#this is not a shit post this is a real post very real too too real

[corseque]

I honestly just wanted one single plot step that I could not predict given the 10 year wait. More behind the cut, I talk about Emet too, and I'm comparing his writing favorably to Solas' writing and why it worked better for me personally, but I am just talking about the writing skill that went into the games and not the dudes themselves, I love them both dearly of course. idk this is a mess and I am not going to edit it for clarity

For me, the game was a series of me saying

"ok I knew that. cool."

"oh yeah, I knew that. I guess it's good that the larger fandom knows about that now."

"nice, but yeah I already knew that too"

"that was something we've been talking about a lot for years"

"this thing they are acting like is a huge enormous reveal that the characters could not possibly have deduced through simply thinking about it in depth over the 10 years... the fans easily figured out by thinking about it in depth 10 years ago. So you would think his girlfriend would be able to figure it out more easily than we did. Like, why couldn't the game have been like 'oh lavellan already figured that out a while ago' it would have cost them nothing"

"this is something I've been thinking about for years, and now that it's being revealed, the companions' reactions to it are very irritating and jarring and unnecessary and I really dislike the experience I'm having right now, in this, the hour of my greatest triumph"

"this thing that is happening on my screen right now is something that I wrote an essay about 2 years ago describing how it would be a letdown if it happened without the correct setup"

"this way that they're characterizing Solas makes him less likable and less interesting than I have been finding him for all these years, and I have had people tell me 'no, he's simpler than you think' for years but I guess I was wrong, he really is simpler than I thought, so that fucking sucks. I wish I could take that information out of my brain."

"this thing is a retcon of information I have been thinking about for 10 years, and so I don't know how to follow along with this new direction, and I'm not sure if I even want to because it's not particularly interesting anyway"

"aw that was sweet"

"why is it like, so very impossible to have an honest back-and-forth with my favorite character about the dilemma that was most interesting to me about the previous game"

and then, as soon as, like, the other fans had caught up to the Solas lore that was really obvious from the other games, the game was.... over without anything surprising happening, or introducing a new element or plot point or perspective, or a real true twist (or two, or three) for those of us who have thought about it too hard for too long. It was very simple and easy, much, much, much, much easier than I was imagining. It all felt sort of like that Nicholson quote:

The thing was, the whole story was so interesting to think about because in 10 years, I couldn't figure out a good solution to it!!!!! It's why I was never able to write post-game fanfic about it. So I was stoked to find out some reveal we never knew about, some new information, in maybe a SERIES of steps of new information, that made the situation more complicated but also something that could be navigated by everyone involved. I know it was asking for a lot, but they had TEN YEARS, and they seemingly had set up the things they did in DAI on purpose, so surely they had some idea of a complex and satisfying narrative that would reconcile everyone.

The reason why I was expecting this is because FFXIV did a very similar story arc, which was started AND concluded WITHIN those 10 years (so it took the FFXIV team far less time to deliver as well). And the conclusion to the story in FFXIV did what I was expecting Dragon Age to do. So I thought, "holy shit, if this is the FFXIV version of this plot, how much more complicated is DA4 going to be!?!?" The DA devs also PLAYED FFXIV so they were completely aware, several years ago, of a satisfying story ending that was pretty darn similar.

People are probably going to think "oh, well Chelsea was disappointed because she spent too much time building it up in her head" but that's exactly it - I actually speculated and thought about FFXIV's story IN DEPTH NONSTOP for a year+ before its ending came out, and the ending absolutely blew me away. FFXIV Endwalker managed to introduce information and new story elements that I was not able to figure out in the YEAR I spent speculating on the ending of FFXIV's story. It took a complicated situation and revealed several several more facets to it that I was not able to predict, but were very interesting and thematically compelling, and took us all to surprising and climactic places that we could not have predicted.

Endwalker ("end" is in the title on purpose) too, was written to be THE ULTIMATE SATISFYING ENDING for a very long-running story in the exactly way that Veilguard SHOULD HAVE for Dragon Age, so while this complexity is being explored, FFXIV also gave catharsis to many different plot threads that have been built up through the previous expansions, until finally it ends with a bang. The story is desperately good to me, I loved it, it gave me closure for Dragon Age long before Veilguard was even revealed, and going back and looking at its story has made this whole thing far less painful for me.

So, I actually did not have a picture in my mind for how things SHOULD go. I just had the thought "I hope it's complicated and there are points of view or facts that we haven't before been exposed to, and the situation is resolved respectfully for Solas, not making him look like a fucking idiot (lol, the only thing I asked for). I don't even care what happens to Solas and Lavellan, I just need the story to be complicated and interesting to think about. Please, god, don't let it be "solas is wrong and he just needs to be convinced" because that's like the simplest story you could tell with this setup"

(btw they managed to tell Emet-Selch's story without making him seem like he's being an idiot on purpose or can never get anything right, and in fact the more the story goes on, the more you think of him as smart and capable and cool, so it is possible to write.... I wasn't asking for the entire moon)

And I played it and... yeah. Most of the story beats were more simple than I wanted them to be, a lot of them didn't make sense in my heart given the writing from Inquisition. (This is another essay, but if Solas' thematic story arc was always about him needing to let go of regrets, why was his personal quest the way it was? After that quest, doesn't he end up regretting not doing more....? Why did he never really talk about regret during Inquisition? If he was so trapped by regret, why was he able to do so many actions? It doesn't mesh well to me. The whole regret thing was very quarter-baked to me, I don't even like thinking about it.) His story never seemed like one that was as simple as being about one man's regrets, but then, I guess, it was always just about one man's regrets.

Emet-Selch's personal storyline (and the way it interacts with and affects the larger story) is very similar but much more cohesive and satisfying to me. It would be difficult to explain why without the aforementioned 5-hour essay. Emet-Selch's story IS about grief and anguish on a world-shaping scale in a similar way that Solas' was apparently always about letting go of regret, but Emet's story was also very pointedly and beautifully about that one theme for the entirety of his story from every tiny detail, from beginning to end - meanwhile, it seemed to me that they tried to introduce 'regret' as the main thrust of Solas' story only in the short story with the Regret demon onward.

