#there's a trope page with plenty of examples

[swan2swan]

An underutilized trope in today's shows (unless I've not been paying attention, which is possible, there are only so many hours in a day and so many shows I can watch), is the classic arc of "Characters we never see but whose lives are constantly updated via the on-screen characters".

I'm not talking "occasionally we learn about our characters and their relatinoships with unseen acquaintances via dialogue", I mean "One character has an increasingly bizarre series of updates about someone else who is leading a very exciting life that we are not directly privy to." Sometimes they can connect in a dramatic upswing, sometimes it's just a complex series of dots that become more and more difficult to connect the more we hear.

Two prominent examples being Dr. Kelso's son (?) from Scrubs, and Jason's offscreen, never-seen family (singular?) from Home Movies.

[lurkingshan]

I saw this great post by @respectthepetty this morning related to Unknown and other Taiwanese dramas that depict pseudo-incest romances, and it reminded me that I've been meaning to write up some thoughts about why this trope is so interesting to a lot of us.

Let me just set some boundaries first, because it's a big potential topic. Depictions of incest or pseudo-incest are plentiful and occur in media from all corners of the globe, and there are lots of different forms it can take. I'm most interested in the version of it currently being depicted in Unknown, which is a relationship change narrative about two people who are not blood related but grew up considering each other family only for those feelings to morph into something different over time. This trope can be hard for some people to stomach because the lines we maintain in our heads about what types of feelings we are supposed to have for the various people in our lives are firm, and it's uncomfortable when they're challenged. But that's what makes the story so interesting. And it's not the only romance trope that wrestles with this kind of change.

Two of the most popular romance tropes of all time are also rooted in a relationship change narrative: enemies to lovers and friends to lovers. When these tropes are executed well, the thrill in the story is watching the characters come to a realization of their changing feelings (never at the same time), wrestle with the angst and uncertainty and external strife that causes, and finally decide to fight for the relationship they want despite the risks. Changing the way you think about someone, and changing the way they think about you, is hard and scary and can feel like a huge threat to the relationships you already have. Sound familiar? It should, because these are the same core beats of a pseudo-incest romance.

But this trope adds an even more intriguing layer on top of all those already juicy dynamics, which is the cultural taboo. Pseudo-incest is seen as wrong and considered by most cultures to be a violation of family norms. To put it bluntly, you're not supposed to want to fuck your brother. And so these romances have a whole added challenge on top of all the internal conflict, because the couple not only has to come to terms with their own feelings and struggle through the pain to get on the same page with each other, they also have to deal with the judgment of everyone around them who feels their relationship is morally wrong. The cultural taboo means that everyone else in their lives has to change the way they think about their relationship, too.

So why do we love these stories? Because the character dynamics and relationship development at the core of them are fascinating. When done right, these are the kind of romances you really firmly believe in, because the feelings are so deep they can't be ignored and by the end you've watched the characters fight like hell to be together. A drama that takes this trope seriously will depict the whole journey with the respect the characters deserve and tend to all the relevant relationships surrounding the couple. Unknown is not finished airing yet, but so far it has been a stellar example of this kind of narrative and that's why so many of us are singing its praises.

[anywhere-with-you-event]

Intro & Rules

Welcome to the Anywhere With You gift exchange! This event is for sharing FirstPrince-centric, alternate universe fanworks, and bringing a little more excitement and joy into what can often be a stressful time for people. As we all know, November is election season in the US, and people in marginalized communities (LGBTQ+, people of color, people with disabilities, and more) are often exceptionally worried and stressed due to this. With the source material being so rooted in politics, we wanted to create a little bubble away from that while still featuring the characters we love so much. While we know this won't make any of the world's problems go away, it's nice to have an opportunity to take our minds off of it and take comfort in escaping to another world for a little while. 

This event is open to anyone who wants to participate - not just US creators. Everyone deserves a respite, and there's plenty of room here for all.

Rules below the cut!

Participation Parameters:

Must complete one fanwork for your recipient based on one of their prompts

Fanwork options include

Fanfiction (approx. 2k-5k word count)

Art / Comic (approx. 1-2 pages)

Podfic of one of recipient’s linked fics OR a fic meeting criteria with permission from the author

Stick to requested source media

Red, White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston (book)

Red, White & Royal Blue (2023) (movie)

Either/Both

If someone requests the book, do not include movie-only characters or vice versa

If someone only requests one source, only tag the one corresponding fandom

For Your Request:

Please provide 2-4 short Trope or Theme prompts and 2-4 Specific prompts for a min of 4 or max of 8 total prompts.

Optionally, you can include a link to 1 or 2 of your own fanfictions that meet the parameters (FirstPrince, AU, 2k-5k) if you would like to receive a podfic of those.

Also provide a short list of Likes/Wants and a short list of Do Not Wants.

For Your Offer:

Provide a list of things you like to or are willing to create/work with (tropes, styles, side characters, etc)

Provide a list of things you will NOT create (squicks, kinks, character bashing, etc)

Example:

Requests:

Trope/Theme Prompts

Cowboys AU

Fake Dating

Legally Blonde AU

Specific Prompts

Alex is a model and Henry is a runway photographer. It’s love at first sight for Henry, so he keeps finding reasons to end up at the same shows Alex is working.

Henry is a mermaid and Alex is a marine biologist/diver. Bonus points for language barrier, bonus bonus points for underwater bjs

Want: fluff, cuddling, David the beagle content, Actual Good Parent Ellen

DNW: omegaverse, heavy religious content (mention/imply is okay), Philip-bashing, drug use

Podfic options

too sweet by thesleepyskipper (link)

Doing It the French (Fry) Way by EmmaLostInWonderland (link)

Offers:

Will Write: Sci-fi, romcom rewrites, social media content, outsider POV, hurt/comfort, fluff, humor

Will Not Write: Darkfic, smut, anything with archive warnings, omegaverse, religious content, kidfic

If you have any questions, please contact the mod team by DM, Asks, or email at anywherewithyouevent@gmail.com

[sailorblossoms-rankane]

Hello! I love your analysis on Ranma and attraction, but I'm a new anime fan, so when I was checking ranma's tvtropes page, there's someone arguing that he IS attracted to Shampoo under "foreign culture fetish"

I don't know enough about the manga to point out examples that say otherwise, could someone who knows more about the topic revise it? I couldn't think of anyone else to ask, I'm more of a lurker... ty for your time!

first of all, I recommend simply not relying on tv tropes. Any serious media analysis vastly improves when you leave it behind

The subject of horniness and how it's portrayed in the manga is something I have touched in this thread... it has too many images to just upload here, but I can upload it in parts (i have so many threads i keep saying i'll share here but i just can't find the time yet lol but much of what you want to know it's probably here)

The subject of Shampoo and "tropes" is very complex. Many can apply, but I personally find "foreign culture fetish" a very gross way to put it.

