#theorizing? predicting? making fanfic off of a fanfic?

[tai-janai]

my shipping brain said "yknow who the emotional manipulation would work on?"

[starblightbindery]

Binder's Note for Forms by Trebia

How Forms fits in the long tradition of Star Wars fanfic.

My hope is that this project captures a snapshot in time from Star Wars fandom het shippers between December 2015 and December 2017, before the franchise confirmed any emotional intimacy—if you can call it that— between Rey and Kylo Ren in Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017).

Trebia, then aged 24, wrote and published the first chapter of Forms on Archive of Our Own on December 18th, 2015—the exact release date of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. When posting this first chapter, Trebia noted, “I’m just working off of memory from the one viewing I saw last night.” The entirety of the fanfic was completed and posted an exact month later, making this fic historically significant in Star Wars fandom as one of the earliest published “Reylo” stories.

A serialized novella that was churned out in an astonishingly short time frame, Forms is notable for predicting many elements of The Last Jedi (2017) and The Rise of Skywalker (2019), including the Reylo Force bond, Rey walking away from her training with Luke Skywalker, Kylo Ren pleading with Rey to join him, and Kylo Ren pushing his Force energy into Rey to save her life.

Throughout the story, Trebia mashed new and old Star Wars elements together—characters like the Mandalorians and Admiral Daala, settings like Illum and Kuat⁠—evincing her fondness for the Galaxy Far, Far Away. Forms has classic tropes from this franchise, like stealing a uniform to go undercover in an enemy base and the forced proximity of a “Slow Boat to Bespin.” Present in Forms are scads of fan theories from between the release of The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. These included the theory that—echoing a Legends plot line from Dark Empire (1991) where somehow Palpatine returns and Luke Skywalker joins the dark side to try and take him down from the inside—Kylo Ren had strategic reasons for his apprenticeship to Snoke. Like many Reylo fan-works set in-universe, Trebia lends justification to his many antisocial acts, part of shipper efforts to make the character more self-relevant and sympathetic.

Forms weaves in tantalizing threads that were tossed around by fans and concept artists but ultimately not pursued, including Dark Rey, Stormpilot (Finn/Poe Dameron), and Rey's saberstaff. Trebia even predicted the Kuat Drive Yards plot line started in The Last Jedi (Rose Tico’s contempt for weapon's manufacturers on Canto Bight) and continued in the abandoned Episode IX: Duel of Fates script by Colin Trevorrow. Forms also addresses loose ends that probably should have been covered for a more cohesive nine film saga, like the Chosen One prophecy and direct interaction between Anakin Skywalker and Kylo Ren.

No discussion of Forms can be complete without also placing it in the context of Star Wars fandom in 2016. Reylo was a fringe pairing that made intuitive sense to many Star Wars fans, particularly women; however, prior to The Last Jedi, the ship was dwarfed by the popularity of slash ships like Finn/Poe and Kylo Ren/Hux. At the time, many fans theorized that Rey was Luke Skywalker’s long-lost daughter, making her Ben Solo’s first cousin, making Reylo an incest ship.

As noted on the Fanlore wiki, the tags on this fic changed over time. In addition to “Riding the bus to hell either way” Trebia joked with tags like “Possible incest?” and “Not incest until proven guilty in the court of law.” Following the release of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Trebia celebrated by replacing those tags with a celebratory “IT AIN’T INCEST.”

The story's strong influence in early Reylo fandom reflected a hunger for more Star Wars romances about the pull between light and dark. After all, the sequel trilogy did not set up Kylo Ren as a horned, alien-appearing monster or a wrinkled geezer. Unblemished by the ravages of the dark side, Kylo Ren was depicted with pillow lips and a fabulous, voluminous coiffure unencumbered by his helm (which really should have flattened it to his scalp.) The groundwork for a lightsider/darksider romance was previously explored in other Expanded Universe stories. At the forefront of these were watered down lightsider/darkside romances like the tepidly written romance between Luke Skywalker and former Palpatine agent Mara Jade. Given Mara Jade was hardly a champion of the dark side, there was no risk of corrupting Skywalker. But the Expanded Universe also boasted stories that played with this dynamic, like the twisted connection between Fable Astin and Jaalib Brandl by Patricia A. Jackson for the Star Wars Adventure Journal (1994), the conflict between Jaina Solo and Zekk in Kevin J. Anderson's Young Jedi Knights (1996),or the passion between Darth Revan and Bastila Shan in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (2003). In this respect, Forms and the rest of the Reylo fan fiction oeuvre continues the grand fan tradition of Star Wars villain fucking.

“Darksider and lightsider conflict is one of the most fascinating points of Star Wars,” Trebia said in 2016, when interviewed by Spencer Kornhaber for The Atlantic. “Rey and Kylo represent the fight to find the balance.” Yet, at the time, the fledgling “Reylo” ship was abhorred by affirmational Star Wars fans who despised the emphasis on shipping with a female gaze, as well as scorned by media commentators who found the ship to be “problematic.” In male-dominated, established fan spaces like Reddit and Jedi Council Forums, discussion of Reylo was effectively banned by moderators through the freezing of threads. In other fandom spaces like Twitter and Tumblr, discourse about Reylo mirrored larger purity culture. The ship became a convenient target for alt-right misogynists, and also for anti‑shippers concerned that the ship “romanticized abuse.” Productive and unproductive debate arose around media consumption construed as agreement or approval, whether a sympathetic Kylo Ren lends people to give more latitude to real-life white right-wing men with anger management problems (or if it's the other way around), and if shippers can tell the difference between a fictional antihero and the same dangerous thing in real life. Critiques of Reylo fandom also included the implicit racism inherent in the sidelining of John Boyega’s heroic character Finn in favor of white whiny fascist Kylo Ren. (It did not help that 2016 also saw the election where white American women voters decided to displace a competent Black man with a white whiny fascist.)

In the September 2020 issue of the Journal of Fandom Studies, Andrea Marshall notes that Reylo “fan fiction acts as a locus of resistance to gendered oppression as feminist authors construct selves that critique the source material and the fandom for gendered oppression within tropes and attitudes.” By having Rey actually interact with and befriend a woman other than Leia, Forms already improves on the source material. It's a delight to see Forms depict older women over age fifty who are plot-significant and interact which one another, if only because Star Wars movies are fairly gender regressive. On the other hand, Rey's strategy to convert Kylo back to the light is to uh, suck the badness out of him. It's Padmé Amidala logic—sure, he arranged the wholesale slaughter of an entire village, but he can also deftly finger you to orgasm! Granted, Star Wars is infamously a franchise of excuse making, where really shitty dudes manage to turn it around and do the right thing at the last minute. Forms also doesn't push all that hard to actively resist the neo-fascist allegory in the sequel trilogy, particularly in Trebia's appendix, which dissatisfactorily explains that all of the First Order war criminals in the story ended up as instructors in military academies. (Who would even hire them, Albus Dumbledore?!)

Fics like Forms led to “ship wars” discourse, which led to the publication of ozhawkauthor's “The Three Laws of Fandom” meta essay on January 1st, 2016. “Laws” is a bit of a misnomer since there is no enforcement body; the essay is more of a request for courtesy in fandom spaces. The laws were also meant to apply specifically to shipping, not fandom or media criticism as a whole. “It’s not up to you to decide what other people are allowed to like or not like, to create or not to create,” wrote ozhawkauthor. “That’s censorship. Don’t do it.”

For fans conscious of fandom history and the impact of censorship in spaces like FanFiction.net and Livejournal, ozhawkauthor's guidelines—(1) Don't like; don't read, (2) Your ship is not my ship, (3)Ship and let ship—felt intuitive. This is reflected in spaces like my bookbinding guild, Renegade, which—similar to Archive of Our Own—takes a hands off approach to policing content. This did not prevent widespread handwringing about Reylo content. Star Wars fan ughwhyben reflected on the “gigantic fandom that is suddenly experiencing a renaissance, where an influx of mainstream folk are trickling into (or running into) the fic side for possibly the first time right now and don’t have this training. It’s like we’re flickering back and forth between the modern evolution of fic side fannish culture and what things were like in, for example, 2001 when I first stumbled in.”

Decades ago, in May 1981, Lucasfilm reacted to the publication of “Slow Boat to Bespin” by Anne Elizabeth Zeek & Barbara Wenk by declaring a ban on smut in fan fiction. I've included in the errata of this binding a letter from 1981 written by the Star Wars fanclub president to circulating fanzines threatening legal action. While slash was also caught in this net—disproportionately targeted given non-explicit gay romance was not okay even though Star Wars has non-explicit het romance—it was this fairly tame (by fic standards) heteronormative fic, featuring Han Solo and Princess Leia, that signaled to Lucasfilm that smutty fanfic was no longer on the fringes and now needed to be addressed to protect the “wholesomeness” of the franchise. Subsequently, fanfic writers had to make a conscious decision to flout Lucasfilm’s policy and go forth with propagating their smut.

And, in 2016, of all the ships in all of fandom, it was the Reylo Star Wars pairing, featuring this specific heteronormative female power fantasy (of being able to leash a villain by the dick to drag him back to the light) that led to a communal reaffirmation of these fandom norms. In her interviews with the The Atlantic, Trebia directly quotes from the Three Laws of Fandom, endorsing “ship and let ship” as a basis for creating Reylo fanworks. “I am fully involved in the garbage compactor that is this pairing, and I love it,” Trebia said. “No matter what way it goes, I will stick with it.”

After studying early romance novels from the late 1600s and early 1700s, Ros Ballaster observed a polarity between didactic love fiction and amatory fiction. Didactic love stories are sweet—aspirational, moral, and idealized—while amatory fiction is spicy—erotic, transgressive, untethered from social sanction. We do see representations of didactic love in Reylo fan fiction, particularly in contemporary romance “Modern AUs” like Ali Hazelwood's The Love Hypothesis (2021)where the Kylo's homicidal Sith rage is sanitized to a more socially-acceptable grumpy academic brooding. One can comfortably bring Adam Carlsen, Ph.D home to meet Mother. But certainly, the majority of Reylo fic written by fans gravitate towards and come with the self awareness of the amatory. For one, Trebia loudly proclaims in her Chapter Two author note: “MORE TRASH FOR THE TRASH GOD.”

Discourse over the “morality” of Reylo fan fiction tends to overlook the distinction between the didactic and the amatory. As compelling as the idea of a “Force dyad” is in fantasy, this relationship is not meant to be aspirational in a literal sense. Yet, readers of Reylo fiction were and continue to have to defend their interest in the archetype with disclaimers—yes, it's trash, yes, I know it's problematic—while men in fandom are not held to the same standards when it comes to “problematic” media they consume or enjoy, whether it's a Michael Bay blockbuster film or male-gaze pornography.

As Deborah Lutz notes, “The Dangerous Lover Romance” is a centuries old, conventional way to represent erotic desire and romantic love. The “sublimely tormented Byronic hero” is hardly groundbreaking, to the extent that Rian Johnson's depiction of Reylo in The Last Jedi subverts the trope—at the end of the film Rey isn't enchanted, she's repulsed. The same way Star Wars replicates Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey monomyth, Reylo stories like Forms reflect the broad appeal of the “how-the-turntables” Dangerous Lover romance—where the woman protagonist, initially subjugated by the debased, restless misanthrope, ends up subjugating him through her strength of will and the power of love. Trebia's Kylo even sports malevolent scars like so many Gothic male romantic leads before him—always on the face. In the Gothic romance, the heroine accesses socially undesirable aspects—power, rage, craving, desire—as expressed by her double, the Dangerous Lover. His presence in the story provides a basis for her disinhibition. The Reylo ship follows a well-trodden cultural script of transgressive female desire.

