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rainbowsky · 7 months ago

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Sorry I've taken so long to address this, I've had a very busy day and didn't have time to finish this post (which I started yesterday).

I'm talking, of course, about the incredibly controversial situation surrounding DD right now. I've gotten some messages about it so I figured I'd give my thoughts in a bigger post so that I don't have to keep repeating myself.

(CW: racism, spoilers FPU)

I know that by now most people are aware of the situation, but I'm going to start from square one for those who are just catching up on the topic.

There is a scene in Formed Police Unit where Chinese UN peacekeeping troops need to rescue a group of citizens who are surrounded by terrorists. In order to accomplish this they disguise themselves as people from the community. This being Africa, the troops were disguised using blackface.

Yes, I am saying that DD and his castmates appear in the film in blackface.

I am not going to post a picture of that here. It's just something I can't post on my blog. I understand that many of you will want to see for yourself so I'll link a clip of the scene, which was posted on Weibo. Please be aware before clicking - this is full-on blackface. Always take care of yourselves, and if you think it might be upsetting to you don't click. You don't need to see it to be a 'good fan'.

Background

For those who may not know, this movie was filmed years ago, in 2021. During those years I have seen many anti attacks against DD, claiming that he is racist and has worn blackface. Here's the photo that was circulating back then.

At the time I thought the makeup that he was wearing was likely anti-reflective black paint or camouflage paint such as is used by snipers (which he played in the film). I assumed that he was wearing his own hoodie over part of a military costume, because he was wearing a cammo shirt and what might have been combat trousers.

I was certainly not expecting full-on blackface from this movie.

There's no getting around it - this is extremely difficult to look at.

Blackface is widely viewed as offensive and racist. It shouldn't be hard to understand why. Putting on another person's ethnicity like a costume is deeply insensitive, particularly when you consider that BIPOC (black, indigenous, and other people of color) are so frequently targeted, exploited and marginalized. For those in positions of privilege and power to put on the appearance of the people who they oppress and exploit... it's just shocking and awful.

Blackface is most frequently talked about in an American context, but it's actually a problem globally - including in China. More on all that here.

The film

I have not actually seen the film, so I don't know much about the context beyond what is being discussed in the fandom. As I said earlier, in the film a group of UN police officers need to infiltrate an area in the community, and they take on disguises in order to do so.

In promotional media this film is being presented as based on true stories from real missions*. It seems the situation in question really happened on a Chinese peacekeeping mission, and the UN troops disguised themselves as black citizens in order to infiltrate and extract the endangered captives.

*I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt on this because it doesn't change how I feel it should have been handled.

This is important context that is being conveniently left out of much of the backlash about this situation. People are outright claiming that DD plays a black person in the movie - that he wore blackface to perform a role that a black actor could have played. This simply isn't true, and people making these claims are antis and liars. There's simply no excuse for not knowing the full context.

Having said that, I don't really think it matters how it ended up in the film. I do not think there is such a thing as a palatable or appropriate use of blackface. In this day and age it is nearly universally understood to be racist, and it's extremely controversial.

I can understand if they were trying to be accurate to the mission that they were portraying, but surely there are other ways they could have accomplished this scene (perhaps with the clothing but not the blackface). 'Historical accuracy' isn't as important as cultural sensitivity, not by any stretch of the imagination. In the interest of respecting audiences they could have adapted the scene to make the use of blackface unnecessary.

I really see no excuse for anything like this in 2024.

Audience reactions

Chinese sensibilities around these topics are very different from what we are used to in the West.

According to fan repos audiences initially didn't recognize any of the actors, and once it became apparent that they were in disguise, laughter erupted around the room. In fact, most fans are laughing a lot at the photos and video even on social media (although some Chinese netizens have been upset by it and have voiced complaints to various stakeholders).

It is also being widely discussed on Chinese social media as an exciting scene of heroism in the film.

I feel the need to point out that the laughter and mockery is a huge part of the harm, here. As if it's not bad enough that these actors are performing in blackface and presenting a perversion of black ethnicity, it also becomes an opportunity for audiences to mock and disrespect black people. It's become an opportunity for social media to be filled with racist jokes and mockery.

Roadshow statements

There have been some clips circulating of PR and roadshow moments with black cast members and some black audience members who have spoken up in support of the film and to thank the cast and crew for telling the story. Here's one example.

International fans have been dismissing those statements as ignorant or coerced, which I think is offensive and deeply fucked up. There's no planet on which I'm going to - with a totally straight face - say that a black person's response to the movie is not legitimate just because it doesn't comport with my own view.

This is a complex issue and there are inevitably going to be a lot of different perspectives. I hope people won't exacerbate the problem by supplanting black voices on this issue with their own, no matter what's being said. If there's any manipulation going on, let's assume it was in their choosing supportive black figures to speak for the film rather than claim that the black spokespeople are insincere.

China has a lot of issues with racism, there's no doubt about it. It's a huge part of why so many people try to whiten their skin, or why they mock each other when their skin gets tanned/darker. There is a lot of sinister, fucked up stuff going on in China around race - both in the country and in their dealings with other countries.

But we can't claim to speak for black people in China, particularly when they are speaking for themselves! I would hope this is extremely obvious!

Where's DD in all this?

It's understandable that bystanders will react to what they're seeing and might immediately deem it unacceptable - and DD along with it. Their reactions are valid, but as fans I hope that we can look at him with a bit more empathy. I hope that we can take a moment to try to see things from his perspective.

DD has been interested in and an avid fan of black culture since he was a small child. We've all seen how much he immerses himself in hip hop, street dance and the accompanying music and fashion. And yes, he's been accused of cultural appropriation in the past for wearing locs and durags.

However, I think fans need a bit of perspective here to get a sense of where DD might be coming from. Here's a guy who loves black culture, who has close friends who are black, who regularly works with black artists and who supports black artists, in a culture where racism against black people is prevalent and often extreme.

I think DD would probably be amazed to hear the accusations of racism against him. He likely has very few people in his orbit who are anywhere near as supportive of or as closely connected to black people as he is. He likely stands out in his circle as being particularly into black culture and connected with black artists, and probably regularly faces ignorant questions or digs from people around him about his close association with black artists and culture.

Not just because of racism alone, but also due to the racist parallels the government tends to draw between black culture, street dance, hip hop, etc. and criminality/moral degradation*. It's likely that ignorant people in his orbit have expressed concern or wariness toward him because of these associations.

*That is, until breakdancing became an Olympic sport, then they were suddenly onboard with some of it.

I'm not saying that he doesn't have a lot of learning to do (and if this situation becomes what I think it might become, he'll have a big opportunity to do so), I'm just saying that his ignorance isn't mean-spirited. He's coming at this from a totally different angle than any of us are, and he is immersed in a totally different cultural perspective than our own. In his world, his interest likely makes him a bit of an anomaly.

So those painting him as a horrible racist... it's just not how I see it.

The element of choice

I've heard many people say that DD 'didn't have any choice' about this role, that turning it down would not have been an option or that he would be under some kind of threat if he didn't take this role. I don't agree with that characterization of things. I don't think it's quite as 'gun to the head' as a lot of fans paint it.

I think it's more likely that he simply didn't realize that the role would involve blackface when he accepted it, or that he thought that blackface in this context - to infiltrate a terrorist cell and save civilians - would be fine. We don't need to depict China as forcibly compelling actors to take unwanted roles if we want to make sense of this. There are simpler, more logical explanations.

DD wouldn't have been the one deciding how to depict the scene - he didn't have that power in 2021 - but I also doubt he would have had a major problem with it given everything we know.

We must overcome our Western tendency to see things only from our own perspective. This has a totally different cultural context in China, and the voices we listen to about it should not be issuing exclusively from white faces that are not at ground zero of this situation.

Final thoughts

This film has had me worried from day one. I think most people have been expecting it to be full of offensive portrayals and propagandistic fuckery. There are so many ways in which a Chinese film about the UN is potentially a sticky, tricky mess. This blackface thing is likely just one problem on a towering pile of problems.

However, I'm not going to sugarcoat this - this has the potential to be a real shitshow for DD, and I am concerned. Especially if this film gets an international release.

