#tbh i was just thinking about how people who say they're nice are often absolutely awful

[ruthlesslistener]

everytime i think about that terf saying that the 'evil' in men starts at 4 years of age i think about that one eight year old kid who saw me waiting in line to get my flu shot with my (presumably) bitch face set in place and very seriously start explaining to me how it's okay, i just need to relax and not look and it won't even hurt at all. Like i myself am not someone who likes or can be around children for long (not bc they're terrible- they're just little people having a hell of a time in the world, and i am an autistic people who has a hell of a time in the world, which doesn't always mesh the best), but holy shit how do you think little boys are anywhere in the least bit inherently awful. Moreover, how do you get a job in CHILDCARE and claim to be empathetic and good with kids if you deadass think just because a baby has balls, they're inherently awful. Fucking hell.

[mandy4ever69420]

opinion on sheila?

i don't care for her. as a person. i've found her miscellaneous shenanigans a lot more enjoyable upon rewatch, though, since i'm no longer trying to find a way to still like her as a person. it's very sad for me to not like her because she is played by JOAN CUSACK whom i adore + naturally she fucking kills it in her performance. alas she is not dom top rosalie mullins from school of rock 😔

i contemplated leaving my response at that but i DO in fact think she's really interesting! i thought, you know, some other people have made Some posts about how she fucks up but tbh, come to think of it, usually they only go so far as to say "she did bad thing, therefore bad" and dont go past that! which is tragic. SO i'm going to. i hope.

please keep in mind as you read this that my biggest problem with sheila is her attempt to, as a white christian woman, adopt and raise a handful of native american children, which is a facet of cultural genocide (article II, item e) that the ICWA was literally created to prevent. i also dislike her for other reasons, but this is the biggest

sheila is probably the strongest example within shameless of a character being cute, charismatic, or "nice" on the surface, in a way that really powerfully distracts from the type of harm they're capable of.

particularly, in addition to being "nice" and carrying joan cusack's INCREDIBLE charisma, sheila is also disabled! she's terrified of a lot of things, and mocked by her husband for it. she absolutely deserves sympathy for her struggles with agoraphobia and a LOT of people conflate sympathizing with someone with having to accept their behavior. this is the flip-side of people not understanding that someone who has done something scary or messed up still has a sympathetic internal experience.

season one has sheila most of the time unable to enact harm because of her limiting circumstances. although she repeatedly ignores frank's sexual boundaries, he's also definitely taking advantage of her hospitality the entire time. frank often will lose sympathy points by acting horrifically in other ways, sheila's behavior will be ignored for how sympathetic she is. in season one, sheila also APPEARS to be a great and supportive mother to karen, specifically because of the contrast in how overtly judgemental and controlling eddie is. while watching this show with a friend of mine, she made the great observation that when sheila comes out of her shell a bit, you can really see how she wound up married to such a stuck up conservative asshole.

even so, sheila's inability to support her daughter hurts her. that's not to say she's at fault for the way her agoraphobia leaves karen feeling adrift, just that it happened. i really like season 1 sheila. karen also spends a lot of time feeling that it's her responsibility to take care of sheila, and while it's extremely nice of her to do, the fact is that sheila needed an adult's support, not her teenage daughter's. when karen spends so much time acting protective towards sheila, which sheila was undoubtedly both touched and embarrassed by, i think this also pushes forward into both of their minds the way that sheila views karen in some ways as more of a bestie/equal than a child under her care.

note also here - sheila seems to have no grown up friends! there are a couple times when she tries to branch out (christianmingle, selling sex toys) but they don't seem to work out. she even sort of alludes to knowing people at her old job at a hair salon, but she seems to never have actually be close to them, just sort of friendly. she is extremely lonely, probably since even before she developed agoraphobia.

sheila is loud and brash and strange, which masks in ways that she may also be very very insecure. it makes sense if she only bonds with little kids if she's terrified of the judgement of an adult. (this is also a problem with kash - though obviously, kash takes this in a worse direction by pursuing ian romantically). she's also GOOD with little kids. she absolutely is not good with teenagers. i would absolutely trust her to watch a toddler, i don't think there's any real problem with that.

however, please see: sheila playing with liam, she asks him "which do you prefer, the baby, or the whore?" this line is hilarious. it also points to her having more or less the same conservative view of sexuality that results in karen's DaddyzGirl plotline. it feels relevant she uses a blonde barbie to represent the "whore".

sheila also seems more involved in catholicism than the gallagher family. to be sure, the gallaghers are catholic, but i didn't get the impression that it was as much of a religious identity to them as something they just inherited and went with.

by the time jody shows up in karen's plotline, sheila is established so aggressively as being kooky and unable to handle a lot of the "real world", that when i recall thinking, oh, well, she shouldn't be letting this guy around her daughter, but i'm not sure she understands whats happening. and it's true she probably didn't. part and parcel to her viewing karen as more of a best friend than a child in here care, and her inability to understand teenagers the way she does littler kids - she just defaults to trying to interact with karen as another adult.

sheila being more catholic also adds an interesting layer to how much she wants karen to go out with jody, given that karen is a bisexual girl, even if sheila might not be aware of that.

i assume we're already in agreement that she shouldn't have allowed karen to marry a 37 year old - which she definitely had to consent to. in an interesting parallel here with my general read of mickey being the karen to ian's lip, the united states does allow people under 18 to get married, but only with a parent's consent. mickey is the only other character i can think of whose parent gives such horrifying and enthusiastic consent to their marriage (and, similarly - both lip and ian show up to these weddings, get drunk, and make an ass of themselves)

sheila viewing karen as a best friend more so than a daughter also is what leads her to believe it's acceptable, just kind of bitchy, to sleep with jody. jody is another incredibly immature adult. this is a running and well executed theme in most of the predatory characters on this show. karen didn't want him, and sheila later apologizes for all the wrong reasons.

sheila obviously gets hit with another massive wave of loneliness and regret after she kicks her daughter out - she doesn't seem to understand that attempting to force someone to keep an unwanted pregnancy or child is a surefire way to ruin a relationship, and almost certainly thought that karen would go into playing this "sweet little girl" role she expects of having a cute, blonde, daughter. this also shows up in sheila's idealization of karen's relationship to jody. sheila can't accept that karen is outspoken and independent, she wants karen to be a housewife and a princess - karen apparently loved princess stories as a small child (or sheila thought she did), and sheila is unable to accept that that's changed - and she wants jody to be the prince in this story.

even when karen comes back, sheila still can't wrap her head around karen not being obligated to be a mother. she's horrified to learn that karen had told hymie's father's family that sheila "wasn't safe", when karen just wanted desperately to go back to before, because she wanted her mom to love her, and she wanted to feel close, without the imposition of an unwanted child from a traumatic pregnancy.

this might be a reflection of the disaster that was sheila's marriage - a lot of women will try to make up for what they feel they missed out on by projecting onto their daughters' lives. sometimes this is just awkward, but sheila decides to send her brain damaged, absolutely unable to consent, daughter off with jody. when karen becomes disabled sheila sees her no longer as a best friend, but more like a doll. come to think of it, this might be why she got so enthusiastically involved in ..."activism"... for down syndrome. it's an exciting role to play for her.

jody makes probably one single good point in his entire life, which is that hymie should stay connected to his chinese heritage. he obviously didn't care THAT much, and sheila wasn't really listening, because these two later separate hymie from family who DO want him (tommy and his mother) to participate in this fanciful idea.

sheila is, after that, somehow surprised to learn she feels lonely again! she desperately seeks out community however she can - this time in latching onto being 1/32nd menominee after taking a DNA test (as per my memory?) - there's not really anything wrong with wanting to know more about a part of your heritage, and if she'd been more normal about this, who would've fucking cared?

carl doing a crappy imitation of black culture while he believes himself to be 1/8th black is the closest comparison here. sure, sheila also might've really identified as native at that point, maybe she meant well! however, sheila is a grown adult, who tries to build this connection through children. carl, is, however fourteen years old, and he tries to get involved in black culture by hanging out with and emulating older people, befriending and protecting nick, and failing pretty embarrassingly at getting a date. even so, carl's behavior is cringeworthy enough to get commented on by pretty much everyone in the show.

