#so the main text of the post still holds true)

[horsechestnut]

I love writing the Vecna Four interacting with each other because you have three characters who internalize everything, and one who will ask the most invasive questions imaginable with zero prompting.

[thef1diary]

Do Not Disturb | M. Verstappen

Summary: Max hates your ex, so when the right opportunity falls right into his hands, he takes it. Even when he's fucking you in the hotel room.

Warnings: 18+, cocky Max, reader is a tease, champagne shenanigans, oral (m receiving), penetrative sex, unprotected sex, degradative terms (barely but just a warning in case)

Word Count: 2.4k

Pairing: max & f!reader

Note: another repost because why not

Max loves winning. Especially winning the first place trophy in his racing career-from karting when he was younger to the F1 races. Although, for a while now, he's been happier. Many people think it's because of his two back to back world championships. While that may be true, he has another reason.

You.

You have known Max for a long time, both growing up together because your parents were good friends. From the moment he began his racing career in the smaller karts, you've been there. From hating the sound of the karts passing by, to loving the sound of F1 cars passing by. You didn't really have a choice because Max always wanted you by his side.

The point is, you've known Max long enough to know everything about him. Even his fans know you as his number one supporter. But what no one knew, was that your friendship has changed overtime. You and Max got to experience things that one normally would in a relationship, without actually being in a relationship.

You two were friends with benefits. It began a few years ago, drunken celebrations led to lingering touches which eventually ended in crossing the line of a regular friendship. There were no regrets but you weren't romantically attracted to him and neither was he, so the decision was made to remain as just friends.

Today, Max had won another race. He stood on the top step of the podium, listening to his country's national anthem with a smile on his face. While he was glad to add another trophy to his collection, he was thinking of all the ways he would be celebrating with you later on. Preferably with you underneath him on his bed, naked.

While you saw him smile towards his team, his expression towards you was slightly different. A difference that no one else knew the meaning behind. See the thing is, you might've told him something when he embraced you after getting out of his car. "A little fact, I'm not wearing anything under this dress"

You knew that no one would hear you because they were too busy cheering for the man in front of you. Max was pulled away by others but his gaze was still on you. Now, as he was standing on the podium, he watched you with a look that only meant mischief.

After the podium celebrations ended, Max was taken away for some post-race interviews where the same questions is asked in different ways.

Knowing that it'll take him a while, you returned to your hotel room. Usually you would stay and converse with some other drivers while he was busy, but today was a different story.

The comment you made wasn't a lie, you truly weren't wearing any undergarments under your dress. It was definitely risky, but you knew that it would spark a reaction out of Max. And you were glad that it did.

You debated whether or not you should send Max a text, something for his eyes only, but decided otherwise because you didn't want anyone else to see. Plus, he should be waiting for his reward. Perhaps another time.

After freshening up, you sat on the couch in the main room, scrolling mindlessly on your phone, waiting for Max to arrive. However, your eyes widened in surprise when you saw a notification from your ex.

It was a text asking if you could meet him. You were debating on either being nice and meeting him once more for closure, or if you should ignore him. The thing was, you didn't like ending on rough terms. You would hate to be in his spot right now, but considering the things your ex has done, you didn't know what to do.

Before you could reply, the door to your hotel room opened and Max walked in. He was holding his trophy in one hand, and the champagne bottle that he got on the podium in the other hand.

Smiling, you got up and embraced him, "congratulations, champion"

"Don't act like you don't know what you did." He retorted, not hugging you back. "Oh I know exactly what I did." You stepped away from him and your hands travelled down his chest, teasing the edge of the hem of his shirt.

"Got me so hard on the fucking podium. Who knows what people will think?" He let your hands roam around his body, close to where he needs it the most.

"Who cares what they think? You looked so hot covered in champagne"

"Yeah? Let me return the favour" Max tilted his head towards the champagne bottle in his hand.

He placed his trophy on the table to free his hand that was itching to touch you. Wrapping that free hand around your waist, he pulled you against him. Then, tilting your head back, he instructed "open"

You obliged, opening your mouth and waiting for the cool champagne to fill your mouth. He didn't stop even after your mouth was full, letting the excess drip down your chin.

"Swallow" he said, watching closely as you listened. Then, he kissed you, savouring the familiar taste of victory that he worked hard for.

Your hands were still roaming around his body, lifting up his shirt by the hem. Parting away just for a moment to remove his shirt, then his lips were back on yours.

His lips travelled lower to your neck, lapping up the champagne that dripped earlier. His two favourite things combined, your taste mixed with the champagne. His mind was buzzing with all the things he wanted to do to you.

Pouring some more champagne on your throat, his tongue darted out to drink it. "Max" you groaned, liking the sensations but also wanting more.

"Gonna cover you in champagne, baby" he whispered as he continued his ministrations. You made a sound, agreeing to his idea. "Make you all sticky with alcohol then with my cum" he continued, and you really liked that suggestion, "fuck yes please"

"Yeah, you want that?" He asked, bringing his face back up and placing a kiss to your lips. You nodded, "yes please, Max" you replied, breathlessly.

Bringing his beloved champagne bottle up again, he smirked as he slowly poured it down the front of your dress. He watched as the cloth stuck to your body, and he also noticed how your nipples hardened underneath. It was due to the mix of pleasure radiating through your body along with the cold champagne.

"You really aren't wearing anything underneath huh?" He believed you when you said it, but seeing it was another thing. "Why bother when I know you are going to remove it after you win" you found your words and explained your reasoning behind the lack of clothes.

"Fuck baby, you knew I was going to win today?" Max loved how much you believed in him. "Not a single doubt otherwise." This time you claimed his lips with yours.

You supported him like no other. And he was so grateful for that; for you.

Pressing up against his chest, he could feel how soaked your dress was and decided to remove it. Blindly finding the zipper on the back, he tugged it down.

Before he could explore your body using his hands, you pressed one more kiss on his lips before sitting down on your knees. Both of you were now quite impatient, and it was evident in your actions.

Quickly removing his belt and tugging the last layer of clothes down to his knees, you paused for a moment. You placed your hands on his thighs and made eye contact with him, noting how he was already looking down at you. "Want a reward for winning?" You asked rhetorically.

Max nodded, "yes, give me your filthy mouth that loves my cock"

You wrapped your lips around his tip, not taking him any further. You can tell that Max is restraining himself from thrusting in your mouth, and for a brief moment you go deeper but then remove your mouth. "You want my mouth?" You asked, teasingly.

"Fuck yes. I want you" he replies, groaning. You almost break out in a smile but contain yourself, "ask nicely."

Max's glare tells you that if it were up to him, you'd be on all fours with your face pressed in the mattress. But, he also knows that even though you're the one that's on your knees, you have all the power right now.

"Please, I need you so bad. Make me feel good please?" He gave in, listening to you. And man, he definitely felt like a winner when you took almost all of him in one movement.

His hand was resting on your head, tempted to force you to take more. You loved the sounds he was making above you when you would brush against a good spot. You noticed every little movement of his; how his breath would hitch when you moaned, how his abs would tense as if he's trying to hold himself back, and the way he would wrap your hair around his fingers tightly.

Right now, all your focus was on pleasuring Max. After all, he is the winner. And you'd be down on your knees to do this every time he wins, because you love it as much as he does.

Sucking greedily on his cock along with his dirty words made a shiver run down your spine. You two were in for a long night, willing to spend a couple hours in each other's presence.

Max was looking at the way his cock made a bulge in your mouth as you tried taking all of him. You knew you couldn't, but you tested the limits. But, his eyes darted around until he could find your phone since he heard it ringing. It was on the couch that you were sitting on earlier, and the screen was facing up which meant he could see the caller id.

He wanted to make a comment on it especially after knowing that it was your ex calling, but you didn't give him a chance to do so. To bring his focus back to you, you put your hand on top on his that was resting on your head, and urged him to force you deeper.

You both simultaneously let out sounds which drowned out the sound of the incessant ringing, making Max forget about it all.

You knew he was close so you pulled off after deeply sucking him one last time, then replaced your mouth with your hand. "Gonna cover me in your cum?" You asked, looking at him as he figured why you pulled away.

The height of his pleasure almost made him close his eyes but he chose to force them open so he could see how his cum coated your chest.

Once you knew he finished, you removed your hand from him and dragged it through the cum on your chest, coating your finger. Then, knowing that he was watching every move, you cleaned off your finger using your tongue.

"You look so pretty baby" he commented as he helped you stand up.

The thing about Max, is that he would be ready for another round in no time. His stamina and refractory period was unbeatable. "You weren't really nice to me so I don't know if I should fuck you." He told you, holding back a smirk when you pouted. "I know you want to, baby. My pussy's so wet because of you."

"Is it now? Waiting for me to fuck you dumb? That's what you want right?" Max asked as his hand travelled down your body, just barely touching you like you wanted him to.

"Yes, fuck me dumb" you pleaded and he positioned you on the couch to lay on your back. Wrapping your legs around his waist, you pulled him closer.

There was barely any resistance when he slid in you due to your wetness that had dropped down to your thighs. "So perfect for me" Max groaned as he felt you clenching around him, causing his hips to stutter since he already orgasmed once.

Max's hands were on your thighs but he moved one to drag up towards the pool of his cum still resting on your body. He would definitely clean you up later, but right now, seeing you like this did something to him. And he liked it.

His two coated fingers tapped your lips and you opened your mouth, taking them in. Once you sucked them clean, he removed his fingers which was now coated with your saliva, and teased your clit.

You arched your back, feeling every single thrust deep, especially after he easily found the perfect spot and kept a relentless pace. Your hands were balling up in fists, tightly gripping on the sheets.

You were so caught up in your pleasure that you didn't hear your phone ringing again, until Max picked it up. "She's too busy being fucked by me" is what you first heard him say to the person on the other side. It didn't take a genius to figure out who it was.

For some reason, that edged you even closer to your release. "Here, listen to her because you'll never get the chance again." Max told your ex, and held the phone closer to you so the man on the other end could hear your moans only meant for Max.

At the same time, his thrusts became stronger and faster. With that plus his fingers circling your clit caused you to moan Max's name out loud as you came undone.

Your ex heard it all. Max slowed his thrusts but didn't completely stop to prolong your orgasm, and held the phone to his ear again. "Don't you dare think about calling her again." He instructed before hanging up and tossing the phone to the side.

You were all fucked out, just like he wanted, looking up at him with a small smile. Seeing Max's smug expression, you forgot about any embarrassment regarding the fact that your ex heard you moan Max's name.

