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lord-squiggletits · 2 months

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I think the key component to my personal reading of post-Delphi Pharma is that he's trying to be a horrible person on purpose. Not "on purpose" in the way that people have free will to exercise their own choices, but in that Pharma's "mad doctor" persona is a performance he puts on to deliberately embrace how much everyone else hates him. Basically, if people already think you're a "bad Autobot" and a horrible doctor who just kills his patients for fun, why try to prove otherwise to people who have already made up their minds about you? Just fully embrace the fact that people see you as an asshole. Don't try to change their minds. Don't plead for their forgiveness or understanding. Just stop caring. If you're going to be remembered as a monster, you might as well be a memorable monster, and eke as much pleasure and hedonism as you can out of it before karma catches up to you and you inevitably crash and burn.

I mean, I guess you could just go the route of "Oh, Pharma was always a fucked up creepy guy and Delphi was just him taking the mask off," but I really don't like that interpretation because, for one, it feels really wrong to take a character like Pharma becoming evil under duress and going, "Oh well clearly he did the things he did because he was evil all along," as if somehow Pharma breaking under blackmail/torture/threat of horrible death was a sign of him having poor moral character. As opposed to, you know, suffering under the very real threat of horrible death for himself and everyone he cares about while being manipulated by a guy who specializes in psychological torture.

The second reason is that it just doesn't make sense to write Pharma as having been evil all along. I mean...

Occam's Razor says that the best argument is the one with the simplest explanation. Doesn't it make way more sense to take Pharma's appearances in flashbacks, his friendship with Ratchet, his stunning medical accomplishments, and the few we see of him speaking kindly/sympathetically (or in the least charitable interpretation, at least professionally) towards his patients and conclude "This guy was just a normal person, if exceptionally talented." Taking all of these flashback appearances at face value and assuming Pharma was being genuine/honest is a way simpler and more logical explanation than trying to argue that Pharma for the past 4 million years was just faking being a good doctor/person. I mean, it's possible within the realm of headcanon, but the fact is Pharma's appearances in the story are so brief that there simply wasn't room in the story for there to be some sort of secret conspiracy/hidden manipulation behind why Pharma acted the way he did in the past.

I just can't help but look at things like Pharma's friendship with Ratchet (himself a good person and usually a fine judge of character) and the fact that even post-Delphi, pretty much every single mention of Pharma comes with some mention of "He was a good doctor for most of his life" or "He was making major headways in research [before he started killing patients]" which implies that even the Autobots themselves see Pharma's villainy as a recent turn in his life compared to how for "most of his life" he "used to be" a good doctor.

And although Pharma doesn't know this, we as the readers (and even other characters like Rung) know about Aequitas technology and the fact that it actually works, so... if Pharma really was an unrepentant murderer, why couldn't he get through the forcefield too? The Aequitas forcefield doesn't require that a person be completely morally pure and free of wrongdoing or else how could Tyrest get through, just that they feel a sense of inner peace and lack feelings of guilt. Pharma has murdered and tortured people by this point, and put on quite a campy and theatrical show of how much he sees it as a fun game, so why then can he not get through?

It circles back to my headcanon at the start of this post that the "mad doctor" persona is just that-- a persona. Delphi/post-Delphi Pharma's laughing madman personality is just so far removed from every flashback we saw of him and everything we can infer based on how other people see/saw him before that, to me, the mad doctor act is (at least in large part, if not fully) a persona that Pharma puts on to put his villainy in the forefront.

To avoid an overly simplistic/ableist take, I don't think Tarn tortured Pharma into turning crazy. To me, it's more like the constant pressure of death by horrific torture, the feeling of martyrdom as Pharma kept secret that he was the only one standing between Delphi and annihilation, the physical isolation of Messatine as well as the emotional separation from Ratchet, being forced to violate his medical oaths (pretty much the only thing Pharma's entire life has been about), etc. All of that combined traumatized Pharma to the point that the only way he could avoid cracking was to just stop caring about all of it. Because at least then, even if he's still murdering patients to save Delphi from a group of sadistic freaks, Pharma doesn't have to feel guilty and sick about doing it. As opposed to the alternatives, which were probably either going off the deep end and killing himself to escape, or confessing to what he did and getting jailed for it.

In that light, Pharma becoming a mad doctor makes sense. It avoids the bad writing tropes of "oh this character who was good his entire life was actually just evil and really good at hiding it" as well as "oh he got tortured and went crazy that's why he's so random and silly and killing people, he's crazy" and instead frames Pharma's evil as something he was forced into, to the point where in order to avoid a full psychological breakdown and keep defending Delphi, he just had to stop caring about the sanctity of life or about what other people might think of him.

Then, of course, the actual Delphi episode happens, and Pharma's own lifelong best friend Ratchet basically spits in his face and sees him as nothing more than a crazy murderer who went rogue from being a good Autobot. Then Pharma gets his hands cut off and left to die on Messatine. At that point, Pharma has not only been mentally/emotionally broken into losing his feelings of compassion, he's received the message loud and clear: He is alone. Everyone hates him. Not even his own best friend likes him any more. No one even cared enough about him to check if he actually died or not. He will only ever be remembered as a doctor who went insane and killed his patients.

