re writing this because i accidentally deleted but the world just needed to know...ty for reading to the end <3

[thevagabondexpress]

cracks in the merry thieves, or, some issues a tsc fan sees in tsc, pt. iii

A nomad needs space to breathe in order to heal. A dismissed shadow fights for oft-denied recognition. And an exchange student outgrows his friends. Not the picture of the Merry Thieves we're used to, I know, but it's what I see when I see Matthew, Christopher, and Thomas in the context of that group.

I've seen lots of people analyze Matthew and his past actions far more deeply and intelligently than I ever could do, but I'm going to talk about his future actions instead, as he's reconciled with most of the other Thieves by the ending of Chain of Thorns—save Christopher, in worlds where he both a) lives and b) sticks around in London long enough to hear Matthew out—and thus what he's about to do now has more consequence here. He's going to travel the world. And not just a cross-cultural exchange like Thomas is going on. He's expatriating from England. It seems pretty clear to me that he's not coming back. London is a place that hurt him, badly, and it's a place in which he hurt other people badly. Alastair and Charlotte, people he'll likely never look at again without carrying grief and guilt, are in London. To truly heal he needs to leave this place that will always remind him of pain, and that means leaving the friends he loved and hurt behind. He's already moving on.

Christopher I've talked about before. I have a whole long vent-post about him. TL;DR direct quotation of that, "He's consistently dismissed, even by those closest to him, as the cinnamon roll, the mad scientist, the one who's bad at social interaction, the one who's definitely not interested in romance, with no input from Christopher himself whatsoever at all to confirm or deny any of these stereotypes.

"He's belittled, his friends and even his sister treat him like he's six, not sixteen (upon hearing of his death Charles calls him 'Little Kit' as if the person in question wasn't two years away from being a legal adult). They seem to think he can't take care of himself just because he's absentminded, nobody ever tells him anything important (Thomas only realizes he should've told Christopher about Alastair once Christopher's gone), and any time he tries to step out of the 'mad scientist' box his decisions are questioned and he's thrown right back in."

He spends the entire series with very little validation or recognition from the narrative and its characters (we really only get one scene in his point of view, in Chain of Iron) and this is epitomized in how he's barely mourned. You might be alive in my version of events, but even so, ave atque vale, you brilliantly adorable bastard, since nobody in CC's canon said it.

And then there's Thomas. He's going through something I've experienced more than once in my life, and that I've watched many other people experience. You change in some way, whether that's an obvious milestone growing-up like starting college or something more personalized; say, switching program tracks in school (honors, STEM, fine arts, general track, etc.) to pursue a goal, or leaving a fandom, or in my case, becoming a publishing internet author. You grow out of the friends who don't follow you in taking that step, or a similar one (I remained friends with the visual art kids I know, but lost the theatre crowd), and you make new friends that fit your new life.

This isn't about age maturity, really, it's not about the fact that Thomas is legally an adult now. We can see Christopher begin a similar process in Chain of Thorns as he discovers Grace (who shares his interests in a way most of the Thieves do not) and chooses spending time with her over attending the Institute's Christmas ball. Thomas has made major steps away from the worldview of the rest of the Thieves: he's done what's essentially the TSC version of a cross-cultural exchange program. He's exploring romance in a way far more complicated than what we see, say, James going through with Grace and then Cordelia: as not only falling in love but also as a process of reconciliation and deep understanding between two people who have fundamentally changed since they first met six years ago. He's spent time away from his friends, gaining new experiences they haven't gained, and while he is in some ways no more more or less mature than his other friends his lifestyle and worldview are very different. Think about how changed you would be after spending most of a year in a country your friends haven't visited.

I can see in the series that he's slowly starting to outgrow the friends with whom he does not connect. They still get along but they're starting to go in different directions. He's already losing his connection to Christopher by the start of Chain of Thorns (he doesn't think to bring up Alastair until after that door is closed). James has settled down with Daisy (for as long as that lasts) and will therefore likely never get a cross-cultural experience like the one Thomas had. Matthew is getting one (his Voyage) but, while his relationship with Thomas seems to be okay at the end of Chain of Thorns, I don't see him sending notes to anyone but James. And all of them are quickly approaching real, functioning adulthood.

Most "real adults" I know in this world (not just people who are legally adults but are at an age where they're done their schooling and have lives of their own beyond it) don't keep in touch with their childhood friends much after college or high school. Like in the real world, I can see that, while they're still close at the end of Chain of Thorns, the Thieves will inevitably change so much that their differences pull them apart and, like real adults do, they'll scatter to the four winds and find new friends who speak to their new experiences.