From Inquisition just by itself, the closest I personally could get to a story theme for Solas was his inability to trust others hurting him and the world, but his trusting others in DA4 wasn't really addressed to my satisfaction. He is never required to trust anyone before the ending, he never opens up or makes himself vulnerable at all. People find out information about him, he never really dynamically opens himself. So the personal story I thought he had was never addressed at all, while a new one about regret was introduced that never made a ton of sense to me. And I don't think this is just because of my expectations - my reaction to FFXIV proves that I am able to meet good writing where it goes in surprising directions, as long as it's interesting and thoughtful and clear.

And I think this might be part of what people felt was off about the ending - Solas is sort of uninvolved in the revelations that are about him, and doesn't do much to be part of his own ending. Part of what I loved about Solas in Inquisition is that he is not controlled by you in any way, and so he feels like his own person with a very strong sense of character.

Anyway, Emet-Selch, in a very comparable and arguably more extreme plot position, is very involved in the revelations about himself, he always feels like a very strong character who cannot be affected by the player, and the whole situation is handled with deft emotion and care and delicacy. The story is comparatively very uninterested in litigating Emet-Selch or putting him on trial - the story allows you to simply feel the way that you feel in an organic way, and Emet's story spends that energy instead actually exploring his thematic material about grief and legacy, and the larger story theme of existentialism instead, in a way that is very refreshing and interesting. I've seen a lot of western stories tie themselves in knots over "redemption" and frankly it's almost never been interesting at all. Who cares about any of that. lol

(Now, I guess this is a matter of preference, because some people really like being able to shape a character's story, but idk I rewatched the ending of FFXIV and even though there wasn't a choice with Emet, because it isn't a branching story, his story felt more satisfying to me, maybe because there isn't a patronizing choice to be made for him. He is who he is, and he fulfills a very beautiful narrative role and purpose that no other character could in the story.)

I don't know how this could have been improved to me and still allowed players to choose Solas' ending for him, but I can actually think of a few different methods, none of which involve Rook condescendingly and patronizingly lecturing Solas as if Solas had never thought about a single aspect of this horrible situation he's in before that very moment that Rook lectures him lmfao.

All this to say... idk I'm writing this and I am not going back to edit it so it's stream-of-consciousness. But yeah

I just wanted the story to be complicated on a few more levels than I could have predicted. I genuinely don't care what happened, but I thought of a few twists like the Veil coming down and yeah, I was expecting A Single Twist or reveal to happen. In a Dragon Age game.

I wanted Solas to seem cool and capable and noble and smart, and actually feel like he was as old and experienced as he is.

I wanted a clear theme I could sink my teeth into

Like notice I didn't even say anything about Solavellan. Like I never in 100 years thought they were getting a happy ending where they were both alive in bodies, and I like that we got that, but I would honestly trade it for a more complicated story. To me, if a story is sad you can always write fanfic, but if a story isn't COMPLICATED, that's a much more urgent issue.

These 3 things DA4 didn't give me in a way that satisfied me but FFXIV did. anyway idk the way my hyperfixations work, I completely switch to a new subject so talking about Dragon Age is actually hard for me right now.

[aeolianblues]

Even as I write this all though, I am not a millennial. I did consider this 'my time' because it's the first one I remember. I was not around in the 90s, everything I know about grunge and 90s TV and Britpop and whatnot is secondhand. Often thirdhand. Books, magazine scans, interview snippets. But I remember the 00s. Many colourful glittery clips, that's how mum did my hair. The multiple layers of gaudy colours; skirts (even shorts!) over tights of a different colour and striped tops was how my mum dressed me. Like the Disney kids on TV. Everyone in your grade was into Hannah Montana (they made kids books out of the episodes, does anyone remember?) Blackboards in school. Chalky hands wiped on your school uniform. Sure, I was too young for 'Oberlin College in the early 00s in NYC', but I had still considered these very 00s 'my time'. I lived it, so it's mine.

But as I get older I slowly begin to feel now to be my time. And I hope that one day I'll look back at the '20s as mine too. I'd love to be old and write, what were the 2020s?

They were Grian Chatten's poetry, Charlie Steen's shiny golden underpants at Glastonbury 2023. It's My Lady Of Mercy and swooning over girls with Abigail Morris. It's embracing the rejected freak with Alt Blk Era, we don't give a damn if they like it, we're normally like this.

It's showing two fingers to the monarchy, shouting 'Brits Out!' with Kneecap, it's Mo Chara reaffirming 'we don't hate yous, it's the government and monarchy. We have much more in common with a working class unionist than some rich fellow from Dublin'. It's Cuntology 101 with Lambrini Girls, it's reminding people of all the Calvin Harris songs that The Dare ripped off word-for-word and the weird 00s nostalgia.

It's Ezra Collective being nominated for BRIT album of the year for Dance, No One's Watching. It's a blurry phone pic posted on English Teacher's Instagram of the free drinks they got at their table for being invited to the Mercury Prize 2024 (SO real of them).

It is lounging in chaise longues all day long in floppy hats in the Isle of Wight, it is being someone's Iced Tea Boy, it's night raves with Master Peace, it's brats on the dancefloor, it's Chapell Roan inspiring people to stand up for themselves and take no shit from anyone, bitch! It's just heartbroke bitches, high heels, six inch In the back of the nightclub, sippin' champagne; it's women artists winning back the rights to their own music and going on to win over the world! It's Phoebe Lunny scaling a 20 ft. pole in a Leeds festival tent in heels and a skirt to fly a Palestinian flag high up on the Reading and Leeds 'Festival Republic' tent.

It'll be okay, we just need to be weird and hife for a bit and eat an old sandwich from our bag.

