#wufei did not want to be a part of this

[imperviousmelodrama]

Prompt: Early in the relationship, Duo emphasized consent. Now Heero literally asks for consent in all things.

[grassbreads]

I finished Pet Shop of Horrors: Tokyo, and I have some mixed feelings about it as a sequel.

On one hand, it was a lot of fun! I genuinely adore the choice to set it in Kabukicho and have Count D start befriending all the local queer people. I really enjoyed leaning a bit into D's cuter, goofier side, as well as his more benevolent and helpful side. Him running around giving magic pregnancy eggs to lesbian couples and having tea with drag queens is 10/10. Him clowning on Lau Wufei constantly is also 10/10. And I really don't mind that the series went in a more non-horror direction, as I really can see the appeal of that from a characterization perspective. Count D deciding to use his insight (and pets) to prod people in harrowing but helpful ways instead of just setting them up for Thematically Appropriate Death/Misery most of the time like he did in the pre-Leon-and-Chris days is a really interesting choice for him to make.

Also, some of the chapters were genuinely quite good as standalone stories! I loved Deathtrap, Decadence, and Dispatch, just to name a few. And the sphynx cat guy!! The sphynx cat guy is the pet of all time tbh.

All in all, I had a pretty good time reading Tokyo! If nothing else, I was quite consistently delighted by D, and most of the individual chapters' stories were compelling (though a few of the ~animals all along~ twists felt rather forced or contrived).

On the other hand, Tokyo did feel like it was missing big parts of the appeal of the original Pet Shop of Horrors. Some of what I loved about the original, murders or no, just wasn't in there.

To start with, I feel like Count D somehow managed to lose a big chunk of his depth from the original series. His family is barely mentioned at all! I can remember one brief reference to his father (and his father's death), and his grandfather comes up relatively rarely as well (mostly just to hammer home why Lau Wufei can't kick D out of his building). And that's wild! Because D's relationship to his family and his family's purpose was a big underlying part of his character in the original. Even in early chapters when we knew nothing about what the Ds were or how their Whole Thing worked, the manga made that familial element feel ominous and important. But now it's all out in the open, now the audience knows what D is and how his family works, and the thread just. gets dropped.

How does D feel about the death of his father? How does he feel about knowing that his grandfather was secretly observing him the whole time he was in L.A. (and possibly for a long time before then)? Is he still in contact with his grandfather while in Tokyo? How is their relationship now? How does he feel about knowing that his grandfather is raising his new brother/son/reborn dad/whatever the hell you want to call the new D? I get that this is a new series in a new magazine, so D's feelings about the original series were never going to be the centerpoint, but leaving out his connection to these events entirely just feels like SUCH a glaring omission. And if he's purposely avoiding thinking about these things, then show us that!

And as an expansion of that, what about the whole revenge mission D is supposed to be carrying out? In the original series, D dreams of extinct animals and wakes up crying. Masses of animals dying on the other side of the world in a wildfire gives him nightmares and makes him feel like he can hear their screams. He nearly collapses and gives everything up while he's on the run close to the end, but he has a vision that prevents him from doing so. His family's purpose isn't just something pushed on him by his grandfather—it's something he is constantly haunted by. The Ds are not allowed to forget the suffering that drives them.

So like, I am absolutely down for a D that chooses to embrace some small measure of hope and move away from a search for vengeance. I love that, actually. I think it's a great way to show the impact Leon and Chris have on him. But Tokyo gives us absolutely nothing in terms of D actually making and dealing with the fallout of that choice. We see him seeking to help out and protect endangered native species, and he's generally compelled by sole survivors and dying embers of every kind, but that's really all we get from this angle of him.

How does D deal with the pain and sadness and anger that runs in his veins? Does he struggle to justify his shift in methods? Both to his grandfather (if they're talking) and to himself? Does he struggle to reconcile his fondness for individual people and his hope for a redeemed humanity with the continuing degradation of the natural world throughout the 2000s? Does he view himself as a helper of humanity now? Human-neutral? Does he see himself as a guide? It's almost impossible to say, because PSoH: Tokyo just does not tell us.

The suffering of the whole natural world runs in D's blood, and D in the original absolutely does struggle to reconcile that fact with his growing care for humanity and humans. He's still conflicted even at the very end, loving Leon enough to let him onto the ship for a moment, but knowing despite the tears he sheds that he cannot let him stay. But Tokyo!D seems like that contradiction has just ceased to be a problem for him. If he's learned to set aside the fear and pain and rage that runs in his blood, it would be nice to see that development. If he feels he's somehow doing right by his mission as he helps the human and animal denizens of Kabukicho, it would be nice to see that justification.

Overall, in Tokyo, D just never seems to struggle with anything. He seems to have no real problems! He's rarely upset, especially late in the series. He has no difficulties bigger than "can't find a kappa when he wants to" or "passes out after Lau Wufei makes him do too many blood tests." I do really enjoy D's sillier side, and I'm happy to see a version of him that seems happier overall, but taking away all of his struggles just makes him feel like he's had all of his depth sucked out.

The original PSoH has whole chapters where D himself is the "victim" of the supernatural happening of the week (the orangutan in Donor, and to an extent the mermaid in Deep and reincarnation in Dynasty). In particular, though Donor has a tie-in plot for Leon, the chapter's story and themes ultimately all center around D and his painful relationship with his family. Dynasty centers on the Counts' disconnect from humanity and our D's emotional struggle to deal with that despite caring for people more than his ancestors did. Can you imagine getting a chapter like that in Tokyo? A whole chapter about inflicting D with complicated emotions, about making him feel yearning, regret, and grief? There's just nothing like that.

There's the very occasional moment in Tokyo that hints a bit at D's deeper, more serious feelings, but for the most part, he feels like he's been fully reduced to Funny Playful Magic Animal Guy. Even when he's letting darker things happen, handing out brood parasites or giving people nightmares to teach them lessons, his violence is handled as glibly as his dessert shopping is.

And beside my issues with what the change to Count D's writing does to him as a character, I do think Tokyo overall loses a lot of the appeal and atmosphere from the original series with its refusal to take him seriously. If there's one thing the original PSoH is good at, it's creating a sense of intrigue and mystique around the Count(s). We spend a lot of time in the pet shop, exploring its back hallways with customers and seeing D in his element there, and it always treads the line between enchanting and unsettling. The back of D's shop is a seemingly infinite labyrinth of hallways and curtains and ornate doors, and some of the "rooms" he has back there aren't even rooms at all. Customers find themselves in dim, impossible spaces lined with incense and heavy curtains, and they are somehow talked into buying "pets" that they never would have wanted in another circumstance. Even when D really does end up helping his customers rather than hurting them, people are off-kilter in the depths of the pet shop. They're unsettled, and yet they find themselves seduced. D himself is hypnotic and enticing in his voice and mannerisms, the avatar of the pet shop's seduction. It's really compelling on an aesthetic level.

The horror element expands on this, adding that knife-edge tension where we never know whether D is going to fix his customer's life or ruin it. Even as he gets more consistently helpful toward the end of the series, helping a customer may still mean breaking them down emotionally or enabling them to kill somebody else. But even if Tokyo wanted to commit to D getting less murderous, even if the creator no longer wanted the audience to worry D might kill half his customers, that doesn't mean we had to lose all the tension in his store. We get lots of "oh, this is strange" when people enter D's twisting back hallways in Tokyo, and Lau Wufei keeps grumbling to himself about how he has to check the blueprints because nothing makes sense, but almost nobody ever seems frightened by that strangeness.

And when people are unsettled by D, when we do get a brief moment where he's allowed to be enticing and ominous once again, it's always played off. He always returns to the happy silly animal guy again, almost like the thought he could still be truly dangerous is just a self-referential joke. D walks past a suicidal man on the street, senses his desire for death, and entices him back to the pet store, but it's so he can make him dress up as santa. D's ability to conjure up tangible afterimages of a long-extinct past—once used both as a way to maim or kill threats and as a way to cope with the immense grief he carries—is now used mostly as a way to replicate a video game for the side characters.

And speaking of those side characters, I feel like the pet shop itself almost gets sidelined along with D's more serious elements. How many of the chapters in Tokyo center on local wildlife (or local monsters) not actually tied to the store at all? How often is D just a friendly outsider that intervenes a bit to help events along? How often do the supernatural beings causing trouble simply visit D at his shop for a helping hand or a friendly chat, rather than originating from him? And of the stories that do hinge on him selling a pet or "pet" to someone, how many of those are centered on mundane animals?

It's not like D never causes trouble or sells supernatural creatures anymore in Tokyo, and it's not like the original didn't have cat and dog stories or stories where D just happened to stumble on the mystery of the week, but even the chapters centered on mundane animals in the original managed to be quite unsettling at times. Again, for myriad reasons, the pet shop just loses so much of its mystique in its Tokyo portrayal, and I think that's a real shame. The shop begins to feel like a fun curiosity, rather than the story's enigmatic beating heart.

It feels like there's a lot less imagery in Tokyo of D with the pets in their humanoid forms. Those panels were always so unsettling, between the almost-but-not-quite humanity of the designs and the uncomfortable sensuality of them. It was a reminder that the animals filling up the background shots in the shop were all quite sentient and potentially dangerous. It added to that air of heavy, seductive mystique I keep talking about. Leon hears D speaking to others through the shop's door, and he's unsettled when he enters and finds nobody but animals inside. Is Lau Wufei or anyone else in Tokyo ever properly unsettled by the strangeness of the animals in D's shop? For more than a few panels?

Where are Tetsu and Pon-chan? They're there on the sidelines sometimes, making faces and reacting to things, but they hardly ever get to do anything. They have no character development, no real bearing on the plots of any of the chapters. In fact, the only pet that ever gets to be important for more than one chapter is the Egyptian cat kid, and I'm pretty sure that kid is just a cameo from one of the creator's other manga. Why does he get to be more important than the original PSoH's menagerie? Where the hell is Honlon?? And it's not like we ever get a hint that D's setting up shop has coincided with an increase in deaths around Kabukicho, so what does the Totetsu eat?