Forms the fan fiction novella is a notable cultural artefact reflecting a distinct period of time in Star Wars fandom. At the time, Reylo fanfic held all the promise of improved representation for women characters, crossed with the instinctual, regressive insistence that maintains a white male character in the forefront. Reylo fan fiction produced in early 2016 also led to the reification of anti-censorship values in fandom. Seven years later, a fandom that was once derided has gone fully mainstream, as fic writers like Ali Hazelwood, Ashley Poston, and Thea Guanzon top traditional publishing bestseller lists. What Trebia knocked out, hours after her introduction to the characters, is now it's own Star Wars literary tradition.

[chloecherrysip]

Now that I've had a few hours of sleep and am marginally a human being again, let's talk about the mario movie some more! SPOILERS ALL THROUGHOUT THIS POST UNDER THE CUT (if you want to see my non-spoilery thoughts and the first part of my spoiler talk as well, here's that post from last night! Be warned that it's pretty all over the place because it was 4:30 in the morning and I was really tired lolol)

After thinking about it more, I truly do have some PROBLEMS with this movie (will talk more about some of that below and I covered a lot of the issues in my first post too) and I do wish it was better overall and not so painfully surface-level with all the character interactions - I can understand why some people REALLY don't like it while others love it! It's joyful and energetic and BEAUTIFUL but if you spent months and months theorizing and speculating about deep character interactions and a very emotional story, it does really sting to finally see how there is virtually NONE of that and the plot feels kinda empty as a result. :(

But! I'm definitely not upset or anything like that, and I'm still gonna see it two more times in theaters with a smile on my face! TRUTHFULLY (and if you've seen my blog before, you know this about me) what I cared about most in this movie was getting to see Mario and Luigi be adorable onscreen and have a good, healthy, loving relationship, and you do get that to some degree, even if it's nowhere near enough. I can make my peace (and write a lot of fanfic, LOL) regarding the rest. :)

Here is a list of moments between Mario & Luigi that made me happy:

FIRST OF ALL, SOMETHING THAT I'M NOT ACTUALLY SURE I LIKED BUT WAS CERTAINLY A CHOICE: Mario's nickname for Luigi is Lu????? He calls him that 3-4 times and at big moments, too. It started to be cute to me, even if I wish they'd gone with "Weegie" or something similar, but it's a little jarring at the beginning for sure.

In general, they are just very physically affectionate with each other! There are one or two quick hugs in the beginning scenes before we even get to the reunion. Also, I can't remember the specifics but the very last scene is them basically teasing/poking each other before running off into the day together and it's cute. :)

Mario is SO protective of Luigi in the Brooklyn scenes and let me tell you, as someone who cares DEEPLY about that, i was LIVING. He gets mad at Spike and tries to pick a fight only when he insults Luigi, and there is also a silly scene with an angry dog and Mario just instinctively puts his arm up in front of Luigi when things get a little scary/focuses on making sure he doesn't get hurt, and I was just having the BEST time. Honestly, I loved the Brooklyn stuff so much that I sincerely wanted the whole movie to just be about that, and things took a downhill turn for sure when the separation happened. :(

Someone definitely predicted this before the movie but Mario hates mushrooms as a food and Luigi likes them. During a dinner scene, Mario is slyly separating mushrooms from his food and putting them onto Luigi's plate in a way that suggests he's done that a LOT. Such a quick shot but I just liked the detail!

THE RUNNING THROUGH THE CONSTRUCTION SITE AND MARIO DOING RIDICULOUS PARKOUR BUT ALSO STOPPING TWICE TO MAKE SURE TO TURN BACK AND OPEN THE GATES SO LUIGI COULD COME THROUGH NORMALLY. There was just something SO funny and sweet about [crazy jumping and leaping] [quiet, thoughtful pause to open the gate] [MORE CRAZY JUMPING AND LEAPING, WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING, SIR] [another quiet, thoughtful pause to open the 2nd gate], I loveeeeee

Once again, just gotta be obnoxious about being right that the dialogue in the warp zone was "nothing can hurt us as long as we're together!" I HEARD THE LINE AS THIS IN THAT PREVIEW FOOTAGE AND EVERYONE CONVINCED ME IT WAS DIFFERENT BUT LOOK WHO'S LAUGHING NOW (i'm sorry, just let me have this win haha)

There is a sad moment where Mario and Luigi's dad clearly doesn't believe in their business and he even says to Mario something like "the worst part is that you're dragging your brother down with you" which is clearly upsetting to Mario so he leaves the dinner table - but then Luigi leaves the table too to come and sit with him and reassures him that he's not dragging him down and it's just a sweet, comfortable moment between them that I very much wish went on a little longer (the theme of the whole movie lol)

(Also, Mario and Luigi still live with their parents and share a room, they're clearly pretty young and are treated like the "babies" of the family. I wish we had seen more of their room other than a very extremely brief shots!!)

Luigi DOES immediately sell out Mario when Bowser goes for the serious mustache damage, LOL, but the way it's done is honestly so cute and once again, just reemphasizes how much Luigi loves Mario XD He's basically like "YES, I know him, he's my brother Mario and he's the best guy ever!" (And then Bowser, who is preoccupied with Mario = romantic rival for Peach's affections, is like "would a princess find him attractive???" and Luigi is like "if she has any common sense, she should!" (lol, that line could be TOTALLY wrong, I don't remember, but that's the gist of it, I promise) or something like that - just hyping Mario up when he's not even there, LOL

in Mario and DK's "darkest moment" scene where things seem hopeless and they're arguing, Mario says something like "well, at least your brother's not going to die because of you!" and noooo, bb, it's not your fault ;; (this scene could have been done SO MUCH BETTER with a few tweaks, btw, but I will get into that)

Luigi bringing coffee for Mario at the end of the movie in their respective cups :) :) :) So simple but I am a very simple person who just wanted to see little moments like this :) :) :)

I have GRIPES with the final battle scene but seeing Mario and Luigi work together and take care of Bowser as a duo was still good!!! Nothing can hurt them when they're together!!!

Also, already talked about this at length in my first post, but one more time: Mario saving Luigi from falling into the lava and their reunion hug is just my favorite moment of the movie, no contest, it goes by so fast and I wish it was longer but I can be happy with that alone and I can't wait for the screenshots/gifsets where I can see all the details of it more clearly and don't have to rely on my awful memory. Literally just going to think about that split-second of Mario holding Luigi's face with both hands in an unbearably sweet, gentle way forever. These brothers love each other very much, your honor ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

ALSO ALMOST FORGOT: FLASHBACK TO THEM BEING BABIES (AND THEY LOOK SO FAITHFUL TO THE ORIGINAL DESIGNS TOO!) AND MARIO PROTECTING LUIGI FROM A BULLY (lol I very much wish it was a longer and/or more creative flashback, but STILL sweet)

AND NOW THAT I AM DONE WITH BEING POSITIVE ABOUT MY FAVORITE BOYS, LET'S ~*~COMPLAIN~*~

First of all, still CANNOT BELIEVE that "I'm not afraid! I'll do anything for my brother" didn't make it into the movie, are you SERIOUS, it would have been perfect in SO MANY PARTS, they recorded it and everything, why???? IS THERE A DELETED SCENE??? ARE THERE SEVERAL DELETED SCENES??? I DEMAND JUSTICE FOR THAT PERFECT LINE, I WILL MOURN IT FOREVER

The editing in general is a little odd sometimes and it really DOES feel like a lot of scenes should be there that are missing. Another VERY weird cut is in the scene where Peach, Toad, and Mario are crossing the bridge with the Cheep-Cheeps and they just immediately cut the scene when one latches onto Mario's face and don't even include the cute stuff from the trailer with Peach trying to help him??? Like, WHY???? WHY DID THOSE FEW SECONDS NEED TO BE CUT??? I DON'T UNDERSTAND

I think one of the most painful things about this movie is that, as a writer/creative person, I can see SO many small opportunities throughout the movie where a couple of extra minutes and some tweaks in the writing would have made SO much difference. An unbelievable amount of difference! The overall structure of the story and the plot is good! The story of Mario wanting to reunite with his brother and Peach wanting to protect her kingdom (that took her in and cared for her when she was all alone in the world) is solid! But they never give the EMOTIONS surrounding these things ANY space to breathe beyond one line here or there, and that is SUCH a mistake and I can't believe no one thought to do something differently here.

FOR INSTANCE: The "darkest moment" scene with DK and Mario! It goes by so fast, but there is some good stuff there that, if the movie took a MOMENT and really let their pain/fear for their loved ones and their shared complex of unsupportive fathers BREATHE, would work SO MUCH BETTER. Like, I can easily imagine a rewritten version of that scene with very similar dialogue but just MORE of it (more pauses, more emotion, more reactions to one another's problems, more recognition of their similarities, etc) would have made it like a DAGGER in the heart. SUCH a missed opportunity. I am itching to rewrite it, LOL. (I am itching to rewrite a LOT of scenes!)

ALSO: Luigi is my LOVE and he is adorable throughout this, but I'm gonna be the first to admit that his scrap of an arc in this movie (if you can even call it that) is so lackluster and his heroic moment at the end genuinely doesn't feel that earned! AND ONCE AGAIN, WITH A LITTLE EXTRA WRITING/ROOM IN THE RUNTIME, IT'S A VERY SOLVABLE PROBLEM

And the solution is: build out the prison scenes and have Luigi actually talking to someone else who is locked up!!!!! Other than a couple of lines and jokes, the prisoners don't TALK TO EACH OTHER and Luigi just spends a lot of time looking sad. We don't get ANYTHING about his thought processes while he's captured other than he is thinking of Mario and hoping his brother comes to save him like he's always done.

WHEN CRANKY KONG AND THE OTHER KONGS SHOW UP, HAVE THEM SHARE INFO ABOUT MARIO'S APPARENT DEMISE WITH LUIGI!!! HAVE LUIGI TALK TO HIM (OR THE PENGUIN KING, OR SOMEONE) ABOUT HOW HIS BROTHER'S ALWAYS LOOKED OUT FOR HIM BUT MAYBE SOMETIMES, HIS BROTHER MIGHT NEED SOME SUPPORT TOO AND HE'S GOTTA BE STRONG FOR HIM TOO

It doesn't have to be a long or especially deep conversation, but some lines of dialogue like this would make that moment where Luigi realizes that Mario is right, nothing CAN hurt them if they're together and he's gotta be strong for his older brother too and he jumps in to protect him from Bowser hit SO much harder. That's all it would take!!!

I HAVE ACTUAL WORK TO DO TODAY AND CANNOT GO ON AND ON ABOUT THE MARIO MOVIE FOREVER BUT LAST THOUGHT FOR NOW: the more I think about the final battle, the more I'm conflicted, haha. The twist of everyone from the Mushroom Kingdom ending up in Brooklyn is definitely SHOCKING in the moment and pretty creative but I don't know, I had my heart set on a more classic version of Mario VS Bowser. It just doesn't hit as hard as it could in the end because of how silly the setting is. :( (But the Mario and Luigi teamup with the power star is great, and the music IS fire) (Also LOL at myself for thinking "Luigi won't fight at the end, that wouldn't make sense since Mario had to train" - he just knows how to fight, the movie goes with what's cool over what's logical and that's fair XD)

Also, the end of the movie is a tad confusing and has some pretty huge repercussions for this version of canon? ARE THE MUSHROOM KINGDOM AND THE REAL WORLD PERMANENTLY MERGED TOGETHER BECAUSE OF WHAT HAPPENED??? That's definitely what it seems to imply with Mario and Luigi waking up in their Brooklyn room and then walking out straight into the Mushroom Kingdom! It's pretty bizarre! (Honestly, what I was expecting was that the Bill would destroy the warp pipes and Mario and Luigi wouldn't be able to go home, which I might have preferred, as sad as that would be.)

