#this entire situation is very unfortunate

[psychotrenny]

The thing about all this "men's mental health" or "male loneliness crisis" isn't that it's entirely fabricated. There are a indeed many men in situations of severe marginalisation and alienation, which is genuinely very unfortunate for them. The problem is that this framing of the issue is agonisingly incomplete. Because it's not just men who are in such positions; indeed men are typically better off compared to their non-male counterparts. This sort of marginalisation and alienation is widespread through the proletariat, a direct product of living under capitalism. But certain sections of the proletariat face particularly severe forms of oppression, and another manifestation of this oppression is that their suffering gets ignored in favour of that experienced by the relatively privileged sections. Like "male loneliness" might be bad, but wait until you see what "female loneliness" is like

Which is also why none of the problem's men face has anything to do with feminism. Feminism isn't the force that puts them into lives of desperate, lonely precarity. The worst it does is help deny them the easiest "escape route"; the easy ability to oppress someone even more desperate and marginalised than they are. Like it's not fair or accurate to say that men suffer because they face greater resistance to the oppression of women; it's not as though misogyny happens because men are born with rotten souls that drive them to seek oppression for the sake of oppression. But a lot of men see how they can improve their position (both economically and socially) by exploiting the even greater vulnerability of women, which is much more quick and convenient way than say "principled solidarity against shared oppression" or anything like that.

It's a very selfish and in the long term self destructive* response; I'm not saying that these people deserve sympathy or that we are obligated (either morally or practically) to be "nicer" to them. But as stupid and vile as the attitudes and actions of MRA types are, at the very core of them there are at least partially legitimate concerns. Like in general a lot of reactionary attitudes among sections of the proletariat manifest from people recognising real problems in their lives and adopting cruel and ultimately counter-productive responses to them. It's a matter of the material conditions that people live under and the ideological framework they use to make sense of it, not a product of ontological evil that exists for its own sake

*anti-feminism is not going to resolve or even ameliorate the contradictions of Capitalism. Like I don't want to downplay the myriad ways that men as a class benefit from patriarchy, but support for it does ultimately undermine their ability to meaningfully resist their own oppression; it can only improve their situation within an oppressive system

[followthebluebell]

Hi! I was wondering if you could give me some advice on medicating my cat. She's definitely on the spicy end of the behavior spectrum, and is unfortunately also intelligent. Specifically, we are unable to get deworming medication in any format other than pill in our region, and while it can be smashed up, she would rather go on hunger strike for 15 hours (true story) than touch even the most expensive wet food or yummiest Churu if it has any trace of pill. Previously, with the preventative doses, I would force down about half of it, get my arms shredded despite my best burrito-blanket efforts, and call it a day. But we adopted a kitten... who came to us with worms. The shelter the kitten is from isn´t helpful, and neither is our vet. I´m at my wits' end here. I need to get her to take this medication and I can´t keep getting my arm turned into ground beef either.

ooof, my sympathies. x_x;; I've had similar situations with the semi-ferals at work. Since they have free-access to a catio most of the year, they can get worms every now and then and... yeah. It's not fun for anyone involved! Especially me! Especially THEM, because they don't understand why I periodically go insane and try to get them to take a nasty tasting pill! They have no idea why this is happening!

Regrettably, this is where force has to be applied. I've got a very, VERY thick pair of falconers' gloves that basically go up my entire forearm. They aren't cat proof--- I have been bitten through them, which is VERY impressive--- but they cut out a lot of the damage.

But let's also talk about other methods of flavoring the pill. You've tried food, but have you tried tuna juice? Or canned chicken juice? It may be slightly more successful and it traumatizes cats WAY less.

[nickfowlerrr]

let’s not.

pairing: mickey henry x curvy!reader

warnings: 18+ only. smut. feelings. happy ending. not edited. maybe a little ooc- i haven’t watched monday in a minute and i am currently heavy in my feelings so apologies if he is.

words: 1.7k

notes: just a drabble of another fic idea i can’t commit to fully fleshing out and writing. enjoy 🩵

You hiss as your hips slam against the edge of the table. Hard. Over and over again.

The only thing keeping you from dropping to the ground is his hold on you. His large hands gripping your soft waist so tightly you can feel the bruises no doubt forming already.