There's a brief scene of humanoid Ten-chan lounging in D's bedroom with a few other pets and chatting about the problem of the month with D in one of the late Tokyo chapters, and I was honestly shocked when I got to it, because until that point it seemed like Tokyo had forgotten those types of scenes could even be done. Just a small handful more of those moments could have really helped create more interiority for D and the pets and make Tokyo feel a bit more like the original, but instead, moments focused solely on D and the pet store's denizens are few and far between.

The original Pet Shop of Horrors was an episodic, atmospheric series of horror stories and haunting moral tragedies, and those individual stories were tied together and given momentum by the over-arching mystery of Count D and the pet shop, as well as the growing emotional bond between D, Leon, and Chris. It's the story of Leon Orcot trying to understand the secrets of the dangerous, enigmatic Count D.

What is Tokyo the story of? It's not the story of Lau Wufei trying to understand the enigmatic Count D, or it does a bad job of being that if it's intended, because Wufei never actually come close to understanding him. D and Wufei become friends of a sort, but they don't seem to actually have an emotional bond. They're work friends! D cries when he leaves Leon behind, and Shuko, an echo of D, cries when it's time for Chris to move on. D sure as hell doesn't shed tears over Wufei. And Wufei, though he seems to acknowledge that D gets up to some weird mystical shit, never learns anything close to the truth of him.

Tokyo doesn't have the original PSoH's over-arching mystery (or any fleshed-out over-arching plot at all). It refuses to engage with D's more fraught, weighty character and story elements. It doesn't have an emotional core in the form of well-developed, caring relationships between the central characters. It doesn't have much focus on the key members of D's haunting menagerie, since the pet with the most screen time doesn't even live with him. It barely has any of the unsettling, enticing aesthetic elements that give the original so much of its ever-compelling mystique.

What does Tokyo give us instead of all that we're missing? Lau Wufei gets bits and pieces character development, and he has compelling aspects with his hunger for power, his hesitance around romance, and his fraught relationship with his dad, but Tokyo also seems afraid to commit too hard to treating him seriously as an emotional agent.

Wufei was never going to replace Leon, but I do think there's a potential version of Tokyo where he and D could have been allowed to bond in a deeper way. A real friendship with Wufei might have been a way to tease out the more serious sides of D. It could have been a way to flesh out Wufei, to put more emphasis on his character and growth, while also letting D talk about his feelings about Leon and his family with someone.

Wufei is probably the most dynamic, emotionally changed character in Tokyo, and I still can't say he changes that radically between the opening chapter and the end. Chapter 2 Leon would have reacted to the finale quite differently than chapter 37 Leon did. I'm honestly not sure how chapter 3 Wufei would have reacted to his finale with the Kirin. He might have taken the offer, but I don't feel like I have enough deep insight into his feelings on the matter to say. And if Wufei is bordering on static, then D, Chin, and the pets are also static to an almost unbearable degree.

Overall, Pet Shop of Horrors: Tokyo almost feels like a manga that's afraid of itself. It's afraid to dig too deeply into its characters, so everything stays happy and silly, and even the characters' inner conflicts and focus chapters are fairly surface-level. It's afraid of the blood and horror of the original series, afraid to let D be more than a little bit morally complex or get his hands dirty. All the violence has to come from outside sources and give him some vague deniability.

Some of the standalone stories in Tokyo are quite good, the happy new take on D is constantly delightful, and the addition of the culture of Kabukicho is genuinely quite a brilliant direction to take the story. But a ~fun~ character, a brilliant setting, and some good episodic elements do not an overall compelling story make. At least, not when you're writing a direct followup to something that managed to have an overarching emotional depth that worked in tandem with its episodic nature. Maybe I'd have fewer issues with the static characters and lack of overarching connection if the franchise hadn't already established its ability to do those things well, but as it stands, the absence leaves Tokyo feeling unsatisfying, incomplete, and empty.

I had fun reading Pet Shop of Horrors: Tokyo! I think it is, for the most part, a very enjoyable read, especially for a fan of Count D like me. However, despite my enjoying it deeply, I don't know I actually like it in the ways that matter. I don't know if it has much deeper worth as a whole story (setting aside the worth of the better standalone chapters). I don't know if I really approve of it as a followup to the original PSoH.

Tokyo is goofy and fun and intriguing, but I know there's so much more it could have been. There's so much more the characters could have been. D's lack of reuinion with Leon at the end is far, far from the only way in which it feels like it's lacking in any real resolution.

Fun or not, it's just hard to give a full two thumbs up to a story in which the beloved main character barely seems to change or increase in depth between the first and last pages, despite the fact that he has 43 chapters to do so. I know from the original that Akino has the ability to tell a story that's fun and also so much more on top of that, so it's frustrating that the sequel feels like a regression.

[ephemeral-builds]

I'm honestly not a huge fan of Mobile Suit Gundam Wing - the gundams all seemed a little too gimmicky. And Shenlong was damn-near "super robo" with that dragon arm. Plus, Wufei was just plain frustrating. But it's still a cool model kit to build.

I really don't love how these metallic stickers look... But I'm stuck with them until I get my hands on some metallic Gundam Markers or something.

I guess the stickers don't look horrible once they're in-place and the rest of the parts get assembled.

I really like how the Dragon Fang folds up into the shoulder. I hate transformation-type gimmicks that just involve sticking more parts on the model. And there are more parts if you want the super-long Dragon Fang... But you can get a Dragon Fang going just by unfolding that shoulder segment.

This time around I did the panel-lining as I assembled the model, instead of saving it all for the end. It was much easier to line things before all the parts were together. Less obstructions.

I don't know who ever thought it was a good idea to build the peg-hole for the Action Base out of two separate pieces. It never holds together. As soon as you try to pose it on an Action Base the butt-piece falls off. I always make sure to glue that one part of the model.

I don't know if it's the polycaps this model is built with... Or the age of this specific kit... Or just a quirk of this generation... But the model already feels kind of loose and floppy. Had some issues getting a pose I liked. That's too bad, too, because the Dragon Fang can make for some really dramatic poses.

[universal-ren-kin]

You got it, a twofer it is. "Marked" is my baby right now, up to a nice 444 hits on ao3. It's hard to pick a favorite part but if I had to, it'd be...

“I take you watched the footage,” Treize began. At Heero’s nod, he hummed. “I figured as much. I am giving this case to another agent. Your emotions would cloud your logic.” He held his hand up at Heero’s immediate loud protest. “No arguments. I want to find Wufei, too. But as passionate as you are about the man, you may overlook important things. I’m giving this to Agents Alex and Mueller. They’re qualified in kidnappings and I have faith in their abilities.”

Anything else Treize may have said was drowned out in Heero’s shock. He was off the case looking for his lover. He was forbidden from looking for Wufei. Alex and Mueller would be looking for him… Heero did not trust those two. There had always been something off about them from the start and he was sure they would somehow bungle this. Heero didn’t notice how hard he was gripping his coffee cup until the thin paper crumpled under his grip and hot coffee poured over his hand. Treize watched in shock as Heero didn’t react and made up his mind.

“Agent Yuy, you are back on leave as of this moment,” Treize declared. “You are of unsound mind so long as this case is active and there’s no telling how long it will be active. You are to act as a civilian for the foreseeable future. You will still receive pay but if I catch one single hint of you trying to work this case on your own, I will terminate your employment for insubordination before you can breathe. Am I clear, Agent Yuy?”

As for the Untitled Oz fic, I don't have a blurb to share but I *can* tell you about it. The basis for this fic is that, at some point in his life, Wufei is actually rescued by OZ against an attack by the Alliance. It's o the point where he can't easily return to the pilots but he's not exactly a prisoner. It's designed around various Steven Universe songs and my favorite so far is "Do It For Her". I can share my outline for it, here!

Training between wufei and Zechs

Zechs realizes Wufei has NO IDEA HOW TO FIGHT

Wufei admits he’s a scholar not a fighter, mobile suit or not

Zechs trains him in practical mobile suit fighting and swordfighting, teaches him to use a gun and fistfight

Bonding over doing it for “Him”

Zechs realizes that while Wufei’s absolutely insufferable, he’s not a total idiot and can absolutely take orders and isn’t a terrible fighter

Thank you for asking, this was fun!

[muwi-translates]

I came across this Gundam Wing scan and the content in the pink boxes was so cute I couldn’t pass up on translating them. I’m not sure where this is from but it’s advertising the HD remaster Memorial Box version of GW, specifically Part 3 which contained Endless Waltz. I originally planned to scanlate it but it was too much work and I’m lazy.

Essentially they introduce the boys, what’s usually on their minds, and also has a tip on how to pursue them/win them over/get their attention??? Which I found SUPER amusing because even the magazine is like “uh, good luck lmao”

For example this is Heero’s:

Case: Heero There’s nothing in his head other than missions, and once he starts working, there is no room for other people. However, he’s become much softer than when he did nothing but fight and follow orders, and can be seen smiling more than before.

Brain analysis: 100% MISSIONS.

How to win him over: It’ll be a difficult time with a tough opponent in Relena. But just keep applying pressure like she does!

-

Note: Just wanted to make it clear that all of the percentages are me eyeballing.

Case: Duo The type of person who prioritises his private life over missions, but he gets the job done. One of his strongest points is his ability to always face forward and take on any foe, like the time he forced his way through the Mariemaia army with only his own body, even without a Gundam.

Brain analysis: 30% missions, 70% private

How to win him over: First, it’s important to get his attention by being friendly. After you get to know each other to some extent, pursue forcefully aggressively! ⭐️

Edit: Found a better adverb lmao

-

Case: Trowa After the war, he returned to the circus and lives a peaceful life. He’s taciturn, but gentle, and he specialises in infiltrating the enemy to strike from within rather than from the front.

Brain analysis: 70% the circus, 30% training

How to win him over: He enjoys his work as a clown, so you should get close to him through his workplace.

-

Case: Quatre Because of his kind nature, which makes him put others before himself, people naturally follow him. However, he also has a stubborn side, and despite other’s objections, he single-handedly carried out the dangerous task of retrieving the Gundam he had sent into the sun.

