#villain teamup au

[zonerobotnik]

I wish they were villains together.

Have I mentioned my "Villain Teamup" AU where Cassandra returned to Corona and met up with Varian and Andrew, who had recently broken out of prison, and later recruited Lady Caine?

I still need to do more art for it, and an actual fic.

[ashyswoyaus]

Wait is Dominator going to be a part of your wander and Sylvia swap au? How would s2 play out?

yes definitely!!! i think s2 would play out with pretty much the same general story beats as the show, mostly the same arcs and tentpole episode premises. then there comes the question of How you would make them work in this swap

instead of wander's eagerness to be friends and belief in redemption, sylvia's actions would be fueled by the thrill of adventure. while i wouldn't say she has the original's full backstory—she was never a bounty hunter—it's still something she loves, and perhaps even Because she doesn't have that full backstory it's something she craves more. for the most part she'd have been satisfied with just hater during s1—but at the same time it becomes so routine and hater barely even registers as a Real threat anymore (especially considering wander's the one that deals with the watchdogs) that she can't help feeling the desire for something New and Exciting.

so when dominator shows up, she immediately latches onto that and decides, well i can't just let this new guy do whatever they want, i've got to go and show them what's what Right Now. of course she gets humbled pretty quickly, but that drive to defeat dominator is what leads her to set up the battle royale. although sylvia shares the plan with wander beforehand and they work things out together. sylvia can't get to dominator when she's on her ship, so the plan is put in motion to lure her out and ambush her (and hopefully, fighting with the other villains first would weaken her a bit)

it still comes down to hater and dominator, and hater still forms a crush on her. sylvia doesn't think anything will come of it, of course, but she's trying to somehow use this to her advantage. i have quite a Bit about my fair hatey in my head which i want to make something of later

it also helps i think with giving her more parallels to hater...she gets so Focused on the Adventure that is Defeating Dominator that it's almost like an obsession and she might lose sight of her other goals. i worry about it maybe being too out of character because she isn't Normally super obsessive, especially compared to the others...but this was the most satisfying way i could think of to do it. like wander was fixated on getting hater and dominator together sylvia is fixated on Defeating Dominator (and internally wanting to Be the One that Does It). she wants to kill her so bad.

and i had these doodles i might as well take about wander and peepers briefly as well. their teamup would happen like 5 minutes earlier because wander would NOT skip out on that hug. you started walking towards me with your arms outstretched boy YOU ARE GETTING HELD!!!!

wander is not one to take pride in enemyship. the moment peepers relates to him about stress and had a moment of softness his fate was sealed. wander is his friend now. peepers doesn't want to admit it out loud but he knows deep down, and almost begrudgingly accepts it

and i didn't notice until after i made it but this is the second time i've drawn wander holding a watchdog and worrying about them getting cold...so i think this would be a funny part of his character. wander is so so worried about the watchdogs because they are small and furless no wonder they wear all black it must be so hard for them to retain heat. space is freezing. he would know. get some warmth!!! (he'll bite if you don't)

[princess-of-the-corner]

Dnd au Tomoe “What having you been doing with your friends” Kagami “we have been playing dnd and…” Tomoe”Been a while since I played would you mind if I joined a session” Kagami *suprised pikachu*

Tomoe: "Okay explain the lore of what you have so far."

Everyone: *long ramble about superheroes, the lovesquare, Heroes, Villains, Teamups and betrayals, the sentikids, etc.*

Tomoe: "I want to play another villain."

[baggebythesea]

I'd love to read the "PROPOGANDA WAS TRUE" AU story of yours

Maybe ever Princess is based off a Disne Villain ;p

Hah, I have something more subdued in mind, but the disney villain au sounds fun too. Evil Ariel+Elsa+Isabele+Tinkerbell teamup.

The closest I have published is The Fairy Queen's Daughter, which play with similar themes.

[5-7-9]

my idea of joker and harley relationship to the point that it’s in my main AU for Joker is that Harley manipulated Joker as her villain debut for a teamup. Eventually falling out of teamwork simply because it was more for the vision and reputation, Harley just leaves one day, no dramatic stuff, just independent villainy to make a solo name. Initially I had trouble figuring out Joker’s animosity towards Harley, since he should reasonably hate her (i couldn’t imagine them being friends sadly. In most of the joker au ideas i’ve had), but now I think he should treat her like he usually does with people he tolerates, being friendly mean. Friendly as in they’ll hang out with you, mean as in they’ll (attempt to) kill each other if they feel like it and will let you know they hate each other.

Since, i was also figuring out the Arkham inmates/patients rouges dynamic. Like, i mean, my AU has them act in a mostly “we’re not friends and we don’t hangout on purpose, but we keep walking into the same room.” They don’t hate or like each other, and they might try to kill you if they feel like it.

But that’s what makes my Harley’s and Joker’s relationship slightly different. Because if they were to sit in the same room with no way to kill each other to pass the time, it becomes genuinely awkward. There’s no bickering, (which is weird/strange for villains, and especially for Joker). Joker hates her, while Harley pities him and doesn’t care that he hates her because she knows she can hurt him. It feels emotionally worse for Joker one-sidedly, but Harley is kinda equal in their attacks(???). In their fights(???). If they were to fight they’d be matched(?). Something with those words??? I’ve been re-evaluating action scenes recently…

Harley’s position becomes a neutral criminal alongside Ivy unlike the other rouges i rehabilitated, so she’s sadly gonna have to go through tougher hoops to have wholesome Arkham buddies moments 🤔 Then again… I never reconsidered how the change i saw in Harley would affect the rest of the rouges. Huh… 😀 Welp 👏 This is embarressing. The rouges really should’ve treated Harley as an outlier not just because she was a henchman, but also because she was all of their doctor’s at some point! But I’m not risking anymore Harley potential, because I like Harley’s friendship moments, it’s grown on me. I’m unsure how awkward this would be realistically in a real friend group, but the premise is enough to sound ridiculous. “Ex-doctor that abused or continued silence on malpractice became a patient and our new acquaintance! Except for this one friend who she messed with the most but besides that we’re all ok with her.”

[sunnysatori]

ralsei really can’t catch a break, can he

[silverwhittlingknife]

i had kind of thought that if dick had actually been killed in infinite crisis, that he probably would’ve been resurrected in blackest night/brightest day. maybe that’s just wishful thinking, but at least that way we would get some good ol batfam angst eventually followed up by a resurrection-gone-right. plus imagine bruce coming back from being lost in time to find that dick’s alive…

OH MY GOD zombie!Dick coming back from the dead and then Tim has to destroy him 😭 in the middle of the awful year where everybody's dead 😭

ooh but a resurrection-gone-right is interesting. Bruce dies at the start of the story when everything's going to hell, but then when he comes back at the end of the story Dick's back and everything has been fixed. There's something nice about the arc of that.

other brainstorming on Dick dying and possible fallout

@upswings look what you've done you've awakened the sadists in all of us

Jason and Tim fighting over Nightwing -- OW. You know, I would really like to imagine this with a happy ending, where ... like, Jason comes to understand Tim better, or vice versa, but also my first instinct is some kind of one-shot that ends in tragedy?