So in the light of 1. Having all of your redeeming qualities be squeezed out of you one by one for the sake of survival and 2. Having your reputation and all of your positive relationships be destroyed and 3. People only know/care about you as "that doctor who became evil and killed his patients" rather than the millions of years of good service that came before.

What else is there to do but internalize the fact that you'll forever be seen as a monster and a freak, and embrace it? People already see you as a murderer for that blackmail deal you did, so why not become an actual murderer and just start killing people on a whim? People already see you as an irredeemable monster who puts a stain on the Autobot name, so why beg for their forgiveness when you could just shun them back? You've already become a murderer, a traitor, and a horrible doctor, so what's a few more evil acts added to the pile? It's not like anyone will ever forgive you or love you ever again.

Why care? Why try to hold on to your principles of compassion, kindness, medical ethics, when an entire lifetime of being a good person did nothing to save you from blackmail and then abandonment? Why put yourself through the emotional agony of feeling lonely, guilty, miserable, when you could just... stop caring, and not hurt any more?

#squiggposting #pharma apologism #i'm sure the doylist reason for the writing is just that pharma was a designated villain #so since he's a villain and 'crazy' it's fine for everyone even the good guys to treat him like complete trash #i just think from a watsonian perspective taking a sympathetic approach is way more interesting and logically consistent #what i mean is like. from a meta perspective one of the best ways to show that a character is super evil and not worth saving #is when even the good guy heroes. the ones who are supposed to be kind and compassionate and wise. see him as dirt #and this is also kind of a necessity in most plots bc TF is the kind of series that just needs action villains and long-term antagonists #so not every villain is written or has a plot to be made redeemable. and pharma is one of these bc he's not important or a legacy character #so from a doylist (meta) perspective you could read the autobots' disregard of pharma as a sign of #'this guy is not meant to have your sympathy as a reader. pay no attention to him'#but from a watsonian (in universe) perspective it paints a miserable picture of pharma being utterly forsaken by the ppl he served alongsid #and like yeah i'm super autistic about pharma so of course i view him with sympathy but like #the idea of being a loyal and good person for years only to be subjected to a Torment Nexus of #being blackmailed into breaking all of the oaths you held sacred. under threat of you and all your comrades dying horrible torturous deaths #then when your comrades find out about it they focus solely on the 'harvesting organs' and not on the 'blackmail' part #and then you get literally left for dead by your comrades and best friend hating your guts #and then you get rescued by a guy who uses you as a test subject for his evil machine #this is a fucking nightmare scenario like pharma could hardly be suffering more if the author TRIED to make him suffer #and for me it's like. the evil pharma did can't be decontextualized to what drove him to that. as well as the question of like #how easily ppl can write someone off as evil and turn a blind eye to (or even find satisfaction in) their suffering bc theyre evil #and either brought it on themselves or it's just karma paying a visit #like. i feel like if pharma WERE a shitty doctor and a terrible person his whole life then the delphi situation would feel like karma #but the way it's written and the lore retroactively put in makes it feel more pharma getting thrown in a torture carousel #and THEN becoming evil. but then being treated as if he was always evil or was some sort of bad apple #bc like i'm not opposed to LOLing when a villain gets a karmic torture/death related to the wrongs they committed #but in pharma's case it feels less like karma and more like endless torture + being abandoned by ppl who should have been more loyal

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jemmo · 3 months

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Making sense of love for love's sake: the game

Despite all the things i absolutely adore about how the plot unravels and expands in love by love's sake, upon first watch, there's some things i couldn't piece together, which @lurkingshan echoes in their post:

'The way the author was messing with Myungha and forcing cruel choices on him really does not track with a desire to help him find happiness.'

And to preface, this is not something i fully get yet either. I think i'll need a good month and a sizeable reading list of relevant resources to understand just what/who this author/sunbae is and what his role is and how he is associated with myungha. But as always with the best shows for meta (aka bad buddy), as a plot unfolds, you can always find a better understanding by looking backwards and re-contextualising what you've already seen. so i watched ep 1, specifically the scene between myungha and his sunbae at the bar. And i will talk about how everything said in this scene has a whole new meaning now we know the full story, but for now i wanna focus on that question that they keep coming back to; "Then... will you change it for him?".

When you watch the show for the first time, your brain follows the simplest, most obvious version of the story you're being told, one where myungha has been pulled into the world of his sunbae's novel that's being turned into a game and given the opportunity to fix the thing he didn't like about it; making yeowoon happy, and thus you just think the rules of the game are imposed by the author, and so when these cruel choices first come up, you see them as the difficult roadblocks that are nevertheless necessary to any kind of game, forcing the player to make an impossible choice so that the game can continue in a certain direction and its only after that you learn whether it was the right choice or not, or there is no right choice, it simply changes the game you are playing.

And when its revealed what this game actually is, at first i tried to interpret these cruel choices, namely the choice between yeonwoon and myungha's grandma, and at best i could come up with the concept of this being a choice between staying stuck to the past aka choosing his grandma, even though he knows that choice doesn't mean she's safe bc he knows the future where he loses here, its an inevitability, but thats the small happiness he knew before it was taken away and thus that happiness is known and safe, theres no risk, versus choosing to pursue a new happiness, a love of yeowoon and thus himself, which he doesn't know, he hasn't experienced yet, and could be risky. Its a happiness that isn't guaranteed like his grandma, but its a happiness that looks to the future and has hope in it that he can find a new happiness to pursue despite what has happened in his past.