Brain analysis: 33.3% work, 33.3% friends, 33.3% peace

How to win him over: He often stands above overs in a leadership position, so you’ll be sure to get him if you can talk to him from the same perspective.

-

Case: Wufei Wufei always analyses himself to determine what is right in the world. His thoughts are preoccupied by himself and his beloved machine, Nataku. His love for his Gundam is so deep that he is the only one among the five who did not give it up.

Brain analysis: 50% training, 25% self-discipline, 25% Nataku

How to win him over: If you treat him seriously and start conversations by talking about Nataku, you’ll have a winning hand.

-

I can’t get over the format. With the exception of Quatre, the others just have this “they’re so weird but I mean, they’re getting better/nice/passionate--oh, you’re interested??? uh, okay... good luck i guess...” vibe LMAO I wonder what the ‘private’ section of Duo’s brain includes.... honestly could be anything.

[meggie-stardust]

hello! random fic question: do you have any wip you're excited about right now?

hello, nonny! There is nothing I love more than random fic questions. <3

So, last year I wrote a Gundam Wing future fic that took place like 12 years after the wars, and was a 1x2x3 endgame. This year, I wrote a prequel that explored the relationship between 1x3 during the series, but it's also a Trowa character study.

I'm currently writing the 2x3 sequel to the first story, and I want it to be a slice of life fic, and a little bit silly. This is also be a nice change of pace after the big fic I just finished for a mini bang challenge.

I'm really stoked on some of parts I've written so far, and I don't want to give too much away, so here is a piece that sounds like it might be critical to the story, but isn't as much as you would think.

The thing about Duo is that whatever Professor G did to boost his healing factor back when he was a kid, it’s now become a challenge for him to push the limits. It’s not something he thinks about often––usually the benefits only come into play during a mission, and pushing the limits while on a mission is just the nature of the beast. And he’s never really discussed his enhancements, as he calls them in his head. He knows Heero is enhanced, that was obvious the moment he survived Wing’s self-destruct, and he has his suspicions about Trowa. But despite everything he’s never pointblank asked either of them. He doesn't really need to; Duo knows Heero and Trowa must also have something going on the same way he unequivocally knows that Quatre and Wufei don’t. 

[this-account-doesnt-exist]

Gundam Wing Secret Operation (1996) Side B (Cast Comment)

M = Midorikawa Hikaru (Heero’s VA); S = Seki Toshihiko (Duo’s VA); N = Nakahara Shigeru (Trowa’s VA); O = Orikasa Ai (Quatre’s VA); I = Ishino Ryūzō (Wufei’s VA); R = Okiayu Ryūtarō (Treize’s VA); K = Koyasu Takehito (Zechs/Milliardo’s VA)

~~~

M: Since the boys have left us in charge, let’s just move onto our self introductions. My name is Midorikawa Hikaru, and I voiced Heero Yuy. The plot of the actual anime was mostly quite serious, so I had a lot of fun recording these comedic skits. If this project garnered enough support, we might get the chance to do a second one, so please make sure to show your support! If we were to make another audio drama, I would personally be really happy if the leader of the circus and Howard were to make an appearance, as I really like those two characters. See you again in the future!

S: Thank you for listening till the end. My name is Seki Toshihiko, the voice for Duo Maxwell. I never expected to re-affiliate with Gundam through a project like this (chuckles). How did you like this parody of Gundam Wing? Whether it be through another parody or something else, I hope that I’ll have the chance to meet everyone again as a member of the GW cast in the future. Goodbye!

N: Hello, thank you for sticking till the end. I am Nakahara Shigeru and I voiced Trowa Barton. Trowa was very docile in the anime, so I was a little worried about how he would fare in this audio drama, but it seems like he is slowly opening himself up more. I really want to see Trowa going all the way out, so here is to hoping that we will get another chance to do something similar to this in the future. Once again, thank you for listening!

O: If the higher ups had let this group do whatever we wanted to do, there is no telling how far we would end up going. Today, I was able to experience this fear first-hand. I am Quatre’s VA, Orikasa Ai. Although I am really fond of the serious story of the anime, I also really love projects such as this one where everyone is able to have a lot of fun. During the recording session today, the studio was generous enough to provide us with slices of cakes as refreshments, so the entire team sat down and ate together. As for Okiayu-kun (Okiayu saying “What? Me?” in the background), he ate 8 slices! (Everyone erupts into laughter while Okiayu shouts “I only ate 4!”). Please look forward to the next audio drama! 

(Koyasu in the background saying “Okiayu-kun just got slandered”) 

I: Hi everyone, thank you for listening. My name is Ishino Ryūzō, and I was given the honour of voicing Chang Wufei. Ever since I took on the role of Wufei and became a part of the GW cast, many people from around the country have sent me letters with a lot of encouraging words written in them, so I would like to convey my gratitude using this opportunity. In their letters, a lot of people have said that they would like to be yelled at by Wufei, so we tried to incorporate that as a part of this audio drama. Hope everyone liked it! See you next week!

(The rest of the cast laughing in the background) 

R: What is this “next week” that Ishino-san was referring to? Anyways, my name is Okiayu Ryūtarō, the voice of Treize Khushrenada. I only ate one slice of cake. (Laughs) I am trying my best to go on a diet. (To the rest of the cast who are laughing in the background) Stop laughing you guys! Since I (here Okiayu is referring to Treize) have died at the end of the anime, I didn’t think that I would have the chance to make another appearance. Even though I was resurrected as the weird school principal this time, I have no idea whether I would appear in the next audio drama or not (chuckles). Thank you so much for today, and thank you for listening.

K: Don’t know how I ended up being the last one, but here we are. I am Koyasu Takehito, the VA of Zechs Merquise. As it has been a while since the anime ended, I wasn’t able to pronounce Chang Wufei when I read the script for the first time (both Koyasu and the rest of the cast laughs). What’s wrong with me today… Now, go back to side A.

~~~

[Part 11] [Masterpost]

[incorrectgundamwingquotes]

The Supportive Friend

Quatre: Forget her, she does not deserve to have you as her partner

Wufei: I killed all of her recruits during the war

Quatre: Okay but is that your fault? She could have done more

-

Quatre: Shoplifting is such a loose term. What’d did you take, like $10?

Duo: $5000.

Quatre: Same thing. I mean, if they didn’t want it stolen, lock it up! You know? That’s not on you.

-

Quatre: That wasn’t really a hit and run--

Heero: I hit him and I drove away

Quatre: Okay but like why was he on the sidewalk? You know? Like sir, we’re in the middle of a war, stay at home, you know? Honestly, reckless of him.

-

Quatre: You killed someone?!

Trowa: Yeah, I don’t--

Quatre: WITHOUT ME? Trowa, I thought we were best friends! Come on, that’s so rude! What am I, chopped liver? ...I mean, he’s chopped liver, but I had no part in it!

[keiko1183]

GW Dinner Show @Gundam Cafe’ Tokyo

So last night I attended the event and it was super fun!

The event heads up here at the official website

Super long post,so...

Ok first, I was so pumped for this I choose a dress that reminds me the space and did some Relena-like hair style (though I’m not the hugest fan)

I reached Akihabara ahead of time to wander around a bit. Nothing new even if it was a while since the last time I went there (just covid- depression all around!)Then finally I met with my friend and we moved to the Cafe’.

First we had a stroll in the merchandise store but I was strong and didn’t buy anything (yet)

As you enter, they give you a face shield. It really makes it hard to eat, drink and look around you during the event, but hey, these are Covid times it can’t be helped!(You can also pay an extra fee and bring it home if you want, otherwise it will be disposed at the end of the event)

Upon entrance of restaurant area there is a display of the event related goods.

You can’t take pictures and videos inside, but basically there are a bunch of tables in front of a small stage with full screen wall.

It was Tuesday night so not too crowded, maybe around 20~30 people in total. You reserve in advance a set menu with appetizer and a main dish. There are 2 options available: Heero &Wufei team’s menu or Trowa and Duo’s team menu. Luckily there were 2 of us so me and my friend had one each (I got Heero&Wufei’s). The dinner show was from 18:30 to 20 ,1.30 hours total.

The show is an interactive one with animated characters from GW series and one real actor playing the show host’s role. Animation is more like Otome game graphics, the characters just show up one by one and only move their eyes and mouth, there is a preview video that shows it better.

As you reach your seat, the animation starts and Relena welcomes the audience as we were guests at this party night she arranged at St Gabriel’s academy. She is hosting this dinner event along with the real host guy which also shows up on the stage and introduces himself. 

The welcome drink tea is served and you get your first coaster as a gift. It comes in an envelope so you can’t choose your fav character’s coaster,it comes randomly.

I opened mine and I got Trowa’s one (how lucky!!),while my friend got Quatre’s. And because she is so kind and she knows how much I like him, she gave it to me! My 3x4 heart is fulfilled! 

If you order any additional drink on the menu, you can get another random coaster. I ordered Quatre’s drink, yeah again because I like him but also the drink looked delicious: mango,grapefruits and orange juice mix. As a coaster, I got Wufei’s one.

Anyway in the coaster’s envelope you might additionally find a Win ticket. What do you win, it will be explained later. Anyway me & friend didn’t get it.

Next showing up are Quatre and Duo,then Trowa,Wufei and Heero. They all are at the party because there is a secret mission for them (plus Quatre was the only one officially invited at the event, because he is an aristocratic brat eheh)

After some reunion chats - and Trowa bullying Heero because tank top and shorts are not an outfit for a party- Relena,who appearently knows nothing about the mission, asks them to cook for the audience.

They decide to split into 2 teams (Heero&Wufei,Trowa&Duo with Quatre supporting both teams here and there) and have a cooking contest to decide who can cook the most delicious and original dish.

It follows a real funny narration of the two teams wondering what to cook and asking advices to Quatre. We can see Heero sneaking inside Trowa and Duo’s kitchen for a second, pretending no one’s seeing him. Duo actually kind of notices but decides not to argue. Meanwhile the appetizer is served to us: a dish designed by Relena dedicated to the 5 pilots.