If it's Jason POV: Jason is generally sympathetic through the whole thing but his own grievances take more and more control of him and it ultimately builds to him killing Tim and striding away while his my-villain-turn-is-now-complete music plays, Dr. Horrible-style. Bonus points if the fic makes you think that it's gonna have a happy ending and then it doesn't.

If it's Tim POV: Trickier! But basically the tonal equivalent for Tim, except Tim wouldn't/physically can't kill Jason, so instead it would have to be a Boomerang-esque setup where ... hmmm ... Tim coolly sets Jason up to get imprisoned, or sacrifices him to save someone else, or something like that? I feel like "sacrifices Jason to save someone else" is a more plausible moral compromise for Tim, since this is Tim's "desperately try to resurrect everybody" stage. So maybe you shift genre a bit to make it more fantasy, and invent some kind of reason whereby Tim needs a human sacrifice to bring Conner back, and he knows he shouldn't at the beginning of the story but by the end of it he's convinced himself Jason is an acceptable sacrifice. *ominous doom music*

Does Tim take on the Dick Grayson legacy of putting everything on his shoulders to fix??? Does Tim “Gotham needs a Batman” Drake take on the cowl even though he fundamentally does not want it and does not think he can do it and hates the idea and is afraid he might go evil?? HOW does a Batman!Tim and Robin!Damian AU work because I think it goes absolutely TERRIBLE. (h/t @bitimdrake)

Bruce dying shortly thereafter leaving just Tim and just Damian and if Tim still leaves maybe that would switch the narrative from “drake can leave and stay gone idc” to “drake leaving is an act of betrayal to the family” (h/t @theflopwonder)

Then what happens to Damian when Bruce dies???? [...] now it would just be Alfred and Tim... if Tim is even still living there, he might not be if there’s a chance Bruce wouldn’t adopt him in this timeline and he runs away to Bludhaven or the Titans or something. So. Just Alfred, unless Cass stays this time. .....Actually. Cass might be the one to step up if Tim leaves. (h/t @forestlingincorporated)

okay i am really intrigued by this hypothetical AU where Dick is dead and we get a Tim-and-Damian teamup after Bruce dies

i don't have a coherent pitch but here is some brainstorming

so one option is obviously Batman!Tim and Robin!Damian, which would be great in a oh-god-they're-so-young-and-this-is-so-sad way, a la BatDamian and Robin!Steph

BUT ALSO CONSIDER:

Tim and Damian TOGETHER on Tim's Ra's-al-Ghul-inflected Brucequest

Tim has a fight with uhhhh Steph (?) or Cass (?) about his resurrection plan and storms off, still Robin; but Damian overhears and makes his own Robin costume and ambushes him in Madrid; what the hell, says Tim; I will bring Father back not you, says Damian.

(meanwhile the Batgirls are in Gotham fighting Pyg)

Robin!Tim and Robin!Damian team up and travel around the world looking for clues, and Tim does not care about Damian, okay, he doesn't, he doesn't even like Damian, but they're sleeping in hotel rooms together and sharing meals and so forth and they're with each other 24-7 and Damian will not leave and if he gets hurt then obviously Tim has to bandage him and they still Officially Hate Each Other but sheer proximity means enforced closeness because they can, like, hear each other's nightmares and so forth --

-- and Ra's is then trying to tempt somebody, but hmmmm I feel like this need to be a single-POV fic, so EITHER Tim's POV OR Damian's POV, not both. So whoever's POV it is has to be the person that's getting tempted to betray the other one, e.g. if it's Tim, then Ra's is determined to get Tim to betray Damian, and if it's Damian, Ra's wants him to betray Tim.

So for convenience's sake, let's say it's Tim POV. So maybe Ra's is mostly focused on Tim, and keeps contacting Tim, and he's dismissive of Damian and/or doesn't realize that Damian is with Tim -

(okay so in canon the body-snatching threat for Damian disappears post-Resurrection, because now Ra's has a new body, but if you wanted, maybe unknown to Tim the reason why Damian keeps hiding every time Ra's calls or talks to Tim or leaves a mysterious clue is because Ra's still wants to body-snatch him and/or kill him??)

but anyway I kinda like the idea of doing something where Tim's getting a similar recruitment-pitch to the League of Assassins -- here have this passport, we rented a hotel room for you, look these people have showed up to help out, etc. etc. So Tim's getting fêted and Damian's getting ..... actually never mind, I feel like this would be more fun if Damian can be actually interacting instead of hiding, so Damian's just kinda getting ignored, or at least that's what it looks like, but Damian's extra-tense.

So at first Tim's feeling kinda petty and smug because Damian talks a good game constantly about how special he is, but now that they're interacting with the actual League it's obvious that he was full of it, right? And yes, this is a petty feeling to be indulging when they have a Big Serious Quest to bring everybody back to life, but it's still kind of a guilty pleasure.

And something something things happen and THEN

Ra's gets Tim alone and Damian's out sulking in the anteroom or whatever, and Ra's is offering Tim exactly what he needs to bring everybody back there's just one tiny codicil

which is that Tim needs to get Damian to do something

(why does Ra's need Damian to do the thing willingly? I don't know, because magic)

and whatever the thing is sounds harmless, but of course this is Ra's, and Tim's got this creepy feeling, because of course as careless as Ra's is acting it can't actually be that simple,

(and of course it's not)

and then hmmmm

i think to make this satisfying Tim has to actually fall for the temptation initially, and then later realize it was wrong and have to run to help Damian

WAIT WAIT I KNOW

What if -- okay I haven't worked this out -- but what if Ra's and Tim made the deal near the beginning of the Brucequest, back when Tim didn't care about Damian at all (plus when Tim was under the impression that this was just a family squabble rather than any kind of actual danger to Damian), and that deal is the basis on which Ra's has been helping,

and then Ra's decides to take advantage of the deal right before the key moment when Tim's going to pull off his resurrection

so now Damian's been kidnapped or tricked or taken on the Night of the Full Moon or whatever

and Tim has to decide between going through with the resurrection plans or saving Damian, and obviously he has to realize that he has to save Damian

and then when he gets there, Damian's horrified because WHAT ABOUT THE RESURRECTION, and it turns out Damian knew about the deal the whole time but he's okay with it because he's sacrificing himself to bring his father back to life

so now Tim has his big REALIZATION and he's all "no Bruce wouldn't want that" and the two of them fight Ra's

and then they go back to Gotham and fight crime together <3

[liturgusakrattorum]

Hello there! I wonder how the WK villains would fit in the Runes AU. I’ve been hyper focusing on it and would be happy to give you a chance to info dump. (You don’t HAVE to, I’m just interested.) Thank you, have a nice day!