[yazthebookish]

Maybe I'll spoil you guys and talk about Gwynriel and ACOTAR5 and anything related to it overall. I recently finished my HOFAS reread and have some fresh thoughts. I'll let my thoughts guide me and some of these points I've already addressed in my insta stories yesterday. I just rather share a lengthy post here since I'll only tag under #gwynriel.

I often see arguments about how Gwyn and Azriel can't move the plot forward because the series is centered on the Archeron sisters.

First, that's not true because Sarah is following what she called "a traditional romance route". She's following the same patterns of Nalini Singh, Kresley Cole, and Lisa Kleypas where they publish multiple books in the same series following different couples.

This is fitting for a series like ACOTAR because it's romance-centered. And Sarah have already said that each couple is getting one book and there will likely be more books beyond ACOTAR6.

Saying that doesn't dismiss the importance of the sisters to the story, Feyre already has a trilogy centered on her. The spin-off just follows different characters including the sisters.

I won't try hard to convince people on this because I've already posted almost everything Sarah said about the spin-off series and what's it's about. So if the next book is not centered on an Archeron sister, that's for Sarah to bamboozle the fandom with.

One thing that stuck out to me is when I compared the ending of ACOSF with the scene of Bryce giving Nesta Gwydion and seeming like she left Nesta with a new quest.

First, this is what the text says, and this is Chapter 80, the very last chapter in ACOSF:

Succeeding in the Blood Rite didn't mean the training stopped. No, after she and her friends told Cassian and Azriel most of the details of their ordeal, the two commanders had compiled a long list of mistakes that the three of them had made that needed to be corrected, and the others wanted to learn from them, too. So they would keep training, until they were all well and truly Valkyries. Gwyn, despite the Rite, had returned to living in the library.

1. The Valkyries are not yet a unit.

2. SJM only and specifically highlighted that Gwyn, despite the Rite, returned to living in the library. It was like "hey, remember all the talk Gwyn did about wanting to leave the library after two years? Yeah that's on hold a bit but keep that in mind". She didnt even add Emerie or the other priestesses to that sentence.

With Nesta being left with Gwydion to find out why the 8-pointed star was tattooed on her, I don't think the next book will start with "hey Elain take this sword and deal with it". Who are Nesta's main companions now? Gwyn and Emerie.

I'll be back to the Valkyries but let's just talk about Azriel for a bit.

It is so painfully obvious to me that Azriel is being handed the Illyrian plot on a golden platter. How big or small of a plot it is depends on SJM, but it's important based on the fact that she fleshed out the Illyrian's origins and tied them to the crossover AND making Truth-teller the knife of Enalius.

That is a big deal for an Illyrian like Azriel.

And I quote my friend Lacie on this, it is very poetic for Azriel to be the owner of the knife that originally belonged to the person who freed his own people from the Daglan's clutches, perhaps because he saw his people are more than just slaves to the Daglan—how powerful would it be for Azriel, who loathes his own people, to parallel Enalius.

And for years some people were against Azriel dealing with this plot because he shouldn't make peace with his "abusers", its true his own family and some Illyrians failed him but he is condemning an entire population. Good people like Emerie and Balthazar. Even Rhys's mother, who had valid reasons to hate her people especially as a female, still made sure to make Rhysand connect with his Illyrian heritage and he even goes on to say that his mother didn't forget what they did to her but still loved her people.

If both Cassian and Rhysand (and by extension the author) continue to flag Azriel's hatred of the Illyrians as an issue—then it is a damn big issue for it to be addressed repeatedly.

Okay so to address my final point about Gwyn and Azriel and how they can move the plot forward.

Now I didn't detail out much about what the next book will deal with because that's another post (and I already have a post on that).

All of our theories and predictions are based on information that is available to us. Saying Azriel and Gwyn cannot move the plot forward does not make any sense because the central plot is tied to multiple characters, Archeron or not.

If SJM wants to make a character move the next book's plot forward, she can do it because she's in control of the story. She's in control of the narrative. She's in control of the characters.

The characters are puppets and this is an unfinished story. If some characters would add more value and make for a more interesting story before the others, she can decide on that. If she wants to make Eris the protagonist of the next book, she can easily do that whether the fandom wants it or not.

Let me give you an example of minor characters that pushed the plot forward and became main characters: Yrene Towers and the Hind. These kind of arguments could've been used for them in HOEAB or HOSAB and Pre-TOD. Before HOSAB/HOFAS and TOD, could we have predicted that they would have played a crucial role before those books? Not likely because they had minimal appearances and were not part of the main cast. This is what I'm talking about.

You can't know how a character will contribute to a story until you see how it all unfolds. We can make guesses on the information we have which is why I believe three characters are likely to join the main cast: Gwyn, Emerie, and Eris.

Why is it so easy to accept that Emerie might be sharing a book with an original character like Mor but it's hard to comprehend the fact that Gwyn could also share a book with Azriel? Because Emerie showed up in ACOFAS? To me that's not really a strong argument based on Sarah's writing and what we have in the books, she doesn't really pick based on who showed up the earliest. Here's a good example: Hypaxia, who showed up earlier, didn't even get her own chapters but the Hind did.

And there's one argument I recall about how I need to rely on Nesta to have a plot focused on Gwyn or the Valkyries in the next book. Nesta's arc is clearly not over based on HOFAS, but does that mean she's getting a POV? Not necessarily. I don't think she is. Gwyn is the perfect candidate for us to see what's going on with Nesta post-HOFAS and how they all deal with the Valkyries and whatever Sarah will set up with them.

There is this whole Valkyrie/Illyrian conflict that could be triggered as a result of the Blood Rite, with Ramiel definitely being an important location to explore in the next book, we also have the Pegasi and the Prison and the implications of the crossover. It makes sense to have an Illyrian and a Valkyrie POV to deal with some plots in the next book.

"Gwyn contributes to nothing" we can't know until the book is out. How sure are we that maybe SJM won't connect her to the crossover by making her mysterious father a Worldwalker? Or Prince of Hel? Or an Asteri? Maybe I'm right maybe I'm wrong.

"But Koschei! And the Human Queens!" Koschei will always be a background player pulling on the strings until the final book as it's obvious he is the big bad in the series, unless someone even worse is revealed. But no one is dismissing Koschei or the Human Queens messing around.

Literally what's the point of the story or the fun elements of surprises or plot twists if you need Sarah to list down everything that the next books will deal with. That's not how a story develops to me. I don't need to know everything in advance to just know how it will go. That's like knowing spoilers early on and checking off with each book what happened and what didn't happen. I feel like it's close to how a lot of readers were disappointed with not having enough ACOTAR in HOFAS, because Sarah implied half of the book would be set in Prythian. So by the time the book came out and it wasn't that, people were vocal about it.

In my opinion, SJM set a good foundation for Gwyn's arc to build up on in ACOSF and her arc is not over. We won't get mentions of her still carrying the guilt of her sister's death or not leaving the library after she said she's sick of being there for two years without us seeing resolution for that. She wouldn't be in Azriel's bonus chapter if she is not involved with him.

To conclude, my reread still affirms to me that the next book with an Azriel/Gwyn book. Azriel is clearly being set in the forefront.

[leighsartworks216]

But they cradled me, yes?

Sylus x gn!Reader

Based on this post

Warnings: blood, super vague refs to Sylus's route (what we can guess at, anyway), slight angst, bittersweet

Word Count: 707 (nice)

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Love and Deepspace Masterlist

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You think of all the things Sylus has done before you met him, sometimes. It’s unfathomable, at best, but you can’t help it.

When he texts you, asking if you’re alright when you send a distraught crow emoji, you wonder if he’s said those words to someone else before.

When he uses his Evol to snag a rare plushie from the claw machine and hands it over, telling you that you just need to say the word and he’d do anything for you, you have to wonder if you’re the only one that is true for.

When he drapes his jacket over your shoulders at a formal event - to keep you warm or hide you from prying eyes, you’re not sure - and he tucks it around your front to ensure it won’t slip off, you have to wonder if you’re the first person to wear his clothes like this.

And you’ll never know.

On some levels, that’s a wonderful thing. When you first met Sylus, when he used his Evol to hold and manipulate you into trying to Resonate with him, when he tried to alter you to reach his goals, you’re more than certain you only got a brief glimpse into who he was before then.

You still see the aftershocks of that carefully instilled terror. In the world around him, it manifests as stares and frightened whispers, devotions of followers terrified to incur his wrath. In you, it made you flinch when he tried holding your hand.

The first time he tried, it was a lovely night. He’d taken you shopping, encouraging you to get anything that caught your eye, carrying bags from different stores effortlessly while he followed along. Then, he took you to dinner. He treated you to the finest cuisine possible, tempting you into trying nearly every item on the menu. Afterwards, he led you up to the rooftop to see the stars twinkling down on the N109 Zone. You think they shine brighter in the harsh territory he calls home.

His fingers had brushed your hand, and you’d startled away, wide eyed and frightened. He’d retracted his touch immediately, apologizing with a slight smile. Once the initial fear ebbed, you’d tried apologizing for reacting that way. But he’d silenced you sharply, saying you did not have to be sorry for a hurt he caused.

He didn’t try to hold your hand again after that. When you felt safe enough, you’d slipped your hand in his, palms pressed close and fingers intertwined. He’d looked down at you with a tenderness you’d never seen before.

You wonder just how much further that hurt runs, for him to be where he is today.

But what does it matter? Where he is today is with you, watching a cheesy romance film in his home, curled together on the couch. He holds your hand, rubbing his thumb along your knuckles. When you look over, he’s not watching the screen anymore.

You tease him about missing the movie, but he says he’ll have time to watch it again. But this time, he wants to savor your reactions, while they’re their most genuine.

The characters in the background are forgotten as he lets your hand go, shifting to cup your face in both his hands. His eyes flit across your face, before settling on your eyes.

He uses his hold to tilt your head where he can reach, before leaning forward to press his lips to your forehead.

There are times with him when you feel sticky, warm liquids on your hands. The lines between hallucination and reality blur when you look down and see blood staining your palms, your fingers.

Sometimes they’re so drenched, you can’t see any exposed skin past your wrist.

You don’t know what these glimpses mean yet. What they’re trying to tell you. But you can’t shake the feeling deep in your gut that they’re real, fragments of a past life you’ve forgotten.

You reach up to hold his own face in your hands, smiling at him as you draw him down to return the favor.

There is blood on both of your hands.

What does it matter? So long as you cradle each other so softly, the blood can be washed away.