In worlds where Christopher lives, I struggle to see him continuing his relationship with the rest of the Thieves much past that final London battle anyway. To fully realize all that potential he has, he needs to break from these people who treat him more like a baby brother than an equal friend on equal footing and move on to people like Grace who not only share his interests but make attempts to connect with him as an intellectual and a mature adolescent, and not just as a beloved hobbit who lives in Henry Fairchild's laboratory.

Thomas needs more friends who share his broad horizons: people like perhaps Cordelia, who like her brother has traveled extensively in her life, or like his cousin Anna who has spent years observing people and developing an analytical skillset that would make her an excellent therapist should demon-hunting ever not work out for her.

And as much as I love James and Matthew's dynamic, and as much as the dream is that parabatai will remain close as brothers always and forever, Matthew needs to travel the world. It's clear that this is his path to fulfillment as chemistry is for Grace and moving out of the house is for Arati. And I struggle to see him, after a long time spent traveling the world, as someone still able to connect to a friend who's chosen to not go anywhere at all.

TL;DR: I love the Merry Thieves. But they're not destined to stay best friends forever.

"some issues a tsc fan sees in tsc" is an attempt to break down the unacknowledged things in tsc that i unearthed reading chain of thorns, rereading the rest of the series in preparation for it, and writing two longform fanfics (one of them a genderbent canon reworking) for the last hours. click on the "some issues..." tag to see more of these.

[fish-gutssz]

random thing but I was just watching twilight for the first time ever (not bc I like it but bc I thought it would be funny BELIVE ME PLLSLSS) and idk I just got that feeling that I get whenever I watch a movie or show that was originally a book (or visual novel type thing like class of '09)

like it just makes me wanna write smth so good that people genuinely want to see it move and come to life

it always makes me just wanna randomly make ocs just for the purpose of writing a book then getting a movie

I want people to complain about the movie not being correct to what was in my book(s) because they liked it better that way

idk but also im thinking about forcing my bsf to write smth with me :33

[jemsbitch]

Tennyson and Hallum is so heronstairs coded and In Memoriam by Tennyson is the proof

[antitheticaldreamgirl16]

after about a week or so of thinking over chain of thorns, I think my main problem with it was that there was too much happening, and not enough time for it to happen.

I’ve seen a lot of people saying this, but there are so many scenes that really should have happened (Christopher’s funeral, Matthew talking to his parents , more idris pov) as well as so much more development that characters needed to have. The development thing was mostly why I think the book felt a bit unfinished to me.

For example, I hated Anna in coi for how she treated Ari, but Cassie just suddenly fixed her character in this book. In the end, I didn’t mind them together, but we didn’t get to see Anna really changing and learning from her mistakes. I don’t think the two of them really had a conversation about it at any point, so they didn’t feel fleshed out at all. I love ari and think that her and Anna’s relationship could have been really interesting if it was given more depth.

Also there are so many characters, and of course I love that abt tlh, but I needed to see a lot more interactions between them. Lucie and Cordelia needed to make up sooner, because I felt their fight was kind of useless to begin with, and have more moments between them. There’s definitely a gap in Cassie’s writing for really close female friendships, and I loved Cordelia and lucie’s dynamic, but in this book their amazing friendship was marred by their useless fights that could have been solved so much more quickly if they had just sat down and talked (and also probably the fact that I didn’t love either of their characters this book, but that’s another post, this one is getting too long). Also I would’ve loved more merry thieves interactions, because they’re just so special to me, and of course we got the scene with them sleeping over at Matthew’s, which was amazing and made me cry, but it wasn’t enough. Especially would have liked to see their dynamic after Christopher’s death.

Which brings me to the fact that there wasn’t really time to show the characters mourning Christopher. The most we got honestly was that one paragraph about Thomas and christopher from Cordelia’s pov. Everyone is saying this, but like he meant so much to everyone, and he didn’t even get a funeral??

There’s probably a lot more I could say, but all in all so much more needed to happen in tlh for it to really feel complete to me. Plot-wise, I think it was pretty good, the actual plot and fighting and stuff was pretty typical from a Cassie book and it wasn’t too much for me. But the characters needed more. More development, more interactions, more povs. I know that chain of thorns is already a very, very long book, and if she had added everything it would be well over 1000 pages, but idk. I know she likes to write trilogies, but I think the series could have benefited from a few more books. I feel like she should write a book just to solve all the many problems between the characters.

