#which would be really sad because i couldn't interact with fans anymore

[sparklecarehospital-archive]

due to the nature of things right now and the possibility of this site sinking ship i'm looking into possible ways of moving my AUs onto their own website(s). the only issue i'm running into right now is how i would manage to use an ask box. the only possible alternative i have right now is using disqus (what i use for the SC site comments) but that would make all questions public and make people able to reply to each other and i don't really want that

this isn't a definite decision i've made, don't worry, and i may not end up going through with it at all but it's something that's being considered in the event of worst-case-scenario. i just wanna be prepared y'know

[phrandallanton]

had a dream that someone I look up to a lot turned out to hate me and treated me horribly while I was at their house (I don't know this person irl nor have I ever met them before) Their parents loved me, saying that I was the biggest fan for what the person I look up to created. Yet the person themselves just HATED me. I felt sad for enjoying the stuff they made and while I was there, their parents gave me a computer to draw (Which belonged to the person I think?)and I drew the things they've created before. I then went to try and delete them cause I think that's why they hated me, was because I liked their stuff. Which is weird but like, okay go off sis. But I couldn't delete it in the end which made me panic and I think they hated me for drawing on their computer that I didn't KNOW was there's.

They also pushed me off their bed saying something like I was stinky and they didn't want their bed to stink. That's not nice :( but I can get not wanting me to be on your bed makes sense. They also said something horrible which I thought was a dark humored joke so to try to interact with them, cause mind you most of the time of this whole thing going down we haven't even spoke to eachother, so I tried to joke back with them. Turned out they were being 100% real and was talking to my mom.

I also hid in the closet (idk if it was their closet or just a closet) I was all snuggled in blankets hiding from something that looked like nightmare Freddy (fnaf 4). But it was like I was playing a game and wanted to see if the person who I looked up to would start playing with me so we can start being chill and what not. But then my parents and their parents started shouting for me and I was like "yeah if they already hate me their not going to hate me more if they find me in their closet" (once again, not sure if it was their closet, but I did say it was)

Towards the end of the dream they started to make a video on me trying to cancel me (???) I don't know man. They just really hated me. So I tried to get recordings of them saying and doing horrible stuff to me so I can prove that the video was just out of hate or something idk.

It's weird cause even though I was really sad that this person I admired was treating me like garbage, I really liked the dream? It had this huge weird feeling of anemoia to it. But it also reminds me that people I admire or like probably suck and that's why I don't hold anyone on a big pedestal anymore. Like how I thought Mr beast was cool and even got to speak to him once with other people I admired and now all this stuff is coming out sooo ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ That's something the dream reminded me about lol and is also the main reason why I don't worship any influencer or artist I admire.

Once again, wanna say that the person in the dream is someone I do NOT know irl or online, I've never really interacted with them, they could be a douche bag irl, they may not be. Nobody knows except them and the good lord. All of this was just a dream.

[snezario]

now that the hyperfixation has waned, i am finally getting this off my chest in full. i am so mentally unwound and have no fucks to give about anything anymore so idc if i'm dredging this up again. you know the drill - don't like what i have to say? block/unfollow/etc. i had mentioned it briefly when it was more of an issue but i hadn't really been able to speak my mind because i was still close to the subject matter, so it caused me a lot of distress to think about.

this is about the haz/bin hate that was circulating snzblr early last year. some of y'all were absolute HATERS and it's so ironic bc there are fandoms that also took snzblr by storm and i never saw that much open hate before. i've been in the snzblr community for several years and i almost never align with the fandoms that was all the rage: y/oi, good ome/ns, ofm/d just to name a few. sure i was sad that i wasn't into it so i couldn't fully appreciate the content (although i did enjoy some!) or share in the constant flow of dopamine with y'all. i just shrugged and kind of did my own thing. so it absolutely boggles my mind that y'all raked the show itself and its fans over hot coals... like dear lord, are you not an adult? criticising the art style or tone of the show in a way that made ppl who liked it feel bad about enjoying it

i know there was also issue with tagging and how ppl wanted to be able to block the tag, which was a fair criticism but that's not just an issue that occurred with haz/bin... i 100% agree, it would be nice to have a universal tagging system that the community could agree on given the fetish/kink space and not wanting our stuff to bleed over

you don't like it fine, but you shouldn't make ppl feel bad about liking something that isn't your cup of tea. it was honestly such disappointing behavior to see from the community. i think most of the ppl i interact with or follow who didn't engage were civil about it so i didn't see the worst of the discourse

[eyewussjack]

WHAT THE FUCK IS UP FREAKS !!! TIME FOR A LIFE UPDATE

so, first and foremost i guess i should announce

I AM AN ADULT!!! and not only that... i am an ADULT GRADUATE!!!!!

which is astounding to me. i honestly never thought i'd make it this far. (which is. a little sad in retrospect but i mean. i was a creepypasta fan so what the fuck could you expect)

next i would like to announce

I DONT KNOW WHAT THE FUCK TO DO WITH THIS BLOG!!!

i seriously have no clue because like. im not an active tumblr user anymore. im not active social mdia user in general. ive long since left my creepypasta hyperfixation. i dont feel comfortable interacting with danganronpa's fanbase. i still love horror! i love horror and the horror genre in all its entirety forever! and i do still love creepypastas, and all the characters! buttttttt... i have no desire to keep doing incorrect quotes and indulging in this little universe i built inside my head anymore.

i have new universes! new interests! new fixations! but none of them are really horror right now.

i have my own creative projects. my fixations now lie with tmnt, genshin impact, bungo stray dogs, and my own characters and worlds. and well, i dont like interacting with fandoms anymore.

it's become so, so taxing. way more than it used to be. both inside and outside of fandoms and communities, it's become so... negative and hostile and judgemental and just. those sides of the internet no longer feel safe anymore. i feel like i have to walk on eggshells constantly.

so, i'm afraid this might be my last post on this blog.

i will always remember this blog fondly, as it really kept me going and kept me feeling productive during. not the absolute pits of my depression, but i guess what i would call the rising period??? where instead of being sad and. well. Depressed all the time i was just sort of. numb to a lot of things and i couldn't find myself worth anything because of reasons i can't articulate well apparently.

but, this was one of the things that distracted me from that and made me feel like i was actually doing something and i did have a lot of fun doing it. and for that i am forever grateful. the community on here has been nothing but kind and lovely towards me and i am so thankful that i got that lucky bc i have Seen. The Others of the fandom.

so, with that. i say to this blog

thank you. i loved you. goodbye.

[secretly-tword-obsessed]

omg okay so when i saw that you write for big mouth and human resources i about lost my shit. so im a huge jatthew fan and id really like a lee jay drabble where matthew gives jay cheer up tkls bcuz he's sad about his family OR lee pete the logic rock headcanons.

ofc you can chose not to but yk💓 ill write them if you wont 😩

Hey! Sorry I'm so late to this - if you like it I'll keep making these in quicker time.

Again, so sorry it took so long, I have periods where I do and don't have time for this witting because of school, but I'm free for the next few weeks (yay!)

Sooo I think I'll do Pete HC's, especially because he interacts with Caleb so much in this new season, meaning I can weave him in there somewhere.

Pete is made of rock, so him being ticklish is like, impossible

(bows, leaves)

Hah! Oh so you thought! (re-enters)

So even though he's so rough and strong we all know that he's a softie. We also know that he's muscly, and that muscles make you more ticklish.

Rochelle found out that he was ticklish actually before they were dating by seeing him get tickled by Emmy before hours. Ofc when Pete saw Rochelle he was visibly embarassed and was pathetically trying to sound like a strong guy and said that he was faking laughing for Emmy's satisfaction to shut her up.

"Come on, surely there is an ounce of logic in your love bug brain. You know that I couldn't possibly be ticklish, I'm a rock and i can't even feel temperature. What was I supposed to do when Emmy started annoying me?"

Rochelle smirked - "well, ok, if that's the case than I still don't think Emmy is satisfied, so maybe you should 'fake' some more"

So yeah whenever someone asks if Pete's ticklish or doubts it when he says he isn't he always brings up logic to conclude that he couldn't possibly be ticklish

This also happened with Connie once because yk she's so randomly curious about the weirdest shit so she walks up to him one day and goes - "so, you know how your made of rock right? Does that mean you can't be ticklish?" And his heart STOPPED for a moment.

Also it has happened with Caleb ofc. Once Pete and Maury were in a meeting to create a list of notes on what touches would be acceptable for a potential partner, and they both wondered weather tickling would be ok so they asked Caleb in person. He said that it would be fine but first asked Pete if he would be ok with it. Ofc Pete pulled off his whole "i'm a rock so your question makes no sense" thing and ofc Caleb didn't fall for it and told him that, very many times, he had observed Pete getting itchy, which means that he was just as likely to be ticklish and even more so because he was sensitive. Maury smirked at Pete and Pete felt like throwing Caleb out the window (but never ACTUALLY considered it because he never would - he's a nonviolent rock).

Oh wait I haven't gotten to him ACTUALLY being tickled yet much so he is sometimes tickled by Emmy when she is pressuring him to say something (Emmy can always tell when there is something up).

ALSO I think Caleb tickled him once but on accident. Like he was poking and prodding Pete because he likes the texture of rocks and Pete just clenched his teeth and took it. Until he couldn't take it anymore and started giggling, squirming out of Caleb's grip with a "stawwp ittt" (fic idea?!)

Now, for the most important thing, spots...

Belly - 8/10. Lots of giggles

Neck - Not much

Sides - Bro will SCREAM, especially on the sides of his belly. 10/10

Underarms - pretty bad, some light chuckling. 4/10

That's all I can think of rn, thankyou for reading! Until next time gigglers (:

[lol-jackles]

Have you seen the first episodes of the final season of "The Crown"? What do you think about it? How realistic do you think this is? There are many similarities of the events that happened after the death of Diana between the show and the movie "The Queen". Had you watched it?

Yes, as far as I could recall in 1997, the events portrayed are mostly accurate. I even remember Charles hosting Camilla's 50th birthday party as a way to non-stealthily slide her into Diana's previous place. Meanwhile Diana was showing off her fabulous self to the press in St. Tropez so that her son William can have a peaceful vacation. While The Crown shows the important role of media every season, by its final season it drives home the point that the media isn’t just reporting on events, it��s an active participant in the lives of these people and institutions. Later, William and Harry helped their father feed the media so they can enjoy their holiday in Scotland. Sad to think present day real William using these skills to alienate his own brother and sister-in-law ...... so anyways...

The Crown set up parallelism between Charles and Dodi as two men born to incredible privilege and wealth, both were instructed by their parents to get with Diana while they were already seeing someone else. Charles' courtship of Diana was handled with a lot more care in season 4 compared to the hasty and half-baked one in season 6 even though Dodi's feelings for her are more genuine than Charles.

