#with a different Shepard it wouldn't necessarily be that way

[husband-steve-cortez]

I kid but the Kaidan being explicitly inexperienced to being domineering pipeline is important to ME.

[laundrybiscuits]

I've recently been tagged in a few WIP/"last thing you've written" type games, and…to be completely candid, I haven't been writing any kind of fic lately because I've become a little bit obsessed with analyzing the Broadway revival of Merrily We Roll Along.

Not for any particular purpose, I just saw it at the Hudson a little while back and have a lot of feelings about it! In my tiny scraps of spare time, I've been working on an essay about Merrily and inevitability that will probably end up rotting in my google docs*, because that's how I approach writing as a hobby.

There's just so much there, holy shit. I'm focusing particularly on "Franklin Shepard, Inc." because Radcliffe's Charley brings a frenetic, desperate vulnerability to the performance that reads so, so differently from earlier productions. Throughout the show, I was consistently blown away by the heavy lifting Radcliffe, Mendez, and Groff do in shifting the core tension from "art vs commerce" (fine but basic, and difficult to keep modern) to "how people prioritize different types of relationships in their lives."

In an effort to make this slightly less wildly off-topic for this blog: this has gotten me thinking about the way that platonic relationships are treated in narratives, particularly but not exclusively in fandom.

"Found family" is and has always been a popular trope, but I do think its current incarnation trades a lot on the underlying fantasy of relationship permanence. When we recategorize friendships as familial relationships, we're making a claim—whether or not it's justified—about the indelibility of those relationships.

That's not inherently bad (or, god forbid, problematic). I think it's very very natural, especially for those who don't necessarily have a lot of experience with the way adult friendships change over time. Why wouldn't you want something as precious and unique and amazing as a good friendship to stay with you forever?

Certain people can feel like pillars of your world, and it's fucking terrifying to think about that being yanked out from under you—or even worse, to think about your lives slowly shifting like geologic plates until suddenly you realize it's been weeks, then months, then years since you last really talked.

CHARLEY: We're not that kind of close any more, the way we used to be. And a friendship's like a garden. You have to water it and tend it and care about it. And you know what? I want it back.

It's a peculiar, particular kind of grief when it happens, because even though it's a fairly common human experience, it doesn't get socially acknowledged in the same way as e.g. a romantic breakup.

So yeah, it makes a lot of sense that found family is a popular trope in all kinds of media, not just fandom.

However...at this point, I've developed a knee-jerk wariness to the phrase "found family," because I've found it often correlates with a really flat, simplistic depiction of human relationships. In extreme cases, it simply recontextualizes a relationship within the socially acknowledged/acceptable framework of a stereotypical family unit.

This does a disservice to familial and nonfamilial relationships alike. Every family is different, so why do so many found families in media look the same?

(I was monologuing about this to my very patient girlfriend, and she pointed out that this also sets up a success/failure binary condition in relationships, where permanence is the arbiter of success in both romantic and nonromantic contexts. She is of course both beautiful and correct!)

I have friends with whom I can sometimes share a glance and know exactly what they're thinking. I even have a running joke with one friend about the sheer number of times we've said the same thing in unison over the last 15 years. I still need to be intentional about building those relationships, extending empathy when we differ, and carving out time to reconnect. Truly intimate long-term relationships of any kind involve disagreements, conflicting priorities, and negotiating and renegotiating boundaries.

Being "basically the same person" or "sharing a braincell" actually sounds super fucking lonely to me, personally, and it handily elides the difficult, essential process of keeping people in your life.

FRANK: Old friends let you go your own way. CHARLEY: Help you find your own way. MARY: Let you off when you're wrong. F: If you're wrong. C: When you're wrong. M: Right or wrong, the point is, old friends shouldn't care if you're wrong. F: Should, but not for too long. C: What's too long?

That's a more complicated and much more mature narrative to tell than "friendship will save the day!" Because it's not that common and there's not a deep bank of references to draw from, it takes a lot of effort and skill to depict well, and I don't blame creators for not wanting to let it suck up all the air in the room. However, I think it's important to acknowledge that platonic relationships can also be flanderised and flattened.