You let your head hang as you remain pliant to him, low breathy sighs leaving you in between your soft moans every time he hits that one specific spot.

Oh, this was so not how tonight was supposed to go…but it feels too good to care about that right now.

You’re on that very delicate edge, overwhelmed by the pain and pleasure of the way he completely controls you; the way he touches you, the filthy words and sickly sweet praises he groans in your ear as he pushes you both closer and closer to your ends.

Your walls squeeze his cock as your voice peaks. His hand flexes on your waist as he feels your imminent release.

“That’s it,” he breathes heavily against your skin as he leans further into you, his thrusts hitting harder as he chases his high. “Feels good, doesn’t it. Ah, fuck. Come for me, baby. Come on my cock,” he growls. “Let me feel you.”

You wouldn’t be able to hold on any longer if you’d wanted to as your orgasm hits you hard; your muscles tensing, your hand gripping his arm and your eyes scrunching shut as you feel entirely electric before wave after wave of pleasure rolls over you as you succumb to the feeling. To him.

It takes only a moment to realize your eyes are stinging with tears, but it’s not until you slowly start to come down that you realize why.

More like remember why.

He grunts and moans as he reaches his own peak, coming inside you but making sure to keep his hold on you as he works himself through his release.

God, here you are again. Different night, same fucking story. Over and over again.

You feel like a fucking idiot.

You are a fucking idiot.

He slowly pulls out of you, backs up for a second and then keeping his hand on your waist, he pulls your body back into him, hugging you from behind as you frown at the apparent show of affection.

You push his hand off of you and escape his hold before you can allow yourself sink into it, walking gingerly around the table to bend and grab your sweater off the floor - the unflattering one that you had chosen specifically to avoid ending up in this situation again.

That worked well.

You pull it on as he follows behind you, watching you with an intensity you don't want to notice, brows slightly furrowed and his icy blue eyes set on you.

“What, one and done tonight? You alright, sweetheart?” He asks, making a move closer to you, reaching out before you stop him with your response.

“God, can you just stop with the pet names,” you snap, turning to face him, “please.”

It’s like he doesn’t remember the fifteen minutes of conversation you had before he got your clothes off - easy as ever. You don’t think he means to, but the second you start to show your emotions, the second you start to cry, it’s like he can’t help but to try and comfort you. Unfortunately, his idea of comfort always seems to be this.

And even more unfortunate, you always let it happen.

It’s pathetic.

It helps for the time it lasts and then everything hits all over again.

“This is exactly what I was talking about, Mickey,” you’re exasperated already, “you act like you care and y-you give me hope that this might actually be…something more, but,” you shake your head, “all it is to you is sex.” He doesn't move from where he stands, but he drops his hand that was outstretched to you.

You can’t hold his eye for very long, it’s already hurting too much. You drop your gaze but it’s only for a moment before you force yourself to look back up at him. You have to ask the question you really don’t want to know the answer to…

“Isn’t it?”

It’s two simple words, a very simple question, but as your eyes are stinging, pleading for the truth, you know it’s anything but.

He blinks, opens his mouth to speak as he shakes his head, but ultimately says nothing before he takes a deep breath, looking away from you and down to the floor. He licks his lips, nervous habit, before he frames his hips with his hands.

“Should put pants on,” he mutters before walking away, down the hall to his bedroom.

You stand there in a perpetual limbo, listening as he opens a dresser drawer and riffles through the clothes for a second before you hear the drawer close again. It’s not long after that he emerges from his room, pulling a pair of sweats the rest of the way up his legs.

He comes back to stand before you as you lean lightly on the table, desperate not to fall and embarrass yourself any further. You know what comes next.

The inevitable.

The end.

You know how this started, and you’ve known from the beginning how it would end. You just weren’t expecting to get so caught up in him. You weren’t expecting to feel so much with him. For him

It’s your own fault. You couldn’t blame him if you wanted to. It just hurts so much more knowing it was all so one sided, that he didn’t - doesn’t - feel the same way… when you let yourself think too much about it, it doesn’t seem possible actually. As hard as you tried to ignore your feelings for him when they first started growing, it just wasn’t possible. Whatever it is - was - between you two…how could it have been so one sided? How could he not have noticed what you noticed, felt what you felt?

Maybe he just doesn’t want all that with you. Maybe he’s just not ready? Whatever it is, you know you can’t keep waiting for something to give.