Elizabeth Debecki really grew into her role as Diana. In the previous season she seemed to be imitating Diana, but this season she embodied the character and commanded every scene with a force of nature that the script clearly couldn't conjure on their own anymore. Debecki makes Diana very likeable yet with just the right amount of selfishness and immaturity. She is compelling, charming, beautiful, fun, and sweet, but also can be calculating.  She was also incredibly shy and would tilt her head down, so as not to be inconspicuous due to her height.  Debicki's Diana really feels like a child trapped in an adult's body, thrown into adult situations.

Then the 3rd episode. I was surprised how tense I was getting and then realized it was filmed and directed to give the audience a sliver of the anxiety Diana felt on a regular basis. When Diana and Dodi were hiding in a jewelry store and then had to run out back because fans where banging on the front window, it looked like a zombie apocalypse scene.

Diana was basically a hostage of the al Fayeds.  She’s trapped with Dodi who desperately wants something from her, who is being hounded by his father, Mohammed, who desperately wants something from her. I don't think The Crown showed that Mohammed wouldn't send backup after he told her to leave her security in England, which is why security around Diana was ridiculously small. The French authorities didn't know Diana was coming to their city so weren't prepared.

Diana and Dodi's last private conversation in the Ritz hotel was obviously a wish fulfillment, nonetheless the actors did a great job and makes you really feel for them, especially Dodi who until now was unsympathetic due to being so weak willed with his father. Diana's interaction with Dodi explains why he, like many others, was attracted to Diana. With her encouragement, Dodi took the first symbolic step standing up to Mohammed. Like I said, wish fulfillment for the audience.

After their tragic death, the "ghosts" of Diana and Dodi visit their respective families. I understand that the ghosts were not representing Diana and Dodi but the yearning of the living for the last goodbye and make sense when a loved one is lost so prematurely. And also how the memory of Princess Diana looms very large in the minds of people for decades, even to future generation born after her death.

Overall the 4 episodes were well done. My main criticism is they should have shown unprecedented mass public grief over her death as a kind of bookend to the unprecedented mass public adoration from season 4. I believed had she lived, Diana would have moved to the United States and possibly settle down in California like what her son, Harry, did. Rest in Peace, Princess Diana

[vacantgodling]

I wanted to ask about someone from demon slayer but I couldn't figure out who to ask about so. please go off about someone from demon slayer if you have opinions otherwise please blast me with overwatch thoughts for:

15. What's your favorite ship for this character? (Doesn't matter if it's canon or not.)

16. What's your least favorite ship for this character?

17. What's a ship for this character you don't hate but it's not your favorite that you're fine with?

~ @void-botanist

LMAOOO thank you for the ask :’) technically i got some stuff im not normal about when it comes to demon slayer even tho i am much more chill about it than other things that i’m into LOL.

ummm i feel like it’d be easier if i just did it for the cast overall? cuz when else am i gonna talk about this pff

15. What is your favorite ship for this character? (Doesn’t matter if it’s canon or not)

my main demon slayer ships are:

Rengoku x Uzui (like a Lot this is probably my otp of this show. however uzui’s wives are included. its like a separate spoke poly to me? uzui x his wives are one half and the wives are all into each other then uzui x rengoku is the other half and rengoku and uzui’s wives all care about each other in a more platonic way lol. basically a healthy poly thing in my mind)

Tanjiro & Zenitsu & Inosuke (in a platonic way!!! those are my sons don’t separate them or i’ll sob!!!!!!)

Giyuu x Shinobu (i like how she teases him and even if she is disdained by his awkwardness sometimes i think she can really understand where he’s coming from and understand him even when he’s just kinda like :| yknow)

16. What is your least favorite ship for this character?

ig i can go down the list for stuff ive seen with any of the above that i’m not a huge fan of?

Rengoku x Akaza -> i hate akaza so fucking much i am strangling every post i see with him and this ship with my bare hands. I Do Not Care about akaza’s boohoo sad backstory i am killing him and not in the teehee way i mean every time i see him i become Enraged <3. muzan may be the antagonist of demon slayer but i want to see akaza’s death animated in Great Detail.

haven’t seen anything about uzui that’s made me squick cuz most people ship him with either his wives or with rengoku lmao

Tanjiro x Kanao -> even though they are canon i’m just not super into her character ig? like she and tanjiro don’t seem like couple material to me. he doesn’t really treat her any differently than any other person he interacts with (imo) and i would argue he shows more care and interest and love towards zenitsu and inosuke than kanao specifically. aside from the standard anime “girl pretty” energy which like. all anime does that so it’s not even a measure of attraction to me anymore (being a long time anime fan). don’t get me wrong i don’t hate her as a character but as a couple they just seem so… boring. esp of the main three canon couples. like inosuke and aoi i can see and i don’t mind, zenitsu and nezuko are a given but… kanao just isn’t a good match for my boy ig (to me) 💀💀

Zenitsu and Inosuke only really get shipped with Nezuko/Tanjiro (solo) respectively and i don’t dislike those. i just like the three of them together at all costs so ig i don’t like the idea of tanjiro and inosuke dating and zenitsu kinda being on the side if i HAD to be nitpicky about it. like the three of them are a unit. do not separate.

Giyuu x Sanemi -> sorry i just don’t like sanemi 💀💀💀

Shinobu x Mitsuri -> i LOVE mitsuri to death. but i hate when fandoms ship two femme characters just because they could be a lesbian couple and for no other reason aside from that. like i get Why because lesbian candidates in anime is fleeting esp in shonen bc of a lack of femme characters in general so like. i understand that but maybe just cuz im not a lesbian idc that much. it’s similar to how i feel about tanjiro/kanao i just don’t think mitsuri has put any special emphasis on her relationship with shinobu. like she looks up to her definitely. but like mitsuri loves everyone. and i feel like shinobu would do better with someone she wouldn’t feel pressured to be Only the happy side of herself with and i feel like once she broke down that barrier she would be able to be more herself around giyuu than around mitsuri.

also this isn’t mentioned in my main ships but i don’t like Mitsuri and Obanai as a couple. idc if they’re canon i don’t like him he’s annoying asf he is not good enough for my girl.

17. What's a ship for this character you don't hate but it's not your favorite that you're fine with?

Rengoku x Giyuu i’ve seen around and i’m okay with it. i love both of these two to death (#tanjiro’solderbrothers) and so them together makes me very soft. i think it would be super rough for giyuu just because i don’t think he’d think he was Good Enough for rengoku which is why i don’t ship it too heavily but like i love them both so i’m never mad when i see it.

Giyuu x Sabito i don’t really ship but like obviously i get why people do and it makes my heart hurt despite not shipping it like that </3

Tanjiro x Genya or Tanjiro x Muichiro are two things i don’t mind seeing. i don’t really ship them bc like. tanjiro is my son and it’s kinda weird for me to think about him romantically l m a o? and muichiro is even younger than him lol. in the case of genya i totally get it but again it’s more just “hmm yes that’s his best friend” like i immediately in my mind view it platonically vs romantically.

annnnd i think that’s it from off the top of my head? thank you again this was fun to actually talk about instead of just rotating it in my brain PFF

[chim-chim1310]

there are so many questions i want to ask the members of bts. unfortunately, we'll never know their real thoughts on the matter/whole solo era.

jimin and jk situation is the most interesting (though very sad). and we haven's seen taehyung's debut yet, so much to look forward to.

from the beginning of 2020 jimin looked really depressed, there was no happy bubbly jimin we knew. some fans believe he likes performing so much that their hiatus made him so miserable. some fans think smth happened, probably some kind of a quarrel (with soulmates - vmin - distancing from each other and it was clear that suga and jimin were also not on the best of terms and they had quite a strong friendship before that).

as for now, jimin and tae are still ignoring each other. jimin and suga seem friendly but i guess its connected with their overlapping promo. what is more, suga and jimin were talking about how relationships between people are hard during suchwita and jimin looked unhappy during that conversation.

i wonder how their internal relationships will change? smth already is not right - well, it looks not right for me, i may be wrong. now it's clear that jimin has outrun his bandmates in terms of success based solely on his vast talents. we witness how jk does the same, but in contrast to jimin, thanks to lots of money and hybe's pr department. some members have expressed their jealousy towards jimin when he had #1 hot100 (some didnt even congratulate him at all, some sounded bitter/heartless), though i doubt they will do the same with jk (some of them probably knew how jk was going to be pushed/promoted).

what do you think about their future relationships? do you believe smth did actually happened in the past (between jimin and other members)?

See I never thought yoongi and jimin were the type of friends to go out and hang out or whatever. They seemed more like brothers you know you don't usually hang out but they're there when you need advice and all. So I've never really questioned them because they never seemed weird when they interacted together. They seem the same.

What I did notice was jimin trying to do everything to avoid performing Tony Montana. I wonder why. Maybe because the song didn't speak to him anymore. Or maybe jimin thought he couldn't perform it after so many years. But yeah that was something I noticed.

Then taehyung and jimin well....... What can I say. Their relationship have always been weird. Sometimes they're like the bestest of friends sometimes they're so passive aggressive with each other. But then again they've always been like that.

However in chapter 2 I do think that jimin is pissed at taehyung for some reason. Or maybe he had just created a distance between him and taehyung. Reason? We would never know. But Idk if they had a big fight. If we look at yoongi's concert they seemed okay, no big fight. Also jimin said there's no reason for both of them to fight anymore. But it felt like there were some boundaries between them that weren't there before. And to me it seems like jimin's the one who drew the boundaries between them. Idk why though. Maybe they just drifted apart. It's not out of the ordinary. It happens a lot and tae anyway seems closer to wooga squad than to bts so.

Namjoon was weird during jimin's promotion. When jimin's album songs were announced rm posted it on his story and instead of congratulating jimin, he just circled his name in the credits and said "I wrote some lyrics". Like dude you didn't have to tell us army notice the smallest, most useless things. They would've noticed this too obviously. But idk Rm looked kinda desperate for people to know that he contributed a little to jimin's album which kinda made me side eye him a bit. He didn't even congratulate jimin properly.

And when jimin started winning shows then rm came live and said things which kinda hinted that he was jealous that he didn't get such things. If he wanted it he would've gone that route then why blame others? But yeah he did seem jealous. For billboard hot100 he did post it on his story though. So yeah that's that.

What I think though is that rm and yoongi were kinda jealous during face promotion. And I think the major reason for that is, they feel kinda threatened and insecure because of jimin. Like of course they're talented but they and everyone knows that jimin is the only one that has the IT factor. Another reason for them to feel insecure is because jimin have a stronger and bigger fanbase then rm and yoongi so I think that bothers them too.

I don't know but I never see them jealous of taehyung even if he's the most biased one. But that could be because they didn't see tae as a threat. I too believe that tae is not that passionate about music, he just wanna be popular without doing the actual idol thing iykwim.

