#writing ramble
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the reason miscommunication gets a bad reputation is because examples that stick out to most folks end up being the really frustrating shallow narrative device engineered to extend unnecessary conflict, that is—a miscommunication that could be solved with a one-minute conversation. miscommunication is such a good tool for conflict as long as the writer knows what they’re doing though.
one of my favorite versions of miscommunication is when Character A knows that Character B has jumped to Wrong Conclusions but is either unwilling to clarify or unable to convince B otherwise. I actually really liked The Cat Across The Hall for this because the love interest is convinced the main character’s in love with the main character’s best friend, and the main character wants to hide that he actually has a crush on the love interest, so a lot of the tension between them builds as the love interest tries to help, catches feelings for the main character, and starts feeling miserable and jealous about the main character’s (nonexistent) romance with his best friend (lol).
another really good one is when the characters have such fundamentally different experiences that they really can’t understand each other without a lot more development. in Failed Princesses, the main character is a very popular girl and the love interest is a gloomy nerd, but the love interest sees the main character get brutally dumped. When the main character is basically like ‘yeah I bet you’re having a great time, you probably love seeing your bully eat shit’ the love interest says ‘no actually, you’re not allowed to stop sparkling because that would be unforgivable.’ what the love interest MEANS is: ‘I’ve always wanted the role of a princess, but I can’t have it because that role is monopolized by pretty, extroverted, arrogant girls like you, so as someone who took the role of the princess from me you are not allowed to be miserable’. what the main character thinks is: ‘wow! even though I bullied this gloomy nerd, she’s nice enough to want me to be happy!’ and that kickstarts their friendship, but also ensures that the love interest (initially) rejects the main character when the main character confesses, since this pretty fundamental misunderstanding/one-sided conflict was never addressed or resolved.
there’s also miscommunication because of past history (we’re assuming each other’s feelings/actions/intentions because of past baggage) and miscommunication because of personality/ideology differences (I thought you were condescending/abrasive towards me but it turns out we have similar priorities, just different ways of going about things) etc.
the thing is, if miscommunication can’t be solved in one minute, then either it has to be because of character-specific reasons (fun) or because the miscommunication has spiraled out of control and is too convoluted to unpack in a minute (also fun). sometimes both. the anatomy of a resolvable conflict is just so interesting!
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For years, I really wanted to work on an X-Men story. The first one I ever planned was actually set during X-Men: First Class and X-Men: Days of Future Past. Reader was Logan's daughter (I know it's weird now don't judge me) and basically he had an idea about her but didn't really know her. So, she ends up with the X-Men in First Class and it goes through to the events of Days of Future Past. And it was going to be Peter Maximoff/Reader and Logan was going to hate that so much, but there would have been a lot of familial angst there. I don't know if I'll ever write it, but it's just so funny to me that I always thought that would be the first X-Men fic I finally made myself write. And then I saw Deadpool and Wolverine and my heart just broke over and over for Logan and I had to channel all that into the fic I'm working on now. I'm so glad I finally wrote an X-Men fic, though. It was a long time coming.
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ok so for the most part i’m a fantasy only writer, but this is more grim dark fantasy than regular. the protagonist is a girl named Nerine who lives in a small fishing town on a small island. in her world, mermaids are really important and heavily hunted. their scales are used for medicine, decor, jewelry, and even dresses; their meat is a delicacy in most places; their saliva is used as medicine or as beauty products; blood can be used in drinks; etc. etc. but the main thing is that no one has a living mermaid, because not being in water is very bad for them. until one day, the Emperor declares that whoever can bring him the most beautiful mermaid in the ocean- and alive, mind you- will be given millions of coins and invited to join his Court. Nerine is, to put it simply, a very morally gray character, and incredibly greedy due to growing up poor, and her goal in life is to be rich, respected, and powerful, but in the dark sort of way where she’ll do anything to achieve that. so, she ends up joining the deadliest pirate crew across the ocean in order to hunt down this mermaid. they’re said to be cannibals, said to torture those who they capture, kill for fun, capture mermaids to abuse them, and some other horrible things that i’m not even going to get into (i think you get the vibe though).
