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touchmycoat · 4 years ago

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I LOVE YOUR PORN AU!!!!! LIKE SO MUCH - and i'm just. if you don't mind me asking, how - the way you flesh out the characters, their motivations, and feelings in every scene in such an eloquent way, and just little things here and there, a habit or an activity that adds dimension to who they are, and - your prose is wonderful. you achieve this addictive, engrossing narrative space that readers just absolutely melt into, and i have to ask - how did you develop your writing style? 1/2

what books did you read that formatively shaped the way you write? or you know, what did you do to improve your writing? i'm so in awe of how you world-built and established the porn au - like lqg & hc being national taolu champions?? how do you come up with that stuff? i cannot comprehend the amount of research and effort that must've gone into porn au, and i'm just so deeply thankful that you decided to share that with us. i apologize if i'm coming on too strong, but wow. thank you 2/2

oh my god please don't apologize, when i saw your ask i rolled on the floor giggling hysterically for a solid 15 min, bless your heart

part of the answer to your question—i've taken like, 8 years' worth of creative writing classes/workshops! there was also a transnational literary component to my degree so whenever possible, i took literature classes fksjdfksd so whatever you see and like is definitely the result of a lot of work. My writing from not even 10 years ago but like, 5? horrid, ridiculous, wild, cringe. The Porn AU itself is the second draft of a MUCH more lackluster piece.

about my writing style. gosh, you really know how to make a writer blush. "I like your writing style" is literally an instant kill LMFAO okay okay, the useful answer: my primary criteria for choosing what to write is, don't be obvious, be interesting. Fiction tells us to show, not tell, right? Poetry is about concretizing the abstract. Screenwriting says cut all useless lines. A lot of writing rules and advice—never start with the weather, avoid detailed descriptions of the characters, don't use adverbs, etc.—are all really about this exact sentiment.

I once took a seminar on writing for horror movies. The golden rule of the horror genre is Never Show the Monster, because whatever the audience is imagining is always going to be scarier than what you actually show them. There are obviously exceptions to this (to all writing rules), but in my mind, it's all the same principle.

LONG answer under the cut

So you start with building a scene. I approach it like essay-writing—I state my thesis for the motivations/main propulsion of the plot. "In this scene, LQG and SY are motivated to save Cang Qiong's porn production, so they have sex on camera." Then you build the sub-motivations: "LQG is also doing this because he's pining after SY."

I learned this "thesis-writing" from theater, specifically from writing 10-min plays. Theater is all about characters being driven by their wants and needs, and the reason I say 10-min plays in particular is because longer forms of writing will give you more leeway, but in 10-min, you pretty much need your character motivations established from their very first line. That's why you need that very clear thesis for yourself—if you don't even know what the character wants from the get-go, then you can't establish who they are, what they want, and where they're going to go in a dynamic and interesting way.

So this thesis drives EVERYTHING that happens in your scene, just like an actual thesis for an essay, just like topic sentences for your paragraphs. Once I do this, I have the emotional direction & narrative scope of how much this scene will cover, I have a sense of where it begins and ends. "Begin with the dynamics of their sex. LQG starts showing signs of his feelings. Reveal LQG backstory for exactly what those feelings are and why he isn't telling SY. The rest of the scene implies that LQG's feelings may not be so unrequited, but also sets up the fundamental problem at the heart of the whole fic—SY's inability to comprehend his own feelings." This is kind of my new thesis now. They're having sex; LQG pines; SY doesn't know he himself is pining.

Now it's time to manifest. This is the "storytelling" part, and the hardest lmfao.

Personally, my approach is largely shaped by my very cool screenwriting teacher, who hammered into us: don't fucking waste lines. The Golden Rule of screenwriting is that every line should reveal something new. I found my old writing kind of repetitive, especially on the emotional front, so this is kind of my editing mantra now—is this line either propelling the story or revealing character? If it's revealing character, is it a revelation that has to happen right now, or is it slowing the momentum of the scene?

But these aren't rhetorical questions! "Momentum" doesn't just mean tumble forward as fast as you can, it also means taking the time to draw the bowstring back further, so your next move has even more propulsion. That's why you get the little "LQG has been in love with SY..." cut scene in the middle of the fucking (at least, that's my reasoning for putting it there). Every line has to bring a fresh revelation that "proves" your thesis further.

That brings me to the details. You said you like the details I inject into the world-building, and honestly that's so gratifying to hear, because that means I'm successfully manifesting my intentions, y'know? "Every line has to bring new info" kind of sounds like a tall order, but the most effective way I've seen it done in books and onstage/onscreen is with these hyper-specific details. If you're writing a scene in which someone feels dirty, never have them just say that—have them say they want to take a shower. Show them running out of bleach again as they scrub down the stall after they wash. Begin the scene like "Steve always washes his throat first now." Then pack the scene with even more revelatory details: "Soap in hand, he heard the pipes above his head groan for a half note on adagio, and readied himself for the blast of icy water that always followed." Shitty shower, probably not rich, is likely a classical musician.

By the same token, I want to build LQG's character. The "Liu Qingge has been in love with Shen Yuan" section is the first insight we get into his background and perspective, right, so: I need to establish LQG's emotional context for filming this scene -> I can characterize him as a nut for martial arts in the same stroke -> so this takes place at a gym, beating up sandbags is a classic way of showing manly emotional distress -> so give me more details on this gym -> Puqi Gym, XL the martial god is obviously the owner -> how do I have XL & LQG a relationship beyond gym owner & client? They spar together -> I want XL & HC's position in this AU to mirror their god/ghost king statuses in TGCF canon -> how can I concretize their fighting prowesses in real-world details? -> they're martial arts champions -> what's an actual competitive martial art form that involves weaponry? -> wushu -> wikipedia Wushu, find taolu weapons sparring

(I just realized that in my songxiao daycare AU, Hualian are Olympic gold medalists by the same narrative logic laksjdnflaksjdnflsd)

So, that's the flow of logic behind my world-building lmao. It's all in the details. Leverage is one of my all-time favorite TV shows and the way they build their stories is super inspiring. If their thesis is "the rich and powerful take what they want, we steal it back for you," they manifest it in the most specific and concrete narratives: mine workers who like the work but are fighting for workplace safety vs. the money-grubbing mine owner who will blow up their livelihoods if it means a bigger payday; the little girl from Iraq with refugee status forced to be an accomplice to antique smuggling vs. international smuggler with a fetish for British royalty.

Last pieces of writing advice I've gotten: pay attention to the real world. A writing exercise we did was just sit in a public spot and make concrete observations on our surroundings. There are stories in everything!!! I learned to observe things like weird holes in the concrete (earthquake? drilling accident? bullet mark?), odd patches of moss or bird shit (look overheard: it's an AC unit dripping water for the former and nesting swallows for the latter), ladies in flipflops walking alongside ladies in high heels (excited mother walking her antsy daughter to the bus for the daughter's first job interview—the daughter's shirt collar is unfashionable and she's taking the bus, so there's a good chance the shoes were passed down, maybe from an office lady aunt. Maybe she's even overdressed for the interview, so will her outfit be an unintended source of tension once she gets to the interview? Is it a group interview, to make the comparison more stark?).

Also, write what you know. You know why SY is a video editor in porn AU? Because I'm a video editor. One of my more popular MDZS fics is set in a plant shop 'cause I worked in a plant shop. SL was First AD in Bachelor!AU 'cause I was First AD on a set once. Concrete details like the editing software having a split-screen, always answering questions about how often to water plants, and being up until 3AM editing call-sheets are the ones that will fully immerse your readers.

And if you can't do the actual things, just watch someone who is, listen to them talk, pick up lingo, and fake it. I watched like a 15-min vox video on fencing for the fencing!AU and a 45-min music theory video on the hospital pianist!AU (also I started learning piano sklfjnlsdjlfkjsd). Of course, I just finished reading a wangxian fic that had me going, "holy fucking shit, the author is literally getting their masters in a music program" so my 45-min youtube video ain't shit, but if you just need a little bit of character establishment, then it's enough to do the trick.

Anyways, tl;dr. Find the details, find the tension. Never tell outright what the tension is supposed to be, manifest it instead. Make the manifestation as interesting as possible, and if it's meant to be funny, make it funnier.

Sorry this turned into a fucking lecture lskjnflskdjnflskd but last thing, someone asked me before if I had formative authors, and this was the list I wrote at the time:

Angels in America (play) by Tony Kushner

The God of Small Things (novel) by Arundhati Roy

The Penelopiad (novel) by Margaret Atwood

“Litany in Which Certain Things are Crossed Out” (poem) by Richard Siken

Night Sky with Exit Wounds (poetry) by Ocean Vuong

Giovanni’s Room (novel) by James Baldwin (and then Go Tell it on the Mountain and then his essays)

Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger

And, ooh, now that I have this list I think I can even roughly sort it as such: Kushner, Atwood, Siken, and Salinger I really latched onto for their dialogue and very present narrator voice—same is true for Go Tell it on the Mountain. Roy, Vuong, and Giovanni’s Room, I think, are texts more representative of the kind of saturated figurative language I like, and emulate. Of course they all do imagery and voice and overall structure amazingly, but that’s the rough dividing line I’d draw.

But yeah James Baldwin is my fucking hero.

#long post #about me #writing #jesus sorry i spent way too long on this laksjdnflaskjdnflaskjndflas #but anyways i'm super grateful you gave me the chance to introspect and articulate all this #i'm exceedingly grateful too to all the writing mentors i've gotten to have #personal #these are the principles and rules i've learned and #i still definitely screw the pooch #on them #so you know this is just what's on my mind #this is how i school myself

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lokigodofaces · 3 years ago

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thoughts on loki ep 3: lamentis

under cut for your convenience

my first thought when i saw C-20 at the beginning was the Framework...i might be a bit too obsessed with an aos/Loki crossover...

C-20 was sorta able to find out something was wrong. from what Sylvie said, that's pretty impressive.

i wonder if Sylvie uses magic similar to Wanda's. like if Wanda just uses it on a bigger scale. the mind illusions thing checks out. and i saw on youtube that another patron looks like Evan Peters, so maybe they're connected? but most likely they just hired a dude that happens to look like Evan Peters.

going back to that, the glitch in C-20's illusion was like the glitches in WandaVision

if this really is similar to Wanda in canon, that means Sylvie and other Lokis might be nexus beings (y'know, the very thing i shout about in tags because i want)

Okay, so Sylvie tried to enchant a minuteman, which means she must have assumed the TVA operates on the same physics as the timeline. So neither Lokis thought magic could possibly be impeded.

good action sequence with Sylvie and minutemen and Sylvie and Loki

dudes...Renslayer can't fight. she literally did a horrible job.

Sylvie really thought the TVA valued Loki and that they really wanted/needed him to stop her. so she threatened to kill him, just for Renslayer to give the go ahead. shows how little the TVA cares and it echoes Odin.

Lamentis 1 sounded cool because that is a very sci-fi-ey name. It means the star the planet orbits is called Lamentis and the planet is the closest planet. That's how we name lots of planets outside the solar system. so i appreciated that.

okay, lamentis is literally just the bi flag. but still lots of purple so i will claim it as ace as well.

teleportation! and actual magic! yay!

okay, are they setting up a Loki/Sylvie romance? the way they framed the two when Sylvie tried to enchant Loki was how it's often done with kisses

Sylvie said with strong minds she has to do what she did to C-20 to enchant them, but she couldn't even do that with Loki. Which shows how powerful Loki is and how powerful the mind stone is.

i will die for more of Loki and Sylvie being chaotic together

Sylvie she said is an alias. Does this mean she is genderfluid but is female more often than male? i'm told some genderfluids are one gender more than the other, and i've considered Hiddleston's Loki to be predominantly male. Could Sylvie be the other way around? & born Loki but haven't changed her name? or have different names for different genders? and doesn't want to be called Loki when she's female because that's not her name as a woman?

literally i can't tell if they're setting up romance or sibling stuff.

i never thought i'd hear the word "savvy" from Loki. but, hey, if Jack Sparrow can say it, i'll allow it.

the effects for the gun that woman used look similar to Daisy Johnson's quakes. for a second i hoped for an aos crossover, but then i remembered that marvel hates it's non-Disney+ series.

i like the differences between Loki and Sylvie. Loki is less confrontational and more likely to mischief his way when Sylvie is more likely to rip the bandaid off and get it over with, if that makes sense. i think that Sylvie might just be so tired from living on the run, only going to apocalypses that she just wants to get it over with.

love is a serious theme throughout this episode. again, are they setting up a Loki/Sylvie romance? or will it be platonic or familial or something else?

