#tiffany susan pompoms

[macksting]

Murderbot: System Collapse (and Susan Pompoms)

This is not exactly spoiler territory but I'm still putting it below a cut. (It might qualify as spoilers for El Goonish Shive, but I kinda feel the same about that in this case too.)

Bharadwaj says even good change is stressful.

A relatively recent page of El Goonish Shive has a character facing this head-on. Unfortunately for Susan, she wants to be rational about things, even though she knows she sometimes isn't, and seems to consider it a bit of a weakness. She's harder on herself than she is on others. Big Mood. We have to deal with our own bullshit 24/7; at least when we sleep or are alone we aren't around someone else's that often, and even then it's a different angle on the subject and, in my experiences, compassion is easier.

[ID: El Goonish Shive page. Susan and Sarah are standing talking on the roof of the high school. Susan is facing away, distraught and trying to hide her expression as she has lost her composure. Sarah suggests, pursuant to a page omitted, "It, um. Maybe you're upset by change?" Susan, still facing away, incredulously asks, "By good change? Not the store closing, but... quitting a job I don't want? Being done with this school? Not having to deal with that terrible locker anymore?" Sarah, concerned but calm, continues her supposition: "Well, I mean... You've worked there for years, and you've been here for years. It's what's normal for you, and... there is stuff you like about both places, right? Like, you started your movie review show with Elliot because of your job, and... you have friends here. You met Catalina here. Got to know Elliot and Tedd here." Susan half-smiles, her expression still bearing the strain of the strong emotions she's navigating, and asks, "And what's there to like about a locker with a sticky door?" Sarah smiles and replies, "You share it with me?" Susan, the sardonic half-smile gone, turns to face her more fully, and with a haunting expression as she comes to terms with it, pauses and says, "I want to hang out more." /end ID] So, y'know, right now I'm a mess. One little line messes me up so much. okay from here on I'm just fangirling to clarify shit. If you don't wanna hear me ramble about these fandoms in the abstract, adios. If you're a Murderbot fan wondering what this is about, El Goonish Shive is a webcomic that's been going since 2002, is unapologetically queer, has both accidentally and deliberately given earnest and deeply compassionate portrayals of queerness and neurodivergence, and also is just interesting, clever, and has a really big cry button moment as early as 2003. Susan in particular doesn't use the label asexual; Dan Shive considers her sexuality representative of his own, and is personally uncomfortable committing to restrictive labels such as that, though he knows how important they can be as well. She is beloved by asexual fans, okay frankly she's beloved by all fans because she's a complex, fascinating character whose political and philosophical views are her own, and excuse me I'm a mess again. She's not even my favorite fucking character. If you're an El Goonish Shive fan, I am crying over a construct made of cloned human tissues and robotic parts who is bitter, sardonic, and spent the first few books in a deep depression it was not aware of, has developed into a badass punk, and has an unsophisticated but very personal perspective on oppression, slavery, and artificial consciousness under a corporate dystopian rule. It calls itself "Murderbot" because of an incident it cannot remember that led to it hacking its governor module so that it might never be forced to kill again. It will kill, it's occasionally even Plan A, but it's a choice, not an order. ("As a heartless killing machine, I was a terrible failure." - Book 1: All Systems Red.) It is asexual ("Things. :p"), prolly aromantic, prolly agender, and wonderful.

Then she added, “You know, you can stay here in the crew area if you want. Would you like that?” They all looked at me, most of them smiling. One disadvantage in wearing the armor is that I get used to opaquing the faceplate. I’m out of practice at controlling my expression. Right now I’m pretty sure it was somewhere in the region of stunned horror, or maybe appalled horror.

My favorite installment takes place after the fourth novella, but the first novella is absolutely sufficient as a standalone work of fiction, with a satisfying beginning, middle and end, comes in a glorious audiobook format narrated by Kevin R. Free, and makes me cry a lot. The early "humor me" level cry button for me is when everyone confronts it, and it turns to face a corner to avoid their deeply stressful eye contact. I have heard that fan responses to All Systems Red led the author Martha Wells to seek out an autism diagnosis; compare Dan Shive's "It would explain a lot."