And that fits nice, okayish. But then i watched ep 1 and heard that question "Then... will you change it for him?" And watching through the rest of the eps, we come back to this scene at the bar and each time we get a new run up to the author asking this question, either new dialogue is added or we hear a different piece of the conversation entirely. It starts at the beginning of ep 1 as:

"Because Cha Yeowoon is the only one who's miserable." "It can't be helped that some people's lives are like that" "The fact that some people are destined to live that kind of life is what's vile."

Then a bit later in ep 1 we go back and its expanded.

"It can't be helped that some people's lives are like that" "The fact that some people are destined to live that kind of life is what's vile." "Why? Do you think you'd write it differently?" "Yes, definately. Someone like Cha Yeowoon, or someone like me with an awful life, can also be happy."

And then all the way on in ep 6, we get this new dialogue.

"I don't like talking about destiny." "Why?" "Because it means everything is predestined." "Then do you not believe in fate?" "Fate and destiny are the same. My grandma likes to say that. She said life is like a written book, and how you'll live and die are written in it. (...)I don't like things like this. Even if fate is already destined, I think it can still be changed. Otherwise, there's no point in trying." "Really? Then Myungha..."

And while we don't hear the author ask the same question, I feel like him getting cut off like that insinuates that the conversation leads to that same ending point. All that is to say, every time we hear this question being asked, its like we learn more and more about what this whole thing is, what the game is, what myungha is saying he will do by agreeing to do what the author asks. And every time, we see myungha being more defiant against the idea of yeowoon being resigned to his miserable ending. He starts off thinking that kind of life is destined, and while it's miserable, its not something he can fight. Then he says he'd want to write the story differently, bc yeowoon, or even him, could be happy. He challenges the idea that yeowoon, and thus himself, is fated to be miserable, and opens up the possibility for happiness for them both, but doesn't yet have the means or resolve to do it, its like he knows its possible on a fundamental level, but doesn't see it as something he can actually achieve. But then we circle back to the idea of destiny and books, both of which came up in the previous quote, and seems incredibly pertinent seen as this whole thing is about a novel this author has written. Myungha talks about how he hates the idea that life is a book where everything written is predestined to happen, from the moment you live to the moment you die. He says "Even if fate is already destined, I think it can still be changed. Otherwise, there's no point in trying." That vile way of life he described before that he said was destined, he is now saying it can be changed, and that possibility is now something he's holding onto, its what he sees hope in so that he can keep trying, bc now he finally is trying, he has the resolve, he's trying to realise this thing, this impossibility of rewriting the life he thought was destined through the way he loves yeowoon.

And coming back to those cruel choices, given this fresh context, it made me think. bc this isn't actually a game that myungha has been put into where the rules are dictated by an author completely separate from him. He said himself, he'd rewrite it, he'd change things for yeowoon. And when you start to think of it less as him fighting against a rigid, removed system and more like him being a character in a story he is trying to rewrite himself, that has both the author and his own limitations, or just his own if you're in the school of thought that the author is some figment or part of myungha himself or his conciousness, then you can start to see where these cruel choices might come from. They could be myungha, the author making edits to this new story, imposing his own doubts and limitations on himself. When he says he has to pick between Yeowoon and his grandma, what if that's the new author myungha seeing this story unfold and thinking no this isn't right, he can't have it all, i'm not deserving of this much happiness.

And what makes me like this idea even more is that when we get that second choice between ending after 14 days or getting 100 days back at the cost of resetting Yeowoon's affection to 0, that whole conversation happens in what I think the bar actually is which is this frozen moment in time where myungha is in the water with this extension of a voice in his head that is talking through these things. That conversation in itself needs its own post, but when you look at it both as a decision to break up or not or a decision to hold onto life or not, you can see how the author is just this soundboard relaying the decisions myungha is going through in his head. The author's voice is his own, weighing up his decisions. And if he is the author here, it only reinforces that the person making the rules of this game is him. You can even extend it further to the idea of the debuffs, where he puts in place this thing that makes it so he causes harm to yeowoon when he's around, and its only by garnering affection that he can prevent it. He gives himself a reason from the get go to stay away from yeowoon and reason it as him doing it for yeowoon's safety, when in fact the only way to make yeowoon safe is to increase his affection, which he can only do by being near him. Its a system that at first gives myungha a reason to stay away aka not like himself, but ultimately says the only way you're going to make yeowoon like you, or the only way you can like yourself, is if you accept risk. And that in itself screams to me of a myungha writing in these game systems that are trying to encourage his own-self love while falling at the hurdle of his own lack of self-worth.

