#It’s funny because 90% of me has never cared about fandom expectations or roles

[heraldofcrow]

Ok, I need to say something and get it off my chest while I actually have some energy.

I know what I want to change for the new year…even though normally I don’t really care for the idea of resolutions because to me there is no guarantee that the turn of a year implies change. I just think everyone should grow at their own pace and transform when they are ready. But my current catharsis just happens to be taking place now, so I’ll make it a resolution. A resolution about creativity.

My energy as a fandom creative has been incredibly low this year, which is weird for me. I have been in quite a few fandoms over the years, but the ones I actively decided to participate in were always fun outlets for me to improve things like my writing and actually make room for my energy. I used to write absurdly long analyses and metas in other fandoms for my own enjoyment and get into in-depth discussions with people about lore, story, themes, or whatever else would come up because that’s where I thrived. I was always the essay spammer lol. I miss the energy that was fueling me then. Something happened to it, and I wonder if it’s because I changed from “writing for myself” to “writing for the fandom” at some point.

Don’t get me wrong, I always loved supportive communities that help you grow and develop in some arena of art. I need that as a person because as isolate and introverted as I can be about my interests, I do have this side that craves the thrill of sharing passion and excitement with others. I love when I create something and other people like it too…I mean, who doesn’t?

That’s a huge part of fandom and of course I am here for that support system, but I don’t want to make my goal to be about supplying content for a fandom.

Just about a year and a half ago I started messing around with drawing for the first time in my life. I had attempted to doodle and scribble as a kid, but it was stick figure stuff. I never was serious. But the urge to depict specific pictures in my head was overpowering. I had to buckle down and watch some tutorials to get anywhere, but I did get…somewhere.

I don’t draw even slightly near the level I want to yet, but I’m glad I practice and learn new little tricks every so often. I just need to break down walls, especially the walls I have been hitting recently. These walls stop me from getting better. They kill my interest in writing. I have trouble responding to people and their conversations with me in fandom…when people express interest in my opinions, I shut down and hide. I don’t put the effort I used to into analysis or research. I am stuck and it is smothering my creativity.

My drawing and writing won’t improve until I stop being scared about challenging myself or being willing to branch out.

That’s my resolution. I need to stop doing stuff for a fandom. I need to smack myself upside the head and genuinely draw whatever the fuck I want and not to create content like a YouTuber. The reason I used to write metas or get into long lore convos with people so confidently is because I was passionate about it and not because I was trying to put something on a platform.

It’s not necessarily that I have been doing this YouTuber thing all year, but I know for certain that the stupid fandom idea of “having a role” or “being The Guy for a certain character” has craftily snuck itself into my head. I adore Bloodborne, I love my Bloody Crow, but I also fucking love Dark Souls, I love Demon’s Souls, I love Elden Ring, I love LOTR, I love Arcane, I love FF7, I love dozens of other films, books, shows, stories…

…I love so much and I want to draw stuff for all of it, I want to write for all of it, I want to express my thoughts on it. I am a subtle participant in plenty of fandoms if they aren’t too toxic, but I have restricted myself to Bloodborne because I felt “safe” about “creating content” here. I also felt a necessity at times.

But truthfully? I am going to suffocate if I force myself to restrict my creativity to one fandom forever. No, I don’t intend to leave it, because I do love it here and I want to still enjoy the community. I also still want this blog to be Soulsborne oriented while my sideblogs are for other fandoms, but that’s just for the sake of my own interest in organization, not because I have to. That’s because I fucking love Soulsborne and its fandom and I want to stay here to share and create. Not because I have to.

I have been hanging around the Soulsborne community for over ten years now…it’s just an infinite vat of creativity and inspiration. I want to contribute because it’s fun. I need to stop limiting myself to the ONE game though. It’s killing the ability to improve my drawing because I don’t truly always want to draw everything from this game. Sometimes I just want to draw knights from Dark Souls.