[annabelle--cane]

it's fascinating to me the way that different social media platforms result in different types of fandom behavior. while s5 of tma was airing, I spent a good amount of time on tma tiktok (I log back in about once every two months now, going back to in-person school after a year a half of lockdown seem to re-blanace my brain and made me once again not really enjoy the format) while still using tumblr as my main socmed, and while there was a lot of overlap in the fan culture, some things were notably different.

tumblr tma fans had near-encyclopedic knowledge of the source material, but it was kind of an ongoing joke for tiktok tma fans that everyone binged the whole show in a week-long fugue state and lost memory of about 35% of it. tumblr has virtually no character limit and allows posts to be passed around by users indefinitely, which lends itself to fairly in-depth meta analysis being made and shared until most any fan could say "the time and space discrepancies at hill top road? psh yeah, I know all about them, I've read seven scrupulously cited posts that lay out all the details." for the entire time that s5 was airing, tiktok videos could still only be a minute long, and I know from a lot of personal effort that there's only so much you can fit into a one minute script that you also have to memorize and record (and cc manually with tiktok text stickers, as they didn't add the caption feature until april 2021) if you want the process to take less than four hours of your one mortal human life. and then you only see the video if your following or fyp algorithm shows it to you. there were a few tma meta-ish videos that got popular because other people would make their own videos referencing them and tag the account so their followers could see what they were talking about, but it's much harder to circulate content you like there. several times I saw people post videos saying "I got into cosplay to film some [agnes or annabelle or gerry or another secondary character] and I just realized I have no idea what their deal actually is 💀".

a thing that tiktok tma fandom was definitely better at than tumblr tma fandom was accurately remembering certain pieces of characterization and the flow of certain scenes. I've seen a bunch of posts on here where someone is trying to argue a point with excerpts from the text ("x character is nicer than you all give them credit for" "x character is so mean to y character in this scene" "z theory can't be true because y character said a line that disproves it") where the argument only holds up because the poster has gotten these excerpts from a transcript dive and hasn't listened to the episodes they're from recently, because while the text alone can be construed to mean one thing, the way it's delivered on-podcast clearly intends another. tiktok, being an audio and video based medium, allows audio clips to be shared around a lot, and cosplayers would often all make videos acting along to the same show clips of juicy interpersonal drama, and so tiktok fans, though they may have had less overall memory of what characters said, always had a better grasp on how they said it. an average tiktok tma fan might not have remembered melanie's subplot about war ghosts, but they would know the nuances of how the way she talks to jon changes between mag 28 and mag 155.

[angelsdean]

I need people to understand how S&P (standards and practices) works in television and how much influence they have over what gets to stay IN an episode of a show and how the big time network execs are the ones holding the purse strings and making final decisions on a show's content, not the writers / showrunners / creatives involved.

So many creators have shared S&P notes over the years of the wild and nonsensical things networks wanted them to omit / change / forbid. Most famously on tumblr, I've seen it so many times, is the notes from Gravity Falls. But here's a post compiling a bunch of particularly bad ones from various networks too. Do you see the things they're asking to be changed / cut ?

Now imagine, anything you want to get into your show and actually air has to get through S&P and the network execs. A lot of creators have had to resort to underhanded methods. A lot of creators have had to relegate things to subtext and innuendo and scenes that are "open to interpretation" instead of explicit in meaning. Things have had to be coded and symbolized. And they're relying on their audience to be good readers, good at media literacy, to notice and get it. This stuff isn't the ramblings of conspiracy theorists, it's the true practices creatives have had to use to be able to tell diverse stories for ages. The Hays Code is pretty well known, it exists because of censorship. It was a way to symbolize certain things and get past censors.

Queercoding, in particular, has been used for ages in both visual media and literature do signal to queer audiences that yes, this character is one of us, but no, we can't be explicit about it because TPTB won't allow it. It's a wink-wink, nudge-nudge to those in the know. It's the deliberate use of certain queer imagery / clothing / mannerisms / phrases / references to other queer media / subtle glances and lingering touches. Things that offer plausible deniability and can be explained away or go unnoticed by straight audiences to get past those network censors. But that queer viewers WILL (hopefully) pick up on.

Because, unfortunately, still to this day, a lot of antiquated network execs don't think queer narratives are profitable. They don't think they'll appeal to general audiences, because that's what matters, whatever appeals to most of the audience demographic so they can keep watching and keep making the network more money. The networks don't care about telling good stories! Most of them are old white cishet business men, not creatives. They don't care about character arcs and what will make fans happy. They don't care about storytelling. What they care about is profit and they're basing their ideas of what's profitable on what they believe is the predominate target demographic, usually white cis heterosexual audiences.

So, imagine a show that started airing in the early 2000s. Imagine a show where the two main characters are based on two characters from a famous Beat Generation novel, where one of the characters is queer! based on a real like bisexual man! The creator is aware of this, most definitely. And sure, it's 2005, there's no way they were thinking of making that explicit about Dean in the text because it just wouldn't fly back then to have a main character be queer. But! it's made subtext. And there are nods to that queerness placed in the text. Things that are open to interpretation. Things that are drenched in metaphor (looking at you 1x06 Skin "I know I'm a freak" "maybe this thing was born human but was different...hated. Until he learned to become someone else.") Things that are blink-and-you-miss-it and left to plausible deniability (things like seemingly spending an hour in the men's bathroom, or always reacting a little vulnerable and awkward when you're clocked instead of laughing it off and making a homophobic joke abt it)

And then, years later there's a ship! It's popular and at first the writers aren't really seriously thinking about it but they'll throw the fans a bone here and there. Then, some writers do get on the destiel train and start actively writing scenes for them that are suggestive. And only a fraction of what they write actually makes it into the text. So many lines left on the cutting room floor: i love past you. i forgive you i love you. i lost cas and it damn near broke me. spread cas's ashes alone. of course i wanted you to stay. if cas were here. -- etc. Everything cut was not cut by the writers! Why would a writer write something to then sabotage their own story and cut it? No, these are things that didn't make it past the network. Somewhere a note was made maybe "too gay" or "don't feed the shippers" or simply "no destiel."

So, "no destiel." That's pretty clearly the message we got from the CW for years. "No destiel. Destiel will alienate our general audience. Two of our main characters being queer? And in a relationship? No way." So what can the pro-destiel creatives involved do, if the network is saying no? What can the writers do if most of their explicit destiel (or queer dean) lines / moments are getting cut? Relegate things to subtext. Make jokes that straight people can wave off but queer people can read into. Make costuming and set design choices that the hardcore fans who are already looking will notice while the general audience and the out-of-touch network execs won't blink and eye at (I'm looking at you Jerry and your lamps and disappearing second nightstands and your gay flamingo bar!)

And then, when the audience asks, "is destiel real? is this proof of destiel?" what can the creatives do but deny? Yes, it hurts, to be told "No no I don't know what you're talking about. There's no destiel in supernatural" a la "there is no war in Ba Sing Se" but! if the network said "no destiel!" and you and your creative team have been working to keep putting destiel in the subtext of the narrative in a way that will get past censors, you can't just go "Yes, actually, all that subtext and symbolism you're picking up, yea it's because destiel is actually in the narrative."

But, there's a BIG difference between actively putting queer themes and subtext into the narrative and then saying it's not there (but it is! and the audience sees it!) versus NOT putting any queer content into the text but SAYING it is there to entice queer fans to continue watching. The latter, is textbook queerbaiting. The former? Is not. The former is the tactics so many creatives have had to use for years, decades, centuries, to get past censorship and signal to those in the know that yea, characters like you are here, they exist in this story.

Were the spn writers perfect? No, absolutely not. And I don't think every instance of queer content was a secret signal. Some stuff, depending on the writer, might've been a period-typical gay joke. These writers are flawed. But it's no secret that there were pro-destiel writers in the writing room throughout the years, and that efforts were made to make it explicitly canon (the market research!)

So no, the writers weren't ever perfect or a homogeneous entity. But they definitely were fighting an uphill battle constantly for 15 yrs against S&P and network execs with antiquated ideas of what's profitable / appealing.

Spn even called out the networks before, on the show, using a silly example of complaints abt the lighting of the show and how dark the early seasons were. Brightening the later seasons wasn't a creative choice, but a network choice. And if the networks can complain abt and change something as trivial as the lighting of a show, they definitely are having a hand in influencing the content of the show, especially queer content.

Even in s15, (seasons fifteen!!!) Misha has said he worried Castiel's confession would not air. In 2020!!! And Jensen recorded that scene on his personal phone! Why? Sure, for the memories. But also, I do not doubt for a second that part of it was for insurance, should the scene mysteriously disappear completely. We've seen the finale script. We've seen the omitted omitted omitted scenes. We all saw how they hacked the confession scene to bits. The weird cuts and close-ups. That's not the writers doing. That's likely not even the editors (willingly). That's orders from on high. All of the fuckery we saw in s15 reeks of network interference. Writers are not trying to sabotage their own stories, believe me.

Anyways, TLDR: Networks have a lot more power than many think and they get final say in what makes it to air. And for years creative teams have had to find ways to get past network censorship if they want "banned" or "unapproved" "unprofitable" "unwanted" content to make it into the show. That means relying on techniques like symbolism, subtext, and queercoding, and then shutting up about it. Denying its there, saying it's all "open to interpretation" all while they continue to put that open to interpretation content into the show. And that's not queerbaiting, as frustrating as it might be for queer audiences to be told that what they're seeing isn't there, it's still not queerbaiting. Queerbaiting is a marketing technique to draw in queer fans by baiting them with the promise of queer content and then having no queer content in said media. But if you are picking up on queer themes / subtext / symbolism / coding that is in front of your face IN the text, that's not queerbaiting. It's there, covertly, for you, because someone higher up didn't want it to be there explicitly or at all.

[purpledemonlilyposting]

Responding to Lily Orchard on Utena

So I already talked about how Lily Orchard never watched Revolutionary Girl Utena and doesn't understand it on my main blog, and now she's trying to invoke the arguments I've had with other morons who have never watched and don't understand Revolutionary Girl Utena. Discussion beneath the cut!

[Lily's Post]

Here Lily and the little zoomers on Twitter who have never engaged with Utena beyond making a tumblr mood board, let me hold your hand through episode 33 The Prince Who Runs Through the Night from my "Let's Watch Utena" livestream from a few months ago. Uploaded unlisted:

Going "um sweaty she's a minor!!!???" instead of engaging with the actual text just stalls any meaningful discussion about the purpose of this episode within the narrative. Utena is a surrealistic piece that operates entirely on hazy dream logic. Trying to bring in real world ethics outside of the text into Akio's seduction Utena is simply irrelevant to what is being communicated. It would be like stalling every discussion about a revenge plot movie with "but murder is illegal!"