The idea is still messy in my head even for me, but i just really like the idea that myungha could be trying to fix this thing both as a character and game master, and that both these versions of him have these flaws that manifest in their different ways to cause the events we see. It kinda is the definition of being your own worst enemy, the idea that in order to work towards loving yourself, the biggest obstacle you have to encounter is yourself, bc we are the ones holding ourselves back, making all these rules that make it harder to like ourselves and pursue our own happiness. The voices in our head telling us that we aren't good enough and aren't deserving are our own, and while the things that happen to us can inform what they say, we're the one's reinforcing those words. And what this show teaches us is that, if we're the one holding that pen all along, we can choose to change what those words are. If we make the rules, you don't have to create a game with concrete ultimatums, you can create a game where rules don't control you. Instead, you make the decisions, and you can make the ones that make you happy.

#wow look at me writing actual kinda thought out meta #also something something about how the pen being in his pocket wasnt a pen given to him by the author its a pen that was his the whole time #look even if this isnt the right interpretation as intended by the author i just kinda adore this headcanon ive come up with and i cant wai #to rewatch the show again through this lens and see if it holds up #i just adore the idea of this whole thing being this manifestation of a flawed doubtful person trying to navigate through their own messy #nonsensical thoughts to find their own happiness #bc yes thats what triggered me thinking of this whole thing. me seeing that post and thinking yeah that doesnt make sense7 #but then again when you tell yourself things an put your own mental blocks in the way they dont make sense either but you still have to fin #the ways to work around them in order to find happiness #like those things dont go away we just find the loopholes or the ways to overcome them that mean we can be happy #the game is your own mind - deal with your own existential crisis as you wish #anyway this is only part 1 in what i hope will be a very extensive meta analysis of this show - stay tuned #love for love's sake

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your-royal-momoness · 1 year

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Toph: this field trip is boooring

Katara: this is not a field trip, we’re grocery shopping

Toph: then why did you invite me?

Katara: I didn’t. I told you not to come with me and you said “fuck you I do what I want” and followed me here

#toph really actually likes going grocery shopping with katara because katara encourages her to try whatever new foods she wants #and sometimes toph needs that encouragement that while she is capable of doing what she wants and defying authority #it doesn’t always have to be a bad thing #doing what you want when you haven’t been allowed your whole life can feel like rebellion no matter the situation #I think katara would show toph that it doesn’t have to be a rebellion it can be about finding joy #source: @/incorrectgenshinquotes #trashbending #atla #katara #toph #avatar the last airbender #incorrect quotes

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hajihiko · 1 year

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you know I had to do it (to em) <- link

#Hajime hinata #Izuru kamukura #It's both! Its HajiZuru you'll see #Fuyuhiko kuzuryu #Sdr2 #Super danganronpa 2 #Danganronpa 2 #Kuzuhina #Author said it can be read as both so I can safely tag it lol but!!! PLATONIC YEEAAHHH #Always a happy day when I find good friend fics <3 #An art #Wait I'm not thrilled with the colouring actually let me edit this more.#There. You didnt see it but a process occurred.#Friends and healing 🥰🥰#I always try to capture the lips-between-teeth crying kind of face bc it's all I know. Everyone does that right

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joyfuladorable · 1 year

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Of Darkness and Light by Bayluff

It was running. It was running from him. Surging forward, he snagged the shadow of his prey, and slowly crawled up, sliding up a leg, up a strangehardback and finally, into the back of the neck.

Mikey suddenly stopped, shuddering, his breath hitching loudly. Leonardo immediately stopped and looked back. "Mikey? Mike what's wrong?" He questioned, concerned his feeling had been right.

"N-Nothing." Michelangelo said after a pause. "I just got real cold for a second." He laughed. "It's gone now."

My angst gremlin heart was appeased by this fic, lol. But also! I was cooing over all the comfort Mikey got while he was having a Bad Time (tm). ALSO, please don't tag this as ship in anyway. That's insta-block behavior.

Less eye-straining first image ^^

#tmnt #tmnt mikey #tmnt 2003 #tmnt 2k3 #tmnt leo #tmnt donnie #tmnt raph #tmnt splinter #fic fanart #my art #had to make that note about ships just to be safe cuz like #y'all do you but leave me Out Of It #and tag your stuff properly #anyways FAMBLYYY #this fic is kinda cheesy but it does give that good good hurt/comfort content #also *salutes the author* couldn't find their social media (if they have one) so hope you're doing well wherever you are #and also yes I will be doing fic fanart regardless of when a fic was posted #if it activates my art brain it's been Chosen

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discworld-heritage-posts · 3 months

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What do you think you add? Do you think you make a poignant post better when after scrolling down through it we see someone saying it's "official"?

I'm choosing to interpret this ask as a genuine question (albeit one that's been worded a bit rudely) instead of a hate anon, because I wouldn't want to tarnish people's dashboards with hate anons.

Now, to answer your genuine question... The "Discworld Heritage Post" tagline I add to the end of posts has as much validity as I have authority to bestow it: none. Do I think my tagline makes posts better? Of course not! And I certainly don't think I make them official, (and neither my url or my pinned post claim that I do so).

I don't know what reasons other people had to start their own Heritage Posts blogs for other fandoms, but I will gladly tell you mine: I got into Discworld. I discovered the Discworld fandom in Tumblr. And, one day, while scrolling down some Discworld related tags, the idea just popped into my head. After checking that there wasn't a Discworld Heritage Posts blog already, I decided to make one.