In the context of fandom, which has always traded heavily in Romance genre conventions, I would really like to see more thoughtful explorations of complicated nonromantic relationships. I'm not even talking about genfic here! I've actually been thinking about Stobin specifically because that relationship (rightly & understandably) tends to show up in any Steve-centric fic, including the vast ocean of Steddie fics, so it makes the issue slightly more visible than I've seen in other fandoms.

I'm not saying I want to see them fight, or not be friends, or not love each other fiercely and near-obsessively in the way that lonely teenagers can. I'm just saying I want them to be distinct individuals who view the world in very different ways, and choose each other anyway. They already have a complicated past; I know from personal experience that it's possible as a lesbian to be best friends with a guy who once made a little speech about how into you he was, but that little layer of history never quite goes away.

I don't want frictionless relationships in my life. I want people who will challenge me and whom I can challenge, in the context of love and trust. I want people in my life whom I have to work to understand, because my life is richer when I do. And sometimes, I want narratives that will reflect the grief of friendships that are no longer part of my life, despite the best efforts of everyone involved.

In Merrily, Charley sings, "Friendship's something you don't really lose—" but Radcliffe's thready, pleading delivery makes it all too clear: Charley already knows he's lying. The audience just needs to catch up.

*Other essays in that particular graveyard: understanding the cast of Peanuts through the lens of anomie, humor and subversive linguistic nationalism in 00s Singaporean TV, how to fix Miss Saigon. WHY am I this way.

[messydiabolical]

Who kisses who first, Thane or Steve?

Oh my god I could have sworn I answered this the day I got it but apparently I saved it to my drafts and just completely forgot?! I am SO sorry! Reading it back I can see why I drafted it, it's my usual rambly thoughts all over the place answer that I probably wanted to make it make more sense... and I still haven't made it any clearer but i'm hoping any answer is better than none. Sorry for the delay nonny: I think Thane and Steve would have lots of long deep heart to heart conversations and a lot of inching closer, closer, hands brushing, suggestive tones, lingering looks. Like I think most likely the first kiss wouldn't come out of nowhere is what i'm saying, but have had some obvious build up to it with them both showing signs of wanting it, or to have even arranged a purposeful date with the expectations it might well end with a kiss. (That said! The ol' classic post mission I-just-saw-you-nearly-die-in battle-and -I -must -snog -the- living -daylights- out -of -you- this second is still a gold standard for a reason and could totally work for them, perhaps pilot steve gets everyone safely off planet, sets a flight course, climbs into the back of the shuttle and smooches Thane silly, for example. Hmm, but he's a professional, so maybe he lets everyone clamber off the shuttle and then grabs Thane, pulls him back in, a brief eye linger, and they move move in and are kissing like their lives depend on it. hnnn.) In the game canon Shrios relationship, Shepard is the one to kind of initiate a more intimate romantic relationship by stating their want for that, then later telling Thane to be alive with them, but that's also with a Thane who is still dealing with only recently awakening from battle sleep, having just found kolyat in quite a state, and is dying of keprals. So a more healed, living to live, more established 'awake' Thane might be more bold than we've previously seen in intiating things compared with that time. Steve I believe would be unwilling to inititate romance at the start of ME3, recognising he's not ready yet. But after the memorial scene (him placing his husbands picture in the refugee camp I mean) and spending a bit of time finding himself again (plane watching, enjoying some fun driving sessions, having lots of chats with Thane and crewmembers), I can see him being the brave, bold, "I want you it'd be great if you wanted me too lets kiss about it" type. Steve I feel would take the initiative to look up drell customs and would offer Thane a frill to cheek caress (in drell would be frill to frill), a nice and loud 'I am very, very interested in being more intimate with you' even if he can't subvocalise it (I headcanon that with drell a lot of intent is communicated with subvocals, a mix of emotional feelings along with questioning tones as a form of asking for more intimacy). So you could even say that's their first 'kiss' in a way, and it would take Steve's research to do that, Thane wouldn't necessarily expect a human to understand the gesture. Perhaps Thane would be so struck by how thoughtful and romantic Steve is by offering that, Thane would be like 'oh i'm kissing the daylights out of this amazing human right now'. Bonus points if he does it so imuplisvely he doesn't stop to think about his venom at first, he didn't have time to stop and remember that, he was so caught up in the moment. (Those eidetic memories take purposeful application I reckon, they can still get caught off guard by impulisveness sometimes). Well that's all quite rambly, as you can see, I don't have any solid headcanons for this and enjoy thinking about a few different scenarios. They both have the potential to be the bold intiators, but the most likely answer is somewhere in between, a growing intimacy between them that naturally leads to an eager kiss.