OH BOY WOULD I

the villains have a pretty big part in runes!! i'm holding off on going into a lot of detail cause i wanna save some things for the actual fic once i get enough time to start writing it, but all four of em have a role to play in the story, especially paisley. (girlie needs some more love, she's underrated <3) for the most part, all of their motivations/gimmicks are the same as canon, except now on top of exploiting nature for their own reasons, they're also going after a highly-coveted ancient technology.

the runes au revolves a lot around the Hunt, which is basically a widespread search for the remaining creature power runes hidden around the world. the villains all have their own personal stake in the Hunt because word of it actually Started within their circle! the tortuga crew were the ones who got dragged into the whole situation directly because of their interactions with zach in particular.

that being said, some of the villains are working together in this while others are working against each other. all of em obviously want the runes for themselves, but villain teamups are like my favorite event in the canon show cause of how much fun it is to explore their dynamics :D

the scale/complexity (if you even wanna call it complex? lol) of this story is a little bigger than i originally expected, so i also have an original villain i came up with that ties up a lot of the loose ends the canon villains couldn't exactly do on their own...but i'll showcase him another day B))

[traincat]

I’ve been trying to piece together a few things from your Twitter and Tumblr posts alike and still can’t make heads or tales of things, so would you mind helping out a FF & spideytorch noob? 1) what is currently happening with Johnny in the comics? (I’ve fallen head over heels for this guy, largely all your doing) 2) when’s the last time he and Peter have interacted, canon wise? (And do you think upcoming interactions are likely?) 3) your thoughts on if they’ll have him come out in the near future? (has that ‘biggest change to the fantastic four’ teaser come to pass yet?) Love all your content, thank you!

I'd say no problem but then I started thinking about this current run again and got a headache. But yes, I can do that to save you from reading it, because it is very largely not good.

So I don't think it's unfair to just flat out say the current Fantastic Four run is not very good, largely due to writer Dan Slott's efforts. Slott was previously on Amazing Spider-Man for 10 years, to mixed opinions, but a large portion of Spider-Man fandom, myself included, blames him near singlehandedly for the decline in quality of Spider-Man books over those ten years. I will say, in the interest of fairness, that Slott as a writer has an incredible fondness for the Spider-Man/Human Torch relationship, and that a lot of the recent teamups and interactions between them have been written or co-written by him. So it's all not all negative here. But in general, I personally find Slott's more recent comics (the last seven-ish years especially) to be badly plotted out, messily characterized disasters that feature characters written with all the emotion of a cardboard cutout. That's me putting it nicely.

To explain this fully, you have to understand the position Fantastic Four comics were in from the years 2015 through 2018, both in the fictional 616 universe and in the real publishing world. Following the 2015 Secret Wars event (great if you want some Johnny angst in the background of your plot), the Fantastic Four were disbanded -- Reed, Sue, and their many biological and found family children were presumed dead but in reality were remaking the multiverse, unable, for a reason that was never clearly defined, to reach home. Ben and Johnny were left on Earth. They had an unspecified falling out, likely due to Reed and Sue's absence, and went their separate ways -- Ben joined the Guardians of the Galaxy and went to space. Johnny was featured on both Inhumans and Avengers books. What's notable about this period is that it's the first time since 1961 that there was no Fantastic Four book being published by Marvel. Now the real world reason behind this is both complicated and extremely petty: Marvel really wanted the Fantastic Four film rights. Marvel denied this explanation at the time, stating that the reason was sales motivated, but it was a thoroughly flimsy excuse and Jonathan Hickman, writer of 2015's Secret Wars and overseer of the current X-Men plot, gave an interview saying the decision was film rights motivated. This decision kept the Fantastic Four books off the shelves for three years, up until the Disney-Fox merger, which secured the X-Men and Fantastic Four rights for Disney's Marvel Studios. Marvel then announced that the Fantastic Four book would be returning. So that's a little bit of background as to the precarious place the Fantastic Four currently occupy in the Marvel universe -- it's worth noting that this year is their 60th anniversary, and Marvel has done very little for it. Compare this to the X-Men, whose film rights Marvel also obtained during the Disney-Fox merger, and whose books are currently dominating the publishing lineup. The Fantastic Four definitely occupy an unpopular position, one Marvel themselves is at least partially responsible for forcing them into.

But to move back into the actual content of the book -- the readjustment period Slott wrote reintroducing the Fantastic Four into the Marvel universe can be described as clumsy, at best. It's never fully explained why Reed, Sue, and the kids couldn't return to Earth, something that was explored in Chip Zdarsky's 2017 Marvel Two-in-One, which featured Ben, Johnny, and Doom on a multiversal roadtrip to try and find their family and which I on the whole recommend, despite it having an awkward ending due to being cut short by Slott's announced Fantastic Four main title.

(Marvel Two-in-One 2017 #4)

Instead, the Fantastic Four return to a Marvel universe a little different than how they left it, with the Baxter Building -- formerly the offices of Parker Industries, the company Doc Ock started in Peter's body during Superior Spider-Man that Peter inherited after his defeat and then lost spectacularly when he trashed his own company to fight nazis (good for him) -- occupied by a different fantastic foursome in a plot that goes nowhere and does nothing. This is somewhat emblematic of the early days of Slott's run -- he introduces ideas that fail to go anywhere, including Johnny's rekindled relationship with his other best friend and former college roommate, Wyatt Wingfoot, who he was seen being very cuddly with in the early issues.

(FF 2018 #1) A small group of Fantastic Four fans have argued for a while that if Marvel was to have Johnny come out, a relationship with Wyatt would feel very natural -- they're already close, with Wyatt being an important Fantastic Four supporting character since the '60s. I have some further analysis here on the conspiracy theory that Johnny and Wyatt were supposed to be in relationship at the beginning of this run but that that plot was, for whatever reason, nixed. I don't know that I entirely believe this theory, for the record -- but I do think the pieces line up remarkably well.