I personally follow a few Heritage Posts blogs, and my reason to do so is probably the same as to why many people follow this blog: I wanted to see that kind of content. Tracking tags and being up to date on the most popular posts of a fandom is doable, but doing so for the dozens upon dozens of media I'm into is impossible, so I like to follow some Heritage Posts blogs to get some of those posts directly into my dashboard (it's also worth mentioning that sometimes, some iconic posts are made when people comment stuff on them, and those don't appear in the search tags, so following blogs that post about a certain fandom is the best way to come across some of those collaborative posts, because otherwise you'd rarely get to see them). So yes, I created a blog that, had it already existed, I would have liked to follow. Also, while other blogs with this gimmick usually limit themselves to reblogging, let's call them the "greatest hits", I've said since the beginning that I didn't care about how many notes something had. Be it cool art or a funny or insightful post, if I like it, I send it to my drafts.

However, none of those reasons are the main reason why I made this blog. The main reason is that I did it for myself. After exhausting all the content that showed up in the Popular Posts tab, I couldn't help but think of all the gold and treasure that wasn't there, buried and hidden due to the way Tumblr's search engine works. If you're familiar with the Discworld concept of "lies-to-children", that's what the "top posts of all time" is in Tumblr. A 20k post from 2016 will not be there, but a six month old post with 400 notes will show up. Surely there had been amazing Discworld posts and art posted in 2015 and 2013, but I wasn't going to find most of them unless I expressly went looking for them. And this blog was the perfect excuse to do so. As of replying to this ask, there's nearly 600 posts sitting in my drafts, and if I didn't have this blog I would have never discovered 90% of them. And those are the ones I've seen. I still have dozens of places I haven't searched.

I know that if I reblog a month old post with over 2k notes, a lot of people in the fandom will have already seen it. However, a 2k notes post from 2014, or a drawing with 40 notes from 2012 is something that is less likely to have hit people's dashes recently, or at all. When you come across the "Discworld Heritage Post" tagline in a post, please don't picture me as an uppity monarch performing the Tumblr equivalent of a knighting ceremony, or a stuffy museum curator deigning a piece worthy of being included in an exhibition. Picture me as a kid enthusiastically jumping and flailing my arms around while yelling "holy shit guys check out what I just found!!", because that's how I feel running this blog.

Ultimately, whether one of my posts does better or worse is indifferent to me, because they aren't my posts, or memes, or drawings. I'm just the intermediary. That being said, of course it's not indifferent to me, because more engagement means that was a post many people hadn't seen before, or had forgotten about, and one of my goals was to run a blog that would allow people to find those hidden or long forgotten gems.

When all is said and done, Heritage Post blogs are just another one of Tumblr's gimmicks. If we're not your cup of tea, you're free to ignore or block us. If you want to reblog something and don't want the tagline, you can reblog it directly from OP (or from another reblog if OP has deactivated their account).

#long post #THAT BEING SAID #I've seen people being very exited about something they made showing up in this blog and calling it an honor and stuff like that #and to those people I say: I see you and your lovely tags and my heart warms when I read them #i might not have any real authority besides a self imposed gimmick in a nearly defunct social media platform #but if seeing your stuff here makes you happy and proud those feelings are valid and I want you to treasure them #a lot of things only have the meaning we ascribe to them and my tagline might not hold any official meaning #but it does mean something VERY IMPORTANT:#that I saw your post and I loved it and I reblogged it to make sure other people could also find it and love it #I need to come up with a tag for asks don't I? ok how about #asked and answered #dhp's asks #discworld

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nerdie-faerie · 2 months

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I'm once again thinking about the missed opportunities to have Klaus and Kol bond more. Part of Klaus' whole motivation as a vampire is to get his werewolf part back and to finally be stronger than Mikael (sort of, I'm simplifying) both of which can be obtained by breaking his curse. But Kol? Kol is the only other original that can relate to having a fundamental part of themself ripped away from them. Klaus might not have known he was a werewolf until he killed, but he likely still had a connection he couldn't explain, as evident by him going to watch the wolves transform. And something he'd never been able to explain was now gone. He might only be able to realise the connection afterwards through its absence.

Kol though. Kol had grown up with magic, a connection to nature and the world around him in a way the rest of his siblings supposedly didn't have. And then he gets turned. And not only has his baby brother died, his father has just murdered him and the rest of his siblings after forcing them to drink human blood, which he'll later learn. Now, not only does he have to deal with the grief of Henrik's death and also his own but also the loss of his magic. A loss that's likely only worsened by Kol being a self-proclaimed child prodigy.

