#the character puts a lot more weight on the limitations that other people would put on him if they knew how precarious his situation was

[daydreamerdrew]

Iron Man (1968) #48

[voidcat]

– [16:52]

characters: togame jo, you

notes: use of nicknames (was gonna be pet names too, but oh well for another fic mayhaps) girl help i was possessed idk where this came from. Anywyas enjoy ;w;

Slight vibrations accompanied by a little mew, you scratch the cheeks of the cat by your side, keeping your other arm extremely still.

The cat seems content but a little too energetic to sleep just yet. “Come on now, just rest.” You try to convince the furry fellow, giving ear scratches with your rhythm decreasing to lull it to sleep.

Not the wisest place to lie with a cat on your chest; streets are one thing but Shishitoren territory is on another level by itself.

Lucky for you, this is one of the streets their members rarely walk upon— that, or they’ve just decided to leave you alone for now, embarrassment still fueling hot in the blood of novices and some wayward punks.

“I just want you to use me as a pillow.” You almost wail at the cat with a pout, the cat not caring in the slightest as to what you want, purring and playing with your fingers.

“Is the offer on the table for others?”

A voice from afar breaks the peaceful space you and the cat had crafted, footsteps beginning to make themselves heard, drawing near with each step.

“Because if the little guy won’t, I’d like to take up on it.” The owner of the voice concludes, stopping several steps away from you.

The cat jumps off of you in an instant, bothered by the sudden raise of noise, disappearing into a narrow alley as all you can do is to sit there and watch them go away.

The lack of warmth quickly takes over your body, and you still remain in the same position, same spot. You don’t need to raise your head to be met with Togame Jo’s smug face, his grin already loud in the words he spoke.

“No can do.” You let the sweetness of your tone to drop, mourning the loss of the cat and your limited amount of solitude in the process.

“Come now.” He singsongs with open arms, still keeping his distance. “Gonna turn away a stray just like that?”

He sounds amused if anything, all the more annoying— “last I checked, you weren’t a cat Togame.” You say his name slower, emphasising on it.

The arms drop and he rests one to his hip, leaning his body weight on one foot as well. The use of his name works as you hoped, even just the slightest tinge of annoyance blooming works just fine.

“Back to the pleasantries, I see.” With the last of his word, he resumes his walk toward you.

“And what could I have…” *clink clank* his sandals echo in the air, “possibly done…” *clank* the sandals come to a stop, a curtain of shade cast over you, you can tell he is standing right next to where you lay, “to have upset my doctor dearest now?”

He speaks the words like honey as he crouches down, arms resting on the surface next to you, brushing against your skin, he tilts his head to the side and with each exhale, you can feel his breath tickling your skin.

The nickname does not help once bit. He always makes it a point to remind you of your embarrassment when you’re least expecting.

So what if you were a little naive back then! Unaware just how often and intense the lot of them would fight… if it’s a crime to be concerned at the sight of a human you saw as acquaintances covered in blood and bruises, getting worried and rushing to his side for first aid— sure you’re guilty as charged, take them in officer! put on the handcuffs and lock them away while you’re at it!

“Let me think…” you hum, bringing a finger to your lips to fake thinking. Your arm aches for being still for so long but you try to hide it away.

“Disturbing the peace of citizens, getting in the way of a potential sick animal’s rescue, asking people to use them as body pillows, initiating physical contact with people unprompted… I think the list goes on, don’t you think?” You turn your head to face him as you finish.

He stands close, too close, if you were to lean forward just an inch, your noses would brush already. And worse of all, he looks more smug than anything, just staring into your eyes, uncaring of the empty look you are careying

“An interesting list of accusations.” Togame speaks up after holding your gaze long enough for both of you to grow bored. “But mostly baseless, should I add.”

You raise an eyebrow in return, bringing both your hands by your chest to clasp them.

“The cat part can be handled any time,” he says as his eyes go up, as if thinking on ways to capture the cat later on, “but someone respectable such as you, doctor dearest, shouldn’t go around, spreading rumors now.” He says as his eyes find yours again.

“And last I checked, the physical contact wasn’t unprompted.” The grin returns to his face, with each word, he goes down a volume.

The grin grows bigger and bigger, the same unnerving one on the opposite sides fear, and the same one he loves to use when he feels like he has the upper hand on you. “You enjoyed it, in fact.”

And with the drop of the ball, he waits for your response, only receiving an eye roll in return, then one hand raising from where it lay to flick him off on the forehead.

The same empty mask is nowhere on your face— too many emotions in fact, all boiling, fighting to retort, say something back, bark or shut him off. But it’s an endless battle like that, only ending with one side speechless. And if anything to come by, you know when to admit defeat.

Like now, as unfortunate as it is.

Togame is the first to break the scenery after some time passes, the sky beginning change its colors. Getting up and stretching his arms, he opens his eyes to steal a glance at the sky.

“Heard it may rain today. Dont want a repeat of last time now, do we?” He says as an invitation. Reaching out his arm to you, bent by the elbow, he watches as you repeat after him, get up, stretch your arms and get off the platform you were sitting.

With a sigh, you link your arm to his and immediately pull him to your side with little force.

“Well then Mr. Stray, lead the way.”

[cy-cyborg]

If you're using Mocap to animate an amputee character, you need an amputee actor!

I know there is a lot of debate about disabled actors playing disabled characters, but with amputees, even in mocap, it does visibly and negatively impact the performance if you don't get an amputee to do that roll - unless you're going to majorly adjust the animations later, but that would require so much additional work that it kind of defeats the point of using mocap at all. Amputation (and limb differences in general), weather a prosthetic is present or not, changes how you move and how fast (stumps and limbs with prosthetics often move faster due to less weight), the poses you can do (abled actors often physically can't always do the same poses because the limb their character lacks is in the way) everything. It will even impact how other parts of the body will be posed (e.g. lots of leg amputees have altered spinal curves, which will effect things in the upper body, because of slight changes to their center of gravity and the pressure applied from prosthetics. The higher up the amputation, the more limbs missing and the longer the character has been without them, the more noticeable this will be)

I'm glad that we're starting to see more amputee representation in games, truely, but you can't just slap motion capture data from a non-disabled people onto a disabled character and expect it to look right, especially when it comes to disabilities like amputation, where a massive chunk of weight is gone or altered. It's exceptionally noticeable.

I've worked in 3D animation and games. I understand crunch, and I understand sometimes it's a technical issue or limitation, especially in older games, but I also know how much work goes into this stuff, how much love and care these folks put into it to get things looking right. Even mocap cleanup is a lot of work, and a lot of skill is still need it to get it looking right in-game. I've seen first-hand the almost obsessive attention to detail some animators have - so why is this the thing that gets consistently overlooked?

A lot of this also applies to live action where a charcater's missing limb or prosthetic is just added in post too...

[justfandomwritings]

An essay on why I won’t be watching next season.

1. Obviously actors have to promote their shows and hype them up. But the interactions between Nicola and Luke during the press tour were, in retrospect, clearly also acting performances, and it is rare to see acting within the press tour to the degree that those two put on while grossly exaggerating things like how sexy this season would be or how much Polin we would get. I don’t blame them. It’s clearly what they were told to do. And it’s fine to hype a show, but I think a lot of people felt genuinely lied to with the WAY this season was hyped.

2. The casting has been color conscious and inclusive in a way I greatly admire. But they have not been inclusive in other ways. And that’s not to say they should have to be. One show shouldn’t bear the responsibility of being inclusive to everyone and making up for an industries worth of exclusion. But we have exactly one size inclusive character in this whole show, and I’m not even demanding more, but to butcher the season of the only size inclusive person in this show this badly and in these ways sends me a clear message of what the writers thought they could get away with with a curvy actress and how they saw her.

3. The wait times for this season and next season are just too long. The hype dies down too much between seasons such that we care less and less each time we get a new one, especially when you only give eight episodes, regardless of their length. You know who also gave us a season in 2022 and then an eight episode season this year? house of the dragon. And they have to CGI a fuck ton of dragons. Yall were sitting on this season being done filming for over a year and for what? What did you do in post? A bee? And then to have the audacity to do it in two parts? Fuck off.

4. Add to that. The costumes and new sets looked so much cheaper this season than previous seasons. Where did the budget go.

5. The plot is too crowded. Maybe you thought a curvy girl couldn’t carry a season. Maybe it was bad writing. Obviously you needed Cressida and Eloise to have decent amounts of screen time but you also did half of Francesca’s story and set one up for Violet and Benedict that collectively took the majority of the screen time and left us with very little Pen and Colin. Which was a disservice you never gave Anthony or Daphne’s seasons and was why they were good. We got enough crumbs of the others to tell us what was happening but not enough to make them feel like main characters or to make it feel like an ensemble show. There were leads in season 1 and 2. This season it was an ensemble with too many moving parts. But everyone’s said that. It’s not surprising.

