#yes that is the gk you're not imagining things

[ktredshoes]

HBO War Fanfiction Stats

Let me start by saying that I am not in any sense criticizing anybody's taste in HBO War relationships. In my opinion, any well-written fanfic, regardless of ship, is worthy. Heck, any fanfic is worthy — it takes a special type of creative courage to write and share a fanfiction story so that others might appreciate what you see in characters you love. So, that's the first thing.

Buckle up, I get wordy. More under the cut.

Tagging a handful of folks who showed interest in my decidedly unscientific findings: @onyxsboxes @jesslovesboats @itstheheebiejeebies @onekisstotakewithme @sparkling-strychnine

Trying something here: @meyerlansky @anachilles @astolovewithallmyheart @dano-png

I started down this fanfiction stat rabbit hole about four years ago when I started looking at The Pacific tags on Archive of Our Own (AO3). I was trying to figure out if it was just my imagination or not that everything other than Sledgefu in TP fanfic felt like a rarepair. I was not surprised to find statistical backup for what anecdotally felt true.

I love all the HBO War series — and for the record, I consider Band of Brothers, The Pacific, Generation Kill, and Masters of the Air to all be part of this fandom community. I won't get into trying to rank them or make the case that one is better than another — they are all related in being stories of men at war, and three specifically stories of men at war during World War II — but direct comparisons, in my opinion, are apples to oranges to prosciutto to tiramisu. They all have different raison d'etres. So that's the second thing.

(I will admit to a particular soft spot for The Pacific as the overlooked "younger brother" to Band of Brothers, precisely because of the tendency of some to negatively compare it to BoB. TP was never intended to be "part two" of Band of Brothers — I was listening recently to a podcast with Tony To, an executive producer of both shows, who asserted that BoB was, yes, about the brotherhood of war, but TP was about the cost of war. )

Anyway.

A couple of days ago, I saw someone post about the fact that the Cleven/Egan ship in Masters of the Air was about to hit 1,000 stories on AO3 — and since I knew that the total number of stories was only about 1,400ish, I figured it was time to take a look at MotA stats too. And that led to looking at GK stats and BoB stats and once I finished, I was really struck by what I saw.

I have a whole spreadsheet looking at the four shows, with breakdowns by relationship and character, with percentages of total stories. (I've posted some graphics from those spreadsheets below, not to worry.)

So what did I learn?

The Pacific and Masters of the Air both are overwhelmingly dominated by a single ship — Sledgefu in the case of TP and Clegan in the case of MotA.

As of August 10, 2024, there were 1,500 stories on AO3 tagged for The Pacific, and 1,485 tagged for Masters of the Air. Sledgefu features in 884 of TP stories, which is 58.93% of the total.

You might think that's an astounding total — but Clegan features in an astonishing 986 of MotA stories, or 66.4% of all stories. The falloff in the next highest ship in each fandom is precipitous: Hilldane in 14% of TP stories (210), and Crubbles in 8.82% of MotA stories (131).

If you are a fan of any ship aside from the most popular pairing in these two fandoms, that has got to be terribly discouraging. You wouldn't think the dropoff would be so high if you're at all active in the HBO War fandom on Tumblr, based on what's posted on a daily basis, but if your entry to HBO War fanfic is solely on AO3, what would you think?

I will once again state that I'm making no judgement on anybody's favorite pairing — I'm making a case on behalf of all the other ships. I'll also note that there are many, many fics posted to Tumblr that never make it to AO3, and I would very much encourage those authors to please please please consider posting your stories to AO3! (If you don't have an account on AO3, it currently takes about 10 days from requesting an invitation to receiving it, which is not that long in the scheme of things.)

The popularity of TP and MotA characters in these stories shows a similar disparity between the most popular and everybody else. In The Pacific, Snafu features in 63.53% of AO3 stories (953) and Sledge in 62.6% (939). No one else is as high as even 20% -- Burgie is in 17.2% (258) and Ack Ack is in 15.6% (234) and Hillbilly in 14.73% (221). The other two ostensibly lead characters in TP are Bob Leckie (12.53% or 188 stories) and John Basilone (1.67% or 25). I find that just shocking.

