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alliterative-albatross · 3 years

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So, I sent you (@disgruntledspacedad) a pretty long ask a while ago (back when you had anon on) and I'm decently sure Tumblr ate it (or maybe you ignored it, in which case, feel free to ignore this one as well). But then I saw one of those "writers appreciate feedback no matter how long" posts, so I'm back here. Here is my mediocre attempt to rewrite my original review of your work. Bear in mind that English is not my first language, so if at any point my phrasing sounds weird to you, you know why. Mandatory disclaimer/apology: this might get a little too long 😅

RULES OF ENGAGEMENT

I remember being SO mad at myself for not finding this sooner. I binge read it one afternoon with no thoughts for any real life responsibilities I might have had (and no regrets). Javiears is one hell of an unconventional relationship in the beginning, and I really love what you did with them. The whole premise of your story is quite refreshing, and you somehow manage to convey the trust and mutual respect there two feel for one another without explicitly showing us the beginning of their "entanglement".

Also, fuck you for what you did to poor Emilio, that man was a saint and he deserved better! I honestly can't believe that I got so attached to a character that appeared so little in the story, but it happened, and his death kind of broke my heart.

But the Javiears reunion + mild confession was lovely, and felt completely deserved. And of course the sex scene. I won't lie, I expected a bit better from Javi there, but I did like how utterly /human/ it was. Capturing that humanity, the imperfections in each character is something you're really good at (more on that later).

AFTERSHOCKS

Ah, my emotionally constipated babies who really need to work out their communication issues. I do love them, though. And this short series did a really good job of delving a bit deeper into Ears's and Javi's psyche. Kudos to you for dealing with the medical "aftershocks" of living through an explosion AND using that experience to move your emotional plot forward. These two need to grow a lot before they can get to a stable point in their relationship, and you really manage to convey their insecurity and fear of commitment/intimacy while making it clear that they're in it for the long run and that theirs is a relationship that WILL work out so help them God.

IF I FALL

Ouch. Punch me in the gut while you're at it, why don't you?

But seriously, "If I Fall" is SO FUCKING GOOD. Don't get me wrong, it's angstier than an image of Jesus on the cross (don't judge me, it's Holy Week and I just got home from accompanying my grandma to church), but it somehow works beautifully. You, my dear, play heartstrings like they're a fucking guitar and I AM HERE FOR IT.

You're doing an amazing job at making me feel everything these characters are feeling, which is both awful (bc pain) and impressive.

Also, if anything happens to Ana I will cry, because she is adorable and wonderful and has suffered way too much already and really deserves a break and some cookies.

Also also, if anything happens to Ears I will cry, because she is badass and wonderful and has suffered way too much already and really deserves a break and some cookies.

Also also also, if anything happens to Javi I will cry, because he is loving and wonderful and has suffered way too much already and really deserves a break and some cookies.

Basically, I am really invested in the well-being of these characters and can't wait until they're happy and safe again (please tell me they will be, my heart can't handle much more pain).

A quick note on the angst complaints: yes, this story is way angstier than most other fics out there and it can be a bit too much at times, especially considering how many chapters of pain it's been. BUT it's obvious that "If I Fall" NEEDS this amount of angst to get where it's going, to send the message it wants to and to properly develop its characters. The pain is as important to this story as flour is to bread. You may not like eating flour on its own (I don't think anyone does), but you love bread (because bread is amazing) and you must recognize that bread NEEDS flour to work. It wouldn't be bread otherwise. And eating the flour as part of the bread even makes you like the flour because the bread is just DELICIOUS.

I fully understand and sympathize with the people who have elected to table "If I Fall" until it's completed so they can binge read it knowing there's a happy ending in sight, but in case you're feeling a bit self conscious about all the angst, please know that your story is beautiful not in spite of the pain, but rather /because of it/.

PS: No, I'm not high/drunk, I just really like bread

AUTHOR'S NOTES

Silly thing to comment on, I know, but I do feel like it's important that you know how useful your ANs have been. There are many details in the story that I simply wouldn't fully get without reading your comments at the end of each chapter, and I appreciate your writing a hell of a lot more knowing how deeply you understand and care for each one of your characters. Plus, it is obvious how much work you've put into researching a country and a time period that are (from what I gather) unfamiliar to you, and I really do believe you've done an amazing job of it.

JAVIER PEÑA

My boy. I love your characterization of this complicated character, and I have eagerly read each and every one of your headcanons about him. I can't really say if your version is fully faithful to the source material because it's been a while since I saw Narcos, but your Javi most definitely reads like a real person. He's fairly consistent as a character, and I feel like everything he does is perfectly natural for him to do as a character. He makes for an unconventional yet deeply interesting romantic lead, and so far I have thoroughly enjoyed all his POV chapters/scenes.

OCs

I know you've gotten some flack for making her into an OC halfway into the story, and while I get why the sudden change may have felt like a disappointment for some, I don't share that sentiment. I firmly believe that this fandom is unfairly harsh towards Original Characters and their creators, and I don't really understand why. Listen, I love Reader fics, and consume many Reader fics. I have read dozens, maybe even hundreds, and I can safely say that I've only ever "inserted" myself in approximately 10% of those stories. Reader characters are not as blank as their writers may want them to be. They can't be. They're characters, and character have personalities and moral values and senses of humor and a bunch of other things. Reader characters may not have a backstory or a physical description attached (and even that's not guaranteed), but they're still characters.

And on a more personal note, pretending they're actual blank slates is naive at best and insensitive at worst. Reader characters are American coded 99% of the time, and white coded 95% of the time. Not every readers is white nor American, even if that's the predominant demographic on Tumblr. When I read a JavixReader fic about a woman who speaks exactly zero Spanish, I know she's not me. The story may be beautifully written and have an amazing plot and character development, but the Reader *isn't me*. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, and some of my favorite xReader stories feature a "reader" who couldn't be more different from me, but it's something that enemies of OC fics should take into account. Particularly if they are white and/or American. But I digress.

HANNAH AARONS

Your character is amazing. She's strong, smart, confident, independent and an all-around badass. She gets kidnapped while pregnant and still focuses on problem solving and survival. But she's also overly guarded and mistrustful, and really needs to work on her communication skills. There are times when I absolutely love her and even admire her, and other times when I want to whack her with a slipper. She's no Mary Sue, but remains interesting and likeable throughout the story. She feels wholly human and real, and that's no easy task. I like her, I am invested in her, and I can't wait to see what's next for her. She's a compelling and three dimensional protagonist in a complex story who never fails to draw me in. I love her. She's your baby, and you should be proud of her.

Also, quick question about personality types: I know you've typed Javi as ESFP and Ears as ENTP (100% agree on both, btw), but have you given any thought to their enneagram types? I personally have always seen Ears as being somewhere on the thinking triad, maybe a 7 or even a 6w7, but I'm not too sure about Javi. 9w8 maybe? He could also be a 6w5 🤔

PARTING THOUGHTS

Basically, I love your story, your characters and your writing in general. You are a fantastic storyteller and wordsmith. You get into the heads of incredibly different characters personality-wise (Ears, Javi, Berna...) and manage to capture all of their complexities and quirks every single time. And it doesn't feel like it's something innate for you either. To me, it seems that you have put a lot of work and effort into understanding each and every one of your characters, who they are, why they do what they do and what they want. And let me tell you, all that effort has been more than worth it. "Better Love" is a fanfic, but it wouldn't be out of place in a regular bookstore, if I'm honest. I don't know what you do for a living or if you've ever considered writing professionally, but you clearly have the skills and the drive to create some masterpieces.

You are amazing and your writing is a gift. Thank you for sharing it with us, and have a nice day! ~ 🍪

My friend, I apologize for hoarding your first ask. I’ve been sitting on it because I’m not gonna lie, I enjoy going back and rereading it. It gave me a lot of comfort when I was in a pretty dark place, both personally and in regards to my writing, and I was reluctant to send it out into the the abyss of Tumblr where I might never see it again.

That’s not fair, though. You put just as much effort into sending me that review as I put into my writing, and I apologize for never responding to you.

Okay, anyway, so twice now, you’ve made me cry. In a good way, I promise!

I absolutely love your bread/flour metaphor. It made perfect sense. I want the emotional release of Javi and Hannah’s reunion to be earned, and in order to do that, the angst has to come first (there are also a few plot “ingredients” that have yet to make their appearances). Thank you very much for understanding that, and for voicing it so eloquently.

I appreciate your comments on my research and characterization. You’re correct that I’ve put a lot of time and effort into crafting a universe. In a lot of ways, I’m doing my best to stay true to the source material (regarding culture and timelines in particular), and in others, I’m branching into my own territory.

On that note, I’ve never once regretted fully embracing Hannah Aarons’ identity as an OC. She’s stayed consistent in my mind from the beginning, and it was a relief to finally share my vision of her with the audience. And for the record, I totally agree with you regarding “reader” characters. Every reader insert echoes the perspective of their author, no matter how vague the physical description. I can only imagine how grating that must be from the perspective of a non-white, non-american reader. Thank you so much for sharing your insight! I will certainly keep it in mind the next time I write a “reader insert” fic.

Okay, enneagrams! I am much less familiar with enneagram than I am MBTI, but I agree 110% that Javi is a 9 with a strong 8 wing. I waffled back and forth on Ears a little, but eventually landed on 8w7 for her. It came down to the eight’s deepest fear, which is being controlled. That’s Ears all over, and the fact that she and Javi share that eight willfulness means that they might butt heads a little, which also seems very appropriate for them. Big thanks to @remusstark for her insight into the eight frame of mind - our conversations helped solidify my decision on this. :)

Anyway, I’m just rambling now. The big take-away point that I want you to get is that I am so, so grateful to you, both for your insightful feedback and your dedication in making sure that I actually saw it. You are an absolute gem and a deep thinker, Cookie-Anon, and if you ever feel like sliding into my DM’s, I’d welcome the opportunity to get to know you better.

Mad love and soft hugs,

~ Jay

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smokeybrandreviews · 4 years

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The Tragedy of Rey Palpatine

I really, really, like Rey Skywalker, in concept. I think she could have been an amazing character and the perfect torch-bearer for the mythos going forward. After The Force Awakens, i was all in with this new trio of characters. Say what you will about Abrams, dude knows how to build a character. He knows how to write a story and Rey’s began wonderfully. She had all of the potential to be held in the same esteem as Mara Jade, Leia Organa, and Ahsoka Tano. Hell, Disney even introduced Chelli Aphra in the Vader comics, another brilliant, female character of Asian descent. Each of these characters were fleshed out, nuanced, and felt real. There is a humanity to them and, i imagine that’s where Abrams wanted to take Rey. Then The Last Jedi happened and ruined almost everything. I think it did a great service for Kylo Ren, overall, but everything else got a big fat Rian Johnson/Kathleen Kennedy sh*t all over it.

Abrams set up a ton of intriguing plots to explore going forward. The hints that Finn may be Force sensitive, the mystery of how Mas got a hold of Anakin’s lightsaber after Vader cut Luke’s hand off in Empire, who the f*ck was Snoke; All threads that could have been elaborated upon to embellish the new characters and give an opportunity to pass the torch on with the new characters. More than anything, the enigma of Rey Skywalker could have driven this trilogy of films in a direction for the ages. The seeds were there for greatness. Why did she hear Obi Wan in that flashback? Why was she spared by the Knights of Ren? Why did Ren know exactly what girl that trooper reported about? The only answer we got was that Rey was the spawn of a Palpatine clone and it was stupid.That reveal was the dumbest sh*t in Rise of Skywalker and there was a lot of dumb sh*t in that movie. Rise spent way too much time apologizing for what Last Jedi did to the mythos and had literally no time to fix the characters going forward. That’s how bad Kathleen Kennedy let Rian Johnson f*ck up.

I like the Last Jedi as a space opera. Hell, i even like it as a Star Wars side story in the vein of Solo or Rogue One. If those events happened in between VII and VIII, cool. But to be a mainline entry? Are you kidding? It just gets so much wrong about the overall lore while simultaneously sabotaging all of the character development and good will fostered by it’s predecessor. The level of f*ckery in The Last Jedi is ind of amazing. At it’s core, The Last Jedi s a fanfic, filled with OC characters, trying to “subvert” expectation to be more than it can or has any right to be. Rian Johnson wanted to make his movie, mythos be damned. Trilogy be damned. Kathleen Kennedy was okay with all of that as long as Johnson pushed her agenda and virtue signaled for all the “Girl Bosses” out there, which he did. The end result was a usual cool, collected, Resistance Ace, Poe Dameron, literally committing treason. We got a regression in the character of Finn, a former Stormtrooper turned rebel scum, a traitor to the First Order who literally got into a lightsaber duel with Vader’s grandson to protect his maybe-love interest, try to runaway like a f*cking coward, only to be tasered into a drooling mess by Rian Johnson’s Jar Jar binx. And the sh*t they did to Luke? That mess is criminal and an entire essay for another time. The Last Jedi f*cked everything up, forcing Abrams to course correct for two and half hours. This sh*t killed any momentum the Disney films had, it killed any semblance of a cohesive narrative going forward, and, worst of all, it murdered any semblance of Rey being more than a poorly written Mary-sue.

