#sure I like the show but I’m here engaging with witcher fans on tumblr because of geraskier and nothing else

[finleycannotdraw]

realllyyyyyyyy fast geraskier scribble because cmon let me have this. I am online to post gay art so that’s exactly what I’m gonna do.

[bamf-jaskier]

Who the Fuck is Eskel?

If you have ever gone on The Witcher tag on Tumblr, I’m sure you’ve seen dozens of blogs dedicated to this guy named Eskel and for people who have just seen the show you might be wondering - who the fuck is this guy? 

Hi, I’m Aaliyah, and this is Part 5 of my WTF Series - a crash course in subjects from The Witcher Books. 

Post under the cut

Let’s jump in by talking about what books Eskel is in. He’s only mentioned in one line in The Last Wish, The Tower of Swallows and The Time of Contempt. He has a flashback scene in Lady of the Lake and the only book where he plays a heavy role in is Blood of Elves. 

For all you Eskel Stans out there, this is good news, because it looks like S2 of the show is going to be taking some cues from Blood of Elves and we do know Eskel is going to be appearing so these scenes might be showing up in some form or another in the show. 

We first meet Eskel in Blood of Elves when Geralt is first bringing Ciri to the keep:

“Who comes?” Ciri heard a menacing, metallic voice which sounded like a dog’s bark. “Geralt?”

“Yes, Eskel. It’s me.”

“Come in.”

The witcher dismounted, took Ciri from the saddle, stood her on the ground and pressed a bundle into her little hands which she grabbed tightly, only regretting that it was too small for her to hide behind completely.

“Wait here with Eskel,” he said. “I’ll take Roach to the stables.”

“Come into the light, laddie,” growled the man called Eskel. “Don’t lurk in the dark.”

Ciri looked up into his face and barely restrained her frightened scream. He wasn’t human. Although he stood on two legs, although he smelled of sweat and smoke, although he wore ordinary human clothes, he was not human. No human can have a face like that, she thought.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” repeated Eskel.

She didn’t move. In the darkness she heard the clatter of Roach’s horseshoes grow fainter. Something soft and squeaking ran over her foot. She jumped. “Don’t loiter in the dark, or the rats will eat your boots.”

Still clinging to her bundle Ciri moved briskly towards the light. The rats bolted out from beneath her feet with a squeak. Eskel leaned over, took the package from her and pulled back her hood.

“A plague on it,” he muttered. “A girl. That’s all we need.”

She glanced at him, frightened. Eskel was smiling. She saw that he was human after all, that he had an entirely human face, deformed by a long, ugly, semi-circular scar running from the corner of his mouth across the length of his cheek up to the ear.

“Since you’re here, welcome to Kaer Morhen,” he said. “What do they call you?”

“Ciri,” Geralt replied for her, silently emerging from the darkness. Eskel turned around. Suddenly, quickly, wordlessly, the witchers fell into each other’s arms and wound their shoulders around each other tight and hard. For one brief moment.

“Wolf, you’re alive.”

“I am.”

“All right.” Eskel took a torch from its bracket. “Come on. I’m closing the inner gates to stop the heat escaping.”

Couple things here. First, for all the game fans out there, Eskel’s scar in the books is VERY different. It’s not the lightening-like claw marks that go over his eye but instead it goes from the corner of his mouth to his ear. This is interesting because it really parallels in my mind Ciri’s scar she gets later on that extends from under her eye to her ear. 

Also, the little reunion between Geralt and Eskel, so sweet. The line about Eskel in Last Wish establishes that they were close friends so here is the snippet just to give more backstory to the two of them: 

“Once, years ago, when a little snot-faced brat following his studies in Kaer Morhen, the Witchers’ Settlement, he and a friend, Eskel, had captured a huge forest bumblebee and tied it to a jug with a thread. They were in fits of laughter watching the antics of the tied bumblebee, until Vesemir, their tutor, caught them at it and tanned their hides with a leather strap.”

Childhood friends and brothers is just so damn great. Actually, speaking of brothers, it is stated in Blood of Elves that Geralt and Eskel actually look very similar and are often mistaken for brothers such as in this scene from Triss’s POV. 

Eskel stood next to Geralt, resembling the Wolf like a brother apart from the colour of his hair and the long scar which disfigured his cheek. And the youngest of the Kaer Morhen witchers, Lambert, was there with his usual ugly, mocking expression. Vesemir was not there.

“Welcome and come in,” said Eskel. “It is as cold and blustery as if someone has hung themselves. Ciri, where are you off to? The invitation does not apply to you. The sun is still high, even if it is obscured. You can still train.”

“Hey.” The Enchantress tossed her hair. “Politeness comes cheap in Witchers’ Keep now, I see. Ciri was the first to greet me, and brought me to the castle. She ought to keep me company—”

This really interests me because Ciri is very young child when she meets Eskel and she is very terrified of him and intimidated. Which makes sense, she is very traumatized. But, when Triss meets Eskel she only makes a short note of his scar and focuses more on his resemblance to Geralt and commenting on the lack of politeness. It just goes to show how different characters perceive people differently. A child’s perspective of a warrior is not going to be the same as a Mage’s. 

“You didn’t even know.” She nodded in what was now a calm, concerned and gentle reproach. “You’re pathetic guardians. She’s ashamed to tell you because she was taught not to mention such complaints to men. And she’s ashamed of the weakness, the pain and the fact that she is less fit. Has any one of you thought about that? Taken any interest in it? Or tried to guess what might be the matter with her? Maybe her very first bleed happened here, in Kaer Morhen? And she cried to herself at night, unable to find any sympathy, consolation or even understanding from anyone? Has any one of you given it any thought whatsoever?”

“Stop it, Triss,” moaned Geralt quietly. “That’s enough. You’ve achieved what you wanted. And maybe even more.”

“The devil take it,” cursed Coën. “We’ve turned out to be right idiots, there’s no two ways about it, eh, Vesemir, and you—”

“Silence,” growled the old witcher. “Not a word.”

It was Eskel’s behaviour which was most unlikely; he got up, approached the enchantress, bent down low, took her hand and kissed it respectfully. She swiftly withdrew her hand. Not so as to demonstrate her anger and annoyance but to break the pleasant, piercing vibration triggered by the witcher’s touch. Eskel emanated powerfully. More powerfully than Geralt.

“Triss,” he said, rubbing the hideous scar on his cheek with embarrassment, “help us. We ask you. Help us, Triss.”

Now, if you can’t tell, Triss’ favorite is Eskel. This scene is also implies that Eskel is more magically powerful than Geralt which Is very interesting. But Triss is an Eskel stan, in fact a couple lines later Triss thinks to herself: 

Vesemir hawked again. But Eskel, dear Eskel, kept his head and once more behaved as was fitting.

“Of course,” he said casually, smiling. “We understand and clearly we will postpone your exercises until your indisposition has passed. We will also cut the theory short and, if you feel unwell, we will put it aside for the time being, too. If you need any medication or—”

Eskel definitely has the older sibling energy where he ends up in charge sometimes and knows how to keep a cool head. He’s also the most aware of societal norms of behavior which is why Triss likes his so much. She really respects people who know how to move in society. 

There’s also this scene in Blood of Elves where Eskel is drinking and offers Triss some:

“White Seagull.”

“What?”

“A mild remedy,” Eskel smiled, “for pleasant dreams.”

“Damn it! A witcher hallucinogenic? That’s why your eyes shine like that in the evenings!”

“White Seagull is very gentle. It’s Black Seagull that is hallucinogenic.”

“If there’s magic in this liquid I’m not allowed to take it!”

“Exclusively natural ingredients,” Geralt reassured her but he looked, she noticed, disconcerted. He was clearly afraid she would question them about the elixir’s ingredients. “And diluted with a great deal of water. We would not offer you anything that could harm you.”

I think it’s very funny how secret The Witcher keeps all their potions and elixirs. Whether it’s mushrooms or potions, they gotta keep those secret drugs locked down tight. Also the fact that Eskel is the fantasy equivalent of high every night? Love that for him.  

Eskel really is the peace-maker of the group. He’s not a push-over by any means but he is definitely more willing to play along that any of the others. When Triss is talking at night, Eskel is really the only one listening and engaging, even if it’s very half-hearted. 

In the evenings, consistently and determinedly, Triss guided the long conversations held in the dark hall, lit only by the bursts of flames in the great hearth, towards politics. The witchers’ reactions were always the same. Geralt, a hand on his forehead, did not say a word. 

Vesemir nodded, from time to time throwing in comments which amounted to little more than that “in his day” everything had been better, more logical, more honest and healthier. 

Eskel pretended to be polite, and neither smiled nor made eye contact, and even managed, very occasionally, to be interested in some issue or question of little importance. Coën yawned openly and looked at the ceiling, and Lambert did nothing to hide his disdain.

And he is really the only sort-of listener to Triss’ stories and retellings of events: 

This time it was Triss who began to yawn and stare at the ceiling. This time she was the one who remained silent – until Eskel turned to her with a question. A question which she had anticipated.

“And what is it really like in the south, on the Yaruga? Is it worth going there? We wouldn’t like to find ourselves in the middle of any trouble.”

“What do you mean by trouble?”

“Well, you know…” he stammered, “you keep telling us about the possibility of a new war… About constant fighting on the borders, about rebellions in the lands invaded by Nilfgaard. You said they’re saying the Nilfgaardians might cross the Yaruga again—”

“So what?” said Lambert. “They’ve been hitting, killing and striking against each other constantly for hundreds of years. It’s nothing to worry about. I’ve already decided – I’m going to the far South, to Sodden, Mahakam and Angren. It’s well known that monsters abound wherever armies have passed. The most money is always made in places like that.”

“True,” Coën acknowledged. “The neighbourhood grows deserted, only women who can’t fend for themselves remain in the villages… scores of children with no home or care, roaming around… Easy prey attracts monsters.”

“And the lord barons and village elders,” added Eskel, “have their heads full of the war and don’t have the time to defend their subjects. They have to hire us. It’s true. But from what Triss has been telling us all these evenings, it seems the conflict with Nilfgaard is more serious than that, not just some local little war. Is that right, Triss?”

Once more, Eskel is the peace-maker of the conversation and he brings it back around to what Triss originally said and also points to her expertise. Basically, Eskel is not really a fan of verbal conflict. 