You’ve finally come out with it, told him in no uncertain terms how you feel about him, about this…arrangement? relationship that’s not really a relationship?… and so, now he knows. Having sex with you after you confessed your feelings for him, well that was a choice, but you don’t think you’re all too upset about it actually. If this is it, it’s a memorable goodbye.

You’re conscious of your lack of bottoms as you stare at his clothed legs, waiting for the words you’re sure he’s gathering in his mind. He’ll let you down gently, you bet. He’s sweet, and he hates to see you cry. At least you know he’ll be nice about it.

He takes a cautious step closer to you and reaches out a hand to yours, finding your eye to make sure it’s okay first.

When you don’t object or look away, he gingerly takes your hand in his and pulls you closer to him. You swallow the lump in your throat as a tear spills over the edge and slips down your cheek, turning your head to avoid his concerned gaze.

His hand finds your cheek and he turns your face back to him, taking a step closer into you. His hand holds yours as his other holds your face, his thumb gently swiping away at the tear. He takes another step closer, and you’re so close you could just collapse into him completely, chest to chest.

“No,” he whispers, his voice low, sounding deeper than you’ve ever heard it as he looks into your eyes. Your brows furrow as you hear him.

One simple word. A very simple answer. But it’s really anything but. Because what the hell does that mean?

He sees the question in your eyes before you can voice it.

“It was supposed to be. For both of us, I thought,” he adds, reminding you again of how this whole thing started. Just sex. It was supposed to be just sex. He still holds your cheek as you look down, your free hand reaching up to touch his forearm. “But no. It’s not.”

He makes you meet his eye again as he walks into you, your bottom against the table at your back as he lets go of your hand and slips it under the hem of your sweater. His warm palm gliding up and smoothing over your skin, almost tickling you up and down, feeling you, caressing you gently before once again he settles it on his favorite spot, holding your waist delicately. He leans in, his nose brushing yours.

“It’s so much more than that,” his soft lips brush lightly against yours as you take a shaky breath, your body searching for him without you even realizing it before he kisses you again. Firmer, deeper, and with a fervency you’ve never felt before from him; like he’s been holding himself back all this time. Your free hand reaches up to frame his head, your fingers splaying in his hair as you kiss him back just as desperately. You almost feel like you’re in a dream as you lose yourself to him.

He moves you both as you continue your kissing, you following his lead until he turns you and you find yourself falling onto his couch. You catch your breath as you look up at him before he follows you down, pushing you to relax as he lays down next to you. He maneuvers you both so he’s holding you again. You tilt your head up to him, and he readily accepts the invitation, kissing you softly before speaking against your lips. “You don’t know how relieved I was the second you said something,” he titters, like you were the one who was missing the obvious this entire time. He takes your face softly in his hands.

“You’re so much more than that.”

You smile softly back, trying to hold back a sniffle at the clear sincerity in his eyes that has your nose tingling.

“So, you…” you trail off, hands idly ghosting along his chest as you try to think of how you want to ask him.

“Feel the same way,” he finishes for you in affirmation. “There’s something here. And it’s definitely not just sex. ‘D be crazy to try to ignore that. So let’s not.”

You nod, holding his bright blue gaze, a small smile tugging on both of your lips as you look into each other’s eyes; unconsciously leaning closer to one another.

“Let’s not.”

[rubykgrant]

(I hope there are at least a few that you can enjoy! I hope it is alright to add a few more, I don't want to overload, but I thought of more books that lean more toward being mature, for older teens/adults, that can fit the theme-)

"Practical Magic" by Alice Hoffman (a family known for many generations as witches, with a particular curse that implies anybody that falls in love with them is doomed to die... two sisters, Sally and Gillian, each try to escape from this in different ways, one by living as "normal" a life as possible, the other by trying to be free and indulgent. After a frightening event, the sisters are brought back together, and while they try to move on with their lives, ghosts of the past rise up for revenge. The writing is both straight-forward and extravagant, with very detailed looks at each character and their relationships, the scary elements a combination of mundane and fantastic. It deals with supernatural events, and issues that involve abuse and trauma, but is ultimately about love. A movie adaptation was made in 1998, and while it has to cut-down parts of the story and has a little more of a rom-com vibe, it still captures the soul of the story, and is enjoyable on it's own)