We need to brace ourselves, because I don't think this is going to just disappear. DD has endorsements with international brands, and this could definitely cause backlash for those brands unless the issue is addressed and the scenes removed. There's no planet on which brands like Chanel and Lacoste can afford to have one of their spokespeople plastered everywhere in blackface.

If this film gets an international release and those scenes are left intact, it's possible he will lose some brands.

Let's hope it doesn't come to that, but let's face it - things like this have consequences, and that's why it's so important for producers and artists to be sensitive about what they're portraying.

While I think there's some endorsement risk here for DD, and the potential loss of some international fans, I want to be clear about one thing: I don't think this will threaten his career overall. In China this just isn't an issue in the way it is internationally.

I do hope the film team addresses this issue in some way, ideally by removing the scenes. They just finished doing a massive edit to remove ZZH from the film, surely they can handle something like this. But let's not hold our breath...

Everyone has the right to make up their minds about DD. As I've often said, being a turtle isn't for the faint of heart. That's not just because turtles are frequent targets for bullies, or because we have to constantly live with uncertainty and doubt.

Being an international turtle also isn't for the faint of heart because there are a lot of cultural and political minefields to navigate, and many ideological differences to adapt to. There's a huge learning curve and a lot of unknowns, and turtles who want to survive have to make peace with the fact that we and the boys are from different worlds in many ways. We may never know where they really stand on issues that are important to us.

However, in this case I feel confident that I know where DD's heart is on this issue. He simply doesn't hold hatred, disrespect or disdain for black people. Quite the contrary.

I think we'd all just feel a lot better if he had a good grasp on how to be a better ally.

And while we're waiting for that, I think we should put our money where our mouths are and learn more about these issues ourselves, both in China and locally at home. We want DD to be a better person; let's be better people too.

Edit: more on this here.

#bjyx #yizhan #ggdd controversies #please rebloggers don't tag with his name or the name of the film #i don't want this outside the turtle circle - the fan wars are horrific

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mrcowboydeanwinchester · 3 months ago

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women in horror

wanted a sapphicnatural anthem so i wrote one <3

this is dedicated to all the women of supernatural, and especially to the people in the fandom who bring them back to life to give them their sapphic happy endings. happy @sapphicnaturalrights sapphicnatural week !!! i tried to hit as many of the prompts as possible in one go <3

lyrics under the cut!

VERSE home alone late at night cold open in the dark light bubble bath, spilling red wine her scream cues the title card

guest appearance, aren't you lucky exposition, keep it clunky mystery isn't the only thing she makes hard

PRE-CHORUS tiny top, thick makeup white and lacy linen lipstick pop, DD cup bloody in your visions oh, she's a woman in horror come and tell me you want her handcuff torn, baby born losing is a given monster turn, crash and burn i know why you're driven oh, she's a woman in horror come and

CHORUS bury your girls bury your gays you like pretty women (yum) but you love your cliches she's coming back wrong i'm making it right once i get my shovel we'll keep you up at night (oh?) we'll keep you up at night (okay)

([british accent] so basically, she- am i american or not? i can't remember. oh. um. [american accent] is this accent okay?)

VERSE bloodthirsty kiss and chase through hell's fire and heaven's grace slow panning shots up to her face (that's hot) that's a wrap on her screentime

credits rolling, she's the last name find a plot hole, give her the blame she's a hot one but it's a shame about her crimes (ew)

PRE-CHORUS tiny top, thick makeup white and lacy linen lipstick pop, DD cup bloody in your visions oh, she's a woman in horror come and tell me you want her handcuff torn, baby born losing is a given (yeah) monster turn, crash and burn i know why you're driven oh, in a fatal genre she's dead cos you (laughter into manic shriek)

CHORUS bury your girls bury your gays you like pretty women but you love your cliches she's coming back wrong i'm making it right (yeah) since i've got my shovel we'll keep you up at night we'll keep you up at night

([american accent] so his girlfriend burns to death, so he wants revenge, but then she comes back to life, like - nonono, his mom comes back to life, because she also burned to death-)

BRIDGE me and bloody mary are getting off in the back of your daddy's car stole your silver bullets, the witches and i making magic, we go so far for women in white for mothers and wives for demons and daughters resurrection time the write to survive she's coming alive for women in horror resurrection time !!!

CHORUS you bury your girls you bury your gays i love all your women and i hate your cliches she's coming back strong i'm making it right now i've got my shovel we'll bury you deep at night we bury you deep at night

#I'M SO EXCITED ABOUT THIS ONE. IT'S BEEN IN MY HEAD NON STOP FOR TWO WEEKS #AND NOW IT WILL BE IN YOURS #bury your girls and we bring them back to life and bury YOU heheh #sapphicnatural #sapphicnaturalrights #spn women #spn song #spn #ola sings

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harveyverse · 5 months ago

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calling all newsies fans!! hello!!!

i’m kind of new in the fandom? i was in here years ago, then disappeared, and i’m back!!! but i’m kind of new as of right now, so pls interact with me, send me an ask, dm, whatever if you’re a newsies fan too!!!

i’m desperate to chat abt it and would love to find more newsies mutuals :DD

#newsies #newsies live #livesies #newsies broadway #newsies fandom #newsies the musical #harvey’s babbling

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roger-that-cap · 1 year ago

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seven summers

bradley bradshaw x fem! reader

this my first fic in what feels like a century for a completely different fandom. i have been gathering up the courage to do this again, and i've been sitting on this for about two months now. take it easy on me y'all i feel like a sixty year old veteran re-enlisting right now and i have NO idea how to reload my weapon

warnings: absolutely none! well theyre a little sad for a minute but nothing that tumblr can't handle

word count: 5.9k

Loud spaces weren’t really in your list of favorite places. You could tolerate bars more than you could do clubs, though, and your best friend took that into consideration when she planned the night out for you two. The music was loud and the people were starting to get rowdy, but at least no one was grinding on you or begging for a dance. That was always when you would wrap it up for the night, shaking your head at even thinking that it was a good idea.

“Thank you,” you told the bartender, an exceptionally gorgeous older woman who always seemed to have a meddling look on her face. Her hair was lightly waved around her face as she looked you up and down for a second. You thought she was going to say something, but she just nodded at you once with a small smile before you turned away again, facing the crowd of people you were about to delve back into. You were just leaving the bar top with a soda (you were the DD, as always) when you tripped over someone else’s huge shoe.

“Oh, shit,” a manly voice said as you tripped, and hands caught your arm before you fell over all the way. You looked up and saw a blond man in an achingly familiar navy uniform looking down at you, and your eyes narrowed as his eyes grew wide. “I’m sorry.”

His uniform nearly brought you to a scene of painful flashbacks. You knew you were bound to run into attractive men in uniforms so close to a base, but there was an air about this man that made you feel like you were almost running right through the mist, right through the shadow of a man that you once knew, and a man that wore that very same uniform as he walked away.

You loved Alexandra, your friend you met through other friends. The only downside was that she was in the Navy, and that meant that you were almost always surrounded with memories of your ex boyfriend when you were with her. Him and that stupid uniform that stole him away.

“No worries,” you said after a few seconds, smiling at him. “It’s crowded here.”

“Oh, nice tattoo,” he said, and your hand immediately went to your collarbone, where the one tattoo you had rested. It was a nicely done tattoo of a honeybee, a mark of your past. Something you probably should have gotten removed, but every time you tried to convince yourself, you gave another reason to not get it removed. Deep down, you knew why you couldn’t go through with it.

“Thank you, I got it a while ago.” That was all you could say as memories flashed in your mind, but you managed to smile.

“You look really familiar,” he said, and you noticed that he also had an air of confidence to him as well as familiarity. He was an attractive man, almost too perfect. And he had a smile that you knew lured girls in far too often to be completely innocent.

“I’m kinda new to the area,” you said, shrugging your shoulders. “Maybe we’ve run into each other at the grocery store or something? Or if you’re a frequent flier at the hospital.” That happened a lot. People you had never had as your own patients would sometimes recognize you, especially if they were often there.

“Yeah, maybe.” He looked you up and down one more time, almost like he was genuinely trying to figure out what his own mind was trying to remind him, before he nodded his head at you with a small smirk and a toothpick between his lips and left just as quickly as he came. And then your friend was taking his place, jabbering on about something as you tried to clear your own head.