[im-the-antonymph-of-your-mom]

Spot: - Actively refuses to be a joke character - Furious with the characters who made them like this - Literally white. Not necessarily White

Bell: - Short white-haired doggirl who probably has red eyes - Looked down upon harshly for their sad upbringing - The author's fetish

Susan: - HATES the author's fetish - Angry at an estranged parent - Frustrated with the other parent as well - Rebellious teen with spite towards authority - Embarrassing and strikingly similar full names

Also, all four of their stories are unfinished & ongoing.

I've connected the dots

[kiastirling]

Rules: Make a poll of your favourite female characters (no limits - as many or as little as you want) and see which your followers like the most!

No one tagged me I just wanted to do this one. Propaganda below the cut, with images (and links for the webcomic ones)

I wasn't tagged so I'm not tagging anyone either.

Propaganda time!

Freya Crescent:

She's a ratfolk ("Burmecian"). She's a dragoon. She's been looking for her boyfriend for 3 years and he has amnesia when she meets him once and then she never sees him again after the place housing the remains of her people is blown up. And still she goes on to save the world.

Lulu:

A black mage with some peak Final Fantasy fashion and her casting medium are a series of stuffed animals. Also she's very focused and taciturn and she ultimately falls in love with her dead boyfriend's goofy older brother which is a fun archetype.

Rica Brosca:

DA dwarves are so crunchy. She's castless (the lowest social class in dwarven society). Her sibling is a gangster and her bodyguard. She's fucking a Prince (possibly becoming King based on player decisions). She's the hottest girl in Dust Town and everyone knows it.

Bubbles:

She's hardcore. And an absolute baby. Love a strong girl who is also just. A girl.

Jessie/Musashi:

@/yamujiburo's Hanamusa AU has done things to me.

Lace Harding:

I reiterate: dwarves! But Lace is super cool and I love her.

Jesse Faden:

Okay I haven't played Control myself but I watched my partner play the whole thing which is certainly enough to say Jesse is cool. Her internal monologue and her friend are great and her single minded pursuit of saving her brother that got her to the Federal Bureau of Control is undeniable.

Amber O'Malley/Amazigirl (Dumbing of Age):

She's a shut-in, she's a (not-so) super hero, she writes horny Batman fanfic, she's plural. Her character arc the past 14 years has been really interesting to see and we're still only like halfway through the school year!

Tiffany "Susan" Pompoms (El Goonish Shive):

Tragic backstory? Check. Magic color changing hair? Check. Anti-Vampire magic? Check. Strong sense of justice? Also check. Horribly embarrassing name she's tried to bury by going by her middle name? Super check.

Susan has had a lot of character growth over the past... many many years. I like her a lot.

Yor Forger:

Best mom a psychic could ask for ❤️Yor is a deadly assassin and a terrible homemaker and she can be kind of a dip and I love her dearly

[zeemczed]

I read the "Stargazing" AF04 One shot you wrote and it is so cool and well done. Do you have any other ideas expanding onto that universe? Because now i am very curious about the posibilities of it.

A few. I've poked my head in a few other times... Ashley is a wannabe-Dr. Doom supervillain (in super cheesy, melodramatic fashion). Tol!Rhoda is kinda the alpha of her friend group (which might be going full poly). Tiffany Susan Pompoms is so cheery because the vampire which nearly killed her in our timeline DID seriously injure her in her timeline, and this led to her "wow I'm still alive LIFE IS AWESOME" cheeriness.

I think there's a lot of possibilities there, but I haven't really stuck my head in as far as it can go.

[eruvadhril]

If I had a nickel for every time I vibed with a character in a long-running fantasy series named Tiffany and/or Susan, who:

- is very introspective and has a tendency to get caught in her own thoughts

- channels her supernatural powers through righteous fury, of which she has a generous amount

- kind of wishes she could do the typical Romance thing in hypothetical terms but doesn’t particularly like the prospect when presented in real life, and eventually realises that if she’s going to have a romance-type relationship at all it’s going to be pretty non-standard

- is Triple A-spectrum (autistic, aromantic, and asexual)

- has a tendency towards being short-tempered and snarky

I would have two to three nickels depending on how you count

[small-witch-big-hat]

Also, what a difference twenty years can make...