sorry for info dumping lol. i know it’s a lot but im just really excited to continue writing this, even if im struggling to write something so gore heavy and dark. my goal is to basically make the reader sick to their stomach. but yeah im having a lot of fun, so thanks for reading this <3
Hi bestie I think you need to know that this is fucking cool
#writing#creative writing#writer#Ramble#Writing Ramble#Not my story#Write that#Because then I can hunt it down#And read it
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really hoping that once I start this new job and get back into having a routine/structure my brain will start working again bc these fics haven’t been updated in like 2 months 🤣
#worst part is having multiple chapters half written I just can’t seem to finish#fingers crossed I become functioning again#writing ramble#sav speaks
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I'm actually writing a gayass skk fanfic where Dante's Divine Comedy is like the protagonist and where later on Dazai's gonna claim how he's a Dante x Virgil shipper. I'm also making him say all my ideas regarding Dante's idea of love for Beatrice.
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Finished the opening scene for my dragon riders project, getting acquainted with Morrigan and Rune. It's definitley a little rough around the edges but it was fun to explore and see how it progressed. At about 2k words for this section, and thinking that this next bit is going to introduce another dragon rider pair... so I need to figure out who they are! I really am just winging it so I don't fully know whose coming up next, just some scraps of ideas that I'll do some work to build upon before I jump back in again.
Some interesting things that have come out of this first scene though!
Both Morrigan and Rune engage in practices of divination, Morrigan throws bones and Rune reads the stars for guidance. Thinking about the theme of uncertain futures... now that they have started to bond as a dragon rider pair they also struggle to engage in these practices alone.
Rune tends to have a playful energy, though when more connected to Morrigan a certain sternness comes out, perhaps drawing from Morrigan's more intense and blunt energy.
Getting a feel for the landscape this story takes place in, and figuring out what it would look like to create a place that accounts for both humans and dragons with such vast differences in scale between them.
I'm having fun just writing and playing around and seeing what happens, no doubt a lot will change as I go, but it's exciting and fun and satisfying to sit down and see what happens as I type.
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WIP expectations are (often) unrealistic
okay so i’ve posted about this general topic before
but posting once a month is not “an update limbo”, it’s not an “abandoned fic” - it’s normal
it is fine to have an irregular or infrequent update schedule (using the word schedule here loosely lol)
I have a fic that I refer to as 28, and I update it on the 28th of every month (the chars went through 28 timeloops, are you sensing the theme here yet?), and have been doing so for... around a year now, actually - I refer to this updating schedule several times in author notes, in the series notes etc, because I deliberately chose the theme after I counted how many loops I’d put them through
yet, on the 26th or so of this month (i’m not getting the bookmark back up but it’s from a few days ago) someone tagged it as “update limbo”
it’s been less than four weeks since it was last updated
like, even if I hadn’t made it super clear on multiple occasions that this fic gets updated on the same day every single month, a few weeks is *nothing* like limbo. sure if it’s been a few years, maybe even down to six months, but anything under three or four months, to me, just means that the author is a busy person and-or has some sort of writer’s block/other ideas they’re focusing on/any other myriad of factors that means that they aren’t posting for that specific fic right now and, unless they’ve said it’s going on hiatus or the like, it’s not abandoned or in limbo or really anything at all except a WIP
i’m not making this to specifically call out this person (i’d be including a screenshot in that case lol), and I’m not saying they or others have bad intentions, not at all, but to me it was just the epitome of so much of this consumerism, WIP-negative, high-expectations sort of culture that seems to be developing around fic writing/fandom creation as a whole
it’s been less than a month, and it feels like people will write off fics entirely for not having been updated in the last fortnight at most. some writers will, perfectly validly, go months between updates, and if anything that just makes it more exciting when a chapter is posted
so, again, this isn’t targeted at any specific person, and I’m not saying people have to read wips if they prefer completed stuff ‘cause that’s valid, but I felt like it needed reiterating that taking time between updates is realistic, not selfish or abandonment - take your time creating, make it something you’re as happy with as possible, and readers please be patient with us, we’re doing the best we can even when you can’t see that directly