You never wanted to be one of those people that lived in the past, and for the most part, you weren’t. You lived in the moment. You loved to make new memories, find new things to do, and meet new people. You loved meeting new people. However, the problem with meeting new people, especially men, was that there was that one guy from that one specific relationship that you had gotten yourself in that made it feel like everything was all for nothing.

Bradley Bradshaw.

You didn’t even know exactly what it was. You had been in plenty of summer flings that were passionate and fun, but you got over them easily enough. You had met so many people, loved and lost, and they all stuck with you in different ways that all felt sweet in one way or another. But Bradley? There was something about him that stayed with you in a different way. The thought of him kept a lingering taste of something distinct on your tongue.

In a way, he was the biggest waste of time you had ever spent your life on. There were two years that you shared being officially together, but it felt like forever. You should have known he was trouble the second you saw that military-grade mustache, and the confident walk he always had. You should’ve known he would cause you some pain the second his eyes and his smile proved to be a deadly combo. You poured so much love into that man in a short time in the grand scheme of things, and looking back, it was as much of a waste as it was a privilege.

For a while, you prayed for his return. He had broken your heart right before he left for his deployment, but that didn’t mean that you wanted anything to happen to him. You prayed for a while for him to come back safely and then come right back to you, and then that progressed into you praying to never see him again. You wished for his safety, you always would, but you never wanted to hear anything about him ever again unless it was saying that he landed safely back on US soil. After that, you wanted his name to be gone with the wind and buried with the dust of time.

Either way, he was in your thoughts forever and always, regardless of how many summers passed or how many people there were after him, how many you had met to pass the time. And as you stood in the middle of the bar with Alexandra, you were frozen in shock as you realized that you probably manifested the very fighter pilot in front of you.

He had seen you first. He was surrounded by attractive people in uniforms that you knew had to be his friends, and when you caught the eyes of the very blond man that you fell over before pointing at you with the angle of his head, your jaw dropped a bit. The man from earlier looked at you and slapped Bradley on his back, giving a blinding smirk before saying something to him that you couldn’t hear.

You were sure you looked silly standing there, freezing up the second you recognized him with a pool stick in your hand. You felt all the tension in your body work together to keep you as straight as a board. You blinked when your friend nudged you, completely oblivious to the mini panic attack you were about to have, and you swallowed and looked away like it didn’t nearly hurt you to stop looking at him.

You felt like you were drowning.

“You’re not tapping out or anything, right?” Alexandra asked, narrowing her eyes at you. “We’ve barely been here an hour, and you already have that uncomfortable look on your face.”

“What look?” You managed to murmur, completely aware that he was still looking at you. His gaze felt as familiar as it had back then.

“The one where you’re looking for escape routes,” she teased, even though she was starting to look concerned. “You do it all the time. Hey, are you okay?”

“Yeah!” You said, way too loud to be normal. “I’m good.”

You prayed he didn’t approach you. He had plenty of distractions on his side of the room, lots of friends to talk to even though it was obvious they were trying to get him to go over to you. You were hoping that he would never come up to you or look your way again, but you were sick to your stomach when you realized that him walking away would mean he didn’t care nearly as much as you did.

You closed your eyes for a moment as you tried to understand that none of what you were seeing was a dream.

“Hi!” A woman’s voice from behind you said, and you turned around. You saw a woman in uniform smiling politely at both you and Alex, and you assumed that she knew her, but then her attention was on you. “I’m sorry, I just had to come over and say I love your dress.”

You were a simple creature, and one of your fatal flaws was that you were exceptionally friendly. That easily, the tension left your body as you spoke to the woman. You smiled kindly at her. “Thank you! I got it at a thrift store, but you can check the back to see where it’s from if you want!” She grinned at you, and then you saw her eyes wander to your hand.

“Oh, your ring is pretty, too!” The woman said. “When’s the wedding?” She joked, and you laughed. You wanted a big wedding, back then. Back when you could see the groom in your head, imagine the words he would say, and even imagine your first name combined with his last: Bradshaw. But that was nothing now.

“Thank you! You’re so sweet. It’s from my mom though, she gave it to me a few years ago.” She gave it to you, her big, shiny ring that her first husband had bought her just as a gift. Instead of pawning it, you begged her to have it. It had no sentimental value to you at all. It kind of looked like an engagement ring, but you couldn’t bring yourself to take it off. It warded off men for the most part, and it was a piece of her.

“Aw, that’s so sweet. I’m Nat! Most people around here call me Phoenix.”

You grinned at her and shook her hand before telling her your name, and you knew right then that you liked her. She was extroverted, but very polite. Just your type of person.

“It’s nice to meet you.”

“You too!” She smiled at you before she continued her walk to the bar, and you didn’t think anything else of the nice girl in uniform.

The next few minutes went without any issues at all, and you felt like you could ignore the situation at hand and have a good rest of the night with Alex before it was time for you guys to head home.

“Hey.”

You weren’t hearing his voice. You just weren’t. You made your next shot in the game and ignored him.

You could feel him get closer to you, so close you could smell his cologne. Your eyes watered when you realized it was the very scent you picked out for him all those years ago. He still wore it.

You heard a very manly throat clear from beside you, and you realized that he wasn’t going to give it up. “Hi,” he tried again, and you breathed through your nose and finally turned around, looking face to chest at him before you looked up.

He was smiling down at you. He was smiling down at you as if nothing had happened, and no time had passed. You smiled back at first like muscle memory, but then your face dropped to a frown almost immediately. His smile fell, too. He nodded at your friend in acknowledgement, but she was too busy eyeing him up and trying to decide if he was a threat to you or the night to know that he was being friendly.

“Bradshaw,” you said, and his frown got deeper when he realized you called him by his last name. He hated that. You weren’t in the Navy and you had been together, you and he always insisted you reserved the rights to using his real name. Not his call sign, not his last name, but the one his parents had given him. “It’s been a while.”

“Bradley,” he corrected gently, almost like he thought you genuinely forgot, or like you threw out his first name from your personal dictionary. As if you could ever forget a detail about him. That was the blessing and the curse that he left you with. “You look-” he stopped talking for a moment, and you could have sworn that you saw an ocean of fondness in his pretty eyes that shouldn’t have still been there. “You’re still so beautiful.”

Your words felt caught in your throat. You wanted to tell him that his tan made him look beautiful. You wanted to say that he had filled out so nicely, and that his scars still fit his face perfectly. You remembered kissing them while laying in the summer sun and you remembered kissing them under the tiny Christmas tree you guys had bought together and plugged in. You were both so broke it only had about ten ornaments on it, but that never mattered. Never to the two of you. “You… still have that mustache.”

“You always liked it,” he said, a small smile coming back into his expression, but you didn’t give one back.

“So you’ve kept it growing in hopes to run into me?”

“Maybe I have,” he answered, and you blinked at him. He had always had a flirty personality.

You just blinked. “Uh, yeah. That’s nice.” Was it? It was opening every old wound you had ever had. Every wound that was partially healed by another person’s fleeting kisses was being torn right back open by one sighting of Bradley Bradshaw.

“It’s- it’s amazing to see you, how have you been?”

You were becoming more and more confused. How in the hell was he being so chipper? Maybe chipper wasn’t the word, he was being polite. Or, maybe it was that he wasn’t falling apart like you were. How? How was he managing politeness when you were hardly breathing? The thought that he would walk away from the conversation like it never happened made you irritable and defensive at the same time. “Why do you care?”

His brows furrowed, and he was looking at you as if you were saying all the wrong things. “Because I care how you’ve been.”

“Why?”

He took a look at your friend, who was still staring him down. “Uh, can we talk for a second?” He asked, and you pursed your lips together.

“No, she’s good right here,” Alexandra said, and you gave her a small smile.

“No, it’s okay, he’s fine. He’s big, but he’s harmless.” You saw his chest puff up in just the slightest at the mention of his physique, and you rolled your eyes. “We can step outside, but I’m not going home with you.”

“Okay!” He said, a little too loud for the setting, and you fought back a smile at how excited he was just to talk. You squashed the fondness down. “Okay, uh, come with me.”

