#the second trans character is because the first could be seen as “kind of writing around transness in the world

[ijichi-nijika]

sometimes i read or watch takes about the things i love that while they praise the aspects of the series that i love and agree with, the things they dislike about them are so incorrect and wrong that i just get pissed off. I regularly see takes about Wataoshi because of how much i love it and it pisses me off so much when people just think the second half is superfluous, because like. ITS SO FUCKIN IMPORTANT. Like yeah, the first half is a complete story, but to write off the second half because it takes itself a bit more seriously (while giving claire and rae even more character driven moments and well written sections of their romcom life) isn’t a bad things. do a few plot points seem random and new? yes but that is literally how, NEARLY ALL STORIES WORK!!! please you can have you opinions about it but don’t just say it’s a bad thing, just say it’s a part of the story you just don’t like, because it very much ISNT BAD!!!

[manicpixiefelix]

and other things that happened by the red staircase

{ One-Shot for head, heart, hand. }

Summary: Like with all events at Saltburn, you take great care to learn all you can about the guests for the upcoming Catton Family Reunion, to make sure you can make a good impression. You and Venetia, however, discover that Felix may be making too good of an impression on his recently un-estranged cousin.

Need to Know: They/Them. Explicitly NB Reader. FWB!Reader/Felix. Reader is from a well off family but has pretty much been adopted by the Cattons.

Warnings: felix fingering(/possibly going down on) his cousin but its not super explicit, reader having a social anxiety regarding the social event, venetia being kind of a nasty little perv i love her

A/N: 3841 words. this was meant to just be a little something about venetia and reader teasing felix after finding out he accidentally fingered his cousin, something i could write on my phone before bed. which i did but i didn't stop writing for 4 hours and it became too long for just an answer. also because there's a bunch of catton family lore ive invented and put it all in here.

also before any discourse arises, there's a character briefly mentioned here, Marv, who is an old butch lesbian who uses he/him pronouns. he is not trans, but chooses to use he/him, look into queer history if this bugs you, or go outside and off of my blog. you're reading the writing of an agender it/its lesbian, my blog is not a place for queer discourse, it's a place for being freaks about Jacob Elordi and Barry Keoghan.

TAGLIST IN COMMENTS!! // TAGLIST ALWAYS OPEN ! (just message or comment to be added)

----

It's been a particularly stressful event for you; so much of Felix's family is in attendance and you're desperate to impress them. It had been called a reunion, but nothing at Saltburn was ever so simple, nor so informal. As always you've prepared ahead of time; Duncan and Elspeth, as they always did, walked you briefly through the guest list, however unlike usual, instead of leaving you alone with the detailed dossier of guests, Elspeth herself had sat with you in one of the numerous studies - the lilac one - and gone through in meticulous detail. The family friends they refer to as cousins, the family they refuse to acknowledge beyond a handshake - and why. All the Catton branches and the gossip that haunts each. Things like how it's the first event in ten years that Sir James' estranged, illegitimate half-sister and her family were invited to. She's laughing, and you act like your nerves aren't on fire, like there isn't bile rising in your throat out of fear of the faux pars you could see on the horizon.

"Oh they're going to love you, darling," she assures. The minute she leaves you start nervous crying over the dossier, which quickly becomes an anxiety attack. It's been a very long time, especially since they'd kindly set up this system to alleviate your known anxieties, that you'd been this afraid of a dinner.

None of them can know.

You're almost eighteen, you're meant to be well past this, meant to have learned to cope with it by now.

On the night of the event, Farleigh's the only one looking as queasy as you feel - the family's pitying looks and grating questions have him going for a smoke break almost every five minutes. Still, Venetia's never without a drink in hand despite her mother's disapproving looks, and Felix is nowhere to be seen. At least at this family affair there's a number of people your own age. Many related, but many not - more friends of the family, or illegitimate offspring. Still, you don't want to put your preparations to waste, want to make a good impression.

There's mean laughter from by the fireplace as you find yourself in conversation with Sir James and his second cousin Barty, praising the man for his recent and lucrative foray into financially supporting broadcast television. James gives you and incredibly surprised and approving look, while Barty lights up with delight, claiming that there was hope for the young after all it seemed. Casting a glance to the fireplace, you see a few mean looking teens all watching you with sneers.

Barty asks how you found yourself here, and James pats you on the back before you can answer, claiming you as one of the wards of Saltburn; a good influence on his dear son, Felix. Pride flares in your chest. But you can still hear the teens call you a freak.

Its taking everything in you to not try and find sanctuary in the company of Felix, Venetia, or Farleigh. Its incredibly tempting, considering the abundance of desperate eye contact you and Farleigh especially are sharing, but you worry that if you don't keep face, don't put your information to use, don't remain visible to everyone in the room who you've convinced yourself are even tangibly related to Felix and his immediate family, every single one of them will hate you.

One day you will reckon with how profoundly your upbringing effected the expectations you place on yourself. Today is not that day. So you smile at Mildred Catton - by marriage, second cousin, young widow and now spinster. Well, she has a girlfriend, judging by the way Elspeth had spoken about her roommate of twenty-five years, and she has a kind and knowing smile as she compliments you - so beautiful, what a handsome young thing you are, oh you do remind me of Marv like this, back when we first met, of that's cute, you'd love him. Marv is short for Marvel Elizabeth, the butch woman who lives with Mildred and runs a bike shop and who you'd spent probably too much time looking at in the dossier, his arm around Mildred in her photo, both of them smiling so wide.

You kind of wish he was here. When you share the sentiment, Mildred looks a little crestfallen; you get the impression that not a lot of the Cattons share your feeling.

Still, talking to Mildred helps ease your nerves considerably. At least until you realise that it's been quite some time since you'd seen Felix.

You don't need him at all times... Don't need to know his whereabouts at every second of every day... But you've found yourself trapped in a conversation with a gaggle of the newer, younger, shinier wives of Felix's various uncles-something-times-removed, and one hadn't been updated in the dossier and you greeted her as the wife she'd replaced. So now you're mortified, like a deer in the headlights as they're all judging you, and you know you're on the verge of panicking or throwing up -

"Need to steal our lovely Y/N for a moment," Venetia, your saviour. She slips an arm in yours and doesn't wait for an answer.

"Venetia, dear -" Christie, owner of a failing fragrance business that she desperately doesn't want people to know is failing, but that her husband had drunkenly, forlornly confessed about to Sir James, barely get two truly disdainful words in before Venetia brightly throws over her shoulder -

"Love your dress, matches your roots, talk later Auntie Chris," and you can only imagine the flustered fury on Christie's face as the other women try not to compare the dark dress to the woman's dark roots peeking through her blonde hair. You, however, are gone speechless in your nauseous panic, and press yourself to Venetia's side as she pulls you through the crowd, "you looked about ready to kill yourself like one of those dishonoured samurai," she says quietly but casually.

"Yeah, that was the rough plan," you managed to joke weakly. Your heart was racing; you hated being like this. It takes you a moment to properly focus back in on the moment, and realise Venetia was dragging you along with considerable purpose, "are you okay?"

"I need your robot brain to help me decide if something's funny or just gross."

"My robot brain?"

"You know everyone here because - and I say this with love - you're a freak about these things-"

"Didn't know Iona," you muttered, once again horrified, gaze going glassy as all you can think about is how you called her Misha. Her husband had a type; models from northern countries and very little sense of humour, it seemed. Venetia snapped her fingers in your face, frowning, keeping your mind from wandering too far.

"They got married a month ago, you probably won't even see her again," she rolled her eyes, taking you by the shoulders, leading you from the main entertaining area towards the main parlous, "but the point is, I know we refer to everyone as Aunt or Uncle or Cousin or whatever, but I'm not even actually at all related to like half of them," Venetia pauses, looking at you very seriously, "but you know the difference, right? Like if I pointed to someone, you'd know how exactly they're here?"

"Uh, yeah, of course," it's who you were, it's what you did, "don't you?"

"Not," she visibly hesitates, gaze shifting to look around the room, "not really," she admits, they're all just, you know, family. There's always been too many to bother with the how or why of any of them, unless mum or dad felt it was important for me and Felix to keep in mind specifically," but after a beat she met your gaze with a wolfish grin, "or if it was particularly scandalous." Okay, you think you're starting to get her intentions.

"So who are you wondering about and why?"

The way Venetia was smiling could not possibly mean anything good.

"So," Venetia took you by the shoulders and steered you through the grand foyer towards the stairs, as if on her way to yours or Felix's room. Her voice had gotten quieter, conspiratorial, "I've been watching this unfold all night," she explains gleefully, "and I did think it was rather bold to be looking to get someone in bed at a family reunion, though I supposed that there is a good chance that they're not even related; as we've discussed, family is a rather loose, fond title for many of them here tonight," she's choosing her words incredibly carefully, skirting around her point for dramatic effect, "and," she stops in the doorway by the red staircase; you think you can hear faint moaning not too far away. Venetia's voice is a whisper, "I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt, considering I'm pretty sure I've actually never seen this girl in my life, so I can't say who she belongs to here."

Around the corner there's an attempt at a shushing that sounds more masculine, judging by the whisper of laughter that accompanies it, and a young woman's giggled apology, followed by a breathy gasp, and the faint sound of wood scraping against the marble floor. You and Venetia peer around the corner like the Hardy boys, you ducking down and her leaning over you.

The girl in question is leaning back against the antique, wooden end table at the end of the short hall, head throw back, chest heaving with wanton breathes. Wearing a flowing, green dress that looked almost like silk, but was clearly rayon when you had seen her up close earlier, you knew immediately who she was. More importantly, you were surprised to see someone in a suit on their knees in front of her, beneath her dress.

Alyssa Morelli has seemed absolutely out of her mind with boredom and disdain for this entire affair in the brief few moments you'd spent with her. Like you she was seventeen, and was the eldest daughter of Sir James' estranged half sister. Having barely any information about her, and also trying to focus on not losing your cool regarding that fact, it had made conversation, at least for you, incredibly difficult.

She hated the wine, hated her mother for dragging her along, hated the way rich people talked about nothing, and thought everything about Saltburn, the Cattons, and the entire night was a frivolous display of meaningless excess and wealth. Rich people are such freaks, she'd told you, with a look that clearly said that includes you, and she's finished another glass of champagne with one large gulp and a shudder. For a long moment you'd looked at her - perhaps you could have been a little less unnerving about it, but she'd caught you off guard - as you tried to think of something to say.

"I think you'd thrive at university," you blurt out. She gives you a look like you were some kind of unpleasant bug, having the audacity to continue speaking to her. One of the staff passes with a tray of more champagne, and you pluck two glasses off, handing one to her as you continued, "however I would be fascinated to hear your thoughts on the way our classicist society prioritises and celebrates formal tertiary education" you let your gaze roam, holding your glass in both hands with the tips of your fingers, a dead giveaway of your nerves without you even realising, but for some reason she's still letting you talk, "and the idea of the pursuit of knowledge without that being a financially sustainable life choice anymore if you do it the wrong way. Why celebrate scientists when we just disregard modern philosophers?" You take a sip of your champagne and try and tell yourself to shut up, "I know the answer's 'because you can't profit off of philosophers as easily as you can scientists', but it just kind of sucks, don't you think?"