It's going to see your friends' tiny bands covering the Strokes every two weeks and knowing none of them have a chance in hell of making it because the music doesn't pay and the rent's too damn high. It's Lily Fontaine giving evidence in court about how even succesful working class bands like English Teacher can't afford to go on tour. It's Carlos O'Connell calling out other artists at the Rolling Stone UK awards for their silence on Palestine, it's Kneecap's 'You can all stay just don't be cunts'. Saoirse don Phalestine, quoth Kneecap. It's oppressed languages breaking through into popular music, it's Alffa's Gwenwyn becoming the first Welsh language song to cross 1 million streams on Spotify.

It's Jocelyn Si rejecting the homophobes and declaring, let us be young! It's Cal 'your boyfriend was looking at my legs' Francis singing about the price to pay for being this way. It's CMAT not giving a fuck and tearing into racist country music, no matter of whether or not she'd ever be able to work in the genre again. It's Skinty Fia talking about the lived immigrant experience. It was Olivia Rodrigo 'reviving' 90s alt rock for the masses, it was 16-year-old rockheads calling Josh Kiszka 'pookie' on Instagram—something unimaginable in 2017. It was James Smith embracing that indie artists can indeed aspire — to make funky pop hits!

Who knows what else the 2020s have to offer us. The Grammys are on Sunday. In a fever dream, someone like IDLES or Fontaines D.C. could walk away with one. A truly indie artist. I'm so scared about that. I just hope that in 20 years, I will still be able to say things like this

‘Indie sleaze’ is not 2014, ‘Indie sleaze’ is not 2014, ‘Indie sleaze’ is not 2014, ‘Indie sleaze’ is not 2014!

It’s not tumblr-core and it’s not Lana Del Ray or 2013 AM, it’s not #girl interrupted, it’s not Ethel Cain (she literally is an artist of our time, what are you on about.)

It was 2001 with the Strokes on the cover of the NME every 2 weeks, it was cabaret night and English poetry with the Libertines in 2002, it’s those red and blue military jackets, it was the fucking grease in Julian Casablancas’ hair, it’s ’cocaine was the banker’s drug’ quoth Alex Kapranos, it was Don't Go Back To Dalston and the heroin, it was red and black horizontal striped tops and tight black shirts as evening wear, it was Russell Lissak’s mop top and a full page interview with London hairdressers in the NME in 2005, it was Jack and Meg’s saturated red and white dresses, it was glued glitter on the cover of Santigold’s first album, it was the sleaze and the sex of CSS’s music, it was ‘cold light, hot night’, it was the anti-Bush and anti-war stances of the bands at the time, it was America by Razorlight, it was Popworld on telly and Simon Amstel being a little shit to musicians, it was Karen O defying death on stage nightly, it was throwing up in shitty nightclubs on god knows what drugs, it was the fucking danger knowing this could all collapse any second—and rightly, it should. It was the godawful egos at DFA, it was knowing that while you were lucky to be seeing these bands live, you’d fucking hate them if you had to spend even a minute in their individual company. It was Amy Winehouse telling the world to get the fuck out of her business, it was Leslie Feist and Peaches sharing a dilapidated flat above a sex shop in Toronto.

It was horrible camera flash and red-eye editing softwares and putting your feet by the warm, spinning fans of your computer while it whirred away and downloaded your albums in *checks* 46 more minutes. It was horrible, it was dirty, it was gritty, we all hated it and thought the 90s were the last time music was good and that nothing good had happened since 1997. It was garishly bright clothes we were all embarrassed of by 2011, it was multiple layers and leggings and asking your mum to cut the itchy tag on the back of your low rise jeans only for her to snip your back. It was bell bottoms at the start of the decade. It being thankful that by 2017, no one would dream of wearing low rises anymore, please please, please let them never come back.

It was faux nostalgic of the past itself. It was ‘please make sure baby you’ve got some colours in there’ in your clothes. It was moral panic over emos. It was wanting to escape into a better past that you could see was visibly impoverished in the present. It was watching your favourite programmes become less and less relevant on air. It was watching MTV decisively die a horrible death. It was watching important venues and nightclubs get bulldozed. It was watching the last regular broadcast of Top Of The Pops in 2006. It was seeing how the 2009 financial crisis most definitely put a stop to independent music in the western world for a decade, it was watching the rise of bedroom DIY and electronic music. It was seeing the phrase ‘SoundCloud rapper’ being coined. It was the rise of Disney pop. It was counter-culture Justin Bieber hatred. It was the MS paint meme of those tumblr girls thoroughly unimpressed by the guy.

It was not using the words ‘indie sleaze’ at all, in fact. That’s a retconned word. It was garage rock revival. It was ‘post-grunge’. We didn’t care what it was called, we hated it all the same. It was a lead into a decade of despair and nihilism, it was the last hurrah for the music industry before it splintered into a thousand little online ecosystems, it was the last time we had physical community and any shared pop cultural moments. It was Live8 2005. It was the same as it is now, and it was a time that’ll never happen again, for better and for worse.

But one thing is for sure: it was decisively dead by 2014. Santi and Karen O’s 2012 collab was its last hurrah and it was dead by Comedown Machine by the Strokes (2013). It has nothing to do with 2014.

[redgoldsparks]

January Reading and Reviews by Maia Kobabe

I post my reviews throughout the month on Storygraph and Goodreads, and do roundups here and on patreon. Reviews below the cut. You might notice the layout image looks different! I have switched to using the Storygraph wrap up and I'm now linking to the Storygraph reviews as well :)

The Sweetness Between Us by Sarah Winifred Searle 

Perley and Amandine are both readjusting to high school life after a major health crisis. Perley was diagnoses with diabetes; Amandine was turned into a vampire after a car crash nearly ended her life. They bond in remedial classes over just wishing their lives could go back to normal. Perley tentatively rejoins the knitting club; Amandine wants to rejoin a sports team but struggles with exhaustion; both of them have less energy than they had before. Their friendship develops into something more, but can they maintain a romance when they are both still figuring out their own shit? This is a very sweet slice of life story with a fun dash of the supernatural. I wanted a little more from some of the queer themes; I spent most of the book unsure of Perley's pronouns. But I was absolutely rooting for these two oddball teens to find their way back to each other.

