#there were some ideas that i didn't use

[seventeendeer]

this isn't at all meant to be condescending or finger-waggy because 100% we all have blind spots like this, but I'm really, really hoping that the people who never found Gaiman's approach to his own fandom concerning in any way will take this all as a learning moment.

he was an older, hyper-famous author engaging directly and frequently with an online audience of largely vulnerable young marginalized people. he presented himself as cultured and worldly, and made himself approachable as someone to go to for advice, encouragement and "wisdom." his manner of speech was extremely pathos-heavy and clearly intended to be comforting and encouraging in exactly the way his target demographic needed it to be to swallow every word. the way he spoke about stories and creativity was designed to make young creative hopefuls feel special and important, while sweeping real analytical techniques under the rug - in hindsight, likely so no one would think too critically about the disturbing amount of patriarchal abuse played for cheap shock value and voyerism in his own body of works.

Gaiman saw a target demographic that was desperate for an older creative role model to tell them they were worth something, and he exploited that pain to twist a narrative around himself where he was king and any critique leveled at him or his works were the enemy.

to be clear, he could have been innocent. he could totally have been just an out-of-touch old man saying nice things to people because he wanted to be kind and he thought he was a lot smarter than he really was. red flags are warning signs, not a surefire way to tell if someone is actually "secretly shitty."

but if you used to look up to him, PLEASE take this moment to revisit the ideas you absorbed from him. did you take his words to heart because they seemed to have objective merit? or did you take them to heart because it felt good to believe what he said? do you still hold these values? does knowing he was intentionally manipulating his online audience make you less certain? do you need more information from a different source before deciding one way or another?

again, I'm just really, really hoping people on here will take a moment to reevaluate the ideas and opinions he's injected into tumblr fandom culture, because his reach is immense and he has absolutely been manipulating popular perception of relevant topics to gain further influence and control the narrative around both his own and Pratchett's legacy. please, please take this moment to notice what he's been doing - and next time someone tries to pull the same shit, hopefully we'll be able to apply what we've learned from experience.

[nenoname]

Details in Stan's letter that still haunt me

(how long will I continue thinking about a two page letter that's technically not even that long because Stan's handwriting is fricking large? .....you don't need to worry about that.)

The bro code only shows up in the Lost Journal pages, and to me Stan's message feels like it purposely echoes Ford's "miss you" in the college photo (and for some reason the message doesn't appear in the website version of the photo?) ....or alternatively Stan simply noticed how distressed Ford was about this entire thing and wanted to support him in a way so he can be sappy but without the kids knowing, or both!

Stan's claim about the Oregon lottery contradicts what the Lost Legends website said about Tate McGucket's ability to predict the winning numbers!! ...but also breaking into the Lottery HQ is definitely a very Stan thing to do and it's not the first time small gags have been retconned

Despite spending most of his letter nonchalantly destroying him, the taunt about ripping a dollar bill in half is the only part where Stan is directly responding to Bill. Maybe it's the two of them having similar ways of thinking but it's rather specific considering Bill taunts the reader about it...

And after Bill spends an entire book calling Ford Sixer despite normally using a pretty wide range of nicknames for him, Stan then spends his letter mainly referring to Ford as Sixer, even though post-Weirdmageddon he tends to use a mix of nicknames. And it's not like he'd gotten to see Bill himself for long, let alone see him steal that childhood nickname (that is only used twice in the actual show btw!). Did Ford tell him what happened or...?

With all this and the website's "still on your mind" message, what I'm getting at is my tinfoil hat theory of Stan somehow seeing some of the pages the irl readers saw, even when it should be personalised to the specific reader, and he's been lying about it for some reason. Considering that the book flat out doesn't make an attempt at convincing Soos, I find it a stretch that whatever Bill was telling Stan via the book was an attempt to convince him either.

Wouldn't be the first time Stan's skimmed through a book and lied about what it meant to him.

(...Now I kinda wanna see a story about the family reading their versions of the book and making fun of it while Stan is improvising every single one of his pages and blatantly ignoring Bill's attempts to mock and taunt him)

But also I'm fascinated by the letters that only showed up on the website (aka the Soos+Wendy+McGucket+Pacifica ones). I'm assuming that Mabel had stuck them on after Stan's letter... but they were basically eaten by the book itself because seeing Stan's letter kick-started Bill's breakdown which takes up the rest of the book

[bittersweet-jack-of-no-trades]

I'm sure this has been done before but Gravity Falls/Hunger Games AU? The 50th games/2nd Quarter Quell becomes even more dramatic because in one of the districts, the two male tributes are twins??