The second your foot hit the gravel outside, his fingers were touching yours. The touch was innocent, but you still yanked your hand away. He backed away understandingly. “Force of habit, sorry.”

And it was. You remembered his little quirks. You were always pretty independent, and he had always been touchy and protective, so the compromise back then was that he would lay off while you were inside of a building, but he would hold your hand and guide you all he wanted to the second you walked outside.

“I- uh, I wanted to talk about us.”

“The past?” You said, crossing your arms.

“We’ve known each other for a long time,” he said slowly, like he was just then realizing he was treading on very thin ice.

“We knew each other,” you corrected, fully aware of your friend piecing the situation together by the expression on her face, and you gave her a look that held promises of filling her in.

“Don’t be like that,” he said, coming a little closer, and you felt your eyes burn when you smelled his familiar scent even more. Your tradition of buying men cologne that matched their personalities had died after Bradley. It was something you didn’t really understand why you did it yourself, but it was fun, and Bradley loved it. He was the fourth guy you had done it with, and he was the last. It just didn’t feel right with anyone else, and it was simply something else you kissed goodbye when you and Bradley went your separate ways.

“I’m not being any certain way.”

“I would definitely say that we know each other,” he said, a short chuckle dying on his lips, and you could hear the hurt in his voice. “We were together nearly every day for two years. We’d sit on the river and on the beach and talk about everything for hours. We road-tripped cross-country. I remember everything you ever told me back home, and I remember the last summer we had together like it was yesterday.”

You looked back up at him with eyes that you knew had to be full of sadness. “That was four summers ago.”

You saw it set in with him how much time really had gone by. You watched his eyes widen and his lips poke outwards as he breathed out. “Wow.”

Had time really not passed for him as slowly as it did to you?

All you could do was swallow and turn your head away from the breeze. “Yeah.”

“Do you have a boyfriend now?”

Part of you was so thrown by his question and his lack of tact, especially because he had been such a good flirt back then. Maybe time had changed him. “I’m married.”

Immediately, he shook his head with a small smile. “You’re not.”

You narrowed your eyes at him, even though you were enjoying the back and forth. It felt so familiar. “How would you know that?”

“That was the first thing I checked before I came over,” he admitted, and you cocked your head at him. “I looked at your finger and saw the ring before you even noticed me. And then I asked Phoenix to go over to you and make sure it was what I thought it was, and I was right.”

You gasped. You should have known that that stupid nickname was a damn callsign, the glaring beacon of a person that meant that they were a pilot. And pilots were… they were hard to love.

“I knew that if I came over to you, there would be no way I could hold my tongue from trying to win you back, so I had to make sure you weren’t married first, at least. But I’m not even sure that would’ve stopped me,” he muttered under his breath, and you rolled your eyes.

You were still a little bitter over him sending one of his friends to talk to you, and how well he knew you. He knew you never would have responded to a random man the same way you did Phoenix. “How do you know I don’t have a boyfriend?”

“I’m praying.” And then he sighed. “I don’t have anyone either.”

You would have laughed in his face if you weren’t so gutted. “I find that hard to believe.”

“What do you mean?”

“Considering you broke it off so you could run around and meet other girls, I would be very shocked if you didn’t have one with a ring on her finger by now.”

His eyes widened to a size that was almost comical. “What?”

You rolled your eyes at him. “Before you deployed. You know, when you broke up with me so that you could go talk freely with other women.”

His facial expression was so shocked that you almost bought it. He looked genuinely thrown in a loop by your words. “I didn’t break up with you to meet other people, Bee.”

You nearly caught whiplash at hearing your old nickname pouring like straight up honey from his mouth. No one called you that in a long time, mostly because ‘Bee’ was reserved for Bradley after a day he met you in freshman year of college, and you did an entire presentation on conservation of bees with passion that none of the other students had in their slideshows. It was what had drawn him to you in the first place.

“That’s what it felt like.” It still felt like that, four years later.

“No, no,” he said, shaking his head slowly. You hated how handsome he looked even when he was confused. But he had no right to look confused. “That’s not what happened at all.”

Your tone said it all for you as you crossed your arms. “Um, that’s what I remember, Bradshaw.”

He ignored what you called him, but you saw it in his eyes that it still bothered him. “I cut it off because I felt awful that you were going to be forced to wait for me,” he said, taking a step closer, and you saw his sad brown eyes begging you to listen. “We were still so young, you were even younger than me. It wasn’t fair for me to ask you to keep waiting for me, especially because I kept going on dangerous deployments.”

His words were bouncing around in your head. You calculated what he was saying, narrowing your eyes and trying to make sense of how it was changing your entire perspective of what happened, second by second.

“Are you fucking stupid?” You blurted, but he wasn’t surprised. In fact, he looked relieved. You never really made a habit of swearing, not even while arguing, but when you rarely let a word slip, it meant that you cared a lot.

Bradley wasn’t quite sure which way you cared and if it was in a good way or a bad way, but he was determined to change the passion to a way that would benefit the both of you.

“If you want me to be,” he rasped, and you narrowed your eyes at him.

“Did you just say you didn’t want me to wait for you?”

He blinked. “Yeah. You were what, twenty three? Your whole life was ahead of you. It wasn’t fair for you to have to wait for me to come home when you… you’re full of so much life. You had just gotten your dream job at the hospital, and you were so happy. If you were to stick it out with me gone, you would just have to decide between your job and me anyway when I got home. I ended up getting stationed somewhere else not too long after I came back home, just like I knew I would.”

“Bradley, I told you I wanted to travel, anyway. That job was not my forever job.”

“But-”

“I was prepared to wait for- for forever.” It was his turn to look shocked. “I really would have, Bradley. You just never even gave me the chance to. You pulled the rug out underneath me. You didn’t even ask me.”

He ran a hand over his face as the weight of the decision he made for the both of you settled heavy on his chest. “Oh, god.”

“I assumed you were deploying and you wanted to meet new people. I mean, I know that a lot of… you guys are cheaters. The stereotypes are true a lot of the time. I just figured you were sparing me from the cheating and cutting it off before it could get to that point.”

“Oh, god, no.” He shook his head. “You- thought I was cheating on you?”

“Well- what else was I supposed to think?”

“I would never,” he said, using his hands to make a broad “no” gesture. “You’ve always been it for me, ever since we met. There couldn’t have been anyone else, and there hasn’t been this whole time.”

You tried to mask the way you were falling into a puddle at his feet. “You’re so dumb.”

“Is it dumb of me to think you’ll hear me out a little more?”

You rolled your eyes at him, but your skin felt like it was on fire being so close to him again. “You’re plenty dumb, Rooster.”

“You never called me Rooster.”

“Well, I don’t know Bradley anymore.”

“I- why are you saying that?” He asked, and his face grew even more distraught. “You do know me. Nothing’s changed. Nothing is different at all besides the time. I still- there’s nothing that has changed about the way I feel for you.”

“What do you want me to say?” You couldn’t confess your love to him again. You loved him, a part of you always would, but you couldn’t handle him coming out of the blue and telling you everything you had secretly been wishing he would say to you for years. He was coming in like a dream. It was far too good to be true. “We got lost in translation four years ago and there's nothing we can do about it. Unless you and your pilot friends have been smart enough to build a time machine.”

“I would build a thousand time machines if it meant that I could change what I did, I was stupid. I was so stupid.” He stepped closer. “But I never stopped loving you. Not even once.”

A tear ran down your face, and that’s when you knew it was time to go find Alexandra again. “I-I gotta go, Bradley.” Before you could even turn around all the way, he took you by your hips and turned you back around, both pairs of your eyes wide mirrors of the other.

“I have been haunted by the thought of you for four years now,” he said, voice as soft and gentle as the breeze, but the grip he had on your hips was so desperate it almost made you sob. “I haven’t even- I’ve tried, but there hasn’t been anyone else. Not emotionally. Not even close, Bee.”

You couldn’t say the exact same. You tried and succeeded for a time, but they were never complete fixes. Just when you thought you were happy with someone else and free of the clutches of Bradley Bradshaw, he snuck right back. He ripped that rug out from under you every time without fail without even being present. That was your problem with each “relationship”, you were looking for a remedy and closure for a relationship that the next person had no idea about and no obligation to make better.