and sheila's attempts to adopt these random children are the culmination of her "cute little baby" obsession - it doesn't escape my notice that she barely pays attention to the oldest (gary?) and focuses heavily on a little girl - and her desperation to find community. she again ignores frank's right to consent or not (and.. the legality of bigamy) to marry frank solely to acquire cute little kids, and, by her hope, a connection and real reason to be involved in a tight knit community.

one of the points at which joan cusacks acting really sticks out to me is when she's at the hearing in hopes of approval for her adoption, and she's sort of playing hard at being "in" group - to boost her chances at getting approved adoption, and because she really, really wants to be "in". she kind of believes she's getting there until the council start to talk to each other in menominee which she, of course, has no clue at the beginning of how to understand. they're just speaking in their own language, but she feels an acute sense of exclusion. when they conclude and simply say "no"- no explanation offered, because why bother to explain to someone who is not going to get it - she has this devastation on her face, because she realizes she was not going to be "in" anyway, no matter what.

when it comes to these kids, yeah, they may have wanted to live with her. but they're kids! they like wifi, and cool snacks, and tv. children deserve a lot more respect and to be trusted, but they also can't understand why it'd be harmful to grow up in a white christian household.

sheila reattaches herself to frank pretty aggressively in response to her new, new, new, old loneliness. she again views someone's daughter as a peer (or adversary) and not a daughter - though with sammi, at least she's a grownup with boundary issues.

sheila's writing is less compelling to me after this, but that might just be because when she really really does try to adopt these kids, i kind of blacked out from rage, and couldn't stand to really look at her. in my rewatch i might pick up on more in s5. she does get pretty involved in the gentrification plotline, though, which is well written, but super difficult for me to look at directly (high fives for anyone who will never afford a house in their hometown) i really hope that her independent sheila life will give her some self confidence by herself, so she'll feel better AND stop twisting herself into these convoluted choices and taking really bizarre kinds of advantage of people in an effort to find ANY community. but idk maybe she'll become a scientologist or something. who really knows

[aquarius-cookie-jar]

So about that Cookie Run MLP au

(click to see the clearer pictures.)

I've basically tried to come up with lore and stuff. If you can't read what's on the images, don't worry, I'll expand more on my thoughts here:

(side-note, it's gonna be a long one)

White Lily Cookie

Before I talk about her, here's some random changeling lore I made up. Woodland changelings are the ones who feed on the love of other creatures by draining it from them. Basically the more hostile, fae-esque creatures. Prismatic changelings are those who don't drain love from others, but instead feed on love through mutual sharing with one another. My goal with them is to make them sorta like faeries. Yanno, the baby snatcher ones vs the nice disney-esque ones. They can transform into either one if say, they're able to form a strong bond with someone else or if they lack a strong connection and have no one to share love with.

Btw, this isn't related to mlp canon, it's just something I made up.

So anyway, White Lily was a young woodland changeling who, while she didn't (often) drain love from other people, she was still pretty lonely and ostrisized by her peers (probably due to her lily scent). She transforms into a prismatic changeling after making a strong bond with Pure Vanilla, who declared how he'll always care for her, changeling (either form) or not.

Ngl, I'm not that happy with her woodland form, mainly because it just feels less changeling-like. I based her off Queen Chrysalis, but still, the only reason I have for this, is that, she's like a queen bee. She's just born that way. She just never took the throne like the rest of her friends.

In her younger years, White Lily often transformed into a pony disguise (even after meeting PV and leaving the academy) because she still felt like it was necessary. Girl was bullied in her tweens, leave her be. (Also, by now, she's become a prismatic changeling.) Eventually, she did drop her disguise, and was relieved to know the other 3 didn't hate her. Dark Cacao even commented about how he prefers her true form.

Her soul-jam form is basically her just becoming more queen bee like, (similar to how Queen Chrysalis was bigger and taller compared to the rest of the hive. She's the queen!)

Pure Vanilla Cookie

Not much to say other than he was a unicorn who became an alicorn as the years passed and he gained his soul jam.

I dunno if I wanted his magic to be blue or yellow. I think I prefer yellow, but his soul jam is blue, and I wanted it to sorta match. Hmm.

He also has terrible eyesight, and relies on his staff to see. However, the drawside to this is that what the staff sees, is what he sees. And boy, his staff can be a bit sassy sometimes, rolling its eye and glancing down at him to judge him at times. It was especially so in his younger years. But he's comfortable with or without the staff's sight. I should mention, he does get to decide if he wants to see what his staff sees or not.

Btw, if this take is seen as ablelist in any shape or way, please let me know, and I will correct it if it is. The whole 'staff sees for PV' is a popular headcanon which I just roll with, but if it makes people uncomfortable, I understand and will revise it.

Hollyberry Cookie

Not much to say other than she was an earth pony who gained wings, magic, and super strength.

Compared to the others, she rarely ever uses her magic/wings unless absolutely needed to. It just feels quite off for her, yanno? Though, she does take advantage of her enhanced strength, agility, and stamina.

Out of everyone, she took the longest to figure out how to fly, not because she was scared, but because it felt very off to control these brand new appendages that just appear on your back whenever you use the souljam's magic to the fullest.

Her design is the most straight-forward out of everyone tbh.

Dark Cacao Cookie

He's a kirin, which are basically dragon-like ponies, and I headcanon him to be part dragon, so it works out.

For his Nirik form, I drew inspiration for how berserk Cacao looked, all whispy and spirit-like.

I was debating on whether or not I wanted to give him wings, but in the end, I realized that it would make his design feel too cluttered. So instead, I drew inspiration from east asian dragons, and how they don't need wings to fly. Dark Cacao can summon clouds and gallop across the winds instead, which I think looks really cool.

Kirin's are depicted with this lion's mane, but I didn't feel like it would fit Cacao, mainly because he's got a lot going on at this point (the armor, for one) and idk, I just couldn't fit it, unless I redesign his entire wardrobe, which I don't want to do.

About the White Lily thing I mentioned earlier, I said how Cacao prefers seeing Lily as a changeling, rather than in a disguise, because (at the time) he thought he was the only non-pony creature on the team, and it was reassuring to him that he wasn't the odd one out. Golden Cheese was the last one to officially join the band.

Golden Cheese Cookie

Head of a pony, body of a lion, wings like a hawk's. Yep, she's a sphinx.

I know she looks more cat-like here, but idk, I just really liked it, so I stuck with it.

Out of everyone, she was the one who had the most trouble with magic, mainly because she's kinda the most scatterbrained. But once she got the hang of it, she really liked using it.

Can I just say, she's definitely the most elegant looking one out of the bunch, and I'm glad that I was able to translate it well. (Or at least, I think I was.)

--

That took a lot longer than expected. But hey, this au is just for fun.

[raayllum]

hi. i always see your analysis and theories in my dash and they're always so well thought and interesting and conecting a lot of things i personally would never think to conect but actually make so much sense when put like that

so hm, not to be weird online, but how does one learn to like interpret and understand what's going on on a piece of midia, yk, cause only consuming doesn't do it? Anyway

your edits are really nice

FIRST OFF this is soo nice omg thank you <333 also never worry about being weird online i'm always more unhinged, this is an unhinged space

which ironically is kind of the best way to get good at literary analysis tbh! I wrote a post about it here but that was more on how to organize thoughts / write meta > finding the things to write meta about (aka the "this feels gratuitous" draft is still in my drafts as we speak — might be time to clean it and some others up and post it).

In a lot of ways there tends to be like.... two main avenues for analysis? Which is an oversimplification but is making sense to me in the moment, and I'd specify the divide is

Treating characters like people (characterization, relationships) vs treating characters like tools (motifs, symbols, plot structure, dynamics).

Ideally, a narrative merges these two things so completely it's hard to separate, and I think TDP does an extaordinarily good job at it. I'll call this marriage Theme since its the main idea(s) of the Story/Narrative and everything should at its best be working together in service of the Theme if you want something cohesive.

I'll use Callum and Rayla as an example just cause I think they exemplify a Lot of how/why this all works and works as well as it does.