As I said on the stream Akio's seduction of Utena is Faustian. He is the devil pulling her further away from her gender role defiant values and her true purpose of saving Anthy from her eternal suffering, as she was spurred to do by the spirit of Dios. He is also using her because he thinks the Sword of Dios he can draw from her will be the key to opening the seal to the "Power of Revolution". But Akio can never regain the power of the Prince again, as he's a corrupt adult now. The ideal of the Prince that exists in both the hearts of Anthy and Utena.

This is a series you have to take within its own symbolic language. It is not interested in being realistic or straight forward. It's heavily influenced by experimental stage theater. Ikuhara purposefully wanted it to be tonally mismatched to put the audience in the mindset of the world.

On the next point:

I've been into Utena for 28 years. I've read lots of essays on it and have listened to many interpretations of it. I have no idea where this idea that Utena "rejects" Dios is suddenly coming from. I'll reiterate from the debate I had about this on Twitter:

Dios, the actual spirit of the ideal of the Prince, whose spirit she calls down during duels, who has only ever spoken to Utena in the space between life and death, appears here to Utena as the duel song chorus swells with "I exist! I'm here!"

Dios kisses her ring

And Utena finds the strength to get back up.

And when Akio is about to drain away the remainder of Utena's life? Dios, his presence completely unnoticed by Akio, quietly disappears behind the glass of pink liquid Akio is drinking. Never to be seen again. Dios has been Utena's ally throughout the entire show. Embodying the ideal of the Prince without having to be a prince is how she frees Anthy.

She puts her fist to the floor to lift herself up with the hand the ring is on. At no point does she "shatter the ring" as this person on Twitter tried to claim:

She has the intact ring still on for the rest of the episode. Because the ring represents her promise to free Anthy. You can watch the damn scenes yourself. The entire show is available on YouTube. I'd recommend watching the entire series first but here's the finale.

Wherever these painfully incorrect surface level readings of Utena are coming from please stop reading them and go to Ohtori.nu I beg.

[goo-berz]

Talking about Vivziepops' weird art of minors

I've never been the biggest fan of Vivziepop, I've always knew about their weird behavior (since like 2018 ~ 2019) before they were as popular as they are now.

She has done a lot of weird stuff but the thing I mainly wanna focus on in this post is their character Addison. Addison is a 17 year old gay effeminate fox humanoid from Zoophobia, he's in a relationship with a 19 year old Teacher's assistant named Gustav. Many people get confused by this but Addison has been CONFIRMED to be 17 years old by Vivziepop. Someone had changed Addison's Fandom Wiki page back in 2019 to say they're 18, when this is not true, Vivzie has confirmed they're 17. I did go back and change the age to 17 on the Wiki with the correct age in hopes that people stop believing incorrect information.

Vivzie confirming their age: https://twitter.com/vivziepop/status/1128064633166712832

The tags in this post brings up the fact that Addison is nearly 18 - not 18 yet - They're still 17.

Edit: Oh yeah, I want to add on context to this tag: "I should mention the characters canon ages are higher then when I first made them because as I wrote the story any big age gaps were uncomfy"

I've heard multiple older fans of Vivziepop say that Addison was originally meant to be 14-15 years old, and I've heard that Gustav was originally meant to be in his 30s.

Addison was created 2010, She began shipping Gustav with Addison in 2011, and Zoophobia began in 2012. So the fact she shipped a 14-15 year old character with a 30 year old one to begin with, and encouraged her friend to draw intense NSFW art of them together is so.. weird.

Anyways, Vivzie also hints at Addison being a minor, using wording indicating how young they are in age in their Blogpost introducing the character

"I finally created a few concepts, but the one I have been toying with the most is a young character much like Gale. An albino boy, with an identical albino sister"

If you need more proof, Addison is also preyed on by Mirage, a character that SPECIFICALLY goes after minors... that's basically her main personality trait, that she's a p3d0. She goes after Addison because he's a young submissive boy and easy to manipulate.

Anyways, back on topic. I personally I don't see anything wrong with the age gap of 17 & 19, however I do think it's weird to have this relationship between Addison and Gustav.. he's not exactly a teacher, but he still holds power over Addison due to the fact he's the voluntary teacher's assistant. Back when Zoophobia was popular there were people who found this dynamic weird & creepy considering the fact that Addison is basically a student under Gustav. Also, I just wanna bring this up because I find this weird, Gustav was originally under the impression that Addison was a year one student and much younger than he actually is, yet he still tried to flirt with him.. erm..? Yeah..

Anyways, that isn't the main point. The point is that Vivzie DREW NSFW OF HER 17 YEAR OLD CHARACTER AND HIS 19 YEAR OLD TEACHER... erm.. holy cracker balls? Literally how can anyone excuse these?

Vivzie also drew Gore of Addison too, but I won't post it here cus it's very graphic and weird and idk why she drew it!!

And .. possibly the worst drawing of them all.. Holy titties what is this... If you're wondering, the stuff under the censors is ACTUAL NSFW. It's not suggestive, or implied s3x, It's their ACTUAL WEE WEEs.

These accounts are poorly archived, so it's hard to find the original post and what it originally said. However after some digging I was able to find out the original text said

“ dollcreep: “ i can only see ‘dark-Günter’ exposing him and addi to a public area like so…so. yeah. Günter says; merry Christmas. god this question is super old. vivz reminded me about it"

So, I'm assuming that Dollcreep drew this, not Vivzie. However I was also able to find out from the limited resources there is that Vivzie reposted this to her accounts Vivzie-zp (unarchived) and ZPanswers, which are also now deleted, but if you view the accounts tumblr archives over the Wayback machine you can see that she did indeed repost this. http://web.archive.org/web/20120801182958/http://zpanswers.tumblr.com/archive

If you don't know, Dollcreep and Vivzie used to be best friends, however aren't anymore. Dollcreep originally designed Gustav, originally named Gunter, and Vivzie bought the design from them. Vivzie designed Addison back around 2010, and taking into account the old caption, this means that Vivzie.. allowed Dollcreep to draw NSFW art of their underaged character ;-; oh my gawd!!! Whatthe heck guys... like I said at this time Addison was still 14 - 15 and Gustav (Gunter) was in his 30s.

Also I want to mention that this drawing was from 2011, so that means Vivzie had this pedophilic ship with Dollcreeps OC for years, & after she bought the rights to the character she decided to.. keep the pedophilic ship and write it into Zoophobia by making him Addisons teacher. That's crazy..?

Anyways, because I brought up Mirage. Mirage is written pretty bad. She was a character meant to be in.. or scrapped from Zoophobia, she was meant to be a villain who preyed on the kids, mainly Addison. Her main trait is that she likes kids

Vivzie's made a bunch of drawings of Mirage preying on kids which I think is pretty weird, especially considering how poorly some of them represent it and make it seem like a joke instead.

and yeah, we all know about this infamous drawing she made of Mirage preying on Kestrel, a 14 year old. Pretty weird

Also when I looked at the web archive of Vivzie's ZPanswers blog (a Zoophobia ask blog) she accepted many weird asks about Kestrel, 14, and Addison, 17, like an ask asking if Kestrel had ever been fucked by a horse & how Kestrel, Addison & others would act when they were drunk. Which is also pretty weird to me I won't lie

Anyways that's all for now. Sorry if this is all over the place its 4am and I just wanted to get my thoughts out that vivziepop is kinda a weirdo

[hongluboobs]

tumblr user hong lu boobs have you played any of the new canto yet im very interested in your thoughts

Yes I do!!! I don't want to make a big post on Some Of The Stuff til the whole canto is up (if you are aware of this account and some of my recent postings it may become aware of what i am talking about) but ohhghghgh. This shit Re Awakened the naive cyanism in me!! I thought it was gone. I thought I was over Hong Lu! I haven't even been doing my dailies and weeklies as of late that's how out of it i've been. but NOPE!! We are sooooo limback babey!!

(i apologize for yapping about hong lu right off the bat. its not that guy's turn yet. it's don's world and we are all just living it, but with the way don's character is structured my brain goes more towards a "wait and see" approach for her. I know it'll be awesome and i Am invested but like. this is hong lu boobs dot tumblr dot com. I'm sorry women)

I'll put some basic stuff above the cut and then some more spoiler-y stuff below.

HUGE fan of the presentation this canto. PJM continues to get crazier with this stuff every canto and this is no exception.

In the light of that previous bullet, I am fully expecting some meta fuckery here. They've pulled some cool stuff at the ends of cantos 5 and 6 but. this is the sinner about delusion/unreality! I Live In Fear of whatever pm is cooking.

The setting is also REALLY fun. whenever I saw a new battle bg i was cheering and clapping. they're all so fun and whimsical and there's so much potential for interesting things

I really like seeing how people dress in the north of the city! We've had so many new factions/branches of factions thrown at us so far and I love a lot of the outfits! Will this still hold true when I try to draw them and get upset at the level of detail after drawing standard formalwear on pm characters for so long? Maybe!

The CGs have been really clean so far? As an artist I get worried about this stuff sometimes because it's a lot of work to get done but all the ones I've seen so far are really nice :)

If you aren't reading passives and status effects this canto. do that. my brain might be a little too small atm to comprehend some of the gimmicks w the main enemy type but some of the wording in the enemies passives may be hinting at things. Also some of them are really funny

this Might be my favorite direction they've taken the OST? Honestly it's so hard to pick because this ost NEVER misses but I've been typing this whole thing to that one boss's theme (you know the one)

If you've played through the first part of the canto, feel free to click through the read more for some of my thoughts that delve more into spoiler territory

I am so intimidated anytime the screen goes black and I have to deal with various colored text and Scary Voiceover. I cannot say much on it aside from just how scared i get whenever it happens. I'm pretty bad at identifying voices (especially if i don't understand the language) but these lines just get. so interesting

Here they are all together for my convenience (and potentially yours :) )

I don't have a ton to say on it especially because anything I say can be proven wrong Very Quickly and I am not a don quixote scholar but I think the "Please, please! I don't want an adventure, stop! Please!" line from (who i assume to me) second kindred don is VERY interesting. much to think about regardless!

UPDATE: while I was writing this my buddy lu-is-not-ok (follow him. if you like what I do you'll like what he does.) sent me this image.

Yep, we've got identity stuff going on. Yellow seems to be Our Don Quixote (It's her text color, at least, but back then she'd be the bloodfiend second kindred, hence being able to obliterate that bear immediately, and acting less in line with the DQ we know and love) while red is... maybe the original don quixote? The original owner of rocinate at least,("Your running shoes look like they could fetch a nice price...") who seems obsessed with justice and fixers like ours. I haven't read the book so I don't feel like I can add a ton more to this aside from flat speculation but I am very interested in how this develops.