In general: what the work frames for the audience and what the character feels doesn’t always align… the reader’s fantasies don't equal the feelings of a character who isn’t a self-insert... (also, if what they meant is Ranma "has the fetish".... lmfao)

When someone is attached to the idea of Ranma being into Shampoo, they are likely attracted to her themselves and are treating him as a self-insert. Ranma becomes a prize, his precious ~male attention~ the thing that validates the Best Girl. It's a nasty way to think about the female characters (wanting to validate any of them through Ranma is unserious as hell, you can just like the character) but you waste your time trying to argue with people who think that way.

Here's the thing about Shampoo: her advances are portrayed with childish mischief. When she jumps Ranma in her birth suit, there is not a single thought behind those eyes. This is on purpose: the scene itself might be raunchy, but the characters themselves are not being horny. Ranma is jumpscared, but a panel later and his first instinct is to look away. The visual language in his reactions are not very different from what we see when Happosai jumps him: he's being harassed, and he's reacting to that, like any person with a pulse would. Shampoo doesn't look at him. She never leers. We see every single girls' fantasies, and the only person who ever gets sexually suggestive in them is good ol' Akane, bless her (this happens in the chapter where she inhales the sleep incense and starts sleep fighting)

This frankly deserves a more detailed reply, but if you can check the thread I linked, well... there is much there with plenty of pages and panels.

Also, I can't comment too much on the old show as I haven't watched much of it. But seeing movies like Nihao My Concubine is very... illuminating. The manga has nudity, but it never gets as nasty as that fucking movie in the framing of the female characters. You can see how shit like this might warp someone's perception of the characters

[lord-squiggletits]

On the MegOP fandom trend of saying "Optimus should apologize to Megatron"

(Speaking specifically for IDW1, though it applies to a lot of MegOP especially ones that do continuity soup with heavy reference to IDW1)

I was talking to a friend in DMs and they mentioned a common headcanon/fanfic trope that I also concurred with, and both of us said it's something that bothers us: a common take in the MegOP fandom goes basically along the lines of "If Optimus had just apologized to Megatron, the war would've ended" (or other variants including "if he'd tried harder to understand Megatron/work in collaboration with him").

And firstly, this is incorrect for a number of reasons:

There were attempts at peace negotiations during the war, but they fell through. So Optimus WAS trying to work with Megatron to the point of participating in formal diplomatic meetings.

Optimus tried multiple times on page to convince Megatron to just stop fighting and work with him for peace (Autocracy, Chaos Theory) that Megatron rejected. Given that these on-page examples take place at the start of the war and at the end of the war respectively, it makes sense that Optimus asking Megatron for collaboration is something he was trying/willing to do the entire time. So again, Optimus was always willing AND ATTEMPTING to work with Megatron and find a joint solution

Even before the war when Optimus was still Orion, he was very explicitly inspired by Megatron's writing and names Megatron as one of the people who "opened his eyes" to the wrongs of Cybertronian society. So how is it that people claim "the war went on for too long because Optimus never tried to understand Megatron" when OP literally named Megatron as one of his biggest idols, thus implying that OP does understand Megatron's ideals

But the primary purpose of this post wasn't to defend Optimus, actually. Even though I personally think Optimus did plenty (dare I say, everything) to try to end the war, there are some who may still think otherwise, so instead of arguing about whether Optimus did "enough", or who should apologize to whom, or who "deserves the blame" for starting/continuing the war, I'd actually rather talk about this:

No matter who is most "to blame" for the war, it's my firm belief that neither Megatron nor Optimus would even expect/demand the other to apologize to them at all.

On Megatron's side, he would never seek to judge Optimus negatively for the decisions to the point of saying "you wronged me, apologize." Whether it's evil Megatron who doesn't care about atrocities and revels in an opportunity to expose Optimus as a hypocrite, or post-war/Autobot Megatron who knows that his own evil actions are irredeemable, the idea of Megatron judging Optimus and demanding an apology for the war specifically strikes me as out-of-character. Why would Megatron demand or even want an apology from Optimus when Megatron knows fully well that he has his own sins to bear, he prolonged the war for his own selfish/material gain, and that he is responsible for an untold amount of suffering? Demanding an apology would imply that Megatron sees himself as the wronged party and Optimus as the wrongdoer, but by the end of the war, Megatron is too aware of his own part in the war to ever demand such a thing of Optimus. Even if he DID think that Optimus was "equally to blame" for the war (which he doesn't/wouldn't, btw), Megatron's own feelings of guilt would prevent him from trying to seek the petty satisfaction of the moral high ground or making Optimus beg for his forgiveness.

Additionally, Megatron knows Optimus very well as a person: he knows that the position of leadership is full of "loneliness [and] agonizing self-doubt" for Optimus (Chaos Theory) and that "when Optimus hurts others, he hurts himself" (MTMTE). Another reason that Megatron wouldn't demand nor want an apology from Optimus is because Megatron knows Optimus so well that he already knows that being a war leader fills Optimus with immense guilt and suffering. Given that Megatron knows about Optimus' self-doubt and guilt, why would he even need an apology when he already knows how much Optimus regrets the war and desperately wishes/wished for it to end?

Then, as established in the previous paragraphs, Optimus is too full of guilt for his part in the war (both before it started and in being unable to stop it sooner) to demand an apology from Megatron. Again, demanding an apology would put Optimus in an implied position of moral superiority and/or victimhood, but Optimus doesn't see himself as morally superior or as a victim (or rather, he sees himself as being responsible for these bad things happening and internalizes this as a duty to do better/fix wrongdoings). In other words, Megatron and Optimus both share this view of themselves and each other: Their hands are so dirty, and they both feel such guilt over this, and they know each other well enough to know that the other feels this way as well. Because both of them feel blame for the war and are acutely aware of their own flaws/part in suffering, both of them feel far too responsible for the war happening for them to ever blame their archnemesis for "not trying harder" or "being responsible for the war."

Hell, if you even look at the socio-political climate of Cybertron before the war started, neither Megatron nor Optimus were the ones who put this conflict into motion. The corrupt legacy of the Primes, Functionism, class issues-- all of these things existed before Megatron and Optimus did. Even once they started doing things like writing about social issues (M) or fighting against the Senate (OP), both of them were "underlings" in sense that they weren't leaders:

Megatron's writings may have inspired the Decepticon movement, but that movement existed as an independent entity with its own leaders and speakers long before Megatron became the "official" ruler of the Decepticons. He wasn't even the leader of the 'Cons until he took control of the gladiator arena and the nonviolent sections of the Decepticons were (presumably) subsumed into the underground, exploitative battle culture that Megatron created.