But you had definitely been haunted by the lack of Bradley Bradshaw. He was there all the time with you in your mind, whether you wanted him or not.

“This,” you said, shaking your head, and judging by the look on his face, he knew he was losing you. “This is a lot.”

“Wait, don’t walk away. I just got you back.”

“I’m not back, Bradley.”

“You’re back in front of me,” he said, and you stopped turning away from him. “That’s all I could ask for. Even if you want nothing else to do with me ever again, I just want to stand here and look at you for one more minute. Please.”

You put your hands over your face the second you felt your eyes start to burn and overflow with tears. You could feel his energy before you even felt his true touch, and the second you felt his arms around you, you broke down.

“I thought- I thought you were so nervous a few days before you left because you were going to propose to me.”

You couldn’t believe the words that were leaving your mouth. You had been so humiliated about jumping to conclusions that you hadn’t even told Alexandra about that part. You never planned on telling anyone that was the reason why you were so hurt, especially not the man who caused you all that pain. It had been sitting heavy on your chest, the humiliation and the sadness alike, for all four summers. You never planned on letting it loose.

But you had already said it.

“You boys get married so fast, and honestly, I was ready. I thought you were nervous because you were going to ask me to marry you, not because you were breaking up with me.”

“Oh.”

“It gutted me so bad when you broke it off. I thought it was going to be the opposite- I thought we were going to start our lives together and then you just…” you looked down at the ground as you tried to swallow back down the memory, even though everything was coming back so strong. “It was gone, that fast. And I realized I loved you a lot more than you ever loved me, obviously.”

“That's not even close to being true,” he said, shaking his head rapidly. “You can ask any of the guys I shipped out with. I was fucking miserable the whole time. And I know you don’t know the new guys I’m with, but this new squad even knows that there’s nobody else. You’re the one that got away.”

“You let me go,” you corrected, and he smiled sadly.

“Because I loved you.”

“That’s so fucking dumb,” you said, but you couldn’t stop yourself from getting closer to him. “That’s for fairytales, stupid.”

You felt yourself leaning into him, and he was letting you. His body language was inviting you in. You could see it in his eyes and you could feel his hands trembling as he moved them from your waist to hover over your back, like he was ready to pull you into him the second you gave in. You knew it was only a matter of time before you did give in, and the longer you felt his hands hover over you like you were stained glass, the more you craved his familiar, burning touch. You felt the pull to him like you were magnets. Like he was the sun and you were Icarus. You were the moth to his enticing flame, but he had always seen you as a butterfly. You were terrified to get burned for the second time, and fall from grace all over again.

“That one pilot said he recognized me,” you blurted, and you felt his eyes on you even though you couldn’t look at him. “I’ve never met him before, have I?” You might have. You used to know a lot of his old friends. He shook his head. “How did he know me?”

Without hesitation, his answer came. “I have pictures of you in my cockpit.”

That was what threw you. “What?”

“Most pilots keep photos of important people in their cockpit. It reminds them to fly safer. In the worst cases, it’s so that they can see a glimpse of family before they go down.”

Your heart was soaring so high that it was breaking with the pressure of it. “You have a picture of me in there?”

He had absolutely no shame about it as he nodded his head firmly. “Yeah, I have pictures of you. In my cockpit and in my locker.” Were you his screensaver, too? You didn’t know.

But you were in his locker. It made your heart flutter and it sent you right back to highschool. “More than one?”

“I have so many that my squad recognized you without me even saying anything. Hangman was the one who told me you were here.”

“Oh.”

He kicked the rocks underneath his foot, and then he was squinting back down at you. “You thought- you thought I was going to ask you to marry me?”

Just like that, your soaring, cracking heart plummeted again. “You don’t have to rub it in, Bradley.”

“No, it’s not that at all. I just- you would’ve said yes?”

“Of course I would have said yes, stupid.” You ignored how his eyes lit up and turned your body away with crossed arms. He was always so expressive, even when he didn’t want to be. “But that was a long time ago.”

“Not too long,” he rushed, and you shook your head.

You fought the urge to roll your eyes, especially because it was mostly to get the tears away. “It was a while ago, Bradley.”

“There’s no amount of time apart that would make me not want to be with you, Bee.”

Your head swiveled to him upon hearing your nickname from him again. “It- it doesn’t just work like that, dude.”

“Why not?”

“We were stupid back then. We lived off of blind faith and a whole lot of hopes. It doesn’t work that way anymore.”

“We make our own rules, that’s the glory of being adults.” He took your hands and you faced him, and the hope in his expression nearly floored you. “Who said we can’t pick up where we left off?”

You scoffed, even though you weren’t even close to laughing. “You’re crazy.”

“Crazy about you, but you’ve always known that,” he said with a smile. “You’ve always known how to work with it, too.”

For a moment, you felt a glimmer of hope and you felt the whisper of a smile come onto your face. And then you crashed again, and he must have seen it all over your face because his own smile went away and was replaced by concern. Before he could even ask what happened that fast, you threw your face into his chest and wrapped your arms around him.

He held you back just as quickly, and you knew he had been waiting for you. He smelled like home and he even felt like it, and when you opened your eyes all you could see was that stupid, loud Hawaiian print.

“I-if we do this again you- I can’t handle it if you leave me again. I couldn’t take it. Please, Bradley.”

“Don’t you even worry about that,” he said firmly, holding you so close that it felt like the two of you were physically molding together. “If you give me the chance, I want a shot at forever.”

You pulled your wet face away from his shirt and looked up at him as your heart raced in your chest. “Huh?”

He stared down at you for a moment, and you could see in his ever-expressive eyes that he was thinking about saying something to you that was about to change everything. “I fully intend to become your husband when we’re ready, if you let me. Just the way you wanted, and the way I’ve always dreamed about. I’m not going anywhere.”

The logical part of you knew that he was being ridiculous. Bradley was nothing if not overzealous, nothing if not reaching for goals that were just short of being unattainable. He was the version of Icarus that always managed to get back to earth safely by the skin of his teeth. He always put the cart before the horse, but somehow he always managed to get there.

So, you knew he was being serious. As crazy as he sounded, he was.

“Do you really mean that?” You didn’t have to ask that question. In fact, the words felt like acid on your tongue, but your heart pressed you to ask it anyway.

“Nothing could get me to leave you again, especially not my own stupidity.” He was holding you even tighter. “I promise.”

You were going to hold him to that with the same intensity that he held you with.

*****

oh boy.

so this one i’ve been sitting on forever and i’m tired of looking at it, but i have nothing but love for this fic that is pulling me out of a writing slump. i wrote it out of pure love for rooster though so i felt like i had to share it!! also- this comes from two main things;

two songs (“7 summers” and “ ‘98 braves” by morgan wallen) and then me being dumb enough to get involved with a military man of my own. he’s been gone for a while so i’m manifesting he comes back soon. anyone who is thinking about getting with a person- especially man- in the military (i can only speak for the united states military bc that’s where i’m from), you better be tough. i know they look good. i know they have this energy to them- trust me i’ve been obsessed since i was like 15. way before top gun maverick. but if you’re gonna be stupid, you better be tough 💀💀💀 and if you need any guidance to being stupid, i’m always here!!!

if you’re new here thanks for stopping by and checking it out! if you’re from an old fandom of mine but read it anyways i love you so much, it means a lot. 💕💕💕

#bradley rooster bradshaw x reader #tgm #rooster x reader #my fics #bradley bradshaw x reader #heaven help me why am i writing again #lys’s fics #top gun maverick #top gun fanfiction #bradley bradshaw fluff

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lilacthebooklover · 8 months ago

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DJKGHKFGJKHFK SHARKY YOU ARE GENUINELY THE SWEETEST PERSON I HAVE EVER MET ILYSM <3333

Lilac should be the main writer from the UK and here's why:

•Not transphobic

•Very kind

•Not racist

•Her writing isn't overrated (it's underrated if anything!!! Like srsly it's so fucking good)

•Very dedicated to her craft

MAKE HER FAMOUS SHE DESERVES MONEY 💥💥💥

#lilarky 2024 #fuck jkr all my homies read lilacthebooklover instead #lilac appreciation #lilac-gold? more like lilac-GOD amirite?#she deserves the world #and more #...SHE DESERVES THE UNIVERSE!!!!?#prev tags #TWIRLING MY HAIR KICKING MY FEET GIGGLING LIKE MAD #THIS IS SO LO V ELY ILY #genuinely whOOO gave you the right to make my day so often <33 #thank you for being an absolute sweetheart #sharky >>>>#i am. genuinely close to tears right now jfkhjghkj <3 #(/ V POS)#it's okay i like being in small fandoms!!#they're very cute close-knit communities #and i get to meet people like you in them!!#that's worth wayyy more than money or popularity :DD

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i-may-be-an-emu · 1 month ago

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TELL ME ABOUT THE MEN!!!!!!