Ok now I want to talk about Hong Lu stuff. Let's ignore the elephant in the room for just a second :)

I'm a big fan of the exchange between Dante, Verg, and Hong Lu. THERE IS SO MUCH CONCERNING FORESHADOWING IN HERE!!!!! OH MY GOG. I can't handle it.

the specific wording of "the most lucid one" is SO interesting to me. fully expecting these cantos to be a True Combo. I was already anticipating it because they both have so much to do with rules and the boundary of reality and delusion but with the familial hierarchy theme present in bloodfiends its Definitely happening. And the light in Hong Lu's left eye going dimmer??? with the water theming being used??? Gloom/sinking themed distortion Please Please Please. you're nothing. Theres some water connections from the book irt the land of illusion (near the end bao-yu's enlightenment is seen as realizing that everything is akin to moonlight mirrored in the water- it ultimately doesn't matter and everything predestined to happen will occur regardless) and this water theming is present in Hong Lu as well (base ego) but it's really interesting to see it Like This.\

And now. there's probably some other stuff I can talk about but I wanna say things about The Elephant In The Room. If you follow my stuff and are caught up on this canto you know what I'm talking about.

I have been compiling a diagram with every mention of Hong Lu's family across all his dialogue. (which you can see here if interested, though it's now outdated for obvious reasons) We only really get vague mentions, the only direct family appearance is Jia Huan, who shows up to say one line and then fucks off.

I was not expecting to get stuff on Hong Lu This Early. They've been giving us mostly crumbs and I was NOT expecting to get hit by All This. I have been surviving on scraps and I just had the Hong Lu lore equivalent of a rotisserie chicken thrown to me. I'm kind of rusty on DOTRC because I haven't touched up on it in a while and as such I cannot give too many details but it's very interesting to see Xichun.

I'm going to check up on Xichun's characterization in the source later because there's so many characters in that book and she wasn't really one I had that close an eye on during my read. From what I remember, she's one of Bao-yu's cousins who lives in the garden with him, and eventually runs away to become a nun when the family starts falling into decline. (mirroring Bao-yu running away to become a monk for the same reasons.) I'm probably missing stuff I'll catch when I go out to reread the book, but based on how she's depicted here it gives me more of an idea about what themes of dotrc they're pushing for canto 8.

They're for sure emphasizing the familial abuse and how fucked up the jia family is. It almost reads like all of the siblings are in competition with each other (building "factions"). and Hong Lu has said his siblings have attempted to kill him before.

Hong Lu has been like this, which lines up with his book equivalent of Bao-yu, who is notorious for being childish/naive and not necessarily working within the pre established rules and conventions set up by his family. I'm curious how he's managed to survive this long with the jias a lot more willing to Kill Eachother.

"My most amicable sibling" fucks me up so much. what the hell is this family's deal man. I'm really curious about this line, because xichun is not a sibling but a cousin in the book. I'm curious what's gonna happen with Bao-chai and Dai-yu in Limbus because it's very challenging to adapt this story without those two. Dai-yu in Dotrc is one of the characters Bao-yu feels most comfortable being himself around. Generally, the female characters in DOTRC are better people than the male ones, and Bao-yu spends most of his time with the girls as a result. I'm curious how/if they'll adapt this because it's a pretty big thing in the book and they serve as an escape for Bao-yu from dealing with the nightmare that is people like his father. I feel if it was happening, they'd probably write Xichun a little kinder, but I don't know nearly enough to make any sort of call yet. Absolutely TERRIFIED (positive. this is a good thing) for what PM is cooking.

I'm gonna have to cut this off here because i have A Lot of thoughts but i also have many assignments to finish and have been typing this for way too long! Thank you for asking the question anon I hope you enjoyed reading some of my thoughts :) !!

[wolffuwu]

new pinned post

pfp by @quab00 which is like a drawing the character in her pfp before this one which she uses the previous pfp most other places

wolf is plural but this time keeping track of alters is hard so she isnt going to do that

wolf talks in third person she has a preference for being referred to in third person including in situations where second person would be the correct way but she doesnt mind if you use second person its just like a bit nicer if you use third person

pronouns: it/she

names: wolf, moss

(it started using the name moss after most of this was written)

wolf is still in the habit of talking with she/her pronouns but at some point she will switch to it/its primarily or just use both (wolf is putting it off)

wolf is a transgender, aromantic, demisexual and a lesbian

wolf doesnt really consider herself human/vibe with being human and apparently otherkin is a label that can be used but wolf doesnt for some reason and someone once called her a therian which is possibly kinda true but how wolf alligns with what she is changesand is often more than 1 thing at once like sometimes she vibes with being a machine of sorts and sometimes other things though like being wolfgirl or whatever is like a consitent one which is accurate to the name :3

atm she vibes mostly with like a mix of wolfgirl, machine and plant :3

mentioning she has autism and adhd might be good to put on this?

wolf struggles to engage in a number of her interstes because her brain is funky or whatever but her is some stuff she likes or is interested in atm are:

she has basically memorised like the majority of the terraria wiki and then even information that isnt even on the wiki and has played a lot of hard modded content aswell as gotten all achivements except impossible or ones that would take too long to get on the zenith seed in legendary mode

she also likes rain world a lot like this and terraria might be her favourtie games and zhe rrslly likes the world its in and the hameplay and has memorised a fair amount about the game. one of the alters in the system is even a fictive of a character in the lore which is funky

wolf is playing a lot of the binding of isaac: repentance atm and she is slowly trying to get dead god (basically 100% but like not only 100% unlocks but you have to have experienced 100% (the main thing being you have to have picked up every item at least once))

she seems to be a bit interested in zome philosohical stuff but doesnt actively engage in it and woulf probably would struggle to she just randomly thinks about interesting stuff that is apparently philosphy and sometimes finds some information about some philosophy thing

she also has a little bit of the language autism but struggles to enagage in it quite a bit but @saphi-everything taught wolf the constructed language toki pona which is cool but she still forgets the meanings of words often which she also does in english tbf but she can hold a text conversation in toki pona okish

she also reads manga sometimes and occasionally watches anime

wolf might update this at some point eg if a new interest happens or like one isnt really a thing anymore or when what she vibes as that isnt human changes

[firthbetterorfirthworse]

2005 Pride & Prejudice

oh boy. I realize I am about to tread on dangerous ground here

I will say that I fully recognize that my prejudice (snort giggle) has influenced when I've seen this in the past. Colin Firth was my first Darcy and that's a hard thing to let go of, even setting aside my obsession preference for him.

That being said, this movie is visually GORGEOUS. Beautiful shots, sets, music, etc. I just...don't love the characterizations of the main characters. Most of the secondary characters I love! Explaining Charlotte's viewpoint for a modern audience and making her warmer, an awkward Collins (I could make a whole post about how if P&P were written today we would consider Collins autistic-coded), they did great! Also, Caroline gives the sassiest, bitchiest curtsies, which I adore.

I appreciate Lady Catherine, not just because I love Dame Judi Dench but because they clearly paint a picture of someone holding onto the past. Not that the costumes in this adaptation are particularly, you know....accurate. in any way. BUT she's got a style that more closely aligns with 1790s than 1810s. (Although maybe that was intentional? Cursory googling suggests the director wanted to bring it back in time but then why isn't everyon- you know what it's fine, it's fine I'm not gonna get into it here, but basically be hyper-accurate or throw all realism out the window, there shouldn't be an in between it just feels lazy)

I very much appreciate the heat in the proposal. It is a FIGHT. I think modern audiences can easily lose that feeling when they're reading the dated text on the page, but they are saying VERY impassioned things and making accusations and I really appreciate the energy this adaptation brings! And the almost kiss, it's hot I get it it's not true to the book but it's fine it's not fair of me to care so much for inaccuracy in this adaptation but not others. still gonna tho I miss the intimacy of her admitting the tragedy of Lydia only to Mr. Darcy, I understand that having the Gardiners there saves time and is more appropriate, but I have strong feelings about that scene where Elizabeth returns Mr. Darcy's trust when she doesn't have to and how it really speaks to her feelings.

Speaking of Lydia, LOVE that she's clearly so so young. Sometimes it's not as obvious.

And my dear Mr. Darcy, bold of you of all people to help Mr. Bingley practice a proposal

but oh dear if that scene isn't just absolutely adorable. I appreciate that this Bingley found some fortitude and requested a private audience with Jane. On second thought, maybe it's for the best that Darcy is the one to help him so he can be like "here's what not to say"

(I'm sorry, she even tells Mr. Bennet about what Darcy did for the family and they STILL didn't include the line about "I'll offer to pay him back, he'll rant and rave about his love for you, and that will be an end to the matter"?? How rude) (But I do adore Donald Sutherland, good scene for him)

The little epilogue scene is sweet, it's cute. I understand why people love this movie. It just doesn't hit me the same way please don't hate me

[ms--lobotomy]

Since you tagged me in this poll I feel the need to answer with my thoughts for all of them. You know, for funsies.

40k Guilliman: pretty good option. He’s (somewhat) mentally stable and has talked it out with you beforehand. Though I am curious on where he acquired primarch-grade bondage equipment. Is that why it was planned months in advance? Was he spending all that time just trying out different kinds of ropes and chains that could hold him like some sort of kinky parody of Fenrir from norse mythology?? Also, he deserves sex that has him relax and not possibly shatter his partner’s pelvis, let that man rest. 8/10.

Corrupted Horus: We all enjoy a very evil and very charismatic man from time to time. And the chaos gods which are currently kinda wearing Horus’ body like a condom are one of the options presented in this poll. But before your mind gets carried away with the fantasy of hot mean DILF, we have to think: He’s still a DILF. And so his taste in music will be that of a Dad. So get ready for him to blast Imagine Dragons while sexily taking his shirt off. You plead for him to strip faster, not because you’re horny but because you hope that when he does so he’ll turn the rock & roll cover of Thunder off and fuck you properly. He won’t. 1/10.

Jaghatai: No words other than those of approval. No thoughts other than those of lust. 9/10.