LaserWriter II by Tamara Shopsin

This is a novel, loosely, but more so it's a little window back into a specific era of repairable technology and the people who were drawn to it. Set almost entirely in a (real, I think) Mac repair shop in New York City in the 1990s, this book jumps from backstory to backstory, introducing a range of self-taught computer fanatics. The cast and the story both feel wide but not deep. I didn't get to know anyone well, not even Claire, the newest hire and lead character. It did give me some serious nostalgia, even though I was really too young in this era to really have any meaningful relationship with it's technology. A weird but charming little book.

The City in Glass by Nghi Vo, read by Susan Dalian

The demon Vitrine has been nurturing, building, challenging and haunting the port city of Azril for hundreds of years when the angels come to burn it to the ground. She tries to defend her people from the heavenly attack but only succeeds in cursing one of angel, embedding a thorn of spite in his side. When his brothers leave, he is forced to stay, and since he has nothing else to do, he watches her begin the long, painful process of cleaning and rebuilding. This is a dreamy stream of consciousness book with less plot that I'm used to from Nghi Vo. I'll admit this one captured me less than her work usually does though the prose is very beautiful.

The Concierge at the Hokkyoku Department Store vol 1 by Tsuchika Nishimura 

Akino is a new hire at the Hokkyoku Department Store, a store build to serve talking animal customers including many unusual and nearly extinct species. Akino must find a way to be present, polite and helpful without hovering or intruding on the customers experience. This is harder than it sounds, especially with fussy managers always watching the store floors! Sweet, silly, and very warm hearted. I like the delicate, retro lineart style.

The Gentle Art of Fortune Hunting by KJ Charles read by Cornell Collins 

Another fun historical m/m romance from KJ Charles, this one more in the comedy of manners genre. I had a good time with it, I liked the leads, and as usual the secondary characters really shown. I did wish the enemies part of the enemies to lovers plot had lasted a bit longer, and the overall silliness of the story isn't going to make this the first Charles book I rec to anyone unfamiliar with her work, but it kept me entertained.

Noodle and Bao by Shaina Lu 

Momo loves living in Town 99, a historically Chinese neighborhood where she knows everyone and all the best places to eat and hang out. But things are changing. Her parents are worried about making rent, and her favorite restaurant was kicked out of its location and now operates out of a cart. The owner of the new restaurant, Fancé Cafe, has big plans to buy out the whole block and upscale everything. Momo rallies her friends and neighbors to fight back against the gentrification. This is a very sweet book for young readers, with talking animal characters and whimsical food battles interwoven with community organizing. An epilogue explains the issues around gentrification for a child who might not have encountered it before.

Brownstone by Samuel Leer and Mar Julia 

Almudena grew up with her white mom, always wondering about the Guatemalan father she'd never met. Until one summer mid-high school when her mom heads off to Europe for a dance tour and drops her off at the Brooklyn brownstone her father, Xavier, is renovating. Almudena has to navigate around a language barrier, an through unfamiliar neighborhood, and into a close knit Latino community many of whom see her as not brown enough to count. But Almudena is determined not to let this opportunity to know her father slip away. This is such a warmhearted book, funny and kind, with a really well developed cast. The art and the writing make a perfect whole, capturing a deeply specific mid-1990s moment. I've been following the artist's self published releases for years and I'm so happy to see their work shine in a full length book!

Leap by Simina Pepesco 

Ana is a college student in a contemporary dance program in Budapest, but her heart has fallen out of dancing. She skips her own classes to spent time rehearsing with her secret girlfriend, Carina, an ambitious ballerina in the classical program. Her new roommate, Sara, transferred out of classical and into contemporary and is thriving in the new, more supportive environment. She's also starting to develop feelings for the kind teacher, Marlena, who helped her transfer. Both of them are struggling to figure out their relationships with their art, as well as their sexualities, as well as how safe or not safe it feels to be out at their private, gossip-prone school. This is a really well told and well drawn coming of age story; I also really appreciated it as a story of queer friendship which complicated some of the standard narratives around first crushes/first relationships/coming out being kind of anti-climatic, half affirming, half disappointing. Definitely recommend!

Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar 

What a book! Several of my friends called this one of their top reads of last year and I can see why. The book centers around Cyrus Shams, a poet and recovering addict, who was raised in the US by a single father. The pair left Iran when Cyrus was a baby after his mother was killed in a passenger plane, shot down by mistake by the US army. In his late 20s, Cyrus is mostly drifting through life, working weird part time jobs, sometimes writing, trying to stay sober. He wants to write about the concept of martyrdom, about dying for a cause, or what makes people consider a death meaningful. When he hears of a Persian artist literally hosting her last weeks as she dies of cancer in the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Cyrus flies to New York City to speak with her. Their conversations will impact him more than he could ever have dreamed. This is an usually structured book, full of flashbacks, alternate POVs, dream sequences. It's rich with layers of symbolism and meaning, especially with repeated references to names, to lineage, to legacy, the lingering trauma of violence and revolution, and what a life of art demands from the artist. This book surprised and moved me. I'm delighted that it was chosen by my book club, so I've got a lengthy conversation with friends about this book to look forward to!

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde read by Susan Duerden 

The Eyre Affair is a mystery-crime-sci-fi-comedy novel for the literary nerd. It is set in England in an alternate universe version of the 1980s, in which cloning of extinct animals for household pets is common, time travel looked down on as wretched career choice, and literary crimes get their own whole division in the police force. Thursday Next is a veteran of the Crimean War (which has been running more than a century) and a Lit Crimes special agent- her expertise is immediately needed when a priceless Dickens' manuscript is stolen by a thief whose image does not register on film. Things quickly get strange- and also hilarious.

Re-read in 2025: I revisited this after reading and loving Jasper Fforde's stand alone sci-fi novel Early Riser last year. Unfortunately, The Eyre Affair suffered in comparison- the main villain of the book is very weak, and I can now see the pacing issues of this debut novel. I still found it very funny and probably caught more of the classic lit jokes than I did last time, but it's no longer the Fforde novel I'd suggest people start with. Try one of his more recent works! 