MotA is both better and worse. There are 10 characters who appear in 10% or better of posted stories on AO3 — but the dropoff from most popular to next highest is even more dramatic. Bucky Egan features in 77.9% of stories (1,157) and Buck Cleven in 74.28% (1,103). The next highest is not, as you might think, Harry Crosby or Rosie Rosenthal, the other featured lead characters in the series. It's Curt Biddick, who is in 25.19% of stories (374), followed by Croz in 23.7% (352). Next is Rosie, who is tied with John Brady — both in 16.9% or 251 stories. What a steep drop!

But, hey, at least there are a baker's dozen plus one of characters who feature in at least 100 MotA stories:

Egan: 1,157 stories (77.91%)

Cleven: 1,103 (74.28%)

Biddick: 374 (25.19%)

Crosby: 352 (23.7%)

Brady: 251 (16.9%)

Rosenthal: 251 (16.9%)

DeMarco: 243 (16.36%)

Payne: 225 (15.15%)

Lemmons: 181 (12.19%)

Hamilton: 167 (11.25%)

Marge Spencer: 146 (9.83%)

Douglass: 139 (9.36%)

Kidd: 130 (8.75%)

Blakely: 111 (7.47%)

After 14 years, will TP ever develop more diversity on AO3? Probably doubtful — though since I first checked the stats in 2020, Hilldane has gained 2%, so there's slow change but some change. Eight months in since the birth of the MotA fandom, and Clegan, and by extension Bucky and Bucky, are steamrollering the rest of the MotA relationships and characters on AO3 — based on what I see on Tumblr, I don't know if that huge disparity will hold up, but who knows? It's still a very new fandom.

But what about GenKill and BoB, you say?

Well, as you might have guessed, there's a clear delineation in GK between the top ship and the next ones below it, but the dropoff is not nearly as dramatic as in TP and MotA.

There are 3,024 Generation Kill stories on AO3 as of August 10, 2024, and the number one ship is Brad/Nate, with 1,261 stories, or 41.7% of the total. Next highest is Brad/Ray, with 677 stories, or 22.39%. The top three characters are Brad, featured in 63.82% of stories (1,930), then Ray, featured 52.35% of the time (1,583 stories), followed by Nate (45.44% or 1,374 stories). Next is Walter Hasser at 571 stories (18.88%), followed by Poke Espera at 284 stories (9.39%), Mike Wynn at 262 stories (8.66%), then Doc Bryan at 254 stories (8.4%). There's that dropoff again!

And as for Band of Brothers? After nearly 21 years on AO3 (the oldest story dates from November 2003), there are 5,016 BoB stories on AO3, with a huge number of ships and characters — albeit some quite small. Frankly, I stopped counting after getting to 70 relationships and 55 characters — I just got tired!

Still.

Let me add that the earliest BoB stories on AO3 are not well tagged for ships or characters — many don't have any tags at all. I don't know the reason for it — whether the tagging system in the early AO3 days wasn't easy to navigate, or maybe the lack of tagging was a holdover from earlier systems or archives? I have no idea how well-tagged stories were on LiveJournal, Dreamwidth, or Fanfiction.net. So anyhow, early BoB stories on AO3, if tagged according to current standards, would definitely change the stats but I have no insight on how it might shift them, except definitely upward for the most popular characters and ships.

At any rate: onward.

The top BoB ships on AO3 are 1) Winnix — 1,250 stories or 24.92%, 2) BabeRoe — 771 stories or 15.37%, 3) Webgott — 663 stories or 13.22%, and 4) Speirton — 662 stories or 12.4%.

Moving on to characters, there are a dozen that feature in 10% or better of the BoB total. Take a look:

Winters: 1,173 stories (34.35%)

Nixon: 1,652 (32.93%)

Roe: 1,380 (27.51%)

Speirs: 1,135 (22.63%)

Heffron: 1,125 (22.43%)

Luz: 1,063 (21.19%)

Liebgott: 1,058 (21.09%)

Lipton: 978 (19.5%)

Webster: 790 (15.75%)

Toye: 749 (14.93%)

Guarnere: 686 (13.68%)

Malarkey: 514 (10.25%)

That's a much more even distribution here, without the massive dropoff in the other three fandoms. Or as @itstheheebiejeebies put it to me: "BoB fans feast on variety. It's a grazing table instead of main and side courses." Just so.