A long, uncomfortable silence follows.

"I swear at least Felix, Farleigh, and Venetia aren't freaks," you blurted out. Alyssa's shoulders relaxed just a little. At least you were self aware.

"Who?" Its... less hostile. You point out Felix and Farleigh headed out for a cigarette with a few others around your age, and Alyssa sighs, rolling her eyes. She's still clearly got Catton blood in her, her eyes and nose even remind you of Venetia. Still, she headed towards the side door; even her walk seemed to ooze contempt for the night.

Now, watching her, moonlight peaking down the stairs to catch the way she's beginning to glow with sweat, white-knuckled grip on the dark wood and her once perfectly straight, dark hair turning curly with moisture around her face and by her shoulders, you're actually a little glad to see it. At least she seemed to have found one person not entirely unbearable.

You knew all too well how overwhelming and isolating these events could be. As much as you felt you could relate, you couldn't really understand what she'd be going through, her first time at an event like this, feeling that there's people in the room who truly think you and your family outright don't belong. She should take her fun where she can get it, you think.

Shoving Venetia back to give the couple their privacy, you push her back into the parlour.

"Who is that?" Venetia demanded in a whisper, eyes bright. You sigh, shaking your head.

"Alyssa, she hasn't been to something like this before, just let her have her fun," after a beat, you step in a little closer, hands finding Venetia's hips as you attempted to distract her, "you know we could -"

"Alyssa who?" It hasn't worked. Venetia takes your hands, "this is important." There's something that goes beyond mischief in her eyes.

"Morelli," but she makes a face like that's not enough, "Aunt June's daughter." Venetia frowned.

"Aunt June's daughter married one of those Dubai millionaires five years ago and hasn't sent her a single pound or even a message since."

"That's your Great Aunt June- Juniper," you clarified without missing a beat, "she's not even related to any of you; your mum doesn't know who she was initially tied to in the family." Venetia takes a few moments to give you a look of faint, disbelieving awe. Clearing your throat, you looked back over your shoulder as the suggestive noises around the corner were growing louder, "Estranged Aunt June."

Venetia's eyes lit up with what could only be described as malevolent glee.

"So she's my cousin."

"Yes."

"Actually? Blood and all? Not just one of my uncles' weird friends who's been hanging around for decades so now we have to call them family?"

"I'm beginning to get afraid of your intentions, Ven," despite your wary smile, you weren't really joking. Venetia completely disregards this, however, holding your shoulders so tightly it begins to hurt.

"That girl," she points sharply, the kind of intensity in her eyes that absolutely means trouble, "just around the corner, moaning like a whore, getting fingered, tongued, whatever -" she wets her lips in some kind of anticipation, "is my actual, blood related cousin? And you're entirely sure of that?"

Taking a deep breath, unsure of what the repercussions of this all will be, you slowly nod.

"Yes..."

Venetia steps back, has to clap her hands over her mouth to muffle her positively gleeful laughter. For some unexpected reason, this piece of information seems to be some of the best news she's ever received in her life. It almost brings her to tears. After she calms down, you think you hear her mutter something along the lines of I'm never letting him live this down as she fans herself, attempting to calm herself.

"Ven, are you okay?" Still utterly confused about what any of this means, you can't help the concern you feel. Venetia's nodding, fighting back aftershocks of giggles, gazing often at the doorway.

"Yes, I- you're wonderful, thank you for helping me with that-" overcome by another, brief fit of giggles, it takes her a moment to compose herself, "I love you and your robot brain so very dearly -"

"Oh my god~" from around the corner, and another, louder shush. Venetia buries her face in her hands, echoing oh my god as she chokes on laughter once more. When she resurfaces, face bright red with amusement, you take her hand and try to insist that you should give them privacy.

"Yes, of course," Venetia agrees, suddenly trying to appear as serious as she's able, "I just have one other favour to ask you."

"What?" You ask flatly, unsurprisingly wary, watching her struggle not to grin.

"Could you tell my brother?"

The question hangs in the air for a long, confusing moment.

"Tell him what?"

"That Alyssa's our cousin."

"Sure...?" you frowned a little, peering over her shoulders, "I don't know where he is though, I haven't seen him in a while." Venetia smiles like the Cheshire Cat.

Oh... no... she isn't implying -? But Alyssa's timing is unfortunately perfect.

"Oh my god, Felix~"

Your mouth drops open in shock upon hearing that.

"Oh my God," you groaned, pained by the realisation as your face scrunched up with sudden understanding and disappointment, "Felix."

Venetia is absolutely right, he's never living this down.

"You had me prattling on for fucking ages about nothing, just letting them go at it all the while? You could have just asked!" You hissed, already mortified on his behalf.

"You're letting them go at it now!" She crowed quietly, and ah, fuck. Yeah, she had a point there.

Rounding the corner briskly, you cross your arms but at the very least keep your gaze to the floor.

"Felix -" you clear your throat.

"Oh, fuck off," Alyssa, seeing it's you, groans with frustration. There's movement beneath her dress when you glance up; there's something almost comical about knowing what you're seeing is Felix sitting up straighter under there.

"I know that's you, Y/N," Felix had enough dignity to not sound ashamed or caught out. But he should, "just, yeah mate, could you fuck off a bit?" Its not a particularly sharp request, and if this were any other situation, of course you'd obligingly fuck off. However...

"Well don't fucking stop," Alyssa hisses to him, sounding almost embarrassed by the fact that he was giving you the time of day right now, "seriously, fuck off!" She tries to whisper-shout, but halfway through her voice turns to an unsteady moan and her head falls back against the wall again, "OhmygodFelix~" she whines, bringing one of her legs up over his shoulder.

"So should I wait until after you get her off to tell you?"

"Tell him what you little pervert?" Alyssa, furious at your refusal to leave, demands.

"Hey, be nice to them," you hear, vaguely muffled from under her skirt. You have to snort a laugh.

"Thanks Fi, I'll just tell you now, uh," you can't look at them in this moment, fighting off your embarrassed smile at you look to the ceiling, "I don't think this is what your dad meant when he suggested you get to know Aunt June's kids; this might be too welcoming for your recently un-estranged cousin."

Around the corner you hear Venetia cackling like a banshee, clearly having been eavesdropping.

Felix scrambles back from under Alyssa's dress, looking an absolute mess.

"You what?"

"Oh my god." There's nothing lewd about it this time, Alyssa herself sounds absolutely fucking mortified.

----

The next morning, over breakfast, the mood is... strained. Its Sir James who breaks the ice, brightly - though it's clearly forced - commenting on how the night took such an unexpected and unfortunate turn. Felix, who likely doesn't even remember the end of the night considering how thoroughly plastered he got after his unfortunate affair with his cousin, looks to his father very suddenly, the sudden fear in his eyes about what his parents may know hidden by his large, dark glasses. He'd threatened to drown himself in the lake if you or Venetia told anyone, but his memory got fuzzy from there. The hangover that he's half worried might actually kill him doesn't help.

"Such a shame," Elspeth sighed, "I would have thought June would raise them better than that."

"Estranged Aunt June's daughter, Alyssa," you leaned over to Felix to stage whisper the context to him, half worried the paranoia might kill him there at the table. Venetia does however feel the need to smugly butt in and remind him -

"Our biological cousin."

"Apparently convinced her younger brothers to riot and start breaking all the crockery," you finished. Felix frowned in vague confusion, a feeling which Farleigh seemed to share.

"And it was so unnecessary, like she knew it was the first family thing her mom had been invited to in a decade -"

"She hates rich people and thinks we're freaks," you sat back, shrugging, "she told me so herself."

"Who, June?" Sir James sounded downright heartbroken at the idea, so you quickly shook your head.

"Alyssa." It seems to alleviate some of his concerns, but not a lot, and Sir James goes back to his breakfast still looking rather put out.

"Well maybe," Venetia leans her elbows on the table, bread knife in hand that she was using to flippantly gesture with, "there's some rich people that she should hate," her gaze and smug smile lands on you, as does the nonchalant way she's pointing with her knife, right before she flicks her wrist as if pointing at her brother by pure chance, "and some of us who are freaks."

Felix glared down at his breakfast.

"I don't know why we un-estranged Aunt June in the first place," he grumbled mostly to himself, though not quiet enough that the rest of the table didn't hear. Sir James sighed with disappointment.

"I think in future we may have to limit June's invitations to only her and her husband," he says, shaking his head. Elspeth kindly tells him that it's probably for the best.

Venetia, still apparently feeling petty, threw a bread roll at her brother, who hadn't looked up from where he seemed to be trying to divine life's secrets from his plate of sausages. It glances off his forehead, but knocks his glasses loose and into his breakfast. A second later Felix officially gives up and follows suit, faceplanting into his food.

"Oh my god, Felix!" His mother gasps with concern.

Despite Elspeth sounding nothing like Alyssa had the night before, the familiar phrase sets Venetia off, cackling with laughter at the top of her lungs. While the rest of the table is utterly confused by the series of events that have just occurred, you scoot your chair over close to Felix, patting him sympathetically on the back. Beneath the table, he rests his hand on your knee to give a grateful squeeze. When he talks, only you can hear it, resigned and half muffled by scrambled eggs.

"Hate this family."

[punch-love]

2, 7, 10, 15, 16

greedily takes up five of the options

I'm actually going to answer these for both lokius and spideypool to be fair to what fandom you read for and also to what I'm reading for right now.

2. 🔁 A fic you’ve re-read several times

There's a clear theme in these.

i could show you by jilliancares

I think this was the first real gender-affirming trans porn I had ever read and kept on re-reading. It's so good. It's very hot and I love everything about the smut and the dynamics but it's also just - a trans guy talking about oral sex and his disappointing experiences with it and there's a lot of intimacy in the way that's handled. It's just very real so the fantasy of it is even realer. I have read this one many, many times.

Turnabout loop - Mirilya

The Mobius coochie fic. It's great. I could say that I love the idea of Loki using his magic for shapeshifting his partner in bed and the genderbending of it, which I do. It's also just hot. Objectively. I think there needs to be more fics with this exact thesis of Mobius getting eaten out. I support it.

7. 💯A fic that makes you think #writergoals

morning in the burned house by antivenom

Just a really stunning character study and piece of prose. It's such a complicated, nuanced approach to Wade Wilson as a character and his relationship with Spider-Man. It has my favorite approach to a backstory I've seen for in the fandom. This just really sits with him as a character and explores the side roads and back alleys of his brain and the reason he is who he is. It's beautiful. I think anything that sits with you afterward is something I am inspired by, and this sits with me.

The Shapeshifter's Guide to Butt Stuff by comrade_bucket

I just recommended the first part of this series (and the whole series is #writergoals) but this one is so conceptual, so out there, so fucking weird and strange and beautiful that every time I read it I'm struck at what a piece of art it is. The way this work addresses genderfludity, god-hood, the human experience, love, gender conformity, and compromise is just so wonderful. I would love to write something as strange and shocking and daring as this! Again, both installments of this series including The-Infinity-Year-Old Virgin are both something I love to re-read and also get inspired by every time. The endings on both of these are something I've taken notes on.