That's all I got for now! I'm sure I will have more thoughts in the future, haha.

[swiftwidget]

MHA: Fling Theory

While writing a much, much longer analysis and prediction post (which we will finish and post hopefully by Wednesday - fingers crossed, it’s already been delayed over a week because of work schedules and additions) and a portion discussing what @aoimikans​ and I know of the wider-known Dad for One Theory, I had to pause while discussing the topic of Nana Shimura’s husband.  

At the time, I had been writing about the alternative ways All for One found Nana Shimura and her husband (whether he was a hero, a civilian, or perhaps the 6th User of OfA) and killed her husband. I mentioned there is an alternative theory floating around that All for One was actually her husband, but it is generally easy to debunk based on canon information, including recent information given to use via Gran Torino’s flashback: 

In a recent chapter, when we see Gran Torino watch Nana as she gives up Kotaro, Nana says later in the flashback “if he learns of Kotaro” as if All for One was not aware of the boy, to begin with. That may imply that her husband was killed while she was pregnant and she escaped AfO’s attention long enough to raise Kotaro for a few years. 

One would think that if AfO was her husband, he’d know about Kotaro early on, or at the very least know of the attempts to have a child. And if AfO already knew of their connection, he would try to use it against her and put both her and her child in danger. Not only that but when All for One finds Shimura’s family later on - and he would have to have found them to show interest in Tenko - he simply allows Kotaro and Hana to die. Kotaro, Nana’s son, and Hana, Kotaro’s daughter who resembles Nana in both name and appearance. If he had been her husband and found she’d managed to hide away a child, I can’t imagine he wouldn’t move to possess that entire family somehow. 

Then… It occurred to me that there is another alternative option which I’m calling the Fling Theory. 

All for One approached Nana Shimura under a different name and quirk (much like the theorized Dad for One = Hisashi Midoriya situation) and attempted to get close enough to her to create a relationship, trick her into giving him One for All (and maybe even a child at that point). All for One was unsuccessful stealing the quirk by force up until then. Perhaps he thought a different approach would work, and being a charismatic person and egotistical it sounds like something he’d do. 

Maybe it got as far as a night of passion before Nana realized who All for One was and fled. That would certainly give one plausible explanation for why everything seems so personal when All for One discusses Nana Shimura. Moreover, if she discovered she was pregnant after? A marriage to a hero or civilian husband to cover for the existence of a child would be necessary to hide him. Again, in Gran Torino’s recent flashback, there is that focus on what Nana says: “if he learns of Kotaro...” 

If Nana fled this false relationship, found out she was pregnant but decided to keep the child, and got married to another man in a very short amount of time, wouldn’t that give the prideful All for One reason to kill the otherwise unnamed, unidentified husband first? Revenge against the woman who did what his brother never could except through death, escape him and build another life. When Nana makes the heartbreaking decision to alter her family registry and send Kotaro into foster care, she is not just protecting herself and Kotaro at that moment, but she is ensuring she takes the secret of Kotaro’s father to the grave.

Which makes it all the more terribly ironic given what we believe All for One did upon discovering Kotaro and the life he’d built for himself. 

We believe All for One discovered Kotaro and his family and watched them for some time. Enough time to know their names, their home life, the kind of life Kotaro’s children were living - specifically Tenko Shimura. In 2016, aoimikans wrote a fanfic called “What Lies Have You Told?” based on her theory that All for One gave Tenko the Quirk: Decay. Then in chapter 235, we see a man dropping Tenko off wearing AfO’s signature suit with no tie (just before Decay manifests). This seemed like pretty strong evidence for that to be the case. A while back during our MHA discussions, we also added to that theory that in exchange, All for One took Tenko’s (“Ten” 天 = sky, “ko” 子 = child) unmanifested Quirk: Air Walk which we saw him use at Kamino and was the only Quirk written specifically in katakana. (Sky child, Air Walk → Sky Walk → Skywalker because Horikoshi loves his Star Wars references.) 

All for One never learned of Kotaro’s true origin. In giving Tenko Decay, he put into motion the events that led not only to Kotaro’s death but also the death of Tenko’s sister, Hana.

Each time All for One tries to own/possess family, he ends up destroying it. 

And again, every time All for One speaks to and of Nana, it’s terribly personal. 

In the All Might Rising OVA, AfO thanks Nana for the “amusing comedy.” Is that a bitter reminder that what they had was an act? That it was all a game to him? (At least, it was meant to be a game until she escaped him for a time.) Either way, his monologuing at Nana, the personal focus on her, may have cost him the chance to capture All Might while he was young and unprepared to fight him. 

During their first fight and at Kamino, each time All for One talks about Nana to All Might, he mocks her to anger him. All Might is Nana’s successor but more than that he is like her son. He is representative of everything All for One could not get from Nana, both One for All the quirk and the love and loyalty of family (be it a child or his brother’s remnant in OfA). Of course, he takes every opportunity to rub Nana’s death and what he views as her shortcomings in All Might���s face. 

And how would All for One know of Nana’s ideals in order to mock them? How would he know of her signature push-up smile that he parrots at Kamino? The way he talks about her even as he mocks her seems to imply that he knows these ideals of hers, how she might talk about them, her vision of the future… Sure, she might have said things during their fight, but honestly, that sounds more like something you’d tell someone as you were getting closer to them.  

This theory naturally pairs well with the Dad for One Theory for a few reasons:

The resemblance pointed out between Nana Shimura and Inko Midoriya. (All for One has a type.) 

The resemblance and similarities between young Tenko and young Izuku. (A family resemblance?) 

The continued themes of family, lineage, and legacy that is shown throughout MHA but works specifically well when we think about how Shigaraki and Deku relate to either side of the All for One / One for All coin. 

The continued use of name puns and Star Wars references that hint and foreshadow. 

Side note: How does the 6th User of One for All fit in this theory? 

We assume based on what canon tells us that All for One has been trying to take back his brother’s quirk, the last remnant of his brother and only family. 

(All for One claimed to love his brother - though his view of love is clearly skewed toward simply possessing his brother - and he tried endlessly to manipulate his brother into showing his “love” in return with loyalty to him and his view of the world. In death and through the passing down of One for All, his brother had escaped him.)

Based on flashbacks, All for One’s attempts up until the 6th User seemed to include killing them off while they were relatively young. Maybe he was attempting to hunt them down, weaken them, and then torture them until they willingly gave him the quirk; however, he was never successful because each User of One for All was successful in passing it down to the next, playing a dangerous game of keep-away.

From the 4th (top right, long hair) to the 5th (see his jacket shoulder), from the 5th (center, bald) to the 6th (far right hand?), from the 6th (bottom center, black hair) to the 7th (Nana’s gloved hand at the very bottom of the frame?). 

Aoimikans and I were trying to figure out: Who was the 6th to Nana? 

He looks younger than most of the other users we can see (not counting the younger, blurry version of Toshinori), too young to have been teaching or training Nana. And in the frame discussing how the quirk was passed down, we see that his right arm is missing, he is offering his hair to pass on One for All, and also… 

… he’s smiling. 

There is something else Nana said that makes us wonder if maybe the 6th User was Nana’s first love:  

To be able to meet again at the end within One for All, she thinks it’s romantic. It may just be her personality, but the idea of reuniting with specifically the previous users is romantic to her. 

Could it be then that the 6th was her first, young love? Could it be that they were both heroes and when he was hunted down by All for One, the 6th hastily gave her the quirk with a smile on his face - a smile she pressed onto her face, and a smile she passed down to Toshinori?

Could All for One have found out that she had that kind of relationship with the 6th and attempted to replicate the feelings that led the 6th to pass OfA to Nana? 

Not only that, but there is that focus on the romantic with regards to specifically previous Users of One for All. Why don’t we see that kind of desire to reunite with the husband that was killed? 

Well, if she were trying to find a husband quickly (not necessarily for love), one who wouldn’t mind that she was already pregnant or who would want to just as quickly have a child with her under the belief she wasn’t pregnant - how best would she go about finding such a man? Quirk marriage. It was likely more common in her time. She’s a hero, young, and with a flying-type quirk. She’d be a catch for any man wanting a marriage focused on mixing quirks. And wouldn’t that be just the kicker for All for One? In his view, she fled him only to run into the arms of a man who wanted her for her quirk? His ego can only take so much of a beating. 

Possible timeline: 

The 6th and Nana have a romantic connection

AfO hunts down and fatally injures the 6th

The 6th gives One for All to Nana with a smile 

Nana escapes for a time

AfO discovers Nana and knows of her previous connection to the 6th

AfO uses his knowledge of their connection to try and manipulate her into a relationship based on falsehoods to trick her into giving him One for All 

Nana discovers AfO’s identity and flees

Nana discovers she is pregnant with Kotaro

Nana quickly marries a man, possibly through Quirk Marriage, to explain away the pregnancy

AfO finds Nana again after years and rashly kills her husband before finding out more about her life

Nana is forced to quickly give up Kotaro to foster care and alter her family records to hide him from All for One, keeping All for One from using the knowledge of their connection against her (again) 

Nana goes into hiding again, eventually finds and trains Toshinori and passes down One for All 

All for One finds Nana again but she doesn’t run away. All for One mocks her (allowing her successor and friend to escape) and kills her in the fight but keeps her hand. 

AfO later finds Kotaro and his family, gives Tenko Decay, unwittingly allows Tenko to destroy what family he had made, AfO takes in Tenko and gives him the name Tomura Shigaraki claiming that Shigaraki is his own surname - ironic to be giving his own grandson his surname thinking he’s simply taking from Nana Shimura the last remnant of her own family. Revenge for her giving away the last remnant of his brother to All Might.  

Meantime, AfO took on the name Hisashi, met Inko (who looks like Nana but would be in his view meeker), and had Izuku. 

Fun fact: Shigaraki is 20 in canon. Izuku is around 15. AfO would’ve likely taken in Tenko Shimura around the time Izuku was born. So, at that point in time, he thinks he’s won that battle. Started a family of his own with a Nana look-a-like, and stolen away Nana’s family. All he needs to do now is take back OfA and kill All Might. Then he’ll have everything he’s wanted.

Then, All Might smashes All for One’s Empire and head in, and he takes away All for One’s ability to be a part of the family he’d tried to create. Adding insult to injury, All Might takes Izuku under his wing 5 years later and gives him One for All. Stealing everything from All for One. (All but Shigaraki - the child pawn All for One raised to hurt All Might, not knowing his own grandson.)

And there you have it: Fling Theory!  

[mrs-denton]

Sappy Paul Denton x OC Fanfic [Part 2]

The Start of the Collapse

After Paul’s departure, Bebe’s eyes struggled to shut. She laid in bed and kept glancing over at her phone occasionally, half-expecting something from Paul to come up. When she realized worrying was futile, she put the phone down and laid it down on its charging pad. She was worried, but she tried equilibrating those thoughts with reasonable positive ones because she was pregnant. She had to avoid as much stress as possible.