Sometimes I want to practice drawing armor and not Bloodborne style get-ups. I just want room and space to explore. There is plenty of variety in Bloodborne yes, but it has to be variety I am passionate about or I will half-ass it. I need that option.

It’s the same with writing. My writer’s block has been horrible this year because once I actually started sharing my fan-fiction for the first time, I felt that pressure of having readers and I wanted to make sure everything I put out was perfect. This kills my motivation. It’s utterly deadly. I actually am fine with my writing normally and am very comfortable with improving it through practice, but whenever I succumbed to the likely nonexistent external pressure, I suddenly couldn’t finish editing to save my life.

I need to be free of this and be able to enjoy my fandoms. I need them. 2023 was one of the hardest years of my life. I was so miserable so often, and it’s during those times when I really want a safe space to run and create. It helps me “regenerate.” But if I’m polluting my own safe space with pressure and worry, then what do I have left?

And so yeah, that’s my goal for this next year and the years to come. I want my old energy and passion back, to use this little online outlet to grow and learn more about drawing, writing, and whatever else catches my fancy. I won’t pressure myself about this either, but I hope it comes naturally if I take it slow and try to unlock my brain from the narrow way of thinking.

No more playing into a role. I just need to be free and enjoy myself.

#SO YEAH NOW I AM A PENGUIN AND NOT A CROW #lmaooo #i’m kidding #that would be hilarious #just taking a different role after abandoning one (help) #no but see crows are just ME #that’s different xD #It’s funny because 90% of me has never cared about fandom expectations or roles #but with the bb fandom there was so much drama once upon a time that i got caught in the trap of taking up a role as a form of armor #now that it’s kind of in the past…i really need to move on #fandoms are supposed to be fun…not warzones and i need to stop restricting my creative endeavors to them so much #because even though bb is peaceful now…if it ever happens again i can’t fall into this routine a second time #there is a lot here #but i’m glad i’m thinking about it #personal #new year #fandom stuff #CrowNotes

[xxlea-nardoxx]

Hi! I love your videos and art! and can I ask a little question - how do you feel about other tmnt movies and TV series? (1987, 90s, 2003, 2007, etc.) what is your opinion on this? (I think you've seen and watched some of this). thank you in advance for the answer. keep up the good work! ^^

I'm so sorry this took longer to answer! I completely forgot it yesterday.😂

I kinda expected this question to arrive SOMEDAY, to be honest, since I mainly talk about 2012, but I don't mind it of course!

1987:

I only ever watched a few episodes and bits of it, so I cannot form a good answer, but I do think the show is actually funny, or at least entertaining. My friend even calls it a haven for incorrect quotes and I agree on that. xD I swear I will continue it one day to have better judgement!

The 90's movies:

Never watched them, honestly. I do want to watch the first one at one point, but I'm still holding out on doing it. xD

2003:

TURTLES COUNT IT OFF! I swear, my friends and I sing the opening of that show more than we've actually watched the show.💀

I started watching the first season and made it a few episodes in. Even watched it in German and it was honestly already great. Fell in love with these idiots immediately, especially Donnie and Raph who became my favorites in an instant. Still cannot believe they let Raph say "shit" in the german dub. xD

2007 movie:

*angelic music resounds*

God, I love that movie SO MUCH. It's just such an enjoyable watch late at night (as is Tmnt in general, actually) and I remember it from back during my childhood. That movie was actually on TV a few times, during my time as a Tmnt fan back during 2013-2016, and I loved to watch it.

Returning to the fandom and finding the movie on Netflix actually brought back all my nostalgia I had for this movie, and thus watched it again one night. And I will not forgive Netflix for just taking it down.

2012:

I mean......Do I need to explain? As if it isn't obvious enough, ahshsjsjs. It was my introduction to Tmnt, to anyone who didn't know!

2014/2016 movies:

I do not care what anyone says: These movies ROCK. Sure, the turtles look quite terrifying, but I never experienced a dull moment watching these movies. I genuinely enjoy watching them so much.