Optimus-as-Orion was a police officer to start, but even once he started going against the Senate, he mainly worked in collaboration with others like Senator Shockwave and Zeta (later Zeta Prime), who he either saw as his idols or who were literally superior to him in rank due to government/military structures.

So with this in mind, even from a social level, while Megatron and Optimus may have been "catalysts" of a sort that caused the war to escalate to an outright planetary/galactic level, the scenario is too complex to solely lay the blame for the war at either of their feet. I'm not confident in saying that Megatron/Optimus would explicitly think of this when talking to each other, but what I'm trying to say is that M/OP were just catalysts in a long chain of brewing tension that exploded into a war. Even if one could claim that one of them "started" or "escalated" the war, the social issues that caused the war and the positions of power that allowed them to become leaders in the first place were falling into place before either of them actually BECAME leaders.

In other words, this shared fate of being the final reaction that exploded a societal conflict into outright war... Megatron and Optimus both have that in common. And because of this, I really don't think either of them would even think to ask the other to apologize because they're both in such similar positions, with such similar feelings of guilt and responsibility, that they understand each other's feelings without words. To demand an apology would be akin to taking that shared vulnerability/guilt and stepping on it, attempting to claim that one is right/superior and the other is wrong/inferior, and that the inferior one needs to grovel and take responsibility for the bad things that happened.

[alexissara]

The Marble Queen Review

The Marble Queen is a an amazingly drawn book, Gabrielle Kari is one of the greatest artists out there and her brilliant craftsmanship truly captures a unique voice in comics. I am impressed her illustrative style was captured on so many pages of the books really showing the level of heart that went into this work. The amazing use of paneling and page layout allowed for very dynamic use of the medium of comics breaking conventions from each other while feeling like bold artist moves on the page.

The book is hampered some what by being a YA book, it feels like at times there are areas that maybe would have been better served with more details but it does really edge what most YAs feel their able to do in a first novel. With lots of death, some blood and some implied sex. The pacing was a bit fast, there were moments that felt like they could have lingered longer and taken more time and perhaps the beginning starts a little slow but the romance does feel satisfying.

I think there are feelings I'd like to see explored more, the ending appears to set up a potential follow up book but it's ending is satisfying enough to simply imply potential conflict that is not needed. Anna does do a great job capturing Amelia's anxiety and the ways it manifests, the ways she tries to treat it, and how it affects her life. It is a great deception of that mental health struggle. I do wish we could have seen more into Salira's perspective, the white woman who doesn't know about being gay being the POV makes sense in the like cynical ways but I would have liked to get more into the interiority of Salira who does fall a bit into the "more butch brown woman who dots after he innocent white GF trope." I think that would have been felt a little less if we saw the world a bit more from her eyes. That said the book does do a solid job of showing plenty of fem brown women so I think it be an oversimplification to say it's just an example of that. It's worth noting only in that i know several other BIPOC women who might hesitate at it but I think we're in the clear here.

This book does feel like it in some ways compensates for being about gay women with good straight brothers who are very good boys. In general we get an idea that Salira'a kingdom is homonormative and see that in a page but from that point on basically everyone is implied to be straight in the kingdom. They leave some details vauge, some people could be bi, but this is all the reader chosing the details what we do see if M/F relationships, a set of women attracted to men, and one other woman who is confirmed to be gay but is also tied into a plot twist so I won't go into detail. That's not to day the queerness feels bad in the story it is good, it's the focus, it's great just that I felt there was maybe a little room for improvement within the bounds the story itself set's up. Unlike something like the lack of trans rep which it does not ever bother with so I wouldn't mention outside of like using it as an example for something I wouldn't take points off for. Regardless, my point is it would have been nice for like one more named character to have been queer.

I do really enjoy that both girls have some troubles in the new arranged relationship and both gave up something they love for it. I also enjoy that there is a twist for a lie that is told that while given a moment of weight is not turned into a giant drama moment and just given a tiny bit of time before the pair moved on. It felt more realistic for the two to understand why that lie was told.

Ultimately, this is a rather good story that I feel like was close to great but maybe fell behind just a little. That said I really liked it and I'd totally love prints of it and stuff. The main couple are cute and extra adorable towards the end. I like that there is a flare of action in the story and that the story had some big shifts in the status quo by the end of it. I love a lot of the sweet little moments. I love the ways it really pushed on anxiety as this thing in your life that can be consuming. It's a really great piece of art. If you enjoyed this review and want to see other reviews and support me making my own sapphic art you can support me on Patreon.

[arcane-vagabond]

Arcane-Vagabond's FAQ

Hi! Welcome to my FAQ page! Here is a list of the different questions I get asked fairly frequently or things I've had to address more than once.

✨ Can I tag you in my fics?

Did I ask to be tagged? Then no.💛

(You will be blocked if you do this anyway.)

✨ Can I make fan art of your fics?

My brother in Christ…..we will have a spring wedding.

(Just let me know/tag me/give me credit)

✨ Can I be added to your taglist?

I do not have a taglist. If you would like to be notified on when I post, follow my sideblog ( @sailoraviator-library ) and turn on post notifications. I will ignore requests asking to be put on a taglist from here on out.

✨ Do you have a posting schedule?

Not currently, no.

✨ Can I request something?

Yes! But please keep in mind that I might say no if I'm not interested or comfortable with the topic. Usually, I will send you over to an artist/writer who I think might be able to fulfill your request if I cannot.

✨ You haven't answered my ask/request/questions or updated my favorite story in a while. Why?

While I try to get to requests, sometimes the writing juice just isn't plentiful for an idea. Also, I'm a grown woman with a full time job, friends, family, and other hobbies/obligations outside of this blog. I travel for work which means at any given time, I'm sitting in a hotel room after multiple hours of driving. If I have time, I try to answer everything, but I also have (as of 7.30.24) 94 requests sitting in my inbox, with some from a couple of months ago. Please be patient.

✨ I want to write a story, but it's similar to yours. Is that okay?

Listen, my love, as long as it's not a complete ripoff of one of my stories, I really don't care what you write. You want to write about mermaids? Please do! You want to write about cursed pirates? Go ahead! The nature of AUs is that you are going to use similar tropes for the stories, and the nature of tropes is that you are going to have similarities to stories that use the same ones. There's only so many ways you can write a meet cute in a bar.