10. 👽 A fic that isn’t prose (poetry, text fic, etc.)

I got really into the Wickerman tag the other day and this AMV is one of my favorite things I've ever seen.

Lovely Day (Good as Hell) [Favid] periru3, Tafadhali

hare toss, check my nails, baby how you feeling? feeling good as hell!

15. 📚 A fic you wish you could display on your bookshelf

They're both by the same author, surprise. (I think it's funny that @primewritessmut wrote two masterpieces in my favorite genres.) I also have told them before that I would book bind them both, and I am extra serious about doing it for the second one.

Songs for the Zombie Apocalypse by zerospoons_onlyknives

I love zombies. They're my favorite horror genre and I have read and watched as much of it as possible but it's so rare to find the good stuff because no one goes far enough. (Prime goes farther.) It's dark, demented, violent, gloriously unwell and erotic. It's not a love story, it's something so much more interesting, and each chapter I got to read in advanced had more and more tangled in it. The ending is unbelievably glorious. It was one of those things that I was like "this feels written for me" and it wasn't (and it kind of was) but I enjoyed it so much. It deserves to be bound in a book that looks suspiciously like human skin.

Midori Sour - oprime

This is the hallmark rom-com bait and switch psychological thriller family drama slice of life romance of all time. It's so good. It really has no business being as good as it is. The idea is so fun and the dynamics are great and the setting and side-characters are so lived in but the underlayers of this. I want this book bound so I can just re-read sections and underline the lines that stick through onto the other side. I love this thing so much. It's so human and compelling and deliciously deep. The depth that Prime goes in on with this one is just unbelievable. I love it very much. I would bind it in green leather and put a little fruity drink in the middle of it and highlight the whole thing in a green neon with red on the cherries.

16. 💞 A fic that led to you making friends with the author

I think it's funny that these are both series.

Bad Things - wanderingflame

I was so, so obsessed with this when I first read it. I remember sitting in a car outside a thrift store just binging through it (and then I re-read it at least two times.) I also think @in-my-loki-feels is the first person I have ever asked to write inspired work for (and also, found out we both share the same feelings on inspired work lmao) because I was just so enchanted by this story. It's so fresh, thoughtful, compelling, and just the right hint of dark. Their passion for these characters and the nuanced groves of their natures is just - god, it's so good. We have a very "writers who like each other's work" friendship in a way I really appreciate.

gunpowder triology - periodicallypuzzled

It's rare for me to find a writer with such a personality through their work. I couldn't get enough of this series when I first read it - the humor, the personality, the characterization, the heart juxtaposition with the grit. I don't often say "I really want to know the person who wrote this" but I remember thinking that after reading that. @periodically-puzzled read something of mine and offered to exchange discord handles and after that we became friends. I should also re-read this, now that I'm thinking about it again.

[teruthecreator]

TW FOR RACISM, CHILD IMPREGNATION, EUGENICS, & TRANSPHOBIA

okay @silvercistern! thats okay! if you dont wanna be here for this conversation then i'll have a conversation without you! for all those readers out there who might've missed it

FOR EVERYONE'S INFORMATION:

Side Quest is definitely one of the weirdest fics I have ever seen get popular, for several content-related reasons.

Firstly, the racism. She writes her Serizawa to be half-black, half-Japanese, which is a perfectly valid hc if not for how she handles this fact. Ignoring the moments of subtle racism she gives Reigen (having him comment on the apparent "sloppiness" of his afro--which she also refuses to call an afro, by the way--and also having him guess his race via his racial characteristics), she blatantly and openly makes Toichiro racist towards Serizawa in a way that I feel we cannot ignore. For example:

I shouldn't have to say that calling a black man a "slave" in any context is fucked up, but I will for the sake of this post! Since she already think I'm insane :-) Also:

Once again, shouldn't have to say this but I will: Saying a black man has a "brutal masculine appeal" is so obviously and blatantly racist while also being entirely unnecessary for his character! We understand, as both readers and watchers of the base material, that Toichiro is a bad guy. We do not need him to then become racist, borderline-pedophilic, and a supporter of eugenics! And if you need quotes for some of these points, I will include one that has both:

Even if he is saying that he won't facilitate the "impregnation of a child", why the fuck is he laughing about it? Just a reminder: Toichiro in canon is only a terrorist and a child abuser. Yes, he is a bad person. However, I think elevating his evil to this level removes any concept of character depth that you could possibly have, and makes the ending of this fic (where he is seemingly normal and fine, with both his wife and child in his relative good graces) all the weirder. But again, I'm insane, right? Oh yeah, one more point about Toichiro that I found from the comments:

Now this tells me several things. Firstly, it's that she lacks the oversight to recognize when there is blatant racism in her works of fiction. Which is questionable, but I'm willing to let that slide because people should always be given the opportunity to grow. HOWEVER, the second part of this tells me that the first part might be a lie!!! Because hey!! If you are headcanoning a person's parent as being a WHITE SOUTH AFRICAN WITH EUGENICIST BELIEFS, you are basically saying your character was raised by an APARTHEID APOLOGIST. So I really don't know how you can avoid the racism embedded in that statement.

Now, let's move away from Toichiro because he's not the only character she completely butchers with weird concepts. Shimazaki is a trans chaser in this fic.

That's right. I'm not kidding. He is a chaser.

Once again reminding you that I'm the insane one.

There is literally no reason I can see as to why she would write this, other than that it is supposed to be a joke. Now, as an afab trans butch, there is only so much I can say to this point, but I will still ask: Who is laughing here? Who is this joke funny to? Is it to the trans women, who have to deal with similar kinds of harassment each time they try to go on a date? Or is it the Shimazaki fans, who I guess aren't weirded out by their fav being a chaser? Or is it just you, silvercistern? Is it just funny to you?

That point brings me to one of my last points with context. She seems to enjoy throwing in random "edgy" topics for either shock value or a laugh, neither of which I think her wording lands on. I did collegiate improv comedy for all four years of college (yes that may seem pathetic to you, but it was fun)--if anyone knows how a joke should sound, I think I'm one of the few. And, frankly, none of these land. For instance, the repeated "joke" of calling Reigen a creep or alluding to him being a pedo:

But, again, me? I'm insane, apparently. If you take issue with any of this, like I did, then to her you are insane.

This is not surprising to me, given that she already had a kind of breakdown to my friend regarding when they asked if silvercistern could tag one of her fics with sa.

Here is the link to their post. I ask that you respect their wishes and do not send harassment to silvercistern (as that is my wish as well) and do not be weird to them in their inbox.

But this is why it does not surprise me that she 1. would private her twitter account when faced with even the slightest backlash, 2. would then talk about the situation to her mutuals to garner sympathy, and 3. not even bother to read a single thing I said, given that she replied to my post in less than a minute after I had posted it.

By the way, one of those mutuals? Yeah, they are literally a toichiro/shou shipper. Here's the proof:

Anyway, this is not an excuse to go harass her. I DO NOT CONDONE HARASSMENT OF ANY KIND. ANY OF MY POSTS ABOUT THIS SITUATION WERE MADE TO DIRECTLY ADDRESS HER AND THE ISSUES I HAVE. IF YOU FEEL THE NEED TO CHIME IN, DO IT ON YOUR OWN TIME WITH YOUR OWN POST. DO NOT HARASS HER.

So yeah. Guess this would be something an insane person does, right? lol

[shizukateal]

Just curious about smth, what do you think of Madoka’s entry on the Feminist Fantasy trope page on TV Tropes?

Well, the first thing to understand about me is that I find this kind of question -"Is This Piece of Fiction/Media Feminist™️?"- to be rather facetious.

Don't get me wrong. There are indeed pieces that engage centrally with the ideology, and that could be considered above most as proponents of it, but the thing is that capital f Feminism is very wide-spanning because it's supposed to be intersectional. It tackles every system of oppression, from economic to sociological: racism, ableism, class, labor, lookism, queerphobia, you know the drill. Which is to say that there's hardly, if ever, a "perfect" Feminist Fantasy piece of fiction/media. And this is because, and I want you to burn what I'm about to write into your soul:

Fiction cannot take into account every nuance of the subjects it talks about. If it could, it would be reality.

Or, to get to the point quicker: I don't think PMMM is The Most™️ feminist anime around, but I also don't think it should be dismissed from feminist discussion, since it certainly engages with the ideology at least a bit further than most of its peers in the genre, although this is not to say that we should dismiss those others instead.

To be honest, I think "feminism" as a theme is secondary in the story to Gen Urobuchi's usual fixation on utilitarianism, but that's a whole other issue that would require me to watch his entire filmography to talk about. So let's go first into the "Feminist Whoopsies™️" that I think the show commits and work our way from there.

In episode 9 Kyubey explains that the Incubators chose Magical Girls as their workforce because they noticed the biggest fluctuations of Hope and Despair in "females in their second stage of development", which is a fancy way of saying that Teenage Girls Are The Most Emotional. Now, there's a lot of space for us to question this assertion because of Kyubey's status as both a very unreliable narrator and a metaphor for systems of oppression. We don't know if the Incubators came to this conclusion because they groomed humanity into adopting gender roles or if the writing staff of PMMM thinks that this is unquestioningly true and Kyubey is supposed to be objectively correct here, or some in-between. The show doesn't go deep into this aspect of its mythology, it can't, it has only 12 episodes to work with and more pressing issues in the plot to resolve. However, regardless of intention or not, in the end PMMM leaves us with an understanding of the concept of "femininity" that is couched, on some level, in the biological, and which promotes an unfair stereotype of women as emotional. And this is antithetical to modern feminism at its core, which goes against biological determinism. There are also no explicitly trans characters around to defy this pov, ironically only Kyubey defies the constraints of the gender binary in their presentation, which opens another can of worms about the Nonbinary Alien archetype.

Then we have Madoka's parents, a girlboss and a malewife respectively. I have the feeling that their inversion of gender roles was on purpose, in line with making Junko (the mom) Madoka's most reliable voice of reason and close confidant and thus giving her a level of relevance and depth rarely seen in mother characters. Feminism win! However, for all its talk about systems of oppression the story doesn't question, say, if this model of nuclear family, where only one parent is allowed to have a life outside of their home and who possibly controls the bulk of the income is healthy in its own right, or if Junko's corporate girlbossing might be reproducing the same exploitation on her company's workers than that of Kyubey on magical girls. We could also have a lengthy debate about how much horny is involved in Mami's presentation. And if you want to go further into Magia Record and it's representation of women of color, well... it's not ideal.

But to leave it at that, tagging the whole show as Not Feminist Enough™️ and therefore not worthy of consideration on its ideas on the subject, would be reductive and dare I say anti-intellectual. I stand by what I say above, but I don't think that episode 9 dialogue had any bad intentions. I think it was simply a solution to a narrative question -why would the incubators use young girls exclusively?- that failed to consider all of the implications. And we can appreciate it as it is and what it brings to what PMMM has to say in the feminist conversation -"Young girls are vulnerable to getting targeted by systems that pity them against eachother so their suffering can propel the agenda of their oppressors"- without dismissing the other concerns as superfluous. Turns out, truths can coexist sometimes.