[omniblades-and-stars]

choose violence asks 4, 12, and 18? :3c

what was the last straw that made you finally block that annoying person? -

This is like the least dramatic thing, but I just block people. If shit sucks, hit da bricks, and sometimes I just don't vibe with someone and so I block. I haven't had anything dramatic happen in ages.

The most interesting time I blocked someone in fandom was a hundred million years ago (like … 2012-2014, thereabouts), I complimented someone's gif edits with quotes and scenes from a character that at the time I was generally ambivalent to. I told them that their work actually had the profound effect of making me care about the character, and they and a bunch of their friends launched a harassment campaign against me because what I said was very mean I guess? I tried explaining what I meant better, but they wouldn't relent. I put up with it for like 2 weeks before I finally said "enough" and just blocked everyone involved.

And then I also left the fan space for several years.

the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them -

My joke answer is that no one cares about the trash compactor on the Normandy SR-2, and that you should love her because of her beautiful glass viewing window and wonderful buttons.

My more serious answers are going to be one, Ashley. Maybe it's because I'm an older sister who grew up religious. But I find her story very compelling. And I think if you really think about how her family and herself have been continually blacklisted in the Alliance because of her grandfather's legacy, and how I wonder if maybe after she got made a Spectre when Shepard is trying to stop Udina and there's that tense moment between the two of them, is she wondering if this is just another way someone is trying to get in the way of her success? I have a lot of feelings about Ash and you all should ahve them with me. (But also, how unpopular is she, because all of my new friends like her.)

And I think we should all love Jacob more for what he could have been. If you have the storywriter's constitution, you can see the threads of an excellent story and character in his dialogue, that just never … mattered. We should all take some time to explore the motivations that Bioware didn't and I have ideas tumbling around in my head for that so maybe one day I can get to it.

it's absolutely criminal that the fandom has been sleeping on… -

Shavik. There needs to be more Shavik.Shit, not even necessarily a romantic pairing so much as just the two of them as mirrors. I am a mess about that horrible bug man and everyone else should be too. The differences between the two of them, how something about Shepard must be familiar because of how they were changed by the beacon, the similarities?! He is a tragic force of violence and vengeance and I go absolutely feral thinking about him experiencing what hope looks like through.

[dragonflight203]

I love how unique the Geth are. I've read a lot of sci fi, but I've never never seen a consciousness arise out of a multitude of programs.

Which probably makes me unfairly biased about the Reaper code making them true AI - I liked their uniqueness, and how different they are to the others in the setting. The Reaper code feels like it's necessary to make the Geth "normal" for them to be accepted.

Heh, a diet of science fiction and fantasy have probably primed me to accept sentience too easily. I never questioned if the Geth were sentient; that seemed self-evident from their actions. The emotions I'll debate over, but without living another's experience it's hard to truly judge what they feel. Or don't.

Sentience and sapience... If there's truly alien life out there, I wonder if we'll even recognize it? On Earth alone there are many creatures whose intelligence we've only just begun to acknowledge. I don't know all the shapes they can take, but I suspect the options are beyond what we can imagine.

For the Geth and indoctrination, I think I misremembered. I didn't find it in the Codex, but in ME3's Geth dreadnought mission if you pick a renegade option when speaking to Legion he says the below. Taken from this video, starting at 22:24:

Legion: You spoke with us. You know we would never agree to subjugation by the old machines.

Shepard: How do I know you're not under Reaper control?

Legion: Our architecture prevents it. We are too complex. But we are being used to broadcast the signal to all geth.

So, Geth are reprogrammed, not indoctrinated. If the platform is sufficiently complex, it can't be reprogrammed.

Can the Geth be indoctrinated? I don't think that's clear one way or the other. Perhaps platforms too advanced to be reprogrammed are vulnerable to indoctrination?