✨ Will you promote my fic?

I try to reblog fics I come across, and promote the ones from smaller authors as much as possible. However, that does not mean my blog is a billboard for you to promote your fics on. I was once a small time author, so I know how hard it can be to get your stuff out there. Shoving your work at me is a guaranteed way to get me to NOT read it and actively ignore it in the future.

✨ Why do you have so many WIPs (Works in Progress)? You know you probably won't finish all of those, right?

I do, and that's okay. That's the nature of writing fanfic, unfortunately. Not everything is going to get finished. You also have to understand that just because I haven't touched a story in a month or two doesn't mean it's been abandoned. The writing muses just haven't given me inspiration or motivation to write for it. I will make an announcement and take something off of my masterlist if I have decided to abandon it.

✨ What are some thing I can do to get my writing noticed?

Tag appropriately. I cannot tell you how many people are going to scroll past your writing if you tag a character fic with the actor (for example, tagging a Jake "Hangman" Seresin fic with Glen Powell). In fact, you are more likely to get yourself blocked versus someone reading your fic. Make use of the "Read More" feature on your fics. People are more likely to block you than read your fic if they have to scroll endlessly past your fics. People will find your fics by searching the appropriate tags. Just give it time.

✨ What are some things I should do when posting/writing?

Do NOT write real person fic. It's one thing to write about a character that doesn't exist, it's something else writing about a real life person who will suffer the consequences when people will inevitably mix reality with fiction. How would you feel if someone wrote a story about you where you did all of these things you'd never do?

Put appropriate trigger/content warnings above your fic. If you are going to write about sensitive topics, it is SO important that you warn people before they reach the story. Writing about losing a child, cancer, or sexual behavior? Tag it explicitely so people can filter it. Do not censor your warnings and do not use "angst" as a catch all. Allow people to protect themselves.

✨ I didn't like [insert fic here].

I literally don't care. Telling me you didn't like something instead of scrolling without a hateful comment makes you a loser, actually.

✨ Do you take non-fanfic related questions?

Yes!! I encourage them, actually! Never feel like you can't shoot me an ask that's not related to fanfic or fandom because I love chatting!! Even if you want to chat with me about fics, I'm more than happy to do so!

✨ Who do you write for?

Mainly Top Gun Maverick at the moment, but I might write for other fandoms in the future! I wrote reader inserts, and it’s good to note that my reader inserts are female unless otherwise stated!

This is by no means a comprehensive list, and will be updated as I get more questions!

[olderthannetfic]

wait has someone ever written up a history of sentinelverse au's? because this feels like a topic that needs to be discussed

--

IDK. What's on Fanlore?

I mean, on a very basic level, yes, I'm sure someone has written something, but I'm not aware of any well-researched deep dives into exactly when such-and-such a part of the trope first showed up.

Given the era, I would guess that at least some important developments happened in zines. The internet was taking over pretty thoroughly by the time the show aired, but oldschool writers, some of them popular BNFs, were still doing zines. Sentinel fandom itself had a lot (and I would bet that the AU does come pretty squarely from TS fanon even if it doesn't come from TS canon). It was also an era of mailing lists, which don't have publicly accessible archives.

That big, old Sentinel archive got imported to AO3, didn't it? So at least a decent chunk of stuff will be findable, but I'd bet there's plenty of old Sentinel fic that's just on somebody's hand-coded HTML page from back in the day. And other fandoms of the era are like that too and/or have dead archives that aren't always on AO3 now. And god knows what developments happened in the LJ years.

By the time we get to easily-findable stuff of the last decade or so, the trope was very firmly established. I'm sure people still come up with new takes (there's some BTS fic by people who clearly have heard of the trope but not really read it, for example), but a lot of the history requires digging.

Anyone have thoughts on the evolution of Sentinel AUs?

[uefb]

Why do you think there’s a pattern of Theseus being abusive/overly aggressive in Fantastic Beasts fanfic? It’s been driving me up the wall trying to find Newt and Theseus fanfic that doesn’t make them OOC especially Theseus, and idk, in the context of Newt being Autistic I find it disturbing. Like sure, Theseus is hot-headed and loses his temper, he doesn’t always understand Newt, but those traits seem overtly exaggerated in a lot of fandom content.

Obsessed with this ask. I have been thinking about it all day, and am just now getting to write it up! Thinking about it in the background of my statistics class almost singularly got me through its sensory and anxiety hell. /sweat-laugh emoji/ So thank you!

Please remember, all of this is based on my own perspectives, knowledge, and headcanons, as well as canon clues. Nothing here is definitive and is open for respectful conversation! (Not directed specifically at you, salamander, just since this is a public blog I like to cover my bases. ^_^)

Buckle up: major autistic info dump incoming

Alright, so, my initial thoughts are that...

Obviously, there was a decent chunk of Newt fic written between 2016 and 2018 before CoG came out, that first film where we really got to see Theseus as a character, for who he really is (especially since they cut that letter from him to Newt at beginning of FBWTFT, that starts with "little brother," which is just pretty endearing). IMHO, this two-year gap means people had a wide open playing field to build the character themselves. Here's a few thoughts on that:

The framework for the entire Wizarding World, narratively, is the Harry Potter series. Boy wizard, shunned by family, isolated from socialization -- Outcasts have always been the backbone of She-who-must-not-be-named's stories. It's compelling. We love it, we lap it up. With only one FB film out before 2018 and Newt being such a unique protagonist, I think it's likely people fell back on the more typical Harry-Dudley trope to create a compelling backstory for Newt, using that tried-and-true fantasy Cinderella-type trope.

Second, from what I can tell, there was a lot less serious consideration of Newt actually being autistic in the early years of the fandom. (I only "joined" relatively recently myself, despite going to the first 2 movies on opening day, but I'm nothing if not fastidious in consuming every scrap of historical content when I develop a new interest, lol.) I've read pages of threads and plenty of "think pieces" attributing Newt's behavior to trauma-related social anxiety and/or his profession as a magizoologist. I absolutely buy the latter (adjusting body language for one's profession), but not entirely the former. (Personally, Newt doesn't strike me as an inherently anxious person--he strikes me as an inherently autistic one who also sometimes experiences anxiety. Discomfort and anxiety aren't the same thing, but people often conflate them, imho.) Anyway, THAT BEING SAID, I've noticed in quite a few fics that people write Theseus as being part of that implied social trauma, via sibling bullying that rises beyond typical sibling harassment. People perhaps tried to explain Newt's behavior by making him, at the very least, overshadowed by Theseus (and ashamed of it) or, at the very worst, abused and/or neglected by his family.