The magical girl genre as a whole is not clean of sin against the feminist movement, either. Magical girl shows are generally noninclusive to fat people if not outright fatphobic, same with poc and disabled people, or they crowbar their female leads into romantic het relationships with male leads that can go anywhere from bland to absolutely rancid, etc. HOWEVER, the genre is also a space that shows "femininity" (the concept beyond biological determinism) with respect, agency, power, as aspirational and heroic, and it has also allowed for a non-negligible amount of queer rep. But if we see an uptick in well-represented feminist themes in the genre it's both because people are demanding it and because it sells. Concerns about woke capitalism aside, this progress can't happen if we don't engage with imperfection. Don't forget that this genre was born largely from a shonen manga where the joke is that the girl loses her clothes during her transformation only to put on a heart-shaped boob window!

I could also go on a tirade on how Kill la Kill fits into this discussion, but to stay focused I will say this: sometimes media can't be shoved into the progressive vs regressive boxes. Sometimes a story contains a bit of both and it's no use to try and measure what it has more of. Sometimes we have to put on the adult pants and analyze shit to have conversations that can actually help us be better in the future, not just to check on who passes our mental Hayes Code! If a piece of media contains these multitudes it's much more useful to ask what we can get out of it instead of which box we can get it in. Because PMMM was never going to be The Last Show Involved With The Question of Feminism, nor was it gonna be Kill la Kill, nor Sailor Moon or anything else. Grab my hand and let's enjoy consuming media consciously.

[aotopmha]

I thought about talking about Dawntrail in detail only once I'm done with it, but I just finished the level 91 dungeon and the corresponding cutscenes some of the vitriol I've seen for the story is so bizzare.

Spoilers for up to the end of the level 91 dungeon!

I absolutely love that Wuk is having such a gradual arc.

The very first encounter of the level 91 quests was great and it was just a conversation where she gains some self-awareness about her own feelings via someone else going through the same. And before then, in the previous areas, she just learned about her limits. About her lack of knowledge and skill.

I saw so much vitriol thrown at the other candidates, as well, where all I see is just a gradual pushing of the curtain.

Every appearance they have is just a little bit more of hinting at their relationship with Wuk and relationships and principles of their own.

I don't know if it is paid off, but to me it comes off as neat set-up and mystery; there are some pretty interesting nuggets with Zoraal Ja in particular to me because his demeanor and his goal contrasting.

It's the contrast and juxtaposition of all of these perspectives I'm interested in the most.

I also love that the Warrior of Light is taking on a mentor role. I didn't even fully think about it, but that's a pretty perfect role for them at this point.

And I like the friendly rivalry angle with the other Scions because I was thinking it would be odd for Urianger in particular to suddenly start being secretive again when his entire arc was about not being secretive anymore. I like that they approach the other group while still having their own principles at play.

And I'm so happy they pulled back the stakes after Shadowbringers and Endwalker, rather than trying to one-up them, since they did want to continue the story and all.

It's so rare to see this kind of restraint with longer stories especially.

Lower-stakes conflicts and character arcs can exist and I like how they are doing it here.

Learning to not fear Alpacas because of a bad experience or learning about the customs of a culture is just as much of a valid moment of growth as coming to terms with the death of a loved one.

It still makes the point about learning to respect and understand what you don't.

The Azim Steppe was about this in spirit, too, and I still think it is the best part of Stormblood. And these two lil stories are good examples of it.

In terms of true issues I have with the story so far, I think the Pelupelu area dragged on just a smidge too long, but that's it.

Do I think this is some mindblowing, revolutionary character writing?

No.

Do I see how it all could come together into something really good in the bigger picture?

Yes, very much. Especially with the tone shift in the second half.

And a lot of these characters are PoC-coded (with PoC English VAs), too.

That's a really cool bonus in my eyes!

The really strong hatred, I do not get at all.

I'm willing to bet Wuk's journey is going to be full of failure and that's where the true vitriol comes from.

(Her voice actress is also a trans woman with a "non-traditional" accent.)

She will not immediately get herself together and will be sad and self-depricating and will get seasick again and people will be mad about it because she said she won't be anymore after she got some worries off her chest.

You do not suddenly start doing better when you just say it. That's not how people work. It's a process and I am expecting one. Because getting rid of preconceptions, prejudices and a unhealthy need for validation because of messy family matters is a process.

So, I don't agree with the super extreme takes at all. It's so funny that I spent like 5 hours playing the game and having fun and then I go on social media and some act like this innocous adventure story about learning to understand and respect other cultures that drags a lil is the worst thing to ever exist.

I mean I hope everyone who hates it will get a better story in the patches or next expac or outside of FF14.

But I've seen so many and much worse stories than this so far.

[omegaverse-guide]

WHY would you read that?!

Let's admit it - upon encountering omegaverse for the first time, we all thought it was weird. Maybe someone reading this still thinks so. There's certainly enough people out there who wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole.

But it's popular. I love it, personally, and I'm clearly not the only one. There are tv shows being made with a concept that a singular person put into a fandom-specific kink meme a mere 14 years ago. My grandma could walk into the bookstore and see a manga with omegaverse terminology in the title and ask me what it is. That's wild.

So, this is an earnest question - not necessarily of how it spread this quickly, but what's so appealing about it. This is based on my own personal experience and what I've heard others say, not necessarily representative of everyone who enjoys the trope.

From what I've seen, omegaverse has four major draws:

1. Porn

That's kinda obvious, and the one most people would put first, or perhaps as the only reason. And I'll argue the other points later, but I think it'd be stupid to understate the importance of this one. If you're into certain kinks, even if it's exclusively in fiction, omegaverse is great for you. Big dicks, breeding kink, excessive amounts of cum, biting, marathon sex, dubcon, feral/animalistic sex, dom/sub dynamics, possessive behaviour, maybe a dash of furry stuff, it's all there. There's a reason so much omegaverse is pwp, and it's that these are common kinks, and they work well together. People are horny, that's how omegaverse got made and spread, and that's beautiful.

2. Mpreg

Yes, there are other ways to knock a man up. Make him trans. Use magic. Or science, which is essentially the same thing anyway. You can come up with any amounts of ways to make this happen. But the beauty of the omegaverse is you don't have to. You don't have to do any research, you don't need to come up with a reason, and you don't have to figure out what the implications are if you don't want to. This man can get knocked up, and it's totally normal to everyone around him, and everyone reading will know and accept it, so you can get all of that out of the way and just focus on your guy, or all the guys, getting pregnant and having and raising a bunch of kids you made up for them. This gives you the satisfaction of letting any character you want produce babies with any other character you want, while also giving you the chance to torture any man you want with pregnancy symptoms (very cathartic). Or maybe you just have a pregnancy kink! Either way, it's convenient.

3. Social Commentary

Okay, to anyone who's never read omegaverse, this probably sounds like a joke, but I'm dead serious. At the core of omegaverse is one basic assumption: if a group of people is capable of bearing children, society will do anything and everything to make them have kids, and restrict them from whatever other roles they can, and they'll find whatever excuse they can find. It exposes sexism by stripping away all pretense of logic: in omegaverse, omegas are the stand-ins for women, and are treated as such. but anyone can be an omega. it has nothing to do with physical or mental capabilities how you're treated. you could literally be batman, the moment people find out you could theoretically give birth to a child, it's all over for you. the reality of our world is, sexism is still here. it's gotten better in a lot of ways, but sexism is not over. and sometimes the best way of realizing just how not over it is, is to put a man into the exact same situations we experience and go 'hey would that be fucked up or what?'.

4. Free For All

Because omegaverse is, by and large, a fanfiction thing, it's popular with the kind of people who enjoy reading and writing fanfiction. Do you know what the best thing about fanfiction is? No, it's not the gay sex, though that's a close second. The real answer is: it can be whatever the fuck you want it to be. Fanfiction has one major selling point: it doesn't need to be sold. Which means no author ever has to consider a target audience, or god forbid, a mass audience. Someone can just pour out their passion onto the page, and sometimes thousands of people will read it, and other times it'll just be you and three other freaks, but there's no reason to only produce the first type of fic. Most fic writers don't even have an editor/beta reader. And omegaverse is the same in that regard, at least in the realm of fic. It can be literally anything. It can be nothing but porn, including all the kinks, and only all the kinks you personally enjoy. It can be fluffy family stuff. It can be deep drama in a 200k epic, with biting social commentary. It can be all of that at once. Omegaverse has no rules. It's an author's playground, and fic writers love their playgrounds.

So that's my thesis on what's good about omegaverse. Why do you like it? Did I miss anything? Let me know!

[fuglyjeans]

i feel like i need to write a video essay but my thoughts are still percolating

joker 2 thoughts so far (spoilers in red):

my initial reaction was positive, I was not bored like some are saying they were

the musical bits could have been done differently but for the most part, I enjoyed them. it made sense for this story. some of the best parts of the film were musical numbers

initially i really liked the plot, I thought it was a cool fuck you to everyone who misunderstood the first film. but on thinking a bit more about it, i think it would have been cooler to ignore the haters and focus on making a better movie. the meta-commentary is a zinger but it really sucks after a few seconds because then you remember wait, i was interested in this character and this worldbuilding tho? can we get back to that?

all the characters in both joker movies are incredibly flat, 1d portrayals. like literally everyone is mean or manipulative towards arthur. that worked for the first film since arthur was an unreliable narrator, it was fun to try to understand what was his nihilism and what was his actual lived reality.

i liked that the lines between serious and not serious were totally blurred and it was anyone's guess if something was corny bs, or actually believable. to me that reflects real life. because there genuinely are people who get shit on and kicked at every possible turn in their lives. i've met people like this. some of them seem "crazy" and i still don't know if they are or aren't lying about the things they claim but in the end it doesn't really matter because they need mental healthcare either way. ask me more about the specific stories if you're interested... I just think it's neat how Arthur reminds me of real life people.

however in Joker 2, this kind of doesn't work anymore. because the film is a lot more sympathetic towards arthur, it makes this demarcation between Arthur and Joker that I don't think existed in the first film. the very first scene in Joker 2 is a cartoon depicting Arthur in a literal battle with an evil doppelganger, who gets him into trouble... pronouncing Arthur as "the sane one" means all the reasons Joker went ham before must have been delusions. so, with every character being a complete tool towards Arthur still in this film, it doesn't make sense anymore. it doesn't feel like potentially part of his delusion, it just feels like lazy writing.

(spoiler) while I understand why they played Lee like they did, i think it's a massive missed opportunity to make her just another one of Arthur's abusers.

I have always read Arthur as a queer character. He is a guy who struggles to feel manly enough despite not really seeming all that interested in masculinity deep down. He is a guy who finds strength performance---the Joker persona is very camp, very drag queen to me. I've always seen Arthur as potentially trans, bisexual, and/or gay...