This is actually the last line we see Eskel in a scene outside of the flashback in Lady of the Lake. After this, Triss, Geralt and Ciri head off. It is important to note that near the end of Blood of Elves Ciri says this about Yennefer:

The lady magician knew a surprising amount about a witcher’s sword and “dance.” She knew a great deal about the secrets of Kaer Morhen; there was no doubt she had visited the Keep. She knew Vesemir and Eskel. Although not Lambert and Coën.

Yennefer used to visit Kaer Morhen. Ciri guessed why – when they spoke of the Keep – the eyes of the enchantress grew warm, lost their angry gleam and their cold, indifferent, wise depth. If the words had befitted Yennefer’s person, Ciri would have called her dreamy, lost in memories.

So clearly Yennefer is also friendly with Eskel and knows him. I love the idea that Yennefer regularly visited Kaer Morhen before Ciri came into Geralt’s care and I would literally cry if they did a flashback sequence in S2 of Yennefer visiting Geralt in Kaer Morhen. 

The flashback sequence in Lady of the Lake with Eskel goes like this: 

The fire in the huge fireplace went out. A gust of wind from the mountains whistled through the crevices of the walls and screamed through the improperly closed shutters of Kaer Morhen, Home of the Witchers.

“Damn it!” Eskel said, standing up and going to the cupboard. “Seagull or vodka?”

“Vodka,” Geralt and Coen said with one voice.

“Sure,” interjected Vesemir, hidden in the shadows, “Yes, of course! Drown your stupidity in vodka. Damn fools!”

“It was an accident…” muttered Lambert. “She had already mastered the comb…”

“Shut your big mouth, you idiot! I don’t want to hear any more! I warned you, if something happened to that little girl…”

“Enough,” Coen interrupted him, softly. “She sleeps peacefully. Deep and healthy. She will wake up a bit sore, but that’s it. About the trance, and what happened, she will not even remember it.”

“As long as you remember,” said Vesemir, panting angrily. “Cabbage heads! Pour for me too, Eskel.”

They were silent for a long time, listening intently to the howling gale.

“We will need to call someone,” Eskel finally said. “We will need to bring a sorcerer here. What is happening to the girl, it is not normal.”

Eskel is one of The Witcher who really pushes to call Triss in order to help with Ciri’s trances. Also, once again this guy is hitting the drinks. 

So yeah! That’s Eskel in the books. Based on how in the non-canon wedding short Asaps wrote where he ended up having Triss and Eskel get together, I think his hints of them having a connection in the books is very intentional and if The Witcher wasn’t such a god damn tragedy and Triss wasn’t mooning over Geralt, I’m willing to bet they would have gotten together at some point. 

Eskel is the peace-maker of the family and is the best at recognizing the norms of “polite society” (or at least noble society) and while Ciri might have been scared of his appearance, it isn’t enough to phase Triss who is considered rather vain. In fact, she seems to respect Eskel the most out of the Witchers. Just imagine a dark-haired, scarred Geralt and BOOM, you got yourself an Eskel. 

[rallamajoop]

The Witcher: The Games vs the Books part 2 – Characters and Accents

So, I've already talked at length about the relationship between the Witcher books and games, but how well they captured individual characters is its whole own subject – and you’d better believe I have enough thoughts on it for a whole extra post.

Andrej Sapkowski's skill for creating vivid and engaging characters really is so much of what brings the books to life, and no matter how much work an adaptation might put into worldbuilding and plot, it's the characters you've really got to nail to get the long-time fans on board. Especially when you’ve done what the games have, framing themselves as a direct continuation of Sapkowski's story. Nothing invites comparison to your source material like basically forcing fans to read the original novels to understand even half the backstory alluded to in-game. 

So how did they do? I can only offer my opinion – characterisation is necessarily going to be a lot more subjective than just telling you what plot points the games contradicted outright – but like any fan, I have opinions in plenty.

Of the main cast, I feel Yennefer is the character they've captured the best. They've done just as well with some supporting players – I have no real complaints about Dijkstra or Phillipa, for example, who are favourites of mine in both games and books. For the main players though, Geralt and Regis seem to be the ones who's differences I'm most inclined to forgive, whereas I don't feel like they've done Ciri justice at all. Book!Geralt is much less of a smartarse, for one thing, whereas Book!Ciri is much more of one. But if we're talking about the differences, I’m afraid we really need to start with Dandelion.

Dandelion

For all the genuinely good work the games do with characters, old and new, I don't think I can overstate what a disservice the they've done Dandelion, who I could not stand in TW3, but is now one of my favourite book!verse characters. Alas, Dandelion is a prime example of something the Witcher games really don't do well: camp. Being the archtypical bard, Dandelion is about as flamboyant as any enthusiastically-heterosexual man can be: you should be able to spot this guy by body language alone, he should be flouncing around and he should talk like a spoiled noble auditioning for Shakespeare. Book!Dandelion is over-the-top and ridiculous and just so much fun, and I loved him well before I'd even really gotten into the rest of the books around him.

Here's just a bit of dialogue from one of his first appearances, to give you a sense of how he and Geralt play off each other.

The  bard  seized  the  fingerboard  of  his  lute  and  plucked  the strings vigorously. ‘How would you prefer it, in verse or in normal speech?’ ‘Normal speech.’ ‘As you please,’ Dandelion said, not putting his lute down. ‘Listen then, noble  gentlemen,  to  what occurred  a  week  ago  near  the  free  town  of Barefield. ‘Twas thus, that at the crack of dawn, when the rising sun had barely tinged pink the shrouds of mist hanging pendent above the meadows—’ ‘It was supposed to be normal speech,’ Geralt reminded him. ‘Isn’t it? Very well, very well. I understand. Concise, without metaphors. A dragon alighted on the pastures outside Barefield.’

Though TW3's Dandelion certainly looks the part, you have to go hunting through art from the Gwent cards to find much that comes close to really capturing his personality (see left pic below – though even there, a Dandelion who'd voluntarily break his treasured lute is a very hard sell). Though a lot of fanart does better (right-below – credit goes to Tatiana Ortaliz).

But as poorly as the games capture his flamboyance, they're not that much better when it comes to taking him seriously. TW3 left me thinking he was all talk and no substance; the books make abundantly clear that he really is renowned enough to be welcome in courts across the continent. Though he often overestimates what he can talk himself out of, he isn’t stupid either: he's lectured at Oxenfurt, spied for Dijkstra, and then there are the moments where the frivolous playboy mask slips and you realise he's sometimes much better at understanding people and relationships than Geralt will ever be (which is honestly kind of funny considering how many of Dandelion’s relationships end with plates being thrown at him from an upper story). He's not at all above mocking Geralt when he deserves it either (and especially his personal and relationship issues) – Geralt will happily mock him right back.

We never do learn how they became friends (I'm pretty sure the incident listed in the wiki is just the date of their first expedition together, not their first meeting), but Geralt just doesn't form lasting friendships or romances with anyone he can't have an intelligent conversation with. And Dandelion is a damn good friend to Geralt – one who, despite being a helpless, squishy little bard, will keep Geralt's secrets under torture, or will follow him into Nilfgaard in the middle of a war simply because you don't let a friend make a trip like that alone. (Seriously, I don’t ship it nearly as much as some, but hot damn there is some material in here if you do.) In short, it's basically inconceivable that he'd leave an amnesic Geralt wandering around Vizima alone, as he does in the first Witcher game – which is the kind of thing I can mostly forgive as a gameplay conceit, only it doesn’t really get better from there.

He’s also supposed to be blond, something I don’t think is technically specified until fairly late in the novels, but 100% what I’d been picturing since his first description as a man in a colourful bonnet with cornflower-blue eyes (let’s face it: Dandelion’s hair isn’t the only thing about him that screams ‘blond’). It’s a shame no-one from the games to the show to the novels’ cover artists seem to have noticed – but at least there are some fanartists out there who were paying attention (credit for these goes to Asphaloth, Ghostcupdraws, Hvit-ravn (tumblr deleted), 94355 and itsmespicaa).

As for the games? Well, I cannot speak to how Dandelion came across in the original Polish, but I think it speaks worlds about the priorities of the English version that they didn’t even bother to cast someone with a halfway-decent singing voice as their master bard. There are isolated moments of dialogue that come close to sounding like book!Dandelion– mostly in Witcher 2, which comes closer to capturing the spirit of the books than either 1 or 3, or his attempts to convince his captor he's a disguised noble when you rescue him TW3 – but his voice actor is just painfully ill-suited to the role.

Geralt

Geralt fares much better than Dandelion, though he’s still a little hard to square with the Geralt of the books. Book!Geralt spends a lot more time sulking, just to begin with: he sulks because his job is complicated and gets him no respect, and because the world is unjust and unfair – and, most of all, he sulks because Yennefer has dumped him again. He also gets mocked for sulking, and usually deserves it. Book!Geralt is generally a lot more taciturn and a less prone to making smart comments just to have something to say – arguably because in book!Geralt's world, making smart comments often ends at the gallows, or at least with some corrupt official making your life much harder. Book!Geralt's world kind of sucks, and he's just got to put up with it.

As much as he often plays into the expectations of being an uneducated monster hunter, he's also got a more of an intellectual streak than you’d guess. He may prefer to stay out of politics (because damnit, his job is to save people from monsters, not people who are monsters), but he attended school at Nenneke's temple and has even taken classes at Oxenfurt academy, and there's a lot of thoughtful nuance to his opinions – his speech to Ciri about why he can't in good conscience take a stronger stance against the Scoiata'el contains a wealth of historical perspective, just for one example. Even his smart comments tend to be, well, somewhat smarter in the books.

Book!Geralt’s explicitly a lot younger than Yennefer – around 50 is the usual estimate, falling far short of the 100-ish the games suggest (the scandal of having a man fall for – gasp! – an older woman clearly didn’t bother Sapkowski one bit). You don’t see nearly as much "I'm getting too old for this" from book!Geralt, who's really not that old by witcher standards, and is apparently still hunting monsters long into his future. I'm also a little annoyed by the way they play off his hatred of portals like he's a grumpy old man who doesn't like mobile phones, when his distrust originally came from having seen the gruesome deaths that result when portals go wrong. This is not to say Book!Geralt lacks other ordinary human flaws, however – twice in the last two books of the main saga, he gets severely sidetracked after his ego gets the better of him (in the adulation he receives after being knighted, then after arriving in Toussaint), and it's quite some time before he properly gets back on track for that whole rescuing-Ciri thing again. He’s also pretty hopeless when it comes to romance and relationships – breaking things off gracefully is really not in his skillset.