Loki is very clearly not okay with the fact that so many people are being left to die, and i'm here for it

so the whole thing to get on the train i think is setting those two up to be a good duo. between illusions and enchantments, they can do a lot. and Loki was able to get them part of the way, and Sylvie the rest. i think it could be foreshadowing both of them needing to use their skills to work together.

never have your back to a door, i guess

Sylvie's reaction to Loki saying he wasn't told he was adopted. man, she was worried. she knows that that is messed up and i think she feels bad for Loki. she's probably imagining how her life would be different if she didn't know she was adopted.

sounds like Odin and Frigga weren't the adopters of Sylvie. Maybe the Lushtons? i don't know anything about them, just that Lushton is Sylvie's last name in the comics. so, yay for her for not having trash parents. unless they were, then sorry for Sylvie. at least they told her she was adopted. but if the Lushtons adopted her, how did they fall across a frost giant? especially the daughter of Laufey?

i've seen suggestions that the post man Sylvie is with could be Stan Lee since a couple cameos were of him as a post man. Maybe a younger post man, but he has less of a lifespan (if he is actually human in universe. i still like to think of him as the One Above All who just really likes to see the drama of things) than Sylvie, so she could be with him for a long time. maybe that's why Stan is always cameoing. he's just trying different things to try to find his love. and maybe he has a longer lifespan (he was in First Avenger) but not as long as Sylvie's so she still was there for most his life but he's dying soon. I actually like this headcanon a lot, i think it's sweet.

YAS BISEXUAL LOKI YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW HAPPY I AM! but i'm also scared my parents will find out. they're anti-queer. my siblings saw it, & they aren't supportive either but they operate on an "ignore it" policy, so they don't really care as long as it isn't a big deal.

also it is heavily hinted Sylvie is bi as well.

yes, i will continue to headcanon Loki as greyromantic and asexual. deal with it. i will change my language from panromantic to biromantic since the director specifically said he was bi.

also, it sounded like the director might be bi as well. good for her, taking a character she saw as bi and literally making it canon.

i knew Tom could sing, he was on Broadway. but i had never heard him sing i don't think. he has a good voice. petition to make a musical with Loki. watch the episode "Duet" of The Flash. i want something similar to that. can Sophia sing? throw her in too if she can!

translation of the norwegian suggests romance between Loki and Sylvie

was i expecting an "ANOTHER" reference? no. am i glad we got it? yeah, that was a nice touch.

turns out "full" means drunk in Norwegian according to a youtuber? but don't quote that. Loki says he's full, not drunk at one point.

what were they serving on that train? Thor couldn't get drunk on Earth. heck, Steve couldn't. so it must've been a heck of a drink they were serving

ok, the dagger metaphor i actually really liked. could be a shakespeare reference?

the fireworks thing with Frigga was cute

okay, i don't like Frigga much, but this has confirmed that Frigga was, maybe possibly, better than Odin. Frigga at least believed in Loki. but then her betrayal was so much worse.

wait, i just realized. Loki gets a fight scene on a train. a superhero genre staple is a fight on a moving vehicle (bonus if it's a train). yay! Loki hasn't had this trope yet in any of his appearances. off screen before Infinity War, and i don't count his attempt to murder Thanos on the Statesman. but we can add that to his list of superhero tropes.

i feel like the TVA needs to make stronger tempads...

okay, Loki threw the dagger horribly because he was drunk, right?they aren't saying he has horrible aim, are they?

falling out of a moving vehicle is also a superhero trope...at least it went better for them than it did Bucky

i relate to Sylvie screaming in the middle of nowhere

Loki being gentle with Sylvie and letting her talk to him. gosh. i love it. was not expecting to see Loki from my fics make an appearance.

Sylvie explained the enchantment to Loki, which i think was a poor decision for her.

she said C-20's mind was hard to navigate to her original memories. maybe the TVA does something to the TVA agents that join them. maybe if Loki proved useful, they'd do it to Loki.

or maybe variants lose memory over time. Sylvie says something about her memory being like blips of a dream, but I don't remember the context. maybe over time variants lose their memories and only retain a few things. Sylvie is well down that process, Loki has had hardly any change, and those working for the TVA only have a few things to remind them.

Mobius absolutely was a jet ski enthusiast in the '90's when he was arrested, and he loved Josta.

Casey liked Boku juice, a sign he was from the '90's.

whoever makes the uniforms is from whatever period that style of suit was popular ('80's?).

if anyone isn't a variant, it's Renslayer. she knows more than she should, i'm sure of it.

C-20 likes margaritas now, i'm sure of it.

Mobius has an interesting relationship with Renslayer. I wasn't sure if it was romantic or what. Maybe Renslayer looks like his lover from the '90's so he is flirty with her because of the faint memories he has.

Loki immediately catches on to the TVA agents not knowing they're variants. they think the Time Keepers created them. he knows that, Sylvie didn't. this immediately tells Loki that the Time Keepers are messed up.

possible redemptions for Mobius? B-15? C-20? when they find out they're variants?

so does C-20 know now? she kept saying "it was real" when Mobius found her in Roxxcart. maybe she had dreams of her life before, and Sylvie showed her that they were real?

the whole scene in the city was wild. so much color, lights, people, action, it was wild

Loki being protective of Sylvie, helping her up and wrapping his arm around her, i'm here for it.

loved the bit where Loki used telekinesis to stop the tower from falling on them.

there was a bit where Loki and Sylvie fought & their moves mirrored each other and gosh that was a nice touch.

Loki's reaction to the Ark's destruction. standing there in defeat while Sylvie walks away. wow. Tom. you are amazing.

and what the heck why did the episode end there?

can't wait for the next episode

more of TVA being evil being shown, loving it.

really, is Loki/Sylvie a thing? i have a hard time seeing romance some times, so let me know.

can we please get a Kang tease?

great lighting & cinematography. beautiful. lovely. also good action. shout out to the stunt doubles since they don't get enough credit.

okay let Loki & Sylvie be friends (or lovers, i'm fine with that) and let them burn the TVA down together.

aaaaaaaaaaa how are we half way through?

also, have the TVA fixed all the messed up timelines yet?

oh wait i gotta talk about this. the minutemen don't remember their names. i doubt Mobius's name was Mobius Mobius Mobius. Casey is probably not his real name. The Clone Wars fan in me was already screaming, but now it is even more.

#loki (2021)#loki (2021) spoilers #loki (2021) review #loki laufeyson #tva loki #sylvie laufeysdottir #mobius m mobius #ravonna renslayer #hunter c-20 #hunter b 15

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ckret2 · 5 years ago

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idk if someone actually finally sent this ask but i'mma do it since it seems people are dancing around it: if you're comfortable with it, may we have some radiosnake sexual headcanons (wherein alastor is not sexually repulsed or is demisexual/grey-ace ofc)?? love, a very happy demisexual who just finished a cold day in hell literally two minutes ago

You win the prize for "actually has the courage to directly ask for sexual headcanons" because no, nobody else has asked yet. Sorry for taking so long to answer it but like... the answer is over 2000 words. Have fun.

Now, anon, I've got something important you should know.

When I brainstorm radiosnake stuff, there's a little chatroom I do it in. What happens is, a lot of times, I'll come up with a scene or a scenario or a plot arc, and I'll describe it to that chat. And then, every once in a while, I'll say, "... and then here's how that same thing goes over in the parallel universe where Alastor Fucks." I have. A looot of little ideas set in the parallel universe where Alastor Fucks.

(He's still somewhere on the ace spectrum in all those ideas—either he's demi or else he's sex-neutral/sex-positive ace, depending on the idea—but he does Fuck.)

However, 1) a majority of these ideas are very clearly set specifically in CDIH's verse, and so I don't wanna share them as broad "radiosnake headcanons" when they're tied to one specific fanfic; and 2) a lot of them are angsty, and if you're asking for general headcanons then I'm assuming what you probably want is them actually having a good time rather than several decades of self-induced suffering over unrequited desire. So if you want CDIH-specific stuff and/or angsty stuff (or, more likely, CDIH-specific angsty stuff), hit me up again and I'll share some more stuff. For now, I'll talk about more general non-angsty headcanons.

Okay so most of this answer is geared toward Alastor's perspective since it's like, it's the more interesting one to me in this context, he's the one gradually figuring stuff out while Sir Pent's hanging out being allo with over a century of having his sexuality sorted out.

So that you know what kinda headcanons I'm rolling with here: there's, like, several ways I can conceptualize Alastor's orientation in my head, and they're sorta ranked by how "true" they are to me. Not "true" as in "how canon I think they are," but "true" as in, like, what Feels the Most Right to me.

The #1 Most True version of Alastor in my head is 100% ace/aro. He's not "repulsed" by sex (or romance, for that matter) in the sense of "disgusted/horrified/never ever wants to hear about it," but he, like, has absolutely zero interest in DOING it. He's not repulsed by the subject but he is by most touch, including the kind of touching necessary for sex. Might have some, like, academic curiosity about sex & romance, might enjoy it in a fictional context simply for the drama it adds to a story, but has no desire to be a participant. He can listen to a friend talk about their sexual escapades in graphic detail for an hour without an ounce of discomfort but if they offer him a quick peck on the lips he goes "I'm out." He might have sex Once just to see what it's like/just to say he has and that’s where his curiosity ends.

So that's my mental Most True Version Of Alastor.

The SECOND most true version of Alastor is like, the exact same as that, except he's just barely demiromantic enough that he might, once, fall in love. The odds of him falling in love are the same as someone's odds of winning the lottery. This is the version of Alastor I use in CDIH and other radiosnake fics, where Sir Pentious happens to have been lucky enough to win the lottery, but also, it took fifteen years before it happened. Alastor's feelings about touch & sex are the same, EXCEPT that whoever he loves is excluded from the Touch Is Unpleasant rule, which opens up a few more possibilities.

And I've got more mental versions of Alastor but that's as far as we need to go to be relevant to this post.

So given the above: Alastor's natural internal pool of Enjoyable Physical Activities that he would be autonomously inclined to want to try with Sir Pentious is broader than "nothing at all" but stops short of actual sex. More like sensual activities.

The not-necessarily-sexual sensual things that are obviously & immediately available on Alastor’s Selectable Menu Of Romantic Physical Activities are gonna be things like:

--Cuddles! We're starting as vanilla as possible, folks. Cuddling and sleeping in bed together. 95% naked cuddles are acceptable, although Alastor is inclined to keep his underpants on. Moving to "underpants" from "underpants AND undershirt" is a Notable Intimacy Milestone for him because like Back In His Day undershirts were part of the required underwear, so to him that's taking off 50% of his underwear. It's like switching from loose boxers to a thong. On the other hand Sir Pent is just, totally nude, because look at him he already isn't wearing any pants, he's got nothing to hide.

--Massage! Neither one of them is any sort of professional but tbh on a scale of 1 to 10 a massage can be as bad as a 3 and still be enjoyable y'know? Alastor tends to offer if he notices Sir Pent is sore and/or if Alastor has decided he's gonna be in Extreme Over-The-Top Performatively* Romantic Mode tonight. He always sort of forgets that the option of being massaged exists until Sir Pent offers it in return, because, like, he thinks of himself as a floating radio voice with an inconvenient meat puppet attached, sometimes he forgets that the meat puppet can be pampered too. And then he sits there in a blissed-out daze while Sir Pent goes holy crap your shoulders are like oak, how have you not snapped your own spine with tension yet.