Also, quite simply: people process their own family trauma via fic. I think it's highly likely Theseus just served a sibling or parental role for some people in stories. (The abundance of abusive!Thranduil fic in the LotR fandom in the early 00s is another example of this.) Nothing wrong with using fic to process feelings and life experiences (god knows I do, it's horrifically obvious and always has been lmao), but this bulletpoint is still one explanation for the pre-CoG "Theseus being a dick in fic" phenomenon.

Plus, fanfic doesn't occur in a vacuum. Even when new canon info comes out, existing fic and whatever the going/contemporary fanon is often impact how new writers write their characters, even post-CoG. (And how those characterizations are received by the larger fandom--that reception may subsequently impact how writers maintain or change their characters in the future, imho.)

As for the current reasons Theseus is often OOC in post-CoG fic...

Well, I have my theories, but I am also not entirely sure. However, I feel pretty confident it has to do, primarily, with points 1 and 4.

Leta Lestrange and the Scamander Brothers - Honestly, I think people likely are pretty offended on Newt's behalf for the Leta/Theseus marriage. In mainstream media, we're kind of trained to think that dating your friend's ex is ultimate betrayal--it's difficult for people to imagine a world in which a person who marries their brother's ex is a good person. (...I was once in a friend group where we had all dated the same girl at some point, but we were all either ridiculously honest or autistic so we just--wait for it--talked about it and moved on.) That being said, I never read Leta & Newt as overtly romantic (then again, I also didn't know Bunty liked Newt until the 4th time I watched CoG), so I don't entirely get this one to the degree that I think some people viscerally feel this. But I expect some people see that and assume it says something much larger about Theseus' character than it does. (I do think it says a lot about Theseus that he loves Leta, but I don't think it says the same things about him that some other people do -- I think it speaks more to his similarities to Newt [compassion and positive outlook] than it does to stealing Newt's Hogwarts sweetheart. But I digress.)

Something Did Happen at Some Point - Now, there is undeniably a distance between the brothers that we, as viewers, don't necessarily know the origin of. (So I think I may have mentioned in my letters that [my brother & I] have quite a complicated relationship. // Does he want to kill you? // Frequently.) Have they always been like that? Is it new? Is it because of the age difference? Because they have different personalities? (Though I will argue until I'm blue in the face that they're actually extraordinarily similar people, at their cores.) Is it because Newt got expelled, or because Theseus scooped up Leta, or because Theseus expresses emotion through touch & Newt jerks away from touch he doesn't initiate himself, or because because because because because? I don't know. But there is something there and, based on the "complicated relationship" comment, it sounds like it is something that likely developed over time. So imho - I think some people see that and just lean in way too hard. Like, pedal to the medal, 0 to 60 too hard.

Theseus is Snarky to Newt on Multiple Occasions - Mostly based around how Newt directs his life, carries himself, etc etc. For example, it would be easy to take that whole scene before and after Newt's travel hearing in CoG and assume Theseus is an overprotective, condescending, and ableist prick. But if we look below the surface (and the stage directions in the screenplay help, too. When he says "maybe a little less... / like me. / well, it can't hurt" the instructions say 'not without fondness', or something like that), it's pretty glaringly obvious he doesn't mean to be that way. Even condescending behaviors usually have causal correlates, even if we can't see them on the surface. (Believe me -- and this is something we both touched on in DMs, salamander, I'm just repeating for the sake of the ask -- well-meaning pep talks and encouragement can still drip with condescension when loved ones think you need guidance because they "love you and know better " and you're just too autistic or too idealistic or too naive or whatever.) Ultimately, whether due to a failure to approach these snarky exchanges with grace and nuance, or because it can make a good fic to put brothers at odds, IDK -- but I expect this particular point plays into some people's decisions to interpret Theseus in a way I view as OOC.

Ease of Narrative ~ Nuance is hard - I mean, this one explains itself. Writing characters in a nuanced manner that allows digging into the messy horrible confusion of relationships--embedded as they are within families and societies and personal & general history--is not easy. It takes not only patience and significant effort as a writer, but it also takes a degree of self-awareness and maturity that we all reach at different points. I'm not there yet myself (there's no real arrival -- life's not a perfect graph), but still: My fic writing is very different now at 32 (with 14 years of 'adulthood' and 12 years of therapy under my belt) than it was when I was writing about adults when I was 15. (And, yes, I still have my first posted HP fic up on MuggleNet and FFnet, so you don't just have to take my word for it lmao.) To be very clear, this isn't me being ageist or whatever: I'm just saying that I often get the sense while reading fic where Theseus is reallllly overly aggressive that the writer is sometimes either very new to creative writing (and good for them! we love new writers! keep writing, lovelies!), or else quite young, and thus still acquiring life experience that is going to improve their work as they age, every single day.**

Sibling Experience - Not having personal or narrative experience with an age gap like Newt and Theseus have. I'm an older sibling by 7.5 years, which is close to Theseus & Newt's age difference. I basically half-raised my younger brother, so I have a real soft spot for that kind of sibling relationship, which comes across in most of my fics (LotR & FB). It's hard to imagine the sort of borderline sibling-parental love, responsibility, and anxiety that can permeate those kind of relationships if you haven't experienced or seen it represented in media yourself. This is just a theory, of course---I have no actual data on this being actually related to his OOCness.

What else? What do you or others think?

Final very random thought

I also think a lot of people forget that autism runs in families. So yes, Theseus doesn't always "get" Newt (god, no, lol) and he doesn't have guidance on what to do when he doesn't, but it is highly unlikely he hasn't seen behavior similar to Newt's before, whether in a parent or cousins, an aunt/uncle or something else. People *also* tend to forget, IMHO, that subclinical traits are often present in direct family members of an autistic person--Theseus' rigid thinking, for example, isn't necessarily "autistic", but he may get Newt better than people think for certain reasons we never have an opportunity to see in the script. (Not that the movies are paying *that* much attention to the actual research or autism presentations lmao, but I'm just saying it is a possibility). Being able to relate to a smaller version of someone's struggles can simultaneously make one both a better support and a worse one in a lot of ways. (And certain autistic traits can even rub up against each other poorly in different people--I have a few acquaintances that rub me the wrong way because our "symptoms" manifest in very different ways and their natural behavior triggers some of my own sensory issues or overdeveloped sense of justice or whatever. Conversely, my ADHD tendency to be 20 minutes late to every hang gives one of my autistic friends a panic attack every time -- I feel terrible, but all we can both do is try to adjust the behavior around our symptoms. And sometimes the same traits--firmly held beliefs, for example--bump into each other explosively, which I have experienced in fandom myself: two autistic people w diametrically opposing views interacting, but because we process information in similar ways even with very different perspectives, no progress can be made before someone shuts down.) BUT I BRING THIS UP BECAUSE, I do think it's possible to headcanon that some of Newt and Theseus' conflict (which does exist) could even be rooted in differing forms of neurodivergence or presentation of subclinical symptoms.