So why does game!Geralt not bother me more? Well, he's the main player character of a game franchise, and one who has to carry the experience largely solo. Some adjustments for genre are pretty much inevitable in that position. He's certainly fared better than Meve, for example, who's been softened far more from her book characterisation for her PC role in Thronebreaker. Then there's the whole amnesia thing – it's easy to believe that sort of experience would change a man – and if he doesn't sulk so much as he used to, maybe he's grown up a bit. Geralt's also in many ways the straight-man of Sapkowski's Witcher universe – there largely as the reliable centre for other, louder personalities to play off. But I expect the real bottom line here is that I do still like game!Geralt enough to forgive him a lot of what he lacks.

The books never do describe Geralt as being very attractive – something book-based fanart often tries to reflect. The point has been made before that the rather-alien-looking Geralt of the first game (left pic above) is probably a lot closer to his book-description. However, the main distinguishing factor you’ll see in book-based fanart is probably the ubiquitous headband, which genuinely is what book!Geralt wears to make his hair behave (the example on the right above comes from Diana Novich).

All that said, if Sapkowski really wants me to believe that nearly so many women are eager to jump into bed with him, I’m going to have to shallowly assume our witnesses are unreliable on this front, and Geralt is at least as attractive as Witcher 3′s take on him. Nothing else makes sense. *g*

Regis

Regis varies mostly in that book!Regis is a lot more smug, sometimes verging on obnoxious – and a lot keener to make fun of Geralt (who generally deserves it). But then, Regis is old and wise and superpowered enough to dance rings around most everyone else – can you blame him? By Blood and Wine, Regis' overconfidence has been recently smacked down hard after his near-death-experience at the hands of Vilgefortz, and that kind of thing could knock some chips off anyone's shoulder. Throw in the fact that with Dettlaff, we have a situation not even Regis could make light of, and the changes to game!Regis make a certain amount of sense.

I do feel it's a bit of a shame that the vocal direction didn't work just a little bit harder to capture some of Regis' smugger side, or emphasise that his long-winded philosophising on human behaviour is supposed to sound a bit pretentious. This is actually something I suspect they were going for a few times in the script, but which didn't come through in the dialogue quite the way it was meant to. Still, again, I'm sure I'm biased by the fact that I like game!Regis far too much to find much fault in what they've done with him. They've done a lovely job capturing his friendship with Geralt too.

Looks-wise, there's a tendency in book-based art to portray Regis with long hair (even some pre-Blood-and-Wine Gwent art did so – see the two pics on the left above, from Gwent and early B&W concepts. The right-most pic is cover art from the books). I couldn't rightly tell you where long-haired-Regis comes from, though – perhaps it's described more explicitly in the original Polish, or perhaps it comes up in passing in some passage I've forgotten, though it may just as well just be a fannish meme.

The books do describe him as looking rather like a tax collector, slim, middle-aged, with an aquiline nose, prone to wearing black, and his hair as 'greying' or 'grey streaked', so presumably somewhat younger-looking than the game would have it. The hammer-horror-esque sideburns are likewise a game-verse addition, though I do like the look they went with – it's distinct from Geralt in a way that making him another long-grey-haired man wouldn't have been, and that's probably the point.

Being the hopeless Regis fan I am, I have quite the folder full of different fanart takes on book!Regis, so have a selection – art here is by gellihana-art, justanor, greysmartwolf, Nastyaskaya, NatalyLanier, beidak, natalliel, ellaine and afternoon63. For what it’s worth, I feel beidak’s (bottom pic, second from the left) comes the closest to what I’d have pictured personally, based on how he’s first described.

Ciri

I find it much harder to rationalise the changes to game!Ciri, who I didn't exactly dislike, but found stuck too close to the role of generic-macguffin-girl-who-just-wants-to-be-normal to be very interesting. Having read the books, not only do I much prefer book!Ciri, I'm not sure I can emphasize enough how much the game did NOT prepare me for utter gauntlet of whump and misery that girl survives in the last four titles. Book!Ciri is a character who works for me mostly because of the same flaws the game mostly strips her free of – TW3 makes some token noise about how you can't tell her what to do, but she’s an utter little royal brat when we first meet book!Ciri, and it’s so much of what brings her to life. She throws herself into her witcher training with the enthusiasm of a kid going completely native, but still revels in getting to be girly for a change when Triss first arrives at Kaer Morhen. She hates Yennefer at first, but soon bonds with her just as strongly as she ever did with Geralt, picking up some of Yennfer’s haughty mannerisms along the way. And then she gets thrown through a portal and lost in the distant wilderness, and the whole world comes down on her head.

The build up to the first time Ciri actually has to kill someone is intense... and things only get worse from there. Steadily. For another couple of novels at a stretch. Seriously, a major caveat that pretty much has to go into any rec for these books (and I will absolutely rec these books) is that Ciri's story gets heavy. So heavy one finds oneself using phrases like, "that time that one guy died of his wounds on top of her while semi-consensually feeling her up was honestly one of the less traumatic incidents in the period."

By the end of the novels, Ciri has nearly died of thirst, been beaten, tied up, dragged around the country as a prisoner, run with bandits and killed innocent people for the fun of it, done fantasy-cocaine and got a tattoo, fought off more than one attempted rape, been drugged, lain for multiple nights next to an impotent elf who completely fails to impregnate her, watched the bodies of her friends and girlfriend being mutilated in front of her, and did I mention where she got that scar? She has survived hell, and it is absolutely a testament to her own strength that she somehow comes through it and puts herself back together at the end. When Geralt finally arrives to rescue her, what matters most isn't that her ordeal is over, but that she finally knows she hasn’t been abandoned by everyone who’d ever loved her after all.

The Ciri of the books is fierce and wild and arrogant, but she's learned her morals from the best, and she holds onto them until she can't, then picks them back up again when she can, and above all she survives. For all that her story turns arguably too much of the last two books into a slog of misery, oh boy does it pay off at the end. And that's probably about as much as I can say about her Big Moment in the last book without spoiling too much, so suffice to say that by the end of the saga, Geralt has pretty much become a supporting character in Ciri's story, not the other way around. (Seriously, you’d be surprised how few chapters of the last two books he’s actually in.)

Finding art which captures the aspects of Ciri’s character and history which are missing from the game has turned out to be pretty hard, though the fanart above from her bandit phase takes a decent crack at it (credit to Loles Romero and NastyaSkaya). I do rather like that one shot of her on horseback beside her girlfriend too, which comes from Denis Gordeev’s illustrations for the novels (below).

How much of this does TW3 get across with her portrayal in the game? Well, she's still pretty headstrong, I guess. And they let you give a 'sorry, I like girls' answer in one bit of dialogue, so they remembered her girlfriend existed. That's nice. But game!Ciri still has a kind of wide-eyed innocence that book!Ciri lost years ago, while book!Ciri is a little force of nature in ways the games hardly even hint at, and that's a really shameful loss.

You'd think, with a character so young, it ought to be easier to imagine she's simply grown up since we saw her last, but so much of what's changed about Ciri feels like a step back rather than forwards. I can shrug off Geralt and Regis' differences and still enjoy their game-verse-selves, but Ciri leaves me genuinely disappointed.

I’d say the official art that comes closest to capturing book!Ciri is that one portrait of her as a very grumpy young child (right above). Some of the early concept art (left above) feels a little more like it has her attitude, though she’s rather too yellow-blonde – not to mention too pretty. I think it also bears pointing out that Ciri isn’t really supposed to be the kind of beauty she is in the game – even before she gets what’s meant to be a seriously ugly and disfiguring scar. (Fanart below by justanor and bobolip)

But of course, the male gamer fanbase can’t be expected to give a fuck about a girl they wouldn’t want to fuck, so game!Ciri must be generically gorgeous. Le sigh.

Triss

I suppose I should at least touch on Triss, too, though she's a very odd case. She's so out of character in the first Witcher game that I am wryly amused that the biggest thing they arguably do get right is that taking advantage of Geralt the moment he showed up with amnesia is... pretty well in-character for her (look, I gotta be honest here, I'm not much of a fan of Triss in any of her incarnations).

The second game does a much better job with her – she actually feels like book!Triss, she has some good dialogue, we're finally dealing with some of her conflicted loyalties to the Lodge and to Geralt – though by the third, her characterisation has been so softened into “the nice one” that none of that potentially meaty conflict is ever resolved, or even really mentioned. Perhaps there's more buried in the Triss-romance path, which I've never bothered with, but the writers seem to have just given up on dealing with anything that might make her look less than wholly sympathetic. Heck, we hardly even get a clear statement about why she and Geralt broke up between Witchers 2 and 3.

Even speaking as such a not-a-fan of Triss, I promise there is more they could've done with the character the books give us. There's her ongoing trauma in from the Battle of Sodden, where she was injured so badly she was memorialised as one the dead: the 14th of the hill. There's her furious impatience with the neutrality of both the witchers and the Lodge: Triss has fought and died for a cause, and is ready to do so again. The second game sort of gets into this, but by and large, the games really aren't up to tackling the moral complexity of having such a theoretically-sympathetic character as Triss, who was still broadly willing to go along with the Lodge's plans to pair Ciri off and get her pregnant as soon as possible – her own wishes be damned. No, instead, Triss has conveniently left the Lodge before the rest of them go spiraling into abject villainy in the second game, clearing all that messy grey stuff out of the conflict.

Of course, the really big unresolved plot point still hanging over book!Triss is how badly she needs to terms with the fact Geralt's just Not That Into Her, and never has been – but since the games want Triss to be a serious romantic option, that's definitely not getting the resolution it could've used.

Book!Triss also pointedly avoids any outfit with a plunging neckline because her chest is covered with the ugly scars she received in the Battle of Sodden, something the games did not have the guts to reproduce. In a more confusing note, the books do consistently describe her hair as 'chestnut', which we'd usually think of as meaning 'brown' – though it turns out the games actually may not have been wrong to make her a redhead, since in Poland 'chestnut hair' apparently mean dark red hair (google some pictures of actual chestnuts, and you'll see why). Still, the firy-red-haired Triss of TW3 who wears nothing but plunging necklines remains a bit of a stretch, however you slice it. Once again, TW2 gets her best (and I must say, gave her the nicest outfit) – though even here she's conspicuously unscarred in all her sex scenes.