Staying up to write, as she did on sleepless nights like these, she scribbled her thoughts into her diary until she crashed. In the morning when she awoke, the unwelcome feeling of first trimester morning sickness sharply seized her from her slumber. She went to the bathroom to alleviate herself from the nausea.

Treating patients at the hospital she worked at, including those with the Grey Death, was dreary. Their spirits were broken and some of them got desperate. She wished she could divulge the truth behind the virus, or at least what she knew, but it would likely get her fired. She made sure to wear the most protective gear—respirator, face shield, gloves, a gown, and foot covers. Her health was going to have to become her top priority if she wanted a healthy baby.

Hours ebbed and flowed with moments of hectic excitement during rushes of patients and emergencies, but inched like slugs when things were slow and she caught herself worrying about Paul. She wondered what time it was in Hong Kong—surely, at least half a day ahead—and if he was alive. She thought about JC as well and didn’t want any harm to come to the Dentons, namely because JC was a cool person, but especially because she knew Paul would be devastated if his younger brother should fall. She scrubbed the pressing thoughts away from the walls of her mind—months of meditation had helped—and she continued to show up at work.

She checked her work emails to see if by some crazy chance, Paul had been daring enough to send her a message there. But of course not—he would never do something to endanger them, especially with the Aquinas net. After what felt like a 12-hour shift, Bebe returned home with takeout and quickly checked her computer. There, an email from Paul—or rather, his alias—was sent hours ago while she was still at work.

“Hey babe. I made it safely to Hong Kong, thank god. Good news—everything’s taken care of. My brother and I are gonna be fine. The bad news is that I’ll have to be living here for a few months as I recuperate, as I predicted. I was in pretty bad shape when I arrived, which is why it’s going to take longer for me to recover. Tong wants to keep me under supervision for a while. But I’m already feeling better.

Things are pretty tight in HK. I’m a wanted man here as well. I don’t think making a move right now is wise, but I can’t wait to see you again. I’ll keep you updated whenever I can. Try to take it easy and don’t worry about a thing—I’ll take care of it. I love you, and I’m always thinking about you. - P”

Bebe typed a reply.

“My darling, I’m glad you’re alright. I was worried about you, but I also knew you’d make it through this. Give the doctor my sincerest gratitude—he saved the man I love. I’m also happy J is fine. I completely understand if you need to stay there—in situations like this, a doctor’s supervision is necessary even after the treatment.

Let me know how things go. I want to be with you but things have to be just right. I love you, P. I hope you get better soon. I already miss you. Hugs and kisses. Yours,

- B”

Within the following day, Bebe received another email.

“Bebe—so much is happening right now. I don’t have much time, and neither does the world. Just bear with me. I’m going to be fine, I think, but my brother keeps unearthing more of this conspiracy. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I know something will, and if it does, it’s going to be big. I can’t explain everything over the net, but I promise I will when I see you. I don’t know how much time there is and I know this sounds crazy but you’ll just have to trust me. Withdraw your savings now. There’s a high chance the net might crash and everything will be lost. Savings, records, and all sorts of info. Make sure you have plenty of food and supplies as well.

No matter what happens, I will find you! And that’s a promise. Just stay where you are. I love you so much more than you could ever imagine. - P”

Something inside Bebe told her Paul wasn’t lying. Everything Paul told her before and everything they had researched and pieced together made sense. She knew there could only be so much more to this story than most people knew and few had theorized about. After typing her obedient reply, Bebe set off for the bank and asked to withdraw the entirety of her account. Her salary provided her with decent savings she had accumulated over a few years.

But she wondered if the funny look the bank teller gave her was indicative of ignited suspicion. She knew it was. She smiled as the bank teller discussed the request with the manager, who gave her a poorly-disguised look of surprise. Who else but a shady person would just want to remove all their chits from the bank? Only somebody that knew something that most people didn’t know would act this way . . . She would just have to lie and say it was for a potential family emergency. Or that she’s just paranoid and that there are rumors the banks will fail soon. Hearsay type of stuff. But no, the latter would be too suspicious. Just go with the family emergency, she thought. 

Signing some papers that would let the federal revenue office know the reason for her massive withdrawal, she questioned just what the hell she was doing. She stopped for a while and glanced up at the bank teller, who was too busy counting chits to notice her. Bebe questioned herself for a bit--she was blindly obeying Paul’s orders, which wasn’t really a problem in and of itself, but how could she really know what was going on? Paul wouldn’t lie to her though. She knew that man for three years and he never lied. She just had to trust him. Worst case scenario, she’d be tracked down. But if nothing were to happen, she could just say she got worried sick for an ailing family member and took the money out to help with treatments.

“Forty-six-thousand, two-hundred and fifty-nine chits, ma’am,” the bank teller said, fat stacks of the electric green notes neatly sitting on the counter.

“Thank you so much,” she said, handing them the signed papers. “Here you go.”

She opened up her purse and filled it with the money, trying to act naturally. The teller and his manager looked at her strangely, as well as the clients behind her. She felt herself tense up.

“Thank you so much,” she said again. “Have a nice day.” She had a habit of being overly-polite sometimes.

And with that, she carried her loaded purse all the way to her car and drove home, the tunes blaring and the pedal to the metal. Suddenly, the music stopped. Could this be it?

She checked her phone and noticed there was no signal anywhere. The music stream was buffering continuously until it lost connectivity for good. Moving to the network settings, she confirmed there really was no net anymore. She couldn’t believe it at first, and then, she did.

Parking her car, she rushed inside the lobby of her apartment building. There were people standing outside with their cellphones in the air, trying to obtain signal, their faces scrunched in bewilderment. Glancing at the far end of two blocks over where one of the P-Mobile buildings was, people swarmed into the store to complain about their phone services.

“Miss, have you heard? The net’s gone black—disappeared,” the alarmed security guard at the reception said. “Everyone’s internet just shut off. Even the phones, TV, everything. We don’t know what’s going on.”

“Oh my god,” she said. “I’ll have to check mine out. Thank you.”

She went upstairs and rapidly scanned her nanokey to her door, eager to get inside. What would she do now?

She checked her computer. The internet was gone. No new emails from Paul, just the cached one from before. As she sat in her apartment, she heard her neighbors arguing loudly in desperation. Turning on the TV, she checked every channel, finding nothing but static—ultimately confirming everything Paul told her. Glancing outside her window and down at the congested streets, violence intensified.

After a few days to a week of the world descending into darkness, reports of the global net crashing and burning appeared on every newspaper. A national emergency was declared, and speculating specialists wondered who was responsible, pointing fingers at foreign governments and even “traitors” within the United States. The zealously religious stood outside every corner, wailing that it was the beginning of the Apocalypse, and the conspiracy theorists held meetings in their garages, claiming it was aliens. But soon enough, the Dentons were named. Bebe paid close attention.

“It is suspected that terrorist JC Denton and his brother, Paul Denton, are behind this massive communications collapse worldwide. We are slowly but surely receiving letters that confirm the internet shutdowns in every nation. Agencies are investigating the matter as best as they can.”

Her heart pounded in her chest. She just hoped the bank tellers didn’t put two and two together and decided to send somebody after her. After all, there was nothing suspicious about a woman withdrawing all her savings a few minutes before the world collapsed. But she sighed in relief when she knew that they wouldn’t have been able to pull up her personal information without the internet.

She thought about her family. Her dad had left them before she was even born, and her mother died of the Grey Death before Ambrosia was released. Her cousins were all living their lives as married people with children, and her only living aunt was old now. What would they think, though? What would they think if she were to run off with a “criminal”, a “terrorist”, a wanted man? Crises were meant to be times where family stuck together more, but with Bebe leaving . . . would they label her as selfish? Crazy? Bad? She only hoped that one day they would understand that Paul was not the person the media and the government was portraying him to be.

They didn’t even know she was pregnant. Engaged? Yes. They knew Paul and they liked him. But the media was a powerful weapon, especially now that the people’s only source of outside knowledge was funneled via the last remaining newspapers. They could twist and besmirch the Dentons as they wished, and people would buy it. Not everybody, though, as there were people who had been following the Juggernaut Collective—until it disbanded—and a few other rebel news disguised as tabloids and conspiracies. But alas, the perceptions of Bebe’s friends and family could definitely be warped against Paul. She had to be careful.

But most importantly, she had to figure out what the next steps in her life would be. If only she could talk to Paul. She wondered if she should keep going to work—part of her would think it better to disappear from society at once and wait until Paul came back, but the other part of her couldn’t just leave all those poor patients behind. She knew there were other doctors and nurses who would do a fine job—but could she really just disappear now? Did she still have to keep up her façade of normalcy? As if she weren’t the woman of the second-most-wanted man in the world right now?

She got up and started packing, hoping that at least sorting this out would bring her more clarity. What were her favorite clothes? What could she stand to leave behind? What would be useful? She took her favorite shoes as well as personal keepsakes and important documents, neatly enclosed in file folders and manilla envelopes, and put them in a suitcase. Most of the money was also stored there. Then, glancing at her desk, she took note of her journal.

How could she leave this behind? She had to take it. Unless, of course, she wanted to be that mysterious woman who left her revealing memoirs in a secret diary. She considered the thought briefly and then took the journal, the pages automatically splitting upon a section with a dried red rose that had been stamped between the weight of the pages. It was the first flower Paul ever gave her. She instantly smiled as she felt the crispy, dark garnet petals on her fingertips, her mind going back to when the petals were bright as fresh blood and smooth like velvet.

[0w0tsuki]

More thoughts on the Mikado fucking dies AU: Chapter 2 Edition

We return to this AU now that I've had some time to think on it and now have an idea for the direction it would take.

The second chapter is obviously going to be very void focused. If you remember last time I talked about it I mentioned I did not know what the void would do. Well I'm deciding to use that. The confusion and indecision. I feel like even with Nikei as leader they wouldn't know what exactly to do. They are just kind standing back and gauging the situation.

Now remember how I said monocrow was going to become a lot more active. Well he's going to provide a motive. You see the two most dangerous individuals who caused discourse among the group (Mikado and Syobai) are "dead" so the students are just hoping that the worst of it is over and the void are a lot less inclined to kill knowing that they will die for real if they get excecuted. So no one is going to kill without a shove in the right direction.

Now for the motive. Remember the motive from the second chapter of the first game? Well imagine instead of getting your own deepest darkest secret you get someone else's. This way we can slip info to one of the students the identity of one of the voids. Mind you that it will only be one of the voids. Mikacrow (My new name for monocrow who is being puppeted by Mikado's programing) isn't playing fair and only wants the idea of the voids out there. He'll make something up for the secrets for the others. (Speaking along those lines I'm unsure whether or not I want Kanade's serial killer secret to be one of these or not)

So yeah what I'm lining up for second trial is a void victim and a student killer. Now for the victim I'm thinking either Iroha or Emma. Nikei needs to survive to at least where he died in canon because I want to explore what it's like when they arrive on chapter 4's island when there's no Mikado to betray. Hajime I just think he's a neat character who I want to explore in general. Now I know the Iroha haters are probably jumping at the bit for the idea of killing off Iroha as early as possible but I'm leaning more towards Emma. It's nothing against her it's just that we never really got a lot of info on Emma and I just don't feel confident in being able to write her. I just wouldn't know what to do with her. Iroha just generally would be a lot easier for me to write even though she is a pretty static character she is a lot more predictable. The second reason I thought of is because I thought it would be a neat idea to swap the canon killer/victim and have Kokoro as the killer. Remember how I said Kokoro would be hella SUS of the voids. Well the motive would confirm her suspicions and we might get a Kaede situation on our hands. Though the descisions are not set in stone and if you have any ideas or arguments on who would end up killer/victim I'd love to hear them. Now onto some side stuff.