Back in 2014 I wanted to watch the movie in the cinema so badly, but I was only 11 and thus couldn’t watch a Rated 12 movie alone (since my mom dislikes the turtles HEAVILY xD), so I could only watch it once it was on TV for the first time (I wasn't allowed the DVD for whatever reason), which did take about two years, shshsjsj.

BUT two years later, when "Out of the Shadows" came out, I was 13 and READY. It was my first Tmnt movie on the big screen and I had such a pleasant time watching it.

These two movies hold a special place in my heart, because they were part of my childhood and my introduction to other Tmnt-versions. Donnie and Raph are my favorites here, they are just so- *screams*

2018/Rise show:

I guess this also counts? xD

I do like the show. It's a different approach on the turtles and their world as a whole, and I enjoy it a lot whenever I watch it. Leo and Mikey are my go-to turtles here for a change and especially Leo has made his way into my heart, shshsj.

Rise movie:

Not gonna lie, this movie was actually the first tmnt-media I had consumed in literal years. I randomly found it on Netflix one day, about a week after its release. Looking at it I went:"Oh my god, the ninja turtles? I haven't seen these guys in ages, how are they holding up?"

I was SO confused by Raph and Leo having some sort of role (and kinda personality) change and wondered, if I remembered Raph being the "fight-first-ask-questions-later" impulsive dude and Leo as the responsible leader correctly, because it was not exactly that way in the movie. Turns out, I was, as I realized upon rewatching 2012 in September.

All in all I did enjoy the movie and its more darker theme! It reminded me of the 2012 show and honestly, it was a ride 'til the end. xD

2023/ Mutant Mayhem (no spoilers, don't worry):

*screams*

Not gonna lie, this version is definitely my second favorite one now. I already enjoyed these guys from the trailers alone, but after watching the entire movie my heart did loopings with adoring feelings.

These guys are easily one of my personal fave turtles. Silly, funny, cringe, teens, everything I need. They kinda gave me 12!turtles vibes again at some certain points in the movie, and even if it's pretty unrelated, they also remind me of my "AU kids". I love the turtles acting the way actual teens would. Seeing them do things that, upon looking back at it in the future, makes one cringe, is exactly how I feel looking back at my teenage-years.

I love these dorks so much and I hope the spin-off show and future sequel are gonna be just as good. :>

I hope I didn't forget anything. But if I did, rest assured I never watched it, qhsgshsjsj.💀

#tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #tmnt 2012 #tmnt 2003 #tmnt 2007 #tmnt 1987 #tmnt 2014 #tmnt 2016 #rottmnt #tmnt mutant mayhem #xxlea nardoxx asks

[emptymasks]

I’ve seen a lot about your thoughts on Elisabeth and Tanz der Vampire, and they’ve been really helpful getting into those musicals! But you have a huge list of other musicals that people can get into…

So I was wondering if you had any musicals you hadn’t mentioned in a while that you really like or would like to talk about??? (preferably something from your lists that has a blue heart please?)

Oh if only you knew how long the list of European musicals really is... I however have only seen 9 (if I counted right) and I have a lot more that I still need to watch. Oh also, I only put the blue hearts on any musicals that I was providing multiple links for so people could see which version I reccoment the most highly. If a musical only had one link and didn't have a blue heart it doesn't mean I didn't like it.

I've watched: Mozart das Musical, Elisabeth das Musical, Tanz der Vampire, 3 Musketiers, Mozart L'Opéra Rock, Dracula (the Graz production), Rebecca das Musical, Roméo et Juliette and Schikaneder.