So what do I take from all this? I mean, in the case of MotA, I came into the fandom all gaga over Callum Turner and thus Bucky Egan. But then I quickly veered off into following Benny DeMarco (Adam Long) and for the past several months I've fallen under the spell of Everett Blakely (David Shields). Will I stay there? I have no idea! And that's kind of exhilarating.

But here's what I know for sure: as I continue to read and write HBO War fanfic, I'm going to be doing my best to support the ships and characters out of the top tier.

Creators: Don't just post your fanfic to Tumblr — post it to AO3 and tag it.

Be the change that you want to see.

---------------------------------

Now, as promised, here are the stats in graphic form.

[firefighterbuckleyskinard]

idk if one-word prompts are what you were asking for, but you always rock at them so:

Acorn

Sea

Ring

~gk<3

New York is gorgeous this time of year.

Ken breathes in the crisp autumn air, hand-in-hand with Colt as they stroll through Central Park. There's something so cozy about fall on the east coast. Barbie loathes temperatures under seventy degrees, but Ken loves the rare chances he gets to break out his heavier sweaters and thick beanies.

It'd come as a surprise to the former doll who'd once been most at peace near the sea.

A squirrel scurries past them, cheeks filled to the brim with acorns. Colt squeezes his hand and grins. "I can't believe I convinced you to come back."

Ken shudders at the memory of his last New York trip. The dense crowds, the flashing lights in Times Square, and the sounds, oh God, honking horns and ambulances and all of it had overwhelmed him into a shutdown. When he and Colt got back to LA, Ken was adamant about never returning.

But that was months ago, and things are different. Recovery hasn't been easy, but it's been worth it. The shackles of PTSD, an eating disorder, and depression don't have a tight grip on him anymore. Ken's eyes open in the morning and he's excited. Dark shadows don't lurk around every corner. For the first time in two years, guilt doesn't squeeze his heart every time a morsel of food passes his lips.

The dense fog is finally clearing, and Ken can breathe.

"What can I say?" Ken asks with a shrug. "You're persuasive."

They lapse into silence. It's still surprising even after all this time that silence can be comfortable. It isn't always eerie quiet, palpable tension, mind games and racing heart. Silence can be warmth, safety, trust.

Things he'd forgotten about until Colt came into his life. The glimmer of light that he'd been missing.

If Ken thinks about it, he can imagine the crunch of leaves under his feet. Hearing loss is scary and frustrating, a permanent reminder of everything Patrick stole from him. But Colt and Barbie have taken it in stride, and all three of them started ASL lessons. The hearing aids are tucked safely in his suitcase. Colt's persuasive, yes, but his diminished hearing has one benefit: the sounds of the city are muffled; the city is finally tolerable.

They find a bench, and Colt launches into a work story. Ken smiles softly. Colt's so expressive whenever he tells a story. His eyebrows raise, blue eyes go wide; if he's angry, his nostrils flare. And he talks with his hands, gesturing wildly at the space between them.

Ken marvels at the man in front of him. Even after a traumatic upbringing and nearly having his life stolen, Colt is still so kind. He's patient, he's supportive, and he hasn't allowed life to turn him bitter.

Colt is safety and warmth, he's impulsivity and fun, and Ken loves him in more ways than he'll ever be able to say.

Later that night, Colt wraps an arm around him, deeply asleep. Ken cards his fingers through his hair with a desperate fondness.

I'm buying the ring when we get home.

[amypihcs]

HELLO!! The problem of Thor Bridge! Let's start right away!

Watson is in a romantic mood (and today all in orange! for double spooktober!)

Nu, poor Holmes tend to have seasonal depression! Also, let's go in order. Holmes and Watson are living together in a house with a yard! Uhm... have they already moved to Sussex? UUUHM! Watson is in any case dressing in their bedroom feeling very romantic and when he hops down the stairs, he finds... A CREEPILY CHEERY HOLMES! It's also with joy that i hereby headcanon that Holmes loves Halloween

I love how this story begins! With Watson making a deduction!

Watson gets to Holmes, gives him a kissy and asks him to share the case he's working on, Holmes is SO happy that Watson starts making deductions on him now and Holmes gets to tell Watson to have breakfast before reasoning on the case! AAAA this is beautiful! I can feel how married they are!

Breakfast gets eaten and we talk of business now

As Watson said on his husband, politics:nil!

and sensational literature: he knows EVERYTHING of it!