"Scorpion Shards" (the Star Shards Chronicles) by Neal Shusterman (Six young people who have never met have something in common; they aren’t normal. They have odd abilities, strange powers, and unfortunate afflictions that cause them pain, fear, and suffering. When they lose control, it can hurt other people, too. Slowly, they are drawn together, and figure out what is happening to them… and what they really are. They have to learn to work together, overcome their fears, battle their demons, and find the courage to save themselves. Some of them want to work together, while others wind up clashing. I've only been able to find the first book, and it has a sad ending... but with open possibilities for what comes next. Very dark, but in a realistic way regarding the emotions and troubles of the characters, making even the absurd situations feel more "real")

"MALICE" and "HAVOC" by Chris Wooding (this book blends illustrations with words, as well as fantasy and reality. There is an a mysterious comic book series, hard to find, and even if you get one the pages go blank as time passes… it depicts a strange and horrifying world called MALICE, full of monsters, and also children who have been transported there from the real world. An urban legend says if you gather the right ingredients and say the right words, "Tall Jake" will come and take you away. It turns out to be very real, and soon two kids begin a search and rescue mission to find their friend. The thing is, not everybody survives being the star of the comic, and you might only make it into one issue)

"Midnighters" trilogy by Scott Westerfield (a group of teenagers have discovered that because they were born at midnight, when they are within the area of Bixby Oklahoma, they are able to experience "extra time"; a thirteenth hour, in which the rest of the world within the "bubble" of the town seems frozen. As long as they stay in the area, they have an hour to experience this additional hour, and each of them also has specific abilities they can use in this time- defying gravity, telepathy and mind powers, touching flames, and more! However, they aren't ALONE in the thirteenth hour... strange creatures called Darklings live here in this part of the world that is made of dreams and nightmares, and they pose all sorts of danger. I'll be honest; these books have very intense problems, and they don't have "happily ever after" resolutions... they are still well-written, and very interesting. While not exactly up-beat, they still aren't entirely "depressing", and what happens feels like an "honest" depiction of how, even with magic powers, life can still be difficult, and even after the worst day every- you still have to keep going, into the next day, and onward)

once again wishing there was something kinda LIKE harry potter but like.

without the shitty author, aimed at an older audience, and also not conflating the "older audience" part with "making it lean way too heavily into being depressing, cynical and over-reliant on dark comedy"

and ALSO not something where you can only find it by hunting down some indie book with a miniscule fandom, thereby making you feel like you're just screeching annoyingly into the uncaring void once you want to actually talk about it.

[air-the-diablo]

!!!GORE!!!

That one scene in the electricity where briefcase is dead but a lil more fucked up. Featuring him ripped in half with cotton guts

My poor little meow meow

[mashmouths]

last night sleeping with long hair and i'm not going to get cold feet about cutting all of it off bc i will not pay the cancelation fee 🫶 but tomorrow my hair will be the shortest it's been since i was maybe 10 years old

[dont-open-dead-inside-25]

i like to think of myself who's relatively normal about holding grudges and the like but. i'm also still incredibly upset about something that happened in... february, i'd wager. especially given that it's relatively minor and i don't think anyone except for me is physically capable of taking seriously

[ningningkittie]

im in love w him not only bc of who he is as a person nd how drawn i am to his personality, but also bc i feel like he's the only one who has ever wanted to see me. who i am, like deep down. he's the only one who i feel like i've ever connected with, in an easy nd genuine way. the only one who i feel has ever gotten me. he's the only one who's ever made me feel like we actually have a connection we're both in on, bc i havent had to pretend or put up a fake front for him bc he wanted the real image of me.

[mantisgodsaus]

there isn't really a specific question on the ask games that fits but we want to hear you talk about what muse is/was like in selkieverse. she fascinates us based on the roughly two things you've said about her

Yes we can do this absolutely! Fair warning - There Are Things Here We Are Not Stating, mainly for spoiler reasons. Hopefully, they are excluded cleanly enough that this still flows well, but this is a long-ass thing so

Muse, though she wasn't a selkie herself, was close enough to Leif that he felt entirely safe leaving her with care of his pelt. She knew that he was a selkie pretty much from the moment that she met him - there wasn't quite as much baggage built up around the risks of having your pelt just Out And About, at the time, though a lot of selkies were a bit skittish about it, and Leif didn't really hide things.