Anyway, that didn't/hasn't yet happened, obviously. Slott instead for the most part put Johnny on the back burner for the beginning of his run, up until the Spyre arc, which I have reason to believe is the main story he pitched that he credits with securing him the Fantastic Four title. The Spyre arc suggests that the Fantastic Four's failed space exploration during which they got their powers wasn't just to beat the commies to the moon, as Lee and Kirby envisioned (simpler days), but to reach a specific planet outside of our galaxy. When the team sets out to conquer this mission, they arrive at the planet, but are quickly captured. The planet, they find out, operates like a soulmate AU -- everyone has a fated person that they are matched to via a gold armband. Reed and Sue are soulmates (and Ben is confined to an underground subterranean with the other monsters, because this is a Fantastic Four comic) while it's discovered! Shocker! That Johnny is actually the soulmate of the one the planet's inhabitants, a winged woman named Sky, with the suggestion that this is both why Johnny's previous relationships have never worked and why he loves space exploration -- he was just trying to get to his Soulmate TM.

(FF 2018 #15) "What's going on here? Where are my clothes?" As you can see, this didn't start off super great, with Johnny being separated from his family, stripped naked, and put in Sky's bed with a soulmate armband slapped on him. Did I mention they're only removable if your soulmate takes it off for you? And that Sky has consistently refused despite Johnny asking her to? Yeah. It's bad. (I think it's important to note Johnny's long history as a victim of assault plays into this narrative, whether or not Slott is personally holding that in mind while writing, which I don't believe he is. cw in the linked post for discussions of sexual assault.) There's an additional issue here in that Slott has a history of problematic writing regarding women of color, featuring characters he's created to act as love interests being oversexualized, infantilized, villainized, or some mix of all three, with two examples of this phenomena being Cindy Moon and Lian Tang, both of whom he introduced in quick succession in Amazing Spider-Man. Slott certainly didn't have to write Sky as manipulative or controlling towards Johnny, but that's what he chose to do, and that factors into the bigger picture of unfortunate themes in his writing.

Sky returns to Earth with the Fantastic Four despite Johnny appearing unenthused about the idea and initially generally reluctant to interact with her. Apparently they went on a few dates after this and kind of made up. I don't know because I stopped reading for about ten issues in there but I feel confident I missed very little. It's hard to talk about the Sky plot without referencing Johnny's previous interactions with a character named Lyja, a Skrull whose relationship to Johnny I have a long breakdown of here. It's doubly hard, because Lyja actually showed back up in Fantastic Four during this plot. Lyja's modus operandi has remained consistent throughout almost all of her appearances, which I guess makes sense, because she literally has no storylines that do not involve her being obsessed with Johnny, and this recent story isn't any different: Lyja shows up, Lyja disguises herself as another woman in Johnny's life to get close to Johnny, Lyja gets caught and claims it was all fine because she did it for love. This time she disguised herself as Sky.

(FF 2018 #32) Not gonna lie, kind of proud of him for this one. That's one of my problems with Slott -- very occasionally, he busts out good moments, only to undermine them with the rest of his narrative.

In the same issue, Alicia Masters, the first woman Lyja impersonated in order to get close to Johnny, uses her supervillain stepfather's radioactive clay to control Lyja's mind and send her back to space, and I do think she utilized girl power when she did this. Johnny, left reeling after Lyja's latest attempts to trick him into a relationship, ends this issue by sleeping with Victorious, Dr. Doom's right hand woman.

I know she pegged him. I know it. This scene was a little controversial in Johnny fandom, because a lot of people viewed it as Johnny cheating on Sky and thought that that action was out of character for Johnny. I'm personally of a little different opinion, which is that regardless of whether or not you view Johnny and Sky in a committed enough relationship that Johnny's tryst would count as infidelity when all Johnny and Sky are bound by are magic plot soulmate bracelets, I think Lyja's involvement changes things significantly when it comes to Johnny's characterization. All of Johnny's "playboy" periods, if we can call them that, coincide directly with Lyja having been in and then left his life again, which I think makes a certain amount of sense -- it's Johnny trying to wrest control back after a situation where he had none. None of this is explicitly canon, I have to note, but sometimes in comics you have to do the work yourself. So I think this is a case of something being accidentally extremely in character that Slott accidentally stumbled into because he had these love triangles in mind, not because he put a lot of thought into it.

Speaking of love triangles! Johnny sleeping with Victorious gets more complicated when Dr. Doom announces his intent to marry Victorious -- not because he has any romantic interest in her (this engagement caused a lot of uproar in Fantastic Four because Victorious had been previously referred to as being like Doom's adopted daughter) but in order to install her as Latverian regent in his absence. I'm not going to lie, I love a political wedding. Victorious, for some reason, thinks Doom will be deeply upset that she slept with some closeted blond twink and the member of the Fantastic Four he views least as an enemy and more as an annoyance. Johnny, who Sky is currently not talking to because she "felt" him sleeping with Victorious through their magic plot soulmate bracelets, also feels nervous about Doom finding out about this, which I guess is slightly more valid. Anyway, for some completely ridiculous reason, Victorious decides the best time to tell Doom about this little indiscretion is when they're standing at the altar, which coincidentally the Fantastic Four are also standing at, because Doom asked Reed to be his best man in a not at all homoerotic little setup involving midnight swordfighting and Reed slipping Doom's emerald ring onto his own finger. Sorry to sidetrack into DoomReed territory here but it's just like. It's just a lot.

(FF 2018 #33) Also, Ben walked the bride down the aisle. :,) Look at his gigantic hand.

Anyway then Doom decides he's going to kill everyone in a completely reasonable and not at all overblown reaction to Johnny and Zora having what was most likely both disappointing for Zora and weepy for Johnny sex. And that brings us up to where Fantastic Four comics left us yesterday -- in answer to your "big change" question, that's most likely coming up in the next issue, so it hasn't come to pass yet.

Having gotten all that out of the way -- the last time Johnny and Peter interacted canon-wise was in the recent Empyre Fallout Fantastic Four, at the end of the Empyre event:

It was cute! Slott does right good interactions between them. This is possibly the Stockholm Syndrome talking. I don't know if more interactions are likely imminent -- the Empyre event was fairly recent. On the other hand, Slott does like writing interactions between them. So I'd give it about a 50/50 shot. I was skimming the letter page in the latest issue and someone wrote in asking if Peter was likely to appear in the pages of Fantastic Four again any time soon, so there is definitely a demand.

As for Johnny coming out -- I don't know. It's not a call I feel comfortable making at this moment, which I guess means I wouldn't bet money on it. I'd like to say yes, especially because I think Slott set up, whether that was his intention or more likely not, several good places in his run where Johnny could have come out. The beginning, when he's implied to be living with Wyatt again and where he and Wyatt are paralleled against Ben and Alicia. Ben's bachelor party, where Johnny laments not finding the right person -- specifically person and not woman -- and where Ben tells him to "be brave, Johnny Storm." And the soulmate planet plot, where I think could have had a very different and much better ending if Johnny had told Sky that she couldn't be his romantic soulmate, because he knows he wants to be with a man. But those are just places that I think would have made good opportunities for a coming out story. Instead, Johnny's been involved (dubiously) with three different women over the space of the last 10 issues, which is more heterosexuality at one time than he's been confronted with in the last 60 years. So my thoughts are still that it's going to happen eventually, but quite possibly not anytime soon.