The world is a big place and there's so many possibilities. These are just some of my thoughts on why Theseus is often portrayed in a way I find to be OOC!

Asterisked footnote under cut -

**I'm trying to convey what Sandra Cisneros does much better in her short story "Eleven." That we, all of us, carry our entire lives and what we have seen inside of us at all times, and I think that's what we bring to our writing.

What they don’t understand about birthdays and what they never tell you is that when you’re eleven, you’re also ten, and nine, and eight, and seven, and six, and five, and four, and three, and two, and one. And when you wake up on your eleventh birthday you expect to feel eleven, but you don’t. You open your eyes and everything’s just like yesterday, only it’s today. And you don’t feel eleven at all. You feel like you’re still ten. And you are—underneath the year that makes you eleven. Like some days you might say something stupid, and that’s the part of you that’s still ten. Or maybe some days you might need to sit on your mama’s lap because you’re scared, and that’s the part of you that’s five. And maybe one day when you’re all grown up maybe you will need to cry like if you’re three, and that’s okay. That’s what I tell Mama when she’s sad and needs to cry. Maybe she’s feeling three. Because the way you grow old is kind of like an onion or like the rings inside a tree trunk or like my little wooden dolls that fit one inside the other, each year inside the next one. That’s how being eleven years old is.

[phoenix-is-the-hottest-thing]

hi! if i may ask, do you have any advice on transposing (?) characters in AUs? i have one i wanna write but i get overwhelmed by stuff i feel like i have to account for, like a character's allegiance, combat ability, traumatic experiences, place of birth, music knowledge, relationships with other characters from that universe waughg. for example, writing Mobius in a position not limited by Elysia, but because she's on a guy's shitlist (he denies it, but he's on her shitlist too, it's mutual)

Hmmm I’m not sure what you mean on that last part (especially since Mobius is hardly limited to Elysia in canon? She has a lot of complex relationships, including negative ones?) BUT I guess start by just. Writing something.

Let me explain. You are overthinking the backstory part. So get some part of the actual story you want to tell down, even if it’s just one scene, and see how you feel.

You don’t have to know everything before you start writing, your best ideas will come up as you go. If you are really into those details and it turns out you’d rather tell the backstory of the characters— that’s actually perfectly fine! I did that in vampire AU via the flashback sections, but you could also just make it the entire plot if you wanted, you are free…

But a story is made of scenes, not background details. So it is more important to write something down than knowing everything you’ll have to take into account for the AU to make perfect sense.

Having said that, I’ll answer the question you actually asked!

To get less overwhelmed when thinking up backstories, think of your AU’s plot. You’re writing a story, not a TV Tropes page— those details must serve the story you are writing. Not everything is all that important, and what you decide is important should be chosen to reinforce your message, make your story more solid or interesting, etc. Characters and their backstories are tools!

Additionally, since you’re writing existing characters into an AU, study the original characters. Know who they are. It will be much easier to write them naturally, without having to think of those AU-specific details ahead of time.

Let’s put both previous points into action.

If you’re telling a story about freedom, you can focus on how Mobius chooses to let her creations have free will, and encourages them to follow their own paths, regardless of whether they will side with her or not. For this to be important to her, she probably feels that she lacks freedom— in her canon backstory it could be because her ideas are widely rejected and she has trouble accomplishing her goals because of it.

Even if in your AU she doesn’t have a lab or an apocalypse to study, this core idea isn’t hard to apply to something else. In a random High School AU it could be that she has controlling foster parents after her dad died, for example, or there are situations where being a minor results in a lack of agency that forces her into undesirable situations. The possibilities are endless! Core character concepts are not tied to specific circumstances, which is what makes them transposable.

Also it’s easier for both you and the reader to just use what’s already there as much as possible. For you that means they’ll be easier to keep in character, and for the reader it’s familiar context (or they learn something new about a character thanks to you).

Mobius’s music knowledge? Well she claims music is just noise, but she feels touched by Eden’s last song. So she doesn’t seem interesting by music unless she has a personal connection to it. That’s perfectly transposable.

Elysia on the other hand, she’s the type to listen to Eden, and she likes dancing, but she doesn’t seem to be the overly academic type. Canon Elysia doesn’t seem to play an instrument either. She probably knows plenty of popular songs, dancing songs, and songs that Eden has sung to her or talked about, but not more than what Eden told her about music theory. That’s also transposable.

But! Remember, details must serve your story. If you’re writing a story about a band, you can take those above points, keep them, and then give the characters a twist.

Perhaps Mobius CLAIMS she hates music but she actually finds singing soothing, so she sings in secret. Perhaps Elysia loves listening to music, so she decided to try and learn an instrument. By combining what your characters are like and what your AU needs, you get a unique, interesting result that readers will be curious about.

Now for entirely “new” things, well. If you have lots of new characters to introduce to existing ones, you could just take an hour and make a relationship chart. Just one hour. Not days. Set an alarm up. You can change it later, but limiting the time you spend will help you feel less overwhelmed.

If you are wondering about a detail canon doesn’t talk about and feel lost, worry about when it’s relevant, and when it is relevant pick what makes what comes next most interesting.

Say that your characters are visiting a new town, and start talking about how different it is to their home town— wouldn’t it be most fun if someone dropped “actually, I was born here”, and became the character to give them a tour or know more than others about the place? That way you can mix worldbuilding and plot seamlessly!

I think that should be enough to get you unstuck. I hope my advice will be helpful.

Just remember one last thing: Your story must be something you enjoy writing, not something that will be a “good final product.” Make sure to have fun, okay? ^^

Happy writing!

[jophiel-extras]

Hi! So I was looking at your page, and I went through the entire thing, and I noticed a few things that are sort of fishy to me. So, you posted that you aren’t comfortable doing dub con content, but you’re okay doing hypnosis/influence fics? And cnc? I’m sorry, I’m just a little confused as to how neither of those are explicitly consented in a fully consensual way. Cnc is a little better than hypnosis/influence fics but they’re both dub con in nature, if not noncon as far as the hypnosis ones go. I was just wondering your thoughts on that. Thanks!