These new trilogies had every opportunity to be great. If they had someone with a reverence, a respect, for the source material helming Lucasfilm, they would have been. Look what Filoni has done with The Clone Wars and Rebels. Look what Favreau is doing with Mando. This might be a little glib but, considering Disney is bringing him in for a Star Wars trilogy on their own, look what Feige has done with the MCU? Hell, all things Marvel at this point. When you focus on dope stories and compelling characters, the narrative takes care of itself. When you focus on agenda and pushing divisive material, you can’t help but destroy what you hope to build. Kennedy is letting her ego cut her off at the knees when, if she just reined that sh*t in a bit, she could have been standing tall and walking into the future with her OCs intact. Instead, she has people in her own organization apologizing for her f*ck ups as the value of the legacy property you were gifted, tanks at a hilariously exponential rate. So how do we fix Rey and, effectively fix this entire trilogy?

First off, she needs to be a Skywalker. That is an absolute necessity. I would make her Luke’s kid. That would explain away her proficiency with the Force, the fact she pilots like a champ, and has that hole Force Dyad bullsh*t with Ren, like her dad and aunt kind of have. Rey would be an organic growth of the Skywalker legacy while simultaneously bringing a refreshing conclusion to it with Episode IX. I would build the familial relationship between Kylo and Rey, one representing either side of the Force, both fighting to discover something about themselves within, over the course of this trilogy. I would have made Rey Luke’s kid; A proper Skywalker. I would have made her mother Mara Jade, opening up a whole situation that could have been embellished into at least two spin-off tales with a ton of ramifications going forward. I mean, imagine a story where Luke had to fight off the Knights of Ren AND his nephew before Ben donned the mask, as his pregnant wife ran off into space to avoid the overall destruction of the New Jedi Order. That sh*t writes itself.

You get a side story of Mara Jade and a young Rey on the run, being chased by the Knights over the years, until she leaves Rey on Jakku, ultimately meeting her fate in a last stand battle, like her nephew, at the hands of several Knights on some nameless planet. Or Tatooine, i dunno. That’s an entire film. That’s a brand new, female lead you can explore. It’s organic. It homages the lore. It’s respectful of the overall mythos. It’s literally better than anything Disney has done with the mainline titles so far. Hell, you can even explore how Luke met Mara. Maybe she was one of the reformed Knights. Maybe she was one of the surviving Force Sensitives after Order 66. Maybe she used to be an Inquisitor but turned on Paps once Vader saw the light. Personally, i would skew more toward her being a former Inquisitor, seeking out Luke for revenge but, upon finding him, falls in love after several clashes. That gives Mara depth and allows for her to grow over a novel or two. Maybe a stand alone film. Luke would self-exile after losing to Ren but not because of the L, more because he thinks his wife and unborn kid are long dead. He’s heartbroken and knows he isn’t strong enough to fell his own nephew so Luke runs away. He goes into exile, like Yoda and Obi Wan before him, all the way to Ahch-to, searching for some killer app to finish Snoke before he can really get started. Imagine how much emotional resonance the ending of Episode VII could of held, going this route. Luke staring at Rey with such apprehension and regret. He immediately knows this is his daughter. That she's live. That she's here to ask him to do what he can't.

You'd spend the a good chunk of Episode VIII building that relationship. Showing Luke being cold and stand-offish because he knows Rey is his kid and he regrets his choice to run. He knows that Mara survived for years without him, probably dogged by First Order assassins. That the woman he loved, died alone after abandoning her child to strangers on a backwater planet somewhere in the galaxy. He knows this adult woman standing before him, is his and Mara’s living legacy and he doesn’t want her anywhere near the conflict to come. She’s demanding to be trained. He’s dismissive and curt, until the Dyad with Ren kicks in. Just being on the Force rich planet of Ahch-to increases Rey’s sensitivity, allowing Snoke to tether her to her cousin. When she goes straight to the dark, that’s Ren’s influence. When she cracks the rock and wigs Luke out, that’s Ren’s influence. In order to combat that growing corruption, Luke decides to train Rey to combat the dark. We actually show look acting like a master, teaching Rey sh*t instead of just, you know, “go cut that rock”. We show her learning from Luke, growing in confidence with her abilities. This entire sequence can take the place of literally all of the Canto Bight nonsense. No one liked any of that and it kills the momentum of the entire narrative going forward. Replace it with Rey actually being trained and you not only give her an opportunity for much needed character development, but you give Luke so much more of an arc and a means to have him bow out with substantial grace. If you decide to go the “Luke Dies at the end” route. Personally, i would have nixed Leia in VIII considering things and moved forward with Luke as the survivor but that's another story. I'd have to rework all of VIII and I don't feel like doing that right now. Leia’s death would devastate Ren, flooding him with a boost in the Dark Side, enough to slay Snoke and raise him to Supreme Leader without the need of Rey’s help. This would lead into a version of Colin Trevorrow’s version of Episode IX, which i think is a superior narrative overall but we’ll get there when we get there. Maybe.

The climax of the Last Jedi could be exactly the same but now it has so much more depth. It has so much more resonance for the trilogy going forward. Luke’s sacrifice would mean something as we watched him slowly come to terms with his daughter being the hope going forward, effectively replacing him in the narrative. Most fans would be okay with this as, even though he never tells Rey he’s her father outright, the audience kind of knows. It’s hinted at. The reveal can come in IX somehow or in his last regards to Leia. He apologizes for Kylo but reassures her that, even if he passes, her niece will carry on the fight. Luke tells Leia of Rey's parontagem she says “I know” like her husband, and promises to continue Rey's training to best of her abilities. Kylo gets his shadows chase. Luke’s last words have so much more impact. We have an emotional investment in Rey because the torch had been properly passed. I, personally, would rework the majority of the plot while i’m at it. I’d fix Poe, continue exploring Finn and his connection to the force, and find a way to make Rose Tico relevant without being trite. I mean, you can have the Canto Bight stuff but draw it back considerably. It doesn’t need to be an entire third of the whole f*cking movie.

I like the character of Amilyn Holdo, too, but her arc was stifled by nonsense politics and shallow development. All of that mediocrity kind of made her an easy target to hate, a lot like Rose. In my story, she’d still take the helm from Leia in Last Jedi but would have had an appearance in Force Awakens. She didn’t need to have a ton of facetime, maybe a shout out at the round table toward the end of VII or getting off the ship at Mas’ bar with Leia. Hell, a f*cking holo transmission would be enough of a mention, Holdo just needed a presence in that movie to be legitimized for the next. Rose was fine as is, she just needs more agency and not that bullsh*t, half-assed, love triangle that was literally dropped like a hot track on Soundcloud in the middle of a chase movie. That sh*t was stupid and it doomed Rose before she had a chance to even get started.

Episode IX would start like Rise, Kylo slaughtering his way toward the wayfinder, but revealing that planet was Mustafar instead of whatever planet he was on originally. Ren has been planetside for weeks, searching for the wayfinder dealy and the planets dark side alignment is taking it's toll on him. The mcguffin is deep in the wreckage of Vader's demolished castle, the deep subdivision and what not. Kylo makes his way to it, fighting dark side shades of his grandfather in Anakin form, goading him about his weakness, feeding into Ren's inadequacies about being weaker than his pap-pap. Kylo finds the mcguffin and takes off toward the Outer reaches in an effort to unlock more power. After the climax to VIII, Rey returns to Ahck-to to find Luke gone and the growing pull to the dark within her as the Dyad is wide open and Ren's spiral is pulling Rey along toward the drain, too. She feels him getting closer to full Sith, all of that pain and rage, multiplied considerably by his anger toward his grandfather's shades. Kylo basically flies to the outer reaches to find a Lost sage of the Darkside. It's not a Jedi or a Sith, but a being that thrives in the Dark, like whatever Maul is, but gigantic and monstrous. He learns from that creature, all the while leaving Hux to command the Last Order in his stead, second by General Pryde. The two of these cats have a battle for power, Pryde suspecting Hux of being a traitor, Hux trying to stave of attempts for his seat at the head, all the while pounding the Rebels as they continue to fight. The Knights of Ren are off, clashing with Finn, Poe, Chewie, and Rose as they search for another means to find a way to Rey, as she has the map and R2 with her on Ahck-to where she is training for the final battle. The majority of the film continues to follow the basic plot of IX, mcguffin chasing and what not, with Finn, finally adept enough in the force, to adequately take Rey’s place in those narrative spots.

We have the whole montage of training on both worlds; Force ghost Luke showing Rey more advanced techniques and Ren taking on a full-on, Vader shade, like Luke, in the Outer Regions or whatever. Eventually, the remaining main characters decide to split up as the pressure of the Last Order continues to deplete their resources. Finn fixes Anakin’s lightsaber and begins to train with it under the tutelage of Mas, who is all in with the Rebels now, as they go after the other mcgiffin on Endor. He still meets the other former stormtroopers or whatever and they still help in the final battle but, instead of Rey and Kylo, it Finn and a few Knights of Ren. Maybe two, I dunno. Anyway, he beats them with Anakin's saber, gets the mcgissin and returns to the Rebel base, stormtrooper backup in hand. Poe and Lando try to drum up support for a final strike on the Last Order’s base and you get that whole shtick with Keri Russell's character. I'd take her helmet off, too. Why the f*ck would you hide Keri's face? Shes adorable! Finn and Lando try their best, but it seems like a no-go so Lando stays to work his magic as he and Chewie return to the Rebel planet. Rose can return to the Rebel planet and take charge of strategy or whatever as Leia secludes herself within the base. I dunno. Rose is kind of hard to place because she has no discernible talents but I imagine anything is better than what they did to her originally. Anyway, Rey is able to develop enough self-control to force the Dyad closed, cutting Ren's influence off from her but, at the same time, her influence off from Ren, completely. That's gonna have big ramifications later.

Around the end of the second act, Ren sees a force projection from his mother pleading with him to turn back to the light but he waves her off. Like her brother, Leia uses the last of her strength in this effort and she dies, pushing Ren over the edge, forcing him into full Sith. Since Rey closed the Dyad, Ren has no semblance of Light to keep the Dark at bay and he just absorbs SO much of it. It multiplies his strength in the Force and Ren is able to slay the Dark Sage, take it's power, and return to his fleet. Sh*t, the sage might be an actual Sith, Like, the people Sith and Ren kills him, effectively exterminated the race. Yeah, I like that. I like that a lot. Anyway, Ren arrives to find Hux is the traitor so he allows Pryde to kill him. Pryde takes command and they raise their newly constructed, massive, fleet along with a brand new flag ship. Mobile, lightspeed ready, and far more deadly than any planet cannon, Ren is ready to begin his march of devastation. Our heroes arrive on the First Order hideaway and the battle ensues. Finn boards the flagship, clashing with the remaining Knights of Ren, his hit squad of former Stormtroopers at his side, as Rose uses her tech skills to drop the shields or whatever they were doing with horses on that spaceship at he end of IX. Rey arrives on the planet, Ren sensing her returns to the surface, to face off with each other. Ren is brimming with the dark, Rey knows he;s too far gone to save and she resolved to do what is necessary to end his tyranny. She ignites Lukes green lightsber, which upsets Ren and then Leia's yellow saber, which sends Ren into a legit rage. Yeah, Rey dual-wields now because it's cool. Poe does his whole lone ranger whatever as he's the last of the vanguard and sh*t. All is lost.

The reinforcements show up in the nick of time and sh*t happens. Big ass sky battle with spaceships and explosions and sh*t, while Finn, Rose, and that black chick accomplish their task on the flagship. Shields dow, sh*t stats blowing up, fun times. Rey gets wrecked by Kylo, who is all the way Dark, no redemption, yellow rage eyes and everything. She’s getting dumped on until she forces the dyad open, allowing Ren to see the Force ghosts of Jedi Masters of old, as they all appear behind Rey, including Leia, Luke, and Mara Jade. They speak that bullsh*t, lay hands on Rei's lightsabers giving her a jump in power, and Rey defeats Ren in a harrowing duel. It has to end in a lightsaber clash. How can it not? Finn wrecks the remaining Knights and the flagship falls as the Rebel fleet overcomes the last of the Last Order. Ren is defeated, dying slowly, lamenting his choices. In his last moments, as the Force ghosts fade, the last few left are his mother, uncle, and grandpa. The last thing Ben sees as he dies is the face of the man he’s chased for so long. Poetic. Tragic. Requisite celebration on a jungle planet ensues while Rey is off, giving Ben a proper Jedi bonfire. Finn approaches, objecting to the respect shown, but she tells him that, in the end, Ren was still a Skywalker. If Vader can be forgiven, so could Ben. The two watch as the flames rise into the night sky. We get a scene of a shadow tracing the insides of Uncle Owen’s joint on Tatooine, generators firing on, mechanics coming to life. Rey is seen, all by her lonesome, igniting her new, personal, lightsabers; Gold, I guess? Is that what color they were supposed to be? A young kid arrives, inquiring about why the old Lars place is lit up for the first time in decades. He asks her name. She hesitates, looking over her shoulder to see the force ghosts of Anakin, Leia, Luke, Mara, and Ben; Her entire family. She gives a knowing smile and answers, “Rey. Rey Skywalker.”