(*Note here when I say Alastor can get "performatively" romantic I don't mean "going through the motions but isn't feeling the love"; I mean that, like, basically NO romantic gestures come naturally to him because he just isn't feeling the gestures even though he's definitely feeling the love. He's sort of figuring out How To Perform Romance As An Action by drawing on how he's seen it done in books/movies/etc. and picking & choosing the things that seem most fun to him to do. So in a sense he is performing a role that he's conscious of when he interacts with Sir Pent romantically, but that's because "performing a role" is how Mr. Perpetual Radio Host approaches all of life—and he's only performing this one because he genuinely wants to and because he's enjoying it.)

--Body worship! Alastor is really deeply squicked out by touching someone's skin/hair/fur but on the other hand (and maybe specifically because it avoids the squick) he is really deeply fascinated by Sir Pentious's scales, which feel Not At All Like Mammal Skin. He also still does the "??? oh right, I have a body too" thing when Sir Pent returns the attention—but Alastor's like, okay, I’m obviously more familiar with my own body than Sir Pent is, I don’t find my body that interesting but it must still be interesting to Sir Pent.

--Showering together! Sir Pent has figured out that if he starts singing in the shower there is a 99% chance that Alastor will trip over his own pants trying to simultaneously strip down and run to the bathroom so that he can join in on SHOWER DUET TIME. Frankly it's a lot safer to just go "hey I'm about to take a shower, wanna join?" but sometimes he doesn't just to see how fast Alastor shows up.

--Kissing! Making out is completely and always an option. Three of Alastor's most defining character traits are being a radio host (which kind of reduces a person to their voice), his perpetual smile, and his cannibalism. Like 80% of this dude's existence revolves around his mouth. He's absolutely got some kind of oral fixation. He gets into making out—as long as it's with the right person. There is exactly one right person. Sir Pent is okay with this.

Other enjoyable mouth activities:

- Kissing places other than the mouth

- Being kissed in places other than the mouth

- Biting

- Being bitten

And there's the overall list of non-sexual sensual activities that Alastor is into!

... And then eventually at some point Sir Pent is like "no pressure but hhhhypothetically sssspeaking are there possibly any sexual activities you might be interested in trying out" and Alastor is like "What? Oh! Right! Actually forgot sex existed for a bit. Yeah sure fine let’s try it." And that's the point at which they start experimenting with activities beyond Alastor's default activities!

Despite just about everything else with mouths being good, things Alastor is NOT into:

- Blowjobs

They did try. It seemed like a logical starting point. Alastor was like "I've liked putting my mouth everywhere else on this snake, it stands to reason I'll like putting it there too!" He got himself psyched up. He faced down The Dicks. He went, hmm. He stuck his tongue out and poked one.

He went "Yeah this isn't happening."

And Sir Pent went "Honestly you've already surpassed my wildest dreams just by getting that far."

They tried it the other way around too and Alastor went "Yyyye... hmmm... nnnnnooo no, no, don't think so. Not into that at all."

And it took him all of five seconds to reject the mere possibility of ever trying rimming, and the only reason it took that long to reject is because first Sir Pent had to explain what that is.

But everything else with mouths is great! Like. Everything. Sir Pent could go "can you lick my eyeball" and Alastor would go "which one? :)" (Sir Pent would probably not ask for this. But the point is he could.)

Figuring out Alastor's acceptable/enjoyable sex acts was a lot of experimentation like the above with BJs. And what they figured out is: he doesn't want his junk touched. Like. At all. In any context. Which, you know, understandably cuts down on nearly all the sexual options out there. But that’s the hard line: no touching his dick and no touching his butthole. Even if he, like, actively has a raging boner.

(Fun fact that I actually had to do research on, because despite being ace I did not know this due to the fact that I don't have a dick: if you are ace and have a dick there's good odds you'll still pop a boner in sexual situations, even if you have zero interest in what you’re looking at or participating in it. It's like something in your crotch goes "oh! Oh! A naked butt! I know what to do here! We got training for this! Time to ready the cannon!" and something in your brain goes "why the hell are you readying the cannon, we are absolutely not going to use the cannon, the cannon is a major inconvenience here" and the something in your crotch goes "listen, pal, I'm just following my orders. I don't tell you how to do your job, don't tell me how to do mine." The tl;dr here is that when Alastor is experimenting with Sir Pent, he could be completely bored out of his mind and still get a boner because biology is funky like that.)

The first few times this happens Sir Pent goes "are you sure you don't want me to, y'know, give you a handjob or something?? I feel like an inconsiderate jerk not helping out" and Alastor goes "absolutely not" and Sir Pent goes well okay I've made a career out of being an inconsiderate jerk, I guess I can do it in the bedroom too.

What they do manage to gradually figure out is that Alastor is perfectly fine with touching Sir Pent's junk, as long as it's not with his own junk or with his mouth. So hand jobs? Totally fair game. Letting Sir Pent grind against his thigh or abdomen? No problems with that. (Alastor flopped on his stomach going "this really does it for you??" and Sir Pent rubbing in Alastor's tail fur going "... yes." and Alastor is like, "wow. wild.")

More than that, Alastor gradually starts to figure out he likes that. Not necessarily the sensation of having a couple of dicks rubbing on his thigh—that's just sorta weird and probably always will be—but the knowledge of what it's doing to Sir Pent. He likes knowing he's giving Sir Pentious pleasure. He likes hearing him gasp and seeing him writhe and knowing that it's because Sir Pent wants Alastor and that Alastor has the power to give him exactly what he wants. He likes hearing Sir Pent hissing his name and little praises and one-word requests. ("Alastor’s existence revolves around mouths” includes sounds coming out of mouths, he gets more out of words and little noises than he does out of sight & touch combined.)

They figure out that what Alastor enjoys doing best is spooning Sir Pent from behind, wrapped around him to jerk him off. In bed or in the shower or even sitting with Sir Pent in his lap or between his legs. Alastor can put his chin on Sir Pentious's shoulder to listen to the sounds he makes and watch how his long long body moves, he can wrap his free arm around his waist and feel how he tenses and relaxes and squirms, they can kiss (and/or bite, biting is nice) with a little bit of careful positioning...

Also it's easier for Alastor to quietly sing to him from there.

... Alastor sings during sex. For the record. The first time he does it it's a nervous "I don't know what I'm supposed to be saying and it seems too quiet—oh I've got a solution" but soon it's just. A thing he does. Sir Pent gradually goes from "what? seriously? this is what you're doing?" to "lmao you dork" to "well I guess I now have a new kink I will never be able to get rid of, thanks." Sometimes he'll shakily sing along and Alastor's guts will melt into warm goo.

So there's a general overview of the more, like, normal stuff they get up to. Considering that their shared hobbies include things like "murder" and "being better than everyone else" and one of them is a cannibal, I'm sure that once they get down the basics they just get weirder. Copious amounts of blood get involved! Not their own blood. Other people's.

#(the content under the cut is of course very n s f w)#radiosnake #hazbin hotel #alastor #sir pentious #anonymous #ask #headcanons

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kob131 · 4 years ago

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https://rwbyconversations.tumblr.com/post/626550438587678720/the-scarlet-letter-lets-talk-about-rwbys-male

Can’t even say I stan RT since I helped in developing your own break in RT’s abusive business practices.

So let’s start with a blunt statement: RWBY’s male LGBT representation has not been good. If the series’ handling of female LGBT rep is good (which… well there’s worse shows) and the general standard for how you write LGBT characters in a show like this, its handling of male rep has been… how not to. And Before the Dawn kinda solidified the idea in my head that the show’s handling of its male LGBT cast just isn’t good enough, either by the standards of when RWBY began in 2013, or today in 2020 when compatively massive steps have been taken over the past decade to show a more diverse list of characters… or at least a more diverse list of female characters.

So how do you make good male LGBT representation? If we’re talking about how something is done badly, you’d think some ground rules would be established. ... Yeah, he never does that.

It’s big romance is (unless the writers are very stupid) going to be between Blake and Yang, their first out character was Ilia, Coco got sent to the Book Dimension where she confirmed “I use my sunglasses to perv on women without their knowledge” which uh… yeah you can definitely tell RWBY is written by men… and Volume 6 had Saph and Terra being a good example of an LGBT couple without any real drama. In the last three years alone, the show has drastically increased its lesbian and bisexual characters, alongside even including its first out trans character in May Marigold (albeit only revealed on Twitter). In general, these depictions of sexuality have been pretty OK. Would have liked it if Ilia wasn’t immediately written out of the show after Volume 5 as it made her feel a bit more disposable than intended but whatever, subject for another day.

A. What examples do we have of Bumbleby being canon? One or two animation things and voice actors? Cool, when’s White Knight becoming canon.

B. I’ve heard Barbara say similar shit. Acting like that’s a male thing is fucking sexist.

C. I’m sorry but by every single standard of LGBT writing I’ve heard-wouldn’t they be considered tokens and flat caricatures? Since they’re so irrelevant and have so little character? They’re barely even characters INCLUDING their kid.

Sorry but considering how there’s no ground rules made for what is good LGBT rep- I can only go off what others have said. And so many, OVERWHLEMINGLY MANY, people have said Saphron and Terra aren’t good.

D. Okay the Illa thing is yet another example of why ground rules need to be set. Saphron and Terra BOTH are written out in Volume 6 so wouldn’t they get chewed out too? What makes Illa getting written out different or more disposable?

RWBY’s male rep though is a bit spottier. There’s the plant bois in Volume 5’s premiere, we nearly had Pilot Boi until some last-minute revisions, and… Scarlet.

Look about the same as the female LGBT audience to me. Why is this so bad?

“Why Scarlet’s a bad launchpad for male LGBT rep”

I don’t like Scarlet or how his sexuality has been handled. Scarlet’s homosexuality wasn’t revealed in the show, or by the writers, or even in anything that’s actually canon. He’s confirmed gay in his sole of dialogue in a non-canon fan anthology, where the manga’s Twitter team had to say that Miles suggested the idea and approved of it.

In short, Scarlet is Dumbledore’d, where his sexuality is revealed in out-of-show material and in a way that doesn’t make it supremely obvious (Miles himself never commented to confirm this so this news was limited in how far it could spread. I’m genuinely curious how many people still don’t know Scarlet’s gay), and Scarlet himself is a nothing character who was written out of the show after Volume 3 and only reappeared in Before The Dawn, half a decade after he vanished. Compared to Ilia, as this came out after Ilia’s entire arc in Volume 5, it’s not a great starting point for mlm rep. But things would have been forgiven if it had gotten better, if the show did have more male LGBT characters introduced, even just on the Saphron/Terra level of just being around for a few episodes before leaving. Then it would have been a misfire but then we could all say “Things got better.”

Why should I care?

See, part of the job of a critic is to make the problems understandable to the audience. I emphasized ground rules because it gives the reader a base level understanding of what constitutes as good in this case. Why should I think Scarlet is bad when Saphron and Terra are on the same level and you said they were at least acceptable?

It… didn’t. Which is why when Before the Dawn released in 2020, a full two years after Scarlet was first confirmed gay, while the franchise had more than doubled its wlw rep, Scarlet remained the one male character in the entire franchise who had a name and liked men. I remember vividly a fake leak for After The Fall which claimed Yatsuhashi would come out to Velvet and admit to having a crush on Fox. And I remember as well how many people were disappointed when it was said to be false, because it would have been nice for Yatsuhashi’s character, especially after the fleshing out he gets in the CFVY books. If Yatsu had come out as gay in the books I’d like his writing enough to say he’s a good case for rep, albeit with the caveat of “This is all in side material.” But in reality, the leak was fake and Coco was confirmed gay instead.

I remember the same leak. Yatsuhashi also disappeared at the same time and even if he was fleshed out-he’s still irrelevant to the show so wouldn’t he be bad? And if it’s about having fleshed out characters, why did Illa whose a fully realized character get shaded while effective background characters praised?

Unfortunately, Before the Dawn proceeded to ruin Scarlet and made me at times feel genuinely uncomfortable as a queer man! Let’s talk about that.

And people said the same about Saphron and Terra and people get backlash for praising them over other lesbian characters.

I hate Before the Dawn. It’s… bad. I read it while on a vacation and the only solace I had about the entire thing was that I’d bought an M&M chocolate bar. The bar was finished before the book. That bummed me out. It’s not a very well written book, the prose is very Early 2010s YA Writer, none of the characters are memorable and there’s various Fun Incidents like “NGDO using children as bait for Grimm,” and “Neptune’s hydrophpobia being used as a threat to torture him and the scene is played for comedy.”