HELLO!!!

GLADLY :DD

THE MEN. :)

They’re called shoot from the hip (sfth) and are @shootimpro on youtube, tiktok, instagram, facebook, x/twitter, as well as on linktree, patreon and ko-fi.

They’re London based but have done shows outside london like in Scotland (Edinburgh Fringe) and even to Spain. They want to hopefully go to other countries in the future too!!

From left to right they’re Sam, Tom, AJ and Luke :)))

(this will probably be LONG so putting a read more lol)

Ok so they do improvised comedy and their shows have two halves (generally with a break in the middle) they play lots of short drama games in the first half and then improvise 20-30 minute (on average) plays in the second half, sometimes with another game at the end.

The plays are so much fun (they’ve got 38 of them up on youtube so far!!) and they’ve also released two full specials (full shows) which you can find on their channel :)

(just a note that for a few of the older ones (apart from the first one) they were filming on an iphone and just projecting their voices, the the audio and image quality can be hard to deal with)

they have SO MUCH CONTENT because during covid they did zoom-style improv shows with eachother and you can watch them as a patreon

they also have SO MANY VIDEOS that are just the regular public ones!!!! They upload short ones of the games and some 5-10min ones of the games too, as well as the long forms (plays)

Now some info about the guys :D

Samuel Thomas Russell-Holmes:

Birthday 21st July 1989 (35)

Married this year and expecting a baby!!! :)

wears a red flannel a LOT (less recently, but still a LOT, it’s his Thing)

he says some very risky things sometimes but also has the audacity to look shocked when the others do it lol

Fav colour is green

he’s 5”10

brown eyes

currently producing a radio show for the bbc called wing it (available in December!)

if he were a Disney Princess he said he’d be Rapunzel

VERY GOOD AT ANIMAL (specifically goat/sheep) NOISES

kisses Luke a lot lol (kisses all of them a lot, but specifically Luke- I counted like the madman that I am lol)

great at talking in Spanish gibberish, often paired with opening his shirt buttons

loves fantasy things

wrote an audiobook called “Evergreen”

his mother and grandfather are/were successful actors

Has a drama degree

Low spice tolerance

has eaten raw egg live on camera

can be a tad egotistical but we love him

Thomas Mayo-Woodman/Hodgson-Mayo:

HES SO TALL (this man is almost 2m tall- he’s 6”5.5 :0)

brown eyes

his birthday is 10th July 1989 (35)

Married to a drag king (@pipdream on insta, tiktok, youtube, ect.) who’s pronouns are they/them

Wrote a graphic novel (it’s called Future it’s about space lesbians)

literally one of the sweetest and kindest souls on this planet I’ve never met him but every time he says anything it’s like WOW OK YOURE SO NICE AND KIND AND WONDERFUL (everything I’ve heard from people who’ve met him is SO NICE)

SO GOOD AT IMPROVISING (specifically Shakespearian-style) MONOLOGUES

his favourite colour is red

has two english degrees (very good with grammar and words)

has adhd

makes a garbled choking noise very well (you have to hear it to get what I mean I guess lol)

has eaten a teabag live on camera

He’s the “dad” of the group

Very hard to make him laugh on stage (but he’s been laughing more, recently!!) and each one is treasured

so kind did I mention he is kind

lovingly called a squid or squidboi by the fandom because of one time he like stuck his hands in his sleeves and was like “I’m a squid”

does a lot of admin work for sfth and handles the finances (at least he did, they might have someone for that now I’m not sure) and takes care of the patreon

Alexander Thomas Jeremy (AJ):

Birthday on 4th November 1991 (32)

CONFUSION KING /aff (he gets confused easily but we love him for it)

He’s bald and gets made fun of for it RELENTLESSLY (again, lovingly)

Absolutely ANGELIC singing voice

Blue eyes

born in Manchester(UK) but grew up in France (fluent in French)

makes movies/short films on youtube!! He’s working on a new one now and you can find them @atjeremy on youtube (that’s also his insta and you can see stuff about his films there too!)

does a lot of the editing for sfth and has a lot of input into which longforms to upload apparently (all of them decide tho I think)

he’s such a himbo (/aff)

fav colour is blue

He’s 6 foot tall

On their covid livestreams would always forget to get costuming ready

his rapping is BEAUTIFUL (words that barely rhyme at all and make NO sense 😌)

can deliver GREAT one liners

so good at playing children it’s crazy

can do magnificent cartwheels and loves to jump on the others with no warning

lots of muscles but lost an arm wrestle against Tom

Thinks he can’t do an Irish accent but I think it’s pretty good

also has a drama degree

Luke Christopher Manning

Birthday is the 23rd October 1989 (currently 34 about to be 35)

Hazel eyes

hes not short but he’s the short-EST, 5”7.5

gets made fun of for his height a LOT (lovingly!!)

SO good at accents

so good at playing women

also so good at playing children

such a good actor overall

says THE MOST UNHINGED THINGS

people think he’s innocent (somehow) but he’s SO unhinged

took his pants off live on stage (wearing underwear but still lol) (AND it’s on youtube hahaha)

lives in Spain with his long term girlfriend (fluent in Spanish)

so much attitude in such a small guy (/aff)

often compared to Macaulay Caulkin looks-wise

plays bass guitar in a band

Teaches acting (to kids??) in Spain

also has adhd

also has a drama degree

His favourite film is back to the future I believe

So confident in himself (this is a very good thing)

people say he “doesn’t age” and looks really young but I personally think he does look his age

sometimes called “Luke Womanning” as a play on his last name because of how amazing all his female characters are

They’re all really close friends and met at uni and started doing improv around 13 years ago together! Started gaining popularity 2022 and are gaining more and more fans every day!

Um. Whoops I wrote a lot lol. (It totally hasn’t been an hour of me just writing this hahahaha)

anyway I love them so much :)))) (as you can probably tell)

anyway!

THANK YOU SO MUCH ANON THIS ASK MEANS SO MUCH TO ME :DDDDD

#shoot from the hip #Sfth asks #Shootimpro #thank you for the ask!#AAAAAAAA :)))))))#This is so nice #theres probably more I could say but tumblr almost killed this post three times cause it couldn’t handle the sheer power of my autism lol #so I’ll leave it be for now :)#Thank you so much anon #sfthposting #sam russell #tom mayo #alexander jeremy #luke manning #:))))))#long post

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infectiouspiss · 5 months ago

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OMG PSA FOR THE ENTIR FANDOM STOP BUTTFUCKIN ME STOP SHOVEN STUFF UP MY ASS IM JUST TRYIN TO HELP YALL DD IS IN SHAMBLES YALL THINK KOBRA KID IS BRITSH YALL WANNA FUCK A BUG GUY YALL FORGOT THE GIRL IVE SEEN SOME SHIT I KNOW HOW FANDOMS WORK IM JUST TRYIN TO GET YAL BACK ON YOUR FEET NOW THAT MCRS ON BREAK ITS PERFCT TIME BCUZ WHEN THEY COM BEACK EVERYNES JUST GONNA BE TALKIN BOUTMCR SO I THOUGHT HEY WHT DONT WE HAVE A WORLDWIDE DD BLAST ON JULY 26 UNLESS MCR DOES SOMEYHIN BEFORE THEN BUT WHATEVEER YALL WANNA JUST KEEP BUTTFUCKIN ME N ACCUSIN ME OF STUFF< LIKE NO I DIDNT SY YOU CANT HAVE OCS I SAID THERE NAMES ARRE TOO LONG GET IT RUGHT, IM FED UP FUCK ALL YALL -Ricky Bobby

so lemme make sure i've got this right, you personally dislike how other people enjoy this fandom, and so have decided to set us a bunch of rules, and are upset when we don't want to follow your rules? is that correct?

you're throwing a tantrum in peoples inboxes because you're not getting your way and are being laughed at for your ridiculous demands, anyone from any fandom would laugh at such insane rules being slapped on us by someone too cowardly to show their face.

you have no power here, the allure of the killjoys fandom is the freedom to do whatever you want, demanding people stop that is rude and disrespectful. your tantrums and insistence that you're "helping" only prove that you know this is fruitless and you are hoping behaving like a toddler will make us obey you.

you need to grow up and realise that you are not the only person in the killjoys fandom, and that this fandom is built on creativity and passion, not rules and demands. hopefully you will look back and realise this was immature and a dick move, you can't control others and the more you try and do so, the more it'll be resisted.

also me and my boy british kobra kid are gonna team up with naruto (full killjoy name naruto jones the ballsack blaster 9000) and have a big orgy with dr steve death defying tommy chow mein the phoenix witch "that clown guy" vaya and korse. fuck you.