I think they're not threatened by jungkook either. I don't think it's because jk is the maknae. Rm seemed more fond of jimin than of jk sometimes. And they're grown up adults I don't think anyone babies anyone in the group. So I don't think that's the reason.

I think Rm and yoongi are not threatened by jungkook because well.....they're seeing that jungkook's achievement are all by the company push, so it's not threatening to them.

But jimin on the other hand is different.......He's the king you know. I think Rm and yoongi noticed how jimin was sabotaged so much, how much less time he got for his promotions but still he managed to get that #1 without anyone's help. They saw how they themselves had a smooth sailing but still they didn't reach at jimin's level.

That's what threatens them. In jungkook's case they settle with the fact that his achievement is because of the scooter. But in jimin's case they can't comfort themselves with that. Because jimin has both talent and a dedicated fanbase and you know the fire inside him to achieve it. Also outside of armies kpop stans mostly talk about jimin. Whether it's positive or negative jimin still is relevant to them. While I don't think they care enough about other members to even hate on them lol. kpop stans hate comes from jealousy and jealousy comes because they're threatened by jimin's talent.

That's why armies too feel threatened. Remember how they started hating on jimin accusing him of sleeping with bangpd when face was doing good. They accused him he was given the preferential treatment. It was because they could see jimin getting bigger than the group. Because negative or positive, jimin gets people talking. They can't ignore him.

And for jungkook and jimin. Dude......I'm extremely confused. From all the stories and all they both seemed to have fun in NY. I don't understand how. Maybe jimin is not blaming jk? Maybe their friendship is that strong that they don't care about such superficial things. Or keeping personal and work life separate though that seem impossible. But idk according to me they seem fine even with everything going around. So ig we just have to wait and see.

And for the future I really don't know what's gonna happen. Maybe members don't care about jk getting all this now. But if it continues even during jk's album then maybe they'll have a problem. But by then ig rm and yoongi will be in military so idk.

But I really can't see them coming together as a group again. Even before the drama, the moment hiatus was announced I knew they would not come together as a group again. Because come on......there's no way people won't change after 2 years. They might want different things from their life after military and maybe they would just not be able to adjust together as a group again.

Honestly I was sad at that time thinking we won't get group together anymore but after chapter 2 i wish that it stays like that. Because i don't want it to be jk and 6 friends lol. And I prefer jimin solo. I'm just over the whole group thing ig. Maybe because I'm a solo stan now.

[luzarvizublog]

Library Assignment

"A Minecraft Movie" May Craft Something New

Author: Sebastian Strawser

A brief summary

The article mainly discusses how "The Minecraft Movie" can actually surprise us and answers the question, "What if I was in Minecraft?". He points out the good and the bad things here and there but saying that the cast and the "stunning" visuals might actually make it at the box office.

Sebastian also explains some other things about the game itself, but in another talk, he says that the "Minecraft" movie could end up being a lively, refreshing, and bold take on the expressionless "Minecraft" world.

Why did you pick this article?

I was discussing the trailer for this movie with some friends, and we noticed that some of the designs looked AI-generated. It was as if you had entered any AI image generator and typed "Minecraft"; the visuals and designs were quite similar to those in the Minecraft movie, but of course, we all said this as a joke. We also noticed the kid looked a lil bit "soulless"...? He just didn't look right in a way.

In the end, turns out that we were right. In a recent Q and A conference, Jared Hess (director for the "Minecraft Movie") answered some questions from the fans like...

Why was the movie live-action and not animated?

I asked my friend Chris Bowman (the movie's screenwriter) the same thing and he said "It wouldn't fit like that." He liked the open world of the game and based the cast chemistry and the basic plot on "Jumanji" and "Zatura." Making an animated movie wouldn't work, he had to be faithful to his "inspiration."

Why does Steve as a kid in the trailer look fake?

Because he is! (laughs). We are trying new things with this movie. We put all the effort into the realism of the mods while the rest is being done with artificial intelligence. The kid shot and certain parts of the script were done with those tools.

The director also said a quote like "I just can't disappoint the 10-year-olds or they're going to murder us"...WELL.

There are people who are intimidated by all this artificial intelligence, there is a campaign going on in the animation industry about this and how some corporations are firing a lot of artists, there was something that actually really stick in my head "Corporations don't care about they're employees, but they care about YOU, the consumers". Sounds sad but it's true.

What can we learn about this? AI is a tool, and it is important to remember that this tool is designed to augment human capabilities, not replace them. It's all about finding the right balance and ensuring that we use AI to complement, not to replace.

At this point, I couldn't care less about the movie's plot. Instead, I'm giving all the credit to the artists involved. I recently watched a behind-the-scenes video about the film and discovered that many of the props I thought were created using CGI were actually handcrafted and sculpted by artists working on the project, which I found it's truly amazing!

Did anything surprise you?

Minecraft was a big part of my childhood, so I was both surprised and excited when I first came across a post about this film. My initial thought was, "Okay, cool. I'm guessing it's going to be animated" and then the trailer came out and I just stood at the screen like...oh. Zero thoughts were said at that moment other than..."Why?"

I came across this other article were they talk about what does the target audience think about this movie? You know, the "10-year-old murderers", and there was this kid who said "I think it looks pants. Minecraft isn’t at its peak in popularity anymore. Why are they making a film about it now? I don’t think it will do well." Now wait, the kid got a point there! I mean, this movie was already being discussed a decade ago, right, but I think things could have gone "better"...I don't know, at this point, anything could have happened.

In my personal opinion, I think the interactive Netflix series is better. I would have preferred if they had created something like that or even if they had made an animated movie I wouldn't mind having Jack Black as the voice of Steve. I reached this conclusion after watching someone create a fully animated remake of the trailer. Alternatively, it might be best if they just didn't make a Minecraft movie at all.

At the end of the day, if I decide to go and spend my money on this movie, I honestly think there will obviously be laughs here and there without a doubt. I think this might be just like one of those movies that feels like a fever dream or something. In Mexico, we often refer to movies that aren't particularly artistic but are entertaining as "palomera." These films are funny, easy to follow, and make for a great choice when you want to relax on the couch with some popcorn, whether you don't have anything else to watch or simply want something to play in the background.

Sourced used:

[definitelynotfrankincense]

Alright I've had a week so you know what, it's time for Sonic posting. Rather, Shadow posting. Copypasting a rant I found scribbled down in a notepad from I don't know how long ago.

There's a pretty huge disconnect between the various Shadows we've known. Most will say there are 2 or 3, but I think there are 6. A seasoned Shadow fan will obviously tell you SA2 Shadow is a different character from any of the others, and I agree. But I branch off from that and say that Heroes, Battle, Shadow 05, Sonic 06 and Meta-era are all distinctly different Shadows, too.

SA2, pre-mindscrew, was already agonizing over his purpose. That is all we know about pre-mindscrew Shadow. For the rest of the game, he's dealing with said mindscrew on top of the ARK Incident having basically happened yesterday for him. He is sad, he is angry, and he's been brainwashed to want the world to burn. He has a little bit of a fun streak in how he words things, though. The sadness and anger are rightfully still there even after realizing his memories were altered, but his reason for acting is still exactly the same: The dying wish of Maria.

Heroes seems to be Shadow at his most pure state. There is nothing really bogging him down at that point, and his interactions with the other characters are pretty positive and fun. You can see bits of his SA2 self in there with some of the odder things he says. This is the last time where he even seems to be having fun without it being at someone else's expense.

Battle is an oddball game straddling canon and non canon in general. But this Shadow has a good chunk (or all) of his memories and is very hung up on his past. He cannot be post-Shadow 05, as he doesn't care about his past anymore after that, but he also can't be pre-Shadow 05 because he has way clearer memory of his past. I think this is what a lot of people kind of wanted from him as a character at the time (and kind of still now), since they expect him to have kept his memories of Maria as dear to him.

Shadow 05 is... a mess of characterization. They fumbled super hard, but I think I get what they were going for, so I'll just go off of what I think the intention was. He's as haunted as he was in SA2 (both about his purpose and the ARK Incident) but without the context for it, he's desperate, he's being pulled every which way and being told who he is by everyone he meets, and his sense of self is fragile. He is very emotional. But the way this is all portrayed does not feel at all like an in-between point of Heroes and 06; it feels like a totally different person.

Sonic 06 Shadow is what a lot have realized is their actual ideal Shadow. He's confident, he allies with whoever is most convenient for his goals, he cares for his friends, he takes no shit, and he probably would be the one spitting harsh truths that nobody wants to hear if the situation arose. Some say he fights only for himself at this point, focusing on the original wording of his final line in his campaign, but those goals all aligned with helping people, so I think they're trying a bit too hard to interpret him as self-centered. Sonic X Season 3 kind of falls in line with this Shadow, I think. This Shadow is perhaps too competent.

(Also there being a tangible future where he's imprisoned for eternity could point toward him willingly surrendering. I'm not saying I believe it, but he could have surrendered for any number of reasons. The measures humans were taking against him could have been drastic enough that, if he kept fighting, he would really kill them all, and he deemed it better to just give up since his mere existence was helping tear humanity up. Maybe he just got tired of fighting for however many years it lasted. Maybe they had leverage over him, able to destroy or kill something he valued over himself (Rouge&Omega?). Maybe he just couldn't bring himself to hurt Omega. Or maybe it's nothing and he was just plain defeated.) (Also screw the horribly OOC Omega of 06. And why would GUN have any authority over an Eggman mech that even Eggman couldn't keep on a leash?? He's honestly why I personally discredit 06. Omega is the worst part of 06 and I know what I'm saying with that.)

Nothing really needs to be said about Meta-era Shadow. He was an edgelord with no friends and is overconfident to an extreme fault. They based his entire personality off of the poorly localized line "this will be like taking candy from a baby, and that's fine by me". Garbage tier Shadow. Not even Shadow anymore. He was just Evil Sonic. Also the ARK Incident was probably retconned out during this era.

Now the miscellaneous Shadows that have yet to cement themselves as the current iteration of Shadow.

(I think I wrote this when we only had a bit of season 2? And I haven't seen season 3 yet.) Prime Shadow is a good step in the right direction. We don't have much in the way of his motives so far (the best we can guess is just generally "keep the world safe"), but his attitude is finally turning away from edgelord to something more like a really annoyed pragmatist. He's actually a pretty good counterpart to Sonic this way. I'd trust the writers of Prime to do him right.

I'm not totally up-to-date on IDW. The bit with the Shadow androids seemed alright? Didn't really give him much to redeem himself character-wise from the damage that was already done in the metal virus arc, but dang did he get to be cool.

The Fast Friends Forever profiles finally acknowledge his backstory for the first time in 13 years (not counting Sonic Channel art and collab material like Legos?? lmao) which is cool, and plainly states his motives--that being to protect earth and its people because of Maria's wish--which may go against the ending of Shadow 05?? Ian Flynn also seems to be of the mind that Shadow 05 was about throwing his past away? so we have 2 recent interpretations that are directly conflicting with each-other. I guess we'll see who wins. (Who's the fake hedgehog around here?!)