A. NDGO is repeatedly shown to be massive assholes in the book.

And B. I can’t really find anything wrong there. In one of my favorite shows, Justice League Unlimited, criminals get threatened with actual torture and even death and it’s treated as a joke. Yeah the context is different in that the victim are criminals but both the villains and Neptune get over it so quickly I see no real problem here. Especially since Jaune’s own low self worth was a joke up to Volume 5.

Theo was cool. I can’t wait to see him as written by good writers, he should be a highlight of the Vacuo arc.

Don’t go blaming E.C. Myers for this- Miles and Kerry helped. You’d have to call them shit writers too.

I had two hopes for Before the Dawn- “Don’t be bad,” and “Let Scarlet and Sage be well written.” I’d liked how After The Fall had handled some of its characters (barring, y'know, Coco perving on women), especially Fox and Yatsu who were surprising in how much I liked them. I was looking forward to seeing Myers give Sage and Scarlet similar treatment- two relatively nothing characters meant he’d have a blank slate to write them however he wanted, he could give them unique personalties and if nothing else it could be cool to see their Semblances.

You know how frustrating it is to see people blame Miles and Kerry for shit that Monty had a hand in and may have even been responsible for?

Yeah well we finally found the flipped version-

Miles and Kerry worked with Myers on the book. Just as Monty is just as much at fault as Miles and Kerry, they’re just as much at fault as Myers.

And then I read the book. (Sage fans I am so sorry for you, you got baited harder than Johnlock fans)

I thought we were talking about male LGBT rep.

Scarlet’s a giant dickhead in the book. It’s his sole character trait and his inner monologues go on, and on, and on about how much he hates Sun, how he revels in mocking him. Most of his dialogue is sarcastic put-downs about Sun and how lame he is, and Sun is never properly allowed to defend himself or point out how going with Blake meant he was able to help save Haven Academy.

You mean like how character criticized Yang for being so reckless even though she was trying to save Blake?

It shouldn’t matter what the intent or results are- Sun and Yang still did bad things and affected the people around them. They should be criticized, especially Sun here since A. He’s still doing it in the book, B. He hasn’t had any real flaws in the show which means his dynamics and interaction are limited and C. This addresses what people bitched at him about in Volumes 4 and 5 thus robbing them of the excuse to chew him out anymore.

(hey remember when Sun in Volume 6 expressly says to Blake “I was a bad leader for ditching Neptune and the others, and I need to work on that” only for Before the Dawn to have him staunchly refuse to accept that he let the team down? I don’t think Myers did but I do)

Remember how characters in RWBY don’t always learn their lesson, especially when it’s related to mental issues like...say....losing their parents and trying to run from their problems?

Also remember how MILES AND KERRY ALSO HELPED WRITE THAT BOOK?

Scarlet being a ratty bitch would be one thing if, again, the franchise had done more rep. He’d still be a badly written character, but it wouldn’t sting as much. But because Scarlet is still the only expressly confirmed male LGBT character in canon (the book teases that Nolan is gay but there’s never confirmation either way beyond him smiling at Scarlet), it means that he has to represent that entire ideal. So when the one gay man in Remnant is being an asshole and a snide loser, that means that by extension, this is how the franchise sees gay men. And that fucking sucks! I wanted to come out of Before The Dawn singing its praises, I wanted to like the book, but it was a massive letdown, especially coming off of the other big 2020 RWBY controversy involving gay characters.

Fun fact: LGBT people can be assholes.

In fact, Scarlet would be the ONLY LGBT character to be snide in the show. Kind of makes him unique in that regard. ...If he was an asshole in canon. When in canon, he’s portrayed as hurt and bitter over Sun’s repeated irresponsibility and doing what anyone would do in his situation.

So honestly, he’s pretty fucking human which I would praised BEYOND being LGBT.

Yeah. We’re doing this.

Remember, you choose to do all this.

Clover and Fair Game: Technically not queerbaiting. BUT:

But nothing. Once again, without any ground rules for what you constitute as ‘queerbaiting’- I only have myself to rely on. And just about every serious definition says Queerbaiting is baiting LGBT rep or pairings to get people to watch the show.

Issue? Not only was Fair Game not used to promote the show, there are other LGBT characters in RWBY. You can’t be queerbaited anymore than a straight person can be ‘straightbaited’ (We’ll be getting into SO MUCH MORE than this later...).

Let’s pre-empt this: Clover wasn’t queerbaiting, and Fair Game, while cool and I dig it, kudos to them for becoming one of the top 5 RWBY pairings on AO3 in one year that’s fucking impressive (I say with mild malice as an IronQrow main), never had a chance. The writing never seriously boosted it barring one interaction which was flirty (them talking in the lobby of the Schnee Manor), and everything else was out of show boosting through the social media teams and CRWBY hyping it themselves by saying they liked it. If you wanna blame people, blame the animators who went off-script with stuff like Kim Newman adding the wink as a deliberate nod to the Volume 4 waitress, or the social media team deliberately using the same policies for Fair Game as they do for Renora and Bumblebee.

So nothing I should give a shit about since marketing teams often work detached from the actual product and are notoriously CUTTHROAT.

It wasn’t Eddy’s fault that things escalated, and he himself has said that in retrospect, he should have warned people that this never had a shot.

But I can’t blame the Fair Game fanbase. Because Fair Game took off like wildfire. It came right as the fanbase began seriously asking for more male rep, Qrow’s pretty hot, and the Clover wink came right after the Great IronQrow Reawakening of November 9th, 2019. The rocket was primed, and they rode it to the moon. Finally, to these people, after seven years RWBY seemed to be doing something with mlm rep in show. People started getting into RWBY just for Clover and Qrow’s interactions. And if heroes were boring, Watts and Tyrian also had a fantastic dynamic that made Nuts and Volts one of the more popular villain ships overnight. Things seemed to be turning around! RWBY was remembering that gay men existed! You could hear the choir sing!

... You JUST said that show didn’t bolster the ship aside from one interaction (one that pales to the shit I use to say in private to fuck with people). It was obviously NOT meant to be a serious component of the show. If people got into a show for something it was never meant to stick to- it’s their own fault for when that part falls away.

… And for those people, that meant that episode 12 hit like Truck-Kun.

People got pissed. People were horrified. And it didn’t help that some members of CRWBY had said in the build-up that episode 12 would have some shots that made them nauseous (probably the Tyrian thumb thing) Out of context, it looked to these fans like CRWBY were basically laughing at their suffering, like they were saying “Lol, you thought you had a chance, get fucked, I hope your vomit burns on the way up.”

Yeah, Fair Game was never gonna be canon, and I think some people ran too far with it. But in the wider context of how desperate RWBY’s mlm community had gotten for basic crumbs of content? I can see why they’d run with what they had. The writers aren’t at fault for what happened, but CRWBY didn’t help matters. And that desperate mix of what felt like official backing from the crew, jokes about how cute the ship was, and the hope that finally the show would have onscreen rep? I can see why people ran with it.

Ah huh ah huh ah huh-

Now do that for the first three Volumes of the show with a bigger fan favorite, more build up and kill one half of it off at the end of the show’s big dark turn while the creators are even MORE unsympathetic.

Sorry but when compared to Arkos, this looks fucking minscule. And you invoked the Arkos comparison due to the numerous parallels. And just like with the Arkos fans, I’ll disregard this without a second thought.

‘But Mlm are STARVED for content-’

Then go somewhere else. I’ve been saying this to your Wlw AND Straight counterparts for years. You are not entitled to have ‘a meal’. The show didn’t advertise in universe around rep- That is not the point. This is like saying you hate nachoes because it dares to have chips instead of more toppings.

So why is the show more lackluster in depicting mlm characters?

I don’t think you ever answered that the question ‘is the show’s mlm lackluster?’ because you spent a third of this post talking about something you basically admit doesn’t count.

Money. Let’s be honest, most RWBY fans don’t care if the show doesn’t have good male rep. I’m willing to bet some of you reading this won’t care and just dismiss it as not being that big a problem.

I dismiss all the romance related shit as not being that big of a problem, so what?

I don’t think the writers care if the show doesn’t have good mlm rep because they’re not poaching that market. They’re after what they see as a bigger, more lucrative market, which in this case is female LGBT rep. That gets people buying games, watching shows, raising awareness and boosting awareness of your property, which means you make more money. In short: Two women kissing hits more markets and generates more attention than two men.

I’d believe that if not for the fact that there is barely any lesbian merch for RWBY, which would be the key way to cash in on that market and squeeze them for as much money as possible. In fact, there’s barely ANY shipping merch from Rooster Teeth. Rather unusual if they’re trying to cash in on a market.

‘Well what’s YOUR explanation?’

Easy: Misandry and moving goalposts.

Guys notoriously get shat on in the fandom more than women. Jaune is STILL being called a spotlight stealing MAry Sue and numerous people are siding against Ironwood because he’s a man. So making good male LGBT rep would just be inviting more pipe bombs in the mail.

And a large amount of people like to claim RWBY has yet to give GOOD female LGBT rep, constantly raising the bar to get what they want. And considering they make up the original hatedom in the show- they naturally hold more power.

Tl;Dr- You fucked yourselves out of good male rep by having male characters having any focus whatsoever be a death sentence.

Am I saying that Miles, Monty and Kerry deliberately sat down seven years ago and said “We’re not doing gay men because it won’t generate enough ad revenue and traffic to be worth the loss in revenue from homophobes?” No, that’s silly. But I’m saying that it’s less important for them, and it shows in the things that are small and add up. Things like Miles not verifying Scarlet’s sexuality or retweeting the manga account’s confirmation to spread the message (compared to how he enthusiastically confirmed Ilia being a lesbian himself during the Reddit AMA). It shows in how Pilot Boi would have been the first mlm character only to die in his second full episode until M&K were told about the Bury Your Gays trope. It shows in how Shannon believes that Ozma is “megaqueer” and Miles jokingly laughs it off instead of confirming it, leaving it to just be Shannon’s headcanon. It shows in how actor shipping is compared between the mlm and wlw ships, where Arryn and Barbara’s frequent pushes for Bumblebee are seen as “official confirmation that it’s endgame” while Michael and Kerry saying they enjoy Seamonkeys is treated as “well it would be cute if they did it, but they’re never going to.”

The whole point of AMA is answer questions, one of which was ‘is Illa a lesbian’ among SEVERAL others.

Yeah and Illa gets called a psycho lesbian.

Yeah and no other voice actor headcanon has been accepted. In fact, Kara pushes for White Knight and the writers don’t even so much as acknowledge that unlike Shannon. Also I dunno what ‘megaqueer’ means but his only on screen relationship was straight so that’s probably why it wasn’t confirmed.

Not the creators, don’t care.

I’m not gonna say anything like “CRWBY are gonna have Qrow end up with a woman like Robyn out of spite against the bad apples of the Fair Game crowd.” I’m not gonna say that I don’t think CRWBY cares about male representation in the series. It is, however, definitely a low priority for them, and because that leads to gaffes like Scarlet’s writing in Before The Dawn being offensive in his depiction, it only makes the contrast between the sexes all the more painfully apparent.

Again, the female side ain’t much better. Fuck, the straight side isn’t much better. This was never a focus of the show.

I’m kinda tired of waiting for Rooster Teeth to show that they do care about mlm. I’m kinda tired of RWBY’s male rep being written like it came from a 1993 time capsule where I have to enhance the screen to see a guy holding a sign of Sun’s abs or be content with the only onscreen rep still being the plant bois in Volume 5. I’m tired of how often the crew dances around answering basic questions about sexuality (and age, and birthdays, and heights, and so on) by treating it as a spoiler question, as if just wanting to know what way people swing would ever be a spoiler. I’m just… tired of all this. When the best mlm rep in Rooster Teeth’s history remains the two dads in Camp Camp who show up in a few episodes, that should say something really bad about your company and your biases (To say nothing of the recent Red vs Blue seasons and their blatant queerbaiting for Grif and Simmons and the whole can of worms that is Donut).