#asks

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furashuban · 1 month ago

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HHHHHH THIS MEANS EVERYTHING TO ME, THANKS SO SO MUCH <33

The universe has decided to prevent me from celebrating Sketchbook Ship Week next 'cause not only am I missing most of my gear to make music 'cause I lend them to a friend months ago but can't give them back due to typhoon weather and thereby limiting my ability to make the kind of Sketchbook song I wanna make for Free Day :< but I caught a FEVER last night and trying my hardest to fight the shivers so I can properly enjoy people's fics + write my next WIP :'))

#this especially means a lot coming from a musician as super talented as YOU :0 !!#i've been awe of your Sketchbook Ship songs they're so masterfully made and make me *feel* so somft with each release <33 #like your lyricism and voice is amazing!!#so to know that my songs inspired you to be active in the community and show your songs for SKBSW to the world—#like genuinely I wished I had better words this is such a huge honor <33 #but I've also just been more enthralled that i'm not the only musician in the fandom anymore :00 'cause you're right it's generally #-pretty rare for people to make music/fansongs in fandom spaces #so how cool is it that our community gets 2 now :DD #and don't worry i've been working around my limits and the fever is going down there WILL be a new song from me on the last day of SKBSW <3 #also you listened to Bewitching how many times 🥺🥺#again just thanks SO SO MUCH for this I'm really happy <33

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tales-from-elysivm · 7 months ago

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BOO! Hii :)) I luv your arcane work, wondering if you could write a lil fluff fic with Vi and Jinx w/ an SO that has trouble getting out of bed bc of motivation problems, and they help a lot (I'm not projecting...I swear...)

★。／ just keep driving ＼。★

pairing: vi x f!reader, jinx x gn!reader (separate)

fandom: arcane

word count: 480

tw: canon typical swearing/slang, some light spoiler warnings, other than that just some wholesome fluffy content for my girls cuz they really need it – not proofread. Im tired

song title: keep driving by harry styles (i’m in a phase ok-)

notes: dw anon i hear you, my sleep schedule has been busted recently and i have no motivation :DD hope you enjoy some fluffy content with our girls, they really need it, so i loved this request!

! be sure to like and reblog if you enjoyed !

↳˗ˏviˎ˗ ↴

i don’t think vi has ever had a moment to slow down in her entire life

going from looking after powder to living in a prison to trying to track down her sister and help caitlin, vi just simply doesn’t have the time

but that doesn’t mean she isn’t sympathetic to you

she finds you one morning when you had been late to meet up with her to complete a bounty she had taken on for some extra cash, so she decides to travel to your home in zaun to figure out what’s wrong with you

walking through your front door, she worries that maybe someone broke in

are you hurt?

did you leave?

did something happen to you?

what if–

but no, you’re just in bed, staring at the ceiling and not moving, even when your bedroom door swings open and you have a 5’8” buff woman in the doorway

she will drag you out of bed if she has to, carrying you around, gently coaxing you through your day’s chores one at a time, with her right beside you <3

“hey cupcake… rough couple of weeks? i understand, i’ll help you out today, yeah? one step at a time babe, and i’ll be here the whole time. slowly, ok? let’s get you some food first before we head out for the day. you gotta get out of bed today though, and i’m not leaving you here.”

↳˗ˏ jinx ˎ˗ ↴

jinx isn’t going to be much help to be honest

all things considered, i don’t think jinx really does anything she is supposed to do, without putting it off for weeks and weeks

this isn’t necessarily a motivation issue with her though, just just can’t be fucked-

so when she comes barreling into your house to show off a new bomb she had been experimenting with, almost setting your house on fire, she’s not entirely surprised to find you curled up in bed

she’ll put away the bomb if you ask nicely enough - and give her a good pair of puppy eyes - and instead she’ll join you in bed

she doesn’t have anything to do that day anyways

and if you do? she thinks you can do it tomorrow, who’s really gonna care?

you have a girlfriend willing to commit arson for you if you ask, no one is going to criticise you as long as jinx is around

cuddles are in store for you

(if you beg her, you might be able to convince her to help you with your chores later on too)

“heya toots! it’s a lazy day today, huh? no problem, i was gonna have one of those myself. leave monkey-bomb outside? fineeee. if you insist. we’re not doing anything today though, ya hear me? i could really use some cuddles after tinkering in my workshop all day. scooch over now, bubbles!”

hope you enjoyed anon!!!

be sure to like and reblog if you enjoyed :))

#arcane #writing #fanfic #arcane headcanon #arcane x reader #vi x reader #violet arcane #lesbian #arcane smut #sevika #sevika x reader #female reader #gender neutral reader

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galadrieljones · 3 months ago

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Zabel Interview, Team Delusional Round-up, re: the past few weeks (months?) 💫

(Based on an ask from @natural-blue-26! This post contains spoilers, pertaining to the script leak. If you don't want them, turn back!!)

First, let me say that @twdmusicboxmystery has posted an excellent video covering this topic over at her youtube channel. This post is jumping off of that, with some additional takes and analysis by me!

Also, note that I wanted to wait to post or to talk about this too much publicly until today, as I think there are a lot of genuine shippers who might be let down right now. Not all c*rylers are unhappy, unruly people. Many are shippers just like us, and even though I don't ship it, I support them. I am only putting this in the Team Delusional tag, so anyone who sees this is seeing it either because they follow me, follow the tag, follow someone who follows me, or they went looking for it themselves. I am not making drama or inciting a "ship war." If you're here out of anger, I suggest you turn back. I am just going to go over what I see.

The Facts

There has been a recent spate of events that have lead Team Delusional to a rare and more than modest resurgence. Until now, we were mostly just working with templates and symbolism, with a healthy dose of informed meta and speculation: We were seeing how the season 4/5 template was beginning to unfold toward the Grady arc, which includes Carol in a major role.

BUT. Let's check in with what's been going on over the past six months. A lot of this new resurgence starts with Emily's multiple trips to Europe for TWD cons in the past six months, integrated with her (yet unrealized) insinuation that she has been in studio recording one or more songs that Beth sang on TWD. Massive financial burdens aside, these are unusual undertakings for Emily. While she has done many fan cons over the years, visiting Europe twice in a four month period is bizarre (as well as expensive). She also talked openly and excitedly in the panel at French comic-con about how cool it would be if Beth returned. Further, Emily's "re-recording" of "Parting Glass" and possibly other TWD songs was a fairly big announcement for us at the time, but we haven't seen any more on it since. Speculation went everywhere from "She'll be singing in a flashback in Daryl Dixon season 2" to "Her songs will be part of the soundtrack" to "She'll actually BE in season 2, singing, in the present moment."

A lot of these things, if they were spread out over a 5 year period, wouldn't matter at all. But the fact that they're all taking place in the six-month run-up to Daryl Dixon s. 2, when we've already been able to speculate her tenuous return based on templates and other tells, is exciting. It's been almost ten years to the day of Beth's *death.* Why now? The timing on all of this is very suspicious.