A marriage, at least for moths, is more a contract of trust than anything else - an expression of trust, a unification of families, and so on and so forth. Somewhat more of one for selkies, with the big blaring weak spot they've got - it's a lot like showing your back to someone and just... hoping that they don't fuck you over. You welcome this particular bug into your family and you trust that they'll watch your back and help raise your children and look after your family when you're gone.

She was the usual person to keep ahold of Leif's pelt during expeditions, so as to keep it safe even when his bug body was in danger from being hurt or killed. She was trusted to keep it safe, or to use it for its transformation if the need ever presented itself - it was more shared between them than anything else during the later stages of their life together, and that meant that she was very, very familiar with how it felt.

Leif died in Snakemouth after having given her his pelt for safekeeping. Just to make sure he had an anchor. Just to make sure he didn't go too deep. Just to make sure that, if something happened, she would know he was okay from the heartbeat of his pelt - or, that if it went cold, she would know to stop, and get out while she still could.

She felt his death in the pelt wrapped around her shoulders. The aftereffects of the venom coursing through his veins, reflected in his pelt, giving the warning she needed to order a repeat. She felt his death throes reflected in the very literal piece of himself still trusted with her all the way out, and all the way home.

She sat at home after submitting the report that declared his death, a dead pelt still settled around her shoulders, standing over the shells of their eggs, knowing that the larvae were in the Ant Nursery where she couldn't know if they were all right or if her whole family had been killed where she couldn't even see, and she felt the shudder of a body restarting as the cordyceps settled into his husk.

Muse knew, for absolute certain, that he died. She felt his death throes. She felt his heart stop on her back. She also knew, for an absolute fact, that he was alive after that, even if she didn't know how or in what form. She knew this, and she could feel the dull pulse of his cordyceps self starting to take over his body in his skin, and she could feel the sealskin starting to change under her fingertips, and she was deadly, deadly afraid of looking away- of taking it off, or simply ceasing to pay attention for slightly too long, and returning to find it dead and vacant again. To that end, she just... didn't take it off.

She didn't take it off, in fact, for several years. Past the point where people thought she was in shock and morning and long into the point that people thought that her husband's death had broken something irreparable in her. She continued to wear it long after her children had emerged from the ant nursery, and long after they had begun to grow into fully-fledged selkies of their own, and long after they had the context to know about It All.

She got into arguments about it. As far as anyone else knew, she was dragging her dead husband's equally dead pelt around 24/7, and once her kids were old enough to understand that whole situation, there was a certain awareness of "hey, this is maybe a bit fucking bizarre to do, don't really like that". It was, in particular, a recurring argument with the son that would eventually become known as Grandpa, as he was of the firm opinion that it was Fucking Weird to walk around with a loved one's dead pelt twenty years after said loved one's death, and that she shouldn't Do That.

Unfortunately for him, this was not an argument he was going to win. Muse, being as stubborn as a bull and with no particular regard to what the neighbours thought, had been doubling down on this particular argument for twenty-eight years already. She had chosen to see this through, and no one could really convince her otherwise, though many of her children would try.

As such, she would remain "that weird lady carrying around her dead husband's pelt and skulking around doing who-knows-what since there's no damn way her husband's life insurance and her dispatch salary from the explorer's association would account for the care and feeding of eight kids plus herself without at least a few jobs in-between and no one knows what the hell she does for a living". The argument, however, would continue.

It would continue, in fact, until after Grandpa had had kids of her own, when Muze was fairly young. The old argument got brought up again, Muse refused to entertain the idea of maybe not being seen as The Local Weirdo, she went off to her room with the usual pelt. She sat, alone, in her room, thinking about the whole Situation. She put on the pelt.

This time, specifically, she chose to put it on in such a way to attempt to shift into Leif's selkie form. It had been years with barely any chance in it, after all. Though she had initially feared disrupting whatever delicate balance was keeping him alive, it had been stable for long enough that she was pretty sure that wearing it wouldn't disrupt something, and she... wanted the assurance, really, that she wasn't going mad. That her choices were based on truth - and that he was still out there, somewhere, even if dead-and-resurructed.

It... worked. With some caveats.