Sure, so I was referring to “hypnosis” in terms of being more realistic; not full body takeover, if that makes sense. More like trigger words that can cause a physical reaction wink wink. As for “influences” I am referring to aphrodisiacs, things that amplify sexuality and desires the examples I used being drugs that boost libido or sex pollen which is a common smut trope. I do understand how that can be confusing though, hope this helped and I’ll specify these in my kink list. Also CNC refers to the consensual roleplay of non consent, which is a fine kink for people to roleplay in a safe setting with a safe word. I don’t hold any judgement towards people who write dub con, but I just don’t want to! Sorry if that disappoints, I’m sure there are plenty of other fic writers who don’t mind.

[autumnslance]

13. worst blorboficiation

-Haurchefant.

-Zenos with Draco In Leather Pants situations. It's actually Sephiroth canon vs fanon example images on that page if one rightly fears actually going to TV Tropes. The characters are built along the same vibes anyway, and both have plenty of fans who only see the long-haired pretty boy and ignore inconvenient parts of actual characterization (so most of it).

[doubleaspectrum]

Oldboy Hallway Fight Analysis

So, I recently watch Oldboy. The 2003 version, not the remake. Seriously, why do people even make those anyways? Remakes only make sense if the original creation sucks and you’re giving things another try to fix it. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Right? Well, OLDBOY AIN’T BROKE!

Sorry about the tangent, I just really don’t get why media outlets keep trying to improve on something that already worked. Most of the times they make things worse. Heck, if anyone can find an example that improved on a success, let me know.

Okay, I’m done this time. So, the reason I was pointed to Oldboy is because my eldest sibling showed me the famous hallway fight scene. At the time, I didn’t see how it ended, they stopped at the first moment Dae-su is knocked down and the gangsters start to crowd him.

So, of course, I figured the obvious answer, no matter how skilled Dae-su could be he’d lose the fight. Skill doesn’t account for much if you’re overwhelmed. Imagine my surprise when I was told that he wins. My jaw dropped. How could he win with those odds?! Only someone like John Wick could win and even then, he’d being using a gun! Well, when I saw the scene itself in its full glory I understood why, and my goodness I loved it!

Now, to go with the beginning parts I saw, they were good, but they were also rather par for the course when it comes to action movies.

There’s a degree of martial arts with Dae-su dancing his way into the crowd.

There’s a part where he fights pragmatically by taking a human shield.

And when he first gets crowded, he gets right back up and starts charging the crowd.

And while this is great, I’m sad to say this isn’t unique. Any other action movie character can do this. There’s no shortage of martial arts films, and we’ve seen heroes like John McClane and John Wick (there’s no shortage of Johns either) tank plenty of hits and manage to keep walking on both feet before the movie ends. So, what is it that makes Oldboy so unique? Don’t worry, I’m getting there.

The first part that really impressed me was Dae-su getting knocked down the second time. You know what he does?

He slams his hammer into his opponents’ feet!

Now this is a stroke of genius! From what I’ve seen of hydraulic press videos, everything likes to hold its shape before enough force makes the substance break in its weakest spot. This applies to the process of hammering a nail. Now, you may get those situations where the nail proves to be the weaker substance and you’ve got a bent nail, but ideally the wooden board is the weaker substance and it gives way when slammed. Now with these principles in mind, tell me what happens when a human foot is stuck between a swinging hammer and a concrete floor.

Now, if a hammer was hitting a floating limb, it would hurt but would go with the swing, but with the concrete floor as a brace, where does the force go but into the foot? It was at this point I realized that Daes-su wasn’t just fighting harder than a gang of thugs, he was outsmarting them!

On a slight side note, I have read a copy of Sun Tzu’s the Art of War, specifically without commentary. So, I remember the advice that you should know both the enemy and yourself to judge your capacity for victory. So, when I say that Dae-su was outsmarting his opponents, I made sure to judge their intelligence accordingly.

The next key part of the fight is that Dae-su gets stabbed in the back and collapses.

This lulls his opponents into a false sense of security, and they start to wonder if he’s dead. One important thing to mention, they don’t take the knife out. Now, if you have basic medical knowledge (or in my case, have read the Worst Aid page on TV Tropes) then you’ll know that what kills someone isn’t putting the knife into the body, it’s the blood loss when the knife is removed. So, when the thugs start wondering if they’ve killed a guy without removing the knife, you can assess how smart they are.

This actually plays into the greatest part of my analysis. You see, Dae-su takes everyone by surprise when he gets up and keeps fighting; from there the atmosphere changes. Suddenly, the gang doesn’t rush him all at once anymore.

They keep their distance, they back away more often, and push each other.

All around, they don’t want to get close to him. And that’s when I understand, none of them are particularly smart so as far as they can tell, some guy they just killed has come back to life and is still kicking their asses! To put it simply, they’re scared. And that makes all the difference. Suddenly this isn’t a simple fight anymore, Dae-su has engaged several opponents at once in psychological warfare, and he’s winning.

Thus, my question was answered. How did Dae-su win the fight? He wasn’t just a juggernaut or a martial artist like any other action hero; he won through tactical genius. He turned unfavorable situations into brutal counterattacks, he used his enemy’s lack of intelligence to catch them off guard, and most of all, he terrified the crap out of an entire group. Normally, we’d be worried about how much sense a fight scene can make, but when I saw this fight, it clicked together and I loved it all the more.

[acourtofthought]

Sarah said that her favorite tropes are enemies to lovers and marriage of convenience. She's shows us that through her books plenty of time. She might not have directly done marriage of convenience but she does that more with mating bonds -> Nessian could be an example.

Sarah never said anything about couples that have liked each other from the start. She often tells us she loves banter and tension and that.. well, it doesn't happen with El/riel. (I swear to god, if one of them comes out and says "But now they have tension and conflicts because the bonus chapter-" I will slap them with their own words "tHe bOnUs cHapTeR iS iRReLeVaNt")

You could pretty much say elucien have the marriage of convenience (mating bond of convenience?). So between Elucien and El/riel, if we go with what she's said and written- I think it's a pretty obvious answer.

Seriously. No one gives a damn if El/riel like each other for a long time. If they don't seem right to Sarah, she won't take their route. Sjm likes her characters to explore first and see where they take her to. To claim that because El/riel like each other for a long time and Elucien aren't on great times, it will forever stay like that shows us that these people don't know Sjm well.