After that, there is a digest sequence of images from Anime and OAVs, recapping to the audience the original story from each pilot point of view and also including a short heads up on the main female characters (Relena,Lady Une,Noin,Dorothy,Catherine,Hilde)

Following, main dishes are served and each team does a short presentation of it, explaining the small references - such as the soup in Trowa’s team dish is inspired by her sister’s soup and so on.

Quatre points out how both teams used peppers and that makes Duo realizes what Heero was doing in their kitchen: stealing ingredients! Heero plays dumb on this one.

It follows public interaction where we decide who’s the winner by clapping hands. Winner yesterday was Trowa and Duo’s team, and the 2 of them have a short speech to thank the audience (I guess you could see also Heero and Wufei’s one if audience response is different)

But there isn’t time to relax, at this point the mission details are revealed: according to the pilot’s resources, someone attending the party is there to kill Relena. “Someone” means literally anyone can be addressed, so the guys start accusing each other of being a potential killer and..(surprise surprise) Heero punches Duo and send him K.O.

At this point the host guy (the real actor) super suspiciously offers Heero a special soup to congratulate him for stopping the killer. Heero accepts and drink it, but nothing happens...the host was expecting him to be poisoned.

However Wufei swapped the poisoned soup with a normal one while everyone was distracted looking at how Duo gets punched. So we discover that there is a sort of “clone” of the host guy who trapped the (poor) true host guy somewhere and approached the party to try to get Relena killed.

Trowa cuts down the light and the entire restaurant falls into the dark, pilots voices ask us to use any available light (like your phone’s) and point it to the killer to block him. After the guy is caught, lights back on and the true nice host guy comes back - while Duo complains it wasn’t necessary of him getting punched again.

The final part is (personal opinion) pure fan service: Relena now understands why the 5 guys all were there and feels relived her host guy is also back, however she wonders how they did caught such information. The guys explain they got it sneaking in some different schools. This is were Relena asks them to change to school uniforms to show us around.

The host guy explains us we are allowed to take pictures of the guys as they change into uniforms. As soon as the guys appear on the screen, we got our chance. It’s time for final greetings. We can only receive farewell from 2 pilots out of 5,so the choice is up to the 2 people who got the win ticket in the coaster envelope. 

Our winners of the day choose Wufei and Duo, therefore we saw their greetings (I guess you can see others if you go on a different date)

This ended the show, but we all were thrilled by it!

Sad note: I promised myself to behave and don’t buy the goods except this bottle. 

However I found out too late that this is available only at the cafeteria next by the restaurant, which was already closed by the time the show ended. I must go back and get it!!!

[acrochetedgundam]

fluffbruary day 17 prompt: plush

summary: trowa, duo, and wufei discuss gifts for their loved ones

(swearing, alcohol references)

“What the fuck am I supposed to do with this?” Wufei asks, gesturing toward the overly cutesy plush bear, adorned with a garish heart on the stomach.

Duo stares at him like he’s grown a third head before he takes a long swig of his drink. “Give it to Sally?”

Wufei arches an eyebrow at him. “In what universe do you think Sally would…appreciate something like this?”

Duo shrugs. “Hey, you asked me for help. Hilde loves shit like this.”

“It pains me to have to point out to you that Hilde and Sally are both in very different categories of women,” Wufei grumbles. “Though…I suppose you did do what I asked.”

“Damn right I did, you ungrateful bastard,” Duo says, tipping his head back as he finishes his beer.

“Would you get something like that for Winner?” Wufei asks, turning to Trowa, who thus far had avoided being drug into their debate on ‘appropriate gifts for the object of your affections for the holidays’.

“Of course not,” he answers easily, ignoring Duo’s glare. “He’s not a five-year-old girl.”

“I hate you assholes,” Duo whines, and Trowa grins. “What did you get him, anyway?” the braided man asks.

“Those sweatpants you showed me.”

“Hold on,” Wufei interjects. “You got him sweatpants?”

“No, you don’t understand, man,” Duo interjects. “They’re sherpa lined sweatpants. Literally the coziest thing I’ve ever put on my body. Quat’s gonna love them.” Trowa nods in agreement.

“Your grand romantic holiday gesture is sweatpants?”

“Well, the gesture part I expect will probably involve more sex, maybe some candles- “

“Fuck you, Barton.”

“No, thank you. But the gift is sweatpants; yes.”

Wufei glares at him, then glares at the bear Duo had offered as a gift. “Sweatpants.”

Trowa shrugs. “Quat hates being cold.” He casts a meaningful glance at Duo. “He still wants revenge, by the way.”

Duo waves a hand dismissively. “Hey, it was his first snow. How was he going to know if he didn’t like it or not if he didn’t actually go out in it?”

“There were probably more…tactful methods that didn’t involve throwing him half-naked into a snowbank.”

Duo grins. “More tactful, less fun.”

“Fucking sweatpants?”

“Jesus, ‘Fei are you stroking out over there?” Duo asks, waving a hand in front of his face. ���Hilde likes cuddly things, so she gets a bear. Quat likes being warm, so he gets sweatpants. You just gotta…think about something Sally really enjoys and go from there.” He huffs out a sigh. “This is only weird because you’re making it weird.”

A smirk pulls at Wufei’s lips as an idea forms. He reaches for the offered bear. “Sally does like target practice.”

[askgundamwingfans]

Oh my goodness the responses!!

Thanks everyone for taking the time to add your perspective. For everyone reading, feel free to reblog with your own answers to any of these questions, or send in some questions of your own.

Without further ado, lets do an easy warm up post this week. The answers are in no particular order, let me know if I should be keeping answers from a single responder together 

Did you take a break from GW fandom? If so, what made you come back?

I took a ~10 year break for school and work. The pandemic got me looking back on my old hobbies and I went looking fanfic that I used to love. It was supposed to be just a quick tip toe into nostalgia but that was back in November and here we are.

There have been periods when I've been less active (especially if you look at my publishing history), and I haven't always hung out in the most popular fandom bases, but even during my quieter periods if I'd been asked "are you still part of this fandom" my answer would have been definitively yes. I think one of the great things about fandom is that it's for us to participate in on our own terms and what it means to be "in" a fandom is a huge net.

A friend of mine wanted to read my old fics but I wasn’t on AO3, so I made an account.

More like I just drifted away. I'd peek back every now and then. But now my new good friends are all in the gw Fandom so I'm much more involved than before

Yes - I organically lost interest in fandom after I first got into GW (2000s) due to RL, came back because I finally had time to sit down and (re)watch the series during COVID.

Which characters/ships are you most interested in? What do you appreciate most about them?

Oh, gosh. I love a well-written rare pair or a seemingly crack ship that, when you read it, suddenly doesn't seem so far-fetched anymore. And likewise, the characters that you don't see being written so often. GW has such a rich ensemble cast to draw from, I like seeing fresh faces get a turn in the spotlight and treated with the same depth as the usual favorites.

I am definitely a 1xR fan first and foremost, but I also love all the GW ladies. Relena was always a favorite because she was probably the first female character I had ever really seen that stood her own with the male characters. She was just super interesting - a feminine, peaceful character that becomes a world leader? And not through magic? Sign me up! Coming back into fandom I started going over the ladies' personalities. I find Dorothy to be absolutely fascinating as a character with her shit-disturbing ways. Hilde, Catherine, Noin, Une. I love that they're given individual strengths and flaws, and each have their own roles that aren't necessarily just supporting the male characters. Even today it can be rare to find a female character that has a personality, history and role all to her own.

Quatre and I don’t have enough space to even go into this, haha. I ship him mostly with Trowa and Duo.

I generally will try most non 3x4 Trowa ships. I lean most towards 1x3 and 3x5, though somehow I got into 3x6 at the end of my first run in fandom, probably because the one writer who got me into it was so funny. I think for whatever reason, I just ended up in Trowa-centric mailing lists for 1x3, 2x3, and 5x3, and Trowa-centric, and the 1x3 and 5x3 lists were the more active ones. I do remember feelings those stories were really unique. The one 5x3 that I remember from my first run was actually super edge-lordy and ended with murder/suicide (it was a very messed up story!!!!). What stuck in my mind was how that writer managed to treat the pilots somewhat opposite of how most others wrote them - arguably straight up OOC for the sake of exploring a darker story, but it also was the first time I think that Wufei was the nice guy/hero and not just a side character wingman. This is similar to why I got into 6x3 - a specific writer was just a fucking hoot about the way they wrote both Trowa and Zechs, and whether it's OOC or not, it was probably the first time I had read anything that funny in fanfiction (especially in stories with sex/smut). So I guess the TLDR is that the stories that happened to really change my mind on characters and/or fic as a medium strongly influenced why I like certain ships. They were also probably arguably very OOC which also influences how I approach fanworks.

Duo will always be my favorite, cause I relate to him the most

[noirangetrois]

The Gundam Wing Diaries

Okay, the actual second part to this post from yesterday. Here you can see just how very attached I was to the characters at that time. Additional previous entries can be found with the “gundam wing diaries” tag.

May 12, 2000 (Friday) - Part 2

Warning: Spoilers for the fanfic “The Ninth Life” by Madam Blue

The fanfic I just read was really good, so good, and I love it, it’s just so good… but I hate it too. It’s called “The Ninth Life.” On a mission, well, Duo kind of falls from a very big height, and something happens to Quatre. Well, a year later, Duo sees Quatre and he's not looking good. He tries to talk to him, but Quatre just wants Duo to leave him alone. Then Duo finds out that Heero is loving Wufei, that’s the best way to put it. Then Quatre finally goes over the edge. Duo goes to see him. They talk. Quatre tells people… he sees dead people, he says ghosts though. That rings a bell… well, Duo tries to figure out how to help him, something happens to him in the library, he has a dream about Father Maxwell telling him about angels… He goes back the next day and tells Quatre that he should talk to the ghosts. Quatre does, they leave.