And their best rep in wlw according to some people is a psycho lesbian.

This is all just personal opinion that is next to useless without the basis needed for clear understanding. I don’t know what you would consider good male LGBT rep aside from a squeaky clean good guy...and many would decry that as condescending and unrealistic.

What can they do except ignore EVERYONE and just do whatever they feel like?

P.S. Someone’s representation is NOT their view on LGBT people. Especially since, as I have said, the reception of said rep can be outright contradictory.

I’d like to not feel like I’m borderline unwelcome because I’d like to see two men in this show kiss, and that the sole thing that represents people like me in this show is some British twat who complains about sand.

Oh fuck off. I’m also apart of a minority group (autists) and yet you don’t see me winging about how unwelcome I feel because there’s no autistic characters. I relate to characters like Ruby not because they have shallow autistic traits but because I constantly struggle with the same ideological dilemma Ruby does: the struggle to keep doing good in an uncaring, cruel world. THAT is what you should find relatable and welcome. Not something like sexuality.

I’d just like to feel like my sexuality isn’t a joke to Rooster Teeth (or at the very least, be like Donut and have it be a funny one). But at this point after the last few years? I feel like a very uncomfortable punchline to them. And it just sucks.

Cool-Welcome to club. You know, since EVERY sexuality has been used a punchline by Rooster Teeth.

Your sexuality should be the LAST thing that you use to find being welcome, especially with a god damn company. And you have no one to blame for your feelings but yourself here.

Your post is damn near useless and I don’t even know how honest that RT stuff is considering Miles and Kerry get away while E.C. Myers gets blamed for stuff you don’t like.

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chriscdcase95 · 5 years ago

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Halloween: Why the Thorn Trilogy was as underrated as "Twenty Years Later" was overrated

So yeah, I said it. And now I’m gonna explain it.

This may be some nostalgia of mine talking but as a long time fan of the Halloween series - I am talking when I was ten years old, when I was first getting into horror genre- I grew up on the old Halloween sequels consisting of the Thorn trilogy and the Twenty Years Later story lines. I know they are considered separate continuities and timelines, but y'know broad strokes, Easter-eggs, and the fact early script drafts for Twenty Years Later (Or H-20) intended to tie them together before they were cut from the final film, you can make the case they are ostensibly canon to each other, but that’s about it.

The Thorn Trilogy isn’t considered the best of the series; many fans looking down on the fifth and sixth film as being the least popular of the films. I think the only reason they aren’t considered by fans the worse in the series is because Resurrection exists, and was that followed by Rob Zombie’s remake duology. On the flip side, H-20 and 2018 are considered the golden calves of the franchise, and for the life of me, I never saw the appeal of the formers popularity. Now I can see why people have problems with the Thorn trilogy - especially regarding the cult and curse plot element of the sixth film. Unpopular opinion, but the sixth film was my favourite of the series - maybe has to do with my autism appealing me with both world building and the familiar - or that it seemed to tie up one storyline, but at the same time set up so much that I was disappointed that it didn’t continue.

For context, this post is partially inspired by Schaffrillas Productions video about Shrek 2. In this I will be using the criteria of what he describes as a “Perfect Sequel” which I’ll apply to the Halloween series, and as his Shrek 2 video says, there’s no such thing as the perfect movie; there’s too many variables to cover in a single movie alone, while a movie can preform it’s functions as a sequel perfectly even that doesn’t mean the movie itself is perfect. The “Perfect Sequel” criteria goes as such; expanding the universe; continue the story; introduce new themes or expand on old themes; leave an impact on the franchise.

Like Schaffrillas Productions, I will use this criteria to determine what the Thorn trilogy did right over H-20. Now am I gonna throw the 2018 sequel into the equation ? Maybe for compare and contrast purposes, but the 2018 sequel hits those same beats. There really is no competition between H-20 and 2018, I don’t question why the latter is considered a fan favorite. What I am primarily doing here is comparing the old sequels, and 2018 barely comes into the equation.

Does the Thorn Trilogy expand the films universe ? Does is continue the story ? As far as continuing the story goes ? Well that’s a no brainier; Halloween II begins where the original film ends; Return of Michael Myers picks up ten years later with Michael waking up from a coma after his seeming death in the second; Revenge follows Return and that leads to Curse. You get the picture, there’s an overarching story here.

“But does it introduce new themes that impact the franchise ?” You ask. Not the Thorn trilogy itself, but the second film does. Halloween II kinda sorta introduces a supernatural element to Michael by hinting a connection to the an ancient element of Halloween - more specifically the lord of the dead Samhain- but more importantly revealing that Michael and Laurie are brother and sister. The supernatural stuff is explored exclusively throughout Return to Curse, but ever since it was revealed the entire Halloween series hinged off of Michael and Laurie’s familial connection. Even in 2018 where they discontinue the sibling aspect, the theme of family permeates the plot, with the focus hear being on Laurie, her family drama, her need to protect them and how Michael not only affected her but her family.

In what’s relevant here is Michael and Laurie’s family connection is the focal point of the Thorn Trilogy, albeit not through Laurie herself; our lead character in Return and Revenge is Jamie Lloyd, the orphaned daughter of Laurie Strode and niece of Michael Myers, and she is what made their relationship the most plot relevant. Before Michael even wakes up from his coma, we are introduced to Jamie being haunted and even bullied over the fact that she’s and orphan and how her uncle is the infamous boogeyman. Her mother is gone, and she never even met her uncle, and yet both their shadows hang over her. Once Michael learns he has a niece that’s still alive, that’s all he needs to get up and at ‘em and nothings gonna stop him from getting his hands on her. And once he does in Curse ? It’s their baby he’s after next! Yes, their baby. Michael is the biological father of Jamie’s son Steven, who becomes his new target and finds an adoptive family in Tommy Doyle, Karla Strode, and her son Danny, who take the responsibility to protect Steven from not only Michael, but an evil cult that will no doubt be following them for some time. So we have something set up; a possible future confrontation between Michael and his vengeful son, and defeat the cult that has been mentoring Michael and orchestrating his rampages from behind the scenes.

So what comes next ? H-20 gives us Dawson’s Creek with a serial killer. One of the things I mark against H-20 was I felt it lacked the same kind of substance as the previous trilogy. For something that was conceived as the finale of the Halloween saga, I just couldn’t get emotionally invested, and maybe it had to do with the later release of Resurrection and the knowledge of what comes next. Maybe I was deflated that Jamie wouldn’t get justice, or that we wouldn’t find out what became of Little Baby Steven. Sure we got a plot about Laurie being a protective mother towards her son John, but for some reason I couldn’t really empathize with John in comparison to Jamie - not helping his case is that 2018 Laurie has a new daughter in Karen who has the same kind of baggage John had with Laurie, was a more interesting in characterization. John was a just a Dawson’s Creek student who serves as someone Laurie needs to fight for, only to be forgotten in Resurrection. Unlike Jamie or Karen, John was more of a plot device than a character.

As far as expanding on the previous films themes go, H-20 doesn’t really do this. It’s focus is on Laurie and her incoming “final” confrontation with her brother…but it doesn’t feel like it has the same weight. Laurie’s having her nightmares, she’s living in paranoia and the constant fear of her brother inevitably coming after her again, and how it took a toll on her relationship with her son. That’s all well and good, but the problem is the emotions feel underwhelming here. I’m not bashing the acting or anything, but I think I was supposed to take Laurie and John’s screaming match when they argue about Michael more seriously than I actually did (their second scene together by the way). Maybe they should have focused more on Laurie’s angst, and her relationship with her son, but it all felt rushed and emotionally underdeveloped in comparison to Laurie’s emotional scars shown in 2018, which felt like they had a little more weight here. 2018 gave us a slow burn with them, H-20 gave us the last three episodes of Game of Thrones.

Also the fact its Halloween night is barely a factor in this movie. There’s more focus on a trip to Yosemite Park than the actual holiday, and none of the characters don’t even go on the trip itself. Hell, this movie and it’s sequel were released in the summer.

“What about expanding the films universe ?” As I said above, I think the main thing I liked about the Thorn trilogy was it’s world building. It is next to 2018 with the most lore filled storylines in the series, (and I expect more to come from 2018’s sequels). And the Thorn trilogy not only captured the atmosphere, but tied the lore of the actual holiday of Halloween much better than H-20. And for better or worse, we dig in a little more into the mystery that is Michael Myers and his family. Or do we ?

Short answer is “Depends on what version of the sixth movie you watch.” Yeah I know the sixth movie introduces the Thorn cult and curse, but there is are differences between the Theatrical Cut and the Producers Cut on account of things that have been added, cut or changed outright between the two versions. The Producers Cut is the only version Michael being a puppet of the Thorn Curse and tool to this cult. The Theatrical Cut plays around with this idea but doesn’t explore it beyond a theory Tommy has, but isn’t verified in the cut itself. As far as the Theatrical Cut is concerned, Michael is just a rage driven psychopath.

And honestly I get that one of the supposed appeals to Michael Myers is the mystery of his character. Everyone goes off about how he was such a cool villain in the first movie was because of his mysteriousness and the questions left unanswered and go on and on about it. But here’s the thing, the point of a mystery is the need to solve it, the need to explore and find out more about this mysterious figure. Michael being a mysterious figure can work in one or two movies before it gets boring and he just becomes a blank slate, a carboard cut-out. And really that was one of the problems Michael had in H-20. The Thorn Trilogy gives three movies to find out more about Michael, and his familial connection to Laurie Strode is the focus, even with Laurie out of the picture. Some would say because we find out more about Michael, his status as a villain is cheapened, but I always thought he becomes more interesting the more we find out about him.

In H-20, we got nothing with Michael. We don’t find out anything really new or interesting, or anything that really makes him that much of a threat. The whole movie was about a showdown he was going to have with Laurie twenty years after his first rampage, but there’s no real substance with Michael this time around. And this isn’t the same as 2018 going back to basics by following only the first movie - H-20 explicitly follows the second movie so this is the same Michael who hints at a supernatural element, the same Michael who is revealed to be Laurie’s brother, but none of that is really important here. The brother and sister element - the crux of these two characters, isn’t of importance here as it was for the Thorn trilogy; the closest we get to that is the scene where Laurie kills someone she thinks is Michael, which leads to Resurrection.

Michael and Laurie felt more related in 2018 than they ever did in H-20. And speaking of 2018, I know they brought Michael back to his original form, but considering there’s two sequels to that movie in the works, there is only so much you can do before Michael becomes “cheapened” by finding out more about him or become boring by keeping him a blank slate. Like I said, Michael can only really get away with being enigmatic for one or two movies before it just becomes a crutch and excuse which would result in him becoming boring.

As far as world building goes, the H-20 storyline doesn’t really expand the universe besides taking us to a boarding school in California, but I can give it leniency since it was gonna originally be a follow up on the previous trilogy. Now onto comparing characters.

Laurie Strode as a Protagonist

While it goes with out saying that Laurie Strode is a runner up when it comes to being the OG Final Girl. In the same way Michael helped define the slasher villain, Laurie is helped define what the final girl is. In just about every timeline and storyline in the Halloween series, all it took was one night to shape Laurie as her fateful encounter with Michael. In the first two movies, Laurie was a great protagonist, she was the naive, inexperienced teenage girl, and even a sisterly figure to Tommy Doyle. She was a protective babysitter who risks her neck to not just survive the night against a psychotic stalker, but protect the kids that are in her care. And that was just the first movie.

The second movie (which takes place on the same night mind you) things get personal with the brother/sister relationship. In this movie, the family aspect did impact Laurie; Laurie was the first person who finds out the truth and has a dream induced flashback of when she met Michael when she was younger shortly after her mother told her she was adopted. Laurie wakes up and the revelation that the seeming stranger that just murdered her friends is her brother, it puts her into a brief catatonic shock…although she might have been faking it while planning an escape. Point is the brother revelation had an effect on her.