Ferrus Manus pre-heresy: Not sure why you specified pre-heresy but maybe I don’t have enough imagination for a post-heresy lewding scenario, but I digress. So I feel that the sex wouldn’t be the main draw of the situation here, instead it’s more to do with trying to make a guy feel better about a body part that he wants to peel his metal-skin off of. Ferrus is a dude that has simultaneously given all of his children body dysmorphia (that they try to fix by replacing their body parts with tech) while also wanting to get rid of the most technological part of himself. And he won’t even tell people a direct answer about where he got the technological metal hands from anyway. This man is an enigma and the sex is just a backdrop for the true scenario; which is the Ferrus Manus character exploration that’s going on. So to judge purely by the sex itself it’s a solid 5/10.

Daemon Magnus: This dude will not only do all of what you specified. But he’ll also add Gale from bg3 astral plane type sex into the mix. The only limit is your imagination Babey!!! 11/10 (he may have used his psychic powers to mess with the rating).

Leman Russ: What’s not to love about a big scary man in a collar? What’s not to love about a living war machine getting restrained like they’re a simple animal?? Though him eventually breaking out of it would imply that my skills in Husband husbandry are poor, and that might make me kind of sad. 7/10 (would change it to 8/10 if you also put a muzzle on him)

Pre-Heresy Fulgrim: The number one rule of kink fantasy is that nothing will work out as perfectly as you want it to, something will always go differently than it did in your imagination because, fun fact, your partner is not a mind reader (and even if they were it’s not like they can control every action/reaction they do/have). If you fuck him he will be very very very disappointed in you and will act like a bitch about it. 3/10 (the sex stops midway through because you ruined his expectations too many times).

Rogal Dorn: The way im about to sexualise that middle aged man. Oh boy… well first of all I’ll- [REDACTED BY THE INQUISITION. SUMMONS A DAEMON OF SLAANESH IF THE TEXT IS READ OUT LOUD]. 9.5/10.

30k Corvus Corax: Now while he can’t be perceived, I can. In fact I am very perceivable. Unlike Corvus’ furtive emo outfits my fashion sense consists of wearing the most sparkly and shiny accessories all the time and in very large quantities. I dress as though I’m trying to sound like one of santa’s reindeer or a sentient human windchime. And my penchant to talk very loudly knows no bounds. So combining his extreme stealth with my extreme unstealth gives us the average of The Normal Amount Of Noticeability. Which would get us both arrested for indecent exposure. 0/10 because i don’t want to go to jail.

Sanguinius: also a pretty good option. Though I question how a man who had big issues with being deified by the mortal populace would feel about having his more “angelic” features worshipped. But I’m sure I can make it work. 7.5/10.

In conclusion: the vote goes to Magnus, but if he wasn’t there then Dorn would be attaining the title of “babygirl” real fucking fast.

Time to /finally/ answer some asks. This isn't a knock on you by any means, or anyone who's sent asks. I'm just not very good at it lol

Robby G: Listen. L i s t e n. This man is 1. the type to have a schedule for sex (nothing wrong with that if thats what people are into) and 2. the type to take it in the butt. He deserves it in the butt. Yes, he is a space war criminal. But wouldn't it be nice to put it in him?

Horse: I'm sorry, the image of an Imagine Dragons striptease is... enlightening as to the individual Horus is. He's the dad that hosts the barbecue parties. He's the dad that falls asleep watching TV. Hell, he probably wears Hawaiian shirts. (That last one's got me bricked up. Shit)

Jagh: This one got me. He fucking would be into leather, be it on him or his partner. May write a fic about it in the future. Dead serious

Ferrus: Ok, I'll admit it, this one was self-indulgent for me. Yes, Ferrus is an ass in canon. I also want him so bad, and that also entails helping him through some shit. (It's the "I can fix him" instinct.) Also, if his partner isn't ok with 17 inches, that's understandable. (Also also, I specified pre-Heresy because him coming back headless horseman style is kind of a pipe dream of mine)

Mags: Monsters are hot. Next guy

Russ: This one was a bit of a gift for my Russ fucker friend. You know who you are! And if you're a Russ fucker anyways, please be my friend

Fulgrim: This man has been through so many partners and he still doesn't understand kink very well, bless his heart. He's still gotta make sure everything goes the way he thought it would, otherwise what's even the point? Mm. Maybe he can be put with someone who makes him realize that it doesn't need to be that way.. ;v

Doorknob: Go ahead, sexualize the brick wall man. Put him in a maid dress. He'd like his partner to be a little rough, especially during... ahem. Encounters. Remember the Rogal Dorn position? Maybe not all the time, but fuck, this man needs to take it like his life depends on it.

Corax: Not for everyone, I get it. Especially if your clothes are like that. I applaud your fashion sense, you dress how I've always wanted to. But that fic's still rattling around in my mind. Thank you Raven Lady we all say in unison

Sang: You raise a very good point. I don't know how comfortable he'd be with focus on his more non-human qualities. But it can work. I have faith in you, battle brother.

[anxious-witch]

Dead boy detectives characters as their big three in Astrology-Edwin

Text from the pictures and additional explanation under the cut

Capricorn-Sun

~ Disciplined & driven, handles their business

~ Rational, wants the facts, prioritizes security

~ Deep instincts, old soul, thoughtful & aware

Virgo-Rising

~ Discerning, self-improving & matter-of-fact

~ Sharp mind, pure heart, practical perspective

~ Observant, watches every detail, critical eye

Leo-Moon

~ Draws attention like a magnet, always a star

~ Entertaining, expressive, proud & passionate

~ Strong-hearted spirit who celebrates life

-all text about signs is take from moonomens.com

*Edwin's is the only one that is canon, everyone else will be just my hcs

I have made a separate post about his main three but none the less, his chart is fascinating. Sun and Rising ruled by very stable, earth signs, who pride themselves on practicality and logic. Capricorn Sun gives him very proud and driven personality, while Virgo Rising gives him attention to detail.

We see him easily follow patterns of those signs. As a Capricorn, bs is very driven by his goals, specifically when solving cases. He wants to know all the importsnt facts before staring a case. Who, what, where, when, how and why and will they get paid? After those requirments are fulfilled, he gets right into solving them. He isn't wasting his time on something that will not hold up to his standards. Yet he is very thoughtful, even if he doesn't always expresses it well. But we see that with how he behaves around Niko perfectly.

As a Virgo Rising, we see how much attention he pays to detail. From perfectly arranged books, to dust poisonous to ghost, to even his outfit. Always perfectly made unless he is in a great distress. He strives to discern right from wrong, and even feels shame when his emotions don't always align with it(ie when he admits part of the reason he solves cases is to plead for leniency). He also always strives to improve his knowledge and we see him change through the season as he gains more insight, both on logical and emotional levels. He finds it difficult to bend and break the rules, but if it is for improvment he does it, while still being very strict with himself.

But then we have Moon in Leo. And text above ofc, describes healthy Leo Moon, aka when one is truly in tune with their feelings, which Edwin is arguably not, at least not at the beginning of the season. Leo Moons want to be seen and draw attention. Except Edwin is terrified of being seen as much as he longs for it, due to his other placements. So he denies that longing, until the plot forces him to face it, through Crystal, the Cat King, and then Monty. We see flashes of his true potential when he starts accepting himself in episode 6. He dresses more flashy, he takes pride in his appearance, he takes more dominant role in communication with Monty and the Cat King and freely expresses his emotions(apologizes to Monty, expresses how much the kiss meant to him, tells the Cat King to shove it, snaps at Monty). And then later of course, during his confession to Charles and in his last scene with the Cat King. Once he leans into his natural need to be seen and dominant fire sign and listens to his emotions, he is gonna be a force to be reconed with(and a menace).

[luxlightly]

Reading comprehension and literary analysis 101: Interpretation vs Intent vs Readings

So, after making my post about the two headed calf poem, there's been pretty extensive argument in the notes about whether or not "all interpretations are valid". The main issue causing the argument is that what we're taught (at least in the American school system, which is what I have the most knowledge of) about "interpretations" is extremely lacking if not outright false. Here, I'm going to break down what an interpretation is and how it differs from author intent, opinion, and "readings".

The first and most important thing to remember about discussion of basically any field of study is that it is meant to have a use. We learn things in the American school system to answer questions on tests, not to utilize the knowledge.

It's a bit like learning how to hold a screwdriver but never being explained that you can use it to tighten screws. You use tools for a purpose, be they physical tools or intellectual. Sure, you could use a screwdriver to hammer in a nail, but it's not going to be as effective and may even hinder your progress.

Literary analysis is also a tool. We use it to extract meaning from works and to expand our understanding of topics, of other people, of ourselves, and of the world around us. An analysis that gives a false impression of these things is, like the screwdriver being used as a hammer, not helpful and even actively hindering.

Understanding that, we should understand these facets of literary analysis, using the short example story.

"Steve eats 10 apples every day. Bob hates Steve."

1: The text

This is the exact words as they appear. Many times, the only thing we are presented with when we read a piece of literature is the text itself. This can limit our understanding significantly.

2: Context

The physical, cultural, emotional, and historical circumstances in which the work was written

3: Intent

What the author, at the time of writing, intended for the audience to understand the piece to mean

4: Interpretation

A deduction about what the piece means, what can be gathered from it, and what significance it has, based on evidence from the text.

5: Reading

A reading is an interpretation of the text through a certain cultural lens (ie: a queer reading, a feminist reading).

6: Opinion

A purely subjective judgement of the quality of a work based on individual preference

So the text of our piece is "Steve eats 10 apples every day. Bob hates Steve."

From only that, we can make any number of interpretations, supported in varying degrees by the text.

Interpretation 1: "Bob doesn't like that Steve eats so many apples." While the text does not directly tell us that Steve's enjoyment of apples is related to Bob's dislike, it's a reasonable jump of logic to make since his eating of apples is mentioned just before the statement about Bob's dislike for him.

Interpretation 2: "Bob hates apples". This is more of a jump from the text than the first, but could still be defended. We know Bob hates Steve and we know Steve eats apples. It could be argued that it's the apples Bob really hates.

Interpretation 3: "Bob likes oranges". This interpretation isn't supported by the text at all. It doesn't help us better understand the text. As a tool, it serves no purpose. Is it "valid" in the sense that you're allowed to believe it's true? Sure. But it doesn't function as the tool it's intended to be and therefore isn't useful to discussion of the piece.

Which brings us to Context.

Let's say this piece was written during the Great Apple Famine where only the very richest people could afford apples and we know the author grew up very poor during this period of time.

This changes how we understand the piece. It would be understood instantly by those reading the piece at the time of writing that Steve must be very rich to afford so many apples. It would not have needed to be stated outright in the text because the context in which it was written was the same in which it was being read.

Knowing that now, it changes what our interpretations may be. Bob may hate Steve because he is wealthy. Bob may hate Steve because he is jealous of his wealth or of the apples themselves. It could be a statement on greed. Or it could still just be about apples. But our toolbox for understanding and gaining meaning from the work has expanded significantly.