And a VERY BIG SIGH, It seems a THANKLESS case

aww, they're so cute! Falling each in the other's habits! They've been married for 20 years. The way Jeremy acted this scene is GREAT! The letter anyway is from this gold king asking Holmes to clear Miss Dumbar, governess of the children, from the charge of having murdered GK's wife.

You introduce the client this way? I already want to chew on his femur

While Holmes explains the case and as usual uses his Watson like a rubber duck. While sitting on his lap, probably. This is great, to see Holmes' actual reasoning process! How he pauses, chews on his words, all of this!

Perfect! Guy's here! And we start bad already!

Mister Gold King, see the handsome doctor near Mr Holmes? He's the man who contributed to Holmes' fame as a household name! You're not tempting him at all, you're ANNOYING him (Oh i LOVE how Jeremy acted this scene!)

Ah, he just jumped and broke the ceiling at the name? the relationship is much deeper that it seems!

Started bad and going on WORSE! GK is stalling!

AND LYING! At least Holmes thinks so, he's pretty irked by it and dismissed that stuff!

Holmes is NOT going to take lies, he needs solid facts! Yes, you are lying and THIS is what makes Holmes dismiss YOU. (Brett's deliver of THIS)

Hey guy, calm down!

PROTECTIVE WATSON! See that guy, GK? Yes, him. He'll throw you out of the window. Without thinking to it a SINGLE bit. Meanwhile Holmes is languid and relaxed. He can't stand conflict after breakfast, just go the fuck out!

AAAAAH unsafe! Unsafe idea, to threaten Holmes. See those fists? They can make you swallow your teeth (i love to imagine a bit of steel in Holmes' voice now, even in his languid position!), if Watson hasn't thrown you out from the window!

Guy exits, Watson relaxes and asks Holmes what we all were thinking

Watson: How the hell did you know? Holmes: Didn't! I bluffed him, my dear! Watson: ... care to come at my club once in a while for a little poker? Holmes: *grins and leans on watson*

And now what?

AND HE ACTUALLY COME BACK! Not like in Granada! OOOOH love it! (feels a bit out of character of GK, toh, i'll be honest. I liked the Granada version better... also because it gave us a GREAT victorian husbands moment)

Ohia, stop sulking and JUST TELL THE THING. It's for HOLMES to decide what's relevant and what is not. So kindly shut up and TELL THE TRUTH!

In the next letter, ofc!

[here-lies-golden-kamuy]

Regarding your words from the previous reblog, I do have some Nikaidou headcanons!

Since it's mentioned the twins are from a Japanese prefecture Shizuoka, the Nikaidou family works in a fishery.

Kouhei and Youhei lived normal lives. The two were menaces to kids their age, playing (mostly) harmless pranks on them, the most obvious one is lying each others identities or guess who is who.

Their hometown is always a warm climate, so when the twins joined the army, they hate the cold. To keep each other warm, the brothers embraced each other.

Their parents are still alive until the present events of GK. This is why Kouhei was desperate of wanting to go home, but slowly loose parts of himself due to blind vengeance.

(These headcanon only exist if Youhei is still alive)

After Youhei gotten a tooth gap from Sugimoto, Kouhei (eventually other people) would put put random objects inside the hole of the tooth.

When asleep, Youhei would 'whistle' due to to the air passing through the gap and this cause Kouhei to irritated by it thus leading to him putting small folded papers or anything to stop the whistling.

Well, that's all the headcanons I have so far. Hope you like it~

@moonbirdflies OMG I LOVE YOUR HEADCANONS, I WANT THEM TO BE CANON STAT!!!! RIGHT NOW!!!! WRITING TO NODA-SENSEI RIGHT NOW /J

AAAAAAH your childhood headcanons for them are so good I'm weepy thinking of them as little kids 🥹 If I remember correctly, the twins were born in November, which makes them Autumn children! I can totally see them hating the cold; maybe they have a thing like Goldilocks where they want things just right? Hence Autumn is their favorite season because it's cool but not oppressively cold, and they can play under the falling leaves too! Also, them embracing themselves in cold, harsh Russian winters? My god you're a genius.

Your idea of them being little pranksters is SOOO CUTE!!!! Maybe that's an identical twin thing to do - messing with other people when it comes to their identity! I can see them being partners in crime since they were children and bonding over pranks and jokes as they grow up! Kouhei already has an adorable laugh, so I'd love to think that their early years were filled with so much joy and laughter!