This is just a rough outline of how i would have written this trilogy. I might embellish a little bit, maybe write it up as a proper fan fiction, but i don’t know. There’s a lot to unpack and i don’t really want to spend the time actually fleshing out this narrative but, i believe this is far superior to anything Disney has done. It fixes Rey, sets up Ren as a actual antagonistic force, kills anything resembling a Reylo romance, returns agency to Finn and Poe, fixes Rose, makes Mas a factor, and wraps everything up nicely. You get answers to the questions from before, the Knights of Ren have a presence throughout the entirety of the trilogy, and even divisive characters like Holdo get a shot at relevance outside of agenda. More than anything Rey being a Skywalker feels earned. It feels organic. It feels right. This is the bookend the Skywalker story deserved, not the rushed, politic laden, ego trip we got.

#Star Wars #The Rise of Skywalker #The Last Jedi #The Force Awakens #Rey Palpatine #Rey Skywalker

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smokeybrand · 4 years

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The Tragedy of Rey Palpatine

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fyrapartnersearch · 5 years

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Partner search!

Hello all! I’m looking for a skilled, experienced 1x1 partner or two for a Discord roleplay. I have a few particular plots, though please feel free to come with your own ideas. Please read to the end as there is a password I won't answer messages without.

•General/Writing Style•

I usually prefer sticking at around 4 paragraphs and up, but quality over quantity for the most part. If you usually write 3 paragraphs or less, it'll be hard for me to stay interested, however. I would prefer you write in 3rd person, past tense. Please have decent grammar and spelling, varied vocabulary and sentence structure, as well as decent syntax. Please provide me something of substance to respond to in your responses. Please also be somewhat experienced.

•Age•

18+ only, but 21+ preferred (I'm 23)

•Timezone•

Mine is EST. I do not mind what timezone you're in.

•Response Frequency•

I'd prefer if you could respond at least once a week. I'm a pretty busy student can't definitely commit to much more than that, so I won't ask that of you. Please try to communicate when you will be gone or significantly less active for several weeks or more. I will try to do the same.I'm a bit less lenient with this when we're still doing introductions, so if we've barely said hello but a few days pass and I hear nothing, I'll assume you're no longer interested or never were in the first place and close our discussion. You are free to assume the same of me.

•Genre•

I'm a sucker for Romantic Slice-of-life with a healthy dose of drama and angst, but I do like to weave other genres in there too such as Supernatural, Mystery, Action, and Adventure. I'm really open to most things if the plot interests me.

•Gender and Romantic Preference•

I strongly prefer playing a female main outside of MxM. Beyond that, I am open to MxF, FxF, and MxM . Currently, I'm mostly in the mood for an MxF or possibly F//. My apologies, but please note I do not play male in MxF unless we have roleplayed other pairings together before and have highly compatible writing styles. I rarely double up.I do not engage in dichotomy personality dynamics(ie- dom/sub, ABO, top/bottom) and like pairings to be close to even as possible in contributions to the relationship. If a scene gets intimate, I'd prefer we fade to black.

•Plots/Creativity•

The plots I’m looking to do atm are listed below. Despite this, you're more than welcome to share plots of your own. I'd prefer it if you are open to brainstorming plot points and bouncing ideas off each other too- let's keep this interesting for both of us so it stays alive.

•OCs•

I would prefer not to roleplay with OCs that are excessively shy, Mary-Sues, or OP. Additionally, please ensure your own OC does not monopolize the plot with their own issues and background. Let's share the spotlight.I tend to play multiple characters and would prefer if you did too.Please do not control my main OC or any named side characters I introduce. It can really mess with my plans with them if you suddenly auto-kill out of nowhere or something... If necessary, I may permit you to control a side character of mine, but please run it by me first. Communication is key.

•Platform•

Discord is strongly preferred. I can potentially be convinced to use kik, tumblr, or line.

•Fandoms•

I am willing to roleplay within the universe of several fandoms, but please note I do not roleplay as canon characters and would prefer not to roleplay with canon characters either. Please recall that I am more than happy to do original plots too if you aren't into any of these.-Corpse Party**-Black Mirror-Death Note-Avatar The Last Airbender*-Downton Abbey-Call The Midwife*-Dragon Quest(IV-IX)***-Miraculous Ladybug****(I'd love to delve into the more subtle, darker elements like the consequences of a broken miraculous and time travel)-Fruits Basket**-Soul Eater*-The Hunger Games-Harry Potter(The number of * indicates craving)

•Original Plots•

(Muse I would like to play is bolded. If neither are bolded, I can do either. All of these are open to brainstorming and tweaking!)

Muse A was born into a society where ‘falling in love’ is not a thing. Sure, it’s written in about fairy tales and even history texts, but most Readers laugh it off as a silly, archaic concept. All couples are formed by reading Cerebral wavelengths, stats that are unique to every individual. Every person has a single match and are paired with that person permanently when they come of age. No trades, no take-backs. Muse B, though born into the regular world, doesn’t believe in love either. Perhaps it was the plight of their parents, or that one nasty breakup. Perhaps it was the sight of all the couples around who’d be lovey-dovey one week, but strangers the next. Whatever it is, they don’t buy it. That suits Muse A just fine- their Cerebral wavelengths not only don’t match, they bang together in a cacophony. Why is it then that these two begin experiencing an undeniable pull to each other?

One night, Muse A is taking their usual jog through the park when they trip right over Muse B tying their shoe. Cliche start is cliche, I know, but stay with me here. After some initial awkwardness, the two hit it off quite well. Flash forward a week or so and the pair are starting school in the same class, Muse A as one of the typical debutants, and Muse B a lucky upstart on a basketball scholarship. Muse B had high hopes for where things’ll go…only to find out Muse A has a boyfriend, who happens to be Muse B’s nemesis on the courts. Whoops. But something’s really off with the couple. As in the boy is downright awful, and it isn’t just the rivalry talking. Yet Muse A refuses to leave him…why is that?

(This is an older one of mine, but I’ve recently kinda been in the mood to start it up again.) Marianoh’s Culinary Institute is the most renowned school for culinary arts in the country. Any who truly wish to be a master chef would be foolish not to attend. Unless they don’t have the means- the tuition is insanely high. Muse A is part of the lucky few of humble beginnings that has been selected to attend via scholarship. They couldn’t be more excited. Muse B, on the other hand, comes from a family of celebrity chefs. Their spot at Marianoh’s was confirmed before birth. Yet, somehow, they don’t share Muse A’s joy. Far from it, actually. What happens when the two are partnered up for the year?

(A brand new one definitely open to suggestions) St. Cornelius’ Academy(or University) is an academic institution reserved only for those of royal or noble background as well as their future servants, attendants, and body guards. Students of the academy hail from kingdoms where individuals are born gifted with control over the 8 elements- light, wind, flame, flora, lightening(tech), water, earth, and darkness. Students are divided based on status into ‘Golds,’ ‘Greys,’ and ‘ The ‘Gold’ category includes all royalty and nobility aside from viscounts and barons of low birth. The ‘Gray’ category includes future ladies and men in waiting, other servants, attendants, and body guards. Students are instructed in all areas in order to best prepare them for their future roles from political science to etiquette to combat. Given the wealth of a portion of the student body, the campus is a vivacious display of luxury, featuring lavish gardens, seemingly endless grounds, state-of-the-art learning facilities, and even an expansive kitchen headed by a world renowned 31 star chef. Currently, I have three potential pairings in mind for this set-up.

-Muse A is a new lady in waiting assigned to a spoilt, catty Duchess of Aquaria(Water Kingdom). Catering to the every whim of the young princess-to-be is exhausting, but her goal of reaching far greater heights than her questionable background merits keeps her going. What faster way to do that than catching the eye of Muse B, the princess’ bethrothed and crown Prince of Aquaria using abilities bequeathed to her by her merpeople ancestry? The lines between acting and reality are prone to blurring, however and actual feelings soon begin to muddle her plans. Muse B isn’t as unaware as he first seems either..

-Muse A is the somewhat naive prince of Angion(Flora), unsure of his future. He’s distant from his fiancée, Muse B a cold, proud Marchioness of the same kingdom, and his closest confident is one of his newest body guards, Muse C. Little does he know, that Muse C has quite the secret- she’s truly a girl whose taken on her brothers identity to serve. What will happen when all comes into the open?

5. Muse A has always been at the top of their class since early elementary and thrived on it. They come from a family of high achievers where failure is neither seen nor accepted. Proud and arrogant over their achievements, their grades make them, them. All that changed when Muse B showed up, smashing the entrance exams with marks unheard of. Of course Muse A wouldn’t take that lying down, thus, the classic rivalry begins. What happens when the two find they have more in common than they thought? Life on Muse B’s side is not all it seems as well.

Contact Instructions: Please message me here on tumblr (https://lisanimelis.tumblr.com/) with your favorite color and a writing sample. If all goes well there, we'll move to discord.

#oc rp #multiple paragraph #long term #messenger #submission

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foreveralwaysanauthor · 5 years

Note

As previously warned, I have a huge number of questions for the fanfic author ask thing. So, here we go: 4, 5, 6, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 20, 21, 24, 25, 26, 27, 29, 30, 31, 33, 36, 37 and then, if that wasn’t already enough, and there is anything you want to answer that I haven’t already asked, then pick one of your choosing to answer as well! 💕

Holy crap you weren’t kidding! lol this is gonna be so much fun!

4: What made you start writing fanfiction?

My 3rd grade teacher, Mr. Gula, gave me a challenge to write out my own ending to my favorite movie or TV show. As I was never really one to back down from a challenge, I went home and wrote out my own story about the first Transformers movie and another one about what I would do if I had been in HIgh School Musical. Yeah... needless to say, I was the Hermione of my grade.

5: Favorite pairing?

I know I don’t write for them, but my top is probably either Dee Dee and Frankie from the Beach Blanket Bingo, Bikini Beach, and Muscle Beach type movies or Seaweed and Penn from Hairspray. Something about those types of romance are sort of sweet to me. Guess I’m just an old soul. I also adore Cory and Topanga form Boy Meets World, but I’m mostly here for the older romances.

6: Least favorite pairing?

I’ll probably get flack for all of my answer, but I’m a little bit opinionated about this lol. The way Ginny and Harry’s relationship in the films was, was just confusing and so not what I had expected from them. The books gave them so much more than the movies ever did. The books were way better. Another case I don’t like was Bella and Edward/Renesmee and Jacob from Twilight. I think the other relationships in Twilight were better (Jasper and Alice are so sweet!) and Stephanie Meyer just kinda tossed Bella and Edward and Renesmee and Jacob together in the hope it would work and it just didn’t.

12: What’s the weirdest fic you’ve ever written?

I can’t believe I’m admitting to this.... I used to write full stories about One Direction. I had a full Niall x OC story I posted on a 1D Imagines group on Facebook that got almost 2,000 likes. It was silly, but, my word, it was almost as long as Broken Record. It spanned over the month of October 2014 and I can’t believe it ot the attention it did. It wasn’t all that good, but I guess it was good enough for people to like it, so that’s alright by me lol

13: Weirdest fic you’ve ever read?

I don’t believe it’s on fanfiction anymore, but I remember the basic info on it. It was Make a Wish by FireBladePrime. It was pretty much a girl made a wish on a shooting star and it made her favorite toys come to life as full size humans. I believe she ended up falling in love with one, but I’m pretty sure it just ended up being something that she came up with in her head when she was in a coma due to a car accident. Definitely a weird one, but it was pretty well written as far as memory serves.

14: Do the people in your life know you write fic? How do they feel about it?

Well, quite a bit of my family knows, actually. It started with just my parents, but my dad was always wanting to show off whatever his baby princess did (I was his only biological child, my older siblings were from my mom’s ex-husband). Dad shared with his siblings, mom shared with her siblings and my grandfather. My nieces and nephews know as well, but I believe that’s it. As far as I know, they are all very supportive and have no problem with it. My neice, Lorali, and nephews, Erek and Drake, have read all of my Teen Beach fics and quote things from them daily just to see if I’ll react, but they mostly just like reading them or having me read to them. They’re very loving and supportive of my writing.

15: Favorite fandom to write for?

I don’t know if I could pick one! I love Teen Beach so much, but I also have a certain affinity for writing small oneshots or “x Reader” style stories for Avengers and Harry Potter which can be found here and here. I do share the Harry Potter page with my sister, but she handles reblogging things to our page. Anyway, those would probably be my top fandoms!

17: What is the harshest criticism you’ve ever gotten on a fic?

Holy crap. Okay, I may or may not have repressed this for a long time, but I have more than one that I can’t decide between. The other one was from a girl in my class who stole my writing notebook and read my writing. Fuck you, Ashley She gave it back to me later that day with marker scribbles all over my writing. She said that I was horrible. The next day, I stole the makeup bag she had brought from her mother’s bathroom and buried it on the playground.

I was a good child that believed in getting even. Nobody found out about that btw.

Anyway, the first real criticism I had on a fic was someone who said, “You have no talent and you shouldn’t be writing. It all sucks and you’ll never go anywhere as an author.” I had actually written this down and, when I felt it no longer mattered to me, I burned it. It took me a couple of years to come to the realization that their opinion didn’t matter to me.

20: What’s your biggest struggle when it comes to writing fic?

Having time to sit down and write, probably. I usually have great ideas, but, in order to write them out and have them come out alright, I would need to sit down and feel it all come together while I write. I need time that I just don’t have most of the time.