[emmalovesfitzloved]

Tell me a few things you love about Wessa!

Ahhh another ask from my fav Shadowhunter blogger! Wohoo! These are the first two things that comes to my head. But there are MORE ;)

Their dark academia aesthetic

The Dark academia aesthetic of their relationship. Now while this may come across as superficial, its more then just "loving books". It's the chaise and adventure they find in books that they then live by in their real lives. How they challenge each other in a conversation and insider jokes they share tethered in the novels they consume. Let the other rant about their favourite things and celebrate novels that invite the reader into more journeys beyond just their own. And the way they talk about characters, morals and plots as experiences and people they know almost intimately. How their choice of words matters, and they are economical about their feelings. Dark over light academia bc London is a dank dark city ahaha. And they feel well deep rather than feather light.

Their timeless love

Somewhat still related to novels, but I feel like what Cassandra Clare did with Wessa was the melting pot of all our favourite literary tropes/heroines in classical literature. Which gives it a sense of timelessness and makes them feel like they are 'endgame'.

I wrote previously that Tessa is the perfect blend between Jane Eyre and Elizabeth Bennet. She retains Jane Eyre’s contemplativeness, slight shyness, physical features, dry sarcasm and strong sense of self-actualisation. But also Elizabeth’s wildness, snappiness, boldness, passionate love and will for happiness, all without the arrogance that came with Austen’s heroine.

Meanwhile Will's darker side reminds me of Mr. Darcy in how he pushes those he loves away. John Thornton from North and South who is set in his ways slightly stalkerish (i'm a sucker for the stalker trope sorry not sorry) Will retains the mystery of Edward Rochester, where there is more depth to him that meets the eye and heck even Tessa says at one point that his mood swings remind him of the treacherous Heathcliff. Most of all he reminds me of Alexander from The Bronze Horseman (which only came out in the 90's but technically it came out before TID and is already considered a classic). Alexander and Will overlap in how they sacrifice their love and longing for a greater peace (War and to not upset a family) all for the love of their other one. They are deeply flawed and challenge the reader on their tolerance for forgiveness .

“I love you. I’m blind for you, wild for you. Sick with you. I told you that our first night together when I asked you to marry me, I am telling you now. Everything that’s happened to us, everything, is because I crossed the street for you. I worship you. You know that through and through…” (The Bronze Horseman)

“Alexander, you broke my heart. But for carrying me on your back, for pulling my dying sled, for giving me your last bread, for the body you destroyed for me, for the son you have given me, for the twenty-nine days we lived like Red Birds of Paradise, for all our Naples sands and Napa wines, for all the days you have been my first and last breath, for Orbeli- I will forgive you. ” (The Summer Garden).

And you find you can, because their love and longing for their partner is almost holy and like a religion to them. Those we love the most, hurt us the most, but in turn, they are also those who deserve the most grace and Mercy. If not for them, then for who?

"You are not the last dream of my soul. You are the first dream, the only dream I ever was unable to stop myself from dreaming. You are the first dream of my soul, and from that dream I hope will come all other dreams, a lifetime’s worth." (Clockwork Prince).

This, coupled with the stakes of their relationship then as a unite (and also separately) echos a timber that reminds me of the setting we find in 19th century Russian literature (but with an HEA tysm CC my heart can't take it). This tragic longing we see in Anna Karenina where any choice Tessa makes she looses something in the same breath. The high apocalyptic war torn feel of War and Peace alongside the feeling of doom you get right at Chapter 1 in Clockwork Angel like we did in Crime and Punishment, when Raskolnikov kills a man, and it's all downhill from there.

Conclusion

CC wrote these two with the aim that they remain true to the history of their time, but blended it in with fresh modern air for us to be able to relate to and TRULY succeed. Who knew a historical romance about two book lovers could escalate so highly in the ranks? Now while they are so high up in the ranks of GOAT-ed couples in literature, they aren't without their flaws. Mainly not bc of the narrative or the character's choices but more to do with CC's discontinuation of their story linearly past TID. But that's a different ask for another time and tbh, that's where I seek out lovely fanfictions like the ones you create in order to fill in the blind spots CC didn't fill.