(spoiler)...So when I heard Gaga was going to play Harley I couldn't help but get fucking excited. because Harley is a bisexual character. Gaga is a bisexual woman who has always paid homage to queer culture and drag. Maybe I'm just projecting but I think this could have been SO SO SO more interesting and fun if they'd done a traditional Harley, who genuinely loves Arthur and isn't just using him and lying to him... I think it could have brought out more facets of Arthur's character and taken the story somewhere we haven't been before. idk maybe i'm delulu but that's what I wanted

i keep thinking about Alien: Resurrection, because I loved what that entry in the Alien franchise added. that was a movie that said fuck this tired old Ripley journey, it's over, it's been done, we are going to throw body horror and species mixing and ridiculous action scenes and also Ripley is gonna fuck a queen alien just cause and also she's going to have lesbian subtext with Winona Ryder. because we already made 3 serious Alien movies and there's no point retreading, let's do something new and silly with this material. THAT'S the tone I wanted out of Joker 2. but, most people hate Resurrection, so maybe that's just me and my preference.

(spoiler) overall while I don't think Harley needed more screen time per se,(this is a Joker movie, not a Gaga mv, it's about Arthur first and foremost) I do think she was so flat and boring and needed more of a backstory to her.

(spoiler) the ending made sense to me. it didn't upset me. it was a good anti-franchise bs from Todd Phillips... like he kneecapped the Joker Movie Universe before it could go on for decades like the MCU. good on that. Arthur's death also makes perfect sense for him and his character. it's sad but it's what would realistically happen. bro was never a criminal mastermind

ok bye i have to get ready for work!

[sissytobitch10seconds]

Opium Lidded Daydreams

Fandom: Shadow and Bone (TV), Grishaverse: Six of Crows Summary: A lot of things have happened to him during his life, this has been one of the best. He thinks that he deserves it after all of the pain that he has had to endure. It's also where he hardens his heart to never care for others. Warnings: Trans characters, canon-typical violence and betrayal, and canon deaths Word Count: 4,628 Ship(s): Kaz Brekker & Poppy Cox

Archive link!

A/N: I very recently fell in love with the idea of Kaz being trans since he has canonically did change his name and totally reinvent himself. I really loved Poppy and the implied backstory with them as well, so I decided that I was going to write something with it! I did take the backstory more from the book than I did the show for Kaz but then things kind of veer to the middle so that I can have Poppy in there since she doesn't show up in the book. I hope that makes sense and feel free to ask me clarifying questions if it doesn't! Stay sissy and bitchy everyone <3

Poppy Reitveld had many changes in her life.

The first had been long before she could remember. Her mother had been desperate for another child, her longing to care for and nurture not satisfied with their collection of animals and Poppy’s older brother. She had always been a sickly woman, so taking on a pregnancy had made her so sick that she was bedridden for a year when she conceived their first. Poppy had been informed that it was a massive sticking point for her parents, the first time that Jordie had ever seen them do anything more than tease each other. Her mother had gotten what she wanted, though, as she always had. A second child was conceived and she was just as sick the second time as she had been the first. She left Poppy with nothing more than the sunny memories of a delicate laugh and the reassuring kisses on the top of her head. She had never known what had really killed her mother, she was too young to be told at the time and there was no one to ask other than a weathered gravestone once she was. Just like that, Poppy was the daughter of only a windower and the sister of a half-orphan.

The second had been her father. She was still young when it happened, but old enough that she had far more cemented in her mind. The memories had stuck to the back of her teeth and her throat like the honey she was spoon fed when she had a cough, refusing to leave. She had been tucked away in the house and given the task of helping her brother cut the vegetables for their supper. She hadn’t been doing a very good job of it, but that was mostly because Jordie had wandered off to do whatever it was that boys at his age got up to. She had heard the shrieking and crying of someone in pain and had rushed out just in time for one of the farmhands to pick her up as though she weighed nothing. The thing that she remembered from her father’s death was the crushing weight of having to stay put, to wait until someone came to get her to tell her what had happened. Poppy remembered the blood stained ground where the seeds should have been and the burning, crackling smell of the plough as they destroyed it, thoroughly convinced it was bad luck. Just like that, Poppy an orphan and the sister of a foolish teenage boy.

The third one had led to the most pain, but only because of the slippery nature of it. She had been dressed up in the clothes that she always wore to mass, the ones that her father had assured her that her mother would have loved to see her in. Poppy hadn’t been so sure about it then, and she was definitely unsure of having to wear it again when she wasn’t being told why. She had blue ribbons woven into her hair to make her extra pretty before they were rushed through the streets of Ketterdam. Jordie had the money from selling their farm hidden away in his pocket. He had been siphoning it off for the room that they were renting and the food they needed to keep them alive. Poppy hadn’t wanted to leave the only home she had ever known, but she loved and trusted her brother, so she had gone along with it anyway. She had trusted Jordie, even after they came up the window of the house that should have been filled with people they trusted to find it completely empty. Just like that, Poppy was a penniless orphan and the sister of the most foolish boy on the streets.

The fourth was the worst thing that she had ever faced in her entire life, and with any luck it would remain that way until she peacefully died under a pile of her own gold. There had been sirens screaming through the air and coughing coming from the little nook under the stairs that they had taken refuge in after the money they had kept for their room had run out. Poppy hadn’t known what was happening when pox began to form in little welts all over her and her brother’s skin, nor had she been able to piece it out when her little body was overcome with the shaking, feverish hurt. The next thing that she could remember was the feeling of clammy, wet flash slipping over her fingertips as she tried to find purchase to locate her brother. The moment that she had found Jordie, it was clear that he wasn’t her brother anymore. Just like that, Poppy was alone and the name Reitveld had died.

The fifth was more of an abstract idea than a single event that had happened. Her body had begun to shift and change as she navigated her new life in the Barrel. Her face softened so she looked more like the sugar-coated memories of her mother instead of her brother and father. Her hips had begun to round, as well as her chest. She hadn’t been able to fit in the simple shirts that she stole from clotheslines and had to invest in not only a slip, but a corset to support herself. She hated the way that the constrictive garment fit on her, and she hated the way that she was spoken to even more. Her voice didn’t deepen the way that she had been expecting it to, which had left her uncomfortable and confused. It was more gravely than it had been before she had gotten sick, yet not in the way she had hoped. The changes were unwelcome and uncomfortable in a way that she didn’t have words to describe properly.

---

The Slat was the closest thing to a home that she had since her brother had sold the farm when she was nine. Her room was better described as a closet, but it had a bed and a basin that she could use to wash herself in private. She had a threadbare blanket and a pillow that could be better described as a stack of fabric, but they were hers. The lock on the door was shitty, so the only thing that she consistently left in her room was her spare set of clothes. Her coin pouch was always tucked next to her hip and buried beneath her skirts when she was working. She hated the skirts, but they got their purpose done when she wanted to obscure a revolver or dagger while out on the job.

Poppy had been wearing her singular pair of slacks since she hadn’t been working earlier that day. Not in the traditional sense, at least. She was almost always working on something since her mind and body wouldn’t let her rest unless she had some kind of purpose. Her purpose lately had become bettering the gang that she was involved with. While she was grateful to the Dregs and Per Haskell for keeping her off of the streets, she knew that times were changing and the old man was not. She was going to work to make the house less leaky and the gang more feared even if it killed her, not just for her but also because it would let her tear down a certain Emerald Palace that made her insides burn.

She had stopped by her room to change into something that would make her blend in more with the nightlife that she was going to be patrolling through that evening. She wasn’t looking forward to it, but she had done far more unpleasant and dehumanizing things until she was given a place within the gang. She knew that she always had the option of refusing a job if it was something she really didn’t feel like she could do. Per Haskell liked her and she could argue her way out of just about everything.

She shucked off her pants and then folded them neatly on the end of her bed. She reached down to tug on the hem of her chemise where it had bunched up underneath her corset. It reminded her of how uncomfortable she had been for the duration of her work, so she reached behind her for the bow she had tied with the laces. She undid it and then loosened the garment with well-practiced hands. Even the other women that worked for the Dregs had to help each other to get dressed the way that Poppy dressed, but the feeling of other people being in such a powerful place behind her made her stomach crawl.

She had been feeling uncomfortable with the form that her body had taken against her will since she woke up that morning. It had lessened a bit throughout the day as she had other things to take up that space in her mind, but it was always present. She half figured that she would always feel at least a little bit uncomfortable with her body and the idea of how her skin lay on top of her skeleton after everything that she had been through. Poppy hadn’t exactly grown up in the most stereotypical household, after all.

She needed more of the feminine wiles that she had long since learned to use to her advantage for the job that she was going to be on that evening. She was good at looking the part, distancing herself from the feelings that crept up from the bottom of her stomach and lodged in her throat.

Poppy carefully redid the laces on the back of her corset so that the garment was allowed to actually support her breasts instead of squishing them down so that she looked nearly flat again. She then tugged on her chemise to get it to lay properly before she grabbed the heavily pleated, full skirt from under her bed.

She undid the hook and eye on the back of the garment and then tossed it up over her head. Her arms went into the air to allow the waistband to fit over her chest before it naturally fell down to her waistline. Her nimble fingers then did the clasps up again so that it was secure around her body. She fidgeted with the waistband a little bit longer to make sure that it was seated properly and wouldn’t become uncomfortable. Then came the bodice.

The feeling of the pleats that came with shoving something as billowy as a chemise into something as tight as a bodice was one of Poppy’s least favorite when it came to clothing. It was better than wet rainwater dripping onto her skin, or the touch or another person when she wasn’t coated in layer after layer of protection, but it was still unpleasant.

She tugged the garment on over her chemise and then pulled at the delicately embroidered sleeves. When she had first started working with the Dregs she had barely anything, so she had to make all of the choices for what clothing she’d use for jobs such as her new assignment all at once. She had chosen a chemise with black work around the neck and cuffs so that it would both contrast against her white skin and bring out the darkness of her raven locks. The fact that the embroidery was also blockier in shape instead of the delicate, elegant swirl that the rest of the garments had held was merely a bonus.

She quickly did up the buttons on the front of the bodice so that it was hiding the majority of her corset and her chemise. It was fine for her to have it semi on display when she was wearing her heavy overcoat, giving mere glimpses to the people that passed her by. She hadn’t ever viewed the garment as something that was protecting what other people wanted but rather a way to change her shape and who she was entirely. She was playing a role that night though, so she had to look the part.

Her long black hair was pleated into an even braid that fell down her back as she searched for the iron pins that she had stashed underneath her bed after easily lifting them from a Mercher’s stall. Once she found them, she took the thick braid into her hair and then began to wind it around itself. She tucked the tail further into the swirl so that it wasn’t perceivable by people looking at it from behind her. She placed one of the pins into her mouth to open it before she shoved it into the bun and the hair stretching across the expanse of her head to hold it in place. She did that with all eight of her pins and then picked up the pretty flower barret that she had lifted the week after the pins. She figured that it would help the illusion that she was trying to set even if she felt apathetic at best towards such things.

She glanced her body over as she tugged her thick black gloves over her hands. She looked every bit the part that she needed to for her job, even if she was less than enthusiastic about having to do it. Her clothing was high quality fibers and weaves without being so pricey that someone would try to rob her. She didn’t need expensive makeups for the look she was going through either, the natural curves and hues of her face would do just fine.

Poppy tried to ignore the way that her stomach clenched at the thought. She had seen some of the other Dregs that looked as she did, but she was always more than they were. Her cheeks were rosier instead of having the stubble to shadow it like she so desperately wished for. Her nose was softer and her jawline blended too well into her neck. She was too soft, too delicate, not sharp and bitter like she wanted.