21: Your biggest strength?

When I sit down to write, it all just flies out of me. Once i start, I don’t stop until my idea is all out into either m notebook or my computer. I can have a simple idea that somehow spirals into an eight page chunk that I never thought was possible. I like to think of that as my biggest writing strength.

24: What’s your process?

Write out the “backbone plot” (The stuff that has to happen, no matter what)

Decide on characters. Figure out appearance, personality and basic traits. (Sorta like a sim, I guess)

Bounce ideas with whoever will listen/listen to music (Gain ideas and write them in a small notebook)

Wait for inspiration and time to line up accordingly.

Write as much as I can.

Go back into that later on and edit what needs to be there and delete what isn’t necessary.

Publish!

I hope that’s what this means, at least.

25: Of all the fics you’ve written, which is your favorite?

Most definitely Broken Record and Creating a Rift. It was one of my first published stories and I just adore them.

26: Which of your fics is your least favorite?

I don’t even know how to find it anymore, but it was called Life’s a Rollercoaster. It was a Transformers fic that I had written when I was 11. Never finished it bc I lost the login stuff and it, now that I remember it, sucked hard.

27: What’s your most popular fic? Do you think the popularity is warranted, or is there another fic that you think deserves it more?

Any of them really! I love that Broken Record has had almost 10,000 reads, but I don’t believe it. As I go back over it, I wonder how on earth it gained popularity in the first place, but I couldn’t be happier that it did!

29: Which of your fics was the hardest to write?

My book. Probably the Christmas one, tbh. I only feel the pull to write it around the holidays and that kinda sucks lol

30: Favorite fic writers?

You better know you’re number one, girlie! For those who don’t know, Eleanor here is one of my closest internet friends and she’s practically family to me at this point!

As for other authors, I love Ulurnaga’s Primary Mechanisms story (Transformers). I know she hasn’t updated it since 2014, but it was so good that she could’ve left it at multiple parts and it would’ve been fine. I think it has abot 118 chapters to it. I have a few favorites from AutobotGuy710 who does a lot of Transformers stories basing around adoption (helps for my references and also a better understanding of what goes on a bit in adoptions/foster care). On Tumblr, I have a few faves, but not a ton. I like imagine-and-marvel and potterlyimagines fics a lot, but that’s about it at the moment as I haven’t sat down to read fics in a little while.

31: Do you write just for fun, or would you ever consider pursuing writing?

A bit of both, actually. I mostly enjoy writing my fics as a bit of an escape from reality. I enjoy being able to place myself in a world that doesn’t exist and sort of play around a bit. However, I do actually write as a job. I was working for my county newspaper for a while and that spiraled into me writing my first book, Feather Picked. I am currently writing one of the sequels to Feather Picked which takes the focus from my original main character, Melody, and moves it to her best friend, Roxy. I am planning on publishing a total of at least 5 books, the first four being the chronological 4 that take place over the course of a full year, each taking one season. The last one will be a look into the future, hopefully.

My first book can be found here!

33: Fanfiction pet peeves?

Goodness gracious. As someone who loves English classes, when people don’t place paragraphs correctly or spell simple words correctly, it reeeeeeally grinds my nerves. I will still sit through a story if it’s a well plotted story, but, come on people, at least do proper paragraphing!!!

Also, when people spell “definitely” as “defiantly”...... uuuuuuuuggggghhhhhhhhh

36: Which charachter(s) would you never write for?

For this one, I don’t really have much to say.

Probably characters from shows like soap operas or shows that never seem to end. If I can’t grasp the character’s backstory or personality after watching it because it never stops changing whenever it benefits the story or what the writers have planned, I refuse to write for them.

Mary Sue types like Bella Swan who are merely the damsel in distress and are only there to play out the author’s wish to be put in some type of scenario where everyone fawns over them constantly (can be applied to male characters as well).

37: Which character is your favorite to write for?

Out of already made characters: Butchy, Lela, Cheech, Evie, Ben, Harry Hook, Bucky Barnes, Draco Malfoy, Luna Lovegood.

Out of my OCs: Mick, Malina, Roxy Madden, Candi DiMaggio

Since you said I could pick one if I wanted, I’m going to pick #40.

40: Imagine yourself 10 years in the future; do you think you’ll still be writing fic?

I think I will be, yes. I don’t think my ideas for movies and books will ever stop. Especially knowing what I have planned after Creating A Rift is done. But... that’s a story for another time, lol

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johnlockficclub · 6 years

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Author Discussion

Welcome @silentauroriamthereal!!! We were so happy to read The Bells of King’s College, and even happier to have the lovely SilentAuror answer our questions about her fantastic story. It’s been a great journey, and now it’s time to get the inside scoop on the boys in this story. We’ve had a lot of fun with this one, and thank you all for joining us! We look forward to seeing you all again for the next round!!!

The most important question is, who did YOU envision when writing Greg? @sherlock-nanowrimo

Greg? No one, actually!

How do you get inspiration too a new fic? @tildathings

I don't know, honestly. I never sit down and go, "hmm, I'd like to write a new fic, what should I write?" I just have ideas in my head all the time and generally order them so that I know what I'm going to work on next. I don't typically go hunting for story ideas

I want to know how you write in general. This story to me feels like one of those write as you go stories. Was it? @elwinglyre

I NEVER write as I go. I always have the entire thing planned before I write a single word I always know the beginning, the ending, and at least several major points that come between, at least - overplanning is just as bad as underplanning

What was the purpose of using familiar names for original characters? @wildishmazz

For OCs, it just made sense for the setting? They were going to a conference, so it couldn't possibly be all people that they already knew?

Hiiiii! Here's one for you! What was your purpose for the swans? What did they represent to you when you wrote it? We speculated on it a bit but I’d love to hear what your intentions were. @hpswl-cumbercookie

The swans! I just like swans, haha! Plus, Cambridge is full of them! No specific symbolism there... I'm pretty un-symbolic, generally. Just straight up narrative

So is Cambridge a location that is familiar to you? @bluebellofbakerstreet

Yes, not as familiar as I'd like, but I once spent three weeks in residence at one of the colleges as a guest cantor (I'm a classical singer and conductor)

Was Mycroft really just interested in solving the case, or did he have ulterior motives? @sherlock-nanowrimo

Yes, Mycroft in my writing never has ulterior romantic intentions. He rolls his eyes heartily at the entire notion, though in his heart of hearts he knows that it's probably good for Sherlock. But he would never do anything to help it happen

I loved the tension you built up between John and Sherlock, especially John not realizing that Sherlock had loved him for so long. When you're writing characterization, how exactly do you plan things out? Outline, character sketch? @elwinglyre

It all depends on the specific context. In this case, I was taking them from literally two weeks out from the end of series 4, where things were cautiously okay on the surface, but there was still all this crap lying right beneath it: John still projecting his literal self onto his notion of what and who Mary was and needing to come to see that in a more realistic and healthy (especially in terms of his mental health) way, and having the two of them (him and Sherlock) actually talk for real about their issues over the years and actually fix them. I had also already written one fake-couple-for-a-case trope and wanted this one to specifically be one where it didn't work very well for them My sole purpose in life is to make these two idiots have a full, direct, and honest conversation just ONCE, since Moftiss isn't ever going to let that happen

Is it a deliberate choice for a specifc effect that you write in present tense, or it just sounds better, or.... something else? (I'm more used to long texts being in past tense) @srebrnafh

I used to always write in past tense, but something about this fandom in particular just makes it feel right to use the present! I don't know why, but virtually all of my Sherlock stories are in present, even in my 152K novel!

Do you think Greg could tell there was seething jealousy revolving around him? @sherlock-nanowrimo

No, he's a pretty typically thick straight dude, hahaha

It's difficult to make Sherlock be all sentimental without him going out of character, yet you suceeded very well with that. How do you walk that fine line? Any tips for us common mortals writing fics? @shiplocks-of-love

it definitely has to be approached with caution! Sherlock is FULL of emotion, though - it's all there, right beneath the surface, and the very reason that Mycroft always lectures him about it, because he IS vulnerable. The entire façade of disinterest is a carefully cultivated, yet absolutely untrue one! He cares so much - but he's also absolutely unused to expressing any of it, or whether he should at all, and if so, how. He hates looking bad at anything, which makes it all extra difficult for him and John, being emotionally repressed and all around hung up, doesn't make it any easier!

Do you find it easier to write as John or Sherlock's POV? You do both so brilliantly, so I'm just curious @inevitably-johnlocked

Sherlock, all the way. I love writing John's POV wholeheartedly, but I'm very much Sherlock in my own head/heart!

Jodie, she was a very good character in this fic. She really made us think about how we have become mistrusting against and good people in fic’s. Why are there not so many good people written in fic’s do you think. @tildathings

Jodie WAS also meant to be a red herring! It's not a technique that I've used often - revealing the murderer quite obviously very early on, and then just having the case revolve around them needing to prove it. So Jodie was also just meant to throw in some suspicion, for interest heh

What inspired you to use evensong in this story? I don’t know much about it so I don’t really know its significance. @hpswl-cumbercookie

I'm an Anglican who's worked in Anglican churches for a long time and it's just a really beautiful service! Plus, in the music world, Evensong is a service that non-Christians often attend strictly for the music, so it made sense to me that the Holmes family might have, too? I depicted Sherlock's mother as being the Vegas show-type, but his father being the one who took them to Evensong. Plus the Christmas Eve Lessons & Carols at King's College really is a place for society people to be seen, etc It's a beautiful service that's more music than anything else

Would you ever write Pre S4 or Pre S3 again, in that case? Or do you go with "as each series happens"? @inevitably-johnlocked

No, once a new series has aired, I'm stuck in the phase of post-that series but I don't consider anything written pre-canon to be AU, either - just canon compliant with the then-known canon

I also think of Jodie as a Mary Sue (one that I would like to be like). Is she you? @elwinglyre

No, I would never deliberately write a Mary Sue!

LoL I was legit just about to ask about how you do your case research lol @inevitably-johnlocked

Hmm - that's hard to answer! it depends on the case! sometimes I'll google street view parts of London for hours just until I've found the perfect street to set the murder on I've also googled "dodgy parts of London" and stuff like that

I was wondering very much over why Andrea didn’t try to kill the bride or the ex? @tildathings

The bomb could easily been going of somewhere else then at the conference. She wouldn't have killed outside her "territory", though. If they'd ever gone to her hotel, she might well have!

Can I say a thing about the antidote? I researched poisons a LOT for this story, like how quickly they act, what they taste like, how curable they are, etc, and I chose the poisons in this story very specifically, the only antidote that acts this quickly - aka, fast enough to save Jodie here - is literally the one that comes up in this story, and it's literally not in use in the UK yet. It's been approved for use in the US only, since it was developed there, so that's why the random American doctor showed up. It was the only realistic way to get that antidote into this conference it's called hydroxocobalamin and it's only been around for about three months now I genuinely do my homework for my fics, lol @silentauroriamthereal

The scene where John gets upset that the others are congratulating Sherlock on sex, we talked about it a lot and it was my favorite conversation in the chat. There were some slightly different takes on what exactly it was that John was pissed about. Being a bottom? Being a conquest? Gay sex in general? What does this say about his views on sex? What were your thoughts in writing it? @sherlock-nanowrimo

All of the above! Being thought of as gay is something that I truly believe that John has a problem. John suffers from classic Short Man Syndrome, and being naturally perceived as the bottom is something I feel like he would naturally rebel against when he's not in his best place in terms of being emotionally healthy but especially the thought of having been a conquest, or having "caved" to something that Sherlock wanted and he didn't so much but I also think that John is so fascinating because his range of possibility is so huge. While I would say that it's absolutely in character for him to be a COMPLETE douche (because he absolutely has been!), I would say that it's equally in charater for him to be the soft-eyed, gently-smiling guy that we see after Sherlock's "England would fall" scene

LOL As an author, do YOU get frustrated that they're just not talking? I've always wondered. @inevitably-johnlocked

YES, omg, all the time!! like I said, it's my purpose in life to MAKE THEM TAAAALK but it has to get there realistically and there's just this huge backlog of stuff that needs talking about now, which makes it all the harder

John fascinates me, his relationship with family and friends. What do you think happened to his parents? Have you thought about them before writing anyone of your fic’s? @tildathings

I don't have a single theory. I've written multiple versions of what could have happened, just as I have at least 6 different versions of Harry now

I was reading another fic recently, where the author said in the notes that they had already addressed certain S4 things in other fics and didn't feel like it in this one. Do you ever feel that way? @sherlock-nanowrimo

Oh, for sure for instance, I've written John discovering Sherlock's whip scars so many times now that I don't always include it in every single story now. Ditto for him discovering that he would have died (snipers) if Sherlock hadn't jumped, that it was blackmail, that Sherlock's silence was protecting his life so I don't always have them have the FULL DISCUSSION OF EVERYTHING in every single story

Did you have headcanons for Sherlock's past memories of the place (Cambridge)? @sherlock-nanowrimo

Not specifically, just family trips, usually during the holidays

Last fic club meeting all of us had ideas for a second fic. From bachelor party sorry forgot what that’s called in English, to marriage with very much fluff. Is fluffy story something you could think of writing? Oh! And competition between Rock Greg and Greg Lestrade who made the best party! @tildathings

I never deliberately write "fluff" and find the term insulting, honestly that said, I am planning on a sequel to Isosceles, my most recent, where they go to LA to visit Corey (the OC in that story) and that will be on the lighter side, haha "fluff", to me, says "without substance" rather than simply "romantic" or "happy ending"

Can I just ask, as the author, writing that first get together after the ball, where was your mind? I'm not quite sure how to word it. like, Sherlock's and John's actions both make a lot of sense and very much feed off one another, but how did you get to that action specifically?. does that make sense? @hpswl-cumbercookie

My intention there was for them to hook up but without having had the major conversations that needed to happen first, plus John's jealousy rearing its ugly head and causing him (and remember, he was drunk and very much sans filters!) to say something hurtful that Sherlock definitely remembered, and for it to be the opposite of fixing their issues, but exacerbate them even further I did want their natural (and seven years built-up!) chemistry to take over, but for it to have happened out of order

Alrighty friends! Thank you all so much for joining us on this adventure, and obviously a million thanks for @silentauroriamthereal for joining us and speaking with us, as well as for writing this beautiful piece of fiction. From the whole JFC crew I want to say thank you and we will see you soon!