Intent:

We rarely get to know exactly what an author's intent for a work is, especially an older work where the author is no longer alive. Many interpretations, therefore, are attempts to understand the author's intent. However, they don't need to be and, in fact, can often be more useful when they are not.

For example, there's an interesting message in our example story about how the excessive displays of wealth of the rich leads to resentment from the less wealthy and how scarcity is a constructed state. These interesting interpretations help us better understand the world and other people.

But let's consider, then, that, shockingly, the author's actual intended message was "Bob likes oranges", something we've established is not evident in the text or particularly useful to discussion of the work. The author is just not good at writing.

In this case, we actually come away with something more meaningful and useful to us when we do not focus on the author's intent. Intent gives us more context for the piece, but is not the end goal of literary discussion.

A reading often entirely and purposefully discards author intent and instead identifies and recontextualizes the text through a specific lens.

For example, let's do a quick religious reading of the text.

"Apples are symbols of original sin in the Christian Bible. We can therefore read Steve as representing one who frequently engages in sinful activity and Bob as being distainful of him for his sinfulness."

It's important to remember that readings like this often are fully aware they are not the intended original meaning of the work. They're just another tool. For example, this reading might help us understand how, even without meaning to, the author may associate apples with sin or negativity. What does that say about the use of that symbolism in our society and how inescapable it is? Or maybe it wouldn't help with that. But the point is that, whether or not it succeeds, it's a tool for better understanding or world and the people in it.

As for opinions, they can't be wrong or right because they are subjective. They aren't judged on any real metric. They can be somewhat helpful in judging a work but ultimately are just a personal feeling. They, unlike interpretation and readings, are not tools for understanding.

So what does this all mean in relation to the two headed cow poem?

If the author's intent is to show how life is precious, even if it's fleeting, does interpreting it as "mankind is cruel to things that are different" really help us in understanding the work and the world around us? If the interpretation contradicts the intent so completely that it's entirely lost, then this new message is what we have to judge and does "mankind is cruel" really tell us anything true about the world or the piece? Or is it just needless pessimism? What does "valid" even mean or matter in the context of literary analysis?

At some point, certain interpretations become counter productive to discussion of the piece. No one can stop you from interpreting something a certain way, but at some point you're using a screwdriver as a hammer and you're just putting holes in the wall.

[springtrappd]

Call me a denier, but I’m STILL not comfortable saying it was the Mimic all along, subtracting the fact that THEY LOOK NOTHING LIKE EACH OTHER.

We see the Blob in Ruin, and Gregory saw it, as evident by the comic page he drew. Burntrap is also in the comic, which means, to me at least, he’s real too. And the basement area looks the same in Ruin and Security Breach. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say things happened as they did in Security Breach. If that’s true, it’s very unlikely Burntrap was the Mimic. It would’ve had to escape the Blob, DRASTICALLY change its appearance, and then get sealed behind the concrete wall.

Something that I don’t think gets talked about is the fact that Vanny was down in the basement. We see the graffiti and a bed during the final fight. That further comprises Glitchtrap=Mimic. If the Mimic could escape at any time, why didn’t it?

Admitley, I haven’t read the books, but as far as I know, the Mimic never learned about William, so it couldn’t have copied him. And it sure doesn’t act like him during the Tales epilogues.

I don’t know if it was you who said this, but someone said something about Vanny destroying part of the Mimic’s code in Help Wanted 2. If it’s symbolized by her crushing Glitchtrap, it would explain why the Mimic acts so differently to Burntrap, if they are indeed the same. Vanny destroyed the part of the Mimic that was copying Afton.

The only problem with this is that the new game could throw all this out the window. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

yeahhhhh, i feel similarly doubtful for... even more reasons, lmao. i've been holding off on posting about it largely because this is a debate i have zero interest in actually participating in, but godddd is there enough holes in the fandom's main narrative to trigger someone's trypophobia. (and this got way too long -- so long it crashed tumblr & forcibly logged me out?! -- so it's going below the cut)

from what i can tell, it's been generally accepted that none of sb's endings were canon -- or rather, that none of the ones gregory drew are. this includes the afton ending and the vanny ending, and since the latter is one of only two endings that place glamrock freddy in fazerblast -- and only one has pq3 completed -- we can assume that the "redemption"/free vanny ending is the one we're continuing on from. provided, of course, that any of sb happened as depicted at all. god fuckin knows!

this does seem to be their way of retconning burntrap out of the picture, since he's only been mentioned in said comics -- a fate the blob dodges by appearing as an easter egg in ruin's first level. again: god fuckin knows!

but there is so, so much about these guys that stands out to me than the shit in popular discourse does. like, the fact that the mxes entity uses poses eerily reminiscent of glitchtrap's? and does the same teleporting-behind-you thing?

(i know this sounds like a reach & i can't go and grab screenies myself rn but just trust me and google footage of this guy okay, they're weirdly similar i promise)

or even the connections between glitchtrap and shadow bonnie -- who (in its only minigame appearance) was depicted as a glitched-out shadow of spring bonnie... that can enter a strange, distorted world that exists in parallel to our own... that's been around since the 80s... which was the same era the mxes machine was designed to evoke.

and ofc you've got this guy in princess quest, who repeats afton's iconic "i always come back" -- both in encoded text and in its screech, which continues the line with "let me out".

(also, this is a thing that literally only i care about, but there's some weird shit going on with names with this group. none of them are referred to by name in the games themselves. "glitchtrap" is the anomaly(hw1)/the darkness(hw2), "mxes" is the entity; the mimic is the thing in the sinkhole/the monster... and the blob is never mentioned at all. [vanny only narrowly dodges this by having painted one of her hideouts with her name, lmao])

and then there's the blob? which, 1) the novels have done similar concepts before; the charlie trilogy has the amalgamation in tfc, when afton melts the missing kids into one big lump of metal scrap that he's slowly swapping pieces of himself with (to see if he can become a machine), and frights has agony, which... well, it's a big monster made out of all the cursed objects that've appeared throughout the series, animated by afton's spirit -- and possessing the ability to 'taint' the soul of whatever it touches. and 2) it's actually made up of numerous Designated Dead Children Animatronics: chica, bonnie, mangle/toy foxy, funtime freddy, circus baby and the puppet. neither cb or the puppet's eyes are glowing, while the rest are. fun fact: it also breathes!

is now when i mention that throughout his boss battle, burntrap actually laughs in multiple voices? contrary to what circles online, this is used in-game -- it's just that it's an ambient sound rather than a voice line, so it only plays when you're physically close to him... which you never are. steel wool... <3

but... god. the mimic. ugh.

i've been trying to stay away from making any sweeping comments about the mimic as, like, a character? rather than as a concept. because -- and here's a confession -- i still have yet to subject myself to tales, and likely won't be for the foreseeable future. (although i do some booze i need to polish off, so who knows?) SO i'll leave the whole "hey, does the mimic ever actually... meet afton? or show any signs of mimicking him... at all...?" convo for another day. however, i do think it's noteworthy that despite there being eight whole books with this guy absolutely nobody has been able to cite even a hint of something like that. and no, hw1 saying that they're scanning old circuit boards doesn't count, because the argument is that the mimic1 program was on those circuit boards.

from what i can tell, current consensus is that the mimic was made -> SECRET -> it vanishes from the timeline for 30+ years -> it magically appears at the silver parasol office -> they scan its circuit boards, per instructions -> it somehow combines with the memory of the mci -> it begins haunting vanessa -> vanessa becomes vanny -> gregory somehow gets into contact with it (presumably through the in-universe hw1) (which implies that tens of thousands of people would have also been affected but whatever) -> gregory becomes ggy -> they infiltrate the pizzaplex -> they dig down to where the mimic's body is -> they start kidnapping & killing kids -> they siphon power from the pizzaplex to charge burntrap!mimic -> gregory somehow snaps out of it and has no memory of who he is or what he's done but also knows he needs to avoid vanessa -> gregory relearns about burntrap in the basement -> pq3 is beaten, redemption ending happens -> at some point later, gregory and vanessa and freddy return to the pizzaplex to install mxes -> at some pointier laterer, cassie's dad goes into the ruined pizzaplex and gets killed by glitchtrap (who was killed in pq3) (who is the mimic) (who is burntrap) and becomes the maskbot -> glitchtrap is killed in pq -> the mimic sends a message to cassie -> she goes into the ruined pizzaplex and releases it -> we are here

and... yeah. notice how several parts of that story directly contradict each other? again: trypophobia. i don't even need to poke holes in it -- they make themselves! the mimic was scanned to make glitchtrap but also it was burntrap stuck in the sinkhole; pq3 killed glitchtrap and erased afton from the system but so did pq4, which takes place not only after sb but after hw2; glitchtrap gives hw2's protagonist the mci memory plushes but it was already erased from the system in ruin... and i'm not even touching motive here! you guys realise characters are meant to have goals, right? arcs motivated by conflicts that they resolve as their story progresses? what possible motive does the mimic have to do any of these things??? at what point was any of this necessary???? what was the point????? (NOT an invitation to try and explain it to me, btw)

i mean you can literally see it crumple fucking metal in ruin but yeah, sure, a concrete wall is its mortal nemesis, whatever. as you said, vanny camped down in that basement for months and had the resources to siphon power from the grid... but couldn't get one of the dozens of 'bots down there to bust a wall down. sure. okay. i, for one, support our quiet quitting queen. go, girl, give us nothing!

i'm willing to concede that the mimic is in some way involved in the creation of glitchtrap/burntrap/whatever (and do genuinely believe it, just not the way fanon does)... but i also think that tunnel visioning on it means ignoring, well, all of this shit (and probably more that hasn't immediately come to mind); you're no longer engaging with the game, you're engaging with The Mimic Question, every minute detail is subsumed into the desperate search for an answer to a question that was really, really dumb to begin with.

and maybe i just think this because i'm not interested in the mimic; maybe these details are only noteworthy to me because they feel unrelated to The Mimic Question, and i'll be proven wrong when sotm drops and we learn that mxes stands for Mimicis Xuper Epic & Special and it was driving the van that ran over the kid that the mimic was friends with. and also both circus baby and the puppet and ennard and every other cool character was inspired by it because it is so amazing and awesome and relevant. or maybe they put the creative energy they didn't use for the title (secret of the mimic? secret of the fucking mimic???) elsewhere. who knows!

and as for what i think is happening? one final time: god fuckin knows! i... kinda don't like making "theories" in the usual sense, in that i much prefer giving you the pieces and allowing you to come to your own conclusion from there; i know that i know nothing, and thus dislike presenting myself as any kind of central authority. i'm not here to make predictions, i'm here to do character analysis, and the fun thing about that is that while i'll always be thinking of the most emotionally/thematically resonant conclusion, canon... sometimes canon asks dumb questions with dumb answers.

but as for what i think a "good answer" would be... well, frights established the idea that enough Terrible Vibes eventually corrupt things on a fundamental level -- in ways that you pass on to others. (or, in other words: a metaphor for the cycle of abuse/trauma; hurt people hurt people. afton hurts andrew, frights' vengeful spirit, so andrew hurts others so they hurt more people. it's maybe the only good thing in frights.) and ar has had shadow bonnie appear as a spirit summoned when you collect too much ""dark remnant"". it's also been around since fredbears... and doesn't have a physical body. of all the ways for the mimic program to gain knowledge of the mci, it's one of the less stupid. (and explains the 'amalgamate' imagery -- rather than being one entity, it's an entity made up of bits of others.)

there's also someone trying to set shit up in the background of all this; someone made the vanni network, someone was killing anyone who asked questions, someone was fudging delivery numbers (and their contents), someone forcibly pushed vanessa's application through (despite her stated lack of experience) -- someone high up on the corporate ladder. there is someone missing here.

so... like you said: we just have to wait and see. i'm just not sure it's gonna be something worth waiting for.