6. My biggest problem is the tone. The blame. Admittedly I’m a woman who relates strongly to Penelope so I’m not impartial here. But for a character who spends her entire life being abused by every single person in this show, who is pushed to her absolute breaking point before finally giving her mother and the tonne a taste of their own medicine. For that character to receive no grace, no understanding, no respect, for the vast majority of the season hurt. To not only have zero understanding of her situation but to frame the entire plot of the show around the fact that SHE alone should be sorry. To have minimal to no groveling from Colin over what he said last season, to have no acknowledgment of how he treated her as a safety net, to humanize Cressida who made her life hell with minimal acknowledgment of that fact, to have Eloise get ONE comment from Cressida of all people about her friendship with Penelope but no real reflection from Eloise or acknowledgment on her part or apologies for what a truly SHIT friend she was for DECADES. That hurt. Because the message is that sure, they can push you to your fucking limit, you can break after years of being bullied for your weight and your looks and your status. Your own mother and sisters hands can be filthy with insults and abuse. Your friends can treat you like utter garbage for years. They can befriend your bullies. Your soon to be husband can, very recently, insult you to his friends behind your back. But you owe them the apology for breaking after years of abuse. It’s not that the tonne couldn’t be angry or that they all should’ve fallen at Pen’s feet. It’s that those arguments never happen at all because once again, just like when she was being used and abused by everyone, everything was put on Penelope. And the cycle continues.

7. Colin should’ve groveled more. I know I said that in the previous point but it really ruined things for me so I want to emphasize it. I wanted that man on his knees the whole season, and I should’ve known I wasn’t gonna get that when y’all dropped the list of songs and there wasn’t any of the A List Yearners on the list. But I’m still mad.

8. Actually that’s a good point. Did anyone else think the songs didn’t go as hard this year? Except Pitbull were we excited about any of them?

9. You did the Pride and Prejudice ballroom trick with the dancing alone thing and you didn’t nail it. If you’re gonna do that trick it has to fucking HIT. (And it has to be enemies to lovers.) And you did it half assed. You should be ashamed.

10. There was a two second window there when Cressida asked the maid for help where I thought they were gonna swap lives and the maid would go with her aunt and Cressida would become a maid and I was like “holy fuck is Cressida gonna become Bennys love interest?” and that would’ve been better than what y’all did I think. And it would’ve justified her excessive screen time.

11. I love gender swapping Michaela and making Francesca bi. We love it. But why was Francesca immediately interested. Once again the writers don’t understand pining. Michaela is PINING for Francesca and can do nothing but love her from afar. Francesca loved John completely and whole heartedly. Michaela was a beautiful love story for her but was also a second chance. She loved John completely. She would never have an emotional affair on him. How did you immediately ruin such a beautiful second chance romance?

12. Where was Pen’s friendship with Anthony or Lady Danbury? Why wasn’t Colin proud of Pen the way he was in the book? To make her even more alone? To emphasize that she was alone and at fault and helpless? Fuck off.

I just don’t have it in me to watch this show deteriorate further.

[david-talks-sw]

What "The Hidden Fortress" (1958) tells us about the Jedi's status in the Prequels.

In 1999, George Lucas had this to say on BBC Omnibus: A Long Time Ago: The Story of "Star Wars" and then The Phantom Menace's director's commentary.

“I greatly admired Kurosawa, especially the film Hidden Fortress, which told a story from the point of view of two serfs, two slaves...

... peasants who tag along with this famous general and a princess-- y'know, royalty. And the whole story is told from their point of view. And I like that idea. I like the idea of telling a story from the lowest person's point of view, uh, in the food chain, and that's how the story got to be told by Artoo and Threepio.”

“[The Phantom Menace] is told primarily from the Jedi's point of view, but the story that's being told is essentially the story of Queen Amidala and her plight of having her planet blockaded. As in, say, Episode IV, where the story is told through the eyes of the droids, in this one, it's told through the eyes of the Jedi.”

“But [from the moment we get to Coruscant, Anakin and Jar Jar] are standing on the sidelines. It's a little bit a riff on the very first film where the story is told through the point of view of the droids, who were sort of the lowliest characters.”

“And in [Phantom Menace], I'm doing it through - primarily - the two Jedi, but then the secondary characters are also carrying a lot of the weight when the Jedi aren't around.”

George Lucas draws a comparison between lowly characters like Hidden Fortress' peasants Matashichi and Tahei, the droids in A New Hope, as well as the Jedi in The Phantom Menace.

What do they all have in common? They are all the lowest-ranking characters in their respective films. Repeat: the movie frames the Jedi as almost at the bottom of the food chain.

Because of course they are. Functionally, they're just diplomats. They hold no political power whatsoever and barely have any authority .

What little authority the Jedi do have in TPM comes from the Queen's young age, which allows them to ease into a more advisory position, and Qui-Gon's rebellious streak. And even he's explicit about the fact that his mandate has limitations.

The only characters "below" them in status are Jar Jar, an exiled Gungan, and Anakin, who just yesterday was still a slave kid, Artoo the literal object and that's it!

Also the other Prequel films are consistent with this portrayal. Who do we see lower in status than the Jedi? Dexxter Jettster and the clones. Everyone else is pretty much above them.

Yes, the Jedi are part of the system, but they're not as high-ranking as you'd think. Yes, they have Force Powers, but that means squat when put against political power. So, like, to expect the Jedi to...

influence the decisions of the Senate,

wage a war against the Outer Rim to end slavery,

or blatantly refuse an order to join the war effort,

... is incredibly unreasonable.

They're not meant to be seen as "the elite, peering down upon the people from their ivory tower".

They're the servants! Servants of the Republic.

And they're seeing their higher-ups destroy what they should all stand for, but are unable to stop them.

Later on, with The Clone Wars, we are introduced to civilian characters and from their point of view, the Jedi are ultra powerful and are highly placed and "should do more but don't".

It makes sense that these characters would see the Jedi as 'the elite'. But they don't have the full picture.

We, as the audience, do.

So we know that the reality is more along the lines of the Jedi "should do more but can't".

After all, we are made privy many instances of the Jedi speaking up and trying to change politicians' minds, only to be dismissed and overruled at every turn.

↑ these aren't even all the times we see it happen, btw, there's more examples...

So at some point, if you - as an audience member - see all this and are still saying "the Jedi should've done more!" I really need to know... what more could they have done?

Take control of the Senate?

That'll result in a dictatorship, there's a reason they waited as much as they did before trying to take down Palpatine.

Power corrupts and they're wise enough to know it.

Don't join the Republic in the first place?

George Lucas never frames the Jedi's involvement with the Republic as a bad thing. In the foreword to Shatterpoint (2004), he says their being part of the Republic led to 1,000 years of prosperity.

Where's the issue, then? Well, it's a two-man job and the Jedi's bosses, the Senate, grew corrupt and stopped doing their part. They stopped carrying their end of the couch.

But “no Jedi in the Republic from the get-go” means the Sith will rise to power even faster. Fun!

Stay neutral in the war?

The Separatists were killing civilians and testing weapons on neutral systems, or enslaving them.

The choice put before the Jedi was "do what we tell you and fight, or let people die".

But also, out-of-universe... do you really think Palpatine, genius politician, master of spin, can't re-frame the Jedi staying neutral in a negative light?

When they joined the war, he unleashed propaganda that either directly (on the Separatist side) or indirectly (on the Republic side) framed them as "warmongers who corrupted their values". If they don't join, they're "apathetic cowards who care more about their own values than the lives of the people they're supposed to protect".

So either way, Order 66 comes around, wipes them out and the Republic goes "good riddance".

So what else could they do?

The answer is "not much".

Because the whole point of the narrative is that Palpatine checkmated them by taking the fight to a field the Jedi had no experience in or right to meddle with: politics.

So if you look at these characters who are nowhere near the top of the food chain, and say "well, why didn't they fix things?" I'm sorry to say you're missing the point of the narrative.

Or maybe you do get the point of the narrative and just aren't trying to be fair...

... in which case, at least be consistent and also argue:

"Why didn't Threepio & Artoo do more to save the Rebel crew of the Tantive IV from the stormtrooopers?!"

"Why didn't Matashichi & Tahei do more to save the Akizuki clan?!"

[madrivervalleyicelandics]

TW pet loss

Big long reflection post under the cut. Wanted to say it all somewhere that doesn’t have a character limit.

We are about a year out from when we put our two mares diagnosed with ESPA to sleep. Ultimately losing them has caused me to really sit with & unpack the way I had allowed the judging & breed standards to impair, inform, & even BECOME my own judgement, even when they didn’t make sense or clashed with something I knew wasn’t right. I think we all need to become more honest about the root of our sports & traditions, & redefine our ideas of “correctness” not based off of historical trends but the best & most current research we have access to.