Now, a few weeks ago, there was a LEAKED SCRIPT excerpt, which was claimed to be the final scene of DD 2.6. In the script, we learn that Isabelle has died and is appearing to Daryl in the form of a hallucination while he fights walkers in the Chunnel. This was confusing for many reasons. First, we already know, given their ruthless advertisement of the fact, that season 3 is already being filmed in Spain. So why are they headed to England? Also, where the hell is Laurent? Further, Isabelle's death, while unsurprising to many of us, creates some new questions. Many members of a certain *other* ship were ecstatic to learn about Isabelle's death, as Daryl/Isabelle ship rumors have been rampant in the fandom basically since season 1. Forget the fact that the same ship FREAKED out over Daryl/Leah three years ago (a clear nothingburger). Any time another female character even comes into contact with Daryl, a notable portion of fans must make their "displeasure" widely known.

Moving on. Yesterday, an article came out summarizing a yet-unreleased interview with David Zabel in SFX magazine. You can read it here. In the interview, Zabel makes the following comment about "C*ryl":

"The obvious thing to do, and the easier thing to do would be, 'Okay, now they're falling in love and they're a couple.' But I always felt like that would be a mistake, because it would feel like you were going into the TV book of tricks," he explains. "To me, there was never a question that [their connection] was something other than what it is, and what it seems to want to be, and why it works so well."

Zabel then goes on to hint at a highly-contentious romance with Daryl and Isabelle:

"What happened in season one was that you could see a connection forming, for sure," he says. "We didn't manufacture that but we left room for it. A lot of season two is about the development of that and where that relationship goes, and that little surrogate family of Isabelle, Daryl and Laurent."

Now, the full interview doesn't come out until September 4, at which point, we may get a clearer picture of what's going on. However, it seems that Zabel is politely declining the "C*ryl as romance" narrative. In the quote, he uses the excuse of wanting to avoid TV tropes; however, he then goes on to say (in a portion of the quote that is being wildly misinterpreted among the c*ryl ship) that "To [him]," there was "never a question that [their connection was something other than what it is." He then equates "what it is" with "what it seems to want to be" and "why it works so well." The misinterpretation is coming with that second part. "What it is" = friendship. Zabel is clearly saying that c*ryl "seems to want to be" exactly "what it is," aka: a sacred friendship and nothing more. He's basically saying that this already "works so well," and so why fix what ain't broke? Why create a romance between two characters who are clearly just very, very good friends when he could go another, more interesting direction?

Certain c*ryl accounts have misinterpreted that section of the quote. They seem to think he's saying that the c*ryl ship "seems to want to be" something else, something other than what it is. But if you follow the grammatical logic of the sentence, you can see that they're wrong here. It wants to be what it already is, which is friendship. Of course, to c*rylers, what it already is = romance, but that isn't canon. There's no proof of this. In fact, there's more proof to the contrary, that they're best friends. They're family. Carol was married to somebody else, raised a child with him, still holds a contentious relationship with the other man, allowed Daryl to toil away in the woods alone for five years because she needed to stay with her husband...

In addition to factual evidence from the show, the C*ryl Friendship Campaign has been going strong on social media for MONTHS. In her video this morning, twdmusicboxmystery also goes over quasi-recent comments from Angela Kang which are UNSUPPORTIVE of a c*ryl romance. The notion that this perspective is coming out of nowhere, which some fans are claiming as a way of blaming Zabel for either lying or betraying his fanbase (and the actors), is, frankly, absurd.

Please note that I'm not saying that nobody should ship c*ryl just because it isn't canon. That would be silly. I ship non-canon ships all the time. BETHYL is a non-canon ship! I've written whole fanfics for Beth and Daryl (well, I've tried lol, but most remain unfinished). It's one of the funnest parts of being in a fandom.

What I'm saying is that c*ryl is NOT CANON. It never has been. And the people who get angry about this, who want to get professionals fired over this, who think that they're entitled to getting exactly what they want, lest the show perish, are wrong. They're doing it wrong. It's totalitarian and, frankly, obsessive. This is not how you be in a fandom, and my interpretation here of the Zabel interview in conjunction with the C*ryl Friendship Campaign is that they are TRYING to let this highly volatile and frankly unpleasant faction of the fandom down lightly in an effort to get them off tptb's AND the actors' backs. They don't want to deal with this shit anymore. And by the way, they're actually not leading anyone on. They've been insanely clear here, in their rebranding of c*ryl to a platonic ship, as to what's happening and what's going on, and while I really do feel for the good people who may feel let down by this, I am GLAD to see that the showrunners aren't going to heed the demands of one tiny, loud faction of a giant fandom, and that despite the haters, they're going to tell the story they want to tell.

ANYWAY.

Over the past 48 hours, things have gotten...weird. Zabel's interview dropped less than a day after the TWD Skybound social media accounts appear to have...posted a Bethyl edit out of nowhere. @sweetz1919 also posted early this morning, bringing together a few more Beth-related posts on either official accounts or *near* official accounts, which post promotional material, and which are followed by AMC TWD. One of these posts is a repost on twitter by Scott Gimple, who so rarely posts on social media, that any time he does, it's like a unicorn, symbolically notable and certainly important.

Now, pertaining to the Zabel interview, another wide complaint taking place in the c*ryl camp is that Zabel is likely LYING or he is being taken grossly out of context, because if c*ryl isn't happening, AND Isabelle is going to die, then how could Daryl POSSIBLY get his happy ending?

THIS is where Team Delusional comes in. Of course, we have our theories. Most people think WE'RE the delusional ones. And maybe we are! Lol. I don't really care. Most of our theories are crafted through a TON of hard, circumstantial, pattern-driven, and symbolic evidence, evidence taken from IRL sources, and hypotheses made after paying very close attention to what's been going on and making LOTS and LOTS of connections over a period of many years. Me, myself, I've only been here for four, but some of you guys have been doing this for almost ten, and for that, I salute you! As I said earlier, TD has been theorizing Beth's "return" in DD2 based greatly on symbolic and template-driven evidence alone for a while. A lot of what we're seeing now on social media is playing directly into our hand.

Emily in Europe multiple times in a 4mo period, including a trip to Paris, with her latest stint being just a week before "official" filming for season 3 was set to begin? Emily re-recording tracks from TWD? Leaked script pages in which Daryl mentions Beth specifically AND suggest that Isabelle is going to die? Romantic!C*ryl = not happening? HOW could Daryl possibly get his happy ending now? The rest is TD theory, ie: WHY we think Beth will come back to manifest Daryl's "happy ending." Speculation and theories on how she could come back, the connection to Spain/England/France, that's basically all we talk about lol, each of us with our own interests and niche perspectives, all arriving at the same point.

SO while there is still no proof that she is coming back, all of this is a Good thing, actually. For us. Because while everyone is looking around, freaking out, wondering what's going to happen next, we are seeing and able to read a LOT of signs that others ignore. And rightly so! There's no reason the rest of the GA needs to think that Beth is legitimately coming back. That would overshadow Carol's role in season 2, which is significant. It's just important that the GA REMEMBERS who Beth IS, that she was important to Daryl, and that hey, people used to really like Beth, and they liked Beth and Daryl together, and that was hopeful, and nice for him, and he hasn't had much "hope" or "niceness" since, and wouldn't it be nice if he could have that again...? All of these things are really there to do just this: let the c*ryl ship down easy, and remind people that Daryl once held a very strong connection to a woman whose life "ended" too soon, and who has really never been mentioned again.

While I really have no idea what's coming next, I wonder if we'll begin to see more astroturfed discussion on Beth's *death.* How weird it was, what the hell was going on at Grady, etc. If we don't see it in promotional material, we may hear about it in-show. Because if Daryl is casually mentioning Beth (along with Merle and Glenn) to Isabelle's ghost/vision in episode 2.6, then this likely implies that he's told her about Beth before, and that he's talked to her about what happened. It implies that Isabelle knows who Beth is, which would be a truly insane development, since he's literally never talked about her to anyone, including Carol, as far as we know.

So anyway, as usual, we should all just keep our heads down, chins to our chest, keep hope alive, but with a balanced sense of anticipation. We still really don't know what's going to happen, so it's important to be rational, but it also won't hurt to have a little faith 💫

#team delusional

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