[ndiebrioxhe]

Another Rambling post about Ascendance of a Bookworm:

BLUE - ORANGE MORALITY

(with minor digs at Harry Potter)

When I was younger I used to browse Tv Tropes and I really enjoyed looking at them describe things I noticed in media but didn’t have a name for. On a rare occasion, I would find a trope that I had no real reference for and one of those was “blue-orange morality”.

The concept of having a morality system completely divorced from our own that we can’t really judge it. Now it’s not like I have never seen like a series or text attempt to create a character or species that has different standards of morality but the issue I always had was, that the supposed “different moral standards” were always included as a contrast to a more recognisable real world standard - which meant it was framed from a real world standard anyways.

It is always seemed like one of two scenarios:

Scenario A:

Alien/Monster/Non-human: “Here is our horrifically barbaric practice that has no functional purpose to our society and entirely superstitious!”

Human/Humanoid 1: “That’s bad”

Human/Humanoid 2: “Oh that’s just their culture”

And its like no… the narrative framing still shows that is weird and barbaric and not at all a foreign concept which is it’s own morality system so divorced from our own. If we have to be advised not to judge it on our own standards, it can be judged by our standards.

Scenario B:

Olden Times!

Stories being set in a distant past/medieval times where there are different moral standards is not true blue-orange morality. They are just the worse models of current moral standards. We are not divorced from those at all. They are just uncomfortable to think about. Like, yes it is fucked for dudes to claim to be kings and murder thousands to maintain their power… but people weren’t super cool with massmurder back then either - it was just an inevitability due to the social economical problems. It’s like being a billionaire with hundreds of sweatshops now. Even with people who are cool with the system - we all know that shit isn’t our “moral standard” - it’s our uncomfortable reality. Pushing the setting back or forward a 1000 years doesn’t really change anything. Our countries’ leaders still go off to kill and exploit people to maintain power, they just don’t get crowns for it anymore.

And I don’t care if you chose to do this with fictional races and places, that is just set dressing. They still resemble human society as we know it.

So I just never really saw a series that really grabbed me as authentically blue-orange… just typically shades of grey.

But then I read AOAB… and I really saw the potential of blue-orange morality. And it was done well.

Now it might seem logical to treat Bookworm as a Scenario B.

After all, it’s literally nobles presiding over commonfolk and elizabethan era political drama… but heres the thing… the framing of Scenario B is based on understanding that some characters still fit our present mold of a good person:

caring

considerate

fair

just

humble

attractive (no literally)

would not murder babies

religious in the right way

And these characters are the ones we root for. The characters we aren’t rooting have qualities we do not desire

mean

selfish

powerhungry

bloodthirsty

unattractive

will murder babies

over zealous or cult-like

Like in a Scenario B you can’t show the main characters enslave children in a sweatshop and allow grown adult attendants put their hands on them - and still be the good guy. You can’t plan the purging of an entire faction and hold their children hostage under penalty of death - and be THE GOOD GUY . Can’t overtly tax a city to the bones and deny them the best possible harvest because the previous mayor annoyed YOU — AND EVER HOPE TO BE THE GOOD GUY.

Well you can in ascendance of a bookworm tho.

And the readers will agree with you.

And it’s NOT because readers can overly moralise the actions of main characters.

And it’s because unlike a Scenarios A and B which are just OUR WORLD where we are all AWARE that we don’t really need kings or billionaires and antiquated traditions that rely on human suffering for the world to work. AOAB is different

The world of AOAB is not our own. Nobles have more rights because the world explicitly requires their mana to function. Nobles are human plus. They are what rich people in the regular world pretend to be.

Remove the army, the wealth, the status of a king and he is commoner. AOAB Nobles are literally magic batteries that build cities, make harvests happen, keep the population safe from deadly magical creatures …like the yearly giant blizzard monster that won’t literally won’t let spring come unless you have an army of trained magical knights slay it. Without Nobles the world literally be a giant sandpit.

So right of the bat, the nobility are integral to society. You simply don’t live your life raised as a necessary part of the world functioning and not have a social structure that reflects that. Its our world turned on it’s head. All the commoners could die and all that means is the nobles have to do more work. Instead of rich needing the poor, the commoners need the nobles. Otherwise they rarely even interact. The commoners and nobles are almost different species.

And not like it’s particularly unfair on the commoners. Not having mana simply bars you from a lot of activities, duties and experiences. Hell, not having a lot of mana as someone born into a noble family arguably sucks more than being a commoner. Nobility is earned, not given. Being born into a noble family that doesn’t have the means to regulate your mana means you won’t even make it to age where you are considered a separate entity from your parents in that society. If you have enough mana to make it to the Royal Academy without getting sent to the temple and the ability to pass or even excel at the Royal Academy - congrats you are now an asset to your duchy and that includes the commoners inside it. Just make sure you don’t blunder and cause your own execution.

So if murder, classism, deception and greed aren’t necessarily immoral in AOAB, what is?

The only real way to be a labeled a bad person in AOAB noble society is to endanger your duchy and cause widespread problems. Which only means the real way to be immoral in AOAB is to be incompetent or to FAIL.

You might initially think The Veronica-Georgine faction are the antagonists because they try to murder a barely baptised child but the guardian trio literally admitted they had plans to kill her too. They are ones committing the most one sided mass murders in the series. Ferdinand being able to outmanoeuvre and manipulate his enemies in the ring of politics is considered a SEXY TRAIT.

So what’s the difference between the Florencia faction and the Veronica-Georgine faction? Easy. The V-G faction is DESTABILISING AN ENTIRE DUCHY WITH SHORTSIGHTED NOBLE BULLSHIT. And just escalates into the entire nation being in jeopardy… because the Ahrensbachian Archducal family keeps producing nobles that are profoundly worthless with no sense of noble duty. They are defective.

In the next paragraph, I’m just going to state something this legion of defective nobles did and the names of who did it/involved.

They don’t respect the authority or wisdom of nobles of higher rank so they disobey orders (Bezewanst, Veronica). They force already new brides on married nobles that ruin established marriages for no benefit besides sating their schoolyard fantasies on a whim (Gabriele). Their spitefulness and cruelty to one of the biggest archnoble families in the duchy has made the Ehnferestian faction politics a disaster (Veronica) and were forced to create an entire section of mednobles not even loyal to Ehnferest because archnobles rightfully disliked them (Shikikoza and Gloria). They’re such suck ups it endangered their own duchy’s stability to the point where their only options is an intermediate archducal candidate that was poorly raised by all metrics (Gieselfried). Ahrensbach archducal children are regularly raised to be puppeteered by the parents instead of independent thinkers (Detlinde). Which is a real fucking problem for duchies when you keep trying (and typically succeeding) in making these children the Aubs of duchies (Georgine).

Ultimately it comes down to the fact they believe in their ideological RIGHT as nobles over their ideological DUTY to prioritise their duchies running smoothly. And that leads them to overestimate their APTITUDE as nobles.

Which is REALLY telling when a little powerhouse is redefining what it means to be an accomplished noble and entire political career is to the benefit of Ehnferest. Which is why the Ehnferest archducal family and Florencia faction who prioritise the stability and growth of the own goddam duchy instead of their own personal grudges are the good guys.

Bad guys are bad because they are bad what they are supposed to be doing and the good guys are good because they focused on what they should be.

There’s even a moral gray zone which is “trying your best but not being enough” and the prime example of that is the current the royal family. The country is only in this sorry state because one prince allowed his ineptitude and thirst for power to spiral and cause the nation lose the most important tool, and now it has a king that was only ever raised as a vassal is struggling (impressively) to keep a nation that should have dried up to keep running… A shame his intel gathering is dogshit so he keeps making mistakes and even overlook things that could have solved the problem.

So the dynamic of magic and morality is baked in the worldbuilding and it’s doesn’t feel dumb that nobles have all this power but somehow DON’T really interfere the non magical inhabitants in the world on a grand scale. These features, not flaws.

It is so much better than making a magical world where wizards hide their shit IN non magical places but don’t interact with non magical humans and have poverty and slaves that do house chores despite HAVING MAGIC that handles that shit. And also celebrate non magical people’s holidays despite thinking non magical people are beneath them because despite the book apparently being about fascism being bad - it doesn’t address any of the core issues of it and even has extra issues layered on top!

AOAB doesn’t operate on regular morality so it’s not mind numbingly incongruent when bad things happen in the universe because the magic people choose to let it happen despite thinking it’s bad. Even tho nobles do not care about the commonfolk it would stupid if they hid magic from the non magical folk and even dumber if entire spinoffs were based in fighting to keep it secret. Having a series where the protagonists realise that a faction in their world is a problem and getting RID OF THEM? Imagine getting rid of people who are the problem instead of fighting them in a WAR and reading checking the epilogue and that faction caused the fascism is STILL THERE and children are scared to end up there?? WHY DOES SLYTHERIN STILL EXIST—

Anyways,,,

I haven’t had the pleasure of reading past the translated pre-pub myself, but from what I do know is the Ahrensbachian penchant for stupidity and shortsightedness in the pursuit of positions of power they couldn’t hope to manage effectively… while destabilising as much of the nation as possible continues and I can’t wait to read it.