I liked Skvísa from the start because she was hypermobile & that made her talented & easy to prepare for sport. Bottom line. Hypermobility wins, the standard calls it correct & rewards it, & I followed & believed in the standard. I didn’t see her hypermobility for what it was until recently. I saw it as talent, suppleness, flexibility.

If I hadn’t bred her, she’d have lived an almost normal lifespan, which is true of many ESPA horses. She always had some sensitivity & required a lot of careful stabilizing training to stay balanced with a rider (particularly to keep her trot & avoid cross-canter), but she would have more or less been okay for the normal lifespan of a horse. Her fetlocks might have dropped in her late teens, she might have developed an unusual propensity for eye ulcers or colics or whatever but if I hadn’t - twice! - allowed her body to undergo 11 months of relaxin & weight gain followed by a year+ of pasture time afterwards, she’d have lived a more or less normal life, & I can almost guarantee she’d have retired undiagnosed & whatever eventually killed her wouldn’t have prompted us to make the connection & diagnose her.

She only got diagnosed because for whatever reason her kids expressed this hereditary disease to a much more extreme degree, & with a much faster progression. Síríus was incompatible with life because his larynx lacked integrity & stuck together when he flexed his neck, blocking his airway. His older sister, Sylgja, seemed normal at birth but presented with extreme nerve impingements as she grew, & was crippled & experiencing whole-body pain episodes by 5. I got to see her get better under my stabilizing training & then watch her completely fall apart worse than before & realize that it was my responsibility, entirely, from her conception right down to the bitter, early end.

What happened to these horses is 100% my responsibility & my fault, the result of choices I made. But I made those choices based on the education I received regarding what “correctness” is & looks like - a standard I was then very heavily reinforced for riding & training towards.

Since my mares’ deaths, I’ve learned about enough other Icelandic horses with this disease, & talked to enough people who fully don’t care & have no intention to change anything that I’ve all but completely removed myself from the breed community. I won’t be told this was an isolated or unlucky problem for me specifically when I know that I’m not alone. I won’t continue to use language that dances around what we’re doing when we endlessly rehab the same problems over & over again - horses losing trot, losing canter, getting pacey, crests falling over, etc etc etc. I can’t see the sense in continuing to chase an “outline” that requires inappropriate poll/AO compression & a degree of leg action that does not make sense to the animal’s anatomy, with no research to support these practices and so MUCH research indicating that this runs counter to welfare, while mindlessly parroting the standards & citing them as the reason why X hypermobile hyperflexed example is “correct.” It’s a feedback loop. We’re saying that the horse is correct if he scores high, but he scores high because he’s correct.

It makes no sense. It’s rooted in nothing. The standard was written to fit the trends - it’s not as if science informed the standard & THEN the sport followed. No! The sport came first. That’s true of Icelandic horses, true of saddleseat, Tennessee walkers, hell - it’s true of competitive dressage. Honestly? It’s true of classical dressage, too! We are riding to standards set by a bunch of dudes from a very long time ago based off of what they thought 1. Looked cool & 2. Felt cool to ride, with NONE of the knowledge we currently have about training science, biomechanics, equine behavior, etc. As recently as the 1970s, scientists were still claiming animals couldn’t feel pain. Think about how that mentality informed horse training!!

We retrofitted rules to match & reward what was already winning, in these early iterations of sport. We continue to do mental & linguistic gymnastics to maintain this status quo with every new study that emerges. We know SO MUCH MORE now. We have progressed rapidly in the last century, last 50 years especially. Equestrian sports NEED an update. The onus can’t just be on the riders to find ways to meet the standards using better, more evidence-based techniques. The sport standards themselves have to change to fit what we KNOW now.

Anyway. Not all hypermobility is ESPA, obviously, and many ESPA horses can live long, relatively okay lives with careful management - if they’re diagnosed and the owners know & can stop riding them & certainly not breed them. It’s worth learning how to manage hypermobility, & how to use certain training techniques to help stabilize hypermobile horses, because the world is now absolutely freaking flooded with them. But until we stop rewarding it so heavily, we won’t stop selecting for it, & as I learned the hard way - when you’re breeding hypermobile animals, you can’t control how that hypermobility expresses itself down the line. AND - ESPA isn’t the only disease or injury associated with selecting for hypermobility.

Bottom line: No horse deserves what happened to Sylgja, in particular. She suffered, and longer than she should have because it took me so long to figure out what was wrong.

Because of this experience with them, my life looks completely different than it did a year ago, & in my opinion every single change is very much for the better. Identifying and learning to manage my own hypermobility & connective tissue weirdness has been a piece of that puzzle. I owe very much to those mares, but that is not what horses are here for. They do not exist to suffer so that we can learn about ourselves.

I considered what it would look like to step away from horsekeeping entirely, & in the heaviest months of grief that felt extremely attractive. But where I landed is to recommit myself to understanding their minds & bodies, be a student again (the trauma-informed certification being the first step of that!) & reconnect with my own horses more as pets, & less through sport. Beyond that, I really can’t say what my future with horses holds.

Right now I’m focusing on healing & supporting my own body, & building up other areas of my life. My own horses are not in the back seat, but they’re on this journey alongside me, rather than BEING my journey. I think it’s the amount of distance & clarity I need from the various pressures & stressors of The Sport to avoid falling back into the cycles that blinded me to Skvísa’s dysfunction to begin with.

I hope that when all is said & done, I emerge from all this grief & shifting to find that I am a better horseman than I was when they left me. Time will tell.

But I can’t let a year go by without acknowledging it. They died about a year ago. It was the worst experience of my life, from Síríus’ birth to Sylgja & Skvísa’s last breaths. I miss them daily. I feel the weight of my responsibility for them & their pain always, & I always will.

And if I haven’t said it publicly, I am so, so sorry for what happened to them.

[cripplecharacters]

Hello! I'm working on a story that is, fundamentally, a revenge story. A young woman loses her beloved older sister in a car accident, and becomes obsessed with hunting down everyone she perceives as responsible for or complicit in her sister's death.

This girl was also in the car when the accident happened, and while she survived, she did lose her leg (below the knee).

My question is, is it okay to have a disabled character seeking revenge for the event that disabled them if the disability isn't the driving force behind that revenge? My protagonist did lose her leg in that accident, but the thing she's bitter and vengeful about is the death of her sister, and she makes that very clear throughout the story. Is that enough to detach her from the trope of "character wants vengeance for becoming disabled," or is it still too close for comfort?

Also, I'm planning to make this girl fat; we need more badass fat characters in the world. Will that affect her experience with having a prosthetic? Especially considering it's a leg, so it'll be bearing her weight. Very few of the medical resources out there account for fat people, unfortunately.

Hi!

Standard disclaimer that we don't have amputee mods, please keep this in mind.

I think that this is a cool alternative to the usual "revenge for making someone disabled" plot line. Her being incredibly emotional because she lost a loved one is a natural reaction, and the desire for revenge is well, natural for the genre. It's just nice to see a disabled character being involved without disability being the main factor. In my view it's realistic too, I feel like most people would care about the death of a beloved sibling more than a new disability (not to imply that they wouldn't at all, of course). Disability is better than death, even if it makes life harder. I believe the concept for the story is fine.

For the second part of the ask, I 100% agree that we need more badass fat characters, especially women. These are some factors that could affect her as an amputee, and they are things that fat amputees deal with more often - but obviously no group is a monolith, so I doubt every single one will apply to her specifically. Skinny amputees can deal with these issues as well. Not an exhaustive list of course.

Prosthetic weight limit. These are different for different models, but they do exist. The most ranges I've seen go up to 136kg, so the process of getting one might be more costly and/or time-consuming if she's above it. The higher the weight the higher the risk of needing custom-made parts. That's expensive.

Actually being able to put it on. If she can't reach the end of her residual limb, she might either need another person's help or get an assistive device to help her both take care of the stump and put her prosthesis on.

Prosthetic fit. This one can already be difficult if the person is skinny, but it's a more time-consuming experience for people with more fat and skin on their residual limb. This is partially due to shrinkage and tissue remodeling, which is a progressive process, and more tissue means that there is more to remodel. She might have to go through a lot of refitting before landing on one that will be appropriate for the long-term. Keep in mind that basically everyone gains weight after becoming an amputee, so this is a process that can go on for a long time just for this reason, not even including the other reasons like the wear and tear.

Sockets. Like most things, they were designed with skinny people in mind, and it kinda shows. A socket gives stability through hugging firm tissue, so the more soft tissue is present in between them, the less stability and control it offers. Mobility aids can help with this - whether that'd be crutches, a rollator/walker, or a cane, depends on her personal preference and needs.

Fatigue levels. Using a prosthetic is really tiring already, but it gets more tiring if you are physically heavier, same for more pain due to the increase in pressure between the skin and the prosthetic. Again, a mobility aid can be helpful - she'd probably own a wheelchair, even if that's not the aid she'd use most often. She could opt to use a wheelchair at home to preserve energy, and walk outside with prosthetic and crutches.