After the trial Mikacrow will inform everyone that the victim is not the only void. With one of their members having been killed and the truth finally out there Void is a lot less inclined to cooperate with the group. I don't know if they would go full fledged trying to continue the plan but they sure as hell ain't coming out.

Sora's secret. I feel like it would be interesting if the info of her being Akane was out there. Either given to Yuri, Teruya, or one of the voids. Yuri just because of her history with Akane. Teruya to further instill his paranoia of the group once he regains his memories potentially earlier if the motive gives info on what Akane did. I just like the idea of Sora being isolated from the group because she's suspected to be the MM even if she doesn't have any memory. The voids just because I know they weren't originally given any info on Sora and it might be a nice bone to throw them given the difficulties they are going through. But speaking of Yuri and Teruya.

You may have noticed that I used she/her for Yuri. That's because I'll be giving Yuri a trans arc. I have a post in my drafts. It's part explaining what Yuri's backstory might be extrapolated from what little information we have on her, part using Yuri's transness to give insight into some of her actions and behaviors, and the last part was me theorizing what a trans arc might look like for her. At the end I just realized that the last half was just an outline for an AU fanfic. So once I had this AU idea I realized that it slots in perfectly so that's what I'm doing. Expect a salvaged version of that post with the first two topics in the future.

And then Teruya. To be honest while I was writing this I rememberd "oh YEAH. Teruya gets introduced into the killing game in this chapter". It's just a side effect of never thinking about boys. I am probably going to need to do some more research on him. Although I don't think the Mikado change has to much effect on him until we start getting into the later chapters.

Anyways that's all my thoughts on the AU currently

[prepare4trouble]

Good Omens fanfic - Looking Like This

So, I posted this last night, having written it literally minutes earlier. That was a mistake. I’ve since made a couple of minor changes, corrected a few typos, changed the title, and posted it again.

This fic was partially inspired by this post by @fuckyeahgoodomens, which theorized what would happen if Crowley and Aziraphale had been unable to swap back into their correct bodies. I have no idea what I’m going to do with it, I might write more, I might not. I hope I do. 

“Right,” Crowley said, offering his hand to Aziraphale, “Swap back then.”

Aziraphale took the hand and through the physical contact, the two of them slipped back into their own bodies.  Only… they didn’t.  Crowley frowned, gripped Aziraphale’s hand a little tighter and they tried again.

Nothing. They each remained firmly where they were.

“Uh… you’re not doing something funny, are you?”

“Me?!” Aziraphale asked, shocked at the implication. “I was about to ask if you…”



“Yeah, okay.” Crowley interrupted. It wasn’t Aziraphale, he had known that already, but he had still needed to ask, to make sure. That look of panic on his friend’s… well, on his own… face had been all the answer he needed. He broke contact, took a deep breath and tried to focus. “Right. Again.” For a second time, he offered his hand, and for a second time Aziraphale took it.

For a third time, nothing happened.

Well, not nothing. This time, Crowley was hit by a sudden and unshakable feeling that things had gone very wrong.

“Well, shit,” he said.

He looked at Aziraphale, or rather, he looked at himself. Even with the shades covering his eyes, it was easy to see that his friend was feeling the exact same thing.

“Shit,” Aziraphale confirmed.  His hand slipped from Crowley’s and came to rest on the bench between them.

“I don’t get it,” Crowley said. “What went wrong?”

Honestly, he had a few ideas. The first of which was that Heaven and Hell weren’t actually the clueless idiots they had assumed them to be, and that their respective forces had dreamed up this little twist as some kind of perverse form of amusement. He dismissed the idea almost instantly — it wasn’t nearly cruel enough for either side, it was more the kind of thing that he himself might have dreamed up to amuse himself on a rainy afternoon — but the thought refused to bugger off, sitting irritatingly in the back of his mind.

“I don’t know,” Aziraphale said. He stared at his… at Crowley’s… hand in confusion. “I don’t know,” he repeated, a little more quietly but with an edge of panic beginning to creep into his voice.

“Okay, don’t… let’s just try again” Crowley suggested. He didn’t hold out much hope of attempt number four being any more successful than attempt numbers one through three, but he wasn’t going to let anybody say that he didn’t try. He had spend a lot of time in that body; he had grown attached to it.

Aziraphale hesitated this time before he took the hand, but eventually grabbed it and held on as tightly as he could. The shades did nothing to disguise the fact that he was screwing up his entire face in concentration. It wasn’t a good look on him.

Nothing. As Crowley had expected.

“What are we going to do?” Aziraphale said. “I don’t want to be you!”

“Oh,” Crowley folded his arms and glared pointedly at the angel, “Well, I’ll try not to take that as an insult! This was your idea, as I recall.”

Technically, it had been Agnes’ idea. Or maybe Agnes had simply watched it happen and written it down in order to give the idea to Aziraphale, who wouldn’t have had the idea if it hadn’t been predicted by… Crowley stopped trying to figure it out before it started to make his head spin. Which wasn’t actually something that most demons did on a regular basis, despite what happened in the movies.

Aziraphale shook his head. “No, I mean… look, it was fine for a little while. It was fun even. You know, walk a mile or two in someone else’s shoes, wait for the inevitable attack by the joint forces of Heaven and Hell, take a bath in holy water.” He grinned, remembering. “I asked for a rubber duck,” he added. “I made the archangel Michael miracle me a towel!”

Crowley couldn’t help himself, he laughed out loud at that image.  “Well, I guess that part was a success at least. They should leave us alone for a while, anyway.” That didn’t help with the current problem, of course.

“That doesn’t help with the current problem, of course,” Aziraphale said.  “I can’t be you.”

“You think I want to spend the rest of eternity wearing a white suit and a bowtie?” Crowley countered. “I mean, look at me!” He ran the back of his hand down the front of the suit as though he was brushing away some speck of dust.

“You never had a problem with the way I looked before, as I recall,” Aziraphale noted.

It wasn’t so much the way the body looked as it was the style that was uniquely Aziraphale’s. He had no problem looking at it, walking around next to it, eating dinner opposite it. What he did object to was wearing it for himself. It was… humiliating. If this lasted much longer, he was going to have to go shopping at the first available opportunity. “I don’t have a problem with it,” Crowley insisted. “It’s just… not very me, you know?”

“That’s the root of the whole problem.”

Crowley sighed. That was the kind of statement that it would be impossible to argue with.  “Yeah, you got me there,” he said instead. He got to his… to Aziraphale’s… feet and held out a hand, “Come on, no point sitting around here all day worrying about it, is there?”

Aziraphale frowned, but took the offered hand and allowed Crowley to pull him to his feet. “You had another venue in mind?” he asked.

Honestly, no. All he knew was that swapping back wasn’t working and he didn’t want to spend the rest of the afternoon sitting on a park bench trying, and failing, to perform what should have been a relatively easy demonic miracle. It was frustrating, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was lurking, watching, and probably laughing about it. “Not really, no,” he said. “But once the whole swapping back thing was done, I was going to try to tempt you to lunch. What do you say?”

Aziraphale frowned, then pushed up the sunglasses that covered his distinctly inhuman eyes. “Looking like this?”

“Not like we’ve got a choice in the matter, is it? Whatever we do right now we’re going to be doing like this. Might as well do something we both enjoy.”

Aziraphale considered it, then sighed and shrugged. “Fine. Why not? Who knows, maybe if we try again on a full stomach, it’ll work.” He paused, then smiled. “How about the Ritz? I believe a table for two has just miraculously come free.”

Honestly, Crowley wasn’t sure that food, or time, or anything else, was going to make a difference. It was as though something had fundamentally changed, some shift in reality that had made the switch back a physical impossibility. He wasn’t going to give up though. It had taken millennia, but he was finally happy with his hairstyle; he wasn’t about to let Aziraphale loose on it for longer than was absolutely necessary.

“Sounds great,” he said. “Shall we?”

He offered an arm to the angel at his side, who took it with a smile, and they walked together through the park to their waiting table.

(part 2)

[wackygoofball]

Calm thy teats, my friends!

This is an important announcement for my blog and I ask you to respect my choice as much as I respect anyone else’s choice regarding the content of his/her blog.

I already got an anon in my inbox complaining about the latest episode.

I am repeating what I said before:

My blog is my happy place. I will keep it as such.

You won’t see my bashing the show, its writers, the characters, or the episodes before I have seen them all in context of the very last episode, its very last minute.

You will not see me raging or complaining and shouting about bad writing as I have not yet seen the conclusion of this tale. I am a show enthusiast and until the last episode, I will remain such.

Please refrain from sending me angry anonymous messages or chat me up only to shout about “bad writing” or “disrespect” or “character assassination” and “OOC-ness” or whatever else. I won’t hear it. I won’t engage in such fruitless conversation.

I won’t answer to it because that is not what I am here for. I am not interested in that. At all. I am here for honest debate and discussion, about theorizing about what may well be the next fakeout after Jon Snow “died” some seasons ago and no one ever really talked about it since.

I ask you to respect that. 

I will write my thoughts done about this episode in due time. I have a lot of them. It caught me off-guard, which I always regard as a good thing because that means it was not predictable, not foreseeable. If you want to listen to my thoughts, be welcome to my blog. If you want to discuss these thoughts and weigh in, be my guest, but leave angry raging on the doorsteps. Because I am not having them in my house.

I am here for my favorite OTP, which cannot be taken away from me ever again because they are, de facto, canon. You can’t unfuck someone, period.

My blog is my happy place. If you want to make yours an angry place, that is your choice, but I won’t let that be my blog, my place, my house.

If that forces me to withdraw again until you have calmed down, then that is so. I respect angry feelings and frustration and sadness as a lot of them are likely currently feeling it, because emotions are like that. I am emotional right now, too. But I have no interest in those kinds of hazardous conversations that only lead to people hating and raging and having a bad time.

So please, respect that, don’t send me those anons, don’t chat me up only just to bash or whatever else. Sends them to those who want to engage in such conversation, as I am sure there are plenty of them.

Just always remember:

Calm thy teats, I mean it. Take a step back, breathe, count to ten, maybe to one hundred, and then look at what you have before your eyes before you let emotions rage and cloud your judgment.

The last episode has not rolled yet. We don’t know the full context yet. We don’t know what’s still to come.

JB iscanon in every sense of the term, no one can take that away from us ever again.

For all that may frustrate you now, for all that may make you sad, there is fanfic to fix it.

We are going to be okay.

Thank you.

[krixwell-liveblogs]

“I wouldn’t have minded,” Imp said.  “I wouldn’t have anything to contribute, but I’d like to follow along.  And I can’t figure out my niche in the group with the trio being so… trio-ish.”

The trio! Heh. I like how the newcomer is the one who finally points out in-story the dynamic of Taylor, Brian and Lisa having the tightest connection and the most relevance, while the remaining three are the flanks of the team narratively.

Which is actually reflected in the piece I brought up in the previous post, with Alec, Aisha and Rachel being literally in the flanks (though Rachel is a bit more in the foreground than the other two).