She Loves to Cook and She Loves to Eat vol 3 by Sakaomi Yuzaki translated by Caleb Cook

This series just keeps getting more and more adorable! This volume introduced two new characters, and I braced for a moment hoping they wouldn't be rivals to the main couple, who are very slowly beginning to flirt. I should not have doubted!! Both newbies immediately seen that Nomoto and Kasuga are interested in each other and begin to cheer lead/wing man from the sides. Plus, in the author's note, the author talks about selling merch for a Japanese organization supporting marriage equality. I can't wait to read more!

[attroxx]

TLDR: my activity over the next week or so will probably be spotty. taking a small semi - hiatus but i'll still be lurking / writing from time to time but. just don't expect too much. i'm going to rant a little under the cut so forgive me, you don't need to really read it i'm just on the verge of crashing out and i need to vent, thank you.

my mental health at the end of 2024 wasn't great ( honestly all of 2024 was very hard for me ) and now with the state the US is in and having pretty much no way to leave or anything is freaking me out. the last few days all i've wanted to do is play LADs or honkai and watch youtube as a distraction. my spoons are low and i'm on the verge of tears what feels like every other hour so. with that being said i need to be honest with myself and say 'hey. you need a break'. so, for the next week or so i'm going to be sporadic with activity. i may only post one reply a day or none at all & i'm sorry but i told myself i'd be more real with myself and give breaks to myself cause well, this is a hobby & not a job. i've been pretty consistent with activity for a while and going into 2025 i told myself i'd take breaks and only write when i feel good so this is me sticking too that.

it's just . . . crazy to be acting like nothing is wrong and everything is cool when it's not. i feel bad for trying to distract myself but also, as a queer / non - binary person all this news and shit is exhausting and taking a toll on me mentally. all i've wanted to do the past week is cry and rot in bed. and i will be damned if i let that orange man steal away my happiness. i want to stay informed but also protect myself mentally when the past year has been so hard on me. i have depression, anxiety & ocd already. constantly exposing myself to scary news is just draining me entirely. it doesn't help that i live with my grandparents who are trumpies. but i don't have the means to move out so, i'm kinda stuck here.

idk. i just wanted to write this down somewhere so i could get it off my chest. if you read all of this post, thank you. you didn't need to.

if you need someone to talk to or need a distraction than, talk to me and i'm more than willing to vent or yell or talk about RP or whatever. discord is the best way to do that ( softsalem666 ) love you guys and thanks for reading, again.

[centrally-unplanned]

So I think I will just add "the declining efficacy of protests" to the topic pile for an effort post since it is a very good topic that needs depth to cover. I will be briefer therefore here, no real expectation that it will be super convincing or anything.

protests are an incredibly important signal of how pissed off people are about something. protests can and frequently do serve an important function of being a highly credible and highly visible signal to people pissed off about something that other people are also pissed off about that thing--they served this role in the first trump administration wrt the muslim ban.

They are a very weak and indeterminate signal of all of that, actually! Which you sort of self-prove here: the muslim ban protests were quite small. A few thousand people at a dozen or so airports., The US is over 300 million people. This is anti-data, it is pure selection bias, it tells you nothing. One can try to claim "sure but that number of highly active people indicates a mass backing of semi-active people, it is like bubbles from a boiling pot" but everyone knows that isn't true, a class of people who "professionally" protest (students, party activists, etc), composed them. They are not the organic bubbling of the narodnaya volya, they are a faction everyone already knew existed.

Protests can be effective by surfacing undiscussed issues - if Maine's lobster fisherman "March on DC" due to a dispute on water pollution runoff I bet some people will go "okay fair enough let's take a look here". But the Trump muslim travel ban was not undiscussed! Every media source on the planet was talking about it. Hell, that is, in a lot of ways, why there was a protest! People think the protests create the tweets but just as often it is the other way around. They generate more tweets, sure, but there is a harshly declining value on these things. Most people's minds were made up and protests are very poor as an argument for those who were on the fence.

Which again ties back to the actual results - the protests did nothing. They (or the ban overall) were not a big topic driving median voters in the 2020 election, Trump didn't budge, etc. Maybe not literally nothing, eh, I'm sure the ACLU got marginally more funding for their legal suits due to bonus tweets driving donors. I don't think the individual protests in this case were like "bad" to be clear, marginal donor driving aint nothing for a few thousand people to spend a day achieving. But that is very small bore.

And they didn't do anything because:

(and the media is plainly not covering what is happening in the US government right now enough)

Guys:

My friends:

My dudes:

"Look if they just replaced that Groundhog Day Story with a headline on Birthright Citizenship the battle would be won"

It is actually impossible to drive more attention to the current activities of the Trump Administration because literally 100% of all political bandwidth that exists is currently being allocated to it. Trump has monopolized attention on his activities so badly the Danes are reading about defense policy on the daily, this shit is insane.

And, of course, Fox News is not covering these stories the way you want them to. The constellation of alt-right podcasters are not covering these stories like they are bad. But protests are not going to shift that needle! Because this (to play that transition card again):

americans must communicate to other americans in clear and difficult to ignore terms that 1) yes, people are mad about this, 2) no, they won't stop being mad about it, 3) you should be mad about it too and 4) if you are mad about it you are not alone,

Is false. It isn't true. Liberals are mad about this. Which you know because they are liberals and they didn't vote for Trump! Conservatives just aren't mad about this, not yet! And street protests by liberals - which is all they will ever been seen as because that is probably what they actually would be, it is lying to claim they would speak for the masses - will certainly not convince them.

We just had a real street protest, a vocal expression by the American people, a resounding call of a million voices making themselves heard:

And expecting people less than a month into the admin of a winner of that contest to give a single thought to what a crowd 0.1% the size of this one is waving signs about is folly. It isn't gonna happen.