#johnlock fic club #the bells of king's college

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sulevinblade · 6 years

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OC Interview Meme

Tagged by: @mocha-writes (hopefully it tags you properly this time? But still, THANK YOU!!)

I’ll tag: @gremlinquisitor ofc, and anyone else who wants to do it! I don’t know who all among you may have already done it for your OCs but I love reading these!!

Since I did Ghilanel here, this one will be with Varevas. I’m... sorry, about him.

1. What is your name?

“You’ve lost my confidence with the very first question.”

2. What is your real name?

“Varevas, First of Clan Lavellan and Lord Inquisitor. I should make you use the entire thing for the duration as penance for not doing the least amount of background research.”

3. Do you know why you were called that?

“The end of it is just titles, of course, and I’m called those because I earned them, more or less. My given name is a variation of one given to at least one child in every generation of our clan in order to ensure someone carries our freedom forward. But no pressure.”

4. Are you single or taken?

“I am taken, frequently and to great mutual satisfaction.”

5. Have any abilities or powers?

“I love hearing them called powers because the implication is I went to bed one night unable to conjure a great fist of stone out of the loose Fade energy pouring from the rifts and then woke up able to do so. Maybe that’s how it looks to people who don’t possess magic of their own. I have many abilities, learned and honed through time and training. I have one power and that is closing rifts. I had nothing to do with that.”

6. Stop being a Mary Sue.

“I have no idea who that is.”

7. What’s your eye color?

“Green, light green.”

8. How about your hair color?

“Dark red. I’m thinking of growing it out.”

9. Have you any family members?

“My mother was killed by human bandits but my father is still alive, and I have one younger brother and a cousin with whom I’m quite close.”

10. Oh? What about pets?

“No, but recently we were in the Emerald Graves and I found a handful of caterpillars all climbing on some sort of communal nest or cocoon site. I didn’t really think anything of it and no one there knew what kind they were or if they were dangerous, but they did seem to respond to the sound of our voices. It was as though it startled them, but it looked like they were dancing, so I spent a few minutes teaching them different rhythms. I don’t think they cared for it but I never said I was good with animals. Bull thought it was hilarious.”

11. That’s cool I guess, now tell me about something you don’t like.

“I don’t like having my ancedotes dismissed. If we’re looking on a larger scale, I really don’t like that there’s an ancient magister threatening to destroy the world and start over and some people’s greatest concern is still how the ears of the person leading the fight to stop that are shaped.”

12. Do you have any hobbies/activities you like doing?

“I enjoy reading. My clan didn’t have many books and what we did have were focused on our history and written by other elves, which is very effective if you don’t ever plan on interacting with anyone other than elves ever. I can understand why many in my clan would have preferred that but I’ll take Skyhold’s library any day.”

13. Ever hurt anyone before?

“Oh yes, it’s a running joke. If you asked Dorian what my hobbies are, he’d tell you it’s indiscriminate murder, but I think I’m very discriminating.”

14. Ever… killed anyone before?

“I got ahead of myself with the last one. Well, asked and answered, but again, it’s not indiscriminate.” He looks unusually serious for a moment. “I learned my history and I know what indiscriminate murder looks like. What Corypheus intends is indiscriminate. What I am doing, as a representative of the Inquisition, is as thoughtful as it can afford to be. I don’t expect the families of people on the other side to thank me but I am doing what I feel has to be done.”

15. What kind of animal are you?

“A bear. Please ignore all follow up commentary from Dorian should there be any.”

16. Name your worst habits.

“I enjoy reading but I’m very bad at finishing books. There’s a stack of them beside my bed, all with bookmarks in them just waiting for my attention span to resolve itself. I don’t spend as much time here [in Skyhold] as I probably ought to but I’m not comfortable here. I interrupt Dorian’s research on a daily basis, though I can’t say that’s really all that bad since he still gets an impressive amount done.”

17. Do you look up to anyone at all?

“It’s disappointing to me that our differing opinions on the sovereignty of mages keeps Vivienne from giving me so much as the time of day because she’s achieved a kind of power and status that defies all expectations I have ever held for myself as a mage, and I was going to be Keeper of my clan. She’s competent, powerful, self-possessed, and a dazzling conversationalist. Many of those same things can be said of Solas but he also hasn’t kept himself apart in the same way so what admiration I may have for him is tempered by familiarity. We’re friendly, though I do still look up to him and now that he knows we share an interest in manipulating the energy coming from the rifts I think we’ll become even closer. Vivienne, however, is a class apart.”

18. Gay, straight, or bisexual?

“Gay. What a strange way to follow up your previous question.”

19. Do you go to school?

“And yet another unexpected turn! I began a mentorship under my clan’s Keeper as soon as I came into my magic. She ensured I studied other subjects as well but the main focus was history and lore; that’s a Keeper’s function, after all, it’s... it’s literally the name. Keeper.”

20. Do you ever want to marry and have kids one day?

“I haven’t really thought about it. I want to spend the rest of my life with Dorian but marriage is complicated for a lot of reasons, and frankly I can’t imagine anyone who takes the threat our world faces right now seriously daydreaming about raising a child. I want to make sure we have a world where raising families is still a possibility at the end of this but for myself, I don’t know.”

21. Do you have any fanboys/fangirls?

"I pay for my drinks at the Herald’s Rest just like anyone else. I really don’t care for being recognized even though I realize it’s inevitable. Except with you, though, you didn’t even know my name.”

22. What are you most afraid of?

“Fucking it all up. Absolutely just ruining everything. I like to keep my fears general so I’m always just a little terrified, it’s very motivational.”

23. What do you usually wear?

“I prefer light clothing that allows me to move easily. I need to ground myself in order to cast but I need to have my arms and body free.”

24. Do you love someone?

“I do. I never imagined that being an outcome of all this but I’m also lucky enough that he loves me back.”

25. When was the last time you wet yourself?

“Have you ever been gripped by the wrist and hoisted like a wet rag doll by a twelve-foot-tall creature made of red lyrium and avarice who wanted nothing more than to snap your hand off and kill you, knowing all your back-up had fled because you sent them away and the only outcome of this encounter was your death? You’d pee a little too, trust me.”

26. Well, it’s not over yet!

“I wouldn’t be surprised if he made me piss myself again, but this time I’ll be ready.”

27. What class are you? (High class, middle class, low class)

“Being the First of the clan meant I enjoyed certain privileges but our clan was not a wealthy one. My life here in Skyhold is an improvement in a lot of ways over life with the clan in that regard, and I suppose I am a lord now.”

28. How many friends do you have?

“More than six but less than ten. Draw your own conclusions.”

29. What are your thoughts on pie?

“Surprisingly difficult to make but worth it.”

30. Favourite drink?

“The water in Skyhold is the cleanest, freshest tasting water I’ve ever had, and it’s often bitterly cold too, so cold your teeth ache when you drink it. The castle is too cold to really enjoy that but I do enjoy it. Dorian thinks I’m mad but it’s the only cold thing I like.”

31. What’s your favourite place?

“My quarters, with all the doors closed and curtains hauled over them, a fire on and my lover close at hand. It’s the only way I can thaw out.”

32. Are you interested in someone?

“Keep. Up.”

33. What’s your bra cup size and/or how big is your willy?

“I've received no complaints.”

34. Would you rather swim in the lake or the ocean?

“Dorian tells me in Tevinter they have great indoor baths for swimming in. Given the option, one of those.”

35. What’s your type?

"Fire and Rift.” He pauses and sighs. “I don’t know that I could ever be with someone who wasn’t a mage. It made life in the clan very isolating because even as the First you were still seen mostly as competition for younger mages who wanted to keep their place in the clan. Having a ‘type’ never occurred to me. It still hadn’t when I ended up here. I don’t know that I have one. I love Dorian. I don’t need a type.”

36. Any fetishes?

His eyes flash and narrow and Varevas leans forward in his chair. “Whenever possible, I try to convince Dorian to keep his clothes on when I go down on him. I get off on the smell of the leather and the jingle of all those ridiculous buckles and clasps keeping him bound up while I try to make him explode.” He maintains eye contact the entire time he speaks and there’s not a hint of color on his cheeks. “Dorian is an incredibly private man who would be profoundly hurt if I revealed anything factual in a situation like this, so do with that statement what you will.”

37. Seme or uke? Top or Bottom? Dominant or Submissive?

“We’re done discussing this.”

38. Camping or indoors?

“Indoors. Who doesn’t like being warm and dry?”

39. Are you wanting the interview to end?

“If that’s what it takes to end these questions about my private affairs then yes.”

40. Now it’s over!

“Brilliant. You can show yourself out.”

#varevas lavellan #the dalish disaster himself #the pet question is absolutely a reference to the caterpillar rave vine #i was watching vine compilations the other night #and decided that one is var #also ctrl+f how many times he mentions dorian #the boy's got it bad #this was so much fun #i love him even if he's not my canon inq #thank you again for the tag!!#oc interview meme

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megers67 · 6 years

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On OCs and Fandom Cohesion

This may seem like a weird and rambly post and frankly I've been struggling with how to word this for quite a bit. I don't think there's any winning on that front so I'll just get into it then.

So I honestly don't recall why I started following him, but at some point I saw that @moringmark was doing something that really struck me. For Star Vs the Forces of Evil (I have never watched this show so I know next to nothing about it), he made (or popularized) a metaverse made entirely of fankids, original characters who are the kids of two canon characters. And not just his own, but all of the fankids in the fandom.

This may not seem like much, but it blew my mind. See, my formative fan years were the days that I think were the peak of Mary Sue wrath. We're talking My Immortal days. The days where if anyone was doing meta fics, they were of the Mary Sue Hunters or Mary Sue Academy variety. Both types focus on the goal to protect the canon, the former by slaughtering badly-written characters. Meanwhile the latter does this by forcefully sending authors to a meta school where they learn to both write better and learn about the source material where you needed to basically get a license to write fic (I recall a long one about the Lord of the Rings franchise in particular). As far as I'm aware, it has since calmed down. There's still a hang up on Mary Sues, but it isn't to nearly the same degree or vitriol or done in the same manner as it once was. I have to admit, that there are parts of me that still bubble up into this kind of thing, but I at least have the wherewithal to not publicly shame anyone or put it into writing. You do you. My unsolicited advice would do nothing but make an ass out of me.

So to now see the opposite, a coming together of sorts for characters who would have been targeted in the past, is absolutely beautiful to me. Now, I have seen a few similar congregations in the past, but the other ones I saw required a sort of application process. There was still a hang up to make sure that the character was good enough or the writing or drawing skills met some level of expectation and that membership had some sort of responsibility to participate in group projects, etc. But that's not the case here, at least not that I can see. Instead it's more of a "hey, here's a space for us to have some fun outside the bounds of our normal limitations of storytelling." No requirements for specific ships, no test to pass, no obligation for participation. Just fun.

Honestly, that's something we can really use in other fandoms. I'd love to talk about my wish-fulfillment characters that I tend to instinctively make whenever I consume a new piece of media. They're all dumb but I love them to bits. But I never share them because I know they'd likely be categorized as Mary Sues and part of me is still ashamed by that. So they're for my own enjoyment only and for that, would likely never see the light of day. But if there was a space where say, all Treasure Planet OCs could hang outside of their respective canons or rules free of judgement, or Star Trek, or any other number of fandoms.... If this can be the new norm, I think the fandoms themselves would be a better place to be. Because frankly, fandom drama occurs and it always will when you have a large group of passionate people together in one place. But I think something like this can be really helpful to mitigate some of that.

#fandom #OC #ocs #fanfic #mary sue

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thecaffeinebookwarrior · 7 years

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The Dos and Don’ts of Beginning a Novel: An Illustrated Guide

I’ve had a lot of asks lately for how to begin a book (or how not to), so here’s a post on my general rules of thumb for story openers and first chapters!

Please note, these are incredibly broad generalizations; if you think an opener is right for you, and your beta readers like it, there’s a good chance it’s A-OK. When it comes to writing, one size does not fit all. (Also note that this is for serious writers who are interested in improving their craft and/or professional publication, so kindly refrain from the obligatory handful of comments saying “umm, screw this, write however you want!!”)