Anyway, I officially predict that this is going to be Aisha’s arc in this, well, Arc. She’s probably going to be critical to success. Which makes a lot of sense considering the way Coil’s power works - it’ll be far less useful to him if he doesn’t know there’s a threat. That’s one of the main reasons for the sneaky planning in the first place.

“Trio-ish?” I asked.

“Tattletale, you and my brother.  Making all the plans, you’ve got the nemeses…” Imp paused.  “Is nemeses a word?”

Yes.

“Yeah,” I said.

“And you three have the brains, of course,” she stabbed a finger in my direction, as if it was an accusation, “Which leaves Regent, me and Bitch, following along, expected to obediently do as we’re told.”

She’s absolutely right.

Though some of that seems to be because they haven’t tried very hard to contribute in the same ways the trio does.

I suppose it’s a good thing Brian and Rachel aren’t here. I don’t think either of them would like to hear this. Though Lisa would be fine with it, I think.

“Let’s quit and start our own group!”  Regent said, throwing one arm across Imp’s shoulders and gesturing dramatically with the other as he continued, “Regent, Imp, and Bitch, the Othersiders, a spin-off team.

Ahaha!

There are plenty of fanfics about the Othersiders, right?

And we’ll stick with Coil while the others turn traitor, and we’ll have this epic fight…”

I mean I was pretty much theorizing that exact thing for a while there.

Minus Imp, I suppose, but that’s because I literally forgot she existed while I was theorizing on it.

Imp took his cue, “And Brian and I will go head to head, and it’ll end in this dramatic moment where he says something pretentious-”

You know, I’ve said before that I like these two together, but I’m not sure I’ve ever actually put it like this: I think I ship it.

“Et tu, sis?”

Ahahaha!

“And then I’ll say ‘Yeah, it’s me’ and finish him!  No mercy.”

They were playing off one another, joking.

Yes, thank you, Taylor, I could tell.

And it is delightful.

[newhologram]

A4 “predictions” aka what I want from Avengers: Endgame aka how I would do it if it were my billion dollar Hollywood fanfic (except if I really had my way, you know it’d be gayer. Certain characters with serious personal history and chemistry together would actually have their love validated on screen. Don’t get me started) 

This is just for fun and not 100% serious theorizing but it’s a under a cut in case anyone wants to avoid speculations

First off, my main baby: Loki has known how all of this will play out and what he needed to do at which moment since the end of the first Avengers. I talked about my suspicions about his role (and more) in all this after A3 in this post:  Glorious purpose, sacrifice, and the god who started it all  

Reframe the Future: BARF allows everyone to spend time making other choices in Tony’s software, as they looking for things they might’ve missed.

With what they learned, they think why not just go back to the first battle in New York, and yoink Loki away from the Tesseract and the scepter so that Thanos can’t get either. This might fail horribly so:

Possibly multiple failed attempts at fixing things, the team hits a low point constantly being retraumatized when they can’t save the people they refused to sacrifice for the universe in A3. Which brings in: 

Tony, disguised as a SHIELD agent after the battle in New York, gets alone with Loki. He puts it all on him. How he convinces him to help when Loki’s clearly not in his right mind, I don’t know. But this is why Loki hid after TDW, because he knew he needed to stay alive for his big moment. He knew when he needed to “die” again in order to set certain things into motion. His words are too purposeful in his final moments before dying in front of his brother to be anything else and I REPEAT:  I’m supposed to believe Loki gets choked out by Daddy Thanos in front of his brother, and it’s not on purpose?

Tony’s also likely gotta convince Past Cap to help him with this plan.

Ant-Man has been a tiny secret time-traveling Avenger in every movie even before his introduction

Valkyrie and Captain Marvel. That is all.

Probably early in the film we will see Hawkeye’s family get dusted. Just “haha luv u fam” *high five--DUST* What’s he hunting down in Tokyo with his new hair? Please Saint Stan Lee, let it be some little piece of Ultron that managed to escape and hide away in a waifu-covered internet cafe. 

On that same note, if Shuri didn’t get dusted and is in hiding oops, we just got confirmation she was dusted, she may be able to learn a lot from what she was able to do with Vision’s brain before shit went down in IW. We know from AoU that Ultron was partially uploaded into Vision, so what if that’s where he’s been hiding this whole time? Surely Vision would notice some rogue code in his system, but maybe he’s been keeping his older brother in check. Maybe also Vision is brought back without the stone in his cool new 

Speaking of my other shitbaby son: I want Ultron back, damn it, even if it’s only as a weak cluster of code that managed to survive. It would tie in nicely to allow past villains to help fix this. 

If Quicksilver has a flashback cameo, is it Hawkeye BARFing the moment of his death to try to keep it from happening? Not sure why that would have any relevance on the big picture, but everyone is reviewing old mistakes. Where would the team be if they’d had him since AoU?

Tony makes a gauntlet and it blows his mcfreaking left arm off 

Nebula gets her moment, damn it 

Cap is probably gonna go full TFP season 3 Optimus Prime and do whatever it takes to get himself sadkilled. Peggy welcomes him into superhero heaven with that dance they never got.

Pepper lied and actually was pregnant in A3, so we get to see a baby?? If there’s a time jump to justify Ant-Man’s daughter being older, we could see this kid older too. 

It ends with a beautiful Pepperony wedding with everyone there (except maybe not Cap, RIP)

[kiss-my-freckle]

Too many people misinterpret dialogues, scenes, and parallels. That’s how fandoms such as this one end up with incestuous ships. That’s also how many assume our Red lost a wife and child. As I pointed out after the imposter reveal, your regular imposter theory screwed you in that department because it removed Red as someone who lost a family. There is NOTHING in-show that supports him having lost anyone but a lover. That’s not an opinion, that’s fact. 

When you can’t support your own theory with anything in-show, perhaps you're fooling yourself into thinking your theory is correct, and you’re not actually seeing the show as the writers intended. I think people should stick to their designated lane ... to promoting the show and writing fanfics as they’ve always done and leave the actual theorizing to the theorists. 

It’s nice to believe as you want, but I’m going to point out what many seem to be lacking in the theorizing department. The parallels everyone likes to skip over to suit their regular imposter theory as well as their precious ships. If you’re gonna speak to parallels, you better know the parallels. We’re six seasons in, people. If you haven’t figured much of the story out by now, perhaps it’s time you find a theory that’s actually supported by things they’ve given to us in-show. 

Ressler parallels our Red for a reason, which has nothing to do with losing a wife and child. Ressler didn’t have a wife and child. He had a girlfriend that he wasn’t even engaged to. Those who’ve followed my Tom posts already know where I’m going with this. A sad thing for regular imposter theorists who wanted Red and Liz not to be related. They’re going to be because Red is Katarina. Ressler parallels our Red from the opposite side of Tom because their relationship with Liz makes up your love triangle of the past. 

So let me cover Tom first. Tom started off in parallel with Katarina. Two in the spy-business who fell in love with their mark. Tom falling in love with Liz, Katarina falling in love with Raymond. At this stage, Tom now falls in parallel with the real Raymond Reddington, the “father” who died on the night of the fire. Had Redemption been renewed, he still would’ve fallen in parallel with the real Red, but in opposite reverse as it should’ve been. 

Past reversed for the future. They’re now reversing. And yes, Agnes’ storyline is coming. Those parallels for her and Masha will follow in the opposite reverse. Agnes is nearing four-years-old, so that should be coming in S6. Instead of silence, it will be screaming. Instead of secrets, it will be truth. 

On the opposite side, Ressler started off in parallel with the real Raymond Reddington. The highly respected officer who lost lover and child, but lost them in the opposite manner. Audrey being murdered while pregnant, on the opposite side of Katarina pulling away and taking her child with her. That’s where the Takoma house falls in. Ressler parallels the real Reddington who hadn’t seen his child since she was three-years-old. 

Ressler now parallels our Red, and knowing our Red is Katarina, I can tell you the parallel falls in line as it should. In the straight parallel, losing Audrey was like the real Red losing Katarina. In opposite parallel because Red isn’t the real Red, it’s the opposite gender. Katarina lost her lover, Raymond. Ressler lost his lover, Audrey. That’s how our Red and Ressler parallel each other in Mako Tanida. It has nothing to do with Red losing a wife and child. That’s why he’s watching ballerina girl dance on stage. You cannot say this ballerina child is dead when they’ve not shown him to lose a ballerina child. Especially when Liz’s dialogue alone negates your shit, as does the scene cuts between Liz in the shower and the ballet performance. 

You also see Ressler falling in line with the paralllel of Katarina who fought on behalf of her country, but ended up walking through darkness. That’s why I continue to predict Dembe’s death and Ressler being the one who saves Red from the darkness. Ressler parallels Katarina on the opposite side of the fire night. That’s where our Red and Ressler are in their parallel. 

Whatever storyline they have for Agnes, it will run opposite parallel, and will involve her grandparents. That’s where the Takoma house falls. With the real Red’s family. Not of his wife and child, but of his parents. The real Raymond Reddington running in parallel with Kirk, taking the child forever from her mother. “You’re a classic narcissist. You were, what, abused as a child? Abandoned? Made to feel powerless? You must’ve suffered some sick, traumatic, dark event to believe that the sick, traumatic dark things you’ve done to me and everyone I care about could ever result in me loving you.” And because Tom falls in line with the real Red at this point, that incident will fall in line with “Grandma” Scottie just as Masha did at the Takoma house with her Reddington grandparents. 

Endgame Keenler running opposite parallel of Katarina’s marriage to Constantin Rostov. A castle instead of a palace. 

[whittynovels]