I think what I'd most like to see is a redo of Shadow 05 that feels like a more cohesive transition from Heroes to 06 Shadow (or whatever we're deciding current-era Shadow is/should be). Or just Heroes. More Heroes Shadow would be good :] I'd like to see Shadow enjoying himself instead of just being a shade of angry-and-done all the time.

[marielle555]

Thank you so much! Everything you said is spot on. And helped me realize, what it is this feeling that at one time specifically ruined the perception of BG3. Metagaming. I'm a big fan of DnD and RPGs as well. Before I met BG3, I'd had the great pleasure of going through both Pathfinder games and a few other interesting games before that and they gave me quite a few amazing hours of immersion in a fantasy world. BG3 also first gave me that immersion, and then threw me out of it, making me become for a while an exceptionally sad average person from real life, sitting next to a PC screen and writing feedback, in which behind the “wall of text” hid the same meaning: "***! What the ***! Fix your *** in the game!" A unique gaming experience and a uniquely striking contrast, the likes of which I couldn't have imagined if I hadn't encountered in person - an amazing, truly extraordinary character - Astarion, who makes you fall in love with him so much, that you simply don't want anyone else, that I didn't want to give up on him “without a fight” after patch 6, and such, to put it mildly, “ flaws” in his romance, that if someone had told me about it in advance, before I had time to get attached to the character personally, I would not only never touch this game, but even the studio itself with any other projects I would probably avoid it like the plague. But thanks to this interaction with a real player, I learned a lot of new information - what a non-con is, what modern game-therapy approach to healing trauma is, how bad it is to sexualize game characters, and that “all modern vampires,” it turns out, are “tragic”…

Why should I even care what they have going on with “modern” vampires? I bought BG3 because I adored the BG series games, I need Faerûn to be there, my character needs to be a resident of it, and she fell in love with a vampire on Faerûn. This world exists separate from all this “modernity”, therapy language, all this ‘'sexualization’' stuff, some rules of ‘'healthy/unhealthy relationships’' and whatever else is fashionable at this particular stage concretely in Western culture. This world has its own lore, its own rules by which it exists. This idea of “vampire fetishization” that “should” bother a vampire-Astarion, living on Faerûn, completely spits on DnD's lore. And that "There's nothing more desirable in the world than a vampire, is there? “, which completely defies logic, and is in irresolvable contradiction with realistic and actual: ”People don't trust vampires - perhaps understandably - so I needed to get someone on my side“, makes Astarion cease to be Astarion, and become a signboard for those, who for some unknown reason wanted to declare vampire romance as something ‘bad’ and ”unhealthy". And replace it with a healthy sexualization of bears to “improve society”, no other way…

Up until Act 3, the game was going great. There were some rough edges and “stumbles” that didn't kill, but somewhat spoiled the immersion, like the inability to tell the companions trying to seduce Tav, that you are already in a relationship with Astarion. The first sense that you're not the hero of the story comes in the dialogue with Halsin, when that line about you already being in a relationship comes off as completely obnoxious, as if you're okay with Halsin's proposal despite Astarion's love... And you're no longer the heroine of the story, but a boring monogamous heterosexual woman, who has to realize that being monogamous isn't cool or modern. Okay, here I can still imagine that the heroine of the story, unlike me, is a slight-talker, and isn't going to spend any more time on Halsin than it takes to say one word: “No” and move on. But in Act 3 it's just not possible anymore, when you can't pick a line in a scene because they're all no good, but you have to poke your mouse at something or the game won't continue, it's a really awful feeling. And yeah, without spoilers we can't know for sure, without spoilers I honestly assumed that “I want your body” was also some other modern day bullshit, like “it's cool to talk frankly about sex” because the game itself is unabashedly sexualized, with everyone hitting on Tav all the time, including illithid. It was just done poorly, but without spoilers I didn't realize it was done intentionally.

And after the check with mind-reading and “you're degrading yourself...”, to which it is impossible to react, for the first time in my life I had an acute desire for negative interaction through “kinetic discussion” directly with the author of the scene, especially because of the combination of these rails with the ‘possibility’ of “kicking him in the balls”. Why was such an abomination added, filmed, and no normal reactions? I generally find it disgusting that the game has such an “opportunity” and the only way to justify it in and of itself would be if it was possible to hit everyone, absolutely everyone in the game in cutscenes - Karlach, Jaheira, Wyll, Shadowheart, Gale, Lae'zel, Halsin, Mystra (in Gale Origins), only then would it pass as an opportunity for roleplay. This kind of feeling seems to be due to a side effect of Welch's desire to constantly interact directly with the player rather than the character, the player also starts thinking about “Who wrote this?!” instead of enjoying their favorite escapism.

The only thing that makes the situation better and allows you to continue enjoying the game is the mods and the realization, that Astarion can't think you helped him ascend just because you're thirsty for vampire lords. I used to not be very fond of mods, even cosmetic ones, so as not to disrupt the original story in any way or bring something into the fantasy world that couldn't be in it. BG3 was an exception - mods become a “magic pill”, modders are amazingly talented and, what is especially nice, mods do not break immersion, but, on the contrary, help it, making the story better and more realistic.

I agree with you, and I can't say that Baudelaire Welch is a bad writer. It's entirely possible that they are a good writer. They are a bad scriptwriter for RPG games. A player character in an RPG should not be any kind of “narrative tool”, much less one with emotions spelled out by the author. Even Tav's inappropriate facial expressions at many plot points are annoying. This would be fine in a game with a pre-made character, who already has their own appearance, personality, and backstory, but in a game, where you create your own character, it spoils the game. And it could easily be avoided by simply moving the camera more often to companions or NPCs at times, when the PCs' emotional reactions might be different - the player knows how they feel about it, and besides, looking at a companion while talking to them is much more realistic than looking “at yourself”. And when you're a character in someone else's fanfic, why doesn't the game description say FPG (fanficplay game)? It would be better to invent a new genre than to cheat fans of a genre that has been around for a long time. And the very idea of inviting a fanfic author is really bad, since the script should be written by a professional screenwriter. Wouldn't Stephen Rooney, a professional screenwriter, have written the entire Astarion's romance on his own? A screenwriter of that caliber, who clearly doesn't need anyone to “help” him with his writing at all. Fane's romance in Divinity 2 was perfectly written, and if I'm not mistaken, there was no “special writer” for the romances when Larian did Divinity 2, and there were no major problems with the romances in Divinity either. The fanfiction community has always been perfectly fine gathering around any interesting game setting, people were perfectly fine realizing their fantasies using RPG plots written by professional screenwriters. And among the authors of Astarion fanfics there are people, who write better than Baudelaire Welch, Larian could at least organize a fair contest, if they wanted to add a fanfiction author to the scripting team....

And the anti-AA “fandom” is made up of people who don't understand a damn thing about roleplaying, RPGs, or DnD. Astarion “loses his soul” (I think that even sounds ridiculous to any DM or relatively experienced DnD player), then he has “textbook signs of abuser” (you can take a textbook, find signs of abuser in anti-AA themselves, find signs of abuser in Tav in the UA route - it's not hard, but I'd really like to do without textbooks at all, which can't be written on Faerûn).  “Your Tav feels this or that, your Tav is ‘”asking for freedom“’, right down to multiple statements about real players really '”wanting a hot vampire daddy“, ”gooners", and so on. Maybe some “media literate” people need someone to write everything for them, including reality, need authorities to tell them what to think, what to say, and who are the ‘'gooners’' here, but I would hate to be forced to apply my own media literacy to games, figuring out what's the reason that my game is being ruined, what's the “agenda” and what's the preaching in honor of. When in the real world you need this very media literacy to be able to separate facts from lies, in a game you want to take a break from it all. The very essence of escapism is a temporary escape from reality. People whose level of “literary literacy” is at the level of a middle school student, when it is necessary to memorize from the textbook “what the author wanted to say”, to mumble it or write it in an essay and get praise for it, are probably attracted by such simplistic stories about “the cycle of abuse”, “power corrupts” and they accept the metagame and the author's attempts to “teach them”, the main thing is that it was clear, what button to press and how to sexualize someone correctly, so that they could write “good person” in their notebook for it. But I personally buy a book, when I want to read a book, and watch a movie, when I want to be a spectator, and the main pleasure of RPG is the possibility of immersion, the possibility of being inside these events, personal interaction with the characters. If you don't like a book, you can easily drop it, if the series has gone downhill, you can just stop watching it and find another one, but when your character in an RPG is replaced by a doppelgänger created by the author and you can't do anything about it - it's a completely different feeling. And when they try to force you to part with your beloved character, your LI, who looked at you through the screen and interacted with you and not with the heroine of the series - that's a completely different feeling too.

In Daeran romance (Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous) there is a moment, where you can kill the character Liotr, who has learned his secret. Daeran can also kill him himself, you can persuade Liotr, and not kill him. Funny thing is, I found out about the fact that you can choose not to kill him after playing the game by reading the guide, I also found out that it's killing a story NPC, turns out to be a very bad thing, “doing evil for Daeran's sake” according to some people. And I seem to have gotten what is considered his “evil ending” or not, I don't know, the ending was great and very happy, was too lazy to dig further on the internet to find out what it was called. The main thing is that the authors didn't try to “teach” me at all, there was no “very bad” in the game, immersion wasn't interrupted for a second. Pathfinder is perfectly playable blind, without requiring a single spoiler or any guides during the first playthrough. You can read the guides afterwards to marvel at the possible branching of the scenario and the thoughtfulness of the plot and wonder: “Wow, it was possible even that way!” I would never have thought, “being inside the plot”, that it would be possible to let someone who knows such a terrible secret of my beloved person live, and killing Liotr feels like a necessary decision. Yes, an evil act, but an evil act in a “do what you have to do” kind of way, sometimes you have to get your hands dirty, and I wasn't even robbed of the alignment of chaotic-good for that act. In Daeran's romance, there's a line for the PCs, “I will always support you” or “I will always be on your side” (not verbatim) that you choose, and interestingly enough, it's a non-alignment line - love has no alignments, it's something more important than '‘good’ and “evil”. In BG3 for Astarion, we don't have anything like that after he Ascended. Although there was a similar answer in one of the dialogs before that, in the dialog when Astarion wants to find the other spawns. Where did that intention then disappear to? In the same dialog with Daeran, next to this main line, there was also a line leaning the player's alignment “towards good” - something about “you can always be a better person”, something in memory directly giving away the waibes of the UA route. And the line “towards evil” - something about Daeran being a tool for you. When such a line is just there - well, maybe that's how someone roleplays, it doesn't get in the way. In a good RPG bad lines are not noticeable, you just slip a glance and choose another, “your” line, and they can not be called bad, when they are not imposed on anyone, when it is one of many options. In Daeran's romance, it's one “evil” line. In the dialog after the ritual, it's ALL lines. “I want to become a vampire” and “I want your body” - Astarion is seen as a “tool” for Tav + two lines for lecturing and scolding.