If you enjoyed those two you're likely to enjoy Rebecca! It's written by the same composer/lyricist team as Elisabeth and Mozart (and same lyricist as Tanz der Vampire - though if you're listening to any German musical, original or translated, 90% of the time the lyrics will have been done by Michael Kunze that man is everywhere). The Stuttgart production has my favourite set design of any musical! Well... Actually probably. There are so many big set pieces it's insane, way more than I've seen in some Broadway and West End musicals. You can tell so much work went into it and the visual effects that I won't spoil if you don't know the plot but if you know the plot you know what I mean by the effects at the end are so good and I didn't expect them at all and I freaked out so much the first time I watched it. Jan Ammann as Maxim in the Stuttgart production is the best Maxim. No I won't take any argument. Other actors feel a bit one-dimensional to me, but the way Maxim acts at times comes from trauma and some actors and productions seem to forget that, but Jan really goes for it and his Maxim is a lot more sympathetic and I just want to give him a hug. Pia Douwes as Mrs Danvers, if you've seen her in Elisabeth what more do I need to say, she's amazing. A musical goddess. Her Danny is a bit more wild than some, but she kills it. My favourite video, which I put the blue heart next to, has understudy Christina Patten as Ich/I, but I adore her she's my favourite. She adds some spunk to Ich in act 2 and her voice is so pretty and aaaa. I just love these three actors together in these roles.

Roméo et Juliette is another favourite of mine! It's hard to choose which one to recommend, but it has to be the original 2000/2001 production because of the sweetness and chemistry and voices of Damien Sargue and Cecilia Cara as Romeo and Juliet. They're so pretty and work together so well. The only reason I say it's hard to pick is Mercutio. I adore him, but in the original production they cut out a song they had planned for him and he doesn't really do much at all? In the 2010 revival they gave him two more songs and you care about him so much more and John Eyzen plays such a good Mercutio. So I'd recommend the original but if you want to like Mercutio more, which you should he's amazing, I'd recommend watching at least clips of John's. It's an interesting musical because all productions are non-replica and also change around the order of songs, add or take away characters, all sorts. The Hungarian production is also very popular and I'm sure it's great, I just haven't' gotten around to watching it yet.

Mozart das Musical was the first non-English language musicals I watched so I have a fondness for it, but it's not my favourite. However, I do realise I have forgotten most of the songs and the few I've gone back and listened to are better than I remember.

Dracula isn't super popular and I understand why, I don't love the plot of the Dracula/Mina romance in it, however. I do love this musical because despite how I find the plot lacking, the songs are so good! At least, I love them. And the actors are all doing a great job. And it's one of the few Dracula adaptions to keep Quincy Morris so they get bonus points for that.

Mozart L'Opéra Rock and modern French musicals... This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but they're often more like pop-rock operas now. So if you're not into musicals with that style of music it might not be for you, but I still enjoyed it even though I didn't think I would because of the style of music. Mozart and Salieri's chemistry is very good, Salieri's bisexual crisis song is iconic, actually all of Salieri's songs are iconic.

Schikaneder... eh. I didn't like it that much and I didn't really like any of the songs. There's no English subtitles, but someone sent me the entire English synopsis and I watched it with a German friend so I had double the help of understanding it. Doesn't mean others might not like it, just none of the songs stood out to me and I had no desire to listen to any of them again. It's by Steven Scharwz of Wicked fame and I love Wicked, but I didn't love this.

3 Musketiers!! God it's so underrated and not spoken about within the European musical fandom that I even forget about it and literally forgot to write about it earlier in this post. It's a Dutch musical (though did also have a German production) and it's really good!? Faces you might know are Pia Douwes as Milady de Winter, Stanley Burlseon as Cardinal Richeliu (Netherlands Der Tod in Elisabeth), Henk Poort as Athos (Netherlands Phantom and Jean Valjean). The dialgoue is funny, the songs are good, some of the set pieces have no right to exist in this tiny musical?? They made this giant boat and pelt the actors with rain just for one 5 minute song and then we never see the boat again? And while I recommend the Dutch one because Dutch musicals deserve more love and it has official English subtitles!! Official ones, not fanmade! I have the DVD and it comes with English subtitles (and Dutch and German subtitles) which is so nice. The German version is also good, good cast, Pia came back and Uwe Kroger as Richeliu and omg they rearranged the songs and the German arrangement of Nicht Aus Stein is insane and amazing and frankly iconic.