(Leftmost pic above is official Witcher 2 art, whereas Triss-with-scars fanart comes to us – once again – from nastyaskaya)

Shani

Shani sort of falls into a similar category as Triss as someone who isn't terribly well-served by any of her appearances, given that both exist in the first game largely to compete for Geralt's attentions. But I can't honestly say I find Shani’s portrayal in the Hearts of Stone expansion to be much better – the degree to which either version exists solely to fall all over Geralt is a bit painful, especially given that their relationship in the books is limited to a single, undramatic hook-up. Book!Shani really only appears in a couple of chapters: we meet her as a medical student friend of Dandelion's, who's been surreptitiously selling pilfered university supplies to fund her degree, then later see her again in the final book, where she proves herself as a battlefield medic during the climactic Battle of Brenna. She's pragmatic to a fault, and I really can't see her as the type who needs Geralt to point out to her that her patient is dead, for example, or who'd subject a guy with Geralt's problems to such an extended feelings-dump as you'll get out of her during the wedding.

Shani is a reasonably logical book-character to bring back, if only because she’s one of those who explicitly survives the ending, but for my money, "serious contender for Geralt's affections" is just not a role she works in.

Anna Henrietta

The duchess of Toussaint, Anna Henrietta, is another case who differs more from her book counterpart than you might think. In the books, the duchess is by far the least competent of the (pleasantly many and) various female leaders and rulers we meet – she comes across as rather young and naive, and every bit as absurd as everyone else in the ridiculous fairy-tale duchy she rules. She is, for example, most displeased to learn that Nilfgaard's war against the north is ongoing (something her courtiers have carefully avoided mentioning in her presence), because she'd long since sent the Emperor a stern note demanding he brought it to an end. She promptly has one of her ministers sent to the tower for misinforming her, and demands the others prepare an even sterner note for the emperor, which will surely do the job.

After Dandelion (inevitably) cheats on her, she has him repeatedly sent to the gallows, only to change her mind and send him a reprieve at the very last minute each time. Picture yourself a much younger and prettier version of the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, and you've about got her general vibe.

Blood and Wine sort of waves at this part of her character when she first speaks about Dandelion, and again in suggesting there's a widespread feeling she lacks compassion, and once more as she proves utterly immovable on the subject of her sister. But the generally sensible and insightful woman you deal with for most of the main story is a far cry from her book-verse characterisation. That’s a bit of a shame, because I feel like there's a lot more they could have done to blend the two versions of her. Still, it’s hard to argue the duchess we get suits the story being told around her.

Other characters

Much as I love Yennefer, Dijkstra and Phillipa, I don't really have much more to say about them because I feel the games have done such a good job. The Yennefer of the books gets to show a lot more depth and complexity simply because she has more scenes and more space in which to do so, but when ‘there isn’t more of her’ is your biggest complaint, the game is officially doing pretty well. I could certainly gripe her about how “dresses in black and white” seems to have been taken as “dresses in black with maybe a trace of white trim”, or how Yennefer and Triss seem to be the only sorceresses in the world capable of wearing pants, when Phillipa (just for one) is in sensible men’s clothing the very first time we meet her, but that’s getting into serious nitpicking territory.

(Not that Yen can’t look amazing in outfits with more white – art by Emily Caroll, theclashofqueens, BarbaraRosiak, and cosplay by greatqueenlina)

Vesimir, Lambert and Eskel, Geralt's fellow witchers from the School of the Wolf, fall into a similar category for me – though we spend far less time with them in the books, everything we see of them in the games feels like a fairly logical extension of their book-roles. Vesimir is somewhat over-played as the old fogey, and his death is painfully cliched, but the impact on the characters and Kaer Morhen still hits home – and the games do some especially great work expanding Lambert into a much more complex character. To my mind, the only shame is that more of the book-original characters didn't get the same treatment.

Who have I missed? There's Avallac'h, of course, but I think I've got him pretty well covered by that last post. Zoltan, perhaps inevitably, has had his personality largely flattened into 'generic dwarf', with nothing better to do than hang around Geralt and Dandelion. You wouldn't know Book!Zoltan was apparently incapable of turning away women and children in need, for example – even human women and children with the chronic inability to say thankyou for his help. Or that he eventually admits to Geralt that the luggage he and his friends are carrying comes from a decidedly unsavoury source for such a supposedly charitable, upstanding guy. Yes, even Zoltan gets to be a morally complicated character in the books – who knew?

Speaking of dwarves, pleased as I am that Yarpen Zigren gets remembered in TW2, he's an odd one to talk about, since even in the books, he appears to have had a substantial personality transplant between his two main appearances. Yarpen’s a largely comedic figure in The Bounds of Reason short story, where he cheerfully admits to having considered letting his men knock down a particularly pompous aristocrat and piss all over him to teach him a lesson, but he’s evolved into a studious voice of reason against the scoiata'el by Blood of Elves. TW2 doesn't do a particularly good job of capturing either version, which I suspect probably bothered me more than most people – I liked the later book-incarnation of Yarpen immensely (and not even just because he's one of few ever to really call Triss out on just how much she needs to stop misreading Geralt's friendship as anything more than it is). His chapter in Blood of Elves packs a hell of a punch.

On the subject of accents

I do have to wonder if I'd have warmed up to characters like Triss, Shani and Dandelion (or even Letho) more if they'd only had halfway decent voice actors. It's not just that none are exactly leading the talent at the acting part of the job, it's that their American accents stick out in TW3 like a sore thumb.

Geralt mostly gets away his own US accent by dint of being the very first character we meet, so we've gotten used to the way he talks long before we notice how he stands out – hell, maybe that's just how they talk down in Rivia (hilariously, book!Geralt eventually reveals he's not even from Rivia, but simply picked the place and taught himself the accent so he could feel a bit less like the abandoned foundling he is, which only gives us yet more excuse for why his accent might sound a bit weird). More importantly, Geralt is meant to stand out, to be the outsider wherever he goes, so having him sound like no-one else fits the character.

But neither Triss or Dandelion are "of Rivia", and by the time they show up we've had dozens of hours in a game where literally everyone else sounds British, or Scottish, or Irish, or vaguely-eastern-European in the case of the Nilfgaardians. So why do these weirdos sound like no-one else on the continent?

The short answer seems to be that every character with an American accent in TW3 is someone who had an American accent in at least one of the previous games, which were way looser with their casting and had enough incidental American accents around that they didn't stand out. Clearly, by TW3, consistency with prior games has been prioritised over consistency with literally anything else we’re hearing.

Gaetan is an exception to the rule as the only new character (at least that I caught) with an American accent – presumably because between Geralt, Eskel, Lambert, Berengar, and Letho (and cohorts), some sort of 'witchers have American accents' rule has been pretty well established (another random American-accented witcher shows up in Thronebreaker, just to underline the point). We're going to mostly ignore Jad Karadin here, since his British accent is presumably a recent affectation to go with his new identity, and so makes sense.

This still doesn't really work though, since Letho’s school is all the way down in Nilfgaard (land of the Eastern European accents), while the oldest witcher from Kaer Morhen (Vesimir) is the one guy with a British accent. He sounds nothing like any of his students, despite the fact he's logically the guy they ought to have learned their accents from. So the logic falls in a heap however you slice it, and I'm thrown right out of the game.

With TW3 as your intro to the series, it feels almost as if characters like Triss and Dandelion have been assigned American accents because they're just too important to be saddled with the same pedestrian British accents as everyone else, which did nothing to endear them to me. The only one I eventually warmed up to was Lambert, and then only because he's just such a bitter asshole that he eventually goes full circle and comes out the other side (somewhere around when you've heard his miserable backstory, then gotten drunk together and told him how much you love him, man). Gaetan similarly snuck in under the same clause – American accents clearly work better for me in this series when attached to characters you're supposed to find pretty insufferable on first impressions.

Some final notes

To conclude, it seems only fair to throw in a quick nod to some of the more memorable book-characters who don't appear in the games. Neither Mother Nenneke (Geralt's sort-of-surrogate mother) or Vissena (Geralt's biological mother) ever appear either, alas – Vissena doesn't even merit so much as a Gwent card, which seems quite the wasted opportunity.

Milva, Cahir and Angouleme – the three remaining companions of Geralt’s who died alongside Regis but who were not so easily resurrected – naturally don’t appear. But nor are even really mentioned in all the games, which seems rather less than they deserve after giving their lives to Geralt's cause.

Cahir and Angouleme do at least have pretty badass Gwent cards to their names, though I am properly offended that Milva (who has the dubious honour of being my very favourite book character who doesn't ever appear in the games) is stuck with a card of her freaking death scene – which not only gets the scene wrong (believe me, there was no grimacing and gripping the arrow buried shallowly in her chest for poor Milva), but doesn't even bother to get her hair the right colour, for fuck’s sake. Basically, Milva was a stone cold badass and absolutely deserves better. #justice4milva

One can only guess how I'd have felt about some of these characters had I read the books before playing the games – I am obviously biased towards forgiving changes to characters whom I liked in their game incarnations, regardless of how they compare. Still, I think it does speak wonders that there still all these characters who suddenly made sense only after I'd met them in the books.

Even if only for Dandelion and Ciri, I can only dream of seeing a bit more of the book-original characterisations make it into the collective fannish consciousness. There's nothing wrong with getting into the canon purely based on the show or the games, but having read Sapkowski's novels, it's no longer any mystery how they spawned this massive franchise. That the saga wasn’t even fully available in English until well after Witcher 3 was released – a solid couple of decades late, and long after it had already been translated into Russian, French, German, Spanish and more – is a real shame. For once, it’s us in the anglophone world who’ve been missing out: these books deserve so much more than to be thought of as a footnote to the games or the show.

[botwstoriesandsuch]

Sidequests are part of the story so it’s still my ballpark shut up it’s time for

Read Part 1 here!

Part 2 || Part 3

If you’re on mobile, and tumblr hates this post, follow along on this google doc!