If I want to write about Callum and Rayla's internal psyches, i.e. where does Callum's temper or Rayla's gruffness come from? I'm going to look at them as people. They're going to have consistent triggers, responses, contradictory emotions or emotional reactions, etc. This is like the how you wrap a present, the colour and feel of the paper. Any character in a story can technically have any kind of personality, i.e. an assassin can be sweet and snarky (like Rayla) or stoic and rigid (Runaan). That's not all they are, of course, but the characters' personalities often times affect how and why we ship what we do, or have certain favourites, etc.

For example, Callum's primary Narrative Purpose is to be a human mage. He's there to explore the range of possibilities a human who wants/chases magic in the story can have, and we pretty closely follow his magical journey of feeling powerless, struggling and achieving primal magic, and guilt and desperation that drives him to dark magic. But absolutely none of this means that Callum needed to have a temper.

To see the way a character trait can be married to a motif (repeating symbol) let's look at Rayla. Rayla can be secretive — not telling people everything and being closed off about her emotions — and often leaves to try do things on her own, occasionally flat out disappearing. These are her personality traits (characterization), most of these psychological aspects come back to not feeling like she deserves help or not wanting to hurt people, thereby hurting her relationships. She's a person.

At the same time, these traits help us as the audience understand and grasp how the series treats the Moon and its arcanum. The Moon is a symbol, and it's all about changing faces, secrets, and illusions. We don't know whether the ideas for the Moon arcanum (which seem to be loosely taken from Tarot) or Rayla's personality came first, but it's clear that at some point they merged to reflect each other.

If I want to talk about Rayla as a person, I'll talk about how her personality/choices affect her relationships. If I want to talk about how she reflects her primal or how she choices affect the plot, I'll be talking more about structure. If I want to talk about how both of those things say, in a speculative meta about Callum connecting to the Moon arcanum as he understands Rayla (and himself) better, then I'd be talking about both simultaneously (theme).

But those are all like, examples of how you can break stuff down that you see. How do you go looking for stuff / know what to break down?

1) Pick a piece of media, ideally one you already feel very comfortable and familiar with. Book, show, whatever. This familiarity means you can focus less on the processing the plot and more about other elements of the story. Then watch or read the thing but try to pay attention to like, a few pre-chosen ideas or themes. It could be the theme of power, or — I'm thinking for something like ATLA - how the characters reflect their elements (Aang is evasive and avoidant, and air is light and breezy, etc).

For a TV show in particular, it can mean breaking things down scene by scene in an episode to see what the anchoring idea of it, i.e. 1x06 in TDP is all about Soren, Claudia, and Rayla keeping secrets. Soren and Claudia keep their secrets and isolate themselves, because isolationism in the series is usually Bad; Rayla shares her secret, because working through problems and letting people help you (being collaborative) is Good, etc. These messages are pretty consistent throughout the rest of the show as well.

If applicable, I'd recommend starting out with stories where you already know the ending and/or even better, the story itself is aware you know the ending from the beginning (i.e. in Titanic, you always know the ship is going to sink). This can help you pick up on dramatic irony (everyone emphasizing the ship won't sink) as well as setup (the movie making sure we know there's not enough boats, people making the boat go faster, the moment the ship hits the iceberg literally separating Jack and Rose from each other to set up what happens later, etc).

2) If you wanna learn how to analyze, to a certain degree you have to learn to shut down your feelings and biases. This doesn't mean that feelings can't affect how you analyze, or dictate what you want to analyze (I feel very positively towards TDP and therefore I want to deeply analyze it! same with Rayllum) but it does mean leaving "I want this thing so it has to happen" at the door — or vice versa.

The best example I can give is a hypothetical one. For example, it kind of doesn't matter if I — personally — think that Callum and Rayla have known each other that long to know each other well. (I don't, for the record, but bear with me.) In the Text of the Story, they know each other incredibly well, and more to the point, thematically, their senses of self are so incredibly intertwined that them affirming each other's senses of self is like... the only place we could be going. Rayla is "Rayla saves people," so by saving a possessed Callum she's saving herself, and if she goes to kill him, she's likewise metaphorically going to be killing herself (her own sense of identity), etc.

Or for a non-ship example, my real life feelings about monarchy don't matter. I don't like monarchy, I think most western monarchies are crap... and I'd be silly if I brought those feelings into TDP's discussion of monarchy, because they're using monarchy as a vessel to discuss things like power, responsibility, and growing up, particularly for Ezran and Janai (and how often do we see non-white monarchies in media anyway?). And if I want to engage with those themes, then I have to engage with TDP's discussion of monarchy.

It's kind of like how even if something in a story grosses you out or makes you uncomfortable, you have to be really damn sure that wasn't an Intentional writing choice on Purpose or a chance for self reflection before it's launched as a complaint.

Doing this kind of awareness and predictive work also means you'll get better at predicting where stories might be going and leaving ahead of time if something is going off the rails / not going your way (in a bad way).

3) Growing a list of common themes and symbols that stories tend to have. Birds = freedom, chains = entrapment and coercion, grief, identity (particularly in coming-of-age stories), etc. If you have a loose idea of what to look for, that means you can also start to look at the specifics of how stories use these themes/symbols. For example, Midsummer Night's Dream and Romeo and Juliet both feature a theme of love amongst forbidden lovers, but the first is a comedy (love conquers all, even if it makes people foolish) and the second is a tragedy (love is not always enough to conquer hate/violence/our worst impulses).

For example in TDP, although it was in the background in s1-s3, light and darkness has now become a very overt motif (repeated symbol) in both dialogue and imagery. Tracking what those things represent or how the show complicates their meaning (light isn't always good, etc) can help indicate where certain characters or plot beats are going.

This can also mean trying to notice consistent metaphors (i.e. dark magic is often consumed by the caster for spells / referenced with cannibalistic language; dark magic corruption is increasingly seen as spreading sickness/illness) and then being on the lookout for the next time(s) they show up. So much of media literacy / critical thinking is just being able to explain/figure out why you think what you think (with evidence) and it's always a skill that can be nurtured and improved

End of Blabbing

Very long winded but hopefully helpful, and always feel free to ask more questions and/or DM if you'd like! I always love talking about stuff like this and it's such a treat tbh <3

[icharchivist]

your tags on the yulma post made me so emotional, thank you for sharing ;; it’s honestly disheartening to see their representation either get completely dismissed or met with absolute ignorance,, i do think the fandom has come a long way since then even tho there’s still discourse around how “valid” it is but if people dug more deep, it’s honestly undeniable no matter how u look at it

aaah glad it was a worthwhile read then 🥺

and yeah definitely :( fandom changes and there's been a lot of changes in the last twenty years in the way an audience can accept a queer narrative, and while it's for the better, it does also mean that sometimes there's people who aren't going to see what was the big deal or how it was groundbreaking. They often approach their dynamic by modern standards of queer representation that i think can sometimes be a disservice to how huge it was in 2010 when it came out.

I remember talking about this story with a friend once and they were like "so it's queer because one of them is actually a woman in a man's body. that seems cowardly to me" and it frustrated me a little both on the angle of what it means for Alma to be in this situation to start with (if Alma is in a situation where they can accept the change to their body or not, and how no matter how you look at it Alma is fundamentally genderqueer), but also on how i remember the anger against "Kanda being gay" to start with

And i think about how Hoshino had to work for this to start with, having to set up that Kanda was looking for someone very early on, someone implied to be a lover, and then build the Alma arc in such a way where Alma=Person Kanda Was (Romantically) Looking For became unavoidable and no editor could go back on what she wanted to say. It was huge at the time, and i hope we can remember it like that.

but between the way lots of fans abandonned the manga then, the hiatus following afterward, and the new anime not really being beginner friendly, dgm's legacy in term of queer representation ended up kinda buried under it all and difficult to get new people to see.

and now i sometimes see a lot of scrutiny on the Kanda/Alma storyline on "can we even consider it queer" that makes me sad in the sense of, sometimes it circles back to similar argument i've heard at the time to cut down the ship, which also have people say "but if this argument can be made then it means it wasn't obvious enough", while no, it's obvious, people just were seeing it in bad faith because they were looking for their own confirmation basis, but in the end those specific people ended up leaving because even if they wanted to make up excuse to erase the queerness, it was too late, the queerness was here to stay.

like idk i'm just rambling but i so vividly remember how people reacted then that i can't buy into any "it's not queer enough" complains from the modern perspective. It was groundbreaking at the time and it was the real first popular Shounen i personally read where one of the main character was confirmed to be in a queer love story that is the important focus of a full arc, and tbh i haven't truly seen that much ever since (but i also don't keep a close look at modern Shounen so that's on me)

but yeah and in the end i really come back to the feeling of "if they're not queer enough why did homophobes get this mad about it when it happened" yaknow

anyway thank you for the ask and i'm glad the perspective was a nice read <3

i just hope one day people can really realize just how special dgm was at the time for that.