Thank you for this ask! I hope this was worth the read ILY @ibrushmyteeth-donttellanyone♡

Artistic Credit: Cassandra Jean

[garvalhaminho]

ik next to nothing on how the official art works in tsc or who does it but whoever got the idea to pair up the characters w flowers w meanings relating to the characters just know that i am in love w you

[sarascamander]

Ranking the Shadowhunter male protagonist:

1. Julian Blackthorn

His story is my favourite and he is so complex, so tortured, incredibly cunning and smart. Literally he's perfect. (I can write an essay about him and we'll be here forever).

2. Will Herondale

I don't quite like him in the first book because he was acting like an asshole but god his character is so good. I cried for him, I laughed at him, and his love and devotion for Jem just — my heartttt.

3. James Herondale

I think I have a soft spot for him since we literally see him growing up from little baby to an adult. I will always cherish him.

4. Jace Herondale

Jace's humour is top tier, I absolutely love that about him but he pissed me off a lot while reading. I don't even remember what he did, I just remember flipping him off a lot. 😭

[moonysmoothies]

if i wrote essays about everything wrong with each season of the shadowhunters tv show would anyone read it?

[thevagabondexpress]

a mad scientist and an angry fanauthor v. the harmful myth of the cinnamon roll. or, some issues a tsc fan sees in tsc, pt. ii

"Alas, Christopher is far more at home with beakers and test tubes than he is with female company. Let's just hope he doesn't pitch poor Rosamund into the refreshment table." — James Herondale, Chain of Gold

Cinnamon roll. You know the term. You've heard it around. I don't know if it's still in use, maybe I'm dating myself with it. But you know what it means.

Think of someone sixteen years or older that you consider to be a cinnamon roll. Get a good picture of that person, fictional or real, in your head.

I was a cinnamon roll for a very long time. That's how my friends treated me, that's how my first girlfriend treated me, and it's even, in a few cases, a monicker they directly applied to me. And I hated it. It showed that they only cared to know me on this superficial level of "adorable baby too good and pure for this world." They didn't care about the less adorable, less innocent, less naïve, and definitely also a high school student and not a child who lay underneath the oversized spectacles, the choice to keep my business to myself (my school friends simply did not need to know what I read and wrote on AO3 or how foul my mouth could get if I wanted it to) and the long-standing hyperfixation. They didn't want to see about the parts of me that didn't fit their precious archetype.

Does this sound familiar?

Enter Christopher Lightwood. I can guarantee you this was his experience, except that never once do we get enough from his point of view in the series to let us actually see it. Maybe I'm just projecting here (because why wouldn't one project onto their fictional crush) but I had issues with the way Cassandra Clare wrote, framed, and treated Christopher long before his narrative's ending in Chain of Thorns. He was mistreated consistently by the narrative, by the society around him, and unconsciously by his own closest friends.

Think about it. He's consistently dismissed, even by those closest to him, as the cinnamon roll, the mad scientist, the one who's bad at social interaction, the one who's definitely not interested in romance, with no input from Christopher himself whatsoever at all to confirm or deny any of these stereotypes. He's constantly belittled, his friends and even his sister treat him like he's six, not sixteen (upon hearing of his death Charles calls him "Little Kit" as if the person in question wasn't two years away from being a legal adult). They seem to think he can't take care of himself just because he's absentminded, nobody ever tells him anything important (Thomas only realizes he should've told Christopher about Alastair once Christopher's gone), and any time he tries to step out of the "mad scientist" box his decisions are questioned and he's thrown right back in. Say what you will about Grace Blackthorn but she and Henry are the only people who actually get Christopher, who not only understand him but make attempts to understand him at more than a superficial level.

And because nobody's obviously outright hurting him and he doesn't have a deadbeat and/or abusive parent and he's pretty good at just keeping a cheerful face on about it because being angry and mean doesn't do anything but make a situation worse, you don't even realize it until you go back through and look for yourself. And I encourage you to look for yourself. I'm only the pastor, I ain't the Bible.

And guess what? Christopher Lightwood is also a textbook cinnamon roll.

Except he's not. There is no such thing as a cinnamon roll. They don't exist, no more than Santa Claus or Alexandria's Genesis. And that person you've just called a cinnamon roll? Yeah, they're gnashing their teeth, ready to scream.