As you can see, a lot of this has to do with increased costs, so you have to take in your character's financial situation in mind. And of course she's not gonna just put on a prosthetic the day after the accident. It's a process that takes a long time, physical therapy, and patience, even if she starts using a preparatory prosthetic early (before getting a permanent one) it still takes time to relearn how to first stand, then walk, then run... It's a process.

I hope this helps!

mod Sasza

[sarahreesbrennan]

Hello! If IOL were to get adapted into a TV show (or film I suppose), what are some things you'd be excited for, or things you'd want revealed that we don't get from Elliot's POV?

(also fun fact: my name is Elliot too! It may or may not have been very helpful in getting me to read the book three years ago)

Hi Elliot! A fine name. :)

The silver screen by its nature allows us into more points of view - it’s why my TV tie-ins always had more and briefer PoVs than I usually write, to give the same effect as a moving camera. And In Other Lands is a very limited third by design, since we really have to feel Elliot’s feelings to be in it with him. So immediately a visual, more-on-the-surface medium would open the story up to more reveals - there’s a lot to be done with Serene and Luke, and (for my money) with Captain Woodsinger, Golden, Adara and Myra.

The question also arises what the director’s or showrunner’s vision is, because the showrunner would not be me. There are so many different ways to tell a tale.

If they’re going gritty child soldiers, there’s more to be done with the wars between the different peoples, with dryads and dwarves, and with Delia Winterchild and her lost twin. If they’re going, say, romcom like a fantasy Heartstopper, we’re probably putting Wings In the Morning and In Other Lands in a blender and starting with the characters 15 and up. If they’re doing children’s adventure a la (gayer, weirder) Percy Jackson, we might meet the key three waking up in their respective settings on the day they head off to the Border camp - Serene exiting in a rebellious huff after blazing row with her mother, Luke worried under the weight of loving expectation, Elliot totally clueless and friendless in another world - are these children going to meet? What will hap— Holy SHIT the redhead is being rude! But we’d get it, because we saw where he came from.

The mood of a story is often dictated by what information you parcel out when.

And TV throws curveballs. (Movies less often.) What if the Elliot and Adara actors had lightning-in-a-bottle chemistry? What if Luke and Dale did? I hardly dare imagine. But then again, if it was a She-Ra-style animated series, that would be far less likely. So it’s hard to say what I’d be excited for, as I wouldn’t know what to expect!

I’d be really excited if they did any kind of series, because that’s such a show of faith in my work. And it would mean more job security, and new covers, and more chances for me to get more readers and perhaps most important of all to write more in the In Other Lands world… which (more on this later) I would love to do.

A show is always a wild shot - I’d always try to think of the books as my first concern, as they might do something totally bonkers with an adaptation. (Me, if Luke and Serene fell in romantic love while Elliot died a cowardly weasel’s death: What Show? I Cannot Perceive the Moving Pictures, I Just Do Not Know.) Buuuut, if it ever did happen, I would love to see more of the interdynamics at the Border camp, stuff that flew totally over Elliot’s head. I’d love to have Golden introduced earlier. I’d love to have the harpies in sooner, but as a sinister presence until the big reveal. And of course, channeling my inner Elliot, I’d love to see the mermaids. Throw the whole budget at mermaids!

Thanks for asking, and dreaming with me. 💜

[ghost-buddies]

ᴛʜᴇ ʟɪᴠɪɴɢ ɢʜᴏꜱᴛ.

ᴘʀᴇᴠɪᴇᴡ. in commemoration of jjk ending: what would've happened if suguru never defected, and... Shoko did? [pt 1 of 'gone like a wisp of smoke']

ɢʜᴏꜱᴛ ɪɴɢʀᴇᴅɪᴇɴᴛꜱ. lowkey au :: angst :: hurt :: self indulgent :: sfw :: cursing :: multiple parts :: highkey really bad so m sorry

ʟᴏꜱᴛ ꜱᴘɪʀɪᴛꜱ. Gojo Satoru :: Ieiri Shoko :: Geto Suguru :: Iori Utahime :: Mei Mei :: Masamichi Yaga :: a whole lot of other characters that my 3am brain can't comprehend

ɢʜᴏꜱᴛ ɴᴏᴛᴇꜱ. I love shoko and she's being slept on fr </3 this is really self-indulgent and i really dont expect this to go anywhere... enjoy. ANOTHER NOTE. if youre reading this ur a real one, but the next installment is gonna be more abount the 2006/star plasma thing. i havent seen anything on her perspective.

ᴡᴄ. 1.8k (oof)

Ieiri Shoko is a living ghost. Not quite human anymore: just an asset for the Jujutsu world, and a slave to the people that take her for granted, right?

No, Ieiri Shoko is not a ghost. She is a useful tool that will kill herself with cigarettes and sadness, because most of all she cannot feel anymore and simply does as she is bidden.

For all the moping that Gojo Satoru and Geto Suguru do about ‘being the strongest’ and ‘no one quite like us,’ there is no one quite like Shoko; and so she suffers in silence as the world keeps moving.

2006 is the year that everything seems to turn for the worse. But of course Shoko doesn’t know that; she’s barely seventeen, after all, and her biggest worries are keeping her smoking secret(-ish) from Yaga, stopping Gojo and Geto from starting a full-on battle because someone ate the last limited-edition Kit-Kat (Shoko did), and healing them when missions go south. So when the three of them are sent to the gym after Gojo forgets to put a veil where Mei Mei and Utahime did their mission, she doesn’t expect anything to happen.

If anything, she expects Mei Mei to blow a vessel because Utahime’s ‘crush’ on Shoko is getting ‘too obvious.’ Mei’s undying bets about relationships seem to never end, and in order to stop them, Shoko fears that the only way out is to pay the white haired menace.

But that doesn’t matter. Satoru and Suguru seem to be getting ready for another argument, and it’s a perfect moment to have the two boys get their emotions out of the way. Shoko leaves for a smoke break.

Apparently, they’re being sent by Tengen (why he would choose her two insufferable classmates out of anyone, Shoko will never know) to escort the Star Plasma Vessel to assimilate with him.

Satoru makes sure to send her lots of photos of the fight, and Shoko fights a smile as the sees them.

She doesn’t feel too sad that she wasn’t invited to partake in the mission, but Yaga wants to talk to her anyways about it.

“Shoko!” he says, catching up to her as she’s walking back to the dorms from the infirmary. “I just wanted to apologize.”

She looks at him, confused, and so Yaga continues:

“I didn’t invite you to the Star Plasma vessel mission. Tengen just requested the two of them.”

Shoko laughs, a bright little thing that Yaga seems to like since he offers her a small smile. “Oh, sensei, don’t even think about it. I would’ve been dead weight. I’m not worried about them.”

(She should’ve been.)

Time seems to move too fast when they come back to Jujutsu Tech.

--

It’s 2006 – right after the Star Plasma vessel died – and even though the death is still a shock to Gojo and Geto, they’ve bonded over their loss and become stronger from it.

(The one time Shoko thought she might serve as more than a tool to heal, she’s been left in the dust.)

It’s the end of August when Shoko finds Suguru alone. She’s puffing a new cigarette, and he waves to her.

“Oi, Sho. I haven’t seen you in a while, what’s up?”

“Same old, same old. How… how are you? After the vess- After Amanai?”

“It’s tough, but that’s expected of the job. I have Gojo to look after me.” He takes a cigarette from her, making heart eyes at the mention of Satoru.

Shoko internally blazes. She was there every night, when Suguru felt the pangs of guilt, when Satoru felt inadequate for the title of ‘the strongest.’ She was there for them, the both of them, so how dare he say he has Gojo?

“You also have me, dumbass,” she deadpans.

Suguru doesn’t seem to respond to that, because he laughs a little bit and Shoko’s felt no stronger urge than now to slap some sense into him. “You look tired, Sho. Have you been getting rest?”

She ignores him back. “Geto, I have a question for you.”

“What’s on your mind?”

“Do you… do you ever get tired of doing sorcery?” Do you get tired of being used? “You’re forced to risk your life every day to save the people that cause your suffering.”

Suguru thinks for a moment. He’s always been the thoughtful one. “What brought this on? But I guess not. Sure, it gets exhausting, but it’s rewarding knowing that you’re helping innocent lives.”

“Well,” Shoko deadpans, “surely you get annoyed that you need to eat curses and feel like throwing up almost every night.”

He laughs again. Shoko leaves.

--

When Shoko sees Gojo, she’s not doing well. She’s lost weight, and her once-shining eyes are surrounded with puffy purple. She doesn’t sleep very much anymore, using her reversed cursed technique to sustain herself. Satoru’s landed himself in the infirmary, and Shoko almost feels like laughing when she realizes it’s been months since she last saw the white-haired man.