Wanting to go home? BRB CRYING IN THE CLUB 😭 /J THE NIKAIDOUS ARE DUTIFUL SONS!!!! I WON'T TAKE ANYTHING LESS!!!!

LASTLY, THE TOOTH GAP AND PUTTING OBJECTS IN BETWEEN THE TEETH ARE SO....NIKAIDOUCORE I LITERALLY LAUGHED MY ASS OFF WHEN IMAGINING IT!!!! /POS Yes, that's the type of shit that the twins would do.....Youhei wanting to return the favor to Sugimoto and make him have a tooth gap too. I dunno why that's my favorite hc - maybe because it's so on brand with GK humor, and maybe because it's still a sign of their intense brotherly love <3

I love how you're converting me into becoming a harder Nikaidou stan and I'm living for it!!!! Thank you once again for sharing these with me! I'd love to hear more (or help make more if you want!) in the future, love!

[magdasabs]

goal of the season in Sweden 2021

[piduai]

finally sat my ass down and read vol 31 of gk properly

1. i know that i personally was fed like a pig about to be sent for slaughter but i'm greedy so i'm still a bit annoyed there was nothing new for the epic saga of tsurumi and ogata. like i'm feeling antagonized here. is it my own fault for having unrealistic expectations? yes. will it stop me from complaining? no.

2. the line about becoming bait is gone, now he's saying just 'sugimoto and co are coming here'. i thought it was weird af when the chapter came out so i am not displeased

3. reading these chapters reminded me of the convos around each of them i either took part in or saw glimpses of and reaffirms my strong conviction that if you sent a handful of pebbles to first grade they'd put the vast majority of gk readers to shame in terms of intelligence. anyway i remember particularly how much weird fucking discourse that page of sugimoto looking at asirpa after she shot ogata brought. funnily sometimes the volume versions give a little bit more insight into the most controversial things that went down in the eng speaking part of the fandom, so i imagine japanese readers could have had some difficulty with that too. there was an added page in 309 of sugimoto thinking "her alone i can't take with me. her alone i can't put on a vip seat on the train to hell"

and then two additional ones in 310 after ogata yeets himself off the train

in which he's like "at the end of the day, i couldn't treat her like my partner, not truly, not from the bottom of my heart... not until i saw that she's resolved to follow me to hell". don't get me wrong if you're a stubborn dumbass with less emotional depth god granted a rusty kettle no matter how pre-chewed and soft the food you're being spoon-fed is you'll still be fucking stupid i guess. and not GET IT. but the story tried, it tried

4. the close up page of ogata blowing his brains out has been wiped, now it's a distant focus and shiraishi, asirpa and sugimoto are shown looking at him in shock. very disappointed, it was my favorite page in the chapter

5. the whole seemingly random exposition in 309 of tsurumi's plans he just tells us because he wants to is not random at all, it was strategically placed there as a set-up for the omake. lmfao. so that has always been planned as the true ending i guess. except in the volume he tells all of this to a corpse because why not

6. 306-308 were gk's greatest flop era, genuinely the worst 3 chapters in the entire manga. i was mad as shit when i read them as they were coming out and i was mad as hell reading them now. absolutely disgusting. and also 0 improvement on them too, tho i guess since they're unsalvageable it would have been a waste of effort. but i am tired of those two. i am tired of everything related to them so i'll just pretend they don't exist

7. in the mag version sugimoto only punches ogata once, but in the vol he goes oraora mode on his ass. lmfao

8. the way the tsurussy has been kept shadowed for half a chapter before he lost his bones (which he kept in his HEART POCKET) and THAT page... chef's kiss

9. also not pertinent to the volume alone but i love how sugimoto beat ogata's ass but tsurumi gave him a good fight <3 close combat competent king

10.

i love her

[goldenkamuyhunting]

I've been seeing a lot of people assume that Ogata is going to be one of the characters that will die in the end. I can see why because it's hard to imagine him surviving at this point. But my mind still goes back to that "Survival Road" image you mentioned before, and I wonder if that theory of him being among the "survivors" still holds weight? A friend of mine said it's possible he'll survive but end up with a fate "worse than death". What are your thoughts?

Well...