The cinnamon roll is a myth. A harmful myth, one used primarily in three ways: by allo people against ace, aro, and aroace people, by neurotypical people against people with autism, adhd, and similarly-presenting neurodivergences, and by cis and binary trans people against nonbinary people, to infantalize them, to put them in a neatly definable category, and to keep them in that box where they have no power. As a person who is all three: a grey-asexual, nonbinary, and neurodivergent, it was a deeply hurtful label I couldn't escape.

Neither could Christopher.

And in the end, it killed him.

"some issues a tsc fan sees in tsc" is an attempt to break down the unacknowledged things in tsc that i unearthed reading chain of thorns, rereading the rest of the series in preparation for it, and writing two longform fanfics (one of them a genderbent canon reworking) for the last hours. click on the "some issues..." tag to see more of these.

[danrifics]

15 years is a long time...

I've been lucky enough to be here for about 13 of those years and while I didn't get myself too involved in the phandom until 2019, outside of religiously watching phan proof when i was 16, Dan and Phil have been there on my screens since i was a teenager. Their videos quite literally raised me. I would sit and listen to the radio show every week and my friends and I would post about it on facebook, those post still haunt me to this day and make me feel incredibly old every time memories tell me how long ago it was.

I think today is really fitting for me to write a little personal essay on my journey and my feelings here, so i guess if you're interested then you can click the read more <3

I don't know if i fully have the words to describe properly what Dan and Phil and the Phandom mean to me, but i'll try. (I'm gonna do this in context of the last 5 years because that's when i've been most active and when I think they've impacted my life more than they ever did before.)

In 2019, I'd previously been in the Shadowhunters fandom, but as that show finished in May of that year I'd basically lost any form of fandom I had and I felt lost because fandoms are always a big part of my life and to suddenly feel like I didn't have one was hard so in June 2019 when Dan posted his coming out video everything suddenly clicked into place.

This was a community i'd loved from afar for many years and there was an opening for me to jump in. So I did. That was the best thing to ever happen to me. I'm not exaggerating, finding a place in this fandom changed my life for the better.

For the first time in my life I felt like I had friends online, from the first discord server i joined (TY LY Trashcans/ the phannie pack you'll always be famous) to Kris and Leo and to all the amazing mutuals I made, 2019 was really a cool time for me. Unfortunately a lot of these people have come and gone from my life but I often think back to what an impact they all had on me.

And then to my group now, the Rat Relaxation Chat (RRC!!!) without the hiatus ending I wouldn't be friends with any of you guys. See thats the thing, Dan and Phil didn't just bring themselves back into my life. They did something even better, brought the community back. The hiatus was hard, i've seen many of my mutuals just stop posting one day and never come back, it felt like every week we'd get smaller and smaller but then DAPG came back and so did a bunch of people and we even got some new faces and the community picked itself back up again.

As a result of that the RRC was born. For the first time in my life I was meeting my friends outside of discord, from WAD to TIT, Im literally gone end up having met all my best friends <3 (as well as so many mutuals)

I've loved so much over the last 5 years making gifs and memes and video edits and heartbreaking text posts. I'm so grateful for all the people who have ever follewed me, interacted with me, sent me hate messages, All the people who helped me make it possible for so many people to watch the WAD premiere, The people who help me with DGPdaily and the TIT blog.,The other amazing artists and gif makers and writers and archivists and anyone who has ever called themselves a phannie.

The Phandom is special, it's a community like no other. We really are a family, Dan and Phil really are our dads.

It's funny I stared this with full intentions of saying what Dan and Phil meant to me, but in the end it became all about the community they let us build. This is why I can't come up with enough words to tell them what they mean, because they mean the entire world to me because they created that world.

Dan and Phil are my friends, my best friends. They're my heros, the people I look up to most in the world because they make me feel safe and loved and I feel that love now more than I ever have before. Watching them grow older and gayer, watching the confidence grow over the years, watching them find themselves. Its a feeling like no other.

They deserve everything good in the world and i'm so glad to see them so happy and honest and open.

I don't know what the future holds for us but I know whatever it is is gonna be amazing and I hope I get to do this with you all for many more years to come.

15 years is a long time...

[apricusapollo]

teen wolf but it's shadowhunters au and the raeken siblings are the lightwood siblings variants, in this essay i will-

[lawsofchaos1]

Promptlet: Malec Early Meeting

Izzy and Jace start clubbing early because Shadowhunters consider themselves adults around fourteen when they begin full mission status at the Institute. So, sixteen year old Alec just sighs and brings his Advanced Clave Law seminar work to Pandemonium and sits in the corner of the bar with a thick legal text and his battered spiral notebook for his rough draft essays. He doesn’t care if Jace and Izzy are taking field assignments, they’re still his little siblings and need a chaperone.