After I killed Liotr, Daeran didn't think I was “sexualizing” him. When Daeran says “freedom at last” and you ask him why, he says: “because it's the most beautiful thing, except life itself, and many fail to appreciate it”. The Ascended Astarion would probably think the same thing, not that I “lust for him as a vampire”. When I asked Daeran “does he feel lonely around me” in the romantic dialog, he said “no, especially after you got your hands dirty for me”. And Astarion has instead “You're degrading yourself by staying with him...”  And one really gets sad for such a unique and wonderful character like Astarion, when you compare the writing of his romance to Daeran's romance, which was written by professional screenwriters.

“Escapism is the main point of any roleplaying game” - thank you, and I'd awfully like to see studios that produce roleplaying games have a sign with that inspirational phrase hanging in an office somewhere.

I often read that Astarion has two authors, Rooney and Welch. I'd be interested to know what influence Welch had on the AA story. Some also say that his story was "watered down" by Larian. Objectively, though, only Tav's facial expressions changed, so I don't know what else would have changed in his story. Thanks for your answer.

Baudelaire Welch, a former “the companion character designer lead” who has been working on Baldur's Gate 3 as “the romance feature lead”, in their own words, “wrote quite a few of the Astarion romance dialogues in the later period of production”. Unfortunately, this author's work, their views, and their personal perception of how game romances affect real-life romances have been largely a bad influence on the romance of Ascended Astarion. It was Welch's view that the Ascension was a “bad ending” for Astarion that was subsequently hyped by AA haters (Stephen Rooney, the author of Astarion, himself corrected this by saying that the Ascension was not Astarion's ‘bad’ ending, it was his “evil” ending). Their somewhat twisted understanding of romance and desire to make the players feel like failures was expressed in this one:

Article: "Baldur's Gate 3 writer's explanation of Astarion's 'bad' ending is a wake-up call for players lusting over RPG characters".

This kind of insult to the audience, the portrayal of players as sex-crazed (which was later used heavily against Astarion's fans) goes a long way towards explaining where this single mind-reading check in the game came from, which is impossible to react to, and provides no additional options for interaction. The author “wrote” a certain sex-crazed player, creating scenes without the possibility of any roleplay. Accordingly, the scene of dialog with the worst lines (“I want your body”, etc.) and the same impossibility of roleplay, also belongs to Welch's pen. As a player I can only reply: "I failed to see a good RPG in the third act. It's beyond my understanding of classic RPG games". These lines and this check have already been criticized and discussed many times, but the essence of the logic of this narrative is best conveyed here:

(Picture taken from Larian forum, author Ametris, was published on the forum during the period of active indignation of players after patch 6)

How the author managed to ascribe such motivation to the players is, of course, a mystery, as is where the theme of sex is traced during the Ascension ritual, why Astarion can be helped without having romance with him, and why sex can be refused (the romance is preserved). And of course, for submitting to this imposed narrative, the player who leaves Astarion a spawn forever will be rewarded with sex. But without the cutscene. As for the post-Ascension sex scene itself, Welch claimed she didn't know it existed.

Thank you so much to Larian's animation team! You are the best! We can roughly conclude from this that the Welch's authorship of the scene of the night after the Ascension may only include the lines. I even suppose that the very notes of the developers for this scene could belong to Stephen Rooney himself (but this is only an assumption, it is impossible to find information about who wrote these notes).

These developer notes clearly describe how Astarion and Tav love each other and how Astarion is powerful and free. So, thanks for everything we love about this scene, to the animators and to Neil and his beautiful acting. And if you compare the lines for the player, you'll see a strong difference in the quality of writing compared to other scenes of Astarion's romance - Act 1 scene (this scene is written by Stephen Rooney and it's great) everything is fine with the roleplay, Act 3 is a scene of 4 bad lines, it's just impossible to make a choice while maintaining immersion. You can even just compare Tav's facial expression in act 1 scene (when you offer Astarion your neck and he bites you) - the facial expression is adequate to the situation, it's real, as it should be - a smile, you can see that Tav is enjoying it, and in act 3 they imposed a stupid frowning face, and the surprise is as if it's the first time Astarion bit you, and in general everything is bad and Tav just tolerates it. One is left to fantasize about how great the romance could have been if Stephen Rooney had written the entire story of Astarion and every line in it by himself. “A Gentle Line” would have been beautiful for sure. But these are dreams, and in reality, unfortunately, the post-Ascension scene was regularly made worse starting in patch 4:

(From Larian Forum, author Ametris)

Also in this interview with Welch and Schick: “Baldur's Gate 3 Writers Break Down the Craft of Video Game Sex and Romance” you can learn more about the writers' approach to romance. Interesting that:

“In contrast, romance was baked into Baldur’s Gate 3 from the beginning, and Larian developed its dynamic animation system to account for characters having to hug and kiss.” As a result, we have one hug in the Act 2 scene (and that in this scene for confession of feelings for me this action seems too weak, compared to the possibility to open the mind, which I find more serious and sincere). Except it's possible to regularly load a save just to hug Astarion, but within the story Astarion wasn't hugged once until the mod.

“It used to be set up so that the only way that romances could begin was this one night in the party, where you could only pick one character,” Welch says, “And then basically, that character would end up being your love interest for the whole rest of the game.”

This locked fans into dating the same character simply due to a few choices made toward the start of the game. As a fan before coming to work at Larian, though, Welch wished players could experience love triangles and multiple partners.”

It's unfortunate the resources went into this. I was honestly rather saddened to learn that BG3 was originally intended to be a good classic RPG with a romance with a single companion. I can imagine how rich the romance could have been, if all the resources wasted on bears, cheating, “choices between the two” and whatnot had been shared between the romances with LI. For Act 1 there's 2 hours of extra content created for all those triangles (including lines, scenes, and companion reactions), but a hug for Astarion - no, not even in the epilogue, just as there's no kiss in the epilogue, nor is there any opportunity for a “gentle” romance.

And to this:

“People often write fanfiction that is deeply about conflict, about angst, about actual challenges that are being overcome in a relationship,” Welch says. “There are quite a lot of really heartbreaking break-up scenes that happen in Baldur’s Gate 3. That’s the thing that people don’t necessarily consider being an important part of romance.”

I think there's a reason people don't consider breakups an important part of romance. Games are about escapism and fun after all. There's no way I'd pay $70 to get frustrated and get something as unpleasant as a relationship breakup in a game. Fine, let it be, if someone likes it, as an extra option that doesn't get in the way and doesn't take a lot of resources away from the main romance line. I believe that romance in the game and lines for the player should be made for those players, who love the character, and all this side stuff like breakups and fights can be added as an option for those, who want to break up the romantic relationship, but not in the amount of tons of nasty lines for Tav for more than half of the content with no possibility to say “I love you”, hug and kiss gently (which is unfortunately the case in the Ascended Astarion romance). The possibility of a breakup is a common sideline for romance, yes, it should exist in RPGs, but to give it so much importance, to define the romance by it, is ridiculous. But the haters really fucked up AA fans with their “you can't break up with him”. And it's worth pointing out the hypocrisy of praising “Endless Thirsty Fan Art” and sex speedruns on the one hand, and on the other - note the very title of the article, “Baldur's Gate 3 writer's explanation of Astarion's ‘bad’ ending is a wake-up call for players lusting over RPG characters.” Players are being insulted and called gooners for… Wanting to help their beloved character in a plot quest! Just to prevent a tragic outcome for him with “Astarion will remain a spawn forever” and a finale that looks and is essentially a poorly executed quest for an evil companion. And I'm not at all against the first one, I fully support diversity and providing different options in games so people can fulfill whatever sexual fantasies they want without any judgment, but just without this kind of hypocrisy and trying to insult and ruin the game for a portion of the audience who paid the same price for the game as everyone else.

In the game Baudelaire Welch seems to have decided to “shame” fans of vampire romance - in the dialog of non-romantic Astarion after meeting Oblodra in Act 2 we can hear his line: “There's nothing more desirable in the world than a vampire, is there?” and their favorite “degradation” (“It's degrading that people like her fall for it”). This gives haters the opportunity to compare fans of the Ascended Astarion to this very same Oblodra. In order to learn about Oblodra's attraction to Astarion one must play through the game without having a romance with him. Otherwise the meaning of the insult slips away (as it did for me the first time I saw such a comparison, thanks to Arachnomancer for commenting on my previous post with detailed lines). How unrealistic this line sounds in the world of Faerûn, where vampires are feared and clearly not “desired”, well, it's a pretty well known phenomenon that when the agenda comes to the forefront, the lore of the world, realism and other things of little importance to preach cease to matter. It's possible to imagine that Astarion might have encountered something similar in the past, but in the rest of the game, except for this place, attitudes towards vampires are shown differently. In the romantic dialog, Astarion can say, “People don't trust vampires - perhaps understandably - so I needed to get someone on my side. And seducing you was easy, frankly.” He needed protection, because people don't trust vampires, which sounds logical. And the motivation to seduce Tav for the sake of that protection made sense too. Astarion admits that Tav was his first (in terms of a bite, the first person to voluntarily give him their blood, and Astarion took it as a gift “This is a gift, you know. Thank you - I won't forget it.") And he definitely was hiding the fact that he was a vampire, when he was forced to seduce victims for Cazador. The Curse of the Vampyr book (the first of which is literally right in the first tomb) - also illustrates how vampires are treated in the world of Faerûn. Companion reactions after the bite scene. The girl in the sewers (whom Petras has invited, in order to drink her dry, celebrating what he thought would become his freedom), we can tell her that the guy she's waiting for is a vampire, and she'll be scared and completely unwilling to stay waiting for the most desirable lover. Astarion also didn't want to risk stirring our desire too quickly and hid the fact that he was a vampire, early in the adventure. What fans of vampire romance got was preachy, and RPG fans got degradation. The degradation of the genre, when in Act 3 you suddenly get an RPG novelization.

And it's funny how with one hand, bestiality is added to the game (Baudelaire Welch also authored the infamous bear scene, which they say was done for the sake of some “horny shitposting” fans who do it with their friends on Discord, you can see more about it in their “Romance Design in Video Games” lecture below, and game magazines have also written about it, “A sort of shit-eating grin was on my face when I was pitching it”), and the other hand is an accusation for players who like vampire romance. Well, okay, they don't accuse all vampire sexualizers (if you don't let Astarion Ascend, he won't stop being a vampire, but he is allowed to be sexualized), they only accuse players who like healthy vampire romance (when the vampire is healthy, not burning or starving), and try to claim that we're “experiencing the pleasure of degradation”.