She was working to get there as quickly and efficiently as she could. She didn’t do anything halfway and she got what she wanted, no matter what was standing in her way. She may not have understood why the darkest part of her soul cried and begged for her to look like something that she never could, but it did and she was never one to refuse herself something like that. Power and money could buy her anything, so she harnessed her quick wit into a sharp tongue to make up for the softness of her body.

Tonight, though, the softness would give her the power that she needed.

She grasped her cane from where it had been leaning against the edge of the bed and slotted the birdhead perfectly into her palm. Her gloved fingers naturally wrapped around it and she subtly brushed her thumb along the underside of the beak in a nearly instinctual self-soothing gesture. She turned towards the door and walked out of her room, careful to lock it behind her by pulling out the tumblers after twisting them to the side. It may have seemed ridiculous to pick her own lock every time she wanted to come inside her room, but she just called it practice.

Poppy made her way down the steep stairs of the Slat until she was able to meet the man that she had been informed that she was going to be working with earlier that week when she got her orders. He was a tall Zemini man, short cropped hair and a soft yet angular face. There was a kind of in-betweenness that she wouldn’t quite let herself long for, but subconsciously knew that she wanted.

“Hello there,” the man smiled widely as he caught sight of her. His Kerch was clear and held little accent to it, but Poppy was still easily able to identify exactly where he haled from in Novyi Zem. He held his arm out for her and she begrudgingly took it. There was a reason that the bodice she had chosen had long sleeves and her chemise had even longer ones. Being a woman in a male-dominated space meant that she was more likely to be thrust into a role that required her to be touched and she didn’t want to refuse them. Taking more jobs and being easy to work with would make the boss more inclined to pass his business off to her when he finally kicked the bucket and would let her siphon away power from him while he lived.

“Good evening,” she replied curtly. She let her hand fall into the crevice of his arm but kept her body far enough away from him that they weren’t brushing up against each other. It was nice to have the excuse of a massive skirt when it came to that particular part of her job, she supposed. She would rather just not have to do it at all.

“What’s your name?” the man asked, his eyes still boring into the side of her head as they made their way out of the Slat and into the busy streets of Ketterdam. 

She huffed, the words on the edge of her tongue and yet still sounding so wrong when she said them, “You may call me Poppy.��

“Poppy’s a wonderful name,” he beamed so wide that she wanted to punch him in his mouth just to see how many teeth she could knock out.

“Then you can have it, I’ve never been particularly fond of it,” she replied, letting the poison drip from her mouth like it always did. They were still walking side by side, weaving easily through the groups of people like they were a young teenage couple on a stroll to some opera or play instead of two dangerous criminals that were going to be trying to take down a competitor for their boss.

There was a beat of silence and she heard the man take in a sharp breath before he blew it out slowly. He then said, “My name is Kaz.”

“That’s not a very Zemini name,” she replied curtly. She knew that they had to pretend to be making pleasant conversation with each other so that they could go unnoticed while trying to infiltrate the more dangerous parts of the Barrel, but she also detested it.

“I thought that it would be best to pick a Kerch name when I came here as a child,” Kaz replied. 

She turned and looked at him, scrutinizing his face for any kind of lie. It wouldn’t be the first time that someone had fed her a bunch of drivel about where they had come from or how tragic their pasts were to try and get closer to her. That was the main thing she hated about the body that she had grown into.

Instead of saying anything or trying to call him out on a bluff, she just turned her head back to the busy street and kept walking.

---

Missions came and went for Poppy, as they always had. Another change had occurred in her life, however, but this one seemed to be more pleasant than the other ones had been. Kaz was becoming a bit of a friend of hers.

She didn’t think that the other Dreg was at all suited for the life that he had fallen into. He was sweet and compassionate, and more than a little ignorant to the world around him. There had been more than one time where Poppy had to grab her dragger from where it was always hidden along her bodice so that she could protect him despite the fact that he carried a pistol on him at all times.

She hadn’t really known how to have friends before, she had been too young and too isolated on her farm when she was young enough to learn that skill. She didn’t make friends with the other Dregs because they were all far older than her and several of them had attempted to come onto her the first time that she had come out of her room dolled up. Kaz had never tried that on her, which she was eternally grateful for.

She often found herself sitting on his bed as he sang to himself, just enjoying his company. They ate together on most days and were paired up to go on missions and jobs more than they were with anyone else. They worked well together, especially when Kaz learned that Poppy didn’t like to be touched and liked being prodded about the same.

The moment of the sixth biggest change in her entire life came during one of those times. Poppy was sitting on the edge of Kaz’s bed, her head turned towards the window so that she could watch the flickering of the lamplight shining down on the passersby, people that were completely unaware of the sinisterness that ran deep within the veins of every person. She was wearing her chemise with her corset done up around her chest to push it down because she couldn’t tolerate the lump that it left when she got dressed that morning. It was the same reason that she had chosen her pants that day despite some of the work that she was told to do.

Kaz was perched on the little stool that he had for the vanity he had bought with the money he saved from working for the Dregs. Poppy didn’t understand why he would want something that expensive when he could have paid for something far more crucial to everyday life. She didn’t question him as she barely understood the minds of others outside of how to get what she wanted from them.

They were both quiet as Kaz picked at some of the little bottles of perfume that he had splayed out over the top of his vanity. “Poppy?” he asked, his eyes flickering up to meet her own in the mirror.

“Yes?” she asked. She had been speaking lower that day, which was helped by the injuries that her childhood sickness had given to her throat.

“How much do you know about Novyi Zem?” he asked, still refusing to turn and look at her.

That gave her pause. She traced her gloved fingers up and down the head of her cane for a moment as she thought about the way that she wanted to respond. Finally, she said, “I would say a fair amount.”

Kaz turned to face her finally and she almost jumped back when she saw the intensity of the emotion in his eyes. Before she had the chance to ask what was wrong with him or why he was acting the way that he was, he said, “I think that I’m a girl. It’s a very common thing in Novyi Zem but it was still going to be so hard to transition if I stayed back in my hometown because so many people had known me as I was but then I came here and it doesn’t seem like anyone is so I just changed who I was so that they wouldn’t find me. But I don’t think that I can keep going on like this. Were you serious about giving me your name?”

For some reason, the idea of switching genders had never occurred to Poppy before. It was likely because she had been too busy pickpocketing people to survive and vividly reliving the worst moments in her life every time she closed her eyes. Having the short first sentence that her friend had said spread out in front of her for the first time left her sitting on his- her, Poppy reminded herself- bed with her mouth open like an idiot.

She had apparently been too quiet for too long because Kaz stood up and bolted for the door, which she locked. Kaz almost never locked her door because she was too trusting, something Poppy had chided her for time and time again. “I’ll give you a month’s wages if you promise not to tell anyone.”

“What? Absolutely not,” she, Poppy shuddered at the reference to himself as that in his own mind. His thoughts were whirring faster than the waters that lapped at the massive stone piers of Ketterdam. Everything that had come with the discomfort of growing up and going through puberty suddenly made sense. The disgust and borderline fit that he had when Jordie had woven all of those blue ribbons into his hair to try and make him look presentable for that godforsaken meeting that ended up being their downfall. The fact that he hated touch was most likely a combined side effect of what had happened on the Reaper’s Barge and the fact that his body did not feel like his own.

The realization that he was a boy rang through his head like the morning bells, waking up a part of himself that he hadn’t even realized existed. “Will you calm down?” he snapped when Kaz was still fluttering about her small room to try and fix her perceived slight on him.

“How can I calm down when I just bared my soul for you and you’re likely going to have me killed for it?” she asked, rather melodramatically, as she sat herself back down on her stool.

“I will do no such thing,” Poppy shook his head. “I was simply realizing that being a different gender than the one that you were assigned at birth is an option for me as well. And plenty of people here are trans, it’s just something that you’re expected to keep rather hushed up. No one talks about themselves as much as you do, Kaz.”

Relief had spread over her features the more that he spoke and reassured her that she was safe with him. The moment that he said her name, she deflated and looked down at where she was worrying her hands together in front of her. “Oh, please don’t call me that,” she murmured.

“Right,” he nodded. “I was never particularly fond of my name but I certainly can’t use it now.”

“What?” she asked, tilting her head up at her friend in surprise.

“You’ve opened my eyes to something that has been staring me in the face since I was ten. I’m a boy and you’re a girl, but we have mismatched names. We should switch,” he replied simply, as if he hadn’t just discovered something that was going to affect his every waking moment from that second forward.

---

Kaz Brekker was born on that late Summer evening. The smell of rain and the perfumes that his close friend Poppy had used soaked into the memory, mixing with the euphoria of being who he was. They had constructed an elaborate hoax where they both disappeared for a while and then returned under the correct genders with the names that they preferred. There were a few people that recognized them and tried to make a stink, but they were quickly dealt with. 

Months later, Kaz would become the leader of the Dregs and then promise to buy the building that would become the Crow Club with Poppy. However, he knew that as the leader of a gang he couldn’t have someone that knew something so sensitive about him so close to him. So, despite the fact that she was his only friend, he double crossed her until he was the only owner of the Crow Club. They didn’t see each other again for a long while, until he took an incredibly risky job, but the feelings of resentment she harbored for him could only go so far since Kaz had given her her name. 

[420technoblazeit]

hey, I've been looking around but i can't seem to find the answer i want and i know you've played danganronpa so i figured I'd ask you. you've said danganronpa's portrayal of minorites and characterization can be pretty bad, but is it worth it to play with a critical eye? the genre seems right up my alley but i don't want to be like. disrespectful. i just don't know if it's the homestuck death of the author or the harry potter Do Not Touch kind of deal.

so unfortunately. danganronpa v3 is in fact one of my favorite games in the world. which i feel like i dont have to say is complicated considering the fact that they have an islander caricature in the game and my country was literally an island country colonized by japan. it's fucked up and i could write essays about why i think angie yonaga is an incredibly problematic character while most of the fandom seems to have no awareness whatsoever of it. i wish angie wasn't in the game at all but anyway.

danganronpa v3 is still really fucking good in my opinion. i don't think the first game is worth it but the second game also very effectively delivers on its themes of like. perpetuating mental illness in teenagers, how it's exacerbated by academic pressures, and how society often fails in properly addressing those struggles. the third game has a less concrete theme but it's also really good and has a whole bunch of really complex characters. you can write goddamn essays on how nuanced these guys are im not joking and it's the best killing game media i've found so far

as for the racism, homophobia, and transphobia? it's ridiculous. look up the trigger warnings for the second trial in the first game because it's maybe the worst example of violent transphobia i've ever seen in a piece of fiction. like theyre probably outdoing media from the 50s with this shit, im begging you to look up trigger warnings if you get into this game. it goes into some really dark corners and it doesn't do it tastefully either, you will know WAY too much about the author's bigotry if you play danganronpa. any time a darker-skinned character or a character who's coded to be queer or trans pops up just take a step back and look at it with a critical eye. that's all i can really ask as a queer trans poc

what i'm saying is danganronpa has a lot of good and a whole lot of bad too. just know what you're getting into when you start this series. i think it's very possible to get into it without supporting the creators (you can find pirated copies fucking EVERYWHERE and even the newest addition is 8 years old at this point) so i'd say it's fine

[hopeymchope]

Honestly I always saw Chihiro as more of an allegory for trans men more than anything else, in terms of how their storyline was treated. If there were ever an international/American live-action adaptation, I’d expect Chihiro to be explicitly adapted as such, television being television. Same with confirming Hiro is black (which apparently is a controversial idea in part of the fandom, at least on Twitter)?