At this point, Leif was entirely merged with the cordyceps components, entirely hosted on crystal hardware, and the mirror that his pelt offered to his body was one where the bone marrow, connective tissue, and structure had entirely been eaten away by now, and the vast majority of the flesh was now composed of cordyceps tendrils that were a whole lot more obvious when they were puppeting around a skin suit with an internal skeleton, and not a relatively rigid exoskeleton.

No one could really deny that her old paramour was alive enough to animate a pelt. Unfortunately, no one could deny that whatever the fuck had happened to him, it had warped his selkie form beyond anything that anyone had really expected to be possible, and absolutely no one wanted to learn what the fuck his body looked like back in Snakemouth, or what form he was alive in, and no one really wanted to touch the pelt that had offered a form like that.

In particular, no one really wanted to see that particular pelt anywhere that someone might try to put it on after that whole fiasco, and no one was particularly fond of the idea of continuing to let Grandma Muse walk around with the living pelt of whatever her partner had become.

After a great deal of arguing, she accepted the compromise of hanging it over the mantelpiece, where she could keep an eye on it even without physically wearing it. She would then proceed to relocate herself to the living room for most of the rest of her days, if only to make absolutely certain that that faint, dull hum beneath the skin was still active- that he was still alive out there, somewhere, in whatever form.

Against all odds, she would live to see his awakening. Unfortunately, she would not live to see him actually return to his family - just to see the tell-tale shudder of a pelt growing active again, as miles below, Leif stirred from his slumber.

Her family are currently engaged in Trying Very Hard Not To Think About The Whole Situation. They are fairly certain that whatever the pelt belongs to, it's still in Snakemouth Den. They are fairly certain that Leif's relation to the family is through it, though theories are more "he's the kid of whatever-it-is and a different moth" than assuming that he Is In Fact Todd's Great-Grandfather.

No one really wants to take the pelt down from the mantelpiece at the moment, and absolutely no one wants to explain the whole Situation to Leif unless they have a better idea of what he's inherited from his other parent, but there's also enough shit going on with them in general that it might just never get brought up until someone directly mentions it.

Leif is currently under the impression that Muse remarried to a selkie because the whole "being a selkie" thing wasn't terribly relevant to the way that his current cordyceps took up residence and after that whole Situation he was not especially eager to delve into previously repressed memories.

Predictably, this whole setup goes Terribly when poked at, especially as Leif's pelt is a whole lot more autonomous than your average selkie pelt, being more than a century old by now and belonging to a fungus who is very much set up in a way where his disconnected individual body parts can act autonomously on remnants of whatever priorities are/were in the main control system.

It is still hung over the mantelpiece.

[rearranging-deck-chairs]

13 was here

[ofviolentdeath]

"Yeah, maybe, but I'm half convinced she's bulletproof." There was very little that someone could tell him about Belladonna that Atlas wouldn't consider believing, at least for a moment. Still, she had been nothing but sweet to him and, more importantly, to Darcy. "Hopefully everything will be settled soon. Momma wants to meet Darcy and is willing to compromise a little. The issue's gonna be dad at this point, even with Callie laying into him." Their dad had always been stubborn, but this was certainly to a new level. "Not everyone would consider that the bare minimum, unfortunately. And you're right about her deserving the world. She's a better person than even she realizes." But it was still good to know where Blair put his lines, it made Atlas feel better about the entire situation. "Yeah...Not having anyone his entire life really fucked with him in ways I don't think he realized until he actually had someone take the time to care."

"I'm sure a lot of people would say that about you and I as well. Big, giant cats... with feelings." Blair was only teasing, certain that this Belladonna was far scarier than either of them if Atlas considered her terrifying and she was about to be his boyfriend's new mom. He had to assume it was her reputation but he'd never know until he met her or learned more about her. "Yeah, she's really going through it." Blair felt things easily but not in the way Callie did. He didn't have to experience everyone's emotions all of the time. It sounded exhausting and he hoped he could offer her any kind of relief even if for a short time. "Hey now, don't take advantage of my trusting personality." Blair chuckled, knowing he got himself into silly situations by believing the dumbest things sometimes. He'd gotten a lot better as he got older but there were times he still made silly mistakes. "It's an honor, actually. Don't thank me for doing the bare minimum. Callie deserves the world." And if he could, Blair would give it to her. "He doesn't sound like a bad guy, just... a little misinformed. Television will do that though."