Rules/overview this rewrite in the beginning of Part 1

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Side quests, side quests, side quests. What are they? And what are they doing here, on an Age of Calamity rewrite? I must admit, game design is not an inherent forte of mine, and I like to think that my only “expertise” would be on writing and storytelling. So what the fuck is a fool like me doing here

Well my dear ladies, lads, and gentlefolk, if your memory does serve, I did say that the format of Age of Calamity was one that served the major plot and story beats for it’s cutscenes, and its worldbuilding and good parts of it’s character development for its gameplay and side quests. It’s actually a concept that can be seen in shows and movies too, although obviously it’s origins are in TTRPGs and videogames. Definition wise, a side quest is any deviation from the main story and plot that serves to flesh out an optional/overseen aspect of the game. So there’s out perfect outlet for worldbuilding, characters, and even a bit of humour. Side quests, by definition, can’t simply be just XP grinders, because otherwise you could…..just make an XP grinder. It’s like saying you’re getting your kids a bike, but then you get them a stationary exercise one. Sure it’s functionally the same and gives the same benefits, but it could be so much more. 

Does Age of Calamity have good side quests? I’d actually argue, yes. I mean sure, it’s not exactly gonna hold a candle to Fallout or Witcher 3, but there are great memorable side quests that do serve their purposes in this game. 

A fan favourite is “The So-Called Knight,” in which Link spars Mipha, Teba, Sidon, and Revali, a conflict of the Sidon’s confidence and belief in Link, with Revali’s skepticism and grudge against him. Not only is it great fandom content, but it explores the carrying POVs of several characters in a fun way. We also have Hestu’s Dance Competition, and the Miss Vai Battle Pageant. What they lack in serious character tone, they make up for in humour and world building. Even the quests that have nothing to do with the main cast of characters, like the Questionable Escort Mission, still provide funny and interesting details about the world, like how the Yiga Clan is still ever persistent in trying to take down Link with monsters and Windcleavers alike. 

It’s not like those side quests were functionally useless either, all of them still provided great amounts of exp and materials. What specifically made them great and memorable was their small little stories and character/world details. Of course, that’s not to say you can’t have the occasional plotless boss rush every now and again, those are fun in their own right and it’s good to have variety. But just thinking about it...what were everyone’s least favourite sidequests? The timed Yiga Escape?  The ones where you sit around defending strongholds? The one hit death Hair-Width Trials? Ah...so all the least enjoyable side quests were the ones that were difficult, with no enjoyable character or worldbuilding to back it up….interesting interesting….interesting pattern indeed. 

So, let’s improve the game a bit further. I do need to pace out my future character arcs somehow. I tried to make use of the existing quests where I could, but it’s just eaaaasier to just not think about it and do it from scratch. Just shove these in place of all those quests whose only description is “monsters have been spotted here! Take Mipha and go to work!” and stuff like that. Alrighty then! Here’s my take on cool side quests for every single character thus far, along with their paired gambit attacks. Prepare for heists! Drama! Simping! And Bananas!

Link: Mastering Stasis

Ok I have no idea when this quest unlocks so just for my purposes assume this only becomes available after Link pulls the Master Sword. 

Engage the hordes of monsters that have been spotted in Hyrule Field. Now is a great time to master the use of the Stasis Rune. Impa and Zelda accompany you, but it seems stasised monsters aren’t the only thing coming to a tense standstill…

This isn’t anything that special, I just want to further highlight this tension that Zelda and Link have, as it’s something touched upon in Botw, but never really mentioned or used ever in Hwaoc. Now more than ever, Zelda has an excuse to have a rocky relationship with him because she could actively see just how far he’s coming in such a short amount of time. Classic “he probably hates me so I guess I’ll hate him” thing.

You play as Link, the game gives you your little prompts on how to use Stasis, you take out a few hordes of Bokoblins and blah blah blah. I wanted to use an earlier level to establish Zelda’s relationship sooner as obviously it’s gonna be important to the story. But of course like all side quests it won’t kill you to skip out. Text dialogue can be Zelda saying science shit like “This will be a good opportunity to test out the full limits of the Stasis rune” and then Impa’s all “Yep! We got your back, Princess! We’ll clear out these monsters in no time.”Then Link the little angsty shit that he is says nothing, and as you play you clear out more and more bokoblins Zelda just says “...” and then we can toss in a Moblin or two in there for gambit voice stuff.  

Gambit dialogue with Impa would be supportive, her usual spunky dialogue. I had two ideas for Gambit attacks with Link: One where Impa does that thing where she cuts a giant laser through the air, but it’s aimed towards Link and he parries it right in a monster’s FACE because I think it’s badass and also a good way to show trust and stuff. The second thing was Impa’s giant bomb barrels, but Link is the one to somehow ignite them, because he is an arsonist after all. He can even have a chaotic Sheikah blue glint in his eyes like blue flame, I can already picture it so clearly given how anime/dramatic Impa’s movements are. Impa sets bombs, Link *teleports behind Moblin* nothin personal, kid. 

Also right at the end of their gambit attacks, Impa and Link should try to fist bump or something (cause the whole “cool guys don’t look at explosions” thing that Impa usually does on her own) but are interrupted by eggbot jumping up to try and join in. And then Impa can be annoyed and try to punt it or something. That’s not just self-indulgent that’s in her character she totally would and I want to make use of the fact that eggbot travels around with Link. The success of her attempts to punt him can vary.

If Link does a gambit with Zelda, her dialogue can just be her usual monotone Princess stuff, “Thanks for lending your strength,” or “There is still much more to do!” just purely professional, we’re not at a stage yet where she’s buddy buddy with Link. Their gambit attacks can still be cool though. One idea I had was Zelda using stasis, and you know how when you use it in botw everything lights up with that sonar effect? So Link stands besides Zelda, and she activates stasis, the first “sonar” light wave reveals the stasised monster, and you see it from the view of the Sheikah Slate. Then with each additional flash of sonar you just see this silhouette of Link going absolute ham on a monster. And then when the stasis “ding ding ding ding ding” is done, everything’s just dead. Can you see my inspiration from Persona 5 yet? Second idea was Zelda using cryonis and makes an ice ramp for Link to shield surf on and ram into a monster. For entertainment purposes Zelda should also be putting frogs on said slide. (Also also the reason I’m putting Link as the main focus for those gambit attacks is because I want to juxtapose it with future gambits where Zelda may or may not be more powerful…)

Anyhow anyhow, so this side quest, you beat some bokoblins, theres a moblin or two. However as you progress Zelda’s dialogue because a bit more passive aggressive, maybe Zelda can be a bit irritated at how quickly Link is defeating everything before she can even contribute. Impa can comment on this like “She hasn’t exactly been warming up to you, has she…” and then the last point of the side quest, Zelda runs off, there’s a...let’s say a big horde of blue or black Moblins. Or a horde of Wizzrobes, I’m not too picky on it. Link can save her and do a gambit or whatever, but the point of importance is that Zelda leaves with the clear mindset off, “You don’t need to keep coddling me, I can handle my own” to Link, but is “Thank you, I’m glad you’re here,” to Impa. 

Now I stole was inspired to use this based on this comic by @novellanova, and you should check it out here. But basically, at the end when all the monsters are dead and the last few text boxes are rolling, Impa says something like “Gee, at this rate I might have to protect you from the princess! Hmm…. you know, maybe if you two had the opportunity to hang out more and get to know each other, she’d warm up to you! Ha! That’s it! I’ve made up my mind. Listen up Link, from now on I’m gonna let you man the wheel when it comes to protecting Zelda. So with me out of the picture you better take the opportunity to be the nicest, most helpful, and most effective body guard there is. I know you already are, but still, if I hear that one little Chuchu so much as splat in her direction I will take you down...got it?” And, that’s that.

Side quest done. Fun Link gambits with Impa and Zelda, some little character POVs on the situation, plus an explanation as to why Impa doesn’t accompany Zelda everywhere/nods to the cutscenes of Botw as to what happened to Impa. Alright, that was probably the most boring one so let’s move on to

Daruk: A Rumbling Stomach

Alright I’ll be honest...I have no idea what to do with Daruk. Especially when Yunobo’s not here, I got zip-zero to work with considering his character is non-existent. Further down the line I’ll certainly try to give him more nuances and the like, but I’m afraid the majority of my character efforts have been towards Astor, Revali, Zelda, and [REDACTED] so this is my apology ahead of time, rock fuckers.

This is my take on how to make those timed quests more fun. So basically, the premise of this stage is that Daruk was just happily hanging around trying to enjoy his rock roast, when a monster surprised him and he dropped it, and now it’s rolling down the hill. This is based on my real Breath of the Wild experience where I had to trek up that Volcano path to bring a rock roast for that shrine quest, but at the very top I dropped it and had to chase it down before it fell into the lava below. 

Daruk is eager to chow down on the finest rock roasts this year has to offer! It’s too bad things go downhill when monsters start to ambush. Defeat key enemies and rescue Daruk’s tumbling meal before this year’s wait goes to waste!

So, that’s what this is. The stage opens and Daruk says “NOOooOO! My rock roast! Damn monsters!” and you have to defeat baddies and catch up to the rock roast before the timer runs out and it falls into lava. And then when you finish and get back the rock roast that’s pretty much it….except SIKE no it’s not. Because a lot of these timed quests usually have a “surprise! There’s more!” thing at the end so I’ll do that here too. So Daruk has saved his rock roast and he’s talking about how he’s going to enjoy it in all its deliciousness, when he’s cut off by a random Goron’s scream. Turns out, Daruk’s yelling at the monsters about desperation to retrieve his lost lunch has attracted monsters to some traveling civilians, and now you gotta go beat a Talus, or a couple of Moblins, or something...Again I don’t really have level set or idea when these side quests unlock so just use your imagination. Once Daruk defeats the monster(s) the Gorons can thank him, and then one of the Goron kids can be like “Ooo! Is that a super special rock roast?!?” And Daruk is all:  “Ah! Well all the best Goron heroes eat plenty of rocks! This here is the gourmet stuff. You can only get it once a—” And the kid’s like “Woah! I’ve always wanted to have one, that’s why I’ve been training hard so I can explore more of the mountain. Where’d you get it??” And Daruk can sputter a bit, before finally sighing and giving into his instincts. “Ah….well, why don’t you have it? You’re probably really hungry after running around with those monsters…”

“Woah really?? Are you sure—”

“YEAH JUST TAKE IT ALREADY GO”

“Woah, thank you!” and then the Goron kid and co run off. Cue Daruk crying to himself in the background. Daruk may have an appetite, but I like to characterize him as the Goron Hero first and foremost.  