[ohwell-itsme-but-danganronpa]

me when people are hating on Ouma's actions in game like. I just support him, actually

Ves: REAL she looked good doing it

if it were me I would get more crazy for a lot more selfish reasons, and I would punch Kaito back sooner, good for him for keeping his eyes on the goal

fr fr, look at him in the closing argument, that's my babygirl

Ves: the closing argument artist thinks so too

he did not have to go that hard but HE DID IT FOR ALL OF US. A HERO

haters will act like he's irrational, but he stuck out so long with no support system since he couldn't trust anyone and managed to play things off even when he was finally starting to lose his shit in a situation when it was reasonable for him to feel like this (tbh even fans make him often crack way more easily to make shipping content, when he's so resilient and then on the other hand not really lone wolfing it either bc he cooperated as much as he could) his way of going about things was smart, there isn't much else he could do, Tsumugi was setting up others to distrust him as well

Ves: AAAAAAAAAAAUGH!!! he did he lasted so fucking long in the worst possible situation he tried so HARD to cooperate and it just. did not work. if i think abt how quickly his plans fell apart i will explode i'd b doing so much worse in his situation

sometimes it's just like, you're talking about paranoia? trust and attachment issues? untreated mental illness? I think we have to be introduced, there's so much I could show you. I am not saying he doesn't have anything of the sort, but there's a lot more of reasonable justified distrust there, and still, it could be so much worse, trapping the next person who thoughtlessly assigns him diagnosis in a demonizing way in a room with me and making them listen to me rant about my failed relationships history for educational purposes

they will learn about all kinds of issues

Ves: it's trueee people act like he's so strange for breaking down but LIKE??? HE'S PRETTY NORMAL FOR THAT ACTUALLY???? he clearly already had Issues but the killing game was perfectly packaged to dig into those this is why DRS and UTDP mostly suck at characterizing him they're still stuck in the idea of him at his absolute worst he was nicer even in ch1 than he is in some of those events

[and then my amazing wife dropped this bomb, and she says I'm the smart one smh] Sini: The thing is, there’s him being shitty on purpose and him pretending to be the mastermind/making himself appear suspicious. There is a clear difference in how he acts. In DRS and UTDP he usually just comes across as playful. Yeah he’s a jackass, but I think his whole “bad guy” persona (the one we see in the beginning of the game) goes beyond the killing game. I see it as a way for him to protect himself, to push people away and not appear as vulnerable. As he���s said before, everyone always sees him as a villain so it’s the perfect role for him. I think that reasoning goes beyond what was happening to him in canon. I do agree his characterization could’ve used a bit more reworking, but I think for the most part they did a good job in showing how differently he acts in a peaceful setting in small ways. The fact that he never uses his scary sprites once or is seen to be more nice with characters like Mikan and Gonta. Especially with Gonta, where he seems to be more vulnerable around. And while this was probably just a mistake, I like to think him being shown as not as pale in DRS as a sign of him getting better. In a non killing game environment he seems to be doing pretty well for himself. But that’s what I believe, anyway

Ves: h that's really sweet actually,,,i may have been a LITTLE hard on the side modes. it's mostly the way he treats kiibo that drives me INSANE, the mikan n gonta stuff is [ok hand emoji].

Sini: Yeah, I agree. I can understand the Kiibo hate, but he doesn’t have to go as hard as he did in game. It’s not like there is a reason to suspect him. The only thing that could maybe explain it is maybe he suspects he could be tied to Monokuma? Since he, the Monokubz, and Monomi do exist here. He was rude to Monomi and seems to suspect her of being not what she seems ALSO, he’s always gonna be a little shit cause he’s a greedy whore. He wants attention and entertainment so badly.

Ves: THISSSSS it's so important i have seen so many people question why he does things where the answer is literally just that he wants attention like there is not always a plot sometimes he just wants shuuichi to chase him

Sini: That’s all there is to it He wants his crush to chase him like in his favourite novels Live the fantasy

Ves: it's part of why they're so good together!! shuuichi as a detective is v used to obsessing over details and giving his whole attention to something in the way kokichi wants HE'S A NERD THAT ALSO EXPLAINS MANY THINGS

Sini: They’re both nerds. Even more reason to why they are soulmates

Ves: kokichi receives the Detective Stare and goes TEEEEEHEE

Sini: IT’S HIS DREAM COME TRUE It’s just like anime! He’s living anime rn

Ves: i think his hair should curl up at the ends when he gets excited as a treat

Sini: To compliment Shuichi’s sentiment ahoge When he goes to his room after an exciting day with Shuichi, he flops on his bed, kicks his feet, and squeals into his pillow

I feel a little ashamed when reverse happens and I am posting something someone else started and I took over, but with this all I can say: follow @vespertin-y and leave nice comments for my wife so we can prove it to her that she is smart and her takes are divine.

[bubblegumflavor]

Something I keep thinking about the past days and just want to get off my chest. That people should remind themselves once in a while to not treat non native speakers as if they were native speakers. I got confronted with something someone took out of context from a conversation I had with someone else where I tried to describe an emotion like.. the heavyness of the emotion and I used a word for it and the person took it as I was saying something else from the conversation was that word. And I wasn't feeling very well that day, I was literally in bed with a fever and they confronted me with my absolute trigger topic I am not willing to talk about anymore (and they know that) and I said to them 'I don't discuss this, please don't talk to me about that' and then tried to write an explanation on where they got me wrong and that I wasn't talking about the thing itself but just an emotion of mine (and they knew I don't like the thing itself so I don't even know why they felt the need to confront me about it) but they came into my dm with a complete opinion they already created about me which was all kinds of wrong but I couldn't even start to try to explain because I was immediately blocked. It's not a big loss for me tbh because recently I already got into a sitiuation with them where they demonstrated pretty clearly what person they seem to believe I am and I have no interest in being friends with people who assume I'm an asshole over just trying to be kind and supportive so whatever, but this just got me thinking of how often people get me wrong and I don't understand why or how because I am not a native speaker. I don't know double meaning of stuff, I'm glad if I know the right or a in my head fitting vocabulary. I always try to be as clear as possible so I don't get misunderstood. Same way the other way around, I talked to a super nice person recently where I thought they made a hate comment but it was just some slang I didn't understand and the translator gave me "they think I'm annoying and disagree". But it was the opposite. But I only found out because I talked to them instead of instant blocking them. This is how misunderstandings happen and I just write this because I think a lot of drama could be avoided if people would give other people the benefit of the doubt especially if they're native speakers vs non native speakers. English is a language I'm learning. I don't have people in my real life who talk to me in english or have slang and double meaning I naturally learn along while it develops. Like it took me forever to figure out the skull emoji means laughing, I interpreted it as 'dead serious' because that made sense to me but it changed the vibe of everything the person using that emoji was saying. (just an example)

So yeah.. just wanted to get that off my chest because though it might look easy and my english is well enough, I still don't think like a native speaker and never will unless I live several years in a country with people who are native speakers.

[candyskiez]

Favorite The Owl House episode?

tbh, haven't rewatched the show in a long long time so might need to rewatch to be sure. for a while, it was eda's requiem. it means a lot to me and genuinely made me realize shit about myself. as dumb as it sounds it's what made me realize "...oh. if I died, that'd...probably fuck up the people around me." so it has a massively special place in my heart. and also the depth it gives eda! made me reevaluate shit about how I view parents and also just. god. the importance of found family and how important it is to acknowledge that it's just as important as blood family. found family is so often treated as secondary and seeing it portrayed as just as important is so fucking good and god! middle aged characters with depth! middle aged WOMEN with depth! some of the most accurate depression rep I've seen. she feels so real and raw and god, it's really nice to see a middle aged character who gave up learning to get back up again and stop feeling like they missed the best of their life and wasted it, and aaorudhdjd. god. I love eda. the music is beautiful and the duet is haunting, raeda fascinates me, and bard magic will ALWAYS be my favorite magic in toh.