But, the main thing is that Larian did not force players to finally break up with the game and changed Tav's facial expressions in the kisses to adequate ones. The animations of the D/s scenes for Ascended Astarion's kisses were filmed separately, and the words “scared, sad and pained”, (were discovered by the modders in the game's code) were used in order to draw the facial expressions of a rape victim on the faces of the player characters as a “Valentine's Day gift”. There is no confirmation that this was the entire studio's idea. Stephen Rooney, sadly, left Larian before patch 6 was released and he had nothing to do with these disgusting scenes. Patch 7 fixed this, and most likely led the kissing to the version of the content that was previously intended as fanservice. During Larian's appearance at PAX West 2024, when answering a question about sexuality in BG3, Adam Smith mentioned that they purposely added "kinky" sexual scenes into the game to make things more authentic, and that they consider that a good thing that they're proud of. He said, "We wanted it to feel authentic... I don't think sexuality should be controversial; different kinks, arousals, fetishes, whatever it might be... I think it's okay for things to be sexy.” Larian positioned the romance in BG3 as a dating simulator before, and by including BDSM romance, they chose Astarion for the dominant role because he's best suited for it. And the horrible faces for the player character is like Welch's attempt to “finish their novel” (as their fans used to threaten that “the novel must be finished”) at the expense of a wonderful character written by Stephen Rooney and at the expense of cheating players (patch 6 in regards to Astarion's fanservice was a fraud and consumer deception - given that the genre of the game purchased was RPG and the roleplay in the romance line was absent and replaced with low quality fanfic). Unfortunately, these scenes were also triggering and triggered PTSD in many people. (“New Astarion kisses in Baldur's Gate 3 have a disturbing effect on fans and here's why”).

Perhaps Mx Welch thought this was some kind of uniquely innovative approach. In his lecture Romance Design in Video Games:

Welch presented a list of what they think will make romances in games more interesting for players (and what I would call “A Practical Guide: How to Make a Player Unhappy in Your Game with Romantic Relationships.”):

It seems like the disgusting “kisses” designed to victimize the player by stripping them of agency and painting horrible faces on their characters was a failed attempt at realizing point 6. And the haters “fandom” with their “Cazador 2.0”, “soul loss” and other nonsense that is based on nothing is a realized point 5. So seeing gaslighting in a BG3 game definitely succeeded, albeit not in the romance of the game, but in the fandom. In AA romance, there's an opportunity for a roleplay of a toxic partner, all the negativity goes through Tav - lines for Tav (like “You're like Cazador”), imposed facial expressions, no opportunity for roleplay there, where it might have elicited some particular deep emotional reaction from Astarion (you can see the potential of AA's romance in chatbots, even in hater's chatbots, how much he loves and reacts if the player has the opportunity to write their lines, but, in the game, alas, we have a scene of 4 negative lines). Plus “mind-reading” with “degradation” is an imposition on the writer's (Welch's) position. It's a tricky screenwriting move (but “tricky” in a bad way) - the line reflects Astarion's inner state, combined with his character, his inner pain and his self-esteem because of his trauma, and that's what Welch used. But combined with the inability to do anything about it, we get trapped. We have to validate this self-perception of his, while at the same time allowing the author to stigmatize ourselves and fit us to their narrative, as in the tale of the Little Mermaid, who gives her voice to the Witch to save the prince. Plus it gives an opportunity for someone to take that line as if Astarion sees Tav as inferior to himself, or twist it to favor their propaganda. The dialogue scene before this is also a deliberate violation of all laws of the RPG genre - it's purposely done this way, in order to make the player look like a “sexualizer” and give a “feel bad ending”. I believe Welch's contribution is primarily Tav and the lines for Tav (yes, and all those relationship-breaking lines). Of course, Welch did some good stuff ("Aeterna Amantes. Lovers forever, until the world falls down” is their line, according to their fans, the scene of Act 2 is also good and very touching). Exactly what other Ascended Astarion lines belong to their pen is probably unlikely to be known for sure. I've read that Stephen Rooney wrote the epilogue and Astarion at the party after the epilogue, but I have no confirmed evidence of that. But it seems true - the adorable animations of Astarion at the party - the bat, the costume, the way Astarion throws the cup, plays with daggers, etc. seem to me to match Rooney's writing. And the lack of hugs and kisses just for us, just for our fandom, just for our Astarion is more like Welch's solution. Although, considering that even after Welch left, even though they changed our faces, none of the other requests were fulfilled, perhaps the blame for the deterioration of Astarion's romance also lies with those who officially own the rights to the BG3 characters - Wizards of the Coast. Shortly before Patch 6, Wizards of the Coast had mass layoffs of people, many of whom had worked with Larian and interacted with them about the BG3 game. At the very least, don't blame it solely on Welch, there were probably other individuals willing to shove this trashy preaching to players in romance and label Astarion as an “abuser”.

I would also like to call attention to this quote from the Baudelaire Welch lecture:

“In this dialogue, I directly wanted to make the player feel bad for having learned the mentality of click-the-right-dialogue-options-to-get-sex-in-video-games, as that's kind of been baked into us as romance players of previous generations of RPGs. In this scene, it's you click the sex options and you'll further traumatize a traumatized person.”

Yes, this is referring not to the Ascended Astarion romance, but the heavy and rare scene where Tav can force Astarion to have sex with them during the act 2 confession scene. Yes, it's a hard scene, I watched it on video, Astarion is really painful to watch. But… Where has the esteemed author seen players with this “mentality,” who will actually click on lines with a hint of sex in any situation? Specifically this scene in BG3 is only experienced by game testers, with the desire to check all of Astarion's reactions, to watch maximum content, and they choose every possible option to get to know the game and the character from all sides. Well, or post a rare scene on their youtube channel. Even the very first line that leads to this scene, “I was hoping that as a reward for my support you'd throw yourself to me” is for a roleplay of an extremely weird character, to whom a headshot won't damage their brain. And even though the scene itself is strong, heavy and tough, but no one sees it, “roleplaying themselves” and choosing what they want to choose. Treating the players like idiots, that will actually choose this and wanting to “teach them something”? Again, there's no problem with that in this scene, it's not in the main playthrough, you can watch it from youtubers, you can play it yourself in “test mode” to analyze the character and learn more about Astarion. But, ahem, isn't the same attitude shown already in the main story scenes, like the dialog after the Ascension and the attempt to show/impose something through a check that you can only agree with? I really wish that authors of games in the RPG genre, where player agency and choice are supposed to be present, would realize that players are mostly adults and are not going to “learn” anything in games, much less dislike any kind of “preaching” towards them. And if you consider the audience to be idiots, it might produce bad writing, and the audience, in turn, will certainly judge the quality of such writing and criticize it. True wordsmiths may influence the audience, but they don't try to “teach” or “force”. They tell a story - logical, coherent, with room for roleplay and choice. You probably need to be a genius and a master of manipulation to introduce some ideas without being noticed, but it's very difficult, it's better to just write a good script.

Baudelaire Welch is also very fond of fanfics:

“The last part of how do we make our romance feel better for players? Wish fulfillment is forgettable. Players who go to write fanfiction are just as interested in hurt as they are in joy. Hurt is something to analyze. Hurt is a dilemma, and behind it is a moral choice.”

“I know because I was writing fan fiction about Baldur's Gate 3 before I worked on it”.

“It feels like a watershed moment in gaming history, where the fanfiction community felt like we were not a subculture within a fandom, but the majority audience that the game was catering to”.

Well, it doesn't take a statistical expert to realize that the main audience is still just playing the game and not writing fanfics. And those who do write, write completely diverse plots and completely varying quality. There are quite a few beautiful, strong and interesting works written about Ascended Astarion, but there are also some nausea-inducing “abuser” fantasies. Patch 6 was only suitable as a video insert for this, rather disgusting, mediocre and very far from the real image of Astarion category of fanfics. It's not the best option to take a small fraction of the total number of players (those who write fanfics at all), from them choose an even smaller fraction - those who write crappy fanfics, and make a romance for them, screwing up the story for the main consumer - those who bought the game according to its genre (RPG) and with faith in the already known Baldur's Gate setting.

Welch is also known to have worked on Dark Urge and on Astarion's dialog for Dark Urge:

The post with this message has been removed from Reddit. An Imgur link with a screenshot of the post was saved by one of the commenters. The quality is poor, so here's a reprint:

"It was me! So thank you! I am the Dark Urge writer, but I worked on writing for Astarion for several months during crunch. Because I had the opportunity to, I added a lot of extra interactions between the two characters. That’s why Astarion gets a bunch of I dialogues for the Dark Urge, and none of the other characters do. I'm sure we would have liked to have every character repeatedly check in on the dark urge, but there wasn't really time/budget for it. I just was working on the two characters at the same time and wanted to squeak in him being super supportive and worried about you throughout the game.

Neil absolutely killed it, though. I'd totally forgotten I'd added the scene where you try to break up with Astarion because you're worried about endangering him, and he absolutely doesn't let you.

But the Neil delivery of those lines have now totally burned that moment into my brain endurindly, he's just so sweet and anxious for you there".

Baudelaire Welch was selected for the role by Swen Vincke himself because their "mother worked partially on the script for Silence of the Lambs, the movie". (source: "The lead writer of Baldur's Gate 3's Dark Urge was extremely squeamish at first, which shows you can do just about anything if you set your mind to it.")

In general, that's the major of what I know about Baudelaire Welch's contribution to AA history (I apologize for the occasional digression in the form of my own assessments of this or that aspect, but it affected me a lot as a player at the one time). And about what you said about “the story was watered down” even though it was really only the expression on Tav's face that changed - the player character (!), a character that in RPGs has always belonged to the player and the job of a good writer is to provide enough choices and reactions for the roleplay so that the player can find a suitable option and make their own choices - that's a good point. Haters constantly claim that we were demanding a “rewrite of AA”, whereas we were demanding a return of agency, actually, something that has always been there in the same wonderful old games that Mx Welch criticized for supposedly superficial romance. These games didn't have such superb motion capture as BG3, thanks to that and Neil Newbon's superb play Astarion and his romance was so beautiful and clingy, and of course thanks to Stephen Rooney for creating Astarion (a character like Astarion hasn't been in any game before either). But the romance in these old games was written perfectly. I never had such problems with roleplaying as in BG3, in any RPG game I've played, I always had enough lines and reactions, so it can't be called some kind of picky or inflated requirements, if all other games of this genre were fine with it. In interactive novels, where you play as some ready-made character with their own prescribed personality, who act independently in some scenes, and somewhere you can choose options/replies for them and these options are limited - this approach is perceived normally and will not be an imposition, you may not like the character, but it happens. But for an RPG, having the player create their own character/self is just bad writing. As if you “have to” feel, perceive events the way the author demands. No, it's authors who have to write in such a way that immersion is not interrupted. And those whining about “rewriting AA” basically wanted the PCs to be part of their “story” and Astarion had nothing to do with it. By the way, Astarion himself is really great in the romance, I love all his lines, so for the lines of Astarion that were written by Baudelaire Welch, I can only thank them. But not for “Tav.” In general, the very idea of forcing a reaction and trying to fit the PC to “their own vision” is a big mistake. I'll make my decision to buy the next Larian game based on whether they'll treat Tav as a “storytelling tool” or make an RPG with enough roleplay and choices. And whether they'll listen to some next bunch of haters who want other players' beloved character to “not have a happy ending”. After patch 6, Astarion's “romance” looked like this:

(From Larian Forum, by Ametris)

Fortunately, this “novel” was not completed, and player agency is now present in the game, at least for those players who are fans of D/s romance. Modders have returned agency to the rest of us (at least PC players).