Kol is pretty much the only one who could understand what Klaus is going through with the binding of his wolf. We know Kol searched for ways to get his magic back/carry on practicing magic in the same way that Klaus was looking for ways to break his curse. While Klaus likely could still feel his wolf there despite being bound, Kol has no access to his magic anymore. I just think they should've been able to bond or connect over their shared loss of an intrinsic aspect of their selves at the hands of their parents

#TVD #The Mikaelsons #Kol Mikaelson #Klaus Mikaelson #briefly back on my the originals shouldve gotten to be a family goddammit and as someone from a big family im personally offended bs #i did right a lil snippet about them bonding over this that i havent posted yet for the joml verse but still think its an unexplored concep #need more witch!kol acknowledgement honestly. just need more content of my boy #anyway. klaus having a fascination with the moon and kol telling him about celestial events and how it affects his magic when theyre boys #klaus losing that connection to the moon feeling lost & extra tempermental feeling his wolf claw at its binds and vowing to break his curse #kol determined to get his magic back at any cost relating to that devasting loss and promising to help him find a loophole for his curse #kol who becomes extra reckless and determined when he learns that theres a way to break klaus' curse so maybe he can get his magic back too #that knowledge and recklessness combined with his loss of magic driving him to become the volatile vampire that we see #that leads to him being daggered repeatedly but that first time breaks something in that bond between him & klaus that never fully recovers #it makes him bitter and resentful only fueling his reckless behaviour particularly when there seems to be no leads on reclaiming his magic #that he becomes distant from his siblings in the process especially with finn still daggered but that distance only cements the idea #to his siblings that hes a danger and cant be trusted that he needs to be daggered if theyre to stay safe from mikael #the loss of his magic leading to his spiral as a vampire and him being ostracised by his family > actual tvdu kol canon #klaus being trapped in a room staring at the corpse of his little brother knowing he never repaired that relationship with him #and now he never can so he refuses to look away as penance and a reminder of his failings to his little brother #*edit: one of the reblogs on this post is the author of big bad wolf and honestly she does an amazing job at portraying the mikaelsons #as actual siblings if you havent read it its one of my favourites for characterisations but we need more 😭 i want it to be the norm

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greenerteacups · 3 months

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Hi! I am an ardent fan of your writing, and I hope to be as sorted and planned as you some day in my own writing journey.

My question is: you have a keen eye when it comes to planning character personality, dynamics, and such. I've also been wading through your ask replies, and your insights into how you write people and how you make them play off of each other is so wonderful to read. If it's not too personal a q, how did you learn how to write like this? Did you go to school for writing, does it come from years of observing people, do you have reading list recs for "how to write real people and real interactions"?

Thanks! This is a really flattering question. I'll try to answer it honestly, because I wish someone had been brutally honest about this with me when I was a young writer.

I didn't go to school for writing. I started doing it when I was about nine years old. It sucked very badly. I kept writing throughout high school, and it still mostly sucked, but some of it was occasionally interesting. ("Interesting" here does not mean "good," by the way.) I took a break in college, and then came back. I've been writing ever since. Sometimes, I feel good about it. A lot of the time, I don't!

I hate giving this advice, because I remember how it feels to get it, and it's the most uninspiring, boring-ass, dog shit advice you can get, but it's also the only advice that is 100% unequivocally true: you have to write, and specifically, you have to write things that suck.

I do not mean that you should make things that suck on purpose. I mean that you have to sit down and try your absolute hardest to make something good. You have to put in the hours, the elbow grease, the blood, sweat, and tears, and then you have to read it over and accept that it just totally sucks. There is no way around this, and you should be wary of people who tell you there is. There is no trick, no rule, no book you can buy or article you can read, that will make your writing not suck. The best someone else can do is tell you what good writing looks like, and chances are, you knew that anyway — after all, you love to read. You wouldn't be trying to do this if you didn't. And anyone who says they can teach you to write so good it doesn't suck at first is either lying to you, or they have forgotten how they learned to write in the first place.

So the trick is to sit there in the miserable doldrums of Suck, write a ton, and learn to like it. Because this is the phase of your path as an artist when you find what it is you love about writing, and it cannot be the chance to make "good writing." This will be the thing that bears you through and compels you to keep going when your writing is shit, i.e., the very thing that makes you a writer in the first place. So find that, and you've got a good start.

Some people know this, but assume that perseverance as a writer is about trying to get to the point where you don't suck anymore. This is not true, and it is an actively dangerous lie to tell young writers. You are not aiming to feel like your writing doesn't suck. You are aiming to write. You are aiming to have written. Everything else is dust and rust. And of course, you'll find things you like about your pieces, you'll find things you're proud of, you'll learn to love the things you've made. But that little itch of self-criticism, in the back of your brain — the one that cringes when you read a clunky line, or thinks of a better character beat right after it's far too late to change — that's never going away. That's the Writer part of you. Read Kafka, read Dickens, read Tolstoy, you will find diary entries where they lament how absolutely fucking atrocious their writing was, and how angry they are that they can't do better. A good writer hates their sentences because they can always imagine better ones. And the ability to imagine a better sentence is what's going to make you pick up the pen again tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that.

Which is what I mean, and probably what all those other annoying, preachy advice-givers mean, when we say: a good writer is just someone who writes every day. It's that easy, and that hard.