I feel like the grey decaying thing works excellently as a metaphor for depression. it's what made me start going "is this a metaphor for mental illness?" because it FEELS like it. the voice acting is top tier and its so fucking good. it's just,,, man. a middle aged woman having an episode all to herself?? baby mes mind would've been BLOWN. her hatred of the curse wouldn't have hit nearly as hard without this episode, I think. the loneliness and feeling like it makes her Less is shown so well in this episode. it's just,,, man. as someone who's struggled with depression all my life, it resonates. she doesn't even CONSIDER king would still love her. raine saved her fucking life there and I'm still fucked up about it. it handles depression very well and its just. Man. that duet is one of the most memorable scenes in the show. darius abomination form is badass, raine's powers are so cool, the bats have my ENTIRE heart, the fucking MUSIC. brads music bangs. I love his soundtracks and this episode is just. always iconic to me.

that being said, I'm not entirely sure if it's my favorite episode right now? my brain flip flops on these things. right now I think it might be eclipse lake because it's just. SUCH a good episode. it's so gorgeous. the fight choreography, the animation, the lore, but most of all the EMOTION.

it has such excellent abuse rep. showing not only the complicated emotional reality of living with your abuser, of being dependent on your abuser, but also the fact that having an abusive relationship influences how you view ALL relationships. I love that amitys trauma isn't sidelined! what originally comes off as amity being a little TOO excited about having a girlfriend and also dana flipping off disney is shown to be amity being fucking terrified of losing this. she's so desperate to prove herself and since they're foils we gain knowledge as to what odalia and amitys relationship might've been like through hunter and gain insight into how hunter might view other relationships going forward through amity and it's LOVELY.

it also drives me insane that people use this episode as proof amity would hate hunter when. nah. nah, absolutely not. also I love how it shows how fucking KIND amity actually is. this boy's threatened and backstabbed her multiple times and is showing he's willing to do ANYTHING to win, and she still feels so much fucking sympathy for him. because she gets it. he's like her. she would've done this in his shoes. she offers him kindness and shows no sign of holding a grudge??? NONE???? this woman is fucking forgiving. she would have every right to hate his guts and she doesn't. idk what y'all mean when you say she's a jerk shes fucking KIND.

also hunters breakdown is painful to watch. I don't know what I can say about it that hasn't already been said. it's so raw and resonant, it feels like watching a real kid, it has such a realistic depiction of abused kids, what else can I say?

I also love the addressing of the cycle of abuse. hunter isn't a pure innocent baby here. he's manipulative and mean and cutthroat. hes a dick! I love him having anger issues because that's how abused kids often are! and I love amity backsliding! I love amity going tunnel vision! I love how realistic and painful the whole episode is!

they're just kids, man. you can tell the crew wanted this to be realistic and they succeeded.

I don't know which I like more. they're both just so GOOD.

(ask me things!)

[hermit-searching]

TMNTposting, Michelangelo edition:

I still have favs, but I would love nothing more than to talk about the boy in orange. Michelangelo is such an interesting character, development-wise in the series. While Leos and Donnie's usually end up developing more negatively (like the emo breakdowns and all that) Michelangelo and Raph seem to always be the ones that make positive growth. And I love it. We love to see that here.

All Michelangelo's are pretty silly and goofy. They're the most laid back of all the turtles, mostly due to the "youngest brother" dynamic he has with the rest of the turtles, Rise being the most obvious one of all. With 87 Michelangelo, he's more of a chill party dude with an unyeilding optimism despite the circumstances in the later "Red Sky" seasons of TMNT 87. He's the only one of the turtles who genuinely still saw the good in things, and tried to revisit the old dynamic they had even though there was a massive hate campaign against them, and getting double mutated...among many other things. This dude, this little guy, was able to keep a steady girlfriend through all this which is insane (and adorable).

Some of the other cute things I remember about him is:

-he remembers their time being regular turtles.

-he normally sides with Leonardo whenever theres an argument (usually started by Donatello)

-the little alien star child in season 7 could have destroyed the planet but he still decided to be nice and comfort him anyways.

Also random fun factoid about the memory of being a regular turtle. Both he and Donatello or Raphael have mentioned before they spent half their life at the bottom of a glass bowl, in the pet shop. Which either implies they lived in a tiny fishbowl for a really long time, or they were really young when they mutated. The implication seems to lean more towards the latter, and the turtles mutated straight into being teenagers. It's entirely likely the 87 turtles are technically young kids stuck in the bodies of teenagers. Enjoy the nightmares thinking about that.

Now for 03 Mikey. I want to chefs kiss the writers because this series was when they started the "kinda annoying younger brother" trope for him, but somehow still managed to handle his development with absolute grace. The Battle Nexus arcs are some of my favorites in TMNT 03, personally. Both because I'm a sucker for 03 Leosagi, but also because they showed everyone just how smart Mikey can be, and that he is perfectly capable of handling a fight on his own. He's been named Battle Nexus champion, not once, but twice. The first time was more circumstance, but don't let that distract you from the fact he outsmarted Raph in a fight and still won the tournament.

And the second time? That time, he was cursed so any injury he sustained couldn't be healed and he still won! The second time was entirely on his skill and fighting alone and he won.

Despite rubbing it in his brothers faces, he genuinely didn't believe he was capable of winning the Battle Nexus tournament and I LOVE the writers for giving me that. 03 Mikey is a loveable menace.

fun things I love about 03 Mikey:

-he literally saves Klunk because he liked her vibes. on Christmas. good for him.

-despite how often they bicker, he's Raph's best friend.

-the whole thing about him (and his brothers) helping the homeless people in the Garbageman episode.

I don't really have much to say about 2012 Mikey tbh. He sure is a guy who exists. It is cool he survived in Dimension X for a few months on his own though. Good for him.

And finally, I'll leave the Rise ramblings to the other TMNT blogs out there. Because everything I say is something someone else definitely has before. And I mostly want to make these posts for the people out there who never watched the older TMNT series.

[suffersinfandom]

Okay, so I usually try to stay out of discourse and drama and all of that because I'm here to have a nice time, but I saw a post in the OFMD tag after the whole Blackbonnet/Stucky poll thing that I really need to type about. It's just... so bad. Like, I totally get disliking things (I dislike things too!), and I understand that OFMD isn't everyone's thing, but wow. WOW. Um.

While the first part's annoying (point to the tumblr fandom that has absolutely no one in it with a victim complex, please), what I really take issue with is the last bit -- the assertion that OFMD's cast diversity is there to be "inclusive" and "progressive" when the narrative isn't. That's just not true? One of the reasons for OFMD's popularity IS its inclusiveness! People who have never seen themselves represented in a show finally *see themselves* in some of these characters, and I think that's lovely. And the show has a wonderfully diverse crew behind the scenes and in the writing room as well!

As for "the narrative being the opposite"... all I can do is assume that OP never bothered watching OFMD. It's the most genuinely, earnestly inclusive and progressive piece of media I've ever consumed.

The acting in OFMD isn't stylistically different from any other show I've watched. The situations and lines are often comedic, Stede and Ed are definitely prone to dramatics, and plenty of the characters are pathetic (affectionate), but this is such a weird critique. Or maybe I just haven't picked anything up from a lifetime of watching media and being a massive dorkass theater nerd? Idk. Maybe they just think the show itself is cringe (I certainly don't think it is, but that's something I've seen plenty of folks who dislike it say) and that colors their opinion on the acting?

Also: where's the slavery apologism? As many other people have said, there's definitely room for good faith criticism of OFMD: its tendency to gloss over the existence of slavery, the rom-comification of real, historic slaveowners, etc, but there's no apologia in the text of the show. (Correct me if I'm wrong! I'm very white and will defer to others here.)