And yes, if someone starts “accusing” me and other people who gave negative criticism of Welch's work of “hating”, I would ask them to first find out the difference between “hating” and evaluating the author's work. Well, and evaluating the author's attitude towards the audience, based on their statements (it's pretty weird to spit at an audience and expect the audience to take it enthusiastically). Baudelaire Welch is currently no longer at Larian, and I wish them every success in their future endeavors.

[danganronpafan777]

SDRA Boys reaction to finding out Kanade killed there Fem S/O because she is best friend with Hibiki which resulted in Kanade cutting up S/O gruesomely like she did to Setsuka in the canon Game

Damn, fellow angst fan! 

You didn't specify if Hibiki committed the murder too, so I included how they would interact with her after the trial knowing what her sister did-

Yuki Maeda: 

When he sees your body at first, he's in complete shock

He wants to look away, but his eyes won't budge

It isn't until Shinji and Sora say his name a few times when the dam breaks

He's horrified, sad, angry, and full of grief all at once

He throws up during the investigation, and can't go near the body

There's no point, since it's already burned into his mind

He's quiet and crying during the trial, barely even blinking and ignoring anyone who tried to help

Sora tells him if he wants to get justice for you, then he must work with everyone

"...huh...What the hell do you know? About me? About Y/n? She's dead. I don't care anymore."

Yuki goes blank. Even void is a little worried, isn't it a bit soon for Utsuro to come out?

Anytime he sees Hibiki, he feels his stomach drop, the image of your body appearing fresh in his mind

He doesn't want to hate her, as she's just as much of a victim as you were, but her resemblance to Kanade makes him mistake her sometimes

Teruya Otori:

He slams his fist down on the podium in grief and anger, his eyes beginning to swirl in despair.

Why was this happening to him again? It was really all because you befriended the wrong person? Why did you have to die? Why couldn't it have been him!? 

He thinks back to all the moments he had with you. Sun gazing, cuddling, your first kiss... he'd never see you again, he promised he would protect you and he failed again. Why was he such a failure?

He didn't want to give into despair, he really didn't, but sitting idly while everyone you loved died a horrible death made him wonder if hope really did exist 

He stays in your dorm for a while, but definitely keeps a closer eye on everyone

If Hibiki didn't die, he couldn't bring himself to resent her, just her criminal scum of a sister

He has to keep the others safe and put an end to the killing game. He's well aware that he's not smart, if he was, he would have been able to save you

But he's strong. He's pushed himself past his limits before and he's not afraid to do it now. 

He’ll protect everyone because it's what you would have wanted

That's the only thought keeping him sane

Shinji Kasai: 

Also in shock when he sees your body

You were....there...(and there, and there-)

He’s seen a lot of gruesome sights of people who had terrible burns (Including himself, which you always reassured him over) but this was…

He starts to cry right there, as Yuki and Sora rush to comfort him

He can’t bring himself to investigate your corpse or your room, instead talking to everyone about their alibis

This whole time, he was saying that the people in void were friends and probably had some kind of reason for doing this, but…

He’s not sure anymore.

What kind of monster would put you through something so horrid?

When he finds out that it’s Kanade, he nearly breaks his podium

He’d never hit a girl, even if she is a literal demon spawn, but he’ll still yell at her for what she did to you

He can’t forgive her, turning his back on her and not even bothering to watch the execution

He stayed in his room for a few days, barely opening the door to anyone except Yuki

He is actually nicer to Hibiki, and even helps train and comfort her with all she’s been through

but there’s there a part of him that can’t help but think about what would’ve happen if he done this sooner, if he would have met your fate

The thought makes his stomach churn

Hajime Makunouchi:

Falls to his knees upon seeing the body 

He nearly vomits at the way the face on your decapitated head was twisted in terror and your limbs were contorted as if you were nothing more than a doll

Hajime doesn’t feel angry, he just feels… sad.

Abandoned…once again.

He finds himself sobbing, unable to stop

He just felt so alone, but he told himself not to blame you, you hadn’t left him, not on purpose

He can’t investigate… he just can’t…

Ironic, that the strongest person in the class never felt so weak

Another part of him feels guilty, of all those times he talked you into training, into eating healthier foods… what was the point of all that when you were going to die so young?

He can’t say anything to Kanade, he can just glare at her through his sunglasses, his void eyes coming to life

He watches her execution, but he can’t bring himself to smile or feel happy

It just makes him feel….empty

He actively avoids Hibiki, but he’ll try not to treat her any differently

He confronts Nikei about turning against Mikado

Syobai Hashimoto:

Syobai wasn't attached to a lot and he rarely let anyone get close to him 

But he made an exception for you

That's what you were, the exception

He was never loved by anyone in his life

Except you

He never cared about anything other than money and his own survival

Except you

He never fell in love with someone before

Except you

He never felt such sadness and grief when seeing a corpse

Except you.

The moment he saw your corpse, he felt a sharp pain in his chest, a pain unlike any he had felt before

Followed by a tsunami of emotions that were running wild

He forced them all down, much harder to do than ever and investigated your body

He found the culprit easily, charging Kanade with his knife almost immediately

She was quick but not quick enough, he left her within an inch of her life while Hibiki screamed and cried

He used his own medical knowledge to keep her alive for the trial, no matter how hard he wanted to end her right there 

He smiled when she was voted, everyone understanding Syobai's actions

He doesn’t care about Kanade's backstory, he hates her for killing you, that's it

He won't hurt Hibiki, knowing Kanade would probably like that, but he glares at her anytime she's in the room with him 

Yuri Kagarin:

He claimed it was a male the whole trial, only a male would be capable of doing this to you

When he found out it was sweet Kanade, his views shattered

"W-Why...?"  That’s all he can ask, and when she explains, he wishes he kept quiet

You were gruesomely murdered because of your kindness, and how you befriended and comforted a scared and paranoid girl

Kanade was a demon through and through who took pleasure causing pain in others

Only then did he realize what you were always trying to say, about all males not always being bad, funny how the message only got through when he learned the opposite

If Hibiki isn't executed alongside her, he wouldn't ever directly blame her for the person her sister was

But he'll never be able to look at her without thinking of the monster who killed you

Mikado Sannoji: 

This wasn't supposed to happen.

That's the first thought that crosses his mind, out of everyone here, you were supposed to make it to the end

He'd think it was Nikei, being the only void who would dare to do this, but even Nikei is not that psychotic

This was someone that made him look like a saint

He contributes everything during the trial, ignoring when people tell him to be quiet

They don't get to tell him that, not after his S/o was dead

When he learns of Kanade, he feels angry, at both her and himself

He could have figured Kanade's past out if he had just dug a little deeper...

He lightly avoids Hibiki, but doesn't make much of an effort to push her away, 

Not like anyone else besides you would ever willingly talk to him

Nikei Yomiuri:

God damn it... 

Why?!

Rage. He can only feel raw unhindered rage when he sees your mutilated corpse

The whole trial, he thought Mikado was the only bastard messed up enough to do this, there's no way anyone in void would do this to him

To kill the one thing he had left

His leadership, his power, his luck (the whole reason he was pressured into creating this messed up game) 

And now he lost you, the one thing he achieved without the use of his remaining luck

And now you were gone in one of the most messed up ways possible

He demands Kanade's reasons for doing this to you, and only feels more disgusted when he finds out

He hopes she burns in hell

He can't look at Hibiki without his void eyes flaring and his face being consumed by undeniable rage

He lashes out at her a few times, but he doesn't care

He uses the rest of the space in his notepad to write about you

He's not sure if your dead in the real world, but if you were, then he wanted some way for the world to know the kind of person you are

Because he knows for a fact that he's not making it out of here alive

He just hopes he can bring Mikado down with him

[skepticalarrie]

Hii... I was stalking your account a bit last night cos I was bored so from there I went to some other accounts and then from there to other accounts like a chain reaction... So I came across a blog account from 2013-14 ( they deactivated in 2014 ig) and there was this one anon who asked them that Louis hasn't been in the limelight for a long time and he was a bit sad or restless in interviews but was better now (as in when the account replied to their tweet which 2013 end or 2014 start ig)... Which made me wonder is it something to do with sept 28 ( I'm not saying they got married) ... Maybe they took a BIG decision for their relationship and had to fight a lot with the management and that's why Louis was a bit sad... But since I was not there then I don't know what happened can you help like what was going on during that time?

Hello anon! How are you?

I think I have a few posts discussing what was going on with them - and more specifically Louis - between 2013/2014 but I couldn't find the posts so I'm sorry if any of you already saw me rambling about it haha because I feel like I'm repeating myself a lot with this.

But I don't think it has anything to do with September 28th or making a big step on their relationship. I think 2013 was a year where their closeting became very severe. The bullshit tweet was in September 2012 (yes that shit is going to be nine soon), around the same time Haylor happened too, and it was basically all downhill from there. 2013 was the year One Direction became BIG, worldwide big, and I believe all five of them (not only Harry and Louis) really felt that pressure, they were extremely overworked that year, they were too profitable. And as a consequence, I believe H&L also started to slowly realize the extension of their closeting, all the implications. Harry was basically the focus of all the attention they were getting, with his fuck boy over-sexualized image. During the TMH tour we saw them interacting less and less, I believe while they were filming This is Us they were also limited in terms of how they were supposed to act backstage since they always had a camera on them.

As for Louis, more specifically, I think he was heavily media trained and highly advised to tone down his flamboyance and "loudness", it's shocking to see the difference in how Louis acted between the beginning of TMH tour comparing to the beginning of WWA tour in the following year. He lost his confidence on stage, on his voice, everything. It felt like he was overthinking every movement on stage. It feels to me that it was their label/management best interest to let him fade in the background as much as possible. I'm guessing this also came as a punishment because he was the one standing up for the band behind the scenes, trying to have a say on their music, on their public images, etc etc... I think he pissed a lot of people off. He also lost a lot of weight very fast halfway through 2013, his weight loss was very visible and I remember fans being extremely concerned for his health. Probably one of the most horrible stunts happened in that year too, Haige, and I believe that had a huge impact on Louis as well. They were forced more and more apart to go stunting, they were not allowed to travel together anymore. Eleanor was literally everywhere with them, a lot of damage control. So I believe all of this contributed to Louis looking the way he did during that time. There was a lot going on. If I had to describe everything I just said in one video, this would be the one:

(I think there's an even worst footage of that because there was a camera on Louis' side too, but I couldn't find it) I'm not usually very emotional about that kind of thing, but this video of them at the airport in New Jersey where they forced them into different cars, completely breaks my heart every fucking time.