Hope that helps! And that my incredibly long answer about what's currently going on with Johnny in comics sheds some light on things!

[zonerobotnik]

Are there any other stories you have planned or have thought about that you would be interested in talking about?

I'm still interested in that age reversed Andrew and Varian AU, even if you never write it.

Gonna be honest…I have no recollection of this AU. Can you remind me when I talked about it?

As for other stories…let's see…

This is gonna get long. Keep in mind, many of these are so far on the back-burner they may as well be on the cutting block.

Tangled:

There's an AU where Soul and Clyde came back during the takeover and actually made things worse for Rapunzel and the nobility because they have grudges.

There's an AU where Varian broke out of prison and chased after Rapunzel to follow the rocks.

There's an AU where Ulla, Donella and Quirin fled to Saporia after Fred's father didn't listen to Fred and Varian was raised Saporian and also in full knowledge of who and what he is and uses alchemy and his powers to play pranks on Corona and tease the King and is called the "Blue-Stripe-Bandit". (Aged-up Varian)

Conqueror of Corona: Rapunzel returns to Corona to find Varian has taken over and has also seduced nearly every man and woman in the Kingdom, including her parents! Can she resist his teasing temptations, or will she give in? (NSFW, aged-up)

There's an AU that's an RP I'm doing with Viruna that features Rapunzel sneaking in and finding Varian has taken over her room and her bed and he has no intention of moving out OR giving back her Kingdom.

There's an AU where Rapunzel didn't think to use the decay incantation to free Quirin and Varian is pardoned but still alone without his father after she tried and failed to use the healing incantation on the amber and avoids people in his manor while translating the scroll for Rapunzel as part of his redemption.

There's an AU where Varian betrays Rapunzel during "Cassandra's Revenge" after Cassandra tells him that the spell that Rapunzel wants to keep from her will help her lower the rocks in the Kingdom and persuades him to her side, especially since Rapunzel forgot to tell Varian WHY, exactly, they couldn't let her have that power.

There's a Star-Crossed Lovers AU where Corona and Lunos are at war and the Sun and Moon (and their hosts) are fighting each other but the hosts don't actually want to fight and so they meet in secret defying their Kingdoms and their Celestial Powers to have a secret love affair and refusing to use their powers to help in the war. (aged-up Varian

There's an AU where Zhan Tiri realizes Varian has moon powers when he reacts strangely to the decay incantation during the battle and drops her whole plan to capture him for study and takes him away to a hideaway built of golden rocks.

I'll See You on the Dark Side of the Sun: An AU that has a fic I've been poking at where Rapunzel, shortly after moving to the castle, goes into the SunSpot by accident while sneaking outside of the castle and gets involved with a cloaked man with an aphrodisiac cologne and dark intentions. Lucky for her (or is it? She doesn't think so) there's a dark angel from the sunlit side of the Kingdom that is watching out for her, though his arrival is a little late. (Aged-up Varian, NSFW)

Two Men and a Demon Baby: An AU where Varian Tiri is a baby demon that hatched when Fred was grieving his missing daughter and Quirin took him to see his secret Kingdom-secret demon egg, which caused the baby to imprint on both of them.

Villain Teamup: An AU where Cassandra went straight back to Corona instead of wandering aimlessly and found Varian and Andrew recently broken out of prison. (This AU was made LONG before I came up with High-Security, Lucas, Varian being whipped, or Andrew's mistreatment, and also has Andrew being an asshole, but still a big brother to Varian.) The trio team up and later recruit Lady Caine as they plot to attack Corona once all the royals are in town.

Town Secret: An AU where Varian seeks out Gothel for help with a horrible sickness in the village and Gothel brings Rapunzel to heal them all, and they swear to keep Rapunzel's presence a secret from the Capital. (Aged-up Varian)

An AU where Varian and Rapunzel are swapped; age, stones, and roles in life. Varian is now the kidnapped prince and raised by Gothel to believe he's a flower turned human and lives with Gothel and his mother's cursed colleague Regulus. Ulla is Queen, Quirin is King, Rapunzel is the village weirdo, Frederic is in the Brotherhood and Arianna was an adventurous princess from another land that fell in love with the handsome knight and settled down in Old Corona with him. And Eugene and Cassandra are where they usually are.

Eye for an Eye: An AU where Varian goes COMPLETELY off the deep-end after being broken out of prison by the rocks and going to claim the Moonstone Opal before Rapunzel has even reached Vardaros and later returns into the public eye having recruited many criminals until his "Knights of the Moon" and a thirst for absolutely humiliating and destroying Rapunzel and Frederic, capturing Frederic and later luring Rapunzel into an impossible game to win her father back or be their captive as well. (Aged in-story, NSFW)

Little Demanitus: An AU where, following the events of "Cassandra's Revenge", Varian is approached by Zhan Tiri and enticed into making a Deal with her to help her remove the Sun and Moon powers from Rapunel and Cassandra, and to study them with her as she once did with Demanitus.

There's an AU where Andrew is abhorrently abusive that he keeps Varian inside, hides the fact the King and Queen are dead and the city is in ruins and, once Varian is sixteen, takes advantage of the fact he will do anything to make him happy. (Might trash this, I actually don't enjoy it and only wrote up an outline out of pure spite.) (Implied NSFW)

New Girl in Town: There's an AU where Varian escaped prison during an earthquake and flees the Kingdom, only to return years later disguised as a woman with magic (see the necklaces in "The Secret of the black Rocks") to sneak into the castle as a maid and seduce both Eugene and Rapunzel to cause trouble in paradise, as well as cause some trouble for the Kingdom in secret. (Another might scrap)

Make you Proud: An AU where Varian joins Rapunzel on her trip to the Demanitus Device because he collapsed from the long run and so wasn't thrown out and was with Rapunzel when she spoke with Xavier.

Arranged: An AU where Varian is arranged to marry Rapunzel but she loves Eugene who her father doesn't approve of and Varian has been carrying on a relationship with Cassandra in secret (aged-up)

That's just the Tangled stuff, do you want to see the stuff for my other fandoms? XD (Gravity Falls, Death Note, Danny Phantom)

[erazonpo3]

I threw together another one of those Fake Episode Title Cards last night because I enjoy making them when I have a concept in mind (and also a fun play on words for a title). I’m pretty sure I’ve discussed the concept for this arc before but basically; Cass, Adira and (reluctantly) Hector team up to fight the big bad, this goes down about as well as expected (badly). In more detail:

For those unfamiliar with the basic premise, in my post-series AU the first basic plot is “Cassandra hunts down a surviving disciple of Zhan Tiri, realises that it’s not so easy to get rid of her, now has a mean disciple of Zhan Tiri hunting her.” 