I'm not sure why it would be difficult to imagine him surviving.

It's true there are many people who would want him to be dead and some of them are pretty deadly but this doesn't mean he has to die.

I mean, for me it's hard to imagine a character surviving when he's fatally wounded like Kiro in chap 186...

Kiro will die in chap 190 after being further injured but a stab wound in that area is, normally, already ensuring you a slow and painful death and there was no magic doctor Ienaga style around him to save him so I knew he wasn't going to last.

It's also hard to imagine a character surviving when Noda hints at his death one way (characters on the wrong side of the survival road)...

or the other (Noda edited this image in the volume so that Tsurumi's feet would be naked which, Noda said, is a flag for death)...

.... or when the plot hints that character is unnecessary to the progression of the story (Ueji had not the means to help the story going further since he didn't have the means to either help or harm the characters so the easiest way to get rid of him as a character was to kill him off) or when the story made clear that character will need to be killed for the story to continue (Henmi wouldn't have let Sugimoto escape nor would have escaped and, anyway, Sugimoto couldn't leave him behind or Henmi's skin would end up in Tsurumi's hands).

However when no fatal wounding took place nor there was any foreshadowing of impending death, nor the story needed to get rid of that character for plot reasons, for me it's hard to say 'oh yes, he has to die' (although in some cases I might wish for a character's death).

Ogata has dangerous enemies... but the same applies to the whole cast. The story didn't bother foreshadowing his death, actually it foreshadowed his survival..

in more than one way as it's also implied he's a cat with proverbial multiples lives and his name "Hyakunosuke" is a sort of beneagural name that wishes for a long life as it contains the kanji 'hyaku' (百) which can be read as 'momo' which can also means "Peach", the fruit associated with immortality.

The fact that he has been working for Central might also help him not to get punished for killing Hanazawa. In fact Central might even judge Hanazawa's sacrifice as a necessary loss in order to get the gold or to get rid of Tsurumi, especially if Ogata is working for the likes of Okuda which was a supporter of a faction enemy of Hanazawa.

He spared Koito's life and gave him a hint about what Tsurumi did, which might make Koito feel obliged to spare him in return even though we know he strongly dislikes Ogata.

When fearing for her life it was the memory of her almost killing Ogata what stilled Asirpa's hand, so despite being at odds with him she might not want him death.

Ogata didn't get involved in the Tiger's curse which caused who killed a tiger to live a life of misfortune.

In the "Last Supper" Ogata was in Matthew's place and Matthew's gospel is even referenced by GK, which might be a hint he'll live and tell this story.

Long story short, Ogata's death isn't foreordained, for now I'll say it's the opposite, it's his survival which is foreordained.

Of course Noda might have been trolling us, or he just changed his mind and ultimately decided he would eventually kill out Ogata because this sort of things happen, but this is not predictable, this is just Noda changing his mind.

I'm not sure what's the basis on which your friend assumed he might end up with a fate "worse than death", as again, this is not foreshadowed so I can't really comment one way or another.

At the moment the only ones at risk of a life of misfortune are Tanigaki, Tsukishima and Koito because involved in Kiroranke's murder and therefore they're all potential targets to the tiger's curse.

I'm not saying you'r friend's theory is wrong, mind you, just that not knowing the basis for it, I can't really judge it.

Hanazawa cursed him, that's true...

...but we don't know what his cursing mean and if it's actually effective. It might merely mean that Ogata hallucinating Yuusaku is due to Hanazawa cursing him... or that he might never find a blessing path as Hanazawa will never accept him... which yes, would be painful for Ogata as he desperately wanted Hanazawa's acceptance, but really, Hanazawa was a jerk so...

People might know of my pet theory about Ogata being a Meko Oyasi of some sort... so in a way Ogata is already a cursed creature.

In fact, through Ogata isn't the sort who cries about himself, he has already a pretty bad life in which he never got anything out of the people from whom he wanted love and apprecciation, he's alone and currently on the run with occasional moments in which he showed he would be okay with being killed.

Ogata's life might be already terrible enough according to him, as he's bereft of all the things he wants and he might consider this already a fate worse than death.

But well, we can't really tell and, again, I can't really offer opinions on your friend's theory without knowing on what is based.

For now all I can say is that we can only wait and see in the future what will be of Ogata.

Thank you for your ask!