[lize-mary]

What I'm going to do now is a little rant, which I never imagined myself doing, but the pain I'm feeling is so great that it needs to be out.

I've been in the Fate fandom since the first season premiered, but very quiet, not interacting much out of shyness and because I don't think I'm good at anything, not even writing, which I try, while all of you are very talented. Being a fan of the Winx cartoon since I was little, I had as my favorites Griffin, Musa and Flora, and having my attention called right in the first teaser per Farah, going to look on for the character on the internet, most of what I found were lies, but she seemed to me to be a mix between Griffin and Faragonda, drawing my attention even more, as teenagers didn't, I don't deny that I watched the series for her, enchanting me more than I thought possible, not only for the character but also for what it seemed to be happening between her and Silva, turning her into my all-time favorite character. When Dowling was attacked by Rosalind, her return seemed certain, they would not kill the important character that she was, the mentor and who at many times had seemed to be Bloom's biological mother, and even with the darker tone that was warned, she was one of the most powerful fairies, if not the most powerful, as Rosalind had spent 16 years imprisoned while she was free to develop her magic, and it was she who warned the others how dangerous Rosalind was, to turn her back like that without a good plan.

But that's not what happened and since the Friday of the premiere, I literally lost my ground, having my heart in pieces and cried for two hours, I still cry, because it seems like he comes back every moment of the day, it's such a pain big as if she were a real person, even though I know she's a character, and having seen others who were my favorites in other series die, but none destroyed the deepest inside me, that hurts my soul, and I didn't even had the courage to see the scene, knowing only from videos I find, not with it all complete. Maybe I feel that way because the moment that Farah arrived was so sad in my life, when I didn't have the will to live anymore, and she was so solar, amazing, powerful, motherly to the little girls, that in a way she became mine strength and joy to face the chaos, and yes I knew how wrong it was to get attached to a character like that, but I couldn't help it, and I didn't even realize it was on that level until I know about of scene.

The pain became greater when thinking about how she had so much to explore as a character, we don't know her story, we don't know anything about her, her death was in total lack of meaning for what was presented of her, for the couple that they put clues to about it in the official book, and yes I understand that this happened because of Emily in House of the Dragons, but without wanting to give too much spoiler, they could have waited a bit, delayed her return, not killed off one of the most beloved characters in the public, even being a series of teenagers, in all a prominent adult, being family or mentor, as she was to Bloom, needing both her guidance and Muse, whom she would help to make sense of her powers and what she could do catch up. For those reasons and my pain, which destroys me every day, I refuse to believe that this was the ultimate canon ending for Farah Dowling, she really didn't deserve it.

It took me so long to write about this, because with every line I tried, the tears came back, Farah Dowling created a void in my life that was impossible to overcome, and her ending made me lose absolutely everything

Don't mind me, I'm just a person suffering a lot because of Farah, and another one in love with this character, and for everything the fandom created about her, better than the series itself had offered, and it took me so long for that

[thorias]

"Just because we haven't seen Runaan paying for his actions doesnt mean we won't see him being held accountable."

Maybe. I hope we see that. But the reason I get annoyed is because the show (as well as certain fans) has seemed unwilling to go there. We went from Runaan trying to kill Rayla and assassinating Harrow to several seasons of the show telling us how great he was/is after showing us something completely different and I don't see how we're supposed to reconcile these things. It feels like a critical aspect of this character has been glossed over just because it was uncomfortable in order to give him some kind of redemption or character surgery that he hasn't earned and it's not good storytelling.

We haven't seen Ezran address how he feels about Runaan, but we should have; it was his dad who was murdered after all. So in all the time that Ezran has been around Rayla and been forced to step into the role of a king that he wasn't ready for because of Runaan, why in the world has this never come up? I can't imagine that Ezran would have anything good to say about the guy, but for some reason, speaking ill of Runaan is something the writers just won't allow, otherwise it would've happened a long time ago.

"Runaan has spent most of the time of the show in a coin‚ we have seen flashbacks about him from the perspective of the people that care about him but never the show has treated him as an innocent being who will be accepted by everyone."

The show hasn't exactly treated him like the person we saw him to be when the story began either, which is my point. We've seen the perspective of people who love and miss Runaan and seem to view him through rose-colored glasses. Meanwhile, anyone who would understandably have hard feelings toward him has been silent on the issue. And after 5 seasons of this, it's started to feel like something that really would have and should have been addressed by now if the writers had plans to address it at all.

"Now with Callum‚ he spent all season 4 being angry and both the characters and the fandom understood this. None of the characters treated him badly for being mad at Rayla‚ even Soren and Amaya called her out. Callum didn't act happy when she came back and he was mostly cold towards her not even wanting to be near her so where did you get the impression that they didn't allow him to be angry?"

I didn't see anger from Callum. I saw him being sad, mopey and distant, which is a different thing, with Ryala seeming miffed why he couldn't just get over it. He wasn't happy about what she did, but there were no consequences for her actions. They were still interacting, still went on their next big adventure together, still did basically everything they would have done if Rayla hadn't abandoned him and disappeared for 2 years, they just weren't a couple anymore.

The whole thing read like the writers wanting to have their cake and eat it too. They wanted to split up Callum/Rayla for drama, (which they then completely passed on) but also didn't want anything about the dynamic to really change, so the whole thing just felt forced and awkward and weirdly pointless.

"The moonshadow society isn't big on feelings but we may get an actual sorry from her next season(even if its not fully necessary)."

Well, for the characters' peace of mind, I think we need that apology. Frankly, I can't believe it's two seasons later and we're still waiting for it. And it's frustrating as a viewer because (just like with the Runaan thing) narratively this is something that really should have been addressed by now. And I'm sure it would have been if the writers thought it was important, but for some reason, they don't.

One of the more annoying things about the Dragon Prince fandom is how a lot of people put Runaan up on a pedestal. Just because he's an LGBT character doesn't mean he's some precious, prefect, unicorn who never did anything wrong ever. This is the guy who trained his adopted daughter to be an assassin and then tried to kill her the second she decided that she didn't want to murder the human king and start a war.

Hell, when he told Rayla that he'd kill her, she wasn't even surprised to hear it, so... yeah, they probably didn't have the best relationship, your headcanon be damned.

The other characters can talk about what a great guy Runaan was until they're blue in the face, but the only time we've ever actually seen him in the show, he was a piece of shit, so excuse me if I'm not anxious to see him get released from that Dark magic coin prison. Save Rayla's parents, sure, but I don't particularly care what happens to Runaan.

[inessencedevided]

Are you excited for secrets of Dumbledore. Saw the second trailer for it at the movie theater I work.

Ahhh, I'm sorry this took me so long to answer. Tbh, i was debating just answering you in private but then i realised that i actually feel like i need to voice these thoughts aloud now

To answer your question, this is how I feel:

(Tbh, i wanted to put a gif here where chidi (that's the character above) says that every time he needs to make a decision, his mind makes a sound like a fork in a garbage disposal. But i couldn't find a gif of it so this will have to do)

The thing is, I'm physically incapable of not caring about this movie or the grindeldore content in it. I saw the trailer and i legit started shaking. I saw the cafe scene between Gellert and Albus and i literally screamed. This movie seems to be specifically written to press all my buttons. I've been shipping grindeldore since i was 13 and here they are, confirmed, on screen, admittedly in costumes I find quite boring, but also played by two of the most extraordinary actors imaginable. Under normal circumstances I would never shut up about this movie.

But here comes the huge "But": JKR. And the fact that she is deeply involved with this movie and its marketing and seems to use the platform it gains her specifically to spread her harmful ideas.

I'm not on twitter, but while I was pondering whether or not I should interact with this movie online (which would mean on my tumblr basically and nowhere else) I went and looked at her twitter. And frankly, I was shocked. I mean, yeah, I knew her views but I had purposefully cut myself off from that a while ago and was unaware of just how constant these harmful reactionary and transphobic tweets had gotten. (And here i could go into it in detail about how radical feminists and "gendercritical" people don't "just" hurt trans people, but also cis women and the entire idea of feminism by casting (their idea of) men as their enemies instead of the system of patriarchy as a whole but other people have done that already and better than i could and that's not the point of this post anyway.)

And here is the thing, the fact that i strongly disagree with jkr would not automatically mean that I don't engage with the harry potter universe anymore. Fandoms don't necessarily have to be in praise of the creator(s) of the content they engage with. Often fandom acts specifically in opposition to the creators of their source material and if there had been no new material since the Harry potter franchise was completed, i would have no problem doing so in the HP fandom as well. Hell, if my staple was, say, marauders fanfic or drarry content, i might still engage with that right now. But, I'm a grindeldore fan through and through and that's, sadly, actively making jkr money right now as well as giving her a platform to spread her bigoted agenda

So here i am, stuck with the sound of a fork in a garbage disposal in my head.

Because I'm so angry, too. I know there are a lot of people out there who are saying "if you even remotely care about anything related to Harry Potter anymore you're a bad person and you should feel bad" but you know what? No. I care. I'm incapable of not caring because this world (and dumbledore and grindeldore specifically) was such a huge part of my formative years. I used to think that whatever went wrong in my life or the world, at least I'd still have hogwarts as an uncomplicated haven to return too. But no, that's gone now. There is no way to consume or engage with hp content now, that is not in some way inherently political, especially in public. It has truly lost its innocence and that makes me so angry and sad. But these feelings, however much they are hurting me are nothing against the hurt jkr is actively causing towards trans people and the cause of feminism. So I'm really only left with one choice (I'm not getting into the content of the series here. Obviously there's stuff there that's worth criticising too. but in general, I firmly believe that the fact that a book or movie has "problematic" content is no reason not to engage with it. The idea that one cannot love something (or certain aspects of it) and engage with it critically at the same time is, imo, frankly infantilising. My reasons for not engaging with fb right now are firmly rooted in it's real world effects, not its content)

But yeah ... that's my reaction. And I'm sorry I unloaded that on you. I wish I could just enjoy this movie in all it’s flawed, retconning beauty. I wish I could make grindeldore edits out of that frankly unfairly poetic cafe scene (THE FLAMES!!! HELLO??? 😭) bc I finally have proper giffing skills :/ But I can't ...

Maybe i will one day, when the movie is out of cinemas, but not right now

(Please don't reblog this post. I have zero energy for a discussion about this that gets larger than my immediate mutuals and followers 😅 if you are one of those, feel free to comment or send me a dm though 💚)