She decides to cut around his shirt to get closer to his broken rib: it’s fractured and bound to hurt like hell, and she doesn’t want to heal through the fabric and waste precious energy.

Instead of using scissors, she chooses a scalpel. At first, she’s scared of the tiny, wicked blade, but her hands are always steady, and soon enough, she was using it every chance she got. She still has it today: a glinting, thin silver blade that she had personalized – there’s diamond edging along each of the assortment of blades, which she uses on a rotation. It exuded her RCT, and sliced skin (and fabric) easily and reliably.

Satoru’s been scraped badly after a mission, and even though he has Six-Eyes and probably knows Shoko’s unwell, doesn’t seem to comment on it. Shoko heals his broken rib and the scratches on his knuckles and moves to leave him when he grasps her wrist. She stills.

“Sho? I’ve been thinking. We should go out for yakisoba sometime soon.”

“I… can’t.”

“Heh? You’ve never said no to an outing!!”

“It’s been months since you’ve even thought of inviting me to you and Geto’s shenanigans.”

She turns to face him, and he seems to register her state. He softens, only marginally. “You look like shit, Shoko. Let us take you out. We’ll protect you from perverts on the train, and you’ll keep me and Suguru from killing each other. It’ll be like old times.”

Shoko doesn’t smile. “I wish I had the free time. There’s more work for me here in the infirmary.”

“Shoko…” Satoru pouts. “I don’t want to exclude you, or anything like that—”

Shoko tamps down her frustration. She smooths a mask of indifference over her face. Bastard, she thinks. You already have. She looks at his shining eyes.

“It should be a date for the two of you. I’d hate to impede.”

She wriggles her wrist from his grip and leaves.

--

The one thing that perhaps Shoko appreciates about school is that even though her talents lie solely in healing, Masamichi Yaga is not stupid and teaches her how to fight.

She’s a Grade One sorceress, after all. And she did accompany Geto and Gojo on missions early on – it’s a shame her technique is as prized as it is because she could be quite formidable.

So when Shoko reveals that giving energy and healing others using RCT isn’t her only talent, it’s not met with the kind of ‘wow, you’re not actually a one-trick pony!’ response, and more of a ‘well, good to know’ half-assed reply.

Late 2005 and early 2006 were the last times she went on missions.

It was a rainy night, and Shoko, Geto, and Gojo hopped onto a train from Shibuya. It was an easy Grade Two curse and a couple of Grade Threes, and they had no trouble taking care of them.

Unfortunately, Shoko was cold and tired of hearing Satoru yapping, so they quickly boarded the train.

It was of course their luck that it was cramped, and they all had to stand up.

“Why the long face, Ieiri?” Satoru probed. “No way those curses wiped you out. All you did was punch them and swing around banging your stethoscope into their brains.”

Suguru punched his arm. “Yeah, just like how all you did was run around in circles after one of the Grade Threes tried eating your finger—”

“It was a rat! You know how I hate those! Thank goodness for Shoko taking care of that thing—”

Shoko groaned when Satoru blocked Suguru’s next attack with a blow to his shin. They started to attract odd glances, but thankfully Shoko didn’t have to deal with troublesome girls gawking at the two imbeciles next to her because the train was filled with…

Just her luck. Old, pervy men.

They shamelessly gawked at her (she’s a teenager. She’s growing, she shouldn’t be surprised they’d stare), and of course Satoru and Suguru noticed immediately because they formed a meat shield around her.

Satoru snapped at an old man who was taking photos of her: “Oi, what’re you looking at?”  while Suguru tag-teamed with him, snatching the phone from the geezer and quickly deleting the photos he’d taken.

Shoko smiled inwardly. They stopped fighting, to protect her.

One by one, Gojo and Geto intimidated any and all creeps trying to perv on her. Once the train car finally fell silent, they were fighting again as if nothing had happened. Thankfully, they kept up the meat shield.

Shoko had to stop them from having a full-on battle to the death (what Satoru jokingly calls the ‘Battle of the Balls’) before they arrived back at Jujutsu Tech.

Shoko secretly hid the tiny Grade Three curse – the rat that attempted to eat Gojo’s finger – and cupped it in her hands.

Thank God for those creepy men, and them distracting Gojo and Geto from the cursed energy swelling around the tiny thing, Shoko thought. I want to experiment with you, little guy.

If Shoko can output RCT, surely she can take it away… right?

They arrived back at school, right as she finished the thought, and they bid each other goodnight. Shoko made a quick beeline for her room, all while blaming it on ‘the two of you punks taking up all my energy,’ which wasn’t quite a lie. They know she’s thankful for the two of them taking care of her.

In the silence of her room, Shoko marveled as she forced the rat close to death, and then brought it back to life.

She withered an arm and then regenerated it.

 She wrinkled its eyes and let it see again.

 Ieiri Shoko found her full potential that night.

© property of @ghost-buddies. do not repost, translate or edit.

[ethereal-angel111]

Things I’m doing in 2025 for the biggest glow up in history

Step 1: Screen time limits and no more doomscrolling. I’m going to be putting limits on certain apps the only social media apps that won’t have limits is Pinterest and YouTube

Step 2: Mindful eating! My goal is to lose weight but why go on a stressful diet when you can just manifest it lolz. But I do feel the need to be slightly healthier than what I am at the moment. Also gonna work on manifesting that everything I eat is healthy even if others see it as “unhealthy” cuz I’ve seen that manifestation work for a lot of other people :)

Step 3: Get some sort of exercise daily. Doesn’t matter what it is or when I do it it just needs to happen at least once per day

Step 4: Live in the end and be delusional. My goal is to live like I already have everything I desire and to stop caring about the 3D and other peoples input.

Step 5: manifest, affirm and persist as much as possible. Pretty self explanatory lol

Step 6: achieve desired style and aesthetic. I’ve been pretty unhappy with my current aesthetic so I wanna work on that

Step 7: have so many hobbies and be good at all of them. Right now I don’t have many hobbies and I never work on them ever but I wanna change that in 2025! The main hobbies I wanna work on is art, dancing, singing/rapping, fashion, makeup, editing, journaling, and content creation

Step 8: Grow on social media! I want to be popular online and have my desired fans/fanbase!

Step 9: Make and listen to lots of subliminals. My goal is to have a subliminal go up on my channel at least twice a week! I also want to listen to my sub playlist at least once a day

Step 10: Develop an unbreakable mindset. I want my mindset to be perfect and 100% unstoppable! I’m actually working on this one right now so I can be prepared for the new year

Step 11: Become my OC irl!!! This is one of my main manifestations but in the new year I wanna work on this one on a new level. I made my OC to be my dream self before I even found out about manifestation. I thought there was no way I could be like her so I would just daydream about her constantly but now that I know about manifestation I know becoming her irl is possible

Step 12: Treating myself like a god/deity. I already do this one a lot and I talk about it a lot because I swear by it!! I wanna take it to the next level in the new year tho because I deserve it <3

Step 13: Always feel motivated/inspired. Pretty self explanatory tbh but I feel like I need to bring my motivation and inspiration back from the dead

Step 14: stop doing the things I want to stop doing. Bad habits and anything I want to stop is gonna be out after new years. Skin picking is the biggest thing I want to stop but I have multiple things on the list of things I wanna stop doing

Step 15: connect with Mother Earth more. I love her and I want to spend more time with her 💚💚 I feel that spending time in nature and with Mother Earth is important and I don’t do it enough

Step 16: stop being afraid or embarrassed to do things. I’m gonna do whatever I want when I want fuck embarrassment it’s literally a societal construct. I’m not gonna limit myself or my life to make it more palatable to others

Step 17: post lots. I wanna learn to post a lot online while also not spending all my time doomscrolling on social media. Also I wanna make up for all the negativity and over sharing I posted on social media in the past by posting fun, creative and nice posts

Step 18: MAIN CHARACTER ENERGY!! I’m the main character and I’m gonna act like it. The whole world is gonna see me as the main character of life! >:3

Step 19: live like your dream self. Before I do literally anything I’m going to think “would my dream self do this?” Or “what would my dream self do right now.” This mindset will help me become my dream self so quickly I can feel it!

Step 20: become a global well loved it girl. Not much to say about this one lol

Step 21: take lots of pics and vids for memories. I used to take so many pictures and videos all the time to look back on and now I never do which is kind of sad

Step 22: prove everyone wrong. I wanna show everyone that they should have never doubted me or given up on me. I want everyone who ever treated me wrong to realize how much they fumbled

Step 23: spoiling myself and letting others spoil me. I deserve princess treatment from everyone including myself :)

Step 24: no more procrastination, if it needs to be done then do it ASAP. I’m sick of never getting anything done and stressing about shit I don’t need to be stressing about

Step 25: move out. I need my own place desperately y’all don’t even know LOL

Step 26: get the income of my dreams. I’m sick of having no money y’all

Step 27: get dream job/jobs. I wanna be a full time artist, idol, and content creator. I wanna start my own business and stuff! ૮꒰ྀི >⸝⸝⸝<꒱ྀིა

Step 28: achieve my dream sleep schedule. I wanna wake up at 9:30am and be asleep by 12:00am every night. I’ve already been working on this one a ton and I’m doing really well!