When Cass runs into Adira & Hector on the road, Adira agrees to help Cass while Hector is understandably not very interested, but both Adira and Hector have run into Alphecca (said ZT disciple) before and want her gone, so they team up for a short while. It’s dysfunctional, to put it one way. The Moonstone + Mindtrap stuff is the elephant in the room, and Cass’ frustration with Adira’s usual attitude and Hector’s verbal attacks just broils internally because she’s not really in a position to defend herself and none of these adults are going to open up a conversation about feelings so. It gets messy. 

Ilione (Cass’ travelling companion) is the only person here with a killer combo of good social skills and emotional intelligence, but is also the outsider to everything that went down between those three, so she’s the one who has to herd these cats and keep everything civil. She’s also pretty irritated that Adira’s pretty dismissive of her usefulness because she can’t really fight (which true, but ouch) and is generally in a bad mood because she has to deal with all this, knowing that the negativity surrounding all of them (Adira isn’t actually very upset or emotional she’s just. very bad at helping the situation) is drawing Alphecca to them like a moth to a flame. 

To nobody’s surprise, Alphecca shows up and starts causing chaos and is absolutely delighted by her favourite opponents all in one place and giving each other hell. She’s a bit surprised to find Lio grumpy, though- and is curious to see what she’s pissed about (Alphecca and Ilione have that Villain + Hero’s sidekick rapport going on by now) and Lio spills the tea. It’s worth noting that this is one of the key points where Alphecca’s humanity is really evident and Lio’s whole ‘useless’ gripe gets turned on its head because she’s able to talk Alphecca into leaving them alone for now. 

Anyway at that point Cassandra and Adira are prepared to admit that teamwork isn’t really working out for them and that they’re better off going on their separate ways. There should be an actual conversation here, however stunted, that puts them on the same page and departing in mutual respect, but Hector’s just waiting at the door like Adiira let’s Goooo. Happy ending. 

I can imagine this plotline being stretched out over 2-3 episodes pacing-wise but ‘Get Mucked’ would be the keystone ep which sees the Cass & Adira teamup issues confronted and note that shift in Alphecca’s villain arc. I might draw more later but for now tadaa

[birb-tangleblog]

saw your lovely villain quirin au again, i was wondering, how would it progress? i mean like, would he be redeemed? does varian get saved?

Thank you!! I think I talked a bit on how that AU would go in my responses to some asks on my art account, and imo it'd progress pretty similarly to canon post-S1! 

It looks like I actually deleted the ask where I elaborated tho, so a summary + AU of an AU below!

Quirin helps the Saporians b/c he still wants to see the royal family and Corona burn to the ground, but like Varian does in canon, he has a moment of truth, redeems himself and becomes an ally again. Varian’s saved by Rapunzel, all is well. :>

After Var is freed, Quirin learns from his mistakes and takes a much more proactive approach to the black rocks/moonstone situation, lending his knowledge and knightly skills to the party! He’s a lot more open about his past experience, history, and their DK heritage. The rest of the Tangledads (Edmund and maybe Fred, if/when he gets his memory back since that was... really glossed over in canon) are also more involved in this AU, since the moonstone/rocks/Quirin/Brotherhood/DK/Corona connections are entirely unavoidable at this point.

Another thing that’d change is that Varian's development is set back a year, b/c being in the amber effectively put his arc in stasis. Consequently, he’s a lot more babey here since he wasn’t forced to grow up as he was in canon- but he’s also more determined to prove himself and show his alchemy can be used for good since he hasn’t had the opportunity to do that yet.

Post-series, Var does become Corona's royal engineer, and lives part time at the castle, but instead of remaining in Old Corona, I can see Quirin returning to the DK, probably along with some of the villagers who supported him. He brings his skills as a farmer and leader, and helps with bringing agriculture back to the DK!  Everyone's on amicable terms tho, and Var spends parts of the year in each kingdom- I just think Quirin might feel more comfortable getting a fresh(ish) start away from Corona’s monarchy, particularly after a stint as a villain. (And I’m increasingly fond of the idea of the two of them returning to the DK vs. staying in Corona in any AU tbh!)

ALTERNATIVELY.... an idea I didn't mention before, but toyed with a bit was a more divergent route, where if instead of Quirin getting jailed at the end of S1, he avoided capture, escaped- and pursued the party on their journey to the DK.

(I feel like his grudge is more against FREDERIC than Rapunzel... but he could be going after her for revenge purposes- Fred's daughter being a proxy for his son, eye-for-an-eye thing, + ending Corona’s royal line since she’s the crown princess and heir to the throne.)

I don’t completely know how that’d all play out, other than I think it’d be interesting to have an actual recurring antagonist in S2, with Quirin filling that role. 

Ngl, I also like the idea b/c of the conflict it'd generate for Adira, having to defend the party and go against another person from her past, and making her double down on her ideals even more. Her connection to two rogue knights would call her loyalty into question, and I'm kinda here for the thought of a Hector/Quirin teamup once the group reached the Tree, too??

Like, Hector slapping Quirin with the world's nastiest "I told you so", maybe starting to bring him around to his point of view re. protecting the world from the rocks given what happened to his son? And the two of them working together against their common enemy despite lingering tensions and differences? Black knight Quirin and feral tree man Hector.....? 👀

THAT WAS A RAMBLE but yea, overall I tend to assume it'd follow canon closely, it’s almost more of a roleswap than an AU proper- but I think smth more diff is possible and fun to think about too! I like playing loose w/ ideas and concepts.

[princess-of-the-corner]

Hey, you have a fic or a tag that i can serach, for an au where hawkmoth is an allie of ladybug and chat noir?

I mean. There's the "Hawkswap" AU where Gabriel is the mentor figure while Fu is the villain hellbent on world domination(which I need to go back and tag...)

Tbh I'd rather have a temporary teamup as like. A oneshot fic idea where another villain shows up and Hawkmoth is like "bitch if anyone's stealing the Miraculous it's me!"

[5-7-9]

So i went ahead and altered (not much actually, past me was mostly correct save the movie Talia part) my reclamation AU doc. Gonna fully head into the villainization of Harley, I wasn't onboard with it before but now i am.

the concept of a corrupt doctor that's a white woman who constantly struggles with misogyny, utilizing mentally ill patients that have less autonomy than her like the Joker to explore her desires of being a criminal and in the end when Joker proves to be difficult to manage, just dips.