I'm gonna need some sources. I've seen the various accusations, but never evidence or anything that couldn't potentially be explained with context. (I don't actually take much issue with this point -- it's not a crime to think someone's annoying -- I just don't understand the constant vilification of Taika.)

"REAL gay piracy," lol. I can't say much about Black Sails since I haven't watched it (tbh it doesn't sound like something I'd be able to enjoy), but I haven't seen that much seriousness in the OFMD fandom. Do I have all of the annoying crewmates blocked? Do y'all feel like you have a lot to prove? I personally only became invested in this poll when I saw the death threats from Stucky folks, and my impression from my timeline is that most everyone else was in the same boat.

If you ARE taking these polls to heart, please don't! They're for fun (sometimes petty) fandom drama! Win or lose, we all love our ships and our communities and we really don't need to prove anything to anyone (I say, typing out a response to a thing that got under my skin, resolutely not touching grass).

THIS is where I had to start typing. WHAT DOES IT MEAN. How is a show with multiple canon queer couples gaybaiting? Isn't "canon gaybait" an oxymoron, or has the meaning changed? (I'm old, genuinely lmk if my millennial ass is missing something.) Again, I can only assume that OP either hasn't watched OFMD or hates fun romcoms, because the gayness of it all isn't the only thing the show has to offer. My brainworms have better taste than that.

It's some of the best gay rep I've ever seen and I would be delighted to see better! I mean it! I've been in queer circles for almost two decades and in fandom even longer; OFMD is some of the best, kindest, most loving, genuine representation I've come across in that time. I truly hope that it's just the beginning of a new era in media.

"Weak fandom output." I am *drowning* in fandom output and I love that for me! "Driest gay kiss." I'm sorry you don't like awkward middle-aged men who think they're unlovable coming together in what might very well be the first loving kiss either of them has ever had, but I think it's very sweet and moving! No fictional characters have ever owned my brain like this before! I love my silly traumatized queer pirates who can't communicate to save themselves. They're very beautiful to me.

Anyway, that's enough of that. I've released the pettiness and I'm going to go back to being annoying about seeing the lads again in just a few more days. <3

[voidify333]

20 Questions for fic writers

I was tagged by @almarnatiaam- thanks!

1. How many works do you have on A03?

36

2. What's your total A03 word count?

133,211

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Mostly Ace Attorney these days.

I've also written for Les Mis and Good Omens; Les Mis makes up most of my works at 20 (though 4 of those aren't really fics, they're fanart pieces I posted to ao3 for sewerexchange).

And there's a couple random fics that aren't any of these: The Temptation Of Immediate Relief is a Pride & Prejudice missing scene fic that I wrote for high school english class and posted a polished version after graduation, and All Alone is a short War & Peace fic expanding the character of Anatole's wife who's entirely just a plot device with no character in canon (elephant in the room: the name I chose for her was retroactively made weird by my later fandom journeys by being cognate to the name of a completely different character, but like, whatever). I still think both of these are pretty good

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Wilson & Sons (Good Omens outsider POV fic about Aziraphale's barber, a family business that he's been going to since the 1700s), at 1861 kudos

You're Better Off Without Him (Good Omens outsider POV about the guy in episode 4 who says that line), at 763 kudos

perfectly statue-still (Ace Attorney 3+1 fic about elevators being a trigger for Miles, angst with a happy ending), at 433 kudos

driving back in style (in my saloon will do quite nicely) (Good Omens fic, silly cute little A/C getting together scenario), at 303 kudos

naughty list (Ace Attorney fic; angst with a happy ending; the premise is that Gregory didn't get to tell Miles that Santa wasn't real so when the von karma household didn't do santa Miles thought he was on the naughty list for a solid 4 years. If you haven't read it, ho ho ho 'tis the season to read it now), at 241 kudos

Yeah, my good omens stuff is never being unseated from the top of my leaderboard unless I end up getting into an even bigger fandom at some point in the future

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I try to, because comments absolutely give me life and I need a constant stream of them, but unfortunately I don't get around to it often enough

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Absolute angstiest out of my published works is probably my very first ao3 fic, not quite nowhere to turn. Valjean sees Javert die and is too late to do anything. The fic is very flawed in that I was 15 and had not learned how to do subtlety, I can't look at it now, but I was a hyperlexic kid with A's in English so I think it's still better than what most people were writing as teens

Second answer is merry christmas., my most recent fic (if you haven't read it yet, HO HO HO TIS THE SEASON), it's Miles' POV for the first bit of Turnabout Goodbyes, it ends on a note of hopelessness that he's doomed to be convicted, but it only debatably counts since anyone who's played the games knows that the turnabout is coming

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Most of my stuff has pretty happy endings, that's just my sensiility as a writer-- even "not quite nowhere to turn" has an afterlife reunion scene-- so I'm not sure what to say here.

There's some fics where the conflict was trivial in the first place (comedy and crack stuff), there's some fics where I feel in hindsight that the ending was a copout and that a rockier path to happiness would have been more interesting if I had mustered the strength to write it (When Tomorrow Comes is the primary example tbh), and there's some where it feels earned (the fics in this category include the ones I like the most)

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I've thankfully never gotten hate on AO3 that I can recall

9. Do you write smut?

Yes I do, but none of it is up on my ao3 account at this time. I have a ton in my google docs though...

10. Do you write crossovers?

I've written a couple. Both of them, funnily enough, of the format "javert meets one of my other blorbos and they recognise what they have in common"

In "and if you fall" (honestly the point of the title would have landed better if I did the full lyric "and if you fall (as lucifer fell)" but at the time that felt too corny), Crowley happens to be in the right place at the right time to talk Javert down from jumping (context: within GO book canon Crowley was asleep for the 19th century except for getting up in 1832 for a loo break)

In "The Choice Of Death" Miles Edgeworth meets Javert's ghost (AA ghost lore notwithstanding) one liminal night during his year away

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

On a tangent though, bc there's no question directly relevant to share this info, I HAVE gotten fanart for a fic before: this amazing fanart by @maym0rin for chapter 2 of "perfectly statue-still" (she gave me permission to crosspost it on tumblr bc she didn't have tumblr at the time but she later got tumblr when the twitter ship started sinking). There is nothing more flattering as an author than getting fanart, I hope this first time isn't the last time

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Not yet!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes, I helped with @almarnatiaam's fic A King's Heart and got a co-writer credit.

And outside of cowriting on the level of be listed as cowriter on ao3, my friend who doesn't have tumblr (it's tsl for all the mtnr server friends reading this) and I have been collaborating and bouncing ideas on each other's fics for... wow, it's been over a year now!

14. What's your all-time favourite ship?

Honestly it would have to be Valvert because it got to me at a formative time and has shaped the kinds of ships I like for life

15. What's the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

What do you mean "the" wip????

I have two dead fics and counting (one for les mis, one for good omens), and that's just the ones where I posted the initial content before realising it's too intimidating to finish. There's so many more in my docs; my friends know about some of them

16. What are your writing strengths?

Here are some that I have no problem bragging about, I reread my own fics often and smile at the moments where I did a banger line

Character voice (especially when the characters are my blorbos)

Using fancy vocabulary with precision in the prose to achieve effect (a skill born from trying to copy the vibes of victor hugo)

Witty prose humour (a skill born from trying to copy the vibes of pratchett & gaiman)

Prose from the POV of someone in a fucked up state- someone in a dark place emotionally, or someone whose motivations are fundamentally misguided or outright malicious. This is THE most fun shit to write for me

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Committing to long term character pain and tragic character conflict when it's not pulled/extrapolated directly from canon. I have many times read a fic where the author puts blorbo through the ringer and thought "damn if only I wasn't such a fucking coward and could write stuff like this". I've become less of a coward over the years and now enjoy

Writing anything long without a detailed plan for the entire thing

The need to use words with precision and write perfectly in character is as much a weakness as a strength. I am not a "write a whole first draft then edit" person I am a "dot points for the bits I don't have perfect words for" person and this sometimes causes issues where I assume I'll figure out how to get from A to B later but then it turns out to not make sense to get from A to B

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

I have 4 years of Duolingo French and have used this occasionally for my Les Mis works. The way I think of my Les Mis works is that the characters are all speaking French behind the fourth wall but the fourth wall translates for us, so I avoid puns that only work in English except on a couple super cracky occasions.