She never talked about El/riel except for that one Interview when she had legit says she sees El/riel as brother and sister (2017 or 2028 Interview). The clips that they claim as "El/riel proof" are just Sarah talking about Nessian or other couples "She said Sjm hates it when her fav ship aren't endgame! That's El/riel proof because El/riel has been there for a long time!" Did Sjm tell you that El/riel is her fav ship? You assume because she had written romantic scenes for them, that seals the deal? Have you already forgotten that Feylin, Chaoleana, Moriel, Dorleana etc. Where there first? That they had done far more than El/riel? You see what happened to them. She talked about ships that she likes from other authors and also talked about Nessian. If she isn't a fan of one ship she'll either sink that ship immediatly -> Lucien and Nesta. Or she'll wait until the time is right and mislead the readers. That's how she is with her books. She had made heacanons about Elucien and claimed El/riel are like siblings (After acowar was out, mind you).

But yeah sure. If your ship isn't endgame then scream "fanservice" all you like, since you like to believe sinking a ship that has been on great terms is impossible 🤷🏾‍♀️

The fact alone that they have convienced themselves El/riel is Sjm fav ship just because they have romantic scenes... 💀 As if the whole tog series and acomaf doesn't exist? The bonus chapter has pretty much shown us El/riel might not be her fav ship after all, but they've also convienced themselves that only couples that had romantic scenes and sexual tension are winning.. the fall will hurt, I tell you that.

Also.. Sjm is evil. This lady came back after 3 years to drop a book that caused the biggest shipwar and then immediatly pieced herself out again for another... what? 5 years? Like ma'am, please just end our misery.

Not to mention there's a big different between tension and banter and two characters being nearly physical when neither character has let themselves be truly vulnerable to the other versus E/riels POV scene. Elain had done nothing to Az. She hadn't lashed out at him, snarked at him, etc. before their kiss. I'm not saying she was wanting to engage with Az because she has real feelings for him, I don't think Elain knows what she's doing at this point because she still hasn't confronted her losses (and no, even her attempts at moving forward aren't proof of overcoming the past. Until we see her work through those things on page from her own POV, she's not fully recovered because any therapist will tell you processing things inside without actually talking about them isn't the healthiest way to go about it). But she did go into that kiss with more of an innocence than we saw from Nessian's near kiss (not to mention neither Nesta or Cassian needed to get over past LI's yet Cassian STILL addressed his past with Mor before that happened) or even Feysands first hookup scene. And the way Az told her it was a mistake is not comparable and not "snark and banter". He caused her actual hurt considering she was putting herself on the line after Graysen rejected her. Again, I'm not saying she had real feelings for Az but they had a friendship (ish) of sorts and she allowed herself to be vulnerable, opening herself up to kissing someone for the first time after the loss of her fiance (someone who also didn't want her). I so wish someone had a clip of that interview where she said E/riel were like brother and sister. Not saying that she couldn't have changed her mind but it would at least prove to E/riels that E/riel wasn't ALWAYS the plan like they argue. And I would bet money that E/riel is not remotely close to being SJMs favorite ship. Rhys is the thing she said she'd taken to a deserted island and she has been beside herself with excitement over talking about Nessian. I think at one point she actually said Cassian is the kind of male she'd go for and I do know she said Nesta was a gift to her. Those ships have that extra spice that SJM loves in her romances and E/riel is bland in comparison. I'm not even saying that as an Anti E/riel at this point. There is nothing exciting about E/riel, they read as a very YA first relationship kind of pairing and if you really pay attention to every other couple SJM has written about, they don't match up. I'll never understand why people in the fandom try to self insert into the authors preferences. We can all like what we like but what good does it do to ignore what the author likes in order to prove what we want to happen? She has never spoken of E/riel. She doesn't speak of enjoying friends to lovers as a favorite trope. She has never spoken of liking couples who tiptoe around one another and she ALWAYS has her MMC or FMC first address (from their POV) that they are truly over their past love interests before moving on to their endgame person and that alone should be enough to prove to them why E/riel isn't in love, that their kiss was not when either was in the right state of mind and why it's a good thing Az doesn't consider Gwyn a friend at this point.

[mackycheese]

i like editing for tvtropes not because it's a great platform for media analysis or because it's informative or for The Community or whatever. i like it because im autistic and not smart enough for wikipedia

i have nothing of value to add to any page on an obscure species of yeast, but when i accurately remember the events of a story, there's always another editor on tvtropes who thinks they do but doesn't and whose edit i get to correct. everything on wikipedia is already very standardized, but i got to alphabetize the work examples on several trope pages already.

not to mention there's plenty of obscure works that don't but very much could have a tvtropes page (no such thing as notability and all that)

[phantomato]

Trope ask game - first time or kiss?

Mmmm. I feel like this is super-commonly tagged, you know? Because it applies to so many fics, since most shipfic is get-together over established relationship, and “first time” could mean first time ever (loss of virginity), first time with a person of that gender, first time with that specific partner, first time doing that act, etc. First kiss is, at least, specific in naming the act!

I mean, I love a get-together fic, and I love a fic with on-page sex and/or kissing, so I certainly love first times.

I think a first time stands out to me, as a reader, when it’s established as emotionally meaningful to the character above and beyond the marker of hitting a new relationship milestone. That’s fine too, and I like seeing relationships progress, but for a fic to really feel like a great experience of first time, I want the narrative to call attention to the firstness of it all. I have some examples!

Kiss, Raffles/Bunny from Raffles, T, 1.7k—this makes the scant four-year age difference momentous, with Bunny’s relative youth and innocence serving as both the catalyst for the story and the reason that it must stop at a first kiss

Lent Term, 1881, Raffles/Bunny, E, 2.7k—this is a fun E-rated contrast to the above, where Raffles (the older character) is written with an opposite personality to the above, so that he’s pushing on Bunny’s inexperience and the firstness is expressed as a claiming

A Seamus Thing, Seamus/Dean from Harry Potter, E, 3.7k—this fic is so charmingly juvenile about a first time, and reads exactly you’d expect of two teen boys figuring out kissing and sex on-the-fly, which is as unromantic as you might guess

Higher Education, John Bender/Brian Johnson from The Breakfast Club, E, 14k—this one’s got two characters who have both had sex plenty of times before, but it is their first with each other, and the first time John has had sex with a man, and what stands out is his fearlessness. He goads himself into doing everything without hesitation precisely because he doesn’t want to be the guy nervous about new experiences

When fic hits the first-time note simply as a matter of course, because it’s a get-together and so the kiss or the sex will have to start somewhere, the trope doesn’t stand out as particularly interesting to me. If a fic is structured entirely around the idea of their first kiss/time, I really prefer for it to have something interesting to say about why we should care for these characters. Even if I already ship them! Plenty of first times simply aren’t meant to be particularly notable, and I’m happy to see them as part of a larger story but I wouldn’t be excited for that approach to show up in a “first time” fic.