(I used to call Harley's selective compassion, well, compassion, but I realize it's probs not. This means her dynamic with Batman will probs be worse. So i guess the part that changes is Batman's expectations and willingness to work with her, because past e thought they could teamup but now I don't think they should. I tots have to update my meta doc too now aw man)

this is heartbreaking to rewrite becz of all the victims that sees themselves in Harley tho, I'm sorta conflicted tho they're usually racist and transphobic and ableist and- nevermind. Intersectionality mannnnnnnnnn

I wouldn't say it's a downgrade to be a girl villain tho, most times i find it difficult to remove sympathy to girl characters for any to be evil so this is a nice compromise.

intersectionality is realizing that oppressed people can still oppress worse off people. Terrible people can still be treated terribly

[jaytheredbird]

60 QUESTIONS

🌞 Do you have one canon character you love that not many have heard of? What do you like most about them?

🌜 If you could, which character would you bring back (or kill off for good)?

🤡 What's the most whacky moment you actually like from comics?

🙈 Mention one headcanon you really don't like

🙉 Mention one trope you wish you could delete forever

🙊 What's your favorite, least popular, trope?

🤖 What type of music inspires you?

👽 You discover an alien in your kitchen, at 4am, eating your icecubes. What do you do?

👻 What would you rather be: a ghostbuster or the ghost they come to bust? 

☠️ Name one character you just wish writers would stop killing right about now

🦸 Who's your favorite superpowered hero?

🧜 If you could prove the existence of any supernatural/cryptid creature, which one would it be?

🧚 Favorite supernatural character?

🧞 You can make only one of your favorite headcanons officially part of the current canon. Which one would you choose?

🧙 If the main cast of the 'batfamily' were in a D&D game, what would they be?

🧟 The zombie apocalypse has started, but in just one country! What do you do?

🧛 Are you a creature of the night, the night itself, or you only have a bad case of insomnia?

👼 Choose one: Father Todd, angel Jason, demon Jason.

🕵️ What's that one thing from any continuity you wish was used more?

👨‍🎤 What do you think Jason would prefer: glam, metal or indie rock?

🌊 How would you describe Jason's personality?

🌬️ Villain au or no capes au?

🌁 If Jason hadn't been found by Batman, who would you like to have taken him in?

🔥 There's a fire! Who started it?! Why?!!

🌇 Where do you think Gotham would be located in real life?

🌡️ Name one character you wish you could punch

🌈 Imagine: you've been working for DC for quite some time. Fans ask you: is Jason LGBT? You know this is your chance to finally set the record straight. What do you say?

💫 If you could make the crossover teamup of your dreams happen, which characters would you have working together?

🪐 Jason's been chosen as a Lantern! Which corps is he part of now?

🌃 Which character of the batfamily do you wish Jason interacted more with in comics?

🍓 Favorite comic run?

🍒 Favorite comic artist?

🍉 Favorite comic writer?

🍑 Jason: hunk or twunk?

🥥 One couple/teamup you wish never happened in canon?

🍅 Do you have a hero character you can't stand? Who?

🧅 Have you ever been moved to tears by something that happened in comics/any canon? What was it?

🌶️ Who's your favorite villain? Why?

🥑 Hero-villain team up of your dreams?

🍆 Fuck, marry, kill

🥞 How old were you when you first started participating in fandom?

🥚What fandoms are you currently part of?

🧀 When is your preferred time to do art/write?

🌭 What inspires you?

🥪 What's your creation process like?

🥨 Have you made friends through fandom?

🍕 If you could collab with anyone, who would it be?

🌯 Has fandom ever taught you anything?

🍝 What do you prefer: older or newer comic runs?

🍜 Name a character you think would give good hugs

🚥 DC announces another poll to kill or not kill Jason. What do you do?

🧭 Oh whoops! You've been sent back in time! What year is it? What will you do?

✈️ A DC Elseworlds comic you wish was more explored upon?

🚀 Star Trek au, Star Wars au or Cowboy Bebop au?

🛸 Gasp! An alien invasion! What will you do?

🏗️ What are your thoughts on the 'batfamily'?

🏩 Name one character you wish was more popular

🎪 Favorite comedy trope?

🎠 You can bring to life just one character. Who?

🎡 Two characters finally have a long overdue conversation. Who are they? What is it about?

[izumisays]

dear yuletide author

Thank you so much for reading this and taking part in this wonderful annual conspiracy!


First of all, I hope you have a lovely time! If any of the fandoms below pique your interest, I’m delighted already, and ready to hear all the stories you want to tell.

Fandoms:  Chihayafuru, Nirvana in Fire, Thunderbolt Fantasy

As for reading preferences, I’m happy with a wide variety of tones and genres, of any rating, ranging anywhere from lighthearted antics to dramatic casefics. But the core of all the stories I love has always been character interaction and interplay of their competences.

How the characters play off each other and bring out their best/worst, how they’d react to a divergence of events, how true they’d stay to themselves in a different setting – I love fanfiction for allowing us to reconnect with our favourite stories time and again by asking these questions. And there are so many ways to do it! To name a few favourites, I’m always game for POV hijinks, a missing scene, a casefic, canon expansion, backstories and what-ifs.

You may notice that quite a few of my requests lean towards shipfic – those, too, are welcome in a variety of tones – but I also tried to include openings for gen ideas if that’s your jam. Additionally, while it is not usually my top interest, I don’t have anything against AUs if there is something that you are itching to explore: I tend to enjoy them for a new aesthetic that fleshes out the favoured character dynamics in a new light, or a fusion that redefines the playing ground to allow the characters to exhibit their core competences in new and exciting ways.

I would be very grateful if you could avoid a/b/o and similar kinktropes, played-straight soulmate fic, and character interpretation that runs contrary to their core values. If in doubt, please reach out to me on anon - the askbox is open!

CHIHAYAFURU: Mashima Taichi, Wataya Arata, Suou Hisashi

You don’t have to include all three characters, but I’d love to see a fic that explores the connections between them better. I’m up to date with all manga scanlations.

Wataya Arata/ Mashima Taichi

In the immortal words of Henjin Meijin, Arata is that person for Taichi whose opinion makes or breaks him. (His wording may have been different, but if I go rummaging into the chapter archive to find the exact quote, I’ll end up binge-rereading year three into the night again, and then where would my Yule sign-up be?) (On that note, what kind of a MASSIVE LOSER waxes poetics about Taichi’s boyfriend problems to Taichi’s MOTHER, whom he JUST met? Suou Hisashi, that’s who.) Needless to say, that paramount opinion was not always great, and neither was Taichi’s general wellbeing.

Good news is, Arata is confident in his manliness, and he has no problem acknowledging Taichi’s ridiculously pretty and not too bad at karuta these days, and he’s also moving to Tokyo. Taichi’s definitely pretty and has an apartment in Tokyo, where a country bumpkin of paramount importance may possibly stay over until things are sorted out… eventually. Hint hint.