Step 29: manifest/work on achieving my dream appearance and personality. This is one of the biggest things I wanna manifest and work on in 2025!

Step 30: meditate and journal daily. I used to do this all the time and it had so many benefits so I definitely wanna start getting back into it

Step 31: look into dreams and their meanings. I’ve heard a lot of people talk about gaining a lot of insight on their life through learning about their dreams and what they mean so I want to give it a try

Step 32: be grateful for everything and show gratitude for the present instead of constantly complaining about it. I’ve heard people talk about how this mindset helped them manifest faster and I personally feel that this is a beneficial mindset to have even if you aren’t manifesting

Step 33: show my kindness, love and empathy to at least one thing a day (preferably more). It can be a living thing or a non living thing it doesn’t really matter

Step 34: become more knowledgeable on my species! I am part human but I’m also part a couple other things (I don’t feel comfortable saying them here tho). I wanna learn and connect with my species more :3

Omg this post is so long I’m sorry (*꒦ິ꒳꒦ີ) thank you for reading and I hope some of these steps help to inspire some of you as well! Let’s all become the best version of ourselves and live our dream lives in 2025!

[bladeweavedance]

I decided to do one of those ship template meme thingies. There is no official height for either of these characters that I have seen, but they appear to be about the same size, so I kind of gave 'em an average-ish height. Wyll's age is his official age. Gale does not have any official age - he looks to be in his early-mid 40s, but I can't discount the idea that the orb might have prematurely aged him a bit, so I put him in his late-30s.

I figure Wyll and Gale take turns being the big/little spoon hence why I kinda halfsies it for both of them.

For the lends clothes / borrows clothes thing… Well, first of all, I headcanon Gale as being stockier than Wyll weight-wise - so it's likely Gale would not fit in any of Wyll's clothes (which seem rather tight on him anyway). Additionally, I just have this thought in my head that Wyll is sort of used to not being near a water source for washing his clothes for days at a time - so, he might sort of have this habit where he ends up running out of clean clothes and where normally he'd just wear the same thing over again (sort of a young bachelor-type of mindset almost), he just decides to borrow Gale's clothes instead. When they get married, Gale tries to gently break him of this habit. Though, he does like seeing Wyll wearing his clothes. It does things to him. LOL

I feel like neither Wyll nor Gale are the type to really excessively use pet names, but they might use a few simple ones with the occasional unique one sprinkled in. Wyll uses darling, dearest, my love - and maybe "my sweet wizard" and "my king" - playing into the sort of fairytale romance thing with that. Gale is put-off on using darling himself because he's heard Astarion use it too much, but he also uses dearest, my love, my hero, my Blade, and he uses "my king" back to Wyll as well.

Wyll is very charming and he seems really sociable when he's in a good mood (he mentioned dancing a bunch of sarabandes with the ladies and gentlemen of the Gate, and he's really a Man of the People sort, I think - he likes interacting with people and inspiring them) - so I put him all the way on the extroverted side. Gale is a bit harder to judge - on the one hand, he enjoys a lot of solitary activities (reading, he stands off to the side at parties, etc.), but he also exhibits a lot of very social traits as well - seeming to enjoy conversation and hanging out in bars. So, I headcanon him as being the sort that's kind of in the middle in terms of extroverted and introverted.

Wyll and Gale are not only both service-oriented people, but they're also rather eloquent and enjoy romantic phrases and poetry and building up people around them (especially their partner). So, I see both of them as being in-between when it comes to Affection through Words and Affection through Actions.

I wasn't really sure what to put in regards to Confesses First and Waits for Confession. On the one hand, they both tend to play the slow-burn in terms of romance, but on the other hand, they're both also rather eager and bold people… Sooo… I kinda just put them both on the same level. They seem like they'd both confess their feelings first at various points in their relationship (Gale might be the first to say "I love you" but Wyll ends up being the first to propose or what have you).

The bugs question… ROFL While I don't see Gale as really being the scream-y sort about anything really (he's pretty level-headed in the face of danger), he does seem to harbor some wariness towards bugs, particularly spiders (Not just the "Stop licking the damn thing!" but he has some words about phase spiders and Kar'niss). Wyll meanwhile is absolutely fearless and will definitely squash bugs or anything else that might set Gale on edge without question.

More to come for the rest of this! Darn character limit…

[artoriarts]

there’s a lot of talk about missed potential in jjk, and I agree, while culling games onward was a good ol fight shonen, shibuya incident was something special, dark and painful but built on a core foundation of hope and positivity that drives yuji as a character, but it kinda peaked there, never hitting the same emotional depth after, with the exception of maki and the zenin assassination arc.

But from the many things I’ve seen brought up, one of the things I haven’t seen is just the core premise of cursed energy not being used like it could be from the getgo. Instead of just being Ki, it was something developed *through* the negative emotions that pool and spawn curses. This is just gonna be me spitballing but listen listen.

Yuta’s the best way to segue into this. A sensitive kid loses his best friend and spirals into grief, unknowingly channeling his cursed technique (instead of just being able to copy, him being able to replicate/leech soul ‘data’ in general) as he hangs on to every memory and memento of her, acting as almost ritual and binding her soul to his, resulting in the vengeful spirit we know of rika, his raw cursed energy output resulting from the feedback loop of negativity that comes from the mass guilt of the horrors rika enacts in his defense, as well as the guilt of trapping her with him in the first place when he learns it’s his fault. His power is the direct result of the weight he carries with him.

And in the same way, other characters bear their trauma in their power. Maki’s frustration and spite at the circumstances of her birth placing her under every disadvantage with the system as it is. Sukuna’s raw hatred and disdain for his fellow man. Gojo’s isolation from his own humanity as The Strongest, growing up both closer to everyone than anyone could ever know, as the six eyes’ ability to see the flow of cursed energy allows him to practically read people’s minds emotionally, and yet expectations and power have placed him on a pedestal so far away from humanity, pressured and forced into sorcery, not a single other interest permitted, from the moment of his birth. Yuji, being a newcomer, predominantly working off fear and the still fresh grief of his grandpa, along with the pressure he now feels as someone capable of sorcery to protect those who are not, one bornout of love but no less harsh, and after shibuya, like yuta, he gains a burning core of guilt for what his life has allowed to happen. Stretching more now but instead of becoming racist and getting skilljacked, geto breaking at the end of hidden inventory is where his character launches off from, instead of how it dooms itself to end; I would need to put more thought into it to make it make concrete sense but his want to rid the world of nonsorcerers and “evolve humanity” is not out of hatred for the weak but his love for humanity as a whole, he wants a humanity that can defend itself against the natural consequence of its existence that is cursed energy, and sorcerers are basically the only ones who can do that, so non-sorcerers are simply liabilities and sources of cursed energy that don’t pull their own weight, and kenjaku is maybe more like a symbiote to him, his patron that just so happens to have the same practical goals as him, albeit a different motive of pure scientific curiosity (assuming they still want the tengen merger or if they’re still in the story at all, they don’t fit into this brainbaby idea quite as well as everything else, but I digress).

And this isn’t just a story thing, it also affects the battle system too. Desperation while losing a fight actively makes you more powerful - also means consequently that like people who keep their cool like gojo (ignoring the minor insanity (and him seeing his ex-boyfriend)) have an inherent power limiter; he may be the strongest but he doesn’t get the same power buffs that everyone else can. Maybe positive energy actually like exists aside from mahoraga and rct. it’s harder to use because well people latch onto negative emotion easier than positive emotion and if you’re fighting obviously things are not sunshine and rainbows, but it is more effective against pure curses and can heal (also then if you can only rct off positive emotion, that power swing from negativity kinda shifts you into a glass canon with more damage but less ability to heal).

Do I turn this into fanfic. Do I do that thing where you make fanfic but break it so far from anything canon it’s basically just original content. or do I just keep it all locked in my head because I’m lazy. Decisions decisions.

[crowsandturtlesandbatsohmy]

Okay y’all, so I know I’ve been predominantly a Haikyu!! account for a little while now (and there’s still more of that to come once I have the emotional stability for finishing season 4) but we’re gonna switch gears and talk TMNT 2012 for a change!

No season 1 Wrap-up, partially because I have 4 episodes to go and partially because it’s been months since the last time other than today that I sat down to watch it, but I do want to talk about my thoughts on each turtle, as well as April and Splinter. I’ll also rank them among the other versions of those characters to give you a better idea of my general feelings on them, with 1 being best and my fondness decreasing from there. I think it would be fun to repeat this every time I finish a season, so I’ll plan on that! :)

Splinter

I know there are a lot of people who don’t like him. But I honestly can’t see why? I love this Splinter. As far as I know him he’s exactly what my ideal Splinter would be! No spoilers, I want to go into this with as little prior knowledge as possible. But yeah, I like Splinter!