Note: I'm reasonably sure that this refers to the first point I made in this long answer.

ON CHIHIRO FUJISAKI:

Oy... I find that the smartest move when it comes to Fujisaki is to treat them like the first two rules of Fight Club :P

I love the character, they're a sweetheart, but — as this anthology story accurately stated — the second you refer to Chihiro as either male or female, you're going to cause a, um, "heated debate." (Which is putting it mildly. It can swiftly explode into an outright war.)

It's the touchiest subject in the fandom. People who interpret the character strictly either way tend to not want to hear from the other side and have DNI warnings on their blogs and bios and all kinds of shit. I think this stems in part from just how personally people relate to Chihiro. They can be a very personal source of comfort for people with specific experiences.

Depending on how you interpret them, you might relate to the pressure Fujisaki's under to conform to normative gender roles/expectations OR their difficult experience with secretly being trans and being unable to share their truth.

If we look at the game strictly as it's written in the text, the character is about the former issue. But Danganronpa was released in 2010 into the Japanese market — not only a place where LGBT rights are well behind where they stand in America, but also two years before the issue of trans rights really started entering mainstream discourse in the West. So it's not out of line to suspect Chihiro's a stealth allegory about the trans experience.

AHHH, but the layers of the argument run even deeper! Because even among people who interpret the character as being trans, there's the separation of those who see Fujisaki as transfem vs. those who see them as transmasc. The former seems to be the more popular interpretation among the "Chihiro is trans" crew.

I keep using "them" and "they" because I just don't even wanna be in this debate. Clearly. Shit, I've never done any fics involving the character because then I'd probably have to say "he" or "she", and I just CANNOT. Too dangerous. I wish this wasn't the case, but this is where we're at.

HOWEVER... !

I do have ONE version of Chihiro Fujisaki who I think I can make a strong case for being defined a certain way. It's a post I've started to write twice and never had the guts to finish because, y'know, Chihiro fucking Fujisaki = first two rules of Fight Club. Suffice to say there's ONE particular "official" AU where I think there's an especially strong argument for one specific take on the character.

Maybe one day I'll break down that theory. Maybe. And then lose like a couple hundred followers the next day or something :P

ON YASUHIRO HAGAKURE:

I don't think I've ever heard/seen it posited that Hagakure could be interpreted as black before now, but I find the suggestion intriguing. I can definitely see where you're coming from. I think that'd work really well. Although then again? Maybe it's not much of a compliment to make Hagakure representation of black people in the DR1 cast, given that he's kind of a moron. :P

Japanese people are born into a variety of skin tones that can range from pretty deeply tanned to practically white as a sheet, but the typical beauty standard enforced in the culture is that the ideal = the whitest, most porcelain skin. "Whitening" products continue to be a major part of the beauty industry there today, which I think is a sad situation. So I always just assumed that Hagakure (and by extension, also Asahina and Owari) were representing the under-appreciated/put-upon darker-skinned contingent of the Japanese population.

But you know, when you take his hairstyle into account? It becomes VERY easy to interpret Hagakure as being of some African descent.

Furthermore, he actually looks a little darker-skinned in DR3 than he does in his DR1 sprites, which further fuels that potential.

It does seem logical to me that, if some international adaption were to be made? They'd probably take these darker-skinned characters as an opportunity to represent multiple races/nationalities. Black, Latino, etc.

[my-gf-is-kazuichi-soda]

Kind of a drabble about adding Miu to my romantic f/os

I've never been so indecisive about adding a (romantic) f/o.

like. I even used to selfship with Wario (even though I never blogged about it. that was one of my earliest selfships).

but...

like...

nggh! on the one hand, Miu is mean, and gross. on the other hand, she's lonely and self-destructive, and I want to make sure she's alright. she's already our friend that we check up on a lot, and got Mikan and Shuichi and Kaede to check up on her too, and we all ended up peer pressuring her to stop turning to drugs or other self-destructive tendencies because she couldn't stop picturing our "sad little faces" (I was touched when Kaz told me she said that. I hadn't asked her to stop doing drugs, the topic makes me feel too awkward, but the others had and I guess with how worried we all were about her, it made her want to work on herself.) But she still seems lonely, and also jealous of a lot of her friends dating each other, especially me and Kaz and Tenko.

so uh, maybe we could fix her with kisses.

(or maybe she'd make us worse? lol)

also, the chaotic potential of adding Miu to the group is hilarious. (in hindsight, the anon that asked me about adding Toko to the group was almost prophesizing 👀).

I've...already got headcanons for her with our kids... I think I trapped myself with this...

like, of all the things to push me to this brink...

(this is so random) have you ever seen Defunctland: The Awful Wiggles Dark Ride?

I found myself thinking about me, Kaz, and Tenko bringing our three kids when they're all still little on this ride (let's pretend it's still in operation, or maybe it got abandoned but it's still there and Kazuichi could get it in working order. So could Miu tbh.)

I couldn't picture us riding this without Miu there as well. We would all enjoy it, mostly because of the kids (I feel like Miu would have the most childlike wonder about it and Kazuichi would still be rambling about the technical stuff an hour later. Especially if it was the broken version where the tvs or rooms would be on/off at the wrong times. Tenko would be the least likely to enjoy the ride itself (which is like me as well, but I've at least got a little nostalgia for the Wiggles), but she's got an excited toddler bouncing on her lap, so she's pretty focused on that.

So after imagining that, I ended up coming up with headcanons about Miu with our kids.

When the first baby (Ren) is born, Miu is the clingiest out of all of us to this baby and keeps saying they're "the spittin' image of me!" (meaning herself). This is false, the baby's bio parents are me and Kaz and they very much look like a combination of us two. Still, we know this is Miu's way of saying she adores this baby. We're not worried about her being unhealthily attached though; she's still pretty busy with invention ideas and always hands the baby back to one of us when she needs to go work on those, or when we ask her to (but only me, Kaz, and Tenko. She glares at anyone else who asks to hold the baby, lol.)

(Pregnancy, and specifically fictional trans woman pregnancy mentioned in next paragraph. Not sure if anyone needs that as a trigger warning, but just in case. I know pregnancy in general can bring up complicated feelings for people).

I was pregnant with the first baby and picked out the name Ren (who later came out as nonbinary). Tenko was pregnant with the second baby, a girl, and picked out the name Aimi. Miu was able to transfer the third pregnancy to herself and become one of the first pregnant trans women in the world (I feel like it is pretty in-character for her to not only try this but end up being successful. Let me dream okay?) She also had a baby girl. We all asked Miu first if she had a name in mind, but Miu didn't want to pick a name and likes most of the names we suggest anyway. Kazuichi picked the name Yoshi. So our kids are Ren, Aimi, and Yoshi.

Not sure when/if I'll draw fanart and write stories for all of this (maybe the Wiggles car ride though), I feel weird about selfshipping with Miu and Tenko even though I'm still writing the fanfic about just me and Kaz (and that fanfic will definitely take a while). But I'm holding myself to ridiculous standards. I can ship with them just because. I also worry about being unfair by focusing on Kazuichi the most, but I know it's okay to have a main f/o.

[iliadette]

What are some reasons to actually like Spirk + Star Trek?

I'm an ORV fan but I used to watch Voyager as a kid and I've seen a one or two of the newer movies a few years back (dark something something?) I stayed away from the Star Trek fandom as an adult because I mainly associated it with racism and misogynistic nerd guys.

Hi, anon. Sorry if this ask will take a long time to appear, English is not my first language an I am bad with words on a good day.

You're probably thinking of Into Darkness. It's the second reboot movie. There's a lot of different opinions about those lmao. Personally, I love them even though they do have bad bad points, but then again, I love everything about Star Trek, even at its worst.

There's no denying that there was a bit of period-typical misogyny in the original Star Trek, and it got worse in the long run after Rick Berman was selected for production. Latent misogyny, hetero and amatonormativity, as any 60-to-90s show does. To deny that would be stupid. But.

Star Trek was one of, if not the first, tv programs to depict people of different races working together, as equal as they could get in a military-like setting, in a time when segregation and Cold War were still a thing. A Black woman, an Asian man, a Russian one, a Scottish one, all holding a major position in a government vessel, all iconic characters to this day. Censorship never let him, but Gene Roddenberry, the original creator, always intended to include queer people in ST, as I will explain better later. ‌The original series had episodes which very clearly condemned nazism, racism, the Vietnam war, genocide. The Ferengi race of the Next Generation were created to be a satire of western capitalists but were wrongly pegged as an antisemitic stereotype. If a major character is disabled, they have accomodations made for them, they don't have their disability erased, though I hear that Strange New World kind of fucked that up. An episode of TNG was in protest of conversion therapy though people didn't like how it ended. A major theme of Deep Space Nine revolves around colonialism. It had the first black protagonist (commander and later captain); the first female first officer in the franchise to have a major role, who formerly fought in a resistance movement against a the occupation of her planet by a fascist imperialist race; the first trans woman in all but designation, who btw very much kissed another woman in an absolutely iconic scene; a canonically very neurodivergent doctor. Voyager had the first female captain to star in a series. Seven of Nine's character is particularly dear to me because while it's obvious that she was added mainly to boost and entice the male audience with her sex appeal (and well, I am sapphic and far from immune), it's also obvious how much the writers and Jeri Ryan cared for her storyline and growth. She's such a complex character, I really love her. Seven-centric episodes are always a treat for me. I can't remember anything else off the top of my head, sorry abt that (I also haven't watched Enterprise and the newest series yet so I can't talk about that).

Does ST have bad moments? Misogynistic, racist, homophobic, ableist, amatonormative moments? Hell yes. Some episodes are really cringy and have very bad writing. But there are more good ones than not, and those are the ones I live for, the ones that can give you a message that stays with you, where there was somebody in the crew/cast who read the script, saw something terrible, and went "this will not pass on my watch" and worked together to fix whatever they could. I'm sorry if your experience with Star Trek was with dudebros who think "the woke of the latest series ruined the franchise".

Now, about K/S. I believe with all my heart that nobody needs a reason to ship any two or more characters together. That said, I think Spirk is one of those ships where you have to wear anti-ship goggles not to see the potential (but no big deal if you don't). They touch each other all the time, they risk their life and career multiple times to save the other. This is not inherently a sign of non platonic feelings, and they sure aren't canon as we usually mean it, but.

Writers sure had a field day sprinkling suggestive bits (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) all throughout the franchise, especially queer writers (Theodore Sturgeon, writer of Amok Time and Shore Leave, may his soul be blessed for all eternity).

