#squint squint squint squint

[trashy-greyjoy]

really love dynamics that are like 'it honestly doesn't matter if you view them as romantic or platonic, the point is that they love each other. the type of love is inconsequential, all that matters is that it's there'. gotta be one of my favorite genders.

[atissi]

i don't really like when people say dungeon meshi is accidentally good autistic representation, because while i understand not wanting to make conclusions without explicit confirmation from the author, there's always the weird assumption that non-western authors somehow don't know about things like neurodivergency/queerness/etc. (on top of the assumptions that east asian authors are somehow more naive or oblivious to "western" social issues).

given that dungeon meshi started being published in 2014, it's not really a "work belonging to its times"—it's as contemporary as any other media we discuss on this site, which means it should be fair to assume it engages with contemporary topics (and at the very least, you shouldn't say that the representation is accidental with so much confidence)

but anyways, the chapter "perfect communication" in ryoko kui's "terrarium in a drawer" is some of the most straightforward autistic representation I've seen, and from now on I'm going to assume that laios's character writing is absolutely intentional in that regard:

[qiqilasblog]

The eye opened and I wasnt prepared.

[slightlyartist]

Tate deserves to punch Ford so I drew it, felt really therapeutic <3

[chiptrillino-art]

Just boys things! its a continuation of this illustration!

[thatonedudeinthecorner]

Okay but Stan is ALSO trans and has yet to tell either of them so it’s fine (as soon as you put he/him in your bio you become horrible at communicating I fear)

[thunderbottle]

spinning him in my mind a bit

[blorbosinmyheadcentral]

Supervised Machine Learning

[void-dude]

I serve you: What if therapy worked a little tiny bit on BILL?

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4

I said a little

[eternal-moss]

I forgot to post this, which I made while binging the manga

[tossawary]

This is petty fandom salt, BUT... I've been chewing on this phenomenon that I've been calling "Fandom's Darling". It is related to things like "Author's Darling" and "Mary Sue / Gary Stu" and "Protagonist Halo" and all that jazz, where one character gains a peculiar narrative weight in a story.

"Author's Darling" is when a writer has a favorite character, and the world and all other characters sort of get... warped to put the Darling in the spotlight. It's most noticeable in TV shows with multiple writers, when a character you personally like suddenly has their previous characterization destroyed to make another character look good somehow. Every other character might become weirdly incompetent. The Darling's feelings are treated as The Most Important Feelings in any given situation. The logic of the fictional world seems broken past suspension of disbelief in order to validate this one character's beliefs or skillset or some other fantasy. And so on.

"Fandom's Darling" is what I've been calling the pattern where a fandom essentially crowns a New Protagonist for their fanfiction stories (it's often a side character rather than the original protagonist, but it can also happen to protagonists). This character becomes the self-insert for all sorts of indulgent fantasies, gaining special powers or backstories, and/or becoming the focus of extreme whump, and/or hooking up with all the various hotties, starring in all sorts of tropey AUs, and so on. They're not always an obvious Mary Sue version of themselves, but the character's original personality and interpersonal relationships tend to get warped or dropped completely, and other characters tend to become a little flat around them. I call it "Fandom's Darling" because it's not just one self-indulgent fantasy fic (you do you! Have fun!) with characterization choices that I don't vibe with (I have neither the time nor the desire nor the authority to police anything, I am just venting), but rather a prolific mini-fandom of sorts revolving around this empty doll / fanon version of the chosen vessel character, so it becomes a little unavoidable.

I am salty about this (mildly frustrated) (imagine a soft sigh of disappointment before I just go do something else) because you are FUCKED if you actually liked the canonical version of this character and their interpersonal relationships. It's almost worse than liking an obscure character that no one cares about. There's about a thousand fics starring your fave, but maybe only about a dozen of them are actually rooted in any kind of recognisable canon.

[narusasuart]

It's ok babe, you'll get there in your own time

[c4tto626]

writing something with two characters who use the same pronouns and fighting to balance using names vs using pronouns in a way that's both smooth to read and easy to comprehend

[robosuta]

What if.....

[hinamie]

spins him around trying to understand the pink mop he calls hair

[infernumequinomin]

Have we considered what it means that Laois is so good at killing monsters, the one thing he loves, and so bad at fighting humans, the thing he feels most distance from. And inverse Kabru is terrible at killing monsters, the one thing he wants to destroy, but so good at killing humans he would have killed Falin 6 different times when he tried to kill her if her anatomy had been more human, despite his love for and drive to protect humanity? Have we considered what it means to be able to kill that which you love but not that you hate? Has anyone fucking considered the imposter syndrome that has to come from only being good at killing that which you love most??? The fear of not being able to protect yourself from the thing you most think is a threat simply because you cannot find a way to understand it enough to take it's life?