I’m sure that doesn’t stop him from mourning his rock though.

Mipha: Stronger Sentiments

Mipha and Daruk talked a whole bunch about training together so that Mipha can grow stronger, and Daruk was catching on to her crush on Link and it was a nice interaction in between them except for the fact that we never see them do the damn training so that’s what this is.

I think this is as good an opportunity as any to make this a Hair-Width quest, the ones where you can’t take one hit. The difficulty of a level is one of the most effective ways to put the players in the boots of a character to experience the same struggles they do. If the player works hard, then they automatically associate that with the character working hard. So, yeah, let’s have Mipha kicking ass and working to be strong enough to protect Link.

Mipha is determined to grow stronger. Daruk and the other Gorons are helping out with an intense training session by Gut Check Rock. Prove yourself by defeating all the enemies you encounter!

So Mipha is sparring with the Gorons, you fight through them and the captains and blah blah, the final boss is fighting Daruk without getting hit. 

“I promise not to hurt you more than I’m capable of reversing.”

“Ha! Give me all you’ve got, princess!”

You fight, cue the special music or whatever. I mentioned that gambit dialogue/attacks could also work to be custom for the character that you’re fighting, so I’m thinking something like this. Daruk slams the ground and rocks and magma sprout up around him like jagged pieces of glass, but Mipha is no where to be seen. Daruk’s kinda huffing and puffing, “Where’d you go Mipha…” and then FWOOSH, giant geyser right behind him. [yes I KNOW I overuse the *teleports behind you* “nothing personal, kid” thing but I think it’s COOL and you can’t stop me] So anyhow, you know that thing in Avatar where Pakku is just riding at the top of a whirlpool and destroying everything? That’s Mipha.

Daruk turns around and scratches the back of his head. “...huh….that’s not good.” Cue Mipha swooping down to deal the defeating blow. 

So Mipha wins, she can mention how wonderful it was and how much stronger she feels. And she can thank Daruk, and he’s all “No problem!” but he mutters something like “And I thought Gorons hit hard...now I know how Link feels.” End side quest….SIKE it’s another surprise boss at the end. A Goron captain suddenly reports that an Igneo Talus has appeared nearby. 

Mipha goes up to fight it, but wow! Link is already there. They both fight it, but it’s clear that Link didn’t need her help that much. You can defeat the Talus with a Mipha/Link gambit. It’s similar to Link’s usual “swing sword in a giant circle and become a death windmill” but Mipha kinda enhances it with water or something and it puts out the Talus. I wanted this ending with a focus on how strong Link is just to show that while Mipha is improving, she’s still not yet where she needs to be. 

Daruk: “Sorry I wasn’t much help at the end there, I was busy, uh, stretching.”

Mipha: “Oh it’s quite alright, Daruk. We were both quite tired from today’s training.”

Daruk: “Well I dunno about that...seems to me you were quite lively and active as you fought beside Link. *wink*”

Mipha: “Huh!?!? W-What is that supposed to mean??”

Cue laughter from Daruk. Mipha is flustered. And Link is just...confused, as always. 

Urbosa: Mighty Thunder of the Gerudo

So in the game this is just some normal outpost capturing, stronghold defending side quest, but we’re gonna spice it up just a bit. 

An important excavation site is being overrun by monsters, and Urbosa has set out to engage them. Defend and capture the outposts, in order to prevent this valuable place from falling into enemy hands…

So you fight as Urbosa, defeat some enemies and blah blah. When you first arrive there, I want one of the Gerudo Captains to be like “Lady Urbosa? Where did you come—What are you doing here? Aren’t there areas of greater importance for you to be at right now?” Urbosa says something like “Nevermind that now, let us focus on achieving victory over these rotten beasts.” 

As the battle goes through, it is revealed that this excavation site is where Zelda’s mother would often work and hang out with Urbosa. Urbosa says some stuff like “Her Majesty would not be happy to see all these monsters heading here!” *decapitates Moblin* and then she can say other dramatic stuff at the end like “We have fought well...for her memory” and other classic lesbian pining. Some guard at the end can say “Perhaps you should move on and help out somewhere else, Lady Urbosa. We can handle the clean up from here.” 

“Sure,” Urbosa replies, “Just another moment.” And then cue reminiscing. “She always did love these machines…”

And just other sentimental stuff like that. If you’re gonna be a coward and hold out on the Champion death angst, then you best be pumping that angst and emotion from somewhere, you know?

Also yay for worldbuilding! At least in my rewrite, the Guardian excavations and stuff were overseen by the Queen. Could be a reason Zelda hangs out with Sheikah tech so much...who knows who knows... who knows what other implications this has, it’s just a side quest after all.

Revali: Anti-Ice Training [get it??? Cause in this one, Revali’s gonna break the ice with some other characters?? I’m funny I swear]

Ok so for this one, I want to pull Revali’s character away from just “the birb that doesn’t like Link” and give him some other stuff to stand on. Obviously, there would be other side quests in a fully fleshed out game that did even more to characterize him, but for my rewrite I’m only dedicated this post and one other future post to sidequests, so I gotta really bring out what I can for the few side quest stories I have time to tell

Revali sets out alone to deal with some monsters by the Hebra trail. Although intended as an isolated moment to hone his skills, he finds himself with unexpected company. Defeat key enemies.

So you play as Revali and at first you’re alone, taking out Ice Lizalfos and the like. Revali’s text dialogue can say stuff like “Hmm...not fast enough” “My current needs to be stronger” “*mutters* Can’t compete with lightning and magma with aim like that.” Just stuff that establishes that he’s working hard to really prove himself as the best, but is still a bit insecure about his position. He thinks he’s better than Link, sure, and he certainly thinks that being a princess or a chief doesn’t automatically make you the best. However by this point, Revali has battled alongside the other Champions and seen their skill in battle, and has developed some respect for them. Afterall, Champions were chosen in some part for their skills, unlike Link or Zelda who destiny just thrust greatness upon. 

So Revali has this slight insecurity that compared to lightning, and magic healing, and magma, with chiefs and princesses and titles of heroes, he and his efforts will be overshadowed and forgotten, unfairly deemed the useless one. Thus, here he is, training in solitude, not wanting anyone to see the imperfections and mistakes until he is absolutely perfect.

Except for the fact that after you beat a Wizzrobe, the other three Champions show up. 

Revali: Wh—Huh?? What are you all doing here?

Urbosa: Well, we all have to travel with the princess to that Tower in a few hours, so I recommended we find you and hang out until then

Mipha: And a good thing too! Look how many monsters there are

Revali: I’m actually doing very well on my own right now. Wouldn’t want you to catch a cold or something, so why don’t you head on back and let me handle this.

Daruk: Aw, it’s not that we think you can’t do this. It’s that you’re hogging all the fun! Urbosa: And that it would be more efficient if all of us went to work

Daruk: That too

Revali: Look it’s not—you all can’t just—this is not just about—AUGH, look, I’m just trying to train myself at the moment, and I don’t need you all to mess with my drills

Urbosa: Training, hm? Well how about this...you let us continue helping you with these monsters, and after, I’ll let you in on a good Gerudo training technique

Revali: Hmph. Fine, whatever gets you out of my tail feathers faster

So Revali and the Champions clear out the monsters. Revali can have gambit attacks/dialogue with each of the other Champions. This is already incredibly long so perhaps I’ll save specifics for another time, feel free to use your imagination. Urbosa teasing Revali and they make a thunderstorm, Mipha and Revali swimming in the sky and kissing—wait that’s— 

When all the monsters are cleared, which honestly isn’t tooooo many, Revali speaks again.

Revali: So what’s this oh-so-holy technique you had in mind, then?

Urbosa: Ah yes, well really it’s quite simple. It’s called…

Urbosa: One-on-one combat

Now Revali fights Urbosa. It think it’d be really fun if your allies on a stage could swap to a boss, and I wish hwaoc had a bit more freedom with the interactions as a whole, but ah well, that’s what I’m here for I guess.

So when you/Revali defeat her, it’s a good accomplishment! Not only for you the player, as Urbosa would not be the easiest to beat, but also because match-up wise, Revali prevailing over Urbosa is a big feat as their styles are quite opposite, arguably with the strength in favour for Urbosa.

Revali might at first have the mindset that Urbosa is overconfident and thinks she’s got an easy win on Revali, but that mindset is quickly proven wrong when 1) the difficulty of the gameplay itself shows how they’re both doing their best and 2) Urbosa with her Gerudo qualities is probably shouting stuff like “give it your all!” and things.

And so, as you beat her...

Revali, kinda huffing and puffing, but just a bit:: ...you….held back

Urbosa: Come now, do you really think of me as someone who’d do that? I’m almost insulted.  

Revali: Hmm...perhaps not then....

Mipha: Wow! What a wonderful fight from both of you. 

And then insert some other dialogue from Daruk or something that shows the Champions acknowledging the training and hard work Revali must have put in to be so skilled. Perhaps it’s not so bad, when you train with others and your skill is fully appreciated by your frie—GAH. Perish the thought, they’re all just a bunch of royal fools who can’t hold a candle to the skill of a Rito Master….probably…

Revali: Well unlike you lax fools, I tend to take my job seriously. I don’t have time to longue and banter when the princess is still expecting me in an hour or two

Urbosa: Oh alright, let’s get to it then. What’s the expression? “The early bird gets the w—”

Revali: Gross. No. Don’t finish that sentence, I beg you. 

Urbosa: Oh? Well why don’t you fly off to escape my dreadful tones then?

Revali: ...Heh, don’t be absurd…

Revali: Without me, you’ll all probably get lost. So, I suppose I should stick around for that sake Great Fairies: Dress to Oppress 

The Great Fairies are holding a fashion competition and rating people’s outfits. Poorly judged outfits gives them the right to compensation combat. Defeat all your less than fashionable allies.

...

...yeah.

It seemed funny in my head, alright? cOme on, just imagine…

Revali, fully expecting to win: Well?

Great Fairies: Hm...I don’t know dear, all the colors are very clustered. Perhaps if you were taller—?

Revali: bWHAKT!? *other angry bird noises*

- - - 

Daruk: I brought my BEST out today! :D

Great Fairies: Is that a….chain?

