#what are secondary characters

[website-com]

its true he just comes to you in your moment of need

[fictionadventurer]

Maybe Jane Austen's real genius was that, unlike other authors at the time, she didn't have long sections where characters share their backstory. Or rather, when she did it, she set it up like a mystery so we'd want to know the backstory.

Instead of having a character be like, "Here's three chapters about my life," soon after showing up in the novel, she'd sprinkle little clues through the story that make us wonder, "What's Colonel Brandon's deal?" and then closer to the end of the story, Colonel Brandon would tell us what his deal was. We'd wonder "Why does Mr. Darcy do all those horrible things?" and then he'd give an explanation that includes a lot of backstory.

And these infodumps always come in response to significant moments of the story. She'd engage our minds and our emotions and then give us the infodump at a point when we care about the information it contains. Compared to some other authors (even some that came long after) it seems like a significant innovation.

[sunsestart]

Where are my Kurogiri fans at?

I like the mist man, he needs more screen time😭

[godisasimp]

VoidSeeker | Herrscher of Dream

[rhinocio]

NOW WITH PODFIC ACCOMPANIMENT!

[exlimix1a]

Quick piece of @luluyamofficial 's character Lucelia + a 30 second speedpaint!

[fromtheseventhhell]

"Arya wouldn't have been able to survive in KL" is really one of the dumbest fanon takes where you can tell someone only believes it because they like the idea of Arya and Sansa being "exact opposites and perfect complements" (even though it goes against the books). Actual evidence from the books to back it up? Never anywhere to be found despite how confidently people make this claim.

And not only does it severely mischaracterize Arya and ignore what she's been through, it also ignores her importance as a political hostage. The Lannisters weren't searching for her, and lying about having her, for no reason. They needed her because having only one Stark after executing Ned put them in a poor position to negotiate. So Arya would have been more than capable of handling herself (thoroughly shown in her Harrenhal chapters) and the Lannisters would've done everything in their power to keep her alive but, somehow, she wouldn't have been able to survive? It's truly one of those takes that falls apart if you think about it for more than two seconds but apparently, that's too much effort for some people.

[toribookworm22]

Sibling relationships like: I tried to protect you until it made you angry so I tried to let you go but that just made you angrier and no matter how hard I try to hold back on there's too much anger now but I love you and I know you love me and you know I'm not angry right you deserve to be angry please only be angry at me and never at yourself love I love you I love you I love you I'll hold your bloody knuckles in my hands as long as you'll let me

[crowreys-wormstache]

One of these days Adrian Tchaikovsky is gonna drop a novel about sentient spacefaring leeches and for about 600 pages I'm gonna be forced to care about those bastard creatures and I'm gonna LIKE IT

[kaisumisucreations]

i wondered what my sona as a more 'typical' furry design might look like, so there you go.

feat. outfit based on my irl clothes

[thylacid]

i have a secondary sona now . say hi to gizmo please or ill cry and blow up this entire building

[nosferatvpussy]

HBO is really out here wasting money and people's time with season 2 of house the dragon

[silverskye13]

Trying to analyze the tropes in my own fics to see if I think they're successful as component pieces and getting so confused I give myself psychic damage send help

[lizarr7]

Here's the first batch! Deer, as promised. Pretty sure this is actually the first time I have drawn any of the main four, and of course, it was turning them into animals, lol. These are some of the simplest ref sheets I have ever done, but it suited the more cartoony style I went for here, as well as made it possible to do so many, lol (there are more coming). Despite that, I put a LOT of effort into these, really trying to make them be recognizable as the characters! It's been a very fun exercise.

[jahiera]

speaking strictly from a plot & writing perspective here, not a commentary on characters or who or who is not my favorite blorbo (they all are). it's gale time and I wanted to get down everything I thought about this go around with his romance & the writing before it escapes me.

so I once again had a ton of fun of course, the game is still a blast, and several arcs were way more satisfying this time around simply because I ... did not skip the creche, unlike my very first run (I was an idiot) (I didnt think it would be that important) (it really really was). love it 10/10. I cannot WAIT to do my gith run & really focus in on that because the lore there is just, so cool, and that subplot was really rich & rewarding this time around since I had someone who was not orpheus become a mindflayer instead.

as for Gale, Thank Fuck I started before they bugged him up again too much. but let's deep dive into The Material.

shoutout to Tim first of all, he's a legend, dreamboat, superstar. there are so many lines delivered so effortlessly when they would sound ridiculous in anyone else's mouth. he gives gale so much soulful intensity and subtle, nuanced gravitas befitting someone like gale; with enough of Gale's own moments of silliness, cheekiness, wry wit & understated sarcasm, to outright flabbergasted at times, I was Giggling every conversation fr. I'm not usually prone to the "I LOVE YOU" Romances that come earlier rather than later, but ohhhhhhh tim gives each line with all the weight & agony that you can feel inside Gale when it comes (the looming death; not knowing what the end may bring; not wanting to leave any regrets behind) so like. MWAH to him. MWAH MWAH. all the kisses in the world.

okay mandatory compliments to the actor aside. I came out of the whole thing with breadth of new appreciation for Gale as a character in terms of the... concepts, threads, that make him up, and act 2 is where he REALLY shines overall.