If I had to rank the Splinters, where would I put him?

2012 Splinter

Mutant Mayhem Splinter

80’s Live Action Movies Splinter

Rise Splinter

April

I’m not entirely sure what to make of her? I don’t necessarily dislike her, but I can’t say I’m super fond of her either? I think I need to give her some more time.

Where does she currently rank among the Aprils?

Rise April

Mutant Mayhem April

80s movies April

2012 April

Leo

I love him your honor. He’s such a dork in the best way possible! He was tied for being my favorite character for a while, although now he’s settled into a comfortable and consistent second place. I relate to him a lot more than I expected to, which was really cool!

Where would I rank him?

2012 Leo

Rise Leo (just barely behind 2012. They’re essentially tied.)

Mutant Mayhem Leo

Batman V.S. The TMNT Leo

80’s Movies Leo

Raph

He had to grow on me, but I love him now! Most of the time. I think he would probably benefit from more boundaries and some alone time in order to help manage his anger, but I also realize that’s not exactly possible and he’s kinda doing the best he can all things and stressors and inputs considered. Also the point at which I found out he was voiced by Sean Astin??? WHAT??? Mind blown.

Where do I rank him among the Raphs?

Mutant Mayhem Raph

2012 Raph

Batman V.S. The TMNT Raph

Rise Raph

80’s Movies Raph

Donnie

Yeah okay we all knew this was coming, but surprise surprise, Donnie is my favorite. I just love him to death! The whole April thing is admittedly irritating, and I tend to like Leo more in those episodes, but Donnie is overall my favorite because I love watching him come up with things, and I love how he genuinely seems concerned about others (Leo has this as well. I don’t really see it very much in Raph and Mikey?). Also I feel like he’s carrying a lot more weight than he ever gets credit for. Also I found out his voice actor, Rob Paulson, (who I already thought was really cool prior to this and apparently voiced my childhood) played Shreako in Scooby Doo Meets the Boo Brothers. Literally my favorite character from one of my favorite childhood movies!! This didn’t have any effect on my opinion of Donnie, of course, but it was just so neat to see my childhood interests and current interests linking like that! I love recognizing voice actors from other shows they’ve done :) [ask me about Jeffery Combs sometime. I’ve got a story to tell there!].

Anyways, back on track, where would I rank him out of all the Donnies?

Rise Donnie

2012 Donnie (again, barely behind. They’re practically tied.)

Batman V.S. The TMNT Donnie

Mutant Mayhem Donnie

80’s Movies Donnie

Mikey

I’ll be honest with y’all. I don’t really vibe with him. I love chaotic goofballs, but there is a limit, y’know? It’s gotta be combined with depth. You gotta back that chaos and goofiness up with the ability to be serious when needed, and there’s gotta be more to the character than just the goofiness. And he has yet to show signs of any of that? It feels like being silly is his only trait, and it’s kinda irritating. It makes him really one dimensional. And I want to like him! I know there are a lot of people who love him to pieces! I want to be able to see what y’all see. But I just don’t. What am I missing? (Again, no spoilers.)

Where do I rank him among the Mikeys?

Batman V.S. The TMNT Mikey

Rise Mikey

Mutant Mayhem Mikey

80’s Movies Mikey

2012 Mikey.

I really hate ending this on a sour note, so because I can I’m gonna list the iterations I’ve seen and my favorite turtle, and we’re gonna play “How many times is Donnie Crow’s favorite?”

Rise: Donnie

2012: Donnie

Mutant Mayhem: Raph

Batman V.S. The TMNT: Donnie

80’s Movies: It’s been long enough I don’t entirely remember, but it’s a safe guess to assume it’s Donnie.

Alrighty, this concludes my introductory 2012 TMNT post! If anyone has questions about my opinions on more specific things related to TMNT (not just 2012, any of the iterations I’ve mentioned are fair game), feel free to ask! I don’t bite :) I’d be happy to go more in depth!

[icedragonlizard]

Shadow Kirby headcanons

I did a Skirby hc post before, but it was before I did a bunch of changing to my verse. His characterization is now very different from what I had before. I deleted that old post, so this is the post to see how I now interpret this character.

Shadow Kirby, much like his titular pink counterpart, is the hero of his homeland. He obtained the status as the hero of the mirror world some time after the events of Amazing Mirror.

Here's how he got to that point: Shortly after AM, when Skirby and Kirby became friends, Skirby then came to Kirby to ask for help on how to use copy abilities. Kirby, of course, was more than glad to help, and after enough exercise and training with copy abilities, Skirby stepped up and became willing to protect the mirror world.

Dark Mind managed to survive its fight against Kirby, and continued to be a threat to the mirror world for about another year after Amazing Mirror. But after Skirby mastered the use of copy abilities, he then eliminated Dark Mind for good. That establishes his status as the mirror world's hero, and it puts some weight off of Kirby's shoulders because his counterpart protects the mirror world without him needing to constantly come back to do it.

More down below by clicking the 'Keep reading' tag.

Skirby is the hero of his homeland just like Kirby is the homeland of his, but there are plenty of personality differences.

Kirby eats a lot, isn't very talkative, and generally prefers not to spar outside of doing it with one person. He spars with Meta Knight, albeit only because Meta stubbornly keeps challenging him to sword duels, but Kirby generally only gets combative when it's necessary, such as during adventures, breaking up fights between his friends and stopping his morally bankrupt friends from causing minor trouble after they became his friends. Other than that, he's chill and would rather nap instead of fighting when he doesn't need to.

Skirby is different in all of those aspects. His appetite isn't nearly as big as Kirby's, and he's a lot more talkative. He also loves to do things like sparring. He'd gladly engage in a sparring match with anyone that wants to clash swords (or any other weapon) with him.

His best friend is Dark Meta Knight. They became friends after Dark Mind was killed off for real post-AM, as that's when DMK was finally set free from Dark Mind's influence. And sparring is one of the main friendship activities that happen between Skirby and DMK.

There's another big personality difference between Skirby and Kirby: Their niceness and forgiveness. Kirby is well known for being so incredibly nice and sweet, and always forgives every villain that stops being hostile to him. He also never dislikes or hates anyone.

Skirby, however, is not quite the same in that regard. Unlike Kirby, Skirby is actually willing to dislike/hate people. He's not quite as forgiving as Kirby, and he's less nice.

He's still a nice guy overall, but definitely less so than Kirby. And he can get pissed off easier than Kirby can. That's not necessarily even to say he's a temperamental person, but he definitely has his limits a lot more than Kirby does. And he's capable of being a hater if pushed to that limit.

There are notable figures that Skirby has dislike for, and I'll go over them:

He absolutely hates Dark Mind. There is nobody that Skirby hates more than Dark Mind. He immediately respected Kirby for fighting Dark Mind, and when that monster somehow survived and still went on for a bit more, Skirby decided to eliminate it himself. He's glad that being is no more.

Shadow Dedede and Dark Taranza are other people that Skirby has negative opinions of. Like DMK, they were also minions of Dark Mind that were then set free from its influence after Skirby killed it. But unlike DMK, those two had no interest in becoming friends with Skirby and were even mean to him. They simply stormed off and did their own thing, and this made Skirby decidedly not like them. He thinks they're ungrateful because of how they acted after he killed Dark Mind. At least DMK became his friend in the end, though.

Skirby also has not-so-great opinions on a few of the dream friends. But before we get into them right away, let me talk about Skirby's deal with the dream friends in a general sense.

He hadn't actually met most of the dream friends until after Star Allies. The reason why he didn't join the team during Star Allies is because the mirror world was effected by the Jamba Heart threat, and Skirby wanted to protect the mirror world from it. That's also what led to DMK joining the star allies team; Skirby and DMK made a deal where the former stayed and protected the mirror world while the latter went out to join Kirby and the others.

When Skirby met all the other dream friends after Void Termina's defeat, he has varying opinions of them. His favorite dream friend is... DMK, of course, because they're besties and have been for years before Star Allies. And then after DMK, Skirby's next favorite dream friends are the others of Wave 2: Daroach, Adeleine and Ribbon, as he's grateful to them for being DMK's friends. Skirby himself also became friends with them because of it.

Wave 2 + Shadow Kirby friend group baby let's goooo!

And now we talk about the dream friends that Skirby isn't so fond of. His two least favorite dream friends are Marx and Zan Partizanne.

Skirby really doesn't like either of those two. He has distaste for them both, and generally avoids them as much as he can.