But watching II and Twenty Years Later back to back, I just didn’t feel that it the same impact as it did in the previous movie. Michael’s relation to Laurie wasn’t as important in this film as it did the previous films. If it wasn’t for the fact that the brother-sister thing was mentioned a few times, it didn’t feel like it had that much of a weight to it. It didn’t feel like Laurie was afraid of her brother here, but rather just the guy who terrorized her. Like I said, above, Laurie and Michael felt more “related” in 2018 than they did in H-20, despite that aspect being cut out. The closest we get to Laurie having a moment of “this is my brother” is the scene where she kills some poor sap she thinks is Michael.

The focus in both H-20 and 2018 is about Laurie’s trauma and paranoia about Michael coming after her and her children. But overall I felt 2018!Laurie was the better take on the character, especially in that aspect; we see how strained her relationship with her daughter is and how close she is with her granddaughter. 2018!Laurie’s life effectively went down the tubes and Michael never stopped haunting her, and has burned himself into her very soul, that it would be irrelevant whether or not they are blood related. It’s gotten to the point where her daughter barely has a relationship with her. Despite this and having little to lose, 2018!Laurie has spent forty years preparing for a showdown with Michael, and is just itching for him to come loose again, arming herself, fortifying her house, keeping herself in shape the whole nine yards. Because it makes her that much stronger, makes her a little bit harder, makes her that much wiser, so thanks for making her a fighter.

H-20!Laurie spent twenty years just living in fear of Michael that at some point to the point that she faked her death, but doesn’t do much of else. And honestly despite her trauma and paranoia in this movie, I was less sympathetic to this take on Laurie, because she has a lot more to lose. She hasn’t had her life ruined by Michael in the same way 2018!Laurie has, in fact she lived a more comfortable (dare I say) privileged life, as the headmistress of a boarding school in sunny California, and still has a considerably more positive relationship with her son, and it’s only after Michael catches up to her, she’s ready to confront him and (seemingly) kill him. And I just couldn’t feel the same emotions with H-20!Laurie as I did with the 2018 counterpart.

I thought that H-20 was a little rushed with her character development and arc. But I think what made me unsympathetic is because Resurrection made it hard for me to root for in retrospect, and the fact H-20 was originally going to be directly tied with the Thorn trilogy; keep in mind as far as the Thorn trilogy goes, Laurie was killed in a car accident, which left her daughter Jamie virtually alone, with her mothers death taking an obvious toll on her, which dear old uncle Michael is out to kill her. H-20 reveals Laurie faked her death, and considering the original plans to tie the two stories, this effectively means that Laurie faked her death, abandoned Jamie with seemingly no regard for her, and let Jamie go through Hell alone. And I’m supposed to feel sorry for Laurie because of twenty years of nightmares ? Yeah, 2018!Laurie is the mother that Jamie deserves.

Which leads us too…

Jamie Lloyd as a protagonist

Now Jamie was considered a fan favorite upon her introduction, and in my opinion is one of the most thematically important characters in the series. As I explained above, Jamie is the linchpin of Michael and Laurie’s relationship, being both Laurie’s daughter and Michael’s niece. From such, both characters shadows hang over Jamie, despite and because of Laurie being out of the picture. Despite being a child, Jamie is subjected to the trauma of her mothers passing and her relationship with the boogeyman being public knowledge (and other children bully her over it, I can’t get over that).

Now there’s two kind of protagonist dynamics that Laurie and Jamie fill that contrast each other; Laurie is the protector of the cute, Jamie is the cute. But Laurie’s not around, and Jamie would be completely alone if it where not for her foster sister Rachel, Rachel’s friends, the local and state police and a mob of vigilantes. Well unfortunately, the Jamie Lloyd Protection Squad are a non issue to Michael who had squad of his own in the form of the Thorn cult, and these fuckers don’t play around. The world will stop at nothing at kicking Jamie down, and kicking her while she’s down, just for existing. If that’s not enough, she is held captive for years by a cult, forcibly impregnated by Michael and disemboweled in the sixth movie.

Did I mention Jamie was an eight to nine year old kid in the fourth and fifth movie ? I can see why Danielle Harris is disgruntled that she couldn’t return. Fun fact, Danielle Harris wanted the sixth film to have Jamie die killing Michael once and for all to save her baby. But because this is Jamie Lloyd we are talking about, she’s not allowed to get justice. You could make the argument that Jamie gets points dying to save her baby in the actual movie…but it wasn’t Danielle Harris playing, so whatevs I guess.

As I already said, what made Jamie a little more interesting for me than H-20!Laurie is that her connection to Michael being more emphasized here than with Laurie. This was first shown in the fourth movie and expanded upon in the fifth, which implies Michael has some sort of psychic and emotional link with Jamie. Under Michael’s influence, Jamie attacks her foster mother, and is subsequently institutionalized, and is still terrorized by Michael through nightmares, visions and seizures, as Michael continuously taunts Jamie with the murders of her protection squad. That’s when it hit me; Jamie and Michael are Ying and Yang, and that’s why it worked. Where Jamie was innocence, Michael was purely evil.

Michael is the human personification of evil, it only makes sense he be connected to someone who is pure and simply innocent. These two effect each other, and compliment each other. I’m honestly curious how this connection played out during Jamie’s captivity, because despite everything she’s been through, she was still innocent enough to try to reach out to Michael a final time. In the fifth film Michael has a bizarre moment of humanity and feels brief remorse due to Jamie’s influence and on the flip side, Jamie has a brief moment of darkness due to Michael’s influence. So of course I’m going to avoid a certain Mad Titan’s quote about perfect balance, because the meme is too easy. It dawns on me that I may be reading into something that isn’t there, but dear reader is what all theorists and analysts such as myself do ?

And speaking of perfect balance, that is another reason why I think a storyline about baby Steven introduced in the sixth film is a wasted chance. Not only is his *ahem* “origin” anti-hero backstory material, but think about what Steve represents; he’s a living combination of Jamie’s innocence and Michael’s evil. He is someone who not only carries Laurie and Jamie’s legacy on his back, but Michael’s legacy as well. Thematically speaking, he is prime material to be the one to one day kill Michael once and for all. But we got more of Michael fighting Laurie, so I guess that’s cool.

Michael Myers as a villain

Okay, what can I say about Michael as a villain that hasn’t already been said ? I mean what movie does him best ? Many would say the first two. But what does a better job at “expanding” Michael. Many would also say the 2018 sequel, but that’s not primarily what I’m comparing here, so we are sticking with the old school sequels. Michael’s main appeal to the bulk of the fandom was the mystery aspect of him in the first movie. But “Michael is cool because he’s mysterious” can only work for one or two movies before it becomes a crutch and as a result turns Michael into blank slate. And considering that 2018 has two sequels in the work, Michael is likely to get some “expansion” to keep him interesting, and that’s because the appeal to a mystery is the inherent need to solve it.

But that is beside the point. In my personal opinion, Michael’s appeal wasn’t that he was a mystery, but that he was the human personification of evil, and from such I think the only way Michael can really be cheapened is if he was given something to humanize him like love, empathy or sympathetic qualities. And no, the single tear in the fifth movie ultimately means nothing considering what happens down the line. So as long as Michael is evil and doing inherently evil deeds, I don’t see it as cheapening him.

So how does one expand on Michael and his evil correctly ? Make him a bigger threat with each passing sequel, and give him more heinous deeds under his belt.

In the second movie, he massacres a hospital to get to Laurie. The fourth movie has him slaughtering an entire police force and a vigilante mob just to get to Jamie. The fifth movie has Michael track down Jamie’s friends and foster sister, and display their corpses as a way to taunt Jamie. Sixth movie, he disembowels Jamie after she gives birth - mocking Jamie for trying reach out to him no less! - before seeking out and trying to kill their baby, and massacres a group of followers for thinking they can control him. There’s also Steven’s conception, which is universally regarded as too far even for Michael. 2018 has Michael kill a child onscreen, exceed the body count of the first movie before he even gets his mask back -and just to get his mask back- kills several people in different houses in a matter of minutes, and uses a cops severed head as a makeshift Jack-o-Lantern. You see that ? In almost each sequel, Michael was more of a threat, and was more “creative” when it came to his evil. He fulfilled a function as a villain and evil personified with no real humanity and no moral restraint.

What about H-20 ? Compared to those other movies, Michael was boring here. He kills three people at the beginning of H-20 and three more in the third act, but isn’t really creative or spectacular (except for using a skate for one kill). The bulk of the movie is Michael just traveling to the boarding school Laurie is hiding in, but doesn’t really do anything of substance. I wouldn’t mind too much, but back in the day this was billed as the final movie. The only creative thing Michael does is fake his death and that isn’t revealed until Resurrection which was near universally disowned by the fandom. Give Resurrection this, it adds more to Michael’s rap sheet. We do get a brief montage at the beginning of H-20 that implies that Michael has gone on a killing spree across the country, but the problem is it breaks the “show don’t tell rule”.

I’ll give them this, we do get a comic book miniseries called Nightdance set in the H-20 continuity, that expands on Michael’s evil and menace in ways I won’t spoil here because I recommend it, and it’s not as well known as Resurrection despite being considered by some to be the better follow up. It’s almost a shame this wasn’t made into a movie, because in the actual movies in that timeline Michael didn’t feel as threatening or menacing, took a lot of the edge off his character, and made him especially weak compared to the previous sequels. You could make the argument that the movie was mainly focused on Laurie’s facing her demons, the problem was that everything was rushed and undeveloped in that department, so Laurie’s character arc doesn’t really make up for it.

Compare and contrast this with 2018, which gave us a slow burn focus on how Michael effected Laurie, Laurie’s relationship with her family and quickly shown us the stakes Michael’s threat poses. It really makes me question why H-20 was seen as such a golden calf back in the day. It seems to me that is was mostly because Jamie Lee Curtis made a comeback for that movie.

Conclusion

So that’s my reasoning for why the Thorn trilogy hits the “Perfect Sequel” beats over H-20; it had more lore and world building; had a greater focus on the themes introduced in the second film; a more sympathetic protagonist; Michael’s evil was empathized more; and an atmosphere closer related to the actual holiday of Halloween. 2018 had some of the same beats at the Thorn trilogy, but I’m not gonna a final decision until the 2018 sequels are finished. It’s a personal standard of mine to wait until the story is over before I make a final decision.

I will give 2018 points so far for building it’s new lore and developing it’s new characters in one movie, but I think it has it’s problems too. Mainly that 2018 felt more like a big “Fix It” fanfic brought to the cinema, and was a little heavy when it came to self referencing humor, call-backs and leaning on the fourth wall, and fandom wish fulfillment. 2018 isn’t a bad movie, it’s one of my favorite sequels, but even so I can’t get around the whole “fanfic-ish” feel I got from watching it.

Pretty much the one thing H-20 has over 2018 was that it didn’t try too hard to be Scream, which was a formula most late 90’s horror films followed. At most we were given a quick Scream cameo, that could possibly shatter the canon if I think of it too much. H-20 went out of its way by not copying Scream during the writing process. Little known fact, but while H-20 was intended to be the last Halloween film, the studio had this rule was that Michael Myers wasn’t allowed to actually be killed off, so a sequel was planned in advance to clarify he was still alive; the original plan was that “Michael” would be a obsessed fan and copycat; that idea was scrapped possibly for following the “Scream formula” too much, and what we got instead was the infamous paramedic twist in Resurrection.

#halloween #Halloween Return of Michael Myers #Halloween Revenge of Michael Myers #Halloween Curse of Michael Myers #Halloween Twenty Years Later #halloween resurrection #Halloween Nightdance #michael myers #laurie strode #Jamie Lloyd #Steven Lloyd #tommy doyle #John Tate #Jamie Lee Curtis #Danielle Harris #unpopular opinion

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terramythos · 6 years ago

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Notes from my October Daye reread, #7 Chimes At Midnight. Or, "don't eat evil pie if you're planning to overthrow the government". Advanced spoilers, please read the books, etc.

Reminder right off the bat that sweet fashion disaster May used to be an eldritch horror of the night???

-the month name in her case seems to be a coincidence? (But like. How could a name like May Daye be a coincidence. Come the fuck on.)

-Goblin fruit is super yikes. Super addictive drug that inevitably leads to death?