Hey, when it comes to giving Meaningful Names for your characters, unless they have changed their name or otherwise chosen a different name, their name should tell more about their parents than themselves. A character whose name refers to their horoscope is understandable if they have a parent who is into that sort of thing and raised their child into it as well. You can have a drinks-blood-at-graveyards-as-a-sex-thing level goth who’s named Daisy because her parents are normies. A character who is a hardcore atheist can have a very old-fashioned, traditionally religious name, because they were raised in a religious cult, and growing out of it was the thing that made them who they are now.

I mean, you could even have a character with a visible birth defect whose name is a fucking pun on his disability, but that only drives it clear that his parents are straight-up horrifying people.

 The names that people have can tell you about who they are, but usually only as a hint of where they have come from.

[chauffeurdad]

A “modernization” of an old sketchbook entry, from 2004 (!!)

Source: http://www.egscomics.com/sketchbook/2004-04-04

[otakusapien]

El Goonish Shive contains lesbian griffins, a talking space whale, and a character named Tiffany Susan Pompoms. Please read it.

[queen0funova]

Here's the page in question. It's from a comic called El Goonish Shive

I've been reading a comic and one of the main characters was seemingly about to get herself into an abusive relationship, but then she girlbossed so hard that the guy had to walk away in shame and it was amazing.

[yadelah]

[galahadwilder]

Thank you for articulating this! I’ve always had a bit of trouble working out why that kind of thing bugs me.

All's Fair in Love and War (And Turnabout's Fair Play) (1177 words) by GalahadWilder

Chapters: 1/3

Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Characters: Lila Rossi, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Alya Césaire, Nino Lahiffe, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug

Additional Tags: Justice, comeuppance, Lila's Warped Perspective

Summary:

Lila Rossi can manipulate anyone—or so she thinks. She really shouldn’t have underestimated the deviousness of the boy who was born in the media spotlight.

.

@galahadwilder subsequently in Discord cited this comic as inspiration for Lila in Turnabout

my response was p much "that's 100% correct but also entirely wrong" and now I have figured out how to articulate it:

yes, we all filter what we think before it becomes what we say, and modulate what we say in order to convey different things that will get different reactions

(or we get called weird for not doing that or for failing to do it right, whatever 'right' means)

but

most people are doing that because that's the compassionate thing to do

(like, "wow, that's a darwin award for sure" is not the thing one says to someone recently bereaved if one wishes to be kind to the recently bereaved, no matter how hilariously poorly thought-through were the actions that led to the death they're mourning)

and because that's the honest thing to do

(like, if I talk a lot about an aspect of your fic I don't like, and I say nothing about anything else in the fic, then you are likely to get the impression that I don't like that fic at all—which is a seriously dishonest representation of my opinion, if my actual opinion is, except the one bit I don't like, I love it to pieces)

and most people don't think about it that hard because most people find modulating this stuff comes easy to them

(most people are also neither autistic—and therefore needing to explicitly analyze the rules of engagement that we are explicitly told, as opposed to picking the rules up by osmosis and implication—nor trying to be dishonest, and often people aren't even trying to be unkind)

and most people, if they did think about it that hard, wouldn't think in terms of "what reaction do I want them to have"

more in terms of "how do I want them to feel"

and in terms of "what is the ethical thing I should do here"

[mzminola]

In light of the recent story arc I thought it might be nice to remind people of the time Catalina assaulted Larry & Rich with a plastic Mjolnir when they made creepy comments about Susan.

[otakusapien]

Sometimes I forget Susan’s last name is Pompoms and when I do remember it is the best thing in the world

[pthariensflame]

My personal list has been, for a long time now:

Grace Guyur-Sciuridae — Shade Tail

Tedd Drew Verres — The Technomancer

Elliot Daniel Dunkel — Cheerleedra

Ellen Danielle Dunkel — Transformatrix

Nanase Kitsune — The Red Witch

Tiffany Susan Pompoms — The Black Witch

Justin Tolkiberry — Firearm

Sarah Brown — Snapshot

Rhoda — Chiromorph

Catalina Bobcat — Bad Kitty

Noah — Countershade

Adrian Raven — The Ancient Guardian

Abraham — The Wayward Reaper

Magus — The Lost Wizard

Thought for the day

While Big Cat is now Cheerleadra and Chimera is now Shade Tail, most of the rest of Joe England’s EGS Superhero names could still be used.

Sarah is Freezeframe though.