restore me predictions 1

Restore Me title significance -restoring the sector -restoring life to the people -restoring justice to the country BUT ALSO restoring warner back to a healthy self because he’s grieving *I just love powerful juliette who takes no crap from anyone and isn’t afraid to shoot a gun *KENJI REFERRING TO WARNER AS HER BOYFRIEND *there’s something really hyperbolic about the very first scene that makes it feel fake and idk if it’s me or the book. the fact that the buzzcut happens and then it's not mentioned again afterward is shaky to me, so I hope someone comments on it later on. otherwise it still kinda seems unnecessary? *warner holding a gun to kenji’s head i’m SCREAMING *Warner pronouncing “idiot” *i was dreading the buzzcut scene but i dont mind it —warner cutting of the hair was symbolic, not just something kenji did jokingly. i don't hate it anymore. *warning calling himself hideous / says “i hope you’ll still love me" HURTS ME DEEPLY. and also, juliette never counters him and supports him?? where's my loving and supportive power couple?? *I was anticipating this book would be about their wholesome love story (until "tragedy strikes") but it’s already emo on page 1 so finE *WARNER’S TRYING TO BE NICER EEEPPPP *when they were about to kiss oh LORDT —tHE LINE ABOUT “his sharp gasps for air” i NEED AN INHALER *WARNER BREAKS APART THE KISS TO GO SHAVE HIS HEAD I WAS DONE SO DIRTY *"we’ve held memorials for people who passed away” so what about warner’s parents? —i’ve almost written fanfics about this. i wanna know so bad if they did anything for leila. *so far, this isn't what i expected at all—i figured juliette would fight her way to victory over the rest of the country, but not internationally. it's already so complex and setting up to be so wide-reaching —the mind games, though. whoa. it’s gonna be so cool and smart how sector 45 leaders deal with manipulative international assholes *I predict Castle is gonna grow to be a new fave (supporting juliette, getting her and adam to make up, learning more about his relationship with kenji) *WE’VE NEVER SEEN JULIETTE FROM WARNER’S POV AFTER THEY CONFIRM THEIR LOVE FOR EACH OTHER AND I’M W E A K —she’s so beautiful and caring and ahhhh —i’m really looking forward to scenes where warner talks about feeling her emotions, i think that’ll be really cute and ugghhhh i want it —the scene where juliette crawls into his arms when he comes to bed late is what i think about every day. just soft cuddles and love. it’s what’s been replaying in my head for 4 years. *warner's inner turmoil about losing his dad and not knowing if he should be upset is so complex and compelling. there’s already so much depth to this to explore and there’s no way i can make a single video encompassing all my thoughts about every little facet but I LOve THIS *at first i was terrified of warner’s identity crisis but i actually think it’s so smart. i was worried about where this would go because ignite me ended well with everyone happy, but surprisingly, i think this is a very organic place for his mind to be. it’s not forced at all, and although it worries me that he’s not eating or whatever, it gives me room to theorize how he’ll recover from it. like… BUILDING A RELATIONSHIP WITH ADAM *Warner was being emo and said “The last words I ever spoke to my father—“ then it cuts off and i nEED TO KNOW WHAT WERE THE WORDS OH MY LORDT *he hides his emotions around juliette and i’m tired of it. i hate it. —is it him hiding it from her, or his natural response to cover his emotions because of his mom telling him to hide his heart? *I used to be so worried about why warner’s POV is here but I think it makes sense now just to flesh out his inner turmoil that he doesn’t share entirely with Juliette. The biggest person he can relate to in the series is Adam. I think it’s important that we see his head space as much as Juliette. Also, he knows so much about the other supreme commanders and I think his memories and perspective will shed a lot of light on the new characters and world building *BRENDAN AND WINSTON ARE INSEPARABLE!!!!!! —brendan and kenji, my bisexual kings. *juliette and kenji having a routine of eating breakfast and then taking a walk together actually completes my soul *warner & not enjoying food hurts me —a theory i’ve had: juliette teaches him to love himself and take care of himself-- but we don't see this :/ —the cookie w/ knife and fork lmao *i’m not mad about adam. drag me. —redemption arc: he didn’t deserve villainization (reread shatter me. he’s the good guy. he trained her how to love herself and was first to tell her that she’s not a monster) —she owes him nothing and she still goes out of her way to ask if he’s okay i loVE JULIETTE *one of my favorite things about juliette is how she sees the good in people and wants to be optimistic, but i see how that can harm her in this book. warner has always said to shoot first, and i think we’re gonna see that with the international leaders and she’s gonna have to learn to be more ruthless. they’re acting really sinister but she’s naive and happy about it, and i don’t want her getting hurt *The tentative and subtle relationship between Warner and Delalieu warms my soul *ANDERSON’S FILES —i never even thought about juliette inheriting them (actually i did, but i assumed warner wouldn’t care that she saw them) —ANDERSON’S JOURNALS OMMGGGG. i’ve always been curious about an anderson backstory and i really really really want more into his mind. (info about why he’s so cruel? why he was with adam’s mom? info info info i want it) *Oceania: I wonder if the family of the supreme commander are gonna be horrible or on sector 45’s side -why would warner dread meeting them? -is he “friends” with anyone there? what happened to them as kids? (warner’s virginity??) -if they’re good, why does he dread meeting them? —why does warner hate that they’re coming so much?? why is it disregarding and entitled?

[flimflamfranky]

some predictions or something

I’ve seen some speculation about future arcs floating around and I wanted to add a few cents before the Whole Cake Island Arc ends because I have some Thoughts.

Disclaimer: this is basically stuff that I want to happen and that I think might happen but, of course, there’s no guarantee of any this. I’m just putting this out there so that if something does come true I can say “ha I was right!” and if it doesn’t, I can remember them for fanfics or stuff. Also this is my first meta post (if you can even call it that) so I don’t really know what I’m doing.

Prediction 1 - Vegapunk Arc

Vegapunk has been hinted at and referenced for a long time in One Piece, dating all the way back to Alabasta (maybe even earlier). Not only is he a marine scientist but he's also responsible for some crazy shit, like robots, cyborgs, and basically everything the op world knowns about devil fruits (including inanimate devil fruit users and artificial devil fruit users). Considering how important his presence is and how longs he's been around, it's very likely that he’s gonna pop into the story eventually. And it's probably gonna be some time soon, considering we have now meet two associates of his - his presence is already affecting the story more and more.

The question is how exactly he will show and for what purpose. Which leads me to Franky and Kuma. Now these three characters are already highly related. Franky and Kuma are both cyborgs using Vegapunk’s inventions. If Vegapunk shows up, Kuma will probably follow. Kuma is a big mystery on his own - we know he was part of the revolutionary army at some point but then ended up working for the government. And it's implied that this joining with the marines wasn't exactly willing on Kuma’s part nor was being turned into a cyborg.

I should also mention that I don't think Vega is working with the marines voluntarily either: His backstory with Judge seems to imply that Vega might have been coerced into working with the marines. And based on the morals Vega demonstrated in the Punk Hazard Arc, i don't think Vega would willingly take away someone's free will by turning them into a cyborg (especially since he did deliberately leave some free will with Kuma so that Kuma could oppose the government, at least a little).

Of course, his involvement with Judge and the human cloning stuff indicates that he’s not a completely morally good but we also don’t know his goals or motivations for doing so, so it’s hard to say definitely if he’s good or bad. But given what we’ve seen so far, I’m leaning more to the good side. 

So if Vega and Kuma do show up, they might not be as enemies. I mean, the Straw Hats already owe a great debt to Kuma and I can’t imagine Luffy leaving that to go unpaid (just look at his alliance with Law). They would definitely start out as enemies but they might not stay that way. At the very least, I don't think they'll be entirely antagonistic.

And that leads me to Franky. If we get a Vegapunk arc, I think we'll get a parallel Franky arc. Franky still has some mysteries in his past, namely his parents. Considering some of the other Straw Hats’ pasts have been expanded, I think it's likely that we’re gonna get more on Franky. In addition, backstories and character arcs tend to parallel or mirror the current arc. Just looks at Whole Cake Island - they're dealing with enemies that deal exclusively with food and cooking, and Sanji, the cook, is the one getting the character arc. If we do get an arc about Vegapunk, I think it's logical to assume that we'll probably get one on Franky as well, especially since there is more to be explored. And Franky foils both Vega and Kuma very well. Vega and Franky are both extremely smart scientists that have both dealt with robotics/cybernetics (though obviously Vega has a more expanded repertoire). Not to mention, one is a (maybe) trapped marine while the other is a free pirate. And with Kuma, well, one is a cyborg with free-will and his original personality while the other is a cyborg with no or little free will left (which i really hope they explore cuz that would be an interesting contrast).

I'm not really sure how this arc would come about but it’s possible that it could be related to Kaido. After all, it's his army that uses the artificial devil fruits that Vega invented. So Vega might come up there, though there's not a whole lot of evidence to support this.

But mainly, I really miss my boy and I want an arc about him. Is that too much to ask?

Prediction 2 - Wano / Zoro Arc

I've already seen some speculation about Zoro getting an arc, and i just want to add my two cents to it, considering Wano is coming up next and a Zoro arc is very likely (Wano is the samurai country and Zoro has some heavy samurai themes). We might get some backstory for Zoro, considering we know next to nothing beyond Kuina. It would probably something to do with why he became a swordsman (we know why he wants to be the best but we don’t know why he wanted to a swordsman in the first place), but I'm not really gonna expand on that cuz there’s not much to expand on.

Instead, I’m gonna talk about swords. 

I think that Zoro’s swords will have a heavy focus in Wano (cuz of course they would). Most obviously, Zoro currently has the sword of a very famous Wano samurai, Shusui. This has already been brought up by Kin’emon and i think this will be a major source of tension, considering that the sword is a national treasure of Wano and that Zoro will absolutely not give it up (he earned it a duel, fair and square. As far as he is concerned, the sword is his and I can’t imagine him giving up). I can imagine there being some important and symbolic duel for the sword, with Zoro going up against Wano’s strongest swordsman to keep the sword.

However, i don't think that Shusui is going to be the only important sword. After all, Law is also with the Wano group, and he and Zoro share one very key thing together - they both own cursed swords. There hasn’t really been much focus on these cursed blades expect for when Zoro first got his. Considering we now have two in the country obsessed with swords, I think it's highly likely that they will become important.

Of course, there will be much more to Wano than just this, considering Kaido’s forces are currently there, and the whole political drama with Momonosuke will be extremely important. Needless to say, there will probably be a lot going on, and things are going to go horribly wrong. The whole Wano arc is probably going to be a messy political drama, which will be very interesting. 

I’ll be honest though, the thing I'm most looking forward to is seeing those samurai aesthetics (and seeing all my favs again).

Prediction 3 - The Reverie (and Vivi)

The Reverie has also been hinted at over the past several arcs, and I am 100% certain that we’re getting an arc about it. It's far too important for it not to be.

The Reverie, as far as we know, is a meeting of basically everyone of any political importance - royalty, the government, the whole shebang - to discuss matters of world-wide importance. We already know two characters who are attending who are related to the straw hats - Shirahoshi and her family and, perhaps more importantly, Vivi. And let's face it - the Straw Hats are going to crash this party. It's big, it's important, it's a match made in heaven. And i think a Vivi reunion is a real possibility that I desperately want to happen.

A side from that, I do have theories about how the Reverie will be important. I believe that it's gonna kick off some really big, wide-reaching change, like Whitebeard’s death at Marineford. In fact, it might just kick off the beginning of that huge war that Oda has been hinting at. I mean, this will be the most likely place for it, where a bunch of hugely political people are. The reverie will result in some sort of paradigm shift in the attitudes of the OP world. 

Also the revolutionary army will probably be involved somehow. They have to have some plan for the reverie, it would be the place to get some attention and make a point.

I honestly think that the Straw Hats will get involved for Vivi’s sake. Luffy and the crew don't really care much for politics, and I doubt that they would willingly get involved (though a party might tempt them). In any case, I can only really see the Straw Hats getting involved for a nakama, and since Vivi is a past nakama who will definitely be there, it's very likely that they'll do it for her (also I really want a Vivi reunion dammit). I just hope that nothing bad will happen to Vivi, though I am prepared for the possibility (this is One Piece, where any opportunity to make you cry is taken).

Prediction 4 - Brook

This one is a bit more tenuous, since there's not much to indicate if we'll get another Brook arc. and if we do, I'm not sure what it will be tied to, in terms of events that are happening. but I do think that it’s a strong possibility, considering there’s a trend of Straw Hats getting expanded backstory, and how little we know about him. We know his time in the Rumbar Pirates and that he was a soldier for a ‘certain kingdom’ (and isn't that a statement that begs to be explained). If we do get more Brook backstory, I think it will have to do with this ‘certain kingdom’, possibly why he left and how he joined the Rumbar Pirates. It was probably his time in this certain kingdom where he developed his love of music and it is canonical where he got his sword skills, so it is very important to Brook’s character. i mean, his first backstory was more about how he became a skeleton and his goal (which is to reunite with Laboon), but we don't get much about his motivations outside of that. We don't even know his original goal, the reason he became a pirate in the first place. i mean, I could theorize as to what his original goal was, but we don't have any canon about it. So i really do think that we’ll get more brook backstory cuz there's still so much to explore.