So without further ado, let’s jump into it!

Don’t:

1. Open with a dream.

“Just when Mary Sue was sure she’d disappear down the gullet of the monstrous, winged pig, she woke up bathed in sweat in her own bedroom.”

What? So that entire winged pig confrontation took place in a dream and amounts to nothing? I feel so cheated!

Okay, not too many people open their novels with monstrous swine, but you get the idea: false openings of any kind tend to make the reader feel as though you’ve wasted their time, and don’t usually jump into more meaty action of the story quickly enough. It makes your opening feel lethargic and can leave your audience yawning.

Speaking of...

2. Open with a character waking up.

This feels familiar to most of us, but unless your character is waking up to a zombie attack or an alien invasion, it’s generally a pretty easy recipe to get your story to drag.

No one picks a book to hear how your character brushes their teeth in the morning or what they’d like to have for dinner. As a general rule of thumb, we read to explore things we wouldn’t otherwise get to experience. And cussing out the alarm clock is not one of them.

Granted, there are exceptions if your writing is exceptionally engaging, but in most cases it just sets a slow pace that will bore you and your reader to death and probably cause you to lose interest in your book within the first ten pages.

3. Bombard with exposition.

Literary characters aren’t DeviantArt OCs. And the best way to convey a character is not, in my experience, to devote the first ten pages to describing their physical appearance, personality, and backstory. Develop your characters, and make sure their fully fleshed out -- my tips on how to do so here -- but you don’t need to dump all that on the reader before they have any reason to care about them. Let the reader get to know the character gradually, learn about them, and fall in love with them as they would a person: a little bit at a time.

This is iffy when world building is involved, but even then it works best when the delivery feels organic and in tune with the book’s overall tone. Think the opening of the Hobbit or Good Omens.

4. Take yourself too seriously.

Your opener (and your novel in general) doesn’t need to be intellectually pretentious, nor is intellectual pretense the hallmark of good literature. Good literature is, generally speaking, engaging, well-written, and enjoyable. That’s it.

So don’t concern yourself with creating a poetic masterpiece of an opening line/first chapter. Just make one that’s -- you guessed it -- engaging, well-written, and enjoyable.

5. Be unintentionally hilarious.

Utilizing humor in your opening line is awesome, but check yourself to make sure your readers aren’t laughing for all the wrong reasons (this is another reason why betas are important.)

These examples of the worst opening lines in published literature will show you what I mean -- and possibly serve as a pleasant confidence booster as well:

It was like so, but wasn’t.

— Richard Powers

Those of us acquainted with their sordid and scandalous story were not surprised to hear, by way of rumors from the various localities where the sorceresses had settled after fleeing our pleasant town of Eastwick, Rhode Island, that the husbands whom the three Gordforsaken women had by their dark arts concocted for themselves did not prove durable.

— John Updike

The cabin-passenger wrote in his diary a parody of Descartes: “I feel discomfort, therefore I am alive,” then sat pen in hand with no more to record.

—Graham Greene

Indian Summer is like a woman.

— Grace Metalious

If these can get published, so can you.

Do:

1. You know that one really interesting scene you’re itching to write? Start with that.

Momentum is an important thing in storytelling. If you set a fast, infectious beat, you and your reader will be itching to dance along with it.

Similarly, slow, drowsy openers tend to lead to slow, drowsy stories that will put you both to sleep.

I see a lot of posts joking about “that awkward moment when you sit down to write but don’t know how to get to that one scene you actually wanted to write about.” Write that scene! If it’s at all possible, start off with it. If not, there are still ways you can build your story around the scenes you actually want to write.

Keep in mind: if you’re bored, your reader will almost certainly be bored as well. So write what you want to write. Write what makes you excited. Don’t hold off until later, when it “really gets good.” Odds are, the reader will not wait around that long, and you’re way more likely to become disillusioned with your story and quit. If a scene is dragging, cut it out. Burn bridges, find a way around. Live, dammit.

2. Engage the reader.

There are several ways to go about this. You can use wit and levity, you can present a question, and you can immerse the reader into the world you’ve created. Just remember to do so with subtlety, and don’t try too hard; believe me, it shows.

Here are some of my personal favorite examples of engaging opening lines:

"In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."

-- Douglas Adams, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

"It was the day my grandmother exploded."

-- Iain Banks, Crow Road.

“A white Pomeranian named Fluffy flew out of the a fifth-floor window in Panna, which was a grand-new building with the painter’s scaffolding still around it. Fluffy screamed.”

-- Vikram Chandra, Sacred Games.

See what I’m saying? They pull you in and do not let go.

3. Introduce us to a main character (but do it right.)

“Shadow had done three years in prison. He was big enough and looked don't-fuck-with-me enough that his biggest problem was killing time. So he kept himself in shape, and taught himself coin tricks, and thought a lot about how much he loved his wife.”

-- Neil Gaiman, American Gods.

This is one of my favorite literary openings of all time, because right off the bat we know almost everything we need to know about Shadow’s character (i.e. that he’s rugged, pragmatic, and loving.)

Also note that it doesn’t tell us everything about Shadow: it presents questions that make us want to read more. How did Shadow get into prison? When will he get out? Will he reunite with his wife? There’s also more details about Shadow slowly sprinkled in throughout the book, about his past, personality, and physical appearance. This makes him feel more real and rounded as a character, and doesn’t pull the reader out of the story.

Obviously, I’m not saying you should rip off American Gods. You don’t even need to include a hooker eating a guy with her cooch if you don’t want to.

But this, and other successful openers, will give you just enough information about the main character to get the story started; rarely any good comes from infodumping, and allowing your reader to get to know your character gradually will make them feel more real.

4. Learn from the greats.

My list of my favorite opening lines (and why I love them) is right here.

5. Keep moving.

The toughest part of being a writer is that it’s a rare and glorious occasion when you’re actually satisfied with something you write. And to add another layer of complication, what you like best probably won’t be what your readers will like best.

If you refuse to keep moving until you have the perfect first chapter, you will never write anything beyond your first chapter.

Set a plan, and stick to it: having a daily/weekly word or page goal can be extremely helpful, especially when you’re starting out. Plotting is a lifesaver (some of my favorite posts on how to do so here, here, and here.)

Keep writing, keep moving, and rewrite later. If you stay in one place for too long, you’ll never keep going.

Best of luck, and happy writing. <3

#the author speaks #writing #opening chapters #openers #first chapters #plotting #american gods #neil gaiman #douglas adams #the restaurant at the end of the universe #iain banks #crow road #vikram chandra #sacred games

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freedom-of-fanfic · 7 years

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I'm kind of torn on the Mary Sue issue. On one hand, I don't care what anyone writes for their own amusement, but writing is still an art that does and should have standards for professionals. As someone who has degrees in writing and does it as a profession, it's a little insulting to be told that the work your poured tons of research and time into is on the same level as amateur self-insert fic. That's why I advocate for different standards for fandom vs pro work.

I feel you, anon. and I have a lot of respect for people like you who got degrees and write professionally, because words are held rather cheap with the internet being around and anyone who can get paid to write words impresses me to some degree. but:

I’ve always felt like comparing fanfic and original fiction to be not exactly congruous? and

I think Mary Sue suffers from maligning because she’s disproportionately evoked by the youngest/least experienced of writers.

this got … pretty long … so i’m dividing it up a little for ease.

the concept of ‘standards’

first of all, I also advocate for different standards between published/professional/marketed works and fan works, but I do so because of 1)potential spread and 2)they aren’t accomplishing the same thing.

In general, a fanwork will have limited appeal outside of the fans of the canon the work is based in; they cannot stand on their own without some additional effort. Further, fandom has its own language to some degree or another, and fanworks are frequently best understood in the context of other fanworks, like scientific papers citing other scientific papers in passing because the audience is expected to be other scientists in the field who have read it. In other words: the audience is probably fairly niche and in on the ‘lingo’. its potential damage circle is therefore relatively small. if somebody fucks up their research for a fic, it’s nbd, for instance.

On the other hand, an original work with a professional marketing team will certainly reach a much more diverse audience and probably a much larger one. It’s therefore responsible, imo, to be proportionately aware of the potential impact of the subject material and approach it accordingly (though true fiction will always have an unpredictable effect on any given individual, so there’s only so much the creator can do). I’d expect accuracy where research was done, if for no other reason than to avoid spreading false information to such a big potential audience.

and of course I’d hope that if somebody is being paid to write, their grammar/prose/proofreading will meet a certain standard of readability. (the same cannot be expected of free works done for fun that take a few minutes to post on the internet.)

having said that: standards for quality fiction writing will always be subjective. I’m always going to have questions about why The Sound and the Fury is an American classic (I couldn’t make sense of it no matter how hard I tried). What gets published can be as simple as having good luck with the slush pile reader that day. I’ve seen fanfiction complimented with incredible research: there’s a Tokyo Babylon work-in-progress with an author who has traveled to fic-relevant locales to nail story and character details. I feel the line is blurring these days, especially because there are people who make a living off writing commissioned fanfiction now (too small-scale to be an IP concern, of course).

I think the fundamental difference between fanworks and original works is not quality of the work itself or effort expended. It’s related to structure and aim.

Fanworks, even AU fanworks, are like interior decoration. A 'good fanwork’, even an AU fanwork, works within a pre-built framework to elaborate on or add to or evoke what drew its audience to the framework in the first place.

Original works build a whole new house, creating a new framework from bare construction materials to draw in and house the emotions of its readers. (and then maybe its readers decorate the house with their own fanfic.)

tl;dr: if an AU fanfic was so different from canon and the characters were so OOC that the author can shave the serial numbers off and repurpose it as an original story, it might be a great original work. But it wasn’t a very good fanfic, was it?

why is mary sue so offensive to us?

I don’t know if you’ve ever read the post Mary Sue, What Are You?, but what I keep coming back to is its iconic opening. the author describes an OC at length: orphaned as a child when her parents were killed in front of her, she decided she would dedicate her life to fighting for justice. She grew up to be rich, athletic, beautiful, sexy, angsty, a genius, undefeatable in a battle of wits and agility, and everyone who meets her is instantly lovestruck. In other words, a classic Mary Sue …

but also Batman with female pronouns.

I think one could argue that Batman is not always well-written, but the relevant point here is that Batman - and Mary Sue - might be 99.9% perfection in the shape of a human around whom the universe revolves, but if its their own canon and the universe doesn’t recognize their perfection the way the reader/writer does, it’s not really 'bad’. (And there’s something to be said about why giving this power fantasy male pronouns seems to render it so much more palatable than female pronouns, but for more on that I point you to the referenced essay.)

Your ask is worded to suggest that Mary Sue is synonymous with unprofessional writing. I … kind of agree? Mary Sue is frequently the main character of Baby’s First Fanfic, and let’s be real: Baby’s First Fanfic is often being written by somebody who might be as young (or younger than) 12-13 years old, with all the inexperience, grammar mistakes, and lack of training that suggests. and as far as characterization goes, I think that anyone who takes decent writing classes will be discouraged from writing a Mary Sue. But like Batman, Mary Sue can be a perfect princess and get away with it under certain circumstances.

I posit that Mary Sue characters (or Gary Stus) - whom I will call Flawless OCs from here - are not really a problem on their own. Further, Flawless OC is more agregious in fanfic than original works. Because what makes the Flawless OC so irritating isn’t their perfection, really: it’s what the character’s presence must do to the universe (which is, in the case of fanfic, the universe the reader came to experience in the first place) that’s the real problem.

To show what a good fighter Flawless OC is, they defeat the best canon fighter.

Flawless OC has a backstory more tragic and painful than the most tragic canon backstory, and they cope with the trauma of it better.

There’s no room for Flawless OC because canon wasn’t holding a spot open for a self-insert, so now there’s a 6th Lion or a 10th Fellowship member or a Second Child Who Survived Voldemort.

The entire universe bends to ensure Flawless OC has perfect luck; their enemies are helpless before them. Everything seems to go their way except in the chapter where the their love interest is supposed to rescue them from danger. (the rescue goes flawlessly, of course.)

Depending on the author wish that Flawless OC is meant to fulfill, Flawless OC will defeat any undefeatable enemy, solve the unsolveable problem, be the envy or lust object of any character, etc etc, often without regard for the original context of the enemy/problem or the canon personality of the character.

In short, Flawless OC usually have two major issues:

they render canon irrelevant to glorify Flawless OC, and

the universe constantly validates their choices to a degree that wrecks narrative suspense.

what makes each of these things 'bad writing’ is different.

The first problem I mentioned - warping of mythos, plot, and characters to accomodate the Flawless OC - is a fanfic problem. Canon-warping absolutely allowed, but what makes it fanfic - the canon source that acts as our shared experience and usually our main reason for being a potential audience to the fic - is almost always nigh-unrecognizable. That makes for bad fanfiction, but it doesn’t always make for bad fiction. Change all the parts of canon enough and you’ve arguably got an original work. It might even be a good original work if the author has writing skill.