[bedlamsbard]

I totally understand your rage quitting now, although it's exactly the opposite for me! I was *very* into the Asgardian storyline in MCU and I hated Ragnarok with a passion - and the fandom sure made certain I knew everybody who didn't like the movie was an Idiot. Then IW and EG happened and killed all my joy for the MCU. I kinda sorta look at it without flinching nowadays, but it took somewhere around 5 years...

I think I know more people who went MCU --> Star Wars than the other way around! Weird couple of years for both fandoms. I'm a little bit of a weird outlier because I got back into Marvel well after Endgame, but a lot of what people criticize about the MCU is what I find interesting (the puzzle piece aspect). I am well aware that if I'd been consistently in Marvel since 2014 (which is when I drifted off) I'd probably have had the same rage reaction as like...everyone else I know.

I guess it's been a minute and my SW history isn't common knowledge to people who weren't around here between 2013-2021, so the lingering fury is probably confusing to people who only know me from the MCU. I was big into Star Wars from 2013-2021, from 2013-2015 on the PT/TCW side, then from 2014-2021 on the Rebels side (there's crossover), though I was also familiar with...everything. I have forgotten more about Star Wars than your average SW fan has ever known. (I was also in and out from 2007-2013, which is when some of my earlier fic like Oxygen and Rust dates from, but this is a period of time when my big fandom was actually Narnia) I'm quote-unquote "known" for Wake the Storm and Queen's Gambit in the PT/TCW, which have very consistently garnered negative responses since Wake started in 2013, and On the Edge of the Devil's Backbone in Rebels; I also used to do liveblogs of TCW and Rebels and the comics, for a while, so some of those posts are still floating around. I had a very, very bad breakup with a close fandom friend in 2016. I bounced off the ST, had an extremely negative reaction to Rebels S4 (to this day I have refused to do a full reaction post because I hated it so much I can't think about it coherently, and there were years where I couldn't think about it without spiraling), was okay with Resistance, R1, and Solo, hated Mando, hated TCW S7, hated the comics, hated the High Republic, and was still grimly hanging onto the fandom in utter misery in 2021 when the combination of hating TBB's sheer mediocrity (and the way they retconned Rebels) and the first episode of Loki hitting all of my favorite tropes like a fucking train finally knocked me out of Star Wars, to the extreme relief of everyone who knew me.

to this day I have fannish friends (who I met through Star Wars!) ready to stage an intervention if I ever seem even vaguely interested in getting back into Star Wars. I am the only person I know who looked at the Marvel fandom post-Endgame (and the Loki subfandom at any point in time, but especially while the show was airing) and went "this seems like a nice soothing place to immigrate to!" and honestly it is, people aren't as crazy anymore as they were around CW and Endgame. (Except in the Loki subfandom, which has made even me go "hmm. that's a bit much," but then I remember the egg genocide and you guys are fine, actually.)

very amusingly I actually speed-ran the Rebels experience with the Loki show -- really liked the first half, really disliked the second half -- but by that point I'd already gotten back into the rest of the MCU. I hadn't had a dramatic MCU breakup at all; I'd kept up with the films from 2008-2014 (CATWS was the last one I saw in order), but I just hadn't gotten around to seeing more than three odd ones out between 2014 and 2021 (Ragnarok, Captain Marvel, Ant-Man and the Wasp, and then I saw WandaVision early in 2021). I fandom osmosed some weird stuff that turned out not to be true.

anyway for those that don't know, that's the short version of my sordid Star Wars history! also sorry, you didn't actually, uh, ask for this.

[somacruising]

I would have tagged that prev post with Sync but when people say he has a big heart deep down they’re actually just making shit up

[lovechoerrymagic]

john locke is so fascinating as a character because honestly. if i met this man irl he would irritate me so much. he has many glaring character flaws that he clearly does not want to examine or even acknowledge and he’s done so many selfish things that are morally ambiguous at best and borderline irredeemable at worst. however i kind of love him and if he dies i will 100% cry my eyes out

[snekdood]

also if it makes me seem weak to you bc i dont actually wanna kill things-

dawg.

imma say this as if im your close personal friend whos very concerned about you, your wellbeing, and how you've been lately-

you sound like an actual nazi.

[potatoesandsunshine]

just remembered the oculara situation brb going insane about it