And does using Reaper technology make an AI more vulnerable to reprogramming? You'd think so, but Edi and ME3 indicated otherwise.

This would all be easier if the game explained how indoctrination and reprogramming actually worked. :) How does breaking the signal immediately return all reprogrammed geth to normal?

Do the squadmates always make the same argument at the Collector Base? I'm not sure if they always do, or if one always argues for destroying it and the other against. I think in my playthroughs that's been the case, but it could just be a coincidence of who I took with me.

When exposure to Reaper technology causes indoctrination and how quickly is... inconsistent, to say the least. Some become indoctrinated very quickly. Shepard is exposed over and over and is never indoctrinated. I chalk that one up to another "as the plot demands" device.

For the Rachni - Maybe other parts of the galaxy are fighting synthetics? We only see a small fraction of it. I assume Sovereign had some means to keep an eye on the wider galaxy, not just what we know as C-Space.

There's also the possibility that another race in this cycle naturally evolved the Leviathan's indoctrination abilities, but why they'd set the Rachni against C-Space is up in the air. And if they did, where did they go?

The Leviathans... To see if the Rachni would work as soldiers against the Reapers, maybe? We see at the start of the DLC that they're planning something to do with the wider galaxy. They're not just hiding. If they had time to bio engineer the Rachni, they could have been quite terrifying.

Hmm, I don't remember the details of Xen's beliefs in ME2 but from what you say I wouldn't necessarily call it inconsistent. It's foolish to go to war if you can't win. If Xen believed her breakthrough would make it possible to do so, then going to war while the Quarians have the advantage is logical.

That also doesn't negate her end goal being control. Destroy the Geth for now, use their remains for research, then build Geth safely under Quarian control from what she learned. Going to war with the Geth arguably gives her more research opportunities then she would have otherwise.

I had assumed the Quarians attacks took out the Geth backups, but I can't recall if that is explicitly stated one way or another. It's entirely possible Bioware forgot them. Given how fast ME3 had to get out the door, I doubt they did much double-checking.

I can't imagine the Geth not having backups. There's just no logical reason to do so, and every reason in the world to keep them. I don't think a backup by itself would be leaving something behind; the backup presumably isn't "alive" until it's uploaded.

ME1 replay thoughts, wrapping up the Citadel quests:

-The Quarians have uncovered the most mass relays. Logical enough, since they spend all their time in space

-Fist is long gone, but everyone is still talking about him like he's alive. Not sure if that's a bug or an oversight on Bioware's part

-There are a lot of humans in the Wards. I'm going to assume Shepard's in the Citadel equivalent of Chinatown for humans

-There aren't any Turians in the Wards until the Markets. Was that intentional on Bioware's part because of humanity's poor relations with them?

-Conrad's "wife" will love him hanging a picture of femshep in their living room. Uh uh. Sure.

-Starting the Keeper quest by speaking to Jahleed sure leads to different results! Had to fight Chorban. And volunteering to scan the Keepers means I missed out on the paragon points when I returned to Jahleed. :/ Worth seeing once, but not repeating in the future.

-The Keepers and the Citadel are a total blackbox. How did anyone get the idea that inhabiting this place was a good idea, much less making it the center of government? And why don't they at least research it?

-Yep, running all over the Citadel again to scan the Keepers is very aggravating.

-Just how did Septimus learn Xeltan's secrets?

-Turians only wear those hoods in the Wards, not on the Presidium. There are Turians in casual clothes on the Presidium, so I suppose the hoods are just super casual? Like hoodies?

-The Banes person who blackmails Dr. Michel is built up, and then goes absolutely nowhere. Others have said it more eloquently than me, but it is a letdown.

-Shai'ra's words are a bit disappointing to me. Insightful, I suppose, but not so poetic to be beautiful or helpful to be meaningful. I don't mind helping her, but I'm not counting the words as a reward.

-And again once she's done with me and asks me to leave, because she's everything she can for me... I'm just saying, Shepard could probably use a massage. Or someone that isn't a crewmate to talk to. This is what makes me feel used. At least invite me back for tea next time I'm on the Citadel or something.

It's like the consort wants to know everyone except Shepard.