Duo, happy his friend is cured, leaves to face his problem with Heero. “Tell Trowa I said hi.” Quatre talks to Trowa when he gets home, trying to explain what had been wrong with him. Finally, he just says, “Trowa, Duo said hi.” That’s when it hit me… okay, this is really hard, but I’ll keep going. Duo gets home. Heero’s sleeping, Duo thinks he’s awake, and starts talking to Heero about Wufei. “Why did you leave me, Duo?” Heero asks. Then Duo figures it out.

Okay, now I feel like I’m going to cry… I feel really sick, but because I’m upset. That’s why I hate the movie, but that fanfic is worse, because it involves people I love, even though they may not exist. I love them just the same, especially Duo, that’s what hurts so much…

[dekusheroacademia]

Comments from the "Ships! More Ships!" BNHA survey.

This time I received less answers than the previous survey, but on the positive note, most comments were much more positive! I will answer and post here some of the comments I particularly enjoyed!

First of all, there were so many comments like "thank you" and "great survey" so thank YOU! I love looking at the answers and every single person who answered needs my thanks! Also, it is great that even with so many fics differences we are literally from all sides of the world enjoying the same media!

Now for the other comments:

The comments will be in bold and italics!

- (about the Gen fanfics) Yes - just read hero class warfare, big big rec from me!

Thank you for the rec! (I think this is the fic?). As someone who loves gen fics I will definitely check this one out!

- Have a cookie 👉🍪👈 because you deserve it friend (*´∀｀*)

THIS IS SO CUTE, thank you!

- Honestly at the end of the day shipping is harmless, but I don't like the idea of using headcanons as a way to make their opinions canon to the plot, especially if it's for shipping. I'm annoyed by bkdk fans only because they can't shut up about how bakudeku needs to be canon and it destroys the whole rival thing between them. Last but not least I honestly think that shipping should be the last thing to worry in the action & adventure genre like this show.

I agree about the first part. For the rest, the idea of a headcanon is a non canon idea being in one's head, but I do know some people tend to consider canon stuff that is not (many ships of the "canon official ships" in BNHA are not canon at all, but part of a headcanon based on the text through clues and interpretation, and, often, hopes). From looking at the ship you selected as favorite I can confidently say that you are probably annoyed at Bakudeku because it's a rival ship of your ship and thus more likely for you to see it. The thing is: people will always be more annoyed by their Notps (especially if they are rival ships). For example, you might not register someone talking about Kamijirou, the same way.

Generally, everyone talks about their ship, but you might perceive a ship as "always being talked about" more if it is a ship you dislike.

- 1x2x1 forever. 25 years going strong.

EXCUSE ME?? ARE YOU FROM THE GUNDAM WING FANDOM? YES? 1x2x1 was my first ship and how I found out that fanfics existed and shipping existed. I really loved Duo most of all! I think with time my taste changed a bit. Now I enjoy most GW ships, especially 2x1, RelenaHeero, 2x5 and in general anything with Chang Wufei!

- Great survey! I got a bit excited about the fanfic questions ahahah

That's why they are there :D

- I just wanna say BakuDeku, stay modest and don't taunt other ships! :)

Absolutely! Bakudeku gets a lot of content because these two are the main characters in BNHA but taunting other ships is not nice, and pretty annoying. Everyone is here to try and enjoy a media!

- I'm not sure I understood what the question "What is an headcanon?" was about? Was it if I know what the term means? Then what does the option "I don't know but I hate it" mean? How can I hate something if I don't know what it is? I hope I don't come of as rude but I was not sure what to do with that question.

Not rude at all!! The questions was specifically because I had a debate with someone who kept telling me that they did not know what headcanon meant, but they hated it and people should start calling it "fanfiction" instead of headcanon, because it was not canon stuff. Which was highly confusing to me. I expect most people to have chosen between the right answer and the wrong answer, or simply "I don't know"!

- In the "how do you feel 1-10" part, you should put an option for "I don't care/mind" or something similar. I don't particularly care about most ships, writers can do what they want, but that doesn't mean I hate them if that makes sense? Like, I don't actively look for ships outside my core favs, but if they're in the background of what I'm reading it doesn't bother me or make me avoid the story.

You are absolutely right!

- Plss add Kirimina if you do another, I'm reallly curious to know how reddit fandom is towards this ship ♡ I love it! Tyy

I'll do my best! On the positive side, many people chose Kirimina as their second fav ship :D

- Thanks for put Dekulissa here T.T

I LOVE DEKULISSA. As all things, you can definitely see this survey's questions as biased because of the ships I chose. I tried to choose the main ones, but I know I probably missed some!

- The headcanon question is bizarre. You tell people the definition lol. Well, in the case of MHA I picked option 2 because I’ve seen enough in this fandom to realize people using “headcanon” as a defense just want to spout senseless bullshit. Many of them claiming to love the series but constantly getting shit wrong about it.

Haha, you are not the only one who commented on that question. I do tell people the correct definition and a wrong definition, to see what people would choose. The thing is, headcanoning doesn't mean believing something is canon, but adding onto it. So when someone talks about their headcanon, it is important to know what the definition of the word is. Plus, I don't believe there is anything wrong with having headcanons. This is not a competition of "who gets the most correct answer" but just a media people enjoy. Regarding ships in particular, every ship is a headcanon, but many people don't want to hear that.

- This survey was so much fun to answer! But I wish to point something: sometimes, inside M/M shipps' fandoms, it's very very common to see some misogynistic comments/tropes or M/M shippers bashing gratuitously on female characters! I've been shipping for a long time, almost ten years of being inside fandoms, reading fics and sharing content, and this one things always bugged me. If you shipp two boys together, it doesn't mean that all the girls that live around them are bad or a threath. Anyways, that's it! Thank you for doing this and I hope this time around you don't have to read any homophobic comments!

Thank you for this comment!! This is absolutely right. I think it was very very overt years ago, and I remember it was particularly violent in previous fandoms. If you know Gundam Wing, I am sure you are aware that there used to be a website dedicated to killing (in gruesome ways and with fanarts) the main female character. Her crime? Being in the "way" of a ship. I am sure people added additional complaints about her and justified the hatred in different ways, like it happens for BNHA's female characters.

On the other side, I also think this is sometimes used to ignore some of the criticisms on female characters. I think people can criticize characters, but there is a fine line between "hating how a characters is written" (especially when it's a female character and is written by a man) and "hating a character".

- Why did they make mineta bi :(

If it helps, he is not bi in canon! I think his sexuality as bi counts more as a headcanon with some solid in canon literal interpretation, but the meaning of that scene was simply to show that Mineta is a character all about love and eroticism and thus he phrased admiration in such a way!

- You’re welcome! Nothin really i just wanna add that IzuOcha was wgat got me into the MHA fandom in the first place. I’ve never fully interacted in a fandom before so this was a first time. I was hurt a lot by a LOT of negative comments towards my ships but I’m glad I met wonderful people here, and Imm enjoying a lot of content, even not ship related so I’m happy to be here.

I hope you keep enjoying BNHA and the fandom!! I think the best way to avoid negativity is discord and staying in specific fandom discord groups. Twitter is definitely the messiest way to interact with the fandom, because of the format of the website itself! I hope you will enjoy many more fandoms in the future :D

[afinepricklypear]

**Update: The works mentioned in this post have since been taken down. The “message” was removed by AO3 because it was a violation of their TOS and it seems the author chose to remove their “opinions” piece.**

Despite the ongoing world crisis, I hope everyone is doing great as the year comes to a close and prepping for a safe holiday season.

I don’t really post here a lot, but I just wanted to talk about a problem that exists in every fandom and has recently come up for me in the BSD fandom. This problem is typically referred to as: toxic behavior, however, I sort of hate that term because it’s an umbrella term that encapsulates a wide array of behaviors that is purposefully vague so as to imply everything can be toxic, which means the definition changes depending upon the person, and ends up getting thrown around to describe any behavior that a person dislikes. That said, most people can agree that the term ‘toxic behavior’ includes “shipper wars” and harassing people because of their “ship”.

Yesterday, a user on AO3 going by the penname E_C_arts posted a message titled “deer Soukoku fans” and giving it the not-innocuous summary “please we’re begging you, please stop”. Clicking through leads to a rather prime example of this particular flavor of toxic fandom behavior, guised as an attempt to defend those who were allegedly victims of this self-same behavior, also a lovely example of emotional manipulation.

Although what’s currently posted (and what I managed to screen shot below) may not seem terrible on first glance, if not a little cringey, and can be easy to agree with (don’t bully people that write for a ship you dislike), this was not their original message and has been edited since being posted and, and only after receiving the number of comments it did and which they’re now noting as “proving their point” – a point which they erased, thus manipulating perceptions. I wish I had gotten a screenshot of the original, but if you scroll through the comments, you can find some people that quoted it.

This person most definitely did open their “message” to Soukoku fans by literally telling them to “stop writing” for it. They claimed there was some unspecified AU (or maybe multiple unspecified AUs) that had been overwritten for, that it was overused, and not original. They went on to talk about how the abundance of soukoku content was turning off new fans to the series (don’t even know how that logics…) and bullying people from creating content for other ships, basing these irrational sentiments off some false claim that removing everything with the soukoku ship from the fandom would only leave behind a sad, inacccurate (and oddly specific) 305 posts.

Evidence of their now deleted perspective can be further seen in another post they made to AO3 a couple days before this ugly rant. Titled simply “My unpopular BSD opinions”, they didn’t manage to garner much attention and went mostly ignored because, well, it’s your opinions about the show and that’s whatever. Of course, when you click into it, the very first “opinion” shared, is that they hate Dazai x Chuuya. Okay, that’s an opinion everyone is entitled to, and that’s fine. You don’t like the popular ship, that’s…not exactly an unpopular opinion, there’s quite a number of people that don’t ship soukoku. No problem. Until, they go on to elaborate.