- Tybalt and Toby domestic shit hell yeah

Tybalt: arrested for being horny on main

- Toby: let's visit the Queen, who demonstrably hates me, about the goblin fruit problem. What could possibly go wrong (spoiler: a whole lot)

-"i may be a composite of multiple dead people, but I'm not stupid" May is nonbinary, pass the fucking tea

-The Gang Overthrows the Queen

Quentin is such a good kid! Fuck!

-I just... love the characters and how they've developed over the series. Quentin is great, Tybalt is great, The Luidaeg is great... October has changed into a more open and less depressed person. It's great! I mean, everything goes to shit over the next 2 books, but we've come so far!

-Quentin getting extremely upset that The High King didn't notice the Queen didn't have a legitimate claim to the throne? Haha. Haha. *takes another shot*

-Quentin: we could just like... TELL the High King that shes not a legitimate ruler. Like we literally could just call him up and say--

Toby: he would probably kill us and how would we do that anyway

Quentin: *silently screaming*

Have I mentioned I LOVE the Luidaeg? Shes such a great character.

-the implication that tybalt's archaic speech is at least partially just to fuck with Toby is so fuckign funny god they're so cute

GOD...

-Quentin not quite bowing to Arden, or at least not as formally as the others. That's foreshadowing. God damn it.

- The Undersea: is relevant

Me: wow I knew we introduced all that lore 2 books ago for a reason

- "Princesses aren't exciting. I've met Princesses." I am so glad I am not ACTUALLY drinking every time Quentin's identity is foreshadowed, because this book alone would have killed me by now.

- everything: goes to shit

Me: ah, there it is

- Toby becoming instantly addicted to goblin fruit and forgetting 2 of the most important people in her life has me at a severe oof. :(

- fucking props to seanan for making pie legitimately threatening.

- October Daye patch 7.1 notes: due to balance concerns, toby has been shifted back to more human.

Gameplay effects: hair is brown again. blood magic effects and self-healing have been reduced by 75%. Iron resistance increased 75%.

-Theres a line about how Tybalt should have known better than to believe anything could have gone right for very long and. Yikes in context. Yikes with knowing Tybalt's backstory.

- fun lore with the Luidaeg offering to turn Toby into a Selkie to save her from impending death. Being like... technically the Selkie Firstborn. And how much doing that would actually cost. It's certainly something to file away for later because I don't imagine we would introduce a concept like that and then abandon it...

-SUDDEN HEAVY SETUP FOR BOOK 8 STUFF. SUDDEN BOOK 1 BEING RELEVANT. Why did Evening, some random noble, have a fucking ancient powerful artifact just kinda... randomly in her possession? INDEED.

- toby: Why does the name Eira Rosenhwyr sound so familiar?

Mags: Oh she's a Firstborn

Toby: Right, that definitely explains it one hundred percent. Time to not think about it at all ever again.

- TOBY I'm aware you're kind of out of your mind right now but surely you can see the aesthetic similarity between EIRA ROSENHWYR and EVENING WINTERROSE. Ajdjenskkelbsbd

- I fucking googled it and Eira Rosenhwyr translates roughly to "Snow Rose Evening" lmfao

- Mags, continuing exposition: yeah she always had this Snow White thing where like she never stayed dead for long

Me, considering book 1's central conflict and how Evening was described multiple times as Snow White: 🙃

- I really appreciate the fact that whenever Walther shows up in a book he pretty much saves the day in a major way just by making like. A potion

- toby: magic is weird. Candy made from my blood that temporarily curbs the effects of addiction? Right

Walther: you're dating a cat

-I forgot we learn The Luidaeg's actual name in this one???? "Yeah I'm Antigone what up"

-OH THATS WHERE THE "ANNIE" PSEUDONYM COMES FROM. God damn it.

-God I love Danny and his godawful expletives "Oberon's scrotum". God

- I haven't mentioned it too much but there are soooooo many good tybalt and toby moments. They have such a good and loving relationship. Boy I die

-there's a bit where Toby consumes some of the Luidaeg's blood for Reasons and gets a brief Luidaeg-POV flashback.. which shows the Luidaeg protesting Amandine abusing Toby as a kid. So even though they don't really meet until book 1, it puts her first unofficial appearance in a new context. Just some all powerful ancient sea witch checkin up on her niece at Safeway, y'know

- god the first Cu Sidhe shows up in this one and he just looks like a glam rocker who's also sort of a dog. Jesus christ

- they just act like dogs too and it is so funny. Fucking zero attention span, super excited and happy at being told they did a good job.

- arden: there's no way you're amandine's kid. She would never sleep with a human. Her husband would be pissed

Toby: ??? My mom isn't married?

(Oh boy that's gonna be a fun one)

AND, AFTER SIX AND A HALF BOOKS OF SOLID FORESHADOWING:

We get the Quentin reveal. The alcohol poisoning ceases.

-There's some real good irony in like. THE Crown Prince getting apprenticed to Toby, who is a member of Faerie's biggest underclass. And they become fucking BFFs over the course of the series. That's some good shit

👌👌👌some GOOD👌 shit right there

-God just going back there are SO many hints. I noted a lot of them on this series reread but some of my favorites are the real subtle ones. Like Quentin in book 2 being inexplicably amused when Toby orders him to do something.

- Like?? She makes the kid do chores. She's almost gotten him killed like half a dozen times. That's just some... premium good shit.

Well the book sums up that revelation pretty well lmao

- Did... did Arden just imply Toby's mom caused the 1906 San Francisco earthquake...? That is certainly something I either missed or forgot. How is that like even a thing

- The night haunts are cool as shit and I'm glad they're showing up as bigger players. And now we have setup for Toby owing them a favor. Delightful.

ME SIPPING THAT LUIDAEG LORE JUICE

- October Daye patch 7.1.8 notes: oh god we fucked up we fucked up changes reverted

-Blood magic CPR? Canon. Then again I'm pretty sure Toby was established using blood magic to resurrect someone in book 2. So. Book 2 is still relevant

God I'm such a sucker for this angsty shit. And of course this would be Tybalt's solution, considering his backstory. God. Fuck

-I like how they went from enemies to like ridiculously sweet and affectionate lovers.. but it's not 100% perfect, they still have arguments and disagreements. But it all comes down to them caring about each other. That's some good shit right there

- Dianda being a huge badass and just singlehandedly taking out six guards while iron poisoned. a good development.

- new toby power of literally stealing someone's powers by drinking their blood. We're going like full vampire here huh

- and The Queen... who we establish actually traded her name away... manages to escape. Wonder when she shows up again 🤔🤔🤔

- ok god the fucking short story epilogue is SO GOOD. Luidaeg POV!!! Luidaeg lore is always good but this is one of the only parts we have seen Amandine. It reveals that The Luidaeg literally has just been October's guardian angel for years, which explains why some all powerful sea witch just stumbles into Toby's life???. Amandine is a fucking brat. It foreshadows fucking... SOMETHING with the goddamn month names. And it sets up Eira. God next book is going to be so good.

- There are interesting parallels between Toby and her mom. Amandine was trying to turn Toby into a human for fucking years?? As some kind of shitty experiment? Almost succeeded until The Luidaeg intervened. There's all these lines about how Amandine had stolen centuries of Toby's life, how Toby would be defenseless and Faerie would still know who she was even if Amandine succeeded. What does this say about Gillian? Toby turned her completely human in book 4 to save her life. There's no way that's not going to come back in a big way.

-What. Is with. The month names. Seriously we have not had any new ones since 3 but that's still like 5 characters. I know there are several more coming in the next few books and I still don't know why the fuck lol

-This book was mostly the final setup for next book, which is an absolute fucking bombshell. Probably the best book in the series and that is saying something. I'm excited to reread it. But on it's own this one is a good read too... love that we finally got the Quentin reveal!! The horrific Queen is gone for now! Stuff!

#oh god the winter long is next. heaven preserve me #that one is gonna be a LOOOONG post #how am i going to limit it to 10 pics... i had issues with this one!

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airlock · 7 years ago

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oh, by the way! the other day I actually finished that affinity list for FE15 characters but I’ve been forgetting to post it so I hope you’re all ready for a whole shitton of “you know what this character is a lot like that one other character from a game that has canon affinities”

Alm - Light y'know, part of my exercises in attempting to make a regular FE cast out of a series-wide arrange of characters with the best FE Heroes poll results was in workshopping affinities for the characters that made the list. when I started attempting this, Echoes wasn't remotely out yet. I've since discarded the progress I've made on that front, due to the recent changes in the roster as per the link I've just shared and also because when that happened Echoes was much closer to being out. regardless, I'll probably end up bringing up the initial affinity impressions I've had at that point for the Gaiden characters who made it to the initial roster, even though I've (rather predictably) doubled back on most of them this side of Echoes being out. Alm is a big case of this happening. when his sparse characterisation in Gaiden coupled with his Awakening lines made it popular read him as the genocidal scourge of Rigel, I had a good time chucking him into the Ice affinity where not one other FE protagonist would fit. well, for better or for worse (and mostly for the better), those times are now over. Alm in Echoes is not without compassion for his enemies or with a very strong impetus towards revenge; he's just young, in over his head, and a little too eager to please, and that eagerness took him in a questionable (if not necessarily wrong, per se) direction when he felt that pushing back against Rigel is what people wanted. he actually hits many of the same notes as Seliph, although his discomforts with leadership seem to be less inherent (as with Seliph) than they're just naturally stemming from the fact that he's a young boy who just keeps suddenly ending up with more responsibility than he thought he was in for. and he ultimately grows into the roles he keeps being given with little further complaint, and it's all because he enjoys the upshot of it all: getting to help more people. and for someone who's always so inclined towards doing right by others, almost unidirectionally, I can't think of a better affinity than Light.

Celica - Thunder unlike her co-protagonist, Celica doesn't require any sort of analysis to be read as having a Light affinity; I'd expect that this is would be most of anyone's initial impulse. but she's, ah... not nearly enough of a pushover for that. when she talks about her mission, she does so with a kind of steely resolve that can only run much deeper than just a desire to do the right thing; each of her decisions mean something important to her, and for that, she's ever glad to take matters into her own hands, even those closest to her desperately wish she'd be more willing to let everyone else lift some of the load as well. and just like Alm sometimes risks everything out of his unwillingness to disappoint, so Celica's weakness is not listening to other people's thoughts when she's made up her mind, which is how she ends up handing her soul over to Jedah despite as many people as possible telling her not to do it. this principled, yet stubborn attitude is definitely the way of Thunder characters like Selena and Jill, and we can only be very relieved that Celica's tendencies mostly pointed her in directions unlike the sorts those two have ended up in.

Gray - Fire this guy has so much in common with Sain, I was this close to calling it a Wind, but there's an all-important difference: where that affinity's crowd tends to be more dreamy and detached, Gray is actually pretty down-to-earth in spite of his rather humorous openness. his flirty side strikes me as more a social butterfly thing than Sain's floweriness, for one (at least, well, in any context but his supports with Clair). overall, he's more than anything else friendly and easygoing, the way of a Guy or a Ross.

Tobin - Anima/Earth painfully awkward, but level-headed, observant, and clear in his ways of thinking -- this one's pretty straightforward, the way Anima characters can often be.

Kliff - Wind OR Ice so this one is also one where I had a pre-Echoes assignment for Poll Heroes. at that point, whatever little character he had seemed pointedly Wind, being the right amount of free-spiritedness and, as per his ending, dreamy wanderlust. this side of Echoes, those traits were kept and driven in further, but at the same time, he also gained a new and very marked personality trait: a mean, haughty streak that would really not land him out of place with the likes of Raigh and Raven. and I kind of wanted to think that this isn't entirely out of left field for a Wind character either, but there isn't anyone quite that mean on the canon listings; at worst you get some lighthearted snarkers like Haar and Bastian. still, it's not as if pushing the frontier is enough reason to demand a change in affinity... so it's honestly easy to argue either way for him. and to make matters worse -- he's very withdrawn and his ch3 base convo implies he has something of a history with secrets, so he wouldn't be out of place as a Darkness character either, although at this point I'm still feeling Wind and Ice more strongly for him.

Faye - the shit writing affinity it speaks vollumes that I feel like I can only possibly ground her primary characterization on anything that makes sense if I review her lines from the prologue and/or in battle situations. this is also something I don't feel like doing.