For Inspector Javert Chooses Death (a fic with the premise "AU where instead of dying Javert fakes his death like Edgeworth and goes to england and unrepresses his homosexuality") I was originally planning to write the whole letter near the end of the fic in french and put the translation in footnote but my beta reader got confused so I scrapped that and had the prose paraphrase most of the letter and only included one French sentence

19. First fandom you wrote for?

First fandom I published fic on ao3 for was Les Mis. First fandom I published fic anywhere online for was Animorphs (when I was 12 I published a weird dark comedy fic to FFN which was a 5+1 or similar format of Visser Three executing people for slighting him by morphing into huge creatures and eating them. Then people on animorphsforum.com told me the fic was bad so I lost all confidence and didn't write fic again for years)

20. Favourite fic you've ever written?

Right now it's between my two most recent AA solo fics: merry christmas. (already explained; 1-4 fic) and the perfect weapon (Manfred POV throughout his revenge plot, SUPER fun to write all that villain pov, grew from the premise "he had to have known about the nightmare to plan all that")

My best Les Mis fic is but i have seen the same (i know the shame in your defeat); it explores my favourite parallel with a cool alternating scene format and I actually still like the writing and characterisation even all these years later which is a rare honour for one of my high school Les Mis fics

Tagging: @squadron-of-damned @kaleran @samioli @ashkazora @azalawa-scroggs

[butmakeitgayblog]

I'm sorry, but I hate this photo. It seems to me that it was done on the sly and the family is not comfortable. I sometimes thought what would have happened if I had met ADC somewhere in a cafe. I definitely won't come to bother you. I'm not a shy person, but famous people should have a private life. There are panels for this at comic cons and various festivals. Although Alicia is always nice to fans, I don't think she's always okay with it. LET CELEBRITIES SPEND TIME WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS!

That was actually taken by an Australian paparazzi years back right after Alycia had gotten to go home after the travel restrictions were lifted for Covid flying. I'm sure she was slightly like wtf are ya doing 🤨, but I doubt she was mad per se. She's said herself many times over that she really is able to go out and live lowkey without a lot of bother from people or even being noticed 90% of the time, so my guess is it was more just a look of confusion mingled with mild annoyance since it was her and her mom, rather than outright like... being pissed or anything.

And tbh, while I don't think it's right for paps to harrass celebs or stalk them or anything of the sort, I actually am of the opinion that it's not egregious to take pics of celebs when they're out and about 🤷‍♀️. Yes you deserve a private life and no, people should not harrass anyone when they're going about their day, and if a celeb asks you not to take a photo then yeah seriously, fucking don't. But also fame and money come with certain drawbacks, and being recognized in public is one of them. I actually think it's kinda shitty when celebs want fans to spend money to see their projects and support them at every turn, earning often times millions from that very support which lets them live lavishly, and then acting like a complete dick if a fan tries to say hi or just asks for a quick picture. I don't think that's cute. I'm not saying they're obligated to give fans attention, and if they're having a day where they just want to be left alone, that's ok and they can say it and it should be respected, but also I'm saying there's an attitude issue in that specific dynamic when it's the norm of how they treat fans rather than sporadic. Cuz like.... You want the money, you want the fame, you want allllll the luxuries and status that comes with the lifestyle, but you just don't want any of the inconveniences of said fame. It's giving pompous and entitled, ykwim?

And straight up, a decent amount of those paparazzi photos you see in mags, the celebs called them there themselves for the photo-op. I don't think Alycia did that here because 1. She doesn't seem the type, but idk her so who knows, and 2. she looks genuinely like wtf? Why? Lol But I mean just with celebrities in general. Celebs absolutely do know how to play the game when it comes to paparazzi

Anyway, TL;DR, I don't think this pic was a big deal, I think they just caught her 🤨 face in a candid shot

[yanlei-a]

— SHIPPING INFO

answer the following for your muse so people know how shipping works on your blog.

WHAT IS YOUR OTP FOR YOUR CHARACTER?

it's shen x zed, adding the disclaimer i absolutely do not see their relationship as familial at all; childhood best friends, certainly, but not adoptive brothers (i could write an essay about how i don't think that's what it comes across even in the comic and how they were not really raised as siblings despite what kusho represents to both of them but that's!! not what i should be talking about so i'll leave it here). of course, i'm absolutely still wiling to write it as a purely platonic relationship.

honestly other than that i'm always always open to exploring things rp can result in unexpected but really fun pairings so!! it's not at all the only thing i'd be willing to write.

HOW LARGE DOES THE AGE GAP HAVE TO BE TO MAKE IT UNCOMFORTABLE?

i don't really have a problem with big age gaps as long as the two characters are adults and met as adults.

HOW FAR DO STEAMY MOMENTS HAVE TO GO BEFORE THEY ARE CONSIDERED NSFW?

hmmm it really depends on the content? honestly i just prefer to be on the safe side and tag things as nsfw even when it's mostly suggestive?

ARE YOU SELECTIVE WHEN SHIPPING?

more or less. i need to feel comfortable with the other writer and there's gotta be chemistry/make sense for my muse. but i'm also very open to plotting romantic relationships rather than just going with the flow, especially if we're friends, so like? not that selective? i'll be very honest i think romance is SO much fun to explore in writing, i love shipping idc i'm cringe but i'm free

WHO ARE OTHER CHARACTERS YOU SHIP YOUR CHARACTER WITH?

hmmmmm lesseee..... i'm? honestly? not sure? zed is difficult. i think karma could have interesting potential. i know syndra is a fan favorite, and i can kinda see it even if, well, it's not my favorite (i think they deserve to be frens instead tbh....). funny that i listed two women when i've spent days arguing for 'zed big gay' but ajfaisudfhasiuf i really don't actually have other ships so i'm just. trying to give an answer here i guess

DOES ONE HAVE TO ASK TO SHIP WITH YOU?

not necessarily, although openly suggesting you're interested in shipping is actually nice for me because even when i can see it i'm often like oh i don't wanna come across as pushing for that even if it makes sense for how this interaction is going so like. asking is not necessary, it can happen naturally, but i am 100% fine with someone asking as long as they're also fine with the possibility i'll say no, and talking about it actually makes me far less anxious

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE SHIP IN YOUR CURRENT FANDOM?

anyone who's followed me on kat's blog knows i'm a big kat/darius advocate, but xayah/rakan (saying this in this blog, yes i know), sylas/lux, leona/diana, cait/vi... and honestly some my mutuals made me really invested in like lillyone (hi mars) and qiyana/draven (hi prism and rey). other than my own ships i write but i'll leave those for when i answer this on the other blogs sdaifuhasidufh

FINALLY, HOW DOES ONE SHIP WITH YOU?

dm me nicely to talk about the dynamics you can see. or send me memes that indicate that interest when i rb those prompts about wanted dynamics. knock on my door and yell HI MEL DO YOU SEE THIS SORT OF RELATIONSHIP BC I KINDA DO! or grab me by the throat and say you wanna ship with me, that also works.

tagged by: @seekslight ty 💕 tagging: it's one of those days idk who to tag so if you wanna do it and you haven't been tagged, consider yourself tagged

[everybody-loves-purdy]

I do kinda ship RavenXBarely (only kinda because I don't often ship characters), and I feel strongly that if either of them had been a she-cat, the Erins would have made them a canonical couple in like book 2.

That being said, the age gap is iffy (the age gap of most couples in the series is iffy tbh), made worse by the fact that Ravenpaw was vulnerable and Barely was in a position of power (able to kick Ravenpaw out of the only safe place he had at that point -- not that he would, he just could).

Anyways this is to say that as much as I like queer couples (being queer myself), I think a cute alternative that isn't talked about enough is Barely being Ravenpaw's unofficial adoptive father.

Also because so much of Ravenpaw's canon family were either outright against him or were not mentioned to be a positive light in his life at all (why tell this new guy you're friends with about the big fricken secret and not a littermate or other relative?). His one brother/littermate was a dickhead. His older brother was friends with Tigerclaw and was manipulated against him. His sister distrusted him so much that she chased him away from the nursery. Both of his parents died while he was still young.