Though again, I don't know what it would tie into. Depending on how important/powerful his kingdom was/is, it might come up during the Reverie, which would be really cool and interesting, but I don't think it that's likely, especially since there will probably be more important matters at hand.

Basically, I would like another Brook arc, but there hasn’t been much to indicate that we’ll get one. 

Misc Predictions

These don’t really have enough to stand on their own so I’m just gonna make a little list of things I think that we could see / things I want to see.

The last ancient weapon, Uranus. Considering the other two have been very important and heavily involved in several arcs, the last one probably will too.  

and related to that, potentially a Robin arc? She got a bunch of character development with one ancient weapon so she might get more with another one (though she didn’t get any with Poseidon so this one’s more unlikely but I can still dream)

I heard somewhere that Oda said there was going to be Elbaf arc, which would also probably mean an Usopp arc, which I would love.   

[reylosource]

// What advice/reassurance/encouragement would you give to a Reylo fan who suspects that we'll be disappointed with what we get in The Last Jedi? I just have this feeling that all of this theorizing and speculating will end up being for naught and that Reylo won't become a reality (or at least, not in the way we want it to). I'll still love the movie, but I'm wary of getting my Reylo hopes up.

Heya! Such a great question and one that persists across all fandoms since the Beginning of Time™.

// What advice/reassurance/encouragement would you give to a Reylo fan who suspects that we’ll be disappointed with what we get in The Last Jedi?

I’d say that it’s OK to feel that way - to be suspicious of the hope, the signs, etc. and it’s okay to talk about the fears (even though some people might accuse you of being negative, etc.).

Aside from that, however, I would say that I personally feel like I’m not going to be disappointed in the slightest by The Last Jedi. Because the line of my shipper expectations for this movie is essentially ‘they’re going to share some screen time and a storyline’. And there are BOAT LOADS of supporting documents to show it - disregarding all the spoilers/leaks even.

So with that said, some wisdom for you:

not in the way we want it to 

First, and I cannot stress this enough, is that it is really important for you as an independent shipper to decide which is the line that would make you happy in fandom - that is, define what would make you satisfied as a Reylo shipper. There are usually a few general categories of shipper within any given fandom:

The ‘IDGAF’ Shipper: This is the non-canon shipper - the kind that has either been through non-canon ships before and knows that legitimacy (herein defined as canon) is not important to their appreciation of the ship - OR - people who just don’t care if Reylo is ‘confirmed canon’ or not. Both of these types of people can and choose to subsist almost entirely off of transformative works (fanart, fanfic, etc.) and forge their love of the ship entirely out of it and fandom and what could have been/could be.

Example: I think the best example I can think of is ‘Dramione’. Never canon, only exists in fanon circles, hugely popular and has a thriving fandom from what I can tell.

The ‘Subtext/Context’ Shipper: This is the type of shipper who sees signs and hints in the body of a work (movies, other canon things, interviews, etc.) - it is not necessary for the ship to become ‘full-blown’ canon in this situation. Only the hint of it is enough for them - the ambiguity. I suspect that most Reylos in the fandom have been this type of shipper for the past 18+ months, but this is merely speculation.

Example: Sherlolly from BBC’s Sherlock. (Please don’t flame me, this is in example only and is within the context of shipper goggles). Lots of hints, situations, etc. - but never truly became ‘full-blown’ canon. ie, we don’t see a romantic relationship on screen in that specific context.

The ‘Confirmed Canon’ Shipper: Pretty self explanatory, basically the type of shipper who needs it to be canon full-stop. This includes things like kissing, dating, declarations of feelings without questionable context, etc. These are the type who will only find full enjoyment from fandom if the ship is eventually/has been confirmed canon. 

Example: Take any active ship on the market today. To continue the Harry Potter example, let’s use Ron x Hermione. (I don’t even know their ship name, sorry yall!)

There are mixtures of these of course - and of course most people HOPE for the full-blown canon confirmation of any of their ships. However these are the LINES of shipping. Meaning, that point and above would make you happy in fandom/shipping, and none below it.

I just have this feeling that all of this theorizing and speculating will end up being for naught and that Reylo won’t become a reality

I think I would say that you have to not look at it that way. The speculation, the theorizing, etc. is all part of the fandom experience. People make good livings just speculating and theorizing about things that can never truly be confirmed by the author/etc. I wouldn’t pin your enjoyment of the past 2 years on the question of whether it’ll become full-blown canon - I think that sets yourself up for disappointment even IF it becomes canon.

Because - and trust me on this, as a veteran of other fandoms - almost always the meta/fanon that fills in the speculation gaps between episodes or movies ends up being better than the canon material itself. Even IF said material revolves around your canon ship. 

You will probably love what they come up with anyway, but it might not be the way your head has built it - and that’s okay. It’s like reading the book vs watching the adaptation (a good one though ;D). You can enjoy both the work and the transformative work simultaneously - after you get over the initial annoyance of it not being exactly as you predicted (grumbles slightly over past experiences).

I’ll still love the movie, but I’m wary of getting my Reylo hopes up.

Again on this one I think you just have to decide what you’re hoping for - it varies from person to person. I know some just want them to share the screen, regardless of how. Some want them to kiss, etc. Some shippers find that they could only continue shipping it if he is redeemed wholly - while others will continue to ship it even if it turns out they’re related (which ofc is not a reality, but they would.).

So you asked for advice and here’s what I would say, after all my ranting:

I would take a break from fandom before the movie comes out. Two weeks at least. No interviews, tumblr, fanfic, etc. Take a break, recharge and rewatch The Force Awakens to reset your love and memory purely from canon and not fandom. I guarantee that you will walk away from The Last Jedi enjoying it so much more - because you won’t have the huge build up of 2+ years of expectations weighing you down. I went into TFA (being a huge Star Wars fan) having only watched the teaser trailer. I literally said to my friend before we saw it that I thought Luke was going to be ‘the lightsaber dude in the forest’. I had nothing built up and I loved it. You can’t get that back after fandom, but I think a reset would do wonders - I’m probably going to try to do a month long one.

I think fandom is the most amazing thing to participate in, but I speak from thorough experience with shows/movies that take 2+ year gaps between premieres with nothing but fanon/speculation to fill in the gaps - you’ll want to refresh your love of canon after a break before you go into it. Otherwise regardless of how it turns out you risk being disappointed.

That’s just my personal advice, I’m sure others have different experiences. =)

[broken-endings]

since I vented about all my disappointments in vld season 4 last night. More than once.

Without rereading them to try to reignite them again

I’m going to list all the things I LOVED in the second half of season-3-slash-4*. Ignoring all the things I said last night

cuz lets be real there was some really awesome stuff mixed into just 6 episodes

(*2nd half of season 3 slash 4=season 4)

Like 

Matt. I kinda wanted him to just STAY at the castle. I really didn’t know what kind of characterization to expect, even though I know a lot of the fandom was already characterizing him. But he was just a pleasant surprise. He wasn’t a remake of any of the other types of characters we already have. He was this unique quirky, super smart goof who wears his heart on his sleeve. I love that he got such a HUGE “goo goo” eyes crush thing on Allura. And that classic anime “super detailed closeup with dramatic shading and a twinkle in the eye” It overshadows ANY interest Lance has shown in Allura. And seeing Pidge SHOW HIM EVERYTHING was one of my fave scenes. It was so fast and funny and ugh. Some fanfic writers predicted him and pidge’s relationship to a tee.

OH AND PIDGE BEING MATT’S NAME FOR HER. i remember people making meta posts about their reunion and matt being like “who the fuck is pidge” THIS IS SO MUCH BETTER. cuz really. how else would there be a reasonable explanation for pidge’s name?

Keith. I wish we got more screentime. The dropoff in his appearances happened so quick. But it totally makes sense for his character that he’d pull away. He found the blades, and didn’t want to lead voltron. Even though it hasn’t been talked about since, it’s the only connection he has to his mother. I loved the idea of him going with them. I JUST WANTED AN EPISODE ABOUT THAT. I wanted a whole episode of him being off with them, maybe intercut with castle of lions shenanigans. 

Haggar. I wish we got to see more of her too! All her little moments were really interesting. Like looking at her own reflection, and doing more and more things on her own cuz she kinda DOES know better than Zarkon.

LANCE lance. LANCE. His flair and showmanship was just perfect with all the performances. AND THEY HAD HIM FUCKING DOING THAT ACROBATIC, CIRCUS, RIBBON/POLE-like DANCING. LIKE THAT SHIT IS CANON MAN.

I think Keith’s pulling away made it easier for Lance to shine. I think Lance unconsciously puts himself at odds with Keith even when he might not want to. Even with them being a little closer in season 3.

PLEASE TELL ME YOU SAW THE STARFOX REFERENCE. In the last battle with the rebels. There was that fucking DOG/FOX who was leading and there was a frog-looking dude who got blown up. Like, they were not being subtle there.

Allura playing Keith. and me forever holding onto the fact that “oh lance flirts with allura. allura is playing keith. lance flirting with allura now means lance flirting with keith.” i can be juvenile no matter how old I get.

Coran and Allura learning where milkshakes come from

Farmer Lance and his love for his cow. I want to see if he’s formed any kind of relationship with the Red Lion. His treatment of Kaltenecker feels a lot like his treatment of Blue. How’s he treat red? Is red fussy with him? I wanna know!!

GROUP HUG. i feel like there was a distinct lack of emotional affection in the first half of season 3 slash 4. Everybody pouncing on Keith is just what he needed.

RIP NARTI. man. I’ll never forgive Lotor for that. She may not have talked but I really liked her. I was also really glad that the other generals cared enough about each other to support each other and not forgive Lotor. I wasn’t sure if Axca would side with the other two, but I was so glad when she shot Lotor, saying “For Narti” I’m getting chills just writing that.

Matt mentioned other realities. I NEED MATT AND SLAV TO INTERACT. CAN YOU IMAGINE???

It was a nice surprise to see Rolo and Nyma as rebels. It makes sense.

Coran’s plea for help when he was struggling against that brain worm also including a star wars reference “help me obi wan kenobi, you’re my only hope.”

I thought the three generals were going to show up and save the guys cuz Axca said “there’s still one option left” for what they could do.

but no it was lotor. just what the fuck is he trying to do? From my ranting last night I’m completely drained and have no brain power left to theorize where the story could go from here with Lotor wanting to “have a chat”

I think that’s most of my good feels from the second half of season-3-slash-4

[im-the-king-of-the-ocean]

H and I for the Fanfic asks

H: How would you describe your style?

Oh, geez.  I’d say I tend to focus on trying to be descriptive (or, at least, that’s something I’ve been trying to work on lately.  Also, I enjoy sprinkling breadcrumbs through a story before leading up to a moment where things begin to come together, and then immediately start to go to shit so fast you realize you cannot get off this rollercoaster before it makes you feel terrible, terrible emotional things.

(I once called myself the Angst King.  Though it’s been a while since I’ve been deserving of that moniker, I’d like to get back there).

.

I: Do you have a guilty pleasure in fic (reading or writing)?

As a reader, I love stories that thrill and shock me.  I want to be on the edge of my seat, hungering for the next chapter just so I can know what happens next.  I like not being able to predict what happens next (though I tend to try theorize anyway).  I want stories that squeeze my heart remorselessly.

As I writer, my guilty pleasure is writing short, intimate scenes between characters where they offer each other support and love after something major happens.