He thinks Marx is insufferable. The jester can get on his nerves with pranks, and he also tells edgy jokes that piss Skirby off. Not just that, but Skirby also doesn't appreciate how Marx just treats DMK like an entertaining cringe compilation. He thinks he's sort of cruel for that.

As for Zan, Skirby dislikes and resents her because she called him a bastard after mistaking him for a shooting star. He took offense to that. And then things just got rather petty between these two. Skirby just thinks that Zan is really unpleasant and doesn't want to be around her.

Skirby also doesn't like Magolor and Susie, but he can stand them a little bit better than he can stand either Marx or Zan.

And then Skirby has a rather complicated dynamic with Taranza. This is, of course, because Taranza hates DMK's guts for being involved in the corruption of Sectonia - which, to be clear, corrupting her was an order made by Dark Mind.

The thing is, Skirby doesn't blame Taranza for hating DMK, but he thinks he's going too far in wanting revenge on the guy, especially considering that Dark Mind, the one who was really behind Sectonia's corruption, is now gone. That being said, it's not all bad, as Taranza does give Skirby some credit for being the one to kill Dark Mind, but they hugely disagree about DMK and thus have some trouble getting along.

That sums up Skirby's favorite and least favorite dream friends. For the others that weren't mentioned above: He has friendships with Bandee and Gooey, he quite likes the animal friends, and he gets along decently alright with both Meta Knight and King Dedede despite the former still having distaste for DMK. And although Skirby dislikes Zan, he actually gets along pretty well with both Francisca and Flamberge. Especially the latter, who he considers his favorite out of the mage sisters, while Zan is absolutely his least liked one.

Skirby is a member of Kirby's ginormous friend group. He'll be there in the big events that all of Kirby's friends are invited in, including the pink puff's birthday parties. A good chunk of Kirby's big friend circle, namely a lot of the dream friends, know Skirby by his association with DMK, but he's a lot more liked than DMK as people give him credit and applause for becoming the mirror world's new hero.

He's given credit as a benevolent person that stepped up to be the hero of his homeland, as he made the true killing blow to his homeland's most infamous villain and befriended one of its minions, who become a part of Kirby's big friend group just like Skirby himself.

More Kirbies mean more charm!

[bedtimegiraffe]

Blades LI Alignments

It struck me today that the TTRPG pages don't list alignments. Why? Because a lot of players and DMs/GMs see them as outdated and unnecessarily limiting?

...I'm gonna do it anyway.

Here's are the alignments, via the newest addition of Dungeons and Dragons (5e). Basically, how much you follow rules? And how much do you help people/how selfish are you?

Tyril- Lawful Good

Tyril is, to me, extremely Lawful Good most of the time. He's on a (according to him and society) righteous quest to stop evil with no room for nuance. Remember that time he decapitated a corrupted mayor in the middle of the street? He nudges a bit less lawful right at the end, but that's a big moment for him.

Nia- Neutral Good

Nia was raised in the strict rules of the Temple of Light, but she abandons those pretty quickly. She's not seeking out heists, but she kind of likes them. And Nia is undoubtably motivated to protect literally everyone. Textbook Neutral Good!

Mal- Chaotic Neutral to Chaotic Good

Mal has never once cared what the law told him to do and he's not about to start! Our boy is Chaotic, as rouges tend to be. Mal starts pretty focused on his own survival and nothing else (Neutral), but pretty openly acknowledges that MC made him focus on helping others (Good). Stealing from the rich to finance an orphanage you run where you refer to all of the kids as 'yours' is the most Chaotic Good thing to ever happen.

Imtura- Chaotic Neutral

Imtura is a pirate. And she doesn't seem to have any regard for even Flotilla law. Classic Chaotic. And she does lots of good things, but she seems more motivated by protecting the people shares cares about, rather than any more abstract sense of Right. I call that Chaotic Neutral.

Valax- Lawful Neutral

Valax doesn't even have a TTRPG page, but she should! She does things that are both traditionally Evil (kidnapping, blood draining) and Good (owl bear protecting, not killing her friend). But Valax does almost all of them due to a code of conduct- initially set by the Ash Empress, but eventually set by Valax herself. To Valax, it's not about right or wrong. To me, that's Lawful Neutral.

Aerin- Book 1 Neutral Evil, Book 2 True Neutral?

Aerin is a case where the cracks in alignment kind of show. To me, he's best embodied by this gif:

I went by process of elimination for him. And didn't give much weight to what Aerin says when he's fully corrupted, because that's a whole different thing.

Lawful/Chaotic: Aerin knows how to play along with what's expected of him, but clearly doesn't have much loyalty to the letter of the law. And at no point is he spontaneous. So he's in the middle Neutral column in both books.

Good/Evil: Aerin thought he was doing the right thing in Book 1. And he seemed to genuinely like the party and want to look out for them. But I think we can agree that bringing everyone together with the intention of summoning the Dreadlord and kidnapping Nia are both Evil.

Book 2, Aerin helps save the world, but only if you're not a dick to him. To me, that puts him more in the Neutral category. I feel like a fully Good character would still by out there trying to save the world no matter what.

Any agreements or disagreements? I'd love to hear about them!

[spnfanficpond]

Livechat recap: Writing Reader Inserts - How to Reduce the Y/N of It All

We had a great chat in our Discord server about different aspects of writing reader insert fics! Those who were there or have contributed to the discussion after the fact are: @notsofly, @spn-fanfic-reblog-writes, @kazsrm67, @thoughtslikeaminefield, @zepskies, @talltalesandbedtimestories, and @stunudo. Below the cut is a rundown of the points that we discussed!

How do you reduce the use of Y/N and similar placeholders?

Nicknames - This is especially easy when writing SPN because Dean loves giving nicknames to everyone.

For placeholders like Y/H/C and Y/E/C - When writing from the RIC's (Reader Insert Character) POV (Point Of View), this is easy because most people don't consider their own hair or eye color. When writing from another character's POV, like an SPN Character (SPNC), focus on attributes like how eyes can shine, or narrow. Hair can be soft or shiny.

Decide if the detail you're referring to is necessary to the story. If the plot doesn't change without it, do you really need to include it?

How much detail does an RIC need?

Only those details that would change the story if they were different or missing. For example, if a story is about aging/maturity or how a RIC reacts to new tech, then age is necessary.

What specific details should you leave out when possible?

Hair length/style - Some women have very short hair that can't be put into a ponytail or braided. Focus on feel of the hair, not tangling it into someone's fingers.

Weight - You can mention curves and leave the rest to the imagination.

Blushing - You can feel your face get hot, but you can’t really see yourself blushing. Describe the feeling over the appearance. Darker skin tones don't turn noticeably red when blushing.

Race/ethnicity - Unless your story involves ethnic customs or dealing with something specifically racial, this is not a necessary detail.

Clothing - Unless a hunter is dressing up, clothing does not need to be specifically described. Even when dressing up, clothing can be described generically. "A dress in her favorite color that showed off her assets and minimized those little parts of herself she wanted hidden." A job can affect clothing, but just going to the mall or on a date does not. Describe comfort over style.

What is the difference between an OC (Original Character) and a RIC?

Backstory - OC's will usually have a backstory to help define their character. RIC's only need backstory as it pertains to the current story. They can have one, but only what's needed for the story.

Name

Physical description - OC's need to be described but RIC's need to not be described as much as possible.

Does an RI fic need to be in 2nd Person POV?

No. They can also be written in 3rd person omniscient (the audience knows what everyone is thinking) or 3rd person limited POV (the audience only knows what one person is thinking, as if they were in that character's head).

Are RI fics more popular on one platform vs. another?

Yes. RI fics seem to be a lot more popular on Tumblr than on AO3. Tumblr also seems to prefer RIC's over OC's. We don't know why.

Ways to describe eyes that don't involve color?

Focus on the emotions - see emotions in their eyes instead of color

Focus on actions - eyes crinkling, slitting, narrowing, widening. She batted her eyes or looked up at him through her lashes.

Other adjectives besides color - Bright eyes, shining eyes, etc

NO ORBS.

How do you write a Gender Neutral RIC (GNRIC)?

You have to avoid gender stereotypes like women being more emotional and emotionally available while men are more stoic and stubborn. Women and men stereotypically flirt differently. You need to identify those traits in your story and balance them out to neutralize them. Get down to your basic "people" traits for the character.

Who cuddles who? Maybe the SPNC comes to the GNRIC and asks for cuddles? Decide if that kind of thing matters and why.

The GNRIC discussion at the end of our time led to the creation of a writing challenge to explore gender. How would we write a female RIC differently from a male RIC if they were put into the same story? How does knowing this help us to strip gender stereotypes from our story to make a truly gender-neutral RIC? If you would like to know more about this writing challenge and how to participate, click here!

If you have any questions about anything here, or want to add something to this topic, please let us know! You can send an Ask to the blog, add your comments to the #livechat-events channel in our Discord server, or DM one of our admins here or on Discord.

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