#by the way a lot of this draws on ideas inspired by 'letters to a young poet' by rainer maria rilke if you're interested #that's a formative text for me as an artist #it won't teach you how to write but it will teach you how to think perhaps #and once you know how to think. well. life is just pretty good #and i can't say the writing gets easier but when life is pretty good i find myself enjoying it a lot more #this word vomit was prompted by the question 'how do you write real people and real interactions'#because that's like — i'm not trying to be pedantic but—#that's kind of just 'how do you write literature'?#because that's all literature is. what are human beings? how do you write a person? how do they interact with each other?#like shoutout to the void if you know for sure how to write real interactions then please for the love of god tell the rest of us #because i think most of all authors in history have just been giving it our best stab #'this is how the world looks for me. is it how the world looks for you?'#so my advice on that score is: try to see how the world looks for you #and then try to share it with me #don't worry about whether it looks the same for me. it won't

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bakathief · 16 days

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It’s been 209 days. Since the last time you updated Shadow Chase when are we getting a new update :(

Hi how are you I‘m good thanks :)

If you are worried that I‘m slacking off rest assured that I have been working on my art in my 2-3 hours of free time every day. If you don‘t believe me you can check out the +140 art pieces in my latest collab or the 22 pages comic I uploaded 2 weeks ago. Thank you for leaving words of motivations in my comments and inbox as noone loves more „when is the next update“ comments than me, especially after a 12 hour shift on the weekend. :)

That being said, there are new pages, when I have the capacity to upload is another question.

#Yours truly #I don‘t mean to be rude #But I find „when is the next update“ questions rather rude #If you‘re going through the effort to leave a comment for the author consider another approach #Like „hey this is great can‘t wait for the continuation“ :D #Anyway thank you to everyone who reads shadow chase and thank you for your patience

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icewindandboringhorror · 1 year

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................ he

#i feel like I posted this already but I also can't find it in any recent posts so...#......he #cats #EVEN if I did post it.. why not poast himb again? it's he #I'm like halfway through actually editing aforementioned costumes and stuff and i WANT to work on sculptures again and I have video #s and that worldbuilding slideshow and all of these things so hopefully like.. more usual stuff soon maybe.. to be posted #for now though yeah.. just cats #The end of the year is also when I panic about the passage of time and how little I've gotten done and how I will never actually be a #sucessful game maker slash author slash cat cafe owner slash set designer slash costume designer slash psychologist #who lives in like Scotland or somehting and also owns my own candle company or something ghbjhb #and will probably just be a mentally ill hermit recluse all my life who dies early of mysterious health issues with 5000 projects left #undone and blah blah the crushing weight of chronic illness and capitalism and so on and so forth #So then I scramble to get projects done to try and meet some goals but usually that means I scatter between projects #so it takes longer to finish all of them. Like instead of dedicating 8 hours to one thing and finishing it one sitting. I'll do 2 hours on #this then 2 hours on that then 2 hours on another things. so they all get done slower even though I'm still technically making progress on #them all. This is also a very poo poo pee pee stink brain way to work and is not like. the most efficent thing but it's just how my brain #organizes tasks sometimes lol #***#(<ignore this its part of an OCD compulsion lol. anytime you see me type three asterisks I'm not bleeping out a curse word #it's just a Special Secret Foolish Thing I Have To Do At Specific Uncontrolable Times When Brain Says So gbjhhj)#ANYWAY... eeeee #Still haven't resolved my mystery chest injury though so being at te computer for too long is also kind of achey-inducing #Better get over it though because I have like 30+ hours of slideshow vidoe to edit hahaha hee hee hoo!!!!!

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pastafossa · 11 months

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Charlie Cox experience at Philly Fan Expo 2023

So LET”S TALK ABOUT ME MEETING CHARLIE. I’m actually going to make two posts - this one just about my experiences with Charlie, because they were incredibly meaningful and deserve their own post, and then another one about the rest of the con!

I’m going to talk about Charlie first, because of how amazing the experience was, one of the best I’ve had, especially at the autograph table. I’ve done photos, gotten autographs and such before from other celebs - from niche voice actors I loved to people like David Tennant - but this felt Really Really Big. Obviously, I was nervous as all hell because holy shit Charlie Cox, my favorite actor whose work altered the course of my life. I won’t lie - I’d been practicing what to say to him in case I freaked out, but I’m happy to say that everyone who reassured me it would go great, because he was so, so genuine and kind, were right.

The photo op happened first (and thank you to everyone on tumblr guiding me where to go, cause I was LOST about where that was happening), and that went fast. By that point in the con hall, I’d already ditched my Jessica Jones jacket and gloves cause holy shit it’s hot and I am a creature of snow and ice, and my hair was a mess, but honestly I didn’t care, cause there he is. You don’t get long, but he made the most of it and he was SO sweet. Ya’ll, he asked my name, said my name as he shook my hand, and called me ‘my dear’ in that beautiful voice.

I was literally on the moon, but it was time for the big question:

Will he hold the red thread from TRT?

So in a quiet, nervous, soft author voice, I asked, ‘would you be ok with holding this end of the thread?’

HE FUCKING DID.

HE HELD IT.

HE HELD. THE. RED. THREAD.

I’m fairly certain he doesn’t know about the fic at this point - he wasn’t sure where to hold it until I told him, but he loved that it lit up! AND THEN HE PUT HIS ARM AROUND ME AND I GOT TO PUT MY ARM AROUND HIM BACK.

I’m fairly certain I’m dead in the photo. My soul had left my body. I had ascended. I saw Jesus and he looked like Charlie. I had achieved fic author heights never imagined. My brain filled with enough serotonin and dopamine to sink a ship. I didn’t care that I was hot and sweaty or that my hair was messy or that my cosplay didn’t work out like I’d planned. I had been blessed.

also look at that forearm holy shit

I floated outta that gd room ya’ll. I’m pretty sure @wonderlandmind4 did the same. WE FROLICKED OUT OF THAT HALL LIKE

But things got even better at the autograph table, and I had one of the most touching experiences ever.

not me tearing up thinking about it.