This year becomes one of the longest-running games in history; sparked in part by the Capitol's obsession with the twins, Stan and Ford, who have an argument early on and split ways. Stan becomes an expert in hiding and running, making and then breaking alliances as the other tributes inevitably try to use him to get to Ford. But why get to Ford?

Because Ford is excelling. The dangerous and odd mutations of the arena become his fascination and his strength. Probably also because during the pre-game process the Capitol got enamored with his six fingers and awkward attitude and view him as this weird little oddball underdog, and that infuriates especially the Careers. Stan is fighting for his life every day, and thinks Ford is doing the same--- but Ford has a mysterious, anonymous sponsor who sends him everything he needs, signing each note with not a name but a little triangle. The major upset comes when, of course, the last two tributes alive are Stan and Ford. The games end when Stan unceremoniously pushes Ford off a cliff and into the river below.

(Ford, of course, does not actually die. His sponsor was Bill, duh, who I picture as a Heavensbee-like figure, a gamemaker who is actually aligned with D13, more for the chaos than any sense of rebellion or morals. He takes Ford and deposits him in D13 to aid in the rebellion.)

Stan becomes the Haymitch-like drunken, lonely Victor who no one wants to interact with. His district, under his angry tutelage, goes through a period of losing. Then, the 74th games.

When they call Dipper's name, Mabel tries to volunteer. She can't, because she's a girl, but that doesn't stop her from trying so hard the Peacekeepers have to hold her down. So, she does the next best thing: when the girl's name is called, she volunteers again, pushing her way into the games despite Dipper's dismay.

They know Stan is their grunkle, but he's estranged and their first real interactions happen with him as their mentor. He assures them repeatedly they will turn on each other; Dipper and Mabel use the power of twins to win the Capitol's support as gamemakers dramatically drudge up reminders of what happened to the last set of twins. It's the "twins" angle rather than the original books' "star-crossed lovers" angle that earns the twins the right to win as a pair (can you imagine how Stan felt, knowing if he was just a little smarter he and Ford could've been spared, too?).

Eventually, D13's existence is revealed, Ford is shown to be alive, Stan goes through the reverse 7 stages of grief and probably also a lot of booze, etc. etc. They defeat the presidents (probably the Northwests, Pacifica would make a decent President's granddaughter), and end up taking down Bill too as his goal was, of course, to take dictatorial rule in the creation of the power vacuum.

[imerian]

Vr46 academy keychains

Set of five charms that all match in different ways

˚　　　　✦　　　.　　. 　 ˚　.　　　　 . ✦　　˚　

Open for detailed pictures of each one

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ *ੈ✩‧₊˚

ִֶָ 𓂃˖˳·˖ ִֶָ ⋆★⋆ ִֶָ˖·˳˖𓂃 ִֶָ

:･ﾟ✧:･.☽˚｡･ﾟ✧:･.:

˖⁺‧₊˚⭒✮⭒˚₊‧⁺˖

. ݁₊ ✶. ݁ ˖ˎˊ˗

I ran out of tags so I'll say it here but i would greatly appreciate a reblog, especially if you share your thoughts on these pieces in tags (⁠｡⁠•̀⁠ᴗ⁠-⁠)⁠✧

(Also i forgot that bez have matching part with luca so I didn’t add that to tags sorry

[bloggingboutburgers]

Tbh I feel like going to the US while the Nazis are in power is suicidal. So of course I don't understand your choice of going instead of your SO coming to Europe. But while I don't understand, I wish and pray for you to be safe. Whatever you choose, I hope you guys will be okay

You might be right. I have no idea what the future has in store or if I'll come to regret it. But I've already stated my reasons. As it stands, with the year-long process we've already started and that we can't just flip on a dime overnight, my partner can't come and stay in Europe legally just like that. Legal immigration is not that easy in one way or the other. Also... Yeah, I've stated that before, but one shouldn't underestimate how shitty things have been getting in Europe for the past few years as well, and how the influence of the US (which is huge) is likely to make things worse. So again I'm not 100% sure whether that'd have been better anyway.

Also also... Ima be real, I've shared that before, but the time where I was separated from my partner due to the travel ban was the only time in my life where I had actual suicidal ideation. I don't want this to happen again. That's why I'm making moves so it doesn't, first and foremost.

[seleneprince]

Mulciber: So, are you a boy or a girl?

Sevrina: I'm a fucking mess

[pastelaspirations]

I had a dream last night, or early this morning, that I was reading this scholarly book about how to write a dissertation. I have no idea why. But the book kept having... utmv references? Like, it would tell you how to do something and then use utmv characters to demonstrate

I got to one point where it referenced this supposed "famed" fight of Error and Ink. They went to a wild west au and Error supposedly "braved the chacoa in the canyons."