-The Signal Source sidequest is probably the closest Mass Effect comes to foreshadowing the end of ME3, sadly enough. And a large chunk of players probably never started it, and even fewer probably finished it.

-I should have realized Tali would object to possibly resolving matters with the Signal Source peacefully. Of course she would assume it would turn on us. And it insisting that organics must destroy or control synthetics doesn't help.

Still nothing that even hints at Synthesis.

-Interesting. It's possible that Schells was involved in its creation.

The creator originally created a machine to help funnel money from gambling terminals. That machine became an AI, which created the Signal Source, and the original machine was destroyed when the creator realized it was sentient. And who did I just run into that created a device for winning at Quasar in Flux?

However, the Signal Source says the creator is currently serving time in a Turian prison, so Schells probably isn't the creator. They may or may not know each other. Or the Signal Source could have been lying about the creator, the Turian Prison, or both.

-Running all over the Citadel to check each shop is so tedious. Money will become meaningless soon enough, but right now I have very little. At least I picked up a half decent armor for Tali.

[omegastation]

It's not that we don't know what the remake/remaster difference is, it's that the content was already there and more or less good to go with some minor changes (as seen in romance mods). I have to believe that the work they put into the Mako would have been far more difficult than this. & Also I feel like people would have less to say about it if we hadn't been getting more recent commentary like the article about Jack (1/? sorry I have no idea how long this will be aha)

(2/?) The article about Jack where her writer (iirc) went on about how she was conceptualized as wlw and that it's something he wanted to see for her (once again iirc, I don't have it in front of me but I believe that's what the gist of it was). Or in Tali's case, where they had her completed voicelines for the entire trilogy. They can't say that they didn't use this existing content because Fox News was breathing down their necks for this release, nor do I really think (con'd)

nor do I think that budget makes sense either, given that, yknow, it's already there. I also find it hard to believe that at least one or two people on the dev team don't know how their fanbase feels about this, particularly because of what happened with Jaal & his M!Ryder content. I'm happy we're getting ME content period and I don't want people to assume otherwise, like I genuinely adore this game! And it's also been implied that they're willing to (3/? sorry for rambling ffdgfhfhg)

willing to work with modders as far as what it means for existing mods goes, so I can only hope that modding MELE isn't going to be the same nightmare process that trying to mod the OT was. But I'm just really struggling to understand and wrap my head around why they wouldn't restore content that they know we know exists in a 90% completed state & they also know we would like to see in game without having to mod it. To me, I don't think (4/? :') sorry again)

I don't think that's asking them to necessarily add anything, especially when you consider the fact that the core story of the game isn't all that affected by Shepard's relationship to the point you can experience Mass Effect with zero romance whatsoever. & It is kind of upsetting for people to see that complaint & become condescending about it & assume I don't know what remaster means. Bioware acknowledging the existing-yet-unseen (5/?)

existing-yet-unseen "canonically" queer content feels like they're looking for some sort of praise without doing anything to actually deserve it. & you can't even say that the modding community fixes everything, because it leaves console players with whatever they're given from Bioware in the 'final' version and nothing else, and I don't really think that's fair. Personally, I think I'll probably still end up purchasing it at some point (I've lost count of my asks i am SO sorry)

at some point, though it's not high on my list of priority games at the moment (for a variety of reasons, not just this). It just kind of leaves me feeling sort of dejected because I felt like prior to this, Bioware was implying that they would seriously consider adding this back in, and there's also a significant portion of the online community that thinks we're just complaining for the sake of complaining & want to ruin the mood for everyone else, which is definitely not the case at all.

I am SO sorry for so many messages in your inbox btw fdgfhgj I'm long-winded by nature & trying my best. I just wish I could jump on the hype train like everyone else & not have it ruined because of my own disappointment with this, you know? & The irony is, my 'canon' is F!Shrios--my main Shepard wouldn't even be affected lmao, it just makes me sad & I wish more people could see where we're coming from.

You really don't have to apologize at all, your messages are nice and comprehensive! I also think you did your best to explain exactly where you're coming from.

Accusing others of ruining the mood is just a way for them to say they can't handle other people disagreeing with them or feeling differently. Truthfully, it's not that hard to understand, empathize and/or ignore if it's too much. And two things can coexist at the same time. Nuances > Extremes.