The second problem - the validation of the universe - is what makes Flawless OC a dull read in any context. If Flawless OC wants something, you know they’ll get it. If Flawless OC hates someone, you know they’re going to catch hell. If Flawless OC needs to be vulnerable for their love interest, something just bad enough to make them vulnerable will befall them. The perfection of the OC is less of an issue than the lack of meaningful conflict. (A character can have no faults and still be interesting to follow if they must struggle against a universe that doesn’t care.)

to wit:

there’s a fantasy book by David and Leigh Eddings - The Redemption of Althalus - that I read long ago. it stuck with me to a peculiar degree because for a book with such a unique conceit, it was incredibly boring. This is published fiction: it had editors, a marketing team, and was written by professionals with lots of experience! But looking back, none of this saved the story from featuring Gary Stu in a universe that catered to his every need.

The main character, Althalus, is ostensibly a person in need of redemption for being such a bad person all his life and never punished for it, but he’s a loveable, quick-witted rogue almost from the start. To 'redeem’ himself, he’s tasked with saving the world from Enemies (we’re told they’re evil, but I don’t think we see them more than once or twice). Protected by the Goddess of Luck - literally - for the entire novel, there’s never a single moment where Althalus’ victory over the Enemy is in question. He never does anything really awful that would explain his need to be redeemed (in fact, it turns out the Luck Goddess is the one who protected him from punishment all his life). The enemy is weak, forgettable, and constantly outwitted, and the protagonists, supposedly people of gray morality, never did anything worse than be snarky.

The unique conceit that kept me reading was the House at the End of the World. Being the home of the Goddess, it had doors that opened to anywhere on the planet. but for an idea with such double-edged possibilities, it turned out to be an impregnable fortress of Good. The House and its owner were the forces that bent the whole book’s universe to the inevitable triumph of the main character and his companions.

A counter-example might be Miraculous Ladybug. I’ve often wondered if Mary Sue could be written well and be likeable, and Marinette - the titular Ladybug - is probably close. She’s good at almost everything and always outwits her enemies; even when she seems confident to the point of arrogance, it’s justified by her endless successes. (Her only real flaw is being clumsy when she’s distracted, and it only happens when it’s conveniently cute. this is a walking Mary Sue cliche.) Her power is to be lucky, after all.

However: even though everything ends up right for Marinette at the end of every episode, she’s not rewarded when she acts poorly towards others. She causes herself problems when she does. Her luck powers give her the ability to bend the universe a little, but the universe is otherwise unforgiving; she’s subjected to the same banalities as everyone else and learns to be a better person along the way.

OTOH if you put Ladybug in another canon with a makeover to recast her as Flawless OC, changing everything so she could occupy a central role like the one she has in her own series, she’d be insufferable: hence Ladybug is a solid example of how a Mary Sue can prosper provided she’s in a universe designed to both feature her and contain her powers for the sake of Good.

I apologize for how long a reply this is. Still: I hope it successfully illustrates for you that:

though original writing and fanfic writing use the same tool (words), and both can use them masterfully, what original writers like you do and what fic writers do are, in general, very different things.

And Mary Sue is what you make of her. In the right universe, she’s just a very lucky person. :)

#in defense of mary sue #in defense of fanfic #origific vs fanfic #fandom meta #miraculous ladybug #david eddings #i think i read that book because I liked some other book of his #but wow it was a dull read #I kept waiting for everything to fall apart #but it didn't #anywho #long post #y ik es #Anonymous

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nobodysuspectsthebutterfly · 7 years

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So let me tell you about my Star Wars mary sue.

I had a lot of mary sues while growing up. (I don’t use the term derogatorily, btw, but as defined by the late great Kielle at her Mary Sue Appreciation Society, a wish-fulfillment original character, often created by teenage girls, who makes her creator happy. For more discussion, please see here.) I had a whole host of Doctor Who mary sues (2 quite detailed, 2 rather undeveloped, and other background OCs), several Marvel/X-Men sues (years of worldbuilding there), and others. (No Star Trek, surprisingly... or maybe not so surprisingly.) Though mostly these stories were never actually written down -- while my head-fantasies were very detailed, with dialogue and scene-setting and such, often the only thing that ever hit paper was drawings of characters and scenes. Pretty good ones, imo. :)

As for my Star Wars original character...

I, like many fans I’m sure, imagined a Star Wars sequel. And like many fans I’m sure, my characters included Han and Leia’s Jedi-powered twins. This was when I was a young teen, btw... about 1986-1989 or so, just so you know. Before the Expanded Universe, before the video games, before the prequels, before any additional Star Wars stories besides the original trilogy, the Ewok tv movies, and Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. (I now know there were Marvel comics telling original Star Wars stories in the 80s, but I had no idea at the time.) Note I was very put out when the Thrawn trilogy came out in 1991, because twins were my idea. I had an unreasonable grudge against the EU for ages, because they did it wrong. I got over it eventually, but still, the EU was never something I was very interested in.

Anyway, I never developed the boy twin very much (more on that later), but the girl, Ana Solo... she was my favorite, for a while. Light brown hair (in a pageboy cut to start, later grown out to a ponytail), blue eyes. She was named for Han’s mom (technically), and for some reason she wasn’t Force-trained... reasons varied from her being latent, her Force-sensitivity hidden, or H&L refusing to have her trained because of reasons... the story changed over time.

But in the most final form, the story began when 16-year-old Ana was practicing gymnastics, flying through the air through a web of bars on the starship that was her home (not trained, but still capable of amazing flips and stuff because mary sue). When she landed, she got into some argument with C-3PO (about what, I don’t remember? something about her parents being away and not caring/being too overprotective probably), and in her rage accidentally blasted him with Force lightning... and in fear of herself and for what she might to do others, she ran away...

On her ship (she’s a great pilot, because Skywalker), Ana started talking to herself... but actually, no, it was to the Force ghost of Anakin Skywalker who appeared to her. (Looking like the nice old guy from the end of the original ROTJ, not Hayden Christensen.) As the story shifted, it varied when he first appeared to her -- sometimes he’d been her “invisible friend” since childhood (though never explaining who he was), sometimes he didn’t actually appear until near the end of her quest (more on that in a sec), but generally this was the first time. And he’d reassure her that she wasn’t bad, but if she wanted to avoid the temptations of the Dark Side, she needed training, she needed to find Luke.

But for some reason Ana was instead drawn on a quest, something she didn’t understand, something she needed to do. She went to Cloud City and found Luke’s old blue lightsaber... and then to Endor and found the remains of Darth Vader’s... and put the crystals from both together to make a purple lightsaber. Because mary sue. Oh, I mean, it was deeply significant, recovering the legacy of Anakin Skywalker and so on, but also purple. (And yeah I did lightsaber crystals before KOTOR and Clone Wars did -- though to be fair, they got the idea from the same place I did, the Kaiburr crystal from Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, which came from an early draft of Star Wars.)

So in the end, Ana appeared out of a sand storm on Tatooine, wearing an ivory surplice and leggings and boots and mask (which looked very stomtrooper-y), Luke’s old lightsaber at her belt, before the eyes of her astonished uncle and brother...

(I had a drawing of this scene, it’s long-gone now, but it was great. Had a drawing of her gym scene too, and also by the remains of Vader’s pyre on Endor. Sigh.)

Oh, re Ana’s brother, he was very undeveloped, at this point I’m not even sure I ever decided on his name. (I think I once used Ben before deciding against it, lol.) He had dark hair and dark eyes, that I do recall. But I think a major reason for him not being a developed character is that he just wasn’t in the parts of the story I’d worked on. While in most variations of the story he was being trained by Luke when Ana arrived, in some versions he’d been kidnapped as a baby, leading to H&L’s overprotectiveness of their remaining child. And while Ana was tempted by the Dark Side, he was the one who would actually fall, leading eventually to a confrontation between the twins. He wouldn’t die, though, he’d be saved. Though I don’t remember how, I just knew I wanted to have a happy ending. Probably there was something about the power of family love or something, like ROTJ.

Also there was no romance in the story, at the time I was writing it I didn’t really do romance. (When romantic elements even existed in my stories at the time, they were always very chaste.) I eventually decided I needed to have some unrelated male character for Ana to play off of for romantic intrigue (if anyone it might have been Lando’s son, showing up when she’s on Cloud City, but IIRC I thought a non-Force-using scoundrel-type might have been too Freudian), but by that point I’d really moved on to other head-stories and other mary sues. And I’m afraid I never really worldbuilt the future Star Wars universe very much (there were bad people out there, Han and Leia were deeply involved in the new government, Luke taught Jedi students, that’s about it).

But still. There are reasons I spent quite a bit of watching TFA with a deep sense of deja vu. I was mature enough to not get unfairly mad this time (it’s Star Wars, if I could think of these tropes of course other fans could). But still. :)

(btw, no Last Jedi spoilers please, not even hints or reactions. I’m seeing it tonight, if you have something you want to tell or ask me you can wait a few hours tyvm.)

#star wars #not tfa #(as such)#no tlj spoilers #mary sues #oh my nerdy childhood #ana solo #i really mean it about no spoilers btw do not tick me off

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essenceanddescent · 7 years

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Your "Beautiful" Character Sucks

Or … Why I Avoid Fics with overly "Beautiful" OCs

Or ... What Makes a Mary Sue, Part 2

Pre-rant: I don’t normally write about what people shouldn’t do. I don’t like guidelines. I don’t like standards. I don’t like best practices. I don’t like any rules that are placed on highly subjective and creative art forms. So the point of this isn’t to tell you what you shouldn’t do, because you should write whatever the hell you want to. The point of this mini-rant is to point out something that, I … as a reader of fiction … make it a point to avoid reading and why.

For the most part, I’m going to put "beautiful" in quotes, because “beauty” is supposedly subjective, although that is not, in fact, true. For the purposes of this ramble, I’m going to be referring to the socially accepted standards of “beauty”. I am not talking about the people who are so intriguing that they are attractive in ways that are not conventional. I’m talking about the person that 98% of the people in any given room would agree is “beautiful” without ever speaking to them.

So … Those Kinds of Fics. Yeah, you know the ones.

We’ve all read that fic. The one that starts highly promising. It's got all the right tags: Romance, True Love, the right pairing. It’s even well written, the spacing is perfect, the author’s note and summary before the story actually starts is clever and almost pleasant. It shows INCREDIBLE promise.

We are immediately intrigued and very optimistic. Those little butterflies flutter in our stomachs as we start to read and take in all the glorious words, hoping deep down inside that this is going to be the fic that we’ve been waiting for. This is it. Someone has done it and it that will introduce or fix something that is missing in our broken little fandom hearts and then we get to the line (or one very much like it).

He/She steps into full view and [everyone or anyone] gasps as their jaws drops at his/her jaw-droppingly beautiful eyes, and jaw-droppingly beautiful skin, and jaw-droppingly beautiful hair and jaw-droppingly beautiful body and … and … and … and … beautiful … beautiful … beautiful*. Maybe you don’t understand: BEAUTIFUL.

YES, I know this is a blatant exaggeration, but you get my point. It's love at first site because they were just so goddamn beautiful. They haven’t spoken yet. They haven’t shown they have a single thought behind their beautiful eyes … but it doesn’t matter, does it? She’s beautiful, and that means she’s a good person. And that means we have to love her immediately, because Beauty Equals Goodness in our fucked up superficial society.

No romance, no growth, no nothing. Everyone on the cast wants to fuck your OC because they are simply irresistible. I sniffle because … sadly … this fic is not the one. Rarely reading even another single word, I close the tab and begin my search anew, feeling suckered into reading the beginning of it at all.

Look, I get it. I really do. A lot of fic is wish-fulfillment and a lot of us wish that we were that beautiful, but there’s a cost to that kind of power that authors never take into account when developing their characters into something that could make me care about them.

Beauty really IS a Real World Superpower

Before you write blindly about "beauty", do you really understand it and its effect on those around it? I’m not a “beautiful” person, but I’m not ugly either; I’m like the majority of women out there, stuck in some kind of terrible nebulous middle ground: Unbeautiful Purgatory.

As women, we are taught from birth that our worth, regardless of how intelligent we are, regardless of how talented we are, regardless of any other trait, is placed solely on our appearance and ability to be desirable. Franky, anyone who tells you otherwise is full of shit. "In my household." BAH. It's not just our own families that uphold this stereotype, it’s the media and society itself. It even comes directly from us (even in the fics we write) and our friends. We enable and continue to drive and reinforce these superficial ideals on a daily basis.

But, being a highly intelligent woman, stuck in this strange tortuous middle ground, you get a fascinating view of how real world people react to "beautiful" women. When an incredible “beauty” enters a room, she has a powerful effect on all of those around her, men and women alike. This isn’t a myth or an unfounded stereotype, this is a well documented cognitive bias known as the Halo Effect.

TL;DR: The halo effect works in both positive and negative directions (the horns effect): If the observer likes one aspect of something, they will have a positive predisposition toward everything about it. If the observer dislikes one aspect of something, they will have a negative predisposition toward everything about it.

If you’ve watched 30 Rock, then you might have seen the episode, The Bubble, (see Handsome Bubble for the trope of this) with Jon Hamm that touches on this point quite laughably. Hamm plays an overly attractive doctor who doesn’t even know the heimlich maneuver; he’s a tennis coach who doesn’t even know how to play tennis. While this is obviously an exaggeration for comedic effect, it doesn’t make this phenomena any less true. "Beautiful" people experience life quite differently from the rest of us, whether it be for the better or not. And … “Beautiful” people are BORING.