Which I get is frustrating by the way. Trump is awful, doing real damage, he is correctly reading that he has a virtual blank check on power right now because that is how the system (both the gov and the Republican Party) works. Voters were fools to vote for him. Reality just sucks sometimes, it is a world of fools.

(This of course is laser-focused on the idea of "protest" a la things like the Muslim Ban response or the Women's March. Dems are currently doing many other things that are valuable and could be doing more. It is complicated but tweets and podcasts are almost certainly more important things to focus on. And hey if you wanna pivot to violently attacking or overthrowing the government none of this critique applies!)

It's kind of weird to me how little in the way of mass protests we're seeing in response to this Trump stuff.

I'm usually skeptical of protests. The modern, uh, left-wing protest culture seems actively calibrated to accomplish nothing other than making its participates feel good.

But this seems like exactly the type of situation where protesting could genuinely accomplish things. Trump is doing things that are (1) bad, (2) unpopular, and (3) illegal. That's the ideal case for protests to make progress!

Like, Trump isn't personally going to care about protests. But the thing they're good for is drawing attention to an issue that people either don't know about or would rather ignore, but where they'll be on your side if they have to actually think about what's going on.

That doesn't apply to most wedge issues, and especially not most of the ones that get the left fifth of society really excited. But "Trump shut down Medicaid" or "Trump handed the Treasury over to private actors who are refusing to spend money on [insert program here]" or "Trump put in a bunch of tariffs and now your groceries and phones are way more expensive" all totally apply.

[lesbianherald]

so i know you're trying to process Coming Home being the top fic now but bestie are you aware that you hit 30k kudos?

ok. ok ok okok.

As a warning, I'm going to get really weird and personal here.

I got these this morning. Just like with the last one I have no idea what to do with this or how to appropriately deal with it lmao but to everyone who has been so nice - thank you. so much? this is a number so unfathomable to me that I've been trying to sit with it all day and simply cannot process it as real.

I don't want to care about numbers. I want to be super cool and chill and above that. but this is a really big one. and I think it also is really reflective of how big this community has grown. I've decided it would be odd not to acknowledge it.

This is one of the craziest, kindest, most lovely things that has ever happened to me. It feels so incredible and validating to know my work reached some people. That is quite literally all I want to do with my life. And now it feels like I might be able to with my own stuff. But its a lil deeper than that too. All the comments and support have genuinely been such an amazing balm during a really dark time in my life.

At the start, this fic was always a method of escapism for me. I've been under so much pressure in my real life. I'm in a really weird, really competitive transitional point. everything I write irl may make or break the rest of my career. It is a type of pressure I'm incredibly grateful and privileged to have, but still stressful nonetheless.

But then, as i was writing this fic, it became way more of a lifeline. Not to get too personal, and idk if people paid attention to my end notes, but if you did you'll note I fell victim to the ao3 curse last October in a really big way. I lost a dear friend of mine very suddenly.

Starting coming home was a way for me to write something just to write it, knowing that I could be myself and do whatever I want and just throw shit at the wall without worrying about anything. after my friend passed away, the escapism of it became that much more valuable. (btw I would not post about it were I not in a much better place with it so don't worry about me <3)

I feel like maybe it's important at this point to explain the meaning of all the support because I've genuinely been unable to express it in a way I find appropriate. every piece of art every sweet comment etc. etc. helped get me through this really weird, sad, shocking time. As "cringe" as it might seem... fandom and fanfic can be really meaningful, powerful, and connective.

All this being said. coming home was definitely released in the right time for this to happen. A multichapter released right before and during season 2 as well as in the months after? Like. It was primed for this a bit (not intentionally but still) So many fics that get posted now deserve the same amount of love and support.

I really hesitate with numbers. sharing them, abiding by them, gaining value from them. I also get nervous about how people will feel entitled to treat me because of them. But this is so insane it feels weird not to say a bigger thank you.

[utilitycaster]

I just want to say as someone who bowed out of watching c3 very early on, I really enjoy your commentary on the fandom and the politics they keep bringing up as if they understand politics at all. Like the way people treat activism as fandom and fandom as activism is so ruinous to our ability to have real conversations, and to see the political discourse of the past few years reflected so stupidly in the critical role fandom has been mind boggling. The fight to be the most Morally Superior and Righteous in fandom spaces is a poison, and from what I remember, spawned some of the worst c2 discourse too.

Thank you and I agree. I actually struggle to talk about this topic in depth because to give it the explanations it deserves I would need to start naming and shaming individuals so I will leave it at 1. a good gesture would be for some of these people to either delete their accounts or at minimum apologize (deleting the individual posts and ignoring that it ever happened is not, in fact, a good idea) and 2. while I have little faith they'll do that I hope that everyone who decided it was very important to talk about anticolonial themes to the point of talking over indigenous people/those from the global south is involved in immigration/refugee resettlement or native sovereignty activism and that everyone who decided it was super important to defend the term "girlfailure" and attack anyone who didn't think the sun shone out of Imogen or Laudna's asses is involved in abortion and trans bodily autonomy activism (and I mean activism, not just yourself) and everyone who wrung their hands about the poor Ruidusborn child soldiers is working to clear school lunch debt or whatever real world causes they believe in. Because I do think a lot of people substituted attacking people over not liking characters or ships or plot points of C3 over doing anything positive for the world at large, and if so they will have to either change or live as the piece of shit hypocrite person they are forever, which is really more of a curse than anything I can say.

[faceofpoe]

Poe, I was delighted, nay, obsessed with the post you reblogged about Collapsed Coruscant. What do you think would happen there after everyone with any credits fucked off to Hosnian Prime or wherever?