Lukas - Anima/Earth with his whole "cold observer" thing, Ice is a mighty tempting affinity for him, but Anima/Earth fits that bill just as well and also works for Lukas in a number of ways that Ice doesn't. he's not quite mean, aloof, or detached enough to really seem like an Ice; his quiet is more poise than lack of concern or dismissal. all in all, Anima/Earth is a solid affinity for the character who silently yet gladly takes on the role of Team Babysitter, the way Oswin, Oscar, and Nolan are all known to. that said, there's also that whole other way to read his character: for those whom Lukas strikes as being much more stirred than he ever lets on -- between Clive/Lukas B and the way he's deadpan about his awful backstory -- the obvious affinity would be Darkness.

Silque - Ice I'll freely admit she's a hard one to read whatsoever -- and maybe I'd have more material to work with if Faye hadn't fucked this one up for us all -- so the most I can seem to observe in her character is this aloof elegance. and maybe it's just par for the setting, but there are some precious few moments when she shows something of a lowkey judgemental side... but really, this is not one of the assessments I'd be very attached to; if you've got a better idea, you can probably argue it better

Clair - Thunder proud and stubborn and- you know what, I could just copypaste my rationale for making Lachesis this affinity when I was analyzing FE4. in fact, I'm gonna do that. I’m kind of tempted to put her down for Thunder just because she’d match Clarine that way, tbh (sic)

Forsyth - Thunder being as square as he is, Forsyth could've easily ended up on the Anima/Earth bin, where he can be in the company of such spoilsports as Kent and Oswin -- but it's actually not that simple. for all his veneer of orderliness and properness, this is still a guy who gave up on a quiet and safe life to run after a goose chase of a dream that never had a chance to come true, and only got anything remotely close to that as a result of plentiful fortunate circumstances. besides, when he's trying to whip Python into shape, he doesn't resemble, say, Kent trying to whip Sain into shape -- whereas the former pair's dynamic sounds more "ugh, please stop being an idiot and do this properly", Forsyth's beef with Python is over a lack of commitment. because that's what's really Forsyth's primary characteristic: the kind of commitment that can only stem from a Thunder-affinity character, even if he's basically committed to becoming what an Anima/Earth character might just naturally be.

Python - Wind in his own words, he lives carefree, which is exactly the way Wind characters are when they're left to their own devices. he's certainly got a combination of Ranulf's sense of humour (or even Wil's loose tongue) and Haar's boldfaced laziness.

Clive - Light he's idealistic enough for the part -- to the point that what keeps bending him and bringing out some of the worst in him over the course of the story is that not all things play out like the pretty design he had in his head. to name one, he's fine with putting some farmboy climbing the social ladders as the leader of his resistance band so as long as it makes him feel good for being so nice to peasants and giving the common soldier a leader they can identify with, but it’s rougher on him when Alm starts talking back to him and making decisions he doesn't agree with.

Boey - Anima/Earth there's something that keeps showing up in his lines, that I kind of get but can't seem to describe... but in any case, he's pretty much the Tobin of Team Celica, as someone who tries to keep it real but tends to come off more as the short-sighed comic relief than the shrewd realist.

Mae - Thunder I can just say it's Serra's affinity and leave it at that, that should explain everything

Genny - Wind OR Light we're not offered much in actual characterization for her other than shyness, a dreamy, story-loving nature and a dash of helplessness... it's hard to make anything deeper, least of all considering she's pretty young. Wind works with her detached, "this would make such a cool saga" ways, and also with the fact that her ending will show she's willing to troll people about her choice in romantic partners; Light would reinterpret her love of stories as a sort of idealism, and also focus on her helpless but earnest side, where she's similar to characters like Florina.

Saber - Ice aloof, gruff, and with a bad reputation to boot -- even if we know that Saber gets to be much more attentive and supportive than he seems to be, or frankly wishes he were, his nurturing side still tends to be more like "that sounds stupid but I'm here for it" than anything warmer and more earnest.

Valbar - Fire this is another one I had a pre-Echoes take on, and that one was Thunder -- it made perfect sense, since Gaiden doesn't give you anything more on the guy than the fact that he's willing to all but suicide attack a whole bunch of pirates in the name of revenge. this side of Echoes, though, that part of his characterization now seems to be more of an understandably extreme reaction to grief, while his natural disposition is just friendly and charmingly boisterous in a way that strikes me much more as Fire.

Leon - Light deep down under all his quirks, there seems to be something idealistic, even childish at times. if he can fall in love with someone just because that person was nice to him at a difficult time, that's -- at least, by his own admission -- because he appreciates the beauty of the world; and if he can spend half his dialogue talking about Valbar -- I swear, sometimes he almost annoys me as much as Faye does -- that's because he's sporting this mental checklist of things that make someone The Ideal Man and Valbar has yet to fail any of it. plus, well, for better or for worse, this is also Kyza's affinity.

Kamui - Wind aloof, but dreamy, more than anything else helplessly driven by his wanderlust; and on top of all that, just slightly snarky. Kamui is a very straightforward Wind character.

Luthier - Ice also a pretty straightforward assessment: haughty, but awkward; aloof and a little too focused on something that interests him; Luthier is pretty much a living checklist of Ice traits, although he doesn't quite cover the stricter and meaner end of that spectrum (except in that he's almost strict enough when it comes to Delthea -- definitely "almost", though, he's nonwhere near Marcus-level strict). one amusing way to think of it is that Luthier is the exact kind of guy who Pent only barely avoided becoming.

Mathilda - Light time and again she's regarded as being the voice of reason -- and I think that's less in the whole Lukas-esque "cold observer" sense and more in the sense that she's sensible and doesn't lose sight of what's important. it's also worth noting that, unlike Celica above, she's prone to giving others a little too much credit and yielding to particularly persistent characters; from the third Rise of the Deliverance map, plus some of the base game, Clair in particular can play her like a piano just by being very stubborn. maybe that's also how she ends up with that awful ending... (can I go this long without drawing parallels to characters with canon affinities? naaaah. sometimes she's kind of like a Lucius who actually enjoys fighting.)

Delthea - Fire it's rather clear that when Delthea thinks of her dreamy city life, she's thinking of a place where she can go be a social butterfly -- or, as it were, fall in love with someone suavacious. I've also considered Wind as a strong possibility for her but ultimately I get the sense that she's less lashing out against restrictions or being expected to work hard and more against being judged for not really wanting to be a mage. I'm very probably splitting hairs there, but we'd have more established character to build upon if folks would just let Delthea say "fuck" every once in a while.

Palla - Anima/Earth I'll have to admit that Akaneia characterization isn't fresh in my head at the present moment -- however sparse it can be -- but most of what I remember about Palla is her just incorporating that whole The Big Sister (TM) Archetype without a complaint, which is just another way of being the Team Babysitter as Lukas above is.

Catria - Ice this one's also gonna have to work off her FE15 characterization primarily, but anyways! as affecionate as she is deep down, she's pretty aloof and she'll be curt and critical sometimes; this bill probably suits her fine.

Atlas - Fire a big-hearted guy of very simple ways, to the point that even directly befriending a queen-to-be won't draw him away from going back to his village and becoming a simple lumberjack. he's really like a bar-brawling, trash-talking version of Dorcas.

Jesse - Light he just loves playing the hero, right to the point that he'll bog himself down doing it (like, say, by trying to take on a horde of desert bandits alone and ending up captured by them). he's also got the idealism to boot, what with this whole idea for a mercenary's country. and I mean, really, I shouldn't need to argue very much to say that Jesse would have the same affinity as Gatrie.

Deen - Darkness full disclosure: I did not pick him on my first and so far only Echoes run, so there's every chance I haven't seen the full picture yet. still, as far as I can see, this guy just drips with Darkness, hitting much of the same edgelord tunes as Rutger does. that said, for all I know he could be more of a Jaffar-type Ice affinity, so maybe I'll really have to see yet.

Sonya - Darkness full of secrets and unwilling to let anyone in for real, but she can't help but let off a glimpse of her truths if it might just help someone she can see herself in -- yeah, she's right at home with Calill and Micaiah, to say the least.

Est - Fire lively and straightforward -- to the point that, at least here in FE15, her sisters seem to enjoy just completely reading her -- she's not very difficult to regard as a Fire. although, between the way she does her unreliable sales pitches (in her support with Catria) and certain Akaneia things that hint at some severe commitment issues, it's tempting to keep Wind in consideration, too...

Nomah - Wind if Bastian should live to see old age, then he'll become the exact person that Nomah is. ... well, a more long-winded version of him, at least.

Tatiana - Fire I've dithered a fair bit here, because for all her ostensible cheeriness, she's got a lot of insecurity and fright in her. as soon as you rescue her, the first thought in her head is "oh god they're going to kill me", and the second thought is "oh god they're going to kill my boyfriend". there's also how she's terrified of her beloved's memories returning, and how she wastes no time in beating herself up over it, and she's even got a base conversation where she expresses her self-doubts about being a good cleric. I couldn't help but wonder whether all this wouldn't make her a surprising Darkness character, really. but it seems like the precedent for having a Fire-like personality and a crushing load of insecurities is still remaining in the Fire affinity (cfr. Nino, Neimi), so dredging all of that up may not have been the best use of my analytical energy after all. harrumph, I say!

Zeke - Thunder OR Darkness between his characterization here and in other games that he totally isn't in, we know exactly two things about our amnesiac knight: that for better or for tragically worse he's loyal to the bitter end, and that he's definitely not a big fan of solving things through normal people communication.

Conrad - Thunder frankly a very tentative assessment since, seriously, for a new character who's meant to be central to the plot, this guy seriously got awful little development, probably being that IS decided to save up all of his big reveal quality for the most obvious detail about him and decided to leave us in the dark about all his other secrets. he's not even really hiding them himself -- no moreso than the plot demands at least -- so I can't just blame it on a Darkness affinity. all I really have on this guy is that, for all that he's ostensibly soft and sensitive, he's mighty stubborn, enough so that 50% of his interactions with Celica, especially as his masked knight self, are just him and her being very stubborn at each other. he's pretty much the only one that won't shut down and back off when Celica pushes back -- kind of gives me the awful impression that maybe he just doesn't listen to her very much, on review. maybe. but yeah, on the one hand he honestly doesn't /really/ sound like a Thunder type, but on the other hand, there are two different people he sounds like, and he won't drop the masked knight persona entirely even after he's stopped hiding his true identity, so I can't think of anything ostensible enough to draw my analysis from. but here's an amusing thought: a couple lines back there I did a typo and noticing I'd written "when Celice pushes back" was freaking hilarious l m a o

Mycen - Ice it's hard to pin down Mycen's true personality, since he's always so busy doing as the plot demands. at least, Clive (in one of the DLC memories) implies that he was already a notorious stoic even before he ended up in a situation where he's always having to put his own feelings aside, but it's hard not to think that he must've already had some façade going on by the time he turned into a Rigel-born Zofia knight. that said, even if it's what the plot (or, as it were, the bizarro alternate reality that a tutorial tends to sound like) demanded, this is a guy who yelled at a bunch of children because they were crying about having to fight a bunch of actual knights. so yeah, I'm not too hesitant to pin him down as, at the very least, the hard taskmaster who still gets his pupils' adoration -- you know, the Marcus way. that said, what wouldn't I give for some additional DLC that delves more into his actual character, and specially into that sweet, sweet Mycen and Nomah backstory...

Totals

Fire(6): Gray, Delthea, Tatiana | Valbar, Atlas, Est Ice(5~6): Silque, Luthier, Mycen, [Kliff?] | Saber, Catria Anima/Earth(4): Tobin, Lukas | Boey, Palla Wind(3~5): Python, [Kliff?] | Kamui, Nomah, [Genny?] Thunder(5~6): Clair, Forsyth, [Zeke?] | Celica, Mae, Conrad Light(5~6): Alm, Clive, Mathilda | Leon, Jesse, [Genny?] Darkness(2~3): [Zeke?] | Deen, Sonya shit writing(1): you know who | N/A

#my stupid text posts #Fire Emblem is tagged in this post #Valentia FE is tagged in this post #I'll probably have to evening reblog this bleh

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