I didn't necessarily come away from it with the same... weepy...... done-no-wrong? interpretation of Gale that I've seen floating about. he's lovely. he's intense. he's got soul-crushing devotion on his mind, no doubt. but for every fracture of tenderness, raw sincerity, & off the cuff soliloquy, he's got a lot of interesting flaws/characteristics I'd love to unpick with a fine-toothed comb on some replays or rewatches. Still trying to turn over in my brain exactly what that is, but it's there, and I love it. will say I'm really glad I played it mostly in a vacuum rather than getting too into others' thoughts on him, because What I Had Seen on the Webbed Site had near put me off entire (seeing someone say he's not prideful or pompous at all... when he self-describes as pompous?) -- maybe it's my tendency to focus in on what makes a character tick, when are they sharper, or harder, or meaner, and I enjoy watching that play out a lot, but? yeah. I didn't come away thinking him a super soft mushy mwahmwah -- ROMANTIC, yes, but overall as a character not nearly so lovesick and in desperate need of some protector. in fact when you tell him you don't want to be his crutch, he says as much too -- you've helped him, but you're not the sole focus of his person or the only thing keeping him alive.

there's enough of the humanity in his cheekier moments (stop licking the damn thing!!) and plenty of tear-jerking aside all of that. gale my canon-depressive-episode, mildly suicidal, chronic pained up, still-kind-of-full-of-yourself king. I adore you I love you I cradle you softly in my arms. he charmed me entire! I think that the themes hey were trying to tackle are really interesting and nuanced and I do have some thoughts on the success of the game in actually tackling those, what is there is really wonderful. some gorgeous writing in act 2, especially, and it was sold so well by the voice acting & sincerity in the writing I was just like. PERFECT. 10/10. NEED TO WRITE 98 FLUFF PIECES RN. which does not happen often, to me, as a person.

with. some exceptions, going back to critiquing act 3 as a whole.

act 1 & 2 are both strong, really nice. however this romance definitely needed at least one or two more scenes in act 2 to pad out the space between awkward flirting at the party to "I like it when you're sweaty and bloody-- sorry who said that" to "I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU." -- these scenes should've elaborated on Gale's personal feelings; of mystra, of what's been asked of him, of Tav. they should've set in threads of Gale's anger earlier, rather than the jarring shift from late act 2 "yeah I'll kill myself" to "actually... mystra fucking sucks! lol!" in act 3 at sorcerer sundries. yeah babygirl, mystra DOES fucking suck, wish I could've listened to you as you arrived to these conclusions rather than connecting empty character lines between act 2 and 3. and act 3 desperately needed more space to talk gale in or out of the crown. because by the time we get to the end, if he's really into the crown, he's into it beyond the focus of all else. but in the scenes where you talk him off that particular ledge, it doesn't even take very long to do so, and leaves kind of a weird... gap of intention.

I feel like they wrote themselves into a bit of a corner, honestly. because Gale's personal quest literally cannot be resolved until 5 minutes before the end, any climax wouldn't have much space afterward to pad the aftermath. so the solution to that would've been more character focus scenes, more flavor text depending on how you've influenced gale, something that actually makes the choices feel rewarding -- some hurdles to cross too, checks of some kind. but there really isn't any of that, and so the conflict is almost nonexistent. you squirt gale with a water bottle and he gives up the crown with no real additional dialogue. or you tell him "ma...maybe???" and he's suddenly a power obsessed little freak (complimentary) with no recourse, and in either case, we never got much dialogue to get some insight into his personal thoughts on it. this doesn't make Gale a bad character, but it does leave the narrative to be lacking in some regard.

like, for example. Astarion gets dialogue changes depending on the quest outside of character-specific moments (such as a spawn Astarion changing his dialogue after you help Aylin with Lorroakan), post-quest conversations, PRE-quest conversations with his siblings, moments where he reveals more of what he thinks (such as "You're... you. no one is like that.") etc., Gale gets None of that. the only other characters who really do are Lae'zel and Shadowheart; everyone else is either shafted or resolved in the last few minutes too. I came out of this most satisfied as a player overall with LAE'ZEL'S conclusion (also at the end of the game!!) because we had gotten a few more moments where her focus is obvious and her motivations are clear.

anyways, those are just general writing issues. Act 3 overall is the weakest, most agree, and that's still true here. Sadly it kind of takes some of Gale down with it in this case, because his personal quest is both so removed from the overall plot (despite him being a literal fixture as the only character who knows anything about the crown & was decreed by a literal god to take out the absolute).

however none of this is related to Gale as a guy. as a guy I'm Fucking Obsessed With Him. taking him with me everywhere was so rewarding especially in act 1 / 2. his commentary & insights, when they were there, ranged from funny as fuck to genuinely insightful & interesting for the overall plot. the ideas behind him, the glimpses we get of the life he led before, and the life he wants to lead after with Tav -- or what he alludes to wanting to lead with Tav, thinking that he'll still probably die at the end of this -- are lovely, interesting, TOUCHED MY SPIRIT. he's such a neat version of how to do a character that is as endearing as he can be foot-in-mouth, and as intelligent as he can be a little belligerent. I looooved every moment I could talk with him about magic in act 1, see his passions (beyond mystra), argue with him about how to do something (I'M the magical wonder here actually and I get to make the shadowlantern), all of that really MADE the romance for me in the lulls where his Silence or the gaps in his writing were more clear. 10/10 would kiss that fucking wizard again and cry a little bit thinking about exploding with him aboard a giant alien brain while one of those "ITS YOUUU I LIE WITH" songs plays in the bg

[vonlipvig]

started reading the half-life of valery k--so far so good--, and it did something that i really appreciate in books, which is telling us early on those physical characteristics of the main character that the author considers pertinent to know. chapter one, and boom, he looks in a mirror, hair is red. good! that's good to know! because if you had told me he was a redhead any later than chapter one i would have thrown my kindle into outer space. this is an author that cares for their readers.