Bonus for how they look at each other. (1) (2) (3) (4)

Roddenberry himself described their relationship as one of love. It's not mentioned in the series, but in the books it's revealed that they share a telepathic bond that connects their souls, which in Vulcan culture is called t'hy'la which can mean "friend, brother, lover". This definition was created specifically for the two of them, so this is a very obvious wink/nudge, if not an outright acknowledgement that "yes they're in love, but homophobia exists so this is all we can do."

In The Motion Picture when Kirk looks at Spock like a lovesick puppy after a long separation, and the simple feeling not much later.

And can anyone dare to say that those death scenes from The Wrath of Khan and Into Darkness are supposed to be platonic, or what Kirk says about Spock at the beginning of The Search for Spock, that his death feels like he lost "the noblest part of his soul"? And what about "Not in front of the Klingons"??

The books, too, have some very interesting nuance.

Sooooo yeah I absolutely think that Spirk is and will always be the one ship that best comes to mind when it comes to ST. In my eyes and in those of a lot of people they're canon in every way that matters, and if either of them had been female there would have 100% been a marriage in one of the movies, à la Riker/Troi. They'll forever be my ST otp, though I'll occasionally indulge a little bit of Spones and McSpirk. I could even like and reblog other ships like McKirk or Spuhura but only in fanart and only in moderation. I personally wouldn't be interested in reading fanfiction about those. But every ship is valid and equal in fandom, and none is superior just because it's canon and/or had a major role in the birth of shipping culture. Which is the very point all this behemoth of a post originated from, I guess.

This.... Has turned into way more than I thought. Sorry about thay. I hope my answer was satisfactory, anon. Also that I didn't bore you. Hope you have a great day, and thank you for reaching out. ❤️🖖

[queen-beefcake-sqx]

Ask game, feel free to comment for both fandoms please or skip for one.

2,6,7,9 16, 17, 21, 22,

I'm going to like.... jump around to whatever fandom I feel like for each question.

2. a compelling argument for why your fave would never top or bottom

Okay so I did this for Disco Elysium so -- He Xuan would never bottom. My compelling argument is he told me personally. Next question.

6. which ship fans are the most annoying?

I'm sorry but all ya'll Qi Rong fans who keep trying to find him a boyfriend... I support you, but maybe go stand over there? please????

7. what character did you begin to hate not because of canon but because how how the fandom acts about them?

Again, did this one for Disco Elysium, so again tying into the above answer... Qi Rong is a character I'd like to be able to spend more braincells thinking about, because I think there COULD be some interesting meta I could make about him, but the fandom seems to have a very predetermined way of thinking about him and writing him that makes it so hard for me to want to engage.

9. worst part of canon

I feel like I can't speak on DE just because I haven't finished or explored it as thoroughly as I'd like to yet. For MXTX books... God I'll be so honest it was silly and fun the first time, but I cringe rereading the whole Statue Mecha scene near the end of TGCF. It's so ridiculous and outlandish that it breaks emersion for me a bit.

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

Okay, I'll be SO HONEST -- as someone who's come to better accept his trans masc-ness because of Kim Kitsuragi -- I'm kind of shocked at the sheer amount of trans!Kim fics. And I guess there's a part of me squinting at it going, "Isn't there something a little weird about ascribing transmasculinity to a character who -- in the real world -- is part of a race that's often feminized (the "pretty Asian boy" stereotype) and is visually the most slender and short of the male characters? Like? That feels a little weird to me, ya'll..."

(Like, not saying stop, I get it, and the fanfics handle it really well on the whole, but also like... I think it's worth asking ourselves (1) WHY Kim gets this treatment over Harry or another character and (2) WHAT kinds of queerness we're ascribing onto characters. Especially in light of stuff like me seeing KimHarry on a yuri poll.... like. come on ya'll. A tiny bit of critical thinking) (and again. not saying "don't write queer characters" but maybe like... consider diversifying your options).

17. there should be more of this type of fic/art

Tip Top Racer Kim. Why the fuck are none of you writing Tip Top Racer Kim Kitsuragi AUs. Why. Where's the art. Where's Kim in tight fitting racing uniform huh??? (which. uh. if anyone has a good artist you'd recommend for a commission....) (I am LEGALLY obligated to drop my favorite DE fic now just so you all can see THE POTENTIAL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/40802268) Also not enough Jean crossdressing fics, send tweet. That blonde wig is all I think about and there's so much unresolved in that choice....

21. part of canon you think is overhyped

In Disco Elysium, who the FUCK are these student communist dudes everyone is talking about because I LITERALLY haven't seen them.

Also for TGCF, the underwater kiss scene. The actual kiss is honestly secondary to me to EVERYTHING ELSE happening in that moment because people seem to forget how INSANE the circumstances are.

22. your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores Oh for my MXTX fandoms that's easy -- I am easily the second most Beefleaf brain rot person you'll ever meet and the Black Water Arc of TGCF is everything to me. Everyone always talks about the climax and the beheading and sure that's cool but the BUILD UP? The visit to Fu Gu and watching the performance of He Xuan's massacre? The Truth or Dare game in the temple? The foreshadowing with the Water and Wind master statues? The visit to Shi Qingxuan's terrace and the poetry written there? BREAKING SQX OUT OF HER PALACE BECAUSE SWD IMPRISONED HER? AND THEN SQX WALKING AWAY FROM YUSHI HUANG'S FARM AFTER "MING YI" TRIES TO GET HER TO STAY BEHIND? None of you talk enough about the LENGTHS He Xuan went to to try to avoid getting SQX involved in SWD's death and it makes me ABSOLUTELY INSANE ON A DAILY BASIS!!! I am chewing on glass about this!!!!

[glitterparpaing]

i was reading a male character x neutral gender reader (leave me alone, i wanted to know what it felt like) and it still felt very heterosexual, even though i couldn’t exactly pinpoint why.

like there was no pronouns or physical description, but there was something off and as a trans guy i couldn’t really identify with the character that was supposed to be me

and then it clicked.

first of all, classic heterosexual trope, everyone assumes he is my bf. which is like, not the case at all in most homosexual couples. actually, the fact that they see us as friends or siblings no matter how close we try to look IS A PROBLEM. now yes i could imagine we are living in a world full of allies, but this trope is still mostly used in straight romances and it doesn’t really feel right.

second, my character is supposed to be kind of a rebel, telling everyone off, a little careless. i can’t exactly tell you why, but it just feels like this kind of rebel girls we often see in 2010’s tv shows and movies. i know you know which one im talking about. she is there to counter the 'damsel in distress' trope, but most of the time she just does too much and is considered annoying by most of the fandom (if that’s not intentional).

lastly, it just feels like the pronouns were taken off to give this a gender neutral feeling, but the author didn’t go further than just this. there is a very latent heterosexual feeling and even though i think the male character is very hot, i can’t really engage myself in the fic because it just SMELLS straight.

so what i wanna say from all this is not "you should be even more gender neutral". because is that even possible? trying to detach yourself from norms society fed you with for decades is far from easy and believe me, i know what it’s like. and even so, you’re going to be influenced by everything you’ve seen, by the things you like, by the fiction you usually consume. that’s a fact, and i don’t blame you.

what i want to say is maybe wanting to appeal all audiences by making your fiction desperately gender neutral is not the right solution. yes, i’m upset most fictions about this character are openly straight, but i don’t read them because they’re not for me. now, i see that you are trying to make it better for non-binary folks and men, and i recognize your effort, but your work is very much influenced by straight tropes, tropes that we don’t participate in.

i don’t know where i’m going with this, tbh. i don’t really know the solution, except maybe we should write fictions with tropes we actually like, for us and by us? don’t hesitate to give me feedback!

[katatonicimpression]

Salty comics ask: 2,3,5,7, 11, 21, 38. If you feel like it. Character(s) of your choice.

2. What character death for the sake of drama was the worst?

Everett's is pretty bad. They announce that he's dead, then proceed to do an entire 4 issue arc that has nothing to do with him before even explaining what happened. Then, after the explainer, they barely mention him. And I think actually the fact that (similar to the Hellions), his resurrection on Krakoa hasn't featured any of that angst or drama because it's not the direction they want to go with Emma..

But yeah. Transparently done for the drama, to raise the stakes. And, much like with Thunderbird or Darwin in the First Class film, it's a tired racist trope.

3. Who is your most hated comics writer?

Gezza D.

Although, there's definitely overall worse writers out there. There are some attrocious comics that I've struggled through. But in general, I'm not one for going out of my way to look up who the writers and artists are for everything I look at. If I remember their name, I remember their name.

And I genuinely think it's not good to get too fixated on these figures, especially when you don't like their work. I've been hyper aware of how fucked up even the valid criticism can get, when it's relentless, large scale and directed at a single person.

So, I guess I'm saying that I hope Gerry doesn't have tumblr.

5. Who mischaracterized [x] the worst?

Monet? Cullen Bunn wrote Uncanny X-Men (2016) so fuck that guy I guess.

Bobby? Whoever had the idea to pair him up with Mystique.

7. What “throwaway” character could they have done more with?

Ooh, there's a lot of good answers to this.

I'll put forward Mel from that first Cap storyline with Nightshade. No reason why they couldn't bring that back and make more out of it, even if he's dead.

Mindmeld. Interestingly, the new character of Escapade is also a trans woman with similar conciousness transfering powers. But they're hardly similar outside of that; there's plenty of room. Bring back Mindmeld.

11. What’s the worst art you’ve seen?

I saw your post with the Greg Land examples. Seconded.

A lot of Liefeld options, obviously.

Sometimes it feels pretty mean to harp on art for not being so good. I get the "they're professionals, they got paid for this" argument, but whatever. Hell, sometimes I like it when the art looks kind of shitty because it gives me hope for my own lol.

But I will say that, for me, when it's that more realistic and hyper-smooth style that was big in the 2005-2015 era, that's when I have the least sympathy. There's so much technical competence on display and yet so often, really poor compositions of the panels and just a sub zero taste level. So yeah, Greg Land.

21. Who’s the most overhyped villain excluding the Joker?

Thanos was more entertaining in his early days when he was goofier.

I think it makes sense that the MCU used him as their first Big Bad, but I personally do not care about him or take him seriously as an existential threat in the slightest lol.

And specifically, I think the effort to rebrand him as a serious, universe destroying, massive big serious scary, manly man scary villain, makes him less fun. And because of the movies, they're going to keep him as the biggest of big bads forever now. Boo.

38. What character that was reduced to a love interest deserves so much better?

Honestly the phrase "reduced to a love interest" is not one I associate with good faith arguments (see: MCU Sharon hate), but there's something to it sometimes.

Most of the examples I can think of are temporary (e.g. Monet is a love interest in Weapon X-Force, Rachel is basically just a love interest in Captain Britain - The former was awful and the latter is... fine). It's not always an issue when it's temporary and done well, but is a problem if it's a rut the character gets stuck in when they're only "so-and-so's partner", or if they're really ooc or the writing is insulting etc... It also doesn't count if they were only ever conceived of as a love interest.

Weirdly, the only character I can think of that this has definitely happened to is Layla Miller, who hasn't been a character outside of Jamie's wife and a mother to their kid for like a decade.

I'm sure there are better examples, I'm just drawing a blank.