Despite the title of this piece being ‘their opinions’, they state as ‘fact’ that its confirmed that this is “not a thing”, so ‘please stop shipping them it doesn’t work, it’s way too overused for it to be “funny” anymore’ (I’m a little confused about this wording, because Shipping is Serious Business™, so…not sure there are too many soukoku shippers doing it because they think it’s hilarious or whatnot, in fact, most soukoku fics are tagged ‘angst’, which we all know, angst is very ‘haha, lol’…but whatevs). They then include the same sentiment they expanded on in their Dear John to soukoku fans and subsequently deleted: “Please stop, there are too many au’s with almost the exact same plot Chuuya and Dazai being together, its really difficult to find any non-Dazai x Chuuya au’s”.

On the surface, once again, there are some “truths” to this sentiment. DaiChuu is a popular ship and there is a disproportionate amount of soukoku ship fics on the fandom comparative to other ships (soukoku comes in at a whopping 10,000+ currently, with the next popular ship Aku/Atsushi sitting at a decidedly less 2500+). It’s really not that difficult to find non-DazaixChuuya fics, if you know how to use filters on AO3, but there are going to be less to read from when you filter it down, and depending on your ship, you may find yourself in a fic desert, and I can certainly understand why someone young and lacking in rational thought processes might want to blame the popular ship for this predicament.

The problem with this logic, and it permeates every fandom, not just BSD, is that the shippers sharing and loving their ship are not to blame for your lack of ship content. You just don’t have a popular ship. If all the people who love soukoku stopped creating content for it, as this person is ‘begging’ them to do, that’s not going to increase the amount of content for your ships, because the reason that content isn’t being created is because there aren’t enough shippers for it. So, the only way this person’s logic works, is if what this person is actually saying, isn’t that they want these people to stop creating content for the BSD fandom, they just want them to jump ship, stop creating content for soukoku and start creating content for their ships.

Any creator/fan is going to have a visceral reaction to that: who the fuck are you to tell me what to create? And for free, no less!

This moves us more towards a clearer definition of what is toxic fandom behavior. In short, its telling anyone how they should interact with or interpret their favorite content. I mean, even Word of God does not have this power. That’s because every single fan in a fandom is an individual human being. They are possessed of their own autonomy, and as a creator I know, that once you put something out into the world and give it over to others, you have little control over how people consume and feel about your work. You can tell them your intention, but that’s not going to sway them to interpret it that way, and that’s…just the way it works.

Now, the elephant in the room needs to be addressed. It’s easy for me to be ‘offended’ by this person’s post and not see their complaints because I am a soukoku fan. I’m also the target of this person’s rant, and one of those people this person is attempting to emotionally manipulate into writing for other ships in the fandom for which I have no preference. But I am capable of seeing the other side of this argument.

First, because I do have other fandoms in which I am part, and for which I have a rare-pair ship. For example, I am a Gundam Wing fan and a 2x5 (Duo/WuFei) shipper. I’ve posted two 2x5 fics on fanfiction.net. While 2x5 is not the rarest of rarepairs in the Gundam Wing fandom, it is significantly eclipsed (as are almost *all* ships in the fandom) by the 1x2 (Heero/Duo) ship. Do I hate 1x2 shippers for my lack of 2x5 content? No. I just appreciate what I’ve got all the more, and I’ll create content for it when I feel compelled, and I sure the fuck won’t implore 1x2 shippers to stop writing for their fave and write more for mine because I want more 2x5 – that’s sheer entitlement, right there, pure and simple. I also ship 3xD (Trowa/Dorothy) in Gundam Wing, which *is* the rarest of rarepairs – I think there’s only, like, two stories in existence that features this pair on the entirety of the internet. I’m also a RavenxMurphy (Murven) shipper in The 100 fandom and I do not hate Bellarke fans because…those people are scary and have canceled the show’s creator for not delivering on Bellarke, and in BSD, I ship Atsushi/Lucy (yes, I said it, they’re cute af and I hope Asagiri delivers on that ship). I also low-key ship Yosano/Ranpo (sorry, Ranpo/Poe shippers, I understand the appeal, I just think him and Yosano is sooo cute, please don’t kill me…), and I also ship Yosano with Kunikida – all of which are some of the rarest in the BSD fandom.

Second, because I have seen and called out shipping harassment in the BSD fandom, so I am well aware that this kind of thing exists – as it exists literally everywhere and in every flavor. Against soukoku shippers from antis and by soukoku shippers against shippers putting Dazai or Chuuya with any other characters and by soukoku shippers against other soukoku shippers that are, uh, “doing it wrong”. None of these is appropriate. You’re not fighting fire with fire if you’re an anti-attacking the popular ship, you’re just creating a bigger fire and burning the entire fandom down. You’re not defending your ship if you are a soukoku fan attacking non-soukoku fans, you’re just punching down by attacking a less popular ship. And top/bottom arguments aren’t just toxic, they’re also deeply entrenched in fetishization of same sex pairings through a forced heteronormative lens and is, kind of, sort of, actually homophobic in its basis (yes, I said it. It’s ignorant and homophobic and trying to argue with ‘personality/physical traits’ as evidence of who serves what position in the bedroom can be emotionally and mentally damaging to members of the LGBTQ community. Claiming that Chuuya should be bottom because he’s shorter/smaller, or that Dazai has ‘bottom energy’ because he’s more flamboyant and ‘feminine’ is straight up discrimination – a shorter guy can definitely be top, and a manly man can be bottom, it’s not a behavior based on perceived gendered traits, it is just a fucking preferred sexual position, and no, you are not ‘fixing it’ by purposely using positions for these characters that eschews the stereotypes either. Trying to justify positioning by personality/physical traits at all, in any way, shape, or form is just not okay – if it’s your preference, it’s your preference, no justification needed, just recognize that it is *your* preference and arguing what’s ‘right/wrong’ positioning is just plain wrong).

But this brings us to a different issue: bad actors and blaming a whole community for a ‘few rotten apples’. I could easily lump this one person in with everyone that does not ship soukoku and deem them all toxic, aggressive, entitled, bullies attempting to harass soukoku shippers off the platform. Or I could see them for what they are, individuals with individual motivations and drives and morals that also happen to share the same shipping preferences. Is it true to say that there are no soukoku fans that engage in the behaviors described by E_C_arts? No, there are definitely those that do, as there are antis that engage in that same behavior against soukoku fans. But this person also asserts that soukoku fans turning ‘every BSD post about soukoku’ is also a toxic behavior. To which I refer you back to one. This is how they engage with and interpret the work. Don’t yuck on someone else’s yum. People want to gush about how cute they thought soukoku were in an official art, or that they felt there was some hidden (or not so hidden) interaction between them that validates their ship, or their inspired to create soukoku content based on it, so what (for the record, it irks me too when people go ‘see it’s canon and Bones totally ships it’, because it’s unlikely, given BSDs genre, that any romantic relationship will be confirmed, soukoku notwithstanding). It is not, in fact, toxic to gush over it. Let them have their fun with it, let them enjoy their ship. Now, if you go and make a comment about liking the art for other reasons and they reply to you about “…but also soukoku”, then still, that’s not toxic, that’s just them enjoying the content the way that they enjoy it, so let them enjoy it, and you opened yourself to engagement without any qualifiers for the type of engagement you were soliciting, you can’t then backtrack and go ‘but I’m not a soukoku shipper, they should’ve been able to read my mind and known that, it’s totally toxic of them to share their personal reasons for loving the show in response to my sharing my love for the show’. But if you comment about another ship, and they reply to you “…ew, gross! It’s 100% soukoku” then yes, that’s toxic. A lot of people fail to make this distinction, that they are, maybe, merely being triggered and not actually harassed, by feeling like their ship isn’t being validated because they see another ship all over the place and everyone they engage with ships it.

It’s also toxic, to take an experience with one person and hold every soukoku shipper in existence responsible for that one person’s inappropriate behavior. The truth is, that bad actors amongst soukoku fans are not unique, not to the ship and not to the fandom and not even to fandom culture in general. Every group in existence everywhere has bad actors in it that, while the group disavows their behavior, they continue to be held accountable for those individuals and judged by them. For current events, look at how the BLM movement has been blamed for bad actors (many of whom were not actually BLM activists) that took advantage of the protests and started riots and chaos. A small percentage of people were involved in these behaviors, but the entire movement, despite speaking out against rioting, continues to take the blame for it. For me, that’s the root of toxicity. We need to start holding individuals accountable and stop blaming people who have no control over those individuals, because they share a few similar beliefs or interests. That’s throwing the baby out with the bathwater. But the shippers as a whole are not to blame for the actions of a few, and the reason that it feels that there are so many more soukoku fans that do this is because of volume, there are so many more soukoku fans. It’s basic math. If two percent of fans are these toxic kinds of shippers, then there’s going to be so many more of them in a larger population than a smaller one.

I try to call out toxic behavior, no matter if it’s my ship being lambasted or one of my fellow shippers doing the lambasting, whenever I see it, but the trouble is, I don’t typically go into fan content that isn’t for my ship and, thus, I don’t see it. The same goes for the vast majority of soukoku fans out there. We’re here for soukoku content, we’re seeking out soukoku content, and avoiding what isn’t soukoku content. But here is my offer to all of those who are outside of my ship. I like to argue. If someone is harassing you for having a non-soukoku ship, call me, let me know, I will argue with them for you. I will explain to them in no uncertain terms, and in many unpleasant ways, that they do not represent the soukoku shipping community and they are an embarrassment to us. Content for any and all ships is welcomed and encouraged within the fandom. Write, draw, contribute, be a part of the fandom and express yourself, please. If you are a soukoku shipper (or even if you’re not), and someone is harassing you about your top/bottom preference, call me, let me know, I will argue with them for you. I will explain to them why their justifications for which character should be top or bottom in a same sex pairing is grossly misrepresentative and exploitative of the LGBTQ community and rather disgusting. Do not assume that because we seem to remain silent on these types of harassment that it’s because we are in agreement with them, it is only because we haven’t seen them – why would we, we’re not going in those spaces that weren’t created for us. Ask the community for help, don’t attack the rest of us for the poor actions of a few that we were not even aware of. Let us help you in policing them, rather than assuming we don’t care. We are just too busy staying in our lanes, but if you need us, we are here. Majority of us want a clean, friendly, welcoming community for creators of all types as much as you do.