Daruk: TWO chains, actually. :D

Great Fairies: Oh honey…

- - - 

Great Fairies: Ooo! Our little hero is about to come out! Wonder what he chose...a knight in shining armour? A handsome desert voe? Ooo!! And those Snowquill braids always made him look so cute…

Link: *comes out in the Tingle Outfit*

Great Fairies: …

Great Fairies: …………..hm…..

At the end of the side quest, after you beat everyone, the Great Fairy wins because of course they do. 

Great Fairies: Oh my! What an unexpected outcome...but it really couldn’t have gone any other way. I declare the judges the winner! I mean just look at me, I’m as dazzling as a jeweled desert flower, because I am! Ohohohoho…

This side quests unlocks the Tingle Outfit

Hestu: Forest Dance Festival

Alright this quest was already pretty perfect, BUT, I just want to use this opportunity to say that all of Hestu’s gambit attacks makes his allies and enemies do special dances. Absolutely abSURD that Hestu can only make the lesser smaller enemies dance on occasion, nonononono, my guy Hestu is making everyone dance. You can’t stop this. Nothing I say will ever top the imagination, so just take my word that this is a good thing. [Reluctant Revali doing the macarena against his will in sync with Hestu and they bash someone’s head in...ah the possibilities.] 

Maz Koshia: Links to the Past

Ok so before I get into this, a few things. This quest takes place well after the tower activations in Akkala. Age of Calamity leaves a whole lot of plots holes as to why a Monk is just...here, and what the point of the shrines are, and personally my first reaction to all this was just a five minute extended “huuhhhhhh???” 

So here is my headcanon, explanation, thing, canon to the world of the Kip Cut story. Ones all the Sheikah Towers were activated, that officially woke up all the Shrines, because we know that the Towers and Shrines are all connected to the same system. [See Great Plateau Tower activating all the Shrines and Towers, and Creating a Champion explanation on the system] But when all the monks were in their little altars and noticed how Link hadn’t dont a single one, they were like “what the fuck.” Monk Maz Koshia, who is kinda the head honcho of the monks and probably the only one powerful enough to go out in the world anyhow, sets out to see what the deal is, and after many a teleportation and telepathic communication, he figures out that Link is just running around with the Master Sword already. This kinda confuses him, because the whole point of the Shrines was to test Link and give him the spirit orbs so that he could grow strong enough to get the Master Sword, but he somehow already has it...so hmmmm something fishy is going on in this timeline. So Link technically hasn’t proven himself at all, Maz Koshia ambushes him, they do their little combat trial, Link passes, and Maz Koshia’s like “ok cool so you’re not useless.”

So now Monk Maz Koshia has cast aside his old monk duties of waiting around for a couple hundred years, in favour of just hanging out with Link and continuing to train him combat wise. Shrines are still explored by Zelda and co because they are important areas to establish teleportation pads, and whenever they’re there, Maz Koshia forces Link to get in a shrine to get a spirit orb, which is not only useful in general for health, but since Link already has the Master Sword, the other characters can get the spirit orb too. (So all those little heart upgrades that you see on the map, those are all just in the real Botw Shrine locations, rather than just scattered around randomly. Also I’m ignoring the stuff about talking to Hylia in order to exchange for stamina or heart containers because the game never talks about her, or stamina, and I’m not about to create an entirely new custom gameplay feature for this game, fuck you.)

I like to think that Maz Koshia is very selective about the Shrines he encourages people to try out. “Oh nonono, don’t bother with Qukah’s….lazy ass, only set up one little mountain that you have to blast through with lightning and that’s the entire puzzle! Disgraceful...Here, Kaam Ya’tak has set up a wonderful Trial of Power for you. I’m sure you’ll find the level design quite thrilling. They spent a lot of time on the critical thinking aspects so have fun!”

“I should warn you that this one was made by one of the millennials...yes, those youngins who were only initiated 1000 years of age. Honestly, they lack so much experience. Ms. Agana over here was experimenting with something called ‘motion controls?’ Pretty lazy if you ask me. Traditionally I would just stick to combat and block and switch stuff...but ah well, variety I suppose.”

Right, what was I talking about? Oh right! This is a sidequest. So Monk Maz Koshia doesn’t really have...a character??? Or a personality??? So I don’t really know what to do with him other than use him as an outlet for world building. Apologies to the Monk….fuckers? Stans? Feel free to leave me a comment about how I missed all the nuances of his character or something I’m all ears.

On an expedition to mark more Shrines and establish more teleports for the Kingdom, a large horde of monsters is spotted, seemingly with the intention to destroy these Ancient relics. Link and Maz Koshia use this opportunity to sharpen their combat skills. Protect the stronghold and defeat key enemies.

And then that quest would just kinda echo the stuff I said earlier about the world. (As Maz Koshia defends a Shrine, somewhere Qukah Nata is smugly shouting “Bet you wish ALL of them were protected with a giant mountain now, do ya?)

Also Link and Maz Koshia’s gambit attack involves the Master Cycle. I don’t have the specifics, but damn if I want some call backs to Botw while also having fun.

Impa: Steal Yourself [Yiga Clan Escape]

In an act of pure hatred and malice, the Yiga Clan has snuck into Kakariko Village in the dead of night…and stolen all the Swift Carrots! Impa sets out to get them back, as well as taking something else as a form of swift revenge...Escape before the time runs out.

Ok I can explain.

So you know how the Yiga and the Sheikah have kiiiiinda been murdering each other a bunch in Botw, going as far as to kill a deserter’s wife and threatening to murder his kids, and also people on both sides were sorta massacred for no reason? And alsoooo one of those people who literally lived during that time of the massacre is just kinda floating around now?  And you knooooooooww how the Yiga Clan just kinda joins Zelda’s side later on and we’re not supposed to think about the implications of that too hard because they’re the funny banana ninjas, haha? Yeah well neither Age of Calamity or I really have time to explore the moral grey areas of an alliance between two warring factions, one of which has a leader who doesn’t really seem to remember the reason why they hate Hyrule which brings into question whether the lackeys even know their clan’s history, and brings about the moral dilemma of criminalizing the ignorant, and also there’s the whole other dilemma of depicting the side that submitted to their oppression as being “in the right” and the topic of a race of people being pitted against their own by a higher power is really brushed over sO WE’RE JUST GONNA TOSS ALL THAT OUT THE WINDOW AND MAKE THEM ACT LIKE RIVALLING HIGH SCHOOLS, OKAY? OKAY! This is fine this is fine— 

So I have dubbed the High School mascot of the Sheikah, the Swift Carrot. And although there does seem to be some internal debate about whether the carrot should be replaced by the Fortified Pumpkin, the hero of Hyrule Link favours carrots so that’s that. Then of course, the mascot for the Yiga Clan is the Mighty Banana. The two sides hate each other and steal their food symbols to be petty. I’ll be covering the side quests of Kohga and the other later characters in another later post, but just know that Kohga will have his banana heist sidequest too. 

So anyhow, you play as Impa. Maybe she can say a piece of dialogue or two about how she has to uphold the image of her people as she has to lead them one day. And then, this side quest is just her retrieving the carrots and running off with the Yiga’s big banana supply before she’s caught. This is based on that “Escape the Yiga Clan” quest if you couldn’t tell.

Custom gambit defeat of Impa vs Kohga: On one hand I think it would be badass to see Impa’s Sheikah skills go up against the Yiga Clan tactics. Kohga summons a giant metal ball to throw, Impa teleports behind him “nothing personal, kid” nO fuck I’m doing it again away goes to swing a blade at his face. He blocks it with his little energy shield thing, but not before an entire conga line of Impa clones start slashing at him until he’s defeated by a giant explosion. So yeah, that’d be badass and cool. But on the other hand…

Kohga, stomping his feet and having a fit: I cARROT believe you would do something this terrible! Give us back those bananas right now! D: ….please? You can keep the gross orange sticks.

Sooga: He asked nicely. You wouldn’t deny the wishes of the most polite and charming Yiga Chief there is, would you?

Impa: No can do, Yiga scum! I’m afraid this cruel action wasn’t veggie nice of you so I must exact justice! Now it’s my time to split. *Impa clones gather and throw Kohga into a giant frog’s mouth. Impa runs off with a sack of fruit [fruit (derogatory) if you will] cackling into the horizon*

Zelda: The Path She Laid For You

The King has order Zelda to head to the Temple of Time, in order to see if anything there could help awaken her powers. Zelda sets off quietly, with minimal company, as not to attract too much attention lest the Town’s folk be hit with another attack. It seems, however, that these precautions won’t be enough...Defeat key enemies

So this is a pure Zelda sidequest, with no other characters except for eggbot because I said so. Starts out normal when SURPRISE! Bunch of monsters appear and Zelda has to whip out her iphone and fight them. 

Also!! Good time for the Hollows to show up, and you know, tell her what a failure she is and all that. Convince her that she's useless and gonna doom everyone. All that good stuff!! It’s just nice to catch up with the villains and see how they’re doing, you know? ‘Sup Hollow Urbosa, last I saw you were barely spitting words in the Lost Woods, and now you’re giving full hard-hitting insults to Zelda’s character and ability? Good for you, Queen, good for you.

So Zelda and a handful of guards are fighting off monsters, and Zelda has to beat the Hollows too. Her gambit dialogue when she defeats Hollows can be stuff like “You’re not the real ___” or something idk, I don’t have a lot of experience with the evil clone trope, I’ve never played Ocarina of Time. But one specific I DO want to highlight is that Zelda uses the nearby Sheikah Tech to defeat the enemies. I find it a bit weird how Zelda just knows how to use those random water canons in the Faron region in later chapters, so we’re just gonna at least set up a pattern so that it makes a bit more sense later. Plus! This is in front of the Great Plateau, AKA Gate Post Town/Garrisons AKA oh lOOK it’s that area where Link and Impa and eggbot first meet in that Impa introduction scene of my rewrite so we have already established that Sheikah Technology is being stored here and ready to use! Continuity in world building! Nice.

So Zelda uses her knowledge of Sheikah Tech to defeat the Hollows, when...dun dun dun! Astor appears. But you don’t fight him...

Astor: Have you listened to one word spoken to you today? Why are you still resisting? Let me help you.

Zelda: And what exactly is your plan? You wish to kill me, then?