All the adults in his life were horrible or negligent. His mentor tried to kill him and stirred rumours to get others to distrust him. His older siblings believed these rumours and turned against him. His leader didn't see how bad things were getting and even appointed Tigerclaw to deputyship, where he would have more power. The only living kin he has that isn't a dick to him is Brindleface, and I don't think she has any scenes with him.

So Ravenpaw (an adult I think since Fireheart and Graystripe earned their names soon after, but still rather young) going to someone, an adult, who DOES believe him and DOES trust him and becomes the trusted adult figure Ravenpaw needed for so long is...I don't know, an interesting concept?

--

Just to be clear, this isn't to say that I think their ship is bad or that people should stop shipping them. I love artwork of them, and I believe that they're canon now anyways (?).

This is just a little fun alternative to think about!

Or maybe there could be a 'de-aged Barley' AU or replace Barely with another old cat and have that cat have a son around Ravenpaw's age that is the actual Barely.

I will say I do massively ship RavenBarley lol

I don’t think the age gap is that bad, even if you exclude his appearance in Yellowfang’s secret since the mistakes in that book are just huge. In the same scene where Barley is introduced in that book Brambleberry’s apprentice is a bright eyed young Mudpaw and Hawkheart’s apprentice is Barkpaw… when Talltail has been a warrior for moons and moons at this point, and even Runningnose has got his full name. But at this point in the book that Barley appears even if you do consider it accurate it is just before Raggedstar dies, Raggedstar dies literally the next chapter. Honestly Barley may the most accurate piece of timeline in that chapter. Man Yellowfang’s secret is a mess, proof that the Erins have absolutely no series bible, at least at that point.

With RavenBarley I think people assume the two got together basically the moment Ravenpaw got to the barn which yeah is very iffy but I don’t think that’s the case personally. I think they got together at the end of the Ravenpaw manga series, up until that point they just seem a lot less close than what they are later on. And I personally don’t interpret them as having a power dynamic since Barley doesn’t have a proper claim for the barn.

Anyway back on track but I do also like your idea for an AU there if Barley became a father figure instead of a partner, it would have been nice if Ravenpaw got some kind of parental figure, especially since his died when he was so young and he went through so much.

[ultfreakme]

Can I ask for advice? I read your answers to ask, and it seems about random thing too (not just fandom characters)....So, I just got into JJK this year, and my friend is estatic (they were a fan for almost 3 years). They ship yuuta/maki, choso/yuki and gojo/utahime (I think the first 2 ships are cute and I don't mind either ships, too). But when I told them that I ship gojo/getou, they become defensive and told me, "but they're only bffs and it's only platonic relationships and bromance. It's not BL you know..." and I was iritated like, it's okay to ship what we like right? Do you think I should hide my love for this ship from my friend and preted only like het ships, too?

P.s Love your analysis on JJK (especially satosugu and itajun). Now I get more of the story, because of your blog. Thanks to you I also ship ItaJun 😄.

Also your answer to that anon (who loves BL /GL more than het romance), I kinda get their feeling. I'm so grateful to found your blog... Hope you have a wonderful day...

Absolutely not don't hide your love for satosugu! A ship doesn't have to be from the BL section to be mlm. Someone sent me an ask talking about how Blue Flag's end couple is two boys and it was published as a shonen manga.

I'm gonna be a bit of a bitch....and say well Gojo/utahime, Choso/Yuki, Yuuta/Maki can't be shipped because JJK is shonen, it's not romance or shojo. Also they're all bros and friends too! None of those couples said I love you, none of them kissed or really hung out all that much and none of these are canon(although tbh I would argue that based on subtext and a billion comments from anime production and creative staff it practically is) so......

Okay bitch moment over.

You're nice to your friend and their ships despite being ambivalent about one, they have to show the same courtesy to you. They don't have to start shipping it too but like it's just good friend behavior to be accepting. If it's a point of tension, it's best not to argue over it, or try to convince the other person of something. If your friend can't hear you out and dismisses you entirely, THEY are in the wrong, never you.

Also, I've often hid my own interests and loves in the past because my friends were super judgemental(like, "oh ew how could you like anime?" or "oh gross that's two boys/girls that doesn't work"). None of them stuck around me long and I wasn't happy being friends with them. I was miserable pretending to be something I'm not, even if it was something as silly as my interests.

Nowadays though, I do have friends who don't get shipping but they're respectful about it. End lesson; Don't ever change yourself, how you express yourself or your interests for another person. You are totally valid for liking the things you do and if others can't accept that, that's their problem. If they can't let this go or keep telling you to not talk about it or try to change your mind....well I hate to be extreme and this is worst case scenario, but, ditch em, there's better people out there who'd take you as you are.

Thank you so much!!! I love doing metas and analysis like it makes the experience so much richer and there's new depths to enjoy~~ glad you enjoy it!! This is super sweet <3<3 (\^_^/)

The BL/GL thing is so relatable and I think more recently, a pretty common experience for people in the anime/manga fandoms. I used to feel super alone with it but hopefully because of social media we can all feel a lot better in knowing we're not alone. When it comes to fiction, just do what's fun and makes you happy.

Have a nice day too anon!!!

[queenlua]

let's see about 5, 11, 12, 13 for the ask meme?

5. What game would you recommend to someone new to the series?

ugh this is so HARD because i don't think there's any game that's perfect for this...

if they're new to the series but have enjoyed at least a couple older video games at some point (and thus have some tolerance for a bit of gameplay cruft and GBA-era rough edges), i'd be really tempted to throw Sacred Stones at them. absolutely gorgeous sprites, good music, probably the most solid/focused/best-executed story in the series, fun support conversations, and very good gameplay whose only flaw is "it's kinda too easy." but it's satisfying and if someone likes everything about it but "too easy," then that's an easy problem to fix with subsequent games lol

i suspect Awakening is probably the objectively-better answer, though. first "modern"-feeling FE in terms of how streamlined and nice the mechanics feel, the depth/multiplicity of strategies, the storyline is weaker but still has definite highlights (especially when the kids show up), etc

Three Houses is a solid contender but the game is kind of bloated with extras that i think can make playing it feel like a bit of a drag; i know a lot of people who just kinda flaked out or gave up b/c of all the monastery stuff, and i wouldn't want someone's first FE to end that way

i do love the Tellius games but i wouldn't recommend them as starter games. the 3d sprites are kinda ugly and it definitely shows its age a bit in terms of gameplay cruft

11. A character that deserved better?

Edelgard, tbh. she's fantastic when the game isn't trying to make her all woobie/waifu/etc. wouldn't even take many changes to fix this one!

also Renning. i love what's on the page but he gets so little and shows up so late. give the dude some damn base conversations plz

also Meg. the game is so mean to her, goddamn.

12. A game that deserved better?

oh boy. the problem here is, if i finished playing an FE game, that means i liked it well enough over all, even if there's stuff i didn't like. like, i wish Awakening's storyline was stronger, but it definitely feels like it executed on exactly what it wanted to do, so i wouldn't say the game deserves better per se

so i guess i'll say the two FE games i tried and failed to play:

fe6: i ragequit on the map with the fucking reinforcements that move the same turn that they spawn. motherfuckers. why

fe14: i was already pretty "eh" on the story and then that one fucking "defend [x] turns" map (unhappy reunion iirc) took SO much finicky effort to survive that by the time i finished it i was like. ugh. i'm so tired. and then i put it down for a while and never picked it back up oops

13. What do you like most about Fire Emblem?

...god this is going to make me sound SO uncultured but, the support conversations, especially in the older games, are just so delightful. delightful in-and-of-themselves (especially when they would happen DIRECTLY ON THE BATTLEFIELD lmao), and also, were probably weirdly influential in how i thought about game writing / writing generally. conveyed a huge amount of personality & implied huge things about the world & in a relatively small space; and also refused to let anyone be just a rando soldier in your army; you can look back at short fiction i wrote in middle school and see how much i was striving to get that huge-cast-small-space-feel in that format. simple but effective approach

also it's nice to have a big-name game series that executes so well on story and gameplay, on average. i've played a lot of Final Fantasy and i love those games but. often the gameplay is just kinda mediocre/grind-y, right, and i'm forcing my way through for the story? could NOT be fire emblem lol