That's all of the ones I have watched. Next on my list to watch are Rudolf and Notre Dame de Paris, both of which I have listened to some songs from and already love (I've listened to way too much of Notre Dame de Paris and am so in love).

I want to start organising streams where I'll host the musical either by getting the video from Youtube or my own files and anyone who wants to join can come along and watch with us, chat with us if you want or just watch there's no pressure to chat. I thought about doing weekly streams? This would also make me finally watch some of the ones I've been meaning to for ages. But I keep wondering about time zones. I'm in the UK and would want to stream at about 11pm at the latest (11pm BST/GMT+1 as we’re in daylight savings at the moment, if the streams continue past the end of October which would be wild then I’ll make a note of the time change that would be to 11pm GMT), which I know can work for other UK and Europeans, but for any Americans would be in the afternoon. So, I wondered if doing it on a weekend would be better? Then it doesn't matter if it's in the afternoon? Maybe Saturday evenings then? It would either be Saturday evenings UK time or Friday evenings UK time. What do you guys think? If people are down then I'll make a separate post with a list of what we'll be watching each week and if anything happens to me that means I can't stream one week then everything will just get pushed back a week, but I don't see that as likely to happen. And I'll only be streaming those that have English subtitles, so don't worry about not being able to understand anything.

edit: am also open to 10pm bst if others want that, im just trying to think of what time works best for everyone so sorry if 11pm is a little late for europeans, i know 10pm could be a little early for americans. also in case it sounded like these are the only musicals i will be streaming, thats not so, ive got more than just the ones mentioned on this list!

(Tagging some people who I know are or might be interested in streams to see what you think of that plan: @sirona-art @ringwraith100 @tanz-der-trash @smilingwoland @the-weird-dane @witchgaye @ami-fidele @kisstheghouls @looking-4-happiness @ladysapphire928 @sloanedestler @tinywound @persephonaae @phoenixdewinter @uwucoffee @freshbloodandgothicism )

#european musicals #mozart das musical #3 musketiers #dracula the musical #retj #romeo et juliette #mozart l'opera rock #mozart l'opéra rock #musical theatre #musicals #broadway #musicaledit #rebecca das musical #rebecca the musical #answeredasks #non english language musicals

[fandomlurker]

A Ponderous Rewatch: Prologue

You know, I didn’t think this would happen. I didn’t go into bingeing the 2020 renewal of Animaniacs with the thought “I’m going to watch this and then go and watch the original Pinky and the Brain shorts and spin-off show and do a rewatch and loose analysis on the whole franchise with special attention on queer subtext and themes”. What I initially set out to do was simply watch the renewal and see if it lived up to the show I watched pretty regularly as a kid in the 90s…or at least what I remembered of it through the haze of decades worth of time.

Pinky and the Brain was my favorite set-up on Animaniacs back in the day. Back then I probably wouldn’t even have been able to tell you why beyond “I think it’s funny and the characters are fun to watch as they screw up trying to take over the world”. Other segments were funny to me back in the day, too. Slappy the squirrel was great in that she was basically just like the classic, near-timeless Looney Toons a la Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, but as an old lady toon who’s seen it all and tries to relate to the changing world while proving that the ol’ slapstick ways still work. The Goodfeathers were entertaining despite the fact that I was a literal child and didn’t even know that it was a big ol’ spoof of Goodfellas. Hell, I’ve still never seen Goodfellas, but three pigeons trying to carry themselves like macho tough guy mafia folks while being goddamn pigeons is still funny with or without that context. And as for the Warner siblings themselves? Their skits were pretty consistently great as well. Lots of that Bugs Bunny-like energy of putting terrible folks in their place when they annoy you while coupling it with the dynamic of three child siblings who are very, very active and much too clever for the average person. It was fun!