Jokes aside, I pine for the dynamics between the two of them. I nearly lost it, reading the Meijin semifinals — and if you can show me a person who saw them bawl as they crawled into each other’s laps on Japanese national television and didn’t bawl in response, well, that person is sure not me.

I’d like to see a story that lets them build and explore that connect. I do not object to eventual OT3, but I think Chihaya is on a quest to find her own footing and pursue other goals at the moment, and I’d really like it if she was allowed to do this (join forces with Shinobu to drag karuta into a professional league, girl!). I’d like to think that in that space, different bonds and relationships can develop and strengthen, starting with Arata and Taichi.

Taichi the overanalyzer, the hardworker and the looker, the golden boy who at some point surely hit that red button, meme-style: you will be perfect at everything, you will have everything, except the one thing that you want above all. Arata appears to be his perfect foil: steady and serene where Taichi’s scrambling and flawed, adorably awkward and disarmingly sincere where Taichi’s groomed, smooth and miserable about his own deceptions. But they don’t see it like that! And they keep tripping each other up so beautifully!

I’d love to read your take on them growing closer and hopefully smooshing their faces together. Roommates in Tokyo? Long-distance friends? Figuring out how to tell your flatmate you’ve been in love with him since you were 12? Established relationship while hijinks happen? AWKWARD THIRDWHEELING WITH SUOU?!

On that note:

Suou Hisashi & (or / - wejustdon’tknow.gif) Mashima Taichi

I cannot believe that ridiculous man. Did you see a grown ass adult swoon because his unrequited disciple I mean not-friend I mean Taichi just up and went to meet his relatives??? To  help reconnect them?? One can do things like this?? What next, being able to make phonecalls like an adult??

Does not compute.

I was there, Gandalf. I was there when the story first indicated that we might be getting an unlikely team-up of the world’s weirdest Meijin and Tokyo’s most miserable overachiever. But even in my wildest dreams I did not dare hope to see them sprawled on the carpet on a humid summer afternoon, Taichi comfortable in his own skin and Suou, erm, probably not very comfortable with his fascination :D He did not sign up for this. He, a grown ass man in what must be his early twenties, is too old for this youthful seishun sakura bullshit. And yet it is he who mournfully accosts Taichi’s mom to talk about how this other boy is paramount in Taichi’s universe. He who gets offended because Taichi knowing how to adult and work the social ropes is too sexy and competent. He who finds something compelling in the painful struggle of genius and skill.

Arata - Taichi - Suou

For maximum indulgence of yours truly, bring those into one place. Arata coming to Tokyo and finding Suou a fixture in Taichi’s life how?! Suou being infinitely pissy at the Fukuyi upstart and yet dragging himself to socialize with the boys regardless like a totally-not-pathetic adult with a social life of his own? Arata being mildly puzzled about the antagonism, but in there for the sweet snacks?

You tell me! I delight in my anticipation.

NIRVANA IN FIRE: Mei Changsu, Xiao Jingyan

Is this a complex, narratively inevitable historic tapestry strangling people with its treads, full of delicious politicking and identity porn? Yes, it is.

Is my burning – nay, primal – desire so simple as to smoosh two faces together and watch them kiss? Yes, it is :’)

I mean, I will obviously not say no if the kissing is giftwrapped in the said tapestry of beautiful, politicky plot, but the fever I can’t get out of my system is this: LET THEM KISS, GODDAMMIT. LET THEM BE HAPPY. I welcome canon divergences, alternative endings, fix-its, insert eps and codas where it looks like they would have kissed (erm, or at least confronted each other in a way that would inevitably end with them making out) if only Mei Changsu wasn’t so caught up in self-loathing and fluffy foxfur coats, and Jingyan didn’t talk too loudly about his so dead, so very dead beautiful ex to hear Mei Changsu weep stoically into his beautiful white furs.

I adore Prince Jing. He is 90% cheekbones and 20% heartbroken pouting over his so very dead friends, and all of it noble and awkward and stubborn and deserving of happiness. Mei Changsu is ridiculous, and capable, and twisted into pretzels of his own creation: not above gloating over his enemies while daintily dipping cookies into his tea, he gets too caught up in weaving the tapestry to notice he is a part of it.  Pull him off his high horse, Jing! Render him helpless by being yourself! Do something about being hopelessly charmed with each other, through resentment, loss, bitter pining, and narrative inevitability! JUSTKISSALREADY.gif!!

THUNDERBOLT FANTASY: Rin Setsua; Sho Fukan

I LOVE THIS SELF INDULGENT WUXIA NONSENSE AND I CANNOT LIE!

Sanfan is a mixture UTTER GLEE and deep fondness for the genre staples, self-aware and masterful playthrough of all the wuxia tropes in the book, and one goddamn well-constructed story. It plays the tropes straight, calls them out with a knowing wink, walks the tightrope between the two with panache, and just as you are relaxed and enjoying this trapeze show, it grins cheekily at you, sets the discoball on fire and pulls a bunny out of a hat.  It’s DELIGHTFUL and fun and lovingly crafted, just like a good passion project should be.

I want anything that capitalizes on the absolutely hilarious dynamics between Rin Setsua and Sho Fukan (and while personally I end up using the Japanese versions of their names more often, please feel free to go with the Chinese names if you prefer). Sho Fukan does not want any of those heroic quests, he’s the human equivalent of been there, done that mood, and he just wants to REST and hopefully dump a bunch of magical murderswords someplace safe. Rin Setsua is a Totally Respectable and Non-Villainous Member of Society, of which he will inform you firsthand in the most high spoken and verbose way possible, and maybe even produce paperwork that has definitely not been tampered with. He harbours no ulterior motives, ever, and does not trail behind Sho Fukan for any reason beyond the pleasure of his company, and his mission to personally victimize and cockblock every morally derelict villain in two countries, by no-one’s request.

Whether you go shipfic (yiss!) or canon levels teamup circus (also yiss!), don’t hold back your horses. Everything about this is Extra, and should continue to be so <3

I am okay with both expanding the canon and playing with AUs/crossovers/fusions for this one, provided they retain the character dynamics. I love the extended cast as well: any characters including the Seiyou gang (and on that note, if you want to write the Seiyou backstory for Shou’s gang that has no Rin in it, you’re welcome as well), reappearance of the familiar faces from Touri (read: Rin’s victim list, past, future and present), original characters lined up and waiting to be screwed over (guaranteed) and rescued (the administration does not bear any responsibility etc etc).

Thank you for taking the time to read the letter, and I’m greatly looking forward to reading your story — and hopefully, getting to chat about these ridiculous and wonderful characters post-reveals :)