Ha, hello friend! Thank you for the much-needed break from doomscrolling. XD

My morbid obsession with Coruscant has always been around how we've seen it (it's so twisted! it just keeps burying itself, layer by layer! the iconic episode 10 Luthen&Lonni shot is of course an excellent example of the old mostly-forgotten infrastructure but my favorite glimpse of the depths is actually in the final Clone Wars season (there's a fucking lake! fucking what. and even THAT is like... so HIGH relative to the surface) (the SURFACE! there's some twisted remnant of a dead planet down there!) (I have gathered through the course of researching for a TBB fic that the TCW portrayal is largely born from a canceled video game called 1313? I think? Lost to the Dark Times the Disney I imagine. Anyway I digress)(MiniPoe just came down to tell me about his Sonic Encyclo-speedia and something about Metal Sonic getting too much backstory(?)(maybe?)so I lost my train of thought)).

BUT if we take a moment to imagine the infrastructure that must go into keeping the lower levels habitable (I'm not sure what the canon (if any) on how deep one can go) with food and water and air (I mean - AIR, at some depth surely it's just suffocating surely??) -

Side tangent there was an old EU novel in the New Jedi Order bonkers era where a mass evacuation of Coruscant/collapse of the government-ish happened and the novel Traitor has a character wandering the desolation of the planet and all the destruction and I don't remember a lot from it (there were def monsters though) but it's probably where my obsession was born.

Additional side tangent one of the EU X-wing novels has a fun little bit with a star destroyer buried (somehow??? these books were written pre-prequels, mind) under the city and it blasts its way free and just MAYHEM DESTRUCTION DEATH like millions of people just -

LAST side tangent in I thiiiiink the EU Jedi Academy trilogy (do not quote me on that) (also pre-prequels days) the Very Young Solo twins wandered off and ended up finding their way to the bottom of Coruscant where they met a dude who was like... a self-proclaimed king of the underworld (I think he'd once been some govt lackey under Palpatine maybe? I read these like 14 years ago lol) and he'd fled and was ruling happily in the depths and upon being informed 'oh hey yeah it's not like that anymore the Empire is gone you can come back up now' he was all "why would I I am a KING down here?" and just fucked off back to the basement.

Point being the EU was ridiculous as all fuck but it had fun playing with Coruscant before we had a Lucas-approved visual of Coruscant.

BUT if all the wealth up and fled Coruscant after the Empire. Hm. I mean, we still see a significant govt presence on the planet a handful of years later in Mando s3 I believe? So I like to imagine there was a sense of 'hey let's not murder trillions via negligence' but as time goes on and instability heightens and whatever the fuck First Order schisming or some shit (sorry I'm the worst sort of Star Wars fan (the type who thinks Star Wars would be good if only it were good))-

I feel like Coruscant would actually become a bastion (lol (no one gets that joke probably)) for remaining (wealthy) Imperial ideologues. Like - maybe some money would flee but I actually wonder if plenty wouldn't move in and continue enjoying living atop all the poor denizens of the depths. Content to live in the shadow of former Imperial glory and leave the New Republic to its rebuilding.

Ensuing power struggle with underworld warlord sorts who have been moving up since the Empire was yeeted? Waiting until the New Republic gets bored rehabilitating the galaxy to come all the way up and claim the prime real estate?

Eventual massive division and power struggle among a bunch of chaos factions, basically, is my proposal. Eventually, winning becomes more important than maintaining the infrastructure and supply lines. Eventually, maybe, the vicious competition for said supply lines ends up severing them altogether. Plenty of safer business to pursue, in the galactic rebuilding. Coruscant slowly fades from the greater galactic awareness. Left to its madness. Left to tear itself apart. Left to rot. Eventually left, undoubtedly, by many of the same sorts who set it on its slow death spiral in the first place.

Coruscant eventually goes dark.

Coruscant eventually goes quiet.

Every new level constructed through the millennia was, of course, built to be the best, the top, built to last.

How strange to finally have one emerge the victor, standing proud atop a dead city.

But the planet is just the same thing it always was, far back as history remembers - a tomb at the heart of the galaxy.

[r3d-ca9]

OHG HI HI HELLO HELLO

1. Because of Bloodwing and Talon, I usually associate him with vultures!! Something like a bearded vulture, usually. Or other birds of prey.

2. I'd make him a necklace or draw him something!! He's not used to receiving gifts, and isn't too picky, so he'd like pretty much anything I got for him. But a handmade item would mean a LOT more to him, for sure.

3. Exploring Pandora, poking around for secrets and loot. Although if we don't have the energy for that, nothing beats catching up on some drama shows. 😫

4. Y'know.....we uh. Don't really have a house. WHOOPS. I'm gonna say...he'd love any chores involving taking care of the birds, of course. S tier chore. And...just like me, he'd probably HATE dishes. Because dishes suck ass.

5. Oh hell yeah. Dude's basically a stunt driver. If you can successfully survive driving on Pandora for any period of time, you get an A+ from me.

6. Fuckin...hawk screech. You know, the one people always use for eagle noises, even though it's not an eagle sound LMAO.

7. He hates being online. It's stressful. It's dumb. He hates the shit other people post. BUT....maybe, yeah.

8. Mmmmmmm....I wanna say...no...I mean, maybe at some point he did? But he's too cynical for that sort of thing now. Besides...it's more satisfying to view relationships as this thing you work really hard for, rather than some magic that happens out of your control. Soulmates may not be real. But it doesn't mean love is any less powerful.

9. Super casual like, the same way I do everything LMAO. "Hey guys. This is my boyfriend. And these are his birds. Ain't that fuckin' sick? Hell yeah."

10. 👀 cough cough

11. They both seem cool and intimidating, are actually enormous nerds. 👉😎👉

12. It's a toss up between red and green!

13. Also pretty casually! Although. A bit more shy about it. They'd probably know already, or have suspicions, and then be like "I FUCKING KNEW IT"

14. Okay, see...he'd. He'd wanna say something that he thinks is cute. Which isn't a lot of things, maybe a baby bird or some shit. But the OBVIOUS answer is a skag, because I'm very dog.