What is chacoa?? And why did Error have to "brave" it??? I don't know, man, but that is an exact quote that I remember

Anyway. I was reading, trying to discover more about this famed fight because it sounded low key interesting. Then, the book mentioned that Ink ran into… Coshuss. It was the au's variant of Cross. Imagine a very disgruntled bounty hunter cowboy and that was him. Getting angrier and angrier because it was apparently a source of comedy that Ink was having difficulty saying his name right

All I could think was, "Yeah, same, Ink." I had no idea how to pronounce that name

Well, the librarian who was in the room with her daughter with me, the daughter eventually had to run out of the room to get something. The librarian somehow knew what part I was at and said, "You know, you can admit what you thought his name was."

I didn't know what she meant. I guess she thought it was supposed to look like a bad word?? Dream version of me thought that too since I went, "Nah, I think it looks like... Koksue. Kosueh. Koshu."

Cue me badly trying to pronounce this poor man's name. Finally, I settled on one name I pronounced consistently, "Koshussss." Basically, "Koshu" with an awkward, annoying "s" sound dragged out at the end

The librarian woman started busting a gut. I laughed along too, even though I didn't really know what was so funny. Sure, I meant my pronunciation to be kinda funny, but not that funny

I then looked at the book and that was when I saw the correct pronunciation written out in parentheses

It was supposed to be pronounced CrossCross

I literally thought that was so funny, that I snorted so hard from laughing in my dream, I woke myself up.

A part of me is sad. I kinda really do wish there was a "How to Write Your Dissertation 101" book out there with utmv references I should know, but apparently don't

[greyedian]

MAN I'm seriously so sad about season 2. Bc I wish act 2 had the same emotional impact on me as it appears to have on so many others. But rn I'm just somewhere between unable to care and actively annoyed by some of those writing decisions. Seriously the more I think about it the less I like it.

[numberonetribble]

Stuck at my mom's house until the 27th, can't finish the comic I was working on until then :( here's a rough Cowboy!pinup sketch of Bumblebee and some Breakbee + Piston angst:

[o-uncle-newt]

I just got a bit more time in my schedule and I'm hoping to get started on a Sayers-and-Jews reading list, if anyone has any suggestions! I just really feel like I've never seen anyone talk about how WEIRD the apparent received wisdom is of "Sayers was in a relationship with a completely secular Jew who tried to convince her to have premarital sex she was religiously uncomfortable with, which NATURALLY made her start writing about Jews, but a totally different kind of basically fetishized ultra-conservative type than Cournos was." There are clearly missing links there- not an obvious or intuitive connection at all- and I have my own ideas of what they are and am so curious if it's already been written about.

[wombywoo]

Hi, Womby!

Firstly, I wanted to tell you how much I adore Vincent and Quinn!

And if you feel comfortable answering this:

how did you create them?

Did you design them first and then develop their personalities and backstories? Or the other way around?

Every time I try to create original characters, they end up being shallow caricatures of characters I like but without real depth or actual personalities :/

Thanks so much for the kind words about my boys 🥰

As for the question--I kind of just...thought of them as concepts at first. Like, I had a vision of a vampire/human dynamic and projected some of my ideal characteristics onto them, tweaked a few early concepts into something more compelling, and just...went with it. They weren't even their true selves, especially in the beginning, but as I kept fantasizing about the idea, they developed more in my mind. I think it was sitting down and drawing them for the first time that solidified them as Characters for me. And once I had that, I was able to explore their backstories/personalities as if they were suddenly Real Boys. Currently, it's really easy for me to invent and share details about them, because I just know them now. It's less thinking about it in terms of 'this is my original character and I want them to do XYZ things' and more 'this is a person that exists of their own accord and I want to share their story'. I'm their caretaker and I let them decide things for me (I'm realizing now this all might sound crazy asdfghjkk I swear it's like they've taken over my brain 😅) But yeah--I think it's actually the best part of creating characters in the first place--to reach that stage where you feel like they exist outside of your own mind--they live and act and feel, I'm just the one pulling a few strings~

[greenerteacups]

Hi GT! Congratulations on the last chapter, as always! Lately my brain has been fixated on a detail that I find very interesting. I can't help but think that any adult in LH who is preparing for war has at least once thought while looking at Draco "ok, this could definitely help us in the future". And I find it almost hilarious because I love the way you characterize Artur and Molly and their protective instinct towards the kids... but let's be honest, Hermione, Ron and Harry have ensured the heir of the greatest house in the wizarding world to the cause.