Magnus, obviously, starts hearing gossip from his bemused bartenders about the young nephilim downing club sodas with lime while frantically highlighting a battered copy of the Accords and decides he needs to figure out what's going on. Immediately.

So, Magnus ends up chatting with Alec (who, as it turns out, really likes the Shirley Temple Magnus snaps up for him in what was supposed to be a joke) and starts flipping through Alec's latest homework assignment. Magnus blinks, snaps up another Shirley Temple to keep Alec busy, and carefully reads the essay twice over, pulling out his own notebook (bound leather and fountain pen with a gold nib of course) halfway through. Alec found a loophole, a big loophole, that would exempt Downworlders from being questioned without notification to their faction leader. 

Alec is an absolute disaster of a baby gay whenever Magnus so much as says hello or looks in his general direction, but, once he starts arguing the Law? He is vicious and ruthless and sharply concise. (Although Magnus becomes a little bit of a disaster himself when Alec absentmindedly starts chewing on his cherry stem while debating the finer points of interpreting The Clave vs. HOTI-Beijing, 1823.)

Ragnor comes over all the way from England just to see Magnus utterly lose his cool at this now seventeen year old shadowhunter who is literally drinking Shirley Temples and eating his weight in the extra cherries the bartenders slip him because they adore him too. Also, in terms of relationship dynamics? I think it would be kind of fun to explore Alec having a gigantic crush on Magnus (and Magnus just kind of utterly adoring Alec in turn between his obvious looks and, more importantly, his intelligence and his sharp humor and just .. everything) but also realizing that Alec is seventeen.

Alec is much more open (not that he had a snowball's chance in hell of hiding his Gigantic Crush on the High Warlock from anyone in Pandemonium except his siblings), and wages what amounts to pretty much open warfare to get Magnus to date him. He's insistent that Shadowhunters don't mature as slowly as mundanes (which.. fair) and makes bulleted lists and actions plans for every reason Magnus tries to say he deserves better/Magnus is too old/Alec is too young/etc.

And.. just how the Downworlders slide a stray Shirley Temple across the table for advice? Alec starts bringing little vouchers for a certain amount of advice time (or maybe little cupcakes or chocolate chip cookies that he makes for Jace and Izzy or something?) and slides them furtively across the table.

"Where might one take the High Warlock of Brooklyn out on a date?"

And then somehow two days later Magnus ends up in Central Park responding to a call from one of his warlocks and instead Alec is waiting there with a picnic lunch and a blanket and looking very, very smug.

This teenage Shadowhunter is outsmarting him. What even is this?

Also, Can you imagine the first time an old fling of Magnus' portals in to Pandemonium for the evening, expecting a night of fun, and the moment they ask where Magnus is at the bar, every Downworlder in hearing distance is glaring? Suddenly a good dozen wolves and vampires put aside their decades old fights and start running interference to keep this brazen interloper away from where Alec is holding court ranting about the Clave's shoddy grammar and lack of consistent position on Oxford commas (which, how dare) and how that can be used to interpret their latest ruling in three different ways, depending on what side you want to fight on.

(Magnus is sighing and staring dreamily from across the table.)

One day, Camille starts her usual nastiness and trying to get Magnus to come crawling back and Magnus feels .. nothing for her. The only thing Magnus feels is rage that Camille would try to interfere when he's clearly ... dating someone now.

And Magnus blinks wildly internally because holy shit he's dating Alec. WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN MAGNUS DOES NOT KNOW

I do think Magnus would hold off on anything physical until Alec was what Magnus considered of age, so think how fun it would be to explore how the two of them date when their primary love language can't include sex?

Think of all the cuddles and the literal sleeping together and the hand holding and the forehead kisses and, excuse me but did I mention the cuddles? I really want Magnus and Alec cuddling on Magnus' throne at Pandemonium after a hard patrol and Alec falling asleep and all the Downworlders just kind of cooing at their very favorite nephilim.

(I also imagine an impressively oblivious pair of siblings who don't realize their brother isn't just moping in a corner while they dance for literal years.)

When Alec is older maybe Jace and Izzy start trying to subtly tell him it's okay to be gay, he doesn't have to hide it - they'll still love him, and Alec is just .. like .... 'what are you talking about?' as he smugly claims his gorgeous boyfriend.