Astor: Not quite. I mean, if you do die, there are ways I can manage, so if some stray Yiga blade happens to strike you I’m not completely doomed.

Astor: But no, the most optimal outcome for everyone is the one where you live yet. You must see the truth as I do, and let me fix this. I can undo this terrible knot destiny has thread for you. [and insert other fate sisters and sewing metaphors here]

Zelda: But how? What’s your game here, if you’re truly claiming to be in everyone’s best interest then why all this secrecy?

Astor: Ah...ever the one to look for the facts and logic, hmm? Can’t blame you, you get it straight from your mother.

Zelda: …!

Astor: But...I’m afraid even if I did tell you now, you’re in no state to truly grasp it. No...the only way this works is for you to truly understand the position you're in, and the stakes that hang in the path before you. 

Astor: And if I have to kill every King, Champion, or knight to get you to understand…

Astor: Then so be it. 

[dun dun dun]

Zelda: No! I won’t let you hurt anyone, I swear it!

Eggbot [just pretend eggbot can have dialogue boxes too]: *chirps* 

Astor, suddenly noticing eggbot: ...You…you’re one thing I still don’t—

Eggbot chirps again beside Zelda, both seeming to be angry at Astor’s words. Eggbot releases a glowing flash of light. Kinda like a...flash bang? [is that the right word idk]

Astor: Ah—! *and he teleports away to escape* Astor: Until next time then...Princess

And that’s pretty much the sidequest. Zelda can question what exactly eggbot did, but he’s not exactly the most verbal in responses. Finally it ends with Zelda going home, “He was still right though...I’m still sitting in failure, with not a hint of my powers awakening. All I have is some Sheikah tech, some exhausted shoulders….and well, you, I suppose, little one.”

“Come, it’d be a waste to continue forth in this condition. Let’s go back to the castle.”

Eggbot: *happy whistles and chirps*

= = = = = 

Tune in next time folks, as we dive back into the main event! Needless to say, Chapter 4 is where the shit starts to go down...

[janiedean]

Fandom and politics, that's the topic of this message and a request for your opinion on fandom and politics. In recent days in polish fantasy fandom one of the prominent figures, a writer, asked why can't we all just talk and be fandom and leave politics behind, like in "good old days". And explained how he and the wolę fandom just doesn't like ideology pushed at him in media. (1/2)

(2/2) The problem is, what he calls ideology, is often media not being as racist, sexist or homophobic as usually (i.e. the feminist head of the team of writers of The Witcher netflix show, black Heimdall in "Thor" etc.)Or women in fandom demanding to do sth with t-shirts that was sold at one convention, with a print that goes sth along the lines of "I love burning villages and raping virgins". Because those are the prominent scandals of polish fandom.

hmmm the thing is, I think that fandom shouldn’t meddle with politics when it comes to fans period and when it comes to authors, it should but to a certain point. what I mean is:

when I say fandom shouldn’t be meddling with politics when it comes to fans I mean that whole part where you’re judged as SOMETHING just out of your fandom preferences. I mean, people saying you’re homophobic because you don’t ship the slash ship, people assuming you’re racist because you ship two white guys or the likes, people thinking you’re pro-pedophilia because you ship underaged characters and so on. that imo is a thing that regardless of the media in question should die in a fire because you cannot judge people on their fictional preferences. no one should assume I’m okay with incest in general if I ship thor and loki, no one should assume I’m racist because I like stevebucky better than stevesam and no one should assume I’m homophobic if I ship a m/f ship and so on. especially when it comes to people who ship/like problematic stuff for whichever damned reason and they get told they’re monsters when they just wanna do their thing. like that imo is a thing that has to die in a fire right now especially when it becomes a fandom-wide thing and you get people basically going like ‘if you’re white you can’t engage with a fandom with black/poc characters because you’re gonna be racist anyway’ and then complain when they get zero content. or worse, the star wars lists of problematic people that you need to avoid because they ship rey/lo and are therefore *insert problematic word here* and such things. fandom should be a place where fans are free to do whatever they like and explore whatever subjects they like without being judged for it. obviously if someone fucks up MAJORLY (see: the infamous j2 haiti fic of doom) calling them out should happen, also because it means that if they’re ignorant they’ll learn, and using fandom as a platform to learn stuff about people different from your social/ethnical background is always great, but people shouldn’t be shamed for what they do in fandom as a general rule. that is my general opinion when it comes to fans. you can’t go on and judge someone on whether they like noncon in fiction or not. like. no.

what you’re talking about instead is the media itself being more progressive, and in that case I don’t agree with the *good old days* thing because more diversity is good and honestly if someone’s problem is that heimdall is black in a marvel movie that isn’t even accurate per se because in theory thor and loki aren’t even odin’s sons then like, you need to get over yourself.

and like, one thing is having reservation over a shirt such as what you said and another is telling other women they can’t like kink or m/m porn, so like that is a kind of politics that needs to be discussed and absolutely should, but that’s not what I mean when I say I’d really like politics out of fandom space. one thing is fandom space, one thing is the original content. I’m entirely down for diverse original content of whichever kind, what I don’t think should be done is fans engaging with it just looking at the politics and judging it based on the politics only and not on the plot, and mostly judging it on whether it’s progressive enough or not and judging other people for liking it if they don’t think it’s progressive enough, not fans asking for more diverse stuff in general and/or wanting to feel included in fandom spaces, and I think creators should acknowledge that.

like, the polish fantasy writer obviously doesn’t care for diversity - but no one forces him to. but saying that FANTASY IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS WAS JUST WHITE PEOPLE is also ridiculous bc diverse fantasy has been around for ages like ffs.

what I mean is that we absolutely should have politics - if by that you mean more diversity - in the original media we consume, though I don’t think authors should be forced to do that because you get better things when the author actually wants to write them, and fandom should engage with more diverse media absolutely, but fandom can’t also judge what people in it do all the time based on how *they* engage with the content in case, because everyone will like different things and you can’t force people to engage with that specific thing just because you think it’s woke. and you also can’t trash the author for things you might perceive as problematic but actually aren’t.

examples of what I mean: I, author, write a fantasy story.

not so ideal case of politics in media: I, a white cishet female author, decided to write a fantasy story. I don’t know much stuff outside standard fantasy and I don’t feel like writing people who aren’t what I am. I write your usual standard lotr-ripoff, everyone is white, cis and hetero, there’s one romance, a couple bromances, no social or political hidden commentary. it has a good story. it’s an okay book. the fandom most likely will ship the guys in the bromances. no one feels challenged. tumblr declares me problematic for not writing diverse stuff and then ignores me.

ideal case of politics in media: I, a white cishet female author, decided to write a fantasy story. I don’t want to do the same usual lotr rehash and I know that diversity is important and I want to make a good job. I make my character list. I decide who’s white and who’s not, giving a decent balance. I make some of them non-straight. I don’t see many trans characters in fantasy, so I decide one of them is. I spend months talking to anyone belonging to the aforementioned categories asking them what they think of my approach - ie I find a number of trans people to discuss what I want with the trans character, I talk to a number of black people if I want the character to be black possibly not all from the US and I pick people from all over the place. I write my book. I make sure every character has a meaningful relationship with the others so that all their interactions are interesting. I try as much as possible to not have stereotypes. I get a bunch of betas and I change anything they find improvable. my book gets published. everyone loves it.

now, ideal fallout of the above which is what I mean with healthy fandom consumption: I get a fandom made up by diverse people because I have a diverse book. people enjoy that I gave everyone some space. they might interact with me on twitter and asking me ships headcanons. I tell them that they can ship whatever they like write whatever fic off it they want. every character gets some fic or moodboard and everyone enjoys whatever they like in whichever dynamic. not-trans people who had never run into a trans character in fantasy might go like ‘wow I hadn’t realized that’s how it felt’ and might get informed. if I based it on some specific historical period people might get informed on that. people belonging to the minority categories educate the others in fandom about what they might not know, nicely. everyone writes all the porn in the world. everything is great. if someone asks me why I have black/lgbt+/etc people in my book I reply them that minorities exist so why shouldn’t they be in my book and that’s the most twitter hate I get. life is great. my publisher wants more. that book becomes a series. rinse and repeat.

not so ideal fallout, ie what I mean with fandom shouldn’t be about politics: somehow, there’s a fanon ship that gets most fans for a reason. it happens to be idk, bisexual white guy + gay white guy who are not together in the book. they get more fic than dunno, hetero black woman with hetero asian guy. people start calling the first group problematic because they don’t ship the poc couple and THEY’RE RACIST. the trans character isn’t a stereotype/isn’t *good enough* for fandom standards so they decided that idk, feminine straight guy I put in because feminine straight guys exist is actually the only trans one because HEADCANONS and suddenly all fics with a trans character for that book are about the headcanoned character that’s actually a stereotype if you go for that, not the one I actually spent six months researching, and if you don’t agree you’re suddenly a transphobe. someone sends me a twitter message asking me what I think of HEADCANONS and I answer that I’m okay with HCs but I put canon characters that aren’t white, straight and cis for a reason and suddenly I’m THE MOST PROBLEMATIC AUTHOR EVER and people decide that my efforts aren’t good enough and that as a cis woman writing gay men is problematic and everyone in fandom who writes m/m and is a woman is shit. then people decide that shipping the black cis bisexual guy with anyone white is racist and writing porn where he’s on top is racist but then another side says that if he bottoms it’s racist (guys LOOK AT SW FANDOM I DIDN’T MAKE THIS UP), so no one ends up touching the black character out of fear of being dissed. six months after the book is out, the only thing there’s a fandom following for is a problematic as hell crackship in between two cishet white guys that hate each other and barely interacted because it’s the only fandom space where people don’t get shamed for what they like.

I, the author, look at all the hate messages I get on twitter and think fuck it, next time I’m just doing high fidelity 2.0 just with cishet white female protagonists so no one can tell me I did it wrong since I’m white, cishet, female and I hang out in record stores all the damned time or at least I used to when I was younger and they existed. I never write a diverse cast again. I never write a trans character again because that wasn’t what I wanted to do, I just wanted people to have fun and enjoy a more diverse cast of characters without fans murdering each other over it.

like, that’s what I mean with politics shouldn’t be in fandom that much, not that politics shouldn’t be in fandom spaces/in the media we consume period XD ;)