One of the interesting parts about the Harry Potter series is that both sides of the conflict use child soldiers, and you get to see a realistic range of reactions to that from the adults around them. There's Molly, who's reasonably unconditionally opposed to it on the grounds that They're Children, and then Sirius, who unreasonably supports it on the grounds of being himself a stunted teenager, and then Mad-Eye, who reasonably supports it on the grounds of "they're going to have to fight anyway," and Dumbledore, who is some combination of these viewpoints depending on the situation — most protective of Harry when the danger is real, but perhaps necessarily the most realistic about Harry's role in ending the war. Lionheart has a slightly different cast of adults, because it's a different POV, but you still see a range of opinions from Narcissa ("you'll harm my son over my dead body, but also he needs to be able to defend myself") to Snape ("careful, Draco") to Moody (the same, arguably more so, because he's thinking of the long game) and Dumbledore (again, some situation-dependent combination of viewpoints). The kids are often so caught up in their own part of the conflict that it doesn't occur to them the strategic decisions that are happening over their heads — when you're a teen and an adult tells you you're too young for something, the kneejerk reaction is "fuck off" — but there are always conversations happening in other rooms, especially in Grimmauld Place.

[agalychnisspranneusroseus]

CW slightly suggestive content but uhhh

Sashanne having a more physical relationship in highschool before it becomes explicitly romantic, like I'm talking 17-18 years old right? And lately, every sleepover includes making out and lots of touching and y'know, while still strictly calling each other just friends. It's not that they're not in love with each other, they just... don't want to think about it right now. It's just easier this way. Just like how it's easier not to talk about it when it's over.

But they're definitely not exclusive, and Anne has seen Sasha dating boys for the past few years - never girls - and it's honestly killing her inside. She doesn't want to bring it up because why would she? They're just friends! And sometimes they have fun together, but it's just that, little more than an entertaining sleepover activity that doesn't mean anything. Even if Sasha always tells her she's beautiful between kisses, even if she always hugs her tight afterwards. They're just friends. They trust each other with their lives. Nothing's wrong.

But one time they're lying together on Anne's bed, cuddling while Sasha plays with her hair, exhausted and comfy and content, and as they chat, Sasha casually tells her about the boy she was with last weekend, and Anne gets surprisingly angry all of a sudden. Her excuse is that Sasha needs to tell her before doing anything because, what if they get sick or something? It doesn't make much sense but the words fall out of her mouth anyway. She hates hates HATES the idea of a boy seeing Sasha the way she sees her, HATES the idea of a boy touching her, or being this close to her, and frog now she can't get the image out of her head, which is hauntingly explicit because she tries so hard not to think about it that she can't help think about it. She has tears in her eyes. If Sasha was offended by Anne's previous implications, she lets it go as soon as she sees how upset she is. They both know Anne has no right to ask Sasha to stop seeing people - they're just friends, after all - but Sasha has always been the protector, and she already hurt Anne too many times, the last thing she wants is to make her cry (nowadays, seeing either of her girls cry always makes her stop on her tracks, no matter how angry she was before, no matter how right she knows she is, it's like it pushes a special button in her brain that tells her your priority now is to make her happy again, no matter how inconvenient it is). She has two options now: to call this off now before it gets worse and they both end up hurt, or promising Anne some level of exclusivity, even if it just means asking permission before being with a boy. Or anyone, for that matter, but as pretty as girls are, there are only two that truly own her heart and she could never bring herself to be with another. Not after Anne. There is only one other girl she'd be with after Anne and she's half a continent away.

She'd be willing to give Anne that power. She's eager, almost, as if making up for something even though she didn't do anything wrong. Anne can't accept it - friends talk about boys at sleepovers, Sasha telling her about her boyfriend of the week should be normal. She asks Sasha to forget about it, and curls into her side and lets her continue play with her hair while she holds back tears. She knows this is a game for them, she shouldn't expect Sasha to treat it as anything else. Even if it makes her feel a litte bit like a toy.

[nenoname]

.....ok it's legit wild to see people saying that emma may is unironically their fave character

[creativesplat]

ok... so Lambert x Eve...

Eve and the two Blaiddyds

Lambert and the two Fierenes

The step-siblings

@blaiddydbrokeit and I were talking, and they have now sent me down the wonderful rabbit hole that is Eve and Lambert getting married and looking after their children.

[fvckw4d]

The concept of queerbaiting annoys me. I was told that it refers to a work of fiction pretending to cater to a queer audience but then pulling back from it to avoid alienating homophobes, which is an incredibly specific thing. But a lot of people seem to think that it instead means "any time there's any gay subtex, metaphor, or ambiguity" or "whenever something from 1995-2012 was being a normal amount of homophobic for the era."