All of this aside, there are spaces and places for these debates and AO3 is not it. Posting this kind of message is actually a violation of AO3 TOS, constituting as harassment, which is defined on the AO3 TOS as “…any behavior that produces a generally hostile environment for its target…”( https://archiveofourown.org/tos#IV.G.). This general behavior also falls into the realm of another kind of toxic fandom behavior: hijacking a platform/tag for your own purposes that is a direct contradiction to its express usage (otherwise, known as trolling). AO3 is for posting fan-made content that contributes to a deeper understanding and expansion upon the original work. Using AO3 to attack people who are using AO3 for exactly what it is designed to be used for is an abuse of the platform. It’s not okay and invites similar content that will ultimately interfere with the original purpose of the platform. AO3 is for fan content, not for your own personal rants about other people in the community, please keep it that way

I do also want to note, that this person choosing to edit their post after receiving the justified ire from fans (notably soukoku and non-soukoku fans alike upset by the audacity of this person, who, as far as can be told, has never themselves contributed fanfiction to the community, to tell people what they can and cannot write) for their original comments, is a form of manipulative abuse called ‘gaslighting’. They are now claiming to be a victim that “never said to stop writing”, despite that having been the literal words they used in the opening of their original post. They are now pointing at these comments as “proof” of their point that soukoku fans are aggressive bullies that attack without cause when there was definitely cause from the original comments. This person clearly has bigger issues than just lacking shipper content for their personal preferences on the BSD fandom.

To all of those who are afraid to share content for your ship because you think you’ll be harassed, as evidenced by this person’s claims, that is simply not true. While there might be one or two people that say something, we all get them no matter if you have a popular ship or a rarepair ship, haters are gonna hate – I’ve gotten my share of hateful comments towards my ships too, but there are many more people that share your ship and are interested in your content, in fact, some of them are starved for it. While having a rarepair might mean you’ll garner less interactions with your content, you have a better opportunity to form a deeper bond with the people that do interact, and they may be more appreciative, because what you’re delivering to them is so much harder to come by. The existence of one ship does not affect your ship’s popularity, and if it simply went away, that doesn’t mean that your ship would receive more attention – in fact, it might mean the show itself would receive less attention.

Create and let others create and use platforms for their appropriate purposes, and most importantly, when it comes to addressing toxic behavior in a fandom, look to yourself first. Are you placing the blame where it belongs? Are you addressing the root cause of the problem or swinging blindly and attacking innocent bystanders in the process? Will what you say actually help the problem? Or will it contribute to the issue, and maybe even create an issue that didn’t exist before?

[ikuzeminna]

Scene analysis - Meilan's sacrifice

Get them tissues, folks. This is not gonna be pretty.

When their colony gets attacked Meilan is the first one to jump into action. She takes the Tallgeese, the only available armed mobile suit, and sorties to fight OZ and the Alliance.

As we see, Master O warns her that she’ll kill herself if she uses it. But Meilan resolutely declares that she’ll fight nonetheless. She is fully aware that she might die, but she’ll still protect their colony.

That is what “I am Nataku!” means. Nataku is a guardian deity in Chinese mythology. As the Long Clan’s heiress and strongest of them, it is Meilan’s duty to protect them. If she ends up dead because her body can’t handle it, so be it.

Here we see Meilan noticing the damage she is causing to her husband’s favorite field of flowers, so she decides to take the fight outside the colony to spare it.

Meaning, she willingly foregoes the advantage she had fighting in an enclosed area where she didn’t need to use Tallgeese’s thrusters as much and thus her body wouldn’t suffer as much damage, to move the battle to an open space and get her guts turned into jello with the G-forces just because she wanted to protect her husband’s reading spot.

This looks like Meilan is a stubborn badass who believes in her ideals, right? Read this again with the following page in mind:

For the longest time I bought into the idea that Meilan was all gung-ho about justice. But the above shows that she herself actually agreed with Wufei that there was no such thing as universal justice.

“But even so, I have to fight! That is the way of our people!”

Unlike Wufei, Meilan is the clan’s heiress. She has to uphold her people’s traditions, it’s her duty. And so is fighting for justice. So to go back to the previous pic, Wufei is dumbfounded by her response that this is a fight for justice because he knows she doesn’t believe in it herself. Yet, she is still willing to fulfill her duty even at the cost of her life.

It’s one thing to talk the talk and another to walk the walk and Meilan does it. And Wufei is floored.

Wufei is rushing to get to her now because he knows this will end badly. Meilan will go all the way if she has to.

Meanwhile, we see the effects of piloting the Tallgeese and Meilan’s decision to fight outside of the colony. She has started coughing up blood. Even so, she goes Spartan and tells them to come and get her. She won’t throw the fight.

She will uphold her people’s ideals. Come what may.

Look at the Tallgeese. Meilan isn’t holding back at all.

As for Wufei, he may not believe in justice but he’ll be damned if he’ll sit back while his wife gets herself killed for it. An important detail here is that unlike Meilan, he doesn’t stop to put on a spacesuit. He’s in a rush to get to her. The longer he takes, the longer she fights and the more she is injured.

Wufei orders Meilan to get to safety while he takes over. Meilan is pretty surprised that he came. Also, notice how he maneuvers Shenlong to protect the Tallgeese from the shots? He knows she’s battered. Whether she is sitting in a MS made of Gundanium or not, she can’t take much more.

We also see that Wufei is an obviously adept fighter and one can’t help but wonder what would have happened if he had gotten his butt up earlier and fought OZ and the Alliance with the Tallgeese himself.

(Did I just point out the root of Wufei’s guilt issues? Yes, I did.)

Wufei defeats all but the last guy who, not wanting to be a complete disgrace to Treize, rushes him with what I believe is an attempt to self-detonate in his face. What else could a Leo do? It wouldn’t destroy Shenlong, not by a long shot, but it would damage its cockpit. And guess who is out in space without a spacesuit because he was in a rush earlier?

Wufei tries to shoot the guy but he has run out of ammo. If he tanks the attack, he will die because he will be flung out of his cockpit.

This is where Meilan, who despite his order didn’t leave Wufei, intervenes.

A Leo’s destructive power is often on par with a sneeze in the series, but here we see the result: a damaged cockpit. Meilan is floating in space, so we can say for sure that had it been Wufei, he would have been toast.

Meilan isn’t in a better position though. She may be wearing a spacesuit, but she was severely injured in the battle. Which she made worse in part because she wanted to protect that blasted field of flowers. So taking such a hit was just as lethal for her. Right there she had the choice: her life or Wufei’s. And she chose him.

Let us recall, Meilan is the Long Clan’s heiress. She is their future leader and the sole granddaughter of Master Long. She is also the one with a goal: to fight for justice, unlike Wufei who had no interest at all in such a fight, despite his power. No, he was a scholar who didn’t do anything in the face of unjust oppression.

She still chose to throw her life away for him.

When Wufei calls her Meilan, she insists she is Nataku. Like the guardian deity, she protected him after all, didn’t she? (That and she’s a total badass, just like Nataku.)

Meilan also knows she is dying right now. Her final wish is to be brought to the field of flowers.

Let this hit you. She wants to be in her husband’s reading spot in her last moments. Whom she once mocked for it.

After all the antagonizing Wufei and Meilan presented us with all chapter, we are given a completely serene and gentle scene here. Wufei is carrying her carefully, mindful of her injuries, while Meilan reflects on the beauty of the flowers. This is the first time they see eye to eye. Meilan appreciates what Wufei values, while Wufei voices his respect and admiration for his wife’s strength.

In a moment of humility and honesty that the knowledge of one’s certain death grants, Meilan asks an important question. Since she wasn’t able to finish the earlier battle by herself, which Wufei apparently was, she timidly inquires if she had proven her worth or if Wufei was ashamed of her as his wife. Because she had once offended him in this manner by being ashamed of him for being a scholar. Until he proved he could take her in a fight.

Wufei not only tells her she was strong, but declares her stronger than anyone. That includes himself. He may be stronger physically, but there was no way he could match her spirit or nobleness.

Meilan’s last words are that no, he is the stronger one before her injuries claim her and she sags against his shoulder.

Wufei, not realizing what just happened, tells her to get off him because he thinks she’s getting cozy with him. It takes him a moment to understand she isn’t leaning on him because she wants to be affectionate but because she is dead.

And if you notice, she died smiling. Meilan was at ease when she passed.

[thisweekingundamevents]

This Week in Gundam Wing 25-31 October 2020

Here’s this week’s roundup! Oct 25th-31st!

Remember to give your content creators some love! Be sure to join in on the events at the bottom! And remember to send in any new works next week!

~Mod Hel

Fanfiction/Snippets/AU Ideas:

@amberlyinviolet

I Can Kiss You For Free Now https://archiveofourown.org/works/27208864?view_adult=true

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Mature, Fluff, Vague angst

His insides were a riot of overgrown flower beds, bushes in need of pruning. When he tried to clear a space it was filled with something else--debris from his shipwrecked heart, mud from too much rain. It was a constant effort and Duo worked hard, so hard, to try and tidy it into something he could give away. Something neat and beautiful and with no sharp edges that he could offer with both hands, instead of what he had. Instead of slow seeping poison and the constant upkeep, the steady, leaching need for reassurance.

To Bethlehem It Slouched https://archiveofourown.org/works/27232870

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Duo Maxwell, Chang Wufei, Trowa Barton

Mature, Mentions of Violence, Off-screen Minor Character Death, Hospital, protective instinct 

The hospital is a hospital. Duo hates it the way he hates all of them. It’s 12:04 in the afternoon and he all but runs to the trauma center. Stands blank faced as the nurse says words like “concussion” and “minor” and “lucky” and wonders how he’s supposed to be grateful for this. How he’s supposed to feel good that Wufei isn’t dead when he almost was. Lucky means close. Means a few inches either way and it would’ve been different words. Words like “sorry” and “condolences” and “tragic.”