15. Chocolate. Anyone who knows me at all knows that chocolate is the way to my heart. (Also jerky.)

16. We don't really do pet names? At least, I...haven't really thought of any decent ones. Probably a simple "babe", I guess?? (SORRY MORDY, THE CUTE AND CRINGE PET NAMES ARE RESERVED FOR MY IRL HUSBAND 😤😤😤)

17. 👀👀 COUGH COUGH ............ nah i'm messin', he really loves just chilling!!! Life on Pandora is chaotic, messy, and stressful...any chance to just sit and do something low-key is always appreciated.

18. Acts of service, for sure! Helping me solve problems, getting stuff for me, comforting me, he just likes checking on me and making sure I'm doing well!!

19. My winning personality 🫡

20. GRAH, I don't know. I guess he likes how resilient I can be, and how even in the face of stress and danger, I still try to crack jokes and break the tension for the benefit of those around me. He has a hard time seeing the brighter side of life sometimes, and so do I, but I'll be DAMNED if I'm just gonna sit by and let despair swallow me up.

21. Oh my HEART. I don't think he's much of an artist, but I will fold it up and keep it in my wallet forever, no matter what it looks like. <3

22. Mordy doesn't really like eating, so no. He only eats what he has to, so I would never try to snatch any snacks from him, tbh. I am actively throwing protein bars at him.

23. Lol. Red. ❤️

F/O Ask Game!!

A list of questions to answer about your f/o!! You guys can just go down the list and answer them all (I'd love to see it!!!) in a reblog, orrr you can reblog and have others ask you these questions in your inbox! Have fun!! PR.OSHI.P, NOT FOR YOU!

What animal does your f/o remind you of?

If you got your f/o a gift, what would you get them? 

What is your favorite hobby to think about doing with your f/o?

What chores would your f/o do around the house? Are there any they REALLY dislike?

Would you trust your f/o to drive a car?

What kind of ringtone or notification sound would you have for your f/o?

Would your f/o fight someone online? 

Does your f/o believe in soulmates?

How would you introduce your f/o to your friends? How do you think that would go? 

What's the first scenario that comes to your head when you think of being with your f/o?

What dynamic would you use to describe you and your f/o? 

What color do you associate with your f/o? 

How would your f/o introduce you to those they care about? How do you think that would go?

What animal do you remind your f/o of?

What would your f/o get you for Valentine's day, if anything? 

What does your f/o call you in their head? What do they call you aloud/to others?

What does your f/o like doing with you the most? 

How does your f/o show their love best? 

What's your f/o's favorite feature of yours?

What're your f/o's favorite personality traits of yours?

If your f/o drew you, how would you describe the art piece?

Does your f/o share food with you?

What color would your f/o associate you with?

What?? Who's tagging their friends again?- not me... I just really wanna see yalls answers. Formal invitation lest you become worried I don't wanna see it. @jpeg-indulgence @starshakez @moxanji-real @frankys-wife @katsenbergs-soulmate @katanahusband @fl0ralsxgar @one-winged-dreams AND LITERALLY ANYONE WHO SEES THIS.

[wavesoutbeingtossed]

.

[simptasia]

LOST: Season One

[r0semultiverse]

Anyone notice how reality is literally falling apart?

I thought this gag with Vriska breaking out of prison was just a silly little artistic funny but... she has pointed out how fake this reality is.

I'M THOROUGHLY CONVINCED NOW THAT THIS WASN'T JUST ARTISTIC CHOICE.

This plus the course correction of existence only allowing one of each main character to exist really got me going all eyeballs emoji. 👀

[ohsweetflips]

my neutral dragon age trait is that 50% of the time i'm like "the more i critique the games, the more i love them. i can appreciate each game for what they are but my criticism and frustration over what they could be are a sign of love" and the other 50% is like "this is the writing of the dragon age series. sure. why not. this may as well happen."

[moth-flowers]

moth-flowers #17

[beanghostprincess]

Sabo still struggles with memory loss. He had his childhood back, of course, he remembers Ace and Luffy and everything they did together. But he doesn't remember some stuff. Some anecdotes Luffy tells oh so excitedly? He can't recall that those happened. And if he does, it's all blurry and never at all like Luffy says. But he never says anything because that would break his brother's heart, to know his older brother isn't fully back with him, so he nods and smiles and pretends he knows what Luffy is talking about every time.

His room is filled with Post-it notes. Stupid, really. Dumb stuff. But he has all the meetings he needs to remember and the missions he has to do, along with everything he wants to write down at some point properly. The walls are covered in pictures of the people he loves (Luffy, Ace, Koala, Robin... All the others that have ever meant something to him because he refuses to forget somebody again).

He keeps writing dumb stuff down. Anything. He refuses to forget. He denies the possibility of doing it again.

But he forgets. Sabo keeps forgetting important dates. Important parts of his life, like his past with his brothers (he forgets a random adventure they had that he swore he had talked about the day prior) and crucial things he has to do. He has a hard time picturing his memories. Putting them in his brain. Turning them into images. Saying it's frustrating is a huge understatement.

Koala helps him out, of course. She's hard on him so he finishes his paperwork, but she knows it's difficult sometimes. She's his personal calendar and diary. She informs him of what he has to do during the week and always tries to talk and talk about anecdotes that she knows he still remembers but knows he loves to hear again.

His mental health isn't the best either, but he refuses to acknowledge it. There's a revolution at hand, he can't stop working. And fighting. And doing more and more and more. But sometimes it's just too much. Sometimes he goes into depressive episodes he can't control, and the medication is either addicting or the worst thing that has ever happened to him. Sometimes he's a bit too intense. Koala says he needs to calm down, that he has a problem with his fixation on the revolution and his past. Sabo keeps saying that it's fine. But he sometimes forgets or has blurry images of the fights and the people he has killed, filled with energy and excitement and like he has the power of a God. He doesn't like those. Enjoys the moment. Hates to forget it. Hates to know what he did during it too, even if it was for a good cause. Despises the look Koala gives him, also. Makes her promise not to tell Luffy about all of this.

But it's fine, he keeps saying. Sabo will keep trying to never forget anything ever again.

[zorosdimples]

knowing i should take a step back from tumblr for my own wellbeing vs. being emotionally attached to this app and the people on it