The Halo Effect … First Hand

This is a personal story, and you can skip it if you wish.

I’ve witnessed this effect first hand and found it actually terrifying. Being internalized and introverted, I tend to observe in social environments more than interact. At a social event, a few years ago, I found myself in a room full of highly intelligent men and women engineers who got flustered immediately when a "beautiful" woman entered the room.

Just a quick note here: I am not talking about just some pretty face. This particular woman’s "beauty" was talked about at the water cooler daily. She could easily have been a model instead of an engineer.

So, I watched, in awe of the situation unfold, as this said person committed various atrocious acts of social crimes: forgetting people’s names, touching people inappropriately, talking over people, not listening to what people were actually saying before replying. She was entirely unable to follow the technical aspects of the conversations currently in play and as such the dialogue was immediately dumbed down to allow her to participate. She immediately became the ultimate center of attention and … everyone loved it. It was like a show was being put on and you were supposed to be enamoured by her, regardless of what she was actually contributing. It was her mere presence that was the drug to them.

Now, I should have been just as enamoured with her and I do not think that I am immune to the Halo Effect, but I was immune to her effect, specifically, because I had been her officemate for over a year a few years prior to this strange social interaction. We shared cubes in the same office for over a year passing each other every day and exchanging nice pleasantries.

I had learned, over several months, that she was entirely incapable of doing her own work and was … in fact … lacking any kind of significant personality. Over the year of sharing the space with her, she progressively became less and less attractive until I found myself standing uniquely outside of her realm of influence. Don’t get me wrong, it is an extremely powerful effect as it took months and months of constant stimulation for me to build up a tolerance to it and see through the thin veil of just her exterior.

So when someone introduced us at this social event, I started to laugh, because … duh, we already know each other and she put her hand out to shake mine because she had no idea who I was. Sure, it’d been a few years and I’d grown up, lost weight, and changed my hair color but …

Wait. What? Are … you … kidding me???

When I spoke to a friend about this, they actually dismissed me. "It's not a big deal. She didn’t mean to be rude. She’s actually a really nice person. You shouldn’t be so sensitive." I really didn’t look that different, but I was confused why this was suddenly socially acceptable. I have a hard enough time dealing with socializing as it was and the entire experience was a big turn off for me going forward putting in effort to socialize with this group of people.

Socializing and interacting is a pretty tricky game as it is, especially for someone who is hyper observant. Extroverts have a one-up on introverts here. Sure. But the game is entirely stacked the other way around when you are playing with an obvious handicap or … in her case … a Game Genie.

I also want to make it clear that this story wasn’t to put down one unlikeable "beautiful" person. No, the purpose of this story was not to point out her as an abnormality or even to call her out as the standard of “beautiful” people. The point was to appreciate the reactions by everyone around her. These were people whom I’d know for years. People who I considered were highly intelligent. People who had earned my friendship over years of interacting. How did a group of people that I had so much respect for fall prey to groupthink so very easily? It’s simple, we’re wired that way.

I learned a lesson that day: Beauty Completely Disrupts Normal Behavior

But "Beautiful" and disruptive means it’s a Mary Sue. Doesn’t it?

You knew I was going to tie this back to Mary Sue-ism, right? Hehehe, of course I was.

I see a lot of talk about a character being so "beautiful" that she overwhelms the characters and plot and therefore, she is a Mary Sue. This definition, as the previous definition of a Mary Sue, is a bad one.

So, here is the thing with "Extreme Beauty". If you read about the Halo Effect and the physical attractiveness stereotype, then when an insanely attractive person walks into a room, most (it does not have to be all) of your other characters (original or canon) will most likely be enamoured by them and will automagically treat them much differently than other people.

But, you say, the argument that a character is a Mary Sue because they change the characters and plot and story to fit around them is somewhat invalid at this point, isn’t it? Some part of a Mary Sue is all about causing characters to act OOC or act unbelievably. If most people are, in fact, affected by The Halo Effect then it is absolutely IC (In Character) for them to be enamoured with her at first glance and treat her quite a bit differently than they would treat anyone else.

I would even go as far as to say that if you have described your character as infallibly "beautiful" and most of the characters are NOT in the least bit flustered with her beyond reason, that might be OOC (Out of Character). “Most” is an important distinction in that previous statement, as I do think that there are people/characters who are, in fact, immune to the Halo Effect. (This is an extremely important trait for me to find in a hero, btw)

Great! If she’s not a Sue, then I can disrupt with her all I want!!!

Sure. Yes. Yes, you can and yes, in my eyes, she would be a valid character in that sense because absolute "beauty" has a tendency to disrupt absolutely, but why do that? Is it a satire? I might read that then. If not, is that really interesting? Will there be any growth behind her trials or her affect on the characters? Will she provide a lesson learned or just serve as a porn star in the fic to be used and discarded?

Who really wants to read that? Probably some people? I don’t and I won’t. If I’m reading fic about a canon character, chances are I like that canon character and I feel like that canon character deserves my extra attention, so why would I want to read about them and an obvious sex toy with them? I know, I know … that is what smut is, right? No. Smut can be written with real people. Show me real attraction, don’t just tell me about fleeting infatuation driven by the physical features of a vapid bombshell that is supposed to be a husk for reader to assume control of in their minds.

I’m so very tired of being bombarded by the media that makes me feel inadequate as it is. From the issues introduced by problematic tropes to recent Hollywood shenanigans, I actually turn to fanfic specifically to read about realistic characters with which, I always hope on some small level, to be able to relate to and when I find that it's the same regurgitation, I get turned off immediately.

But My Character really is ULTRA UBER Special! LOVE HER!

You: No, no, no. You don’t understand. My ultra "beautiful" character is different. She’s nice, kind, sweet, and she’d never let her beauty get to her head. She’s incredibly smart and playful and lovable and absolutely empathetic and charismatic … She’s JUST SUPER SPECIAL!

Me: ಠ_ಠ

Ok. Here’s the deal …

If you’ve grown up with this "effect" on you for your entire life, there will be parts of your character and personality that are inevitably stunted or just flat out fundamentally different compared to those who didn’t grow up with such … advantages or … (I shudder to use this word) privilege. It’s easy to understand: if you’ve never really used muscles before, then people who have will have stronger ones. Get me? “Beautiful” people are usually gonna be socially stunted and inevitably very, very, very boring.

You: But that’s just the rule. There are exceptions! Extenuating circumstances!

Me: ¯＼(ツ)/¯ Uh … sure? I guess? You just better be goddamn good at SHOWING and SELLING me on it, instead of just TELLING me.

So, the above characters can exist and they can actually be written very well. Absolutely. Who I just described above is … Captain America, handsome Steve Rogers himself. Yup, he is all of those things, but do you know what makes him nearly believable for me? He didn’t grow up like that. He experienced a transformation. He was given this super power after being the complete OPPOSITE of what is considered "beautiful" for a man. He grew up battered and beaten down, learning what it really meant to be empathic and understanding. They SHOWED us that, on so many levels. I related to him. He was introverted and he stood alone in the corner at parties. He went on double dates and was the third wheel that the girls ditched in favor of his best friend. Because of his appearance, he was the outcast.

But, be careful using the Beautiful All Along trope though. Unless you can provide some interesting backstory for said "transformation", then it can be hard to buy. Some people go for the She Is All Grown Up, which isn’t much better IMHO.

All I ask is that you put a little bit of effort into making your character attractive in ways other than physically “beautiful”. It’s tiresome and, honestly, it only perpetuates the problem further.

#it's just a big long hateful ugly rant #rant #fanfiction #fanfic #mary sue #what makes a mary sue #beauty #lazy character development #I'm sorry #if all i cared about was beautiful women i would stick to hollywood and not read fanfic

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eldaryanrevolution · 7 years

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If you could redesign the characters, how would you do it? This includes personality and appearance.

Ok! First of all, give everyone pants (I cannot stress this enough)

An actual color-code for clothes depending on what Guard they’re in!! Because it’s easier to find members from your Guard if everyone isn’t dressed all “personnal style before functionnality” around the fucking headquarters

TALKING ABOUT FUNTIONNALITY Simple but efficient clothing?? Boots, shirt, pants, bam. Visible weapons BECAUSE YOU NEED TO BE READY FOR AN ATTACK AT ANY TIME ESPECIALLY IF THE MASKED MAN TENDS TO JUST PRANCE AROUND IN AND ABOUT LIKE THE HEADQUARTERS ARE YOUR STREET CORNER BAKERY So the color codes would be something like huh Light Guard: white and gold? obvAbsynthe Guard: green, white, maybe blue?Shadow: grey (it’s actually a better color to hide in the dark than black) and some black not everyone is an edgy 2007 teen vampire mary sue oc Nevra thank you very muchObsidian: warmer colors, maybe brown (for leather armors) and white/regular metal plate armor, some gold and red details.

Also, let’s have some cultural diversity in inspirations. Yes, Hang Hua had a beautiful brown skin, but aside from that, maybe it’s Chinomiko’s mediocrity in art style, but her face was exactly like any pretty white face would be. To me, this isn’t enough. Give the elves fine middle east clothes and the looks to go with them (Arab prince Ezarel anyone??). Give the warriors samurai armors, plate armors, old leather armors. (JUST GIVE THEM ARMORS FOR FUCK’S SAKE). Give the “simpler” people like Merry traditionnal clothes from Switzerland, Germany, eastern Europe?? It’s pretty obvious that the Faes didn’t leave Earth without grabbing what was GOOD about it while leaving because that’s what people with brains actually do

And the personnalities oh my goodness

Let’s start with Miiko: Let’s make her what she is already a -failed- attempt to be. A leader who’s struggling with keeping the power because not everyone is willing to listen to her (which raises issues like “oh she’s too young” “she doesn’t have enough experience” “she’s just a girl” among the Eel Guard bc conflict is GOOD). Let’s have internal conflict among the Eel Guard, which adds up to the other threats and make her a person with an iron will, but an ease to break. And no, I’m not speaking about her hysterical bitch personnality, this is annoying.

Leiftan: NO MORE CREEPY MOM ISSUES PLEASE??I mean given he has as much personnality as a white blank page, I don’t really know what to add. Leiftan is a bit like my personnal Petyr Baelish: I sense there’s something wrong with him being all friendly-friendly with our Gardienne, and that makes me extremely wary of him.

Ezarel: Listen up, I hate Ezarel. I hate his “humourous” insults and I hate his supposedly “honesty”. Ezarel reminds me of the 12 y-o kids who bullied others in middle school. I had a personnal headcanons that Ezarel was, in fact, high 24/7, which was where his way to speak came from. My Ezarel, in short, is a stoner genius who’s so annoyed by everyone being less smart that he seeks comfort in datura and other shit to just not care that people are dumb, therefore being a high weirdo who speaks in cryptic shit that nobody has time to decypher.

Nevra: NO MORE CREEPY GUY ISSUES PLEASE????Nevra is constantly trying to “seduce” us , and that’s the problem, he’s the definition of trying too hard. People who seduced me the best weren’t trying at all! Is he an actual vampire? Does he feed off blood? How would that affect someone’s personnality? We may never know, but maybe an actual vampire Nevra, wild and feral, having to feed off others and being constantly isolated because most people see him as a threat, would be interesting, MAYBE I’D JUST LIKE IT BECAUSE OUR GARDIENNE WOULD FIND OUT THAT HE’S NOT A MONSTER AND IT WOULDN’T BE IN A CREEPY STALKER WAY

Valkyon: Oh, my poor poor love. Let it be said, I adore Valkyon. (maybe cause I always fall for the ones able to crush my skull hahaha)But his writing is bland. He’s awkward in the worst way possible, he’s as awkward as I am during Christmas family dinner; Most of the time, it just seems he has no idea what to say. A good Valkyon would be, once again, someone who feels out of place as a leader (just like ALL OTHER LEADERS DO BC NATURAL BORN LEADERS AREN’T INTERESTING IN WRITING THEY’RE JUST A BUNCH OF FUCKUPS TRYING TO MAINTAIN THEIR WORLD) but earned that right to command. He’s half human and doesn’t know how to deal with that? His familiar is weak af and the Obsidian Guard probably mocks him for this, asking why he doesn’t have a giant bear or lion or shit BUT my baby’s tough and he just fights his way to the leading place and anytime anybody says something, he takes them to the fucking training pit because it’s probably the only way he knows how to show strenght. Valkyon isn’t much of a thinker and it’s not a bad thing: you need people of action in leading places sometimes too. Valkyon wouldn’t hesitate to endanger himself for other people’s lives (especially the Gardienne) and his friendship with Ykhar comes from the fact that she taught him stuff from books about knights and knight code and HE TRIES TO FOLLOW IT BECAUSE HE’S THE ONLY THING GOOD AND PURE IN THIS WORLD Also give him an armor please

Now, bear in mind that all the stuff written above is mostly headcanons and reflections in an amateur writer’s mind, not exiging anything from the Eldarya team (I stopped hoping long long ago on that matter). If you wanna discuss, cool, don’t hesitate to send me more asks or pms!

#eldarya #my fingers hurt #bitching #ranting #miiko #valkyon #ezarel #nevra #leiftan #ashkore #if you want more of the personnalities just send me an ask #or just to discuss it all please #but I can't write anymore rn #Anonymous

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