You, Soft And Only https://archiveofourown.org/works/27247480

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Mature, Romance, Softness, Fluff

It’s evening. The kitchen is warm and full of smells. There’s soft light coming in through the window over the sink and Duo is up to his elbows in soap bubbles. He is illuminated, singing along to something upbeat and Wufei watches him from the doorway with wonder. This, he thinks, is his. It’s not exactly a reward. It’s more an offering. A vulnerability that Wufei knows Duo is only comfortable sharing because he trusts Wufei. Because together they’ve built something that’s safe, even if it is a little wobbly. They don’t have to be anything else here, just themselves, and just themselves is enough. It’s something they give to each other over and over, and Wufei treasures it the same way he treasures the man at the sink.

The Fire In Your Eyes https://archiveofourown.org/works/27264679

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Mature, Plotting

“No what ifs.” It’s firm. Steely, and Duo finds himself at the end of one of Wufei’s looks. Finds himself melting despite the chaos around them. The hurricane of fear in his chest. How he loves this man. How he loves the way he understands him, his need to fix this, and combats it with chamomile and the promise of bed, together. Duo takes a sip of his tea and leans into him.

The Blood Is On Your Tongue As Well As Your Hands https://archiveofourown.org/works/27282487

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Mature, Panic Attack, PTSD, Rage, Violence, Suggested Co-dependence

He doesn’t feel safe. Avoids eye contact and looks out the window. Doesn’t know how this room of people can stand him, after everything he’s done. All the little pieces he’s stolen from them, or the big pieces. Duo isn’t exactly a liar but he is a thief and none of the people he loves are safe. Are, in fact, in the most danger and Duo takes another sip of whiskey. Takes another sip of whiskey and tries not to taste the rising bile. Not to feel the sharp scratchy static at the back of his neck. The base of his skull. There is heat. There is heat and electricity and Duo’s hands shake.

Lay Us Down https://archiveofourown.org/works/27286864

M/M, Chang Wufei/Duo Maxwell

Explicit, soft, Confessions, Smut, Feelings

Sometimes their bed seems endless. An expanse of sheets and skin and the silk of their hair, spread out on a pillow. Falling like a curtain around them as they kiss. Wufei has had his body his whole life, but this is the first time he’s ever felt settled in it. Felt like all of it belonged to him in a way he could revel in. Whatever insecurities he has seem to fall away under the heat of Duo’s violet gaze. Under every greedy sweep of Duo’s hand from the back of his neck to his tailbone. They are lying side by side. They are only kissing and it’s such a simple thing but Wufei isn’t sure he’s ever felt anything like this before. That the brush of lips against his has ever sent such a spark through him. Coiled such a fierce need in his belly.

@angelselene

Stand Without Flinching (Ch. 24) https://archiveofourown.org/works/22763293/chapters/66640444

5 pilots + The Avengers

1x2, 3x4, 5xS, TonyxSteve, WandaxVision

MATURE, post-canon, canon divergent, fix-it, GW/MCU crossover, PTSD, found family, slow burn, moral ambiguity, Tony Stark is Duo’s father

For Duo Maxwell, family are the people he has loved and lost and whose names he bears. For Tony Stark, family has always been blood and a name and Howard’s shadow looming over him.

@bobo-is-tha-bomb

Deadly Intent (Ch. 8) https://archiveofourown.org/works/25576657/chapters/66603631

F/M, Heero/Reader, ???/Reader

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Wufei Chang, Lady Une, Relena Peacecraft, Reader, Trowa Barton

Mature, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Reader Insert, Drama, Angst, Romance, Violence, Lime

Eleven years is a long time for a ghost to come back and haunt him. But Heero Yuy finds himself unable to dodge or outrun it. It’s the start of a dangerous cat and mouse game between one of the most powerful organizations in the world and a loner who has every intention of dragging him down with her. After all, she has come with deadly intent.

Comfort https://archiveofourown.org/works/27222649

F/M, Heero Yuy/Reader

Teen And Up Audiences, Romance, Fluff, Angst, Reader-Insert

“I want to thank you for last night,” you said softly, while looking up at him. “It was nice of you to take care of me like that.”

A frown formed on his face. “You sound as if none ever did that for you before.”

@duointherain

Six Feet Apart https://duointherain.tumblr.com/post/633016132898521088/fic-six-feet-apart

Disclaimer: I don’t own Gundam Wing. I also don’t own the song in the Tumblr post I’m about to link. I barely own my own mind as I’m studying to much these days.  Neither do I own: Song  Grow As We Go, by Ben Platt.

Link: https://rosespirit.tumblr.com/post/633002398703616000/priscellie-candiikismet-coffeefoxgirl

Note: Gundam Wing is Sci-fi. It’s a m/m story.

It had all stopped so suddenly. It hadn’t been like anything had been declared, nothing permanent. After the war they’d just sort of fallen in together. First it was the hotel room. Then it was a pizza. Duo’s laughter had saved him. Even months after he last heard it, Duo’s laugh was what he kept breathing for. It wasn’t like there was a lot of other purpose. Weapons are supposed to be decommissioned, after all. Except the memory of Duo’s laugh, Duo’s kisses, Duo sleeping next to him, these things meant he was human. Pain meant he was alive. He still had the ring, though his finger was too small to keep it on anymore.

Gundam Legends 14

Just When You Thought It Was Safe To Go Back In The Water https://archiveofourown.org/collections/GundamLegends14

A collection of fics by various authors for the Gundam Legends event. Previous years can be found here: https://tzigane.neocities.org

@lifeaftermeteor

To Love and Love Again https://archiveofourown.org/works/27309412/chapters/66724459

F/M, M/M, Chang Wufei/Relena Peacecraft, Duo Maxwell/Heero Yuy

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton, Quatre Raberba Winner, Chang Wufei, Relena Peacecraft, Hilde Schbeiker, Sally Po, Lucrezia Noin, Lady Une, Mareen Darlian

Teen And Up Audiences, background Sally Po/Lady Une, Post-Series, Post-Canon, Post-Endless Waltz, Preventers, BROTPs abound, Fluff, Romance, Slice of Life, Wedding Fluff

Following their Christmas engagement, Wufei and Relena bring their family together for their nuptials. The celebration gives their guest an opportunity to reflect on their own romantic inclinations.

@vegalume

Chase https://vegalume.tumblr.com/post/633532147170476032/title-chase-a-drabble-author-vega-lume-written

Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell

The knock at the door startled him more than he would like to admit. In a way he had been expecting it. It was a sort of nervous, anxiousness that had been strumming through his body since he had woken hours before. Now that it was just past sun down he knew what was waiting for him on the other side and he was both apprehensive and excited.

Fanart/Crafts/Photo Manips:

@2pcb

https://archiveofourown.org/works/27312763/chapters/66732790

EXHALE, Heero/Trowa, comic

@cuteciboulette

https://cuteciboulette.tumblr.com/post/633411537102667776/10-left-to-go-hopefully-ill-be-done-by-the-end

GW Merch

@enelle89

https://enelle89.tumblr.com/post/633025341866246144/happy-halloween-its-almost-here

Heero Yuy/Relena Darlian-Peacecraft, fanart

@gundayum

https://gundayum.tumblr.com/post/631834507084021760/i-have-a-little-data-again-so-plz-enjoy-dad-bod

Duo Maxwell, fanart

https://gundayum.tumblr.com/post/632787659677384704/borrowing-my-aunts-wifi-to-share-my-trashy-2xh

Duo Maxwell/Hilde Schbeiker & kiddos, fanart

Head Canons:

@bobo-is-tha-bomb

https://bobo-is-tha-bomb.tumblr.com/post/632983263759220736/gw-oc-october-day-24

GW OC-October 2020 Day 24 Prompt Response

@lochtayboatsong

https://gwoc-october.tumblr.com/post/633017041186668544/my-gw-ocs-part-13-josef-peacecraft

GW OC-October 2020 Day 1 Prompt Response

https://gwoc-october.tumblr.com/post/633174117984698369/my-gw-ocs-part-14-stefan-peacecraft

GW OC-October 2020 Day 2 Prompt Response

https://gwoc-october.tumblr.com/post/633386069070626816/my-gw-ocs-part-15-isabel-barton

GW OC-October 2020 Day 3 Prompt Response

https://gwoc-october.tumblr.com/post/633560666909851648/my-gw-ocs-part-16-sam-maxwell

GW OC-October 2020 Day 1 Prompt Response

Fandom Discourse:

@cuteciboulette

https://cuteciboulette.tumblr.com/post/632800216214536192/lets-go-back-to-this-sharing-my-gw-archives

Over the next few days, a story scanned from the doujinshi “Guerrilla show” by Sango Show.

Quotes:

@incorrectgundamwingquotes

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/633530414557020160/at-preventers-hq-dorothy-to-duo-well

Dorothy, Duo, and Quatre

https://incorrectgundamwingquotes.tumblr.com/post/183465625949/lemontrash-lemontrash-lemontrash

Duo & WuFei

Add-ons by @lemontrash

Calendar Events:

@gwcocktailfriday

Cocktail Fridays!

Post responses on Friday, during Happy Hour between 3 & 5 pm in your own timezone.

Here’s the prompt for Friday, November 6th! https://gwcocktailfriday.tumblr.com/post/633500173247627264/cocktail-friday-post-responses-on-friday-november

In need of WINTER/SPRING prompts!

@gwoc-october

GW OC October 2020!

GW OC-October 2020 is now over!

Do come by and check out all the amazing entries, and remember that if you’d still like to answer any of these prompts, you are more than welcome to! Just send them our way and we’ll reblog them!

@thisweekingundamevents

Events Calendar https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/624053314842230784/event-calendar-update

If you are hosting an event currently, or are planning on one, hit us up with links and dates! We’ll add them to the Calendar and reblog your notices to get the word out!

GW Holiday Gift Exchange 2020

Rules: https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/627952774875906048/gw-holiday-gift-exchange-2020

Check-in 1 https://thisweekingundamevents.tumblr.com/post/633566440354627584/gw-holiday-gift-exchange-check-in-1-notice