#fic writing#update schedule#wip#please don't assume wips are abandoned or in limbo just because it's been more than a week#writers are doing things that you aren't aware of#both real life and likely fandom things#we're artists not just your content creators#and we want you to enjoy but sometimes that takes time#writing ramble#fandom etiquette#fandom manners#ao3#ao3 manners#expectations in fandom are wild nowadays
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Debating on whether or not I should just post the Sterek Fic. It's at 20k and not even remotely done (was supposed to be a oneshot) but now it's looking like I might have to post it in chapters.... which would put ANOTHER wip on my ao3
#ao3#Sterek#idk#should I just continue working on it until it's done or post it now and hope I have enough stamina to finish?#This is the old money fic#supposed to be about a shotgun wedding and it's taken 20k to not even get to the wedding#or the werewolf reveal#writing ramble#feel free to ignore this
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was reminded of a short gothic piece i wrote ages ago for a school assignment (got full marks on it and i am very proud of that), and i've decided i'm gonna rewrite it entirely from memory because i don't have a copy of it now LMAO
no clue when it'll be done because uni is starting up again, but knowing a lot more about myself now it is making a lot more sense as to why i wrote things in the ways i did. i reckon i could make it a lot better now knowing where those ideas come from
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anyway I was telling a friend the other day (did I already make this post?) how art is like a cursed amulet. yes I get to go mad with power but at a cost (the madness)
#writing ramble#I feel like I'm still recovering.... and in fact I am because I stayed up until like 5 a couple nights ago bc I had to sketch something
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Finally saw the Thunderbolts trailer and I cannot wait to finally write for Bucky Barnes. I've wanted to for years.
Y'all really got me in my Marvel era. Sorry about that. 😂
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i literally dreamt about a reaincarnation au for avatrice i need to write this shit once my shift ends
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Guys, guys, this chapter would go a lot faster and have a lot fewer words if you stopped bantering and get on with it.
Oh but it's so nice that a happier Edward low key torments Jack. Nature is returning /wipes tear
Until...well...
#ofmd#never shall we die#edward teach#calico jack#being very much 20somethings#though they're technically teens#and their weird dynamic#writing ramble
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I was made to write angst. Tragedy is my fertile ground. [me after overdramatizing a silly story my oomfie wrote for funsies about some animals that eat a roof and then a goat and I continuing the story by making them all die at the end as some sort of chain of events set in motion by the goat’s self-sacrifice bcuz she digested cyanide pills in order to go against nature’s unjust system of the survival of the fittest]
#wrote 600 words of pure humorous BULLSHIT#AND I LOVE IT#bruh i went crazy with somehow tf???#gave the giraffe a panic attack#the story still unfinished#i only wrote 2 chapters#i wrote the first one like 2 years ago#in fact u can see the style change clearly#think of it like Animal Farm except that back when I started this I had no clue who tf Orwell was#writing ramble#who knew giving human problems and flaws to animals would have been so fun
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Having some thoughts about tv writing in our current age of streaming and indie internet shows, and if/how release schedule affects or should affect the way these shows are written.
When you have such long gaps between episodes in indie series, how do you write to effectively manage that and ensure audiences remain satisfied? Do you lean into self contained episodic advebtures like TADC seems to be doing?
And what are the affordances of streaming services released all at once or in staggered chunks? How does the binge model affect consumption and narrative design?
Arcane had its three act structure, releasing episodes designed to be consumed together to make one whole part, but there was still separation between these parts. Hazbin Hotel had a similar release structure that staggered it into chunks, while some shows try to recreate the weekly release schedule of classic television shows.
I don’t really have any answers just a lot of musings… I wonder if it’s something I can investigate in my upcoming English course on narrative television…
#writing ramble#television#narrative television#indie animation#streaming#a lot of questions not a lot of answers#musings
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people who can keep up with writing challenges puts the fear of God in the devil himself
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