That line was long, but I kept getting glimpses of him and I could already tell he was enjoying interacting with people, and he was making sure everyone got their bit of time with him instead of letting anyone rush people through. He was so happy looking, laughing and grinning, high fives and fist bumps for kids, chatting with fans. Which made me feel a little more confident.

I know some people wondered if I’d tell him about TRT, and I’d already decided I wasn’t going to. Instead, I really, really wanted just a second to tell him what his work as Daredevil had meant for me, as someone who became disabled around the same time Matt did as a kid, and who related to... a lot of what Matt went through in the show. I’d practiced it over and over again, and there was only a fifty percent chance I wouldn’t start crying while telling him, and I wasn’t even sure I’d have time to tell him depending on how much time we had.

He made time.

I got up to him with my art print holy shit he’s even more beautiful in person and his eyes are STUNNING. He said hi, and asked my name so he could personalize the autograph if I wanted (DUH, YES PLEASE), and he apologized about the line after we shook hands. I jokingly told him it was fine since I’d driven hours to get here. A little time in line wasn’t a bother. He even loved one of the buttons on my lanyard - the button of Matt wearing a heart crown specifically! And as he was writing, I knew this was my chance to tell him. He was still signing, so I just decided to go for it in case I ran out of time.

“I just wanted to tell you,” I said quietly, “as someone who became disabled as a kid around the same age as Matt did—”

And then he did something I didn’t expect, something I’d rarely seen anyone do, famous or not, and something I’d never had an actor or artist do for me.

He immediately set down the pen, leaned in close over the table, and made direct eye contact, while giving me the most genuine, gentle, encouraging smile I’d ever seen.

In that moment, I knew everything in him was listening, that he cared about what I was about to say and recognized that this was important to me, and that he’d closed the distance to make this conversation just... us. It felt personal in a way I’ve never experienced at a con or signing.

Just like that, I wasn’t afraid to tell him what I’d wanted to.

“And as someone who related to... a lot of what Matt went through, his struggles in the show, and especially the dark parts of season 3,” I said, more confidently now, “I wanted you to know that all the work you put in, the way you played it, the way you played Matt and treated it seriously, seeing that helped me process and heal from a lot of my own trauma and pain over what I’ve gone through with my illnesses. What you did was important and it really helped me. So I wanted you to know that, how much that meant to me, and to say thank you.”

The whole time I spoke to him, he kept direct eye contact, and didn’t look away once. He didn’t get antsy, or look like he wanted me to hurry up (which I’d have understood, cause damn, these are long days for him). He listened, fully engaged and leaning in, his eyes warm and soft and kind but incredibly serious. I’m not sure how often he’s been told something like this—a lot, I expect; his portrayal was just that good, and I know it was important to a lot of fans—but what I was trying to tell him clearly meant something to him. I felt heard, seen, and understood.

Charlie really does care about his fans. It isn’t an act. I’m sure of it now.

“Thank you, truly,” he said, just as quietly but with that honest smile, eye crinkles and all, and seeing it in person, that close up, I swear the room felt ten times brighter. “Thank you for coming to tell me that. It means a lot, the idea that something I did meant so much and that it could help you. I’m so grateful that you were able to come visit and tell me.”

We shook hands after that. He wished me a good day and I told him thank you again, and that was that. The interaction only lasted maybe a minute, but it meant the absolute world to me, as did what he’s done as Daredevil. And now he knows that.

#Philly Fan Expo #Charlie Cox #Daredevil #he HELD THE THREAD ya'll #my fanfic author life is now complete #and honestly as a fan i don't know if any other experience will ever top those moments I got with Charlie #he is so so kind and warm and wonderful #the way he immediately stopped and gave me his full attention when i started to tell him what it meant #i just had to stop for a second and collect myself because just...#he was *listening* and despite all the noise and chaos i suddenly had his full attention #the way he leaned in so the conversation felt like it was just us and the way he cocked his head and focused on me like #i can't think of a single celeb or interaction like that where i've felt that much like what i was saying to him mattered #(that's not dissing the other actors and celebs i've met. they've all been wonderful! but charlie definitely has a special kindness i think)#and i can now say having been that close to him and having spoken with him over something fairly serious #he is literally one of the kindest celebs i've met and the most genuine #you can literally see the warmth in his eyes when he looks at you. he's *legitimately* happy you're there to talk to him or see him #maybe one day he'll find out about TRT. i'm honestly not sure #but even if he doesn't at least I got a chance to tell him how much what he's done has helped me heal #from a lot of really... really hard things in my life #and according to a friend (who I didn't even know was there but spotted me talking to Charlie from another line!)#Charlie did indeed stay until WAY late signing everyone's stuff so that no one missed an autograph #he said his estimation of Charlie just shot way up because even hours later he was still taking his time with each fan that came up #Charlie has absolutely solidified as my favorite actor and one of the nicest people I've had the pleasure of meeting

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