But as I watched the 2020 reboot with its stripped-down cast now largely consisting of just the Warner siblings and Pinky and the Brain segments for the season (And I’ll be honest, some of the segments from the 90s like Katie Kaboom, Buttons and Mindy, and the Hip-Hippos are ones I’ll be happy to never have return because they were godawful even back then), it brought into focus the strength of those segments compared to most of the others from the old 90s line-up: The strong dynamic and chemistry of the relationships between the main characters of those skits. The Warner siblings are a trio of kids who, despite being truly cut from the same wacky cloth as the most beloved of Looney Toon characters, also very much tap into a very realistic depiction of sibling relationships. Sure, they get on each other’s nerves sometimes. Sure, sometimes they have disagreements on how they view a certain situation. At the end of the day, however, they care about each other more than anything else and work in such perfect sync despite differences in who they are individually.  Sure, Yakko is a talkative theater kid jackass who sasses back at the drop of a dime. Sure, Wakko is kinda quiet and spaced-out and he has the appetite of a garbage disposal. Sure, Dot is adorable and witty and loudly and proudly feminist with an oddly feral streak. But if any one of them is inconvenienced or picked on or threatened in any way by someone, even if that someone is a powerful celebrity of some sort? You bet your ass the other two will immediately back their sibling up and make their tormentor’s life a living hell for the next however long the skit lasts. They’re little gremlin children who love one another, and have a surprisingly tragic backstory that actually speaks to a lot of fans on several levels.

But, okay, the bond between the Warner siblings is great and fun. What about Pinky and the Brain? What makes their dynamic stand out?

Folks, that’s where things get a little more…interesting. To me, at least.

So, watching the beginning of the 2020 reboot got me to slowly remember the parts I loved about the Pinky and the Brain skits from Animaniacs…were actually from their spin-off show. And the things I remembered most clearly from the spin-off were the more heartwarming moments that showed how much they cared about and loved one another, despite Brain being exhausted by Pinky’s dimwitted antics at times. And for a supposedly continuity-light cartoon show, there was a surprising amount of consistency to the main duo and their motivations. There was even a handful of reoccurring side characters the audience was expected to recognize from past episodes, as well, which is a bit strange to have for a show that initially seemed to aim to be strictly episodic. I remembered the odd amount of depth there was to the series. Nothing groundbreaking, mind you, but definitely something more than the average comedy cartoon.

So after watching the first few episodes of the reboot, I took to Tumblr to see if anyone remembered the old 90s show and to see how they were reacting to the new one. In doing so, I came across this post:

“i love that ppl make jokes abt a pinky and the brain version of the destiel confession because that. already happened....... the only difference is that brain pulls pinky out of superhell instead of dying on a barn nail”

Now, look, I’ve never watched Supernatural and only know it through Tumblr cultural osmosis, and at the time we were all riding off the high of the madness that was the finale of that show and the fallout from it. But ANYWAY…

This piqued my interest because 1. I didn’t remember watching an episode of Pinky and the Brain where anything like that happened, and 2. I was already picking up strong gay vibes from the reboot only a few episodes in. So, basically, I just had to hunt down this episode to sate my curiosity and see for myself if there was subtext in this 90s cartoon that I hadn’t quite picked up on as a kid.

I found the episode and started watching it. “Wow,” I said to myself, “this is a lot gayer than I remember…” And after finishing the episode, memories came flooding back to me:

That time the Brain fell for a girl mouse that was looked and acted lot like Pinky.

All those moments where Pinky would wear drag to disguise himself as Brain’s significant other in one way or another to further their plans for that episode, and how I could never remember it being ridiculed.

That one time they accidentally had a child together via a science mishap.

The ending of the Christmas special!...

And as I sat there, dumbstruck and searching Tumblr’s tags to see how far this particular rabbit hole (mouse hole?) went, everything finally clicked in my little bisexual mind.

This was one of the big reasons as to why I loved the Pinky and the Brain skits so much above all the others on Animaniacs all those years ago when I was a kid. It was the same sort of thing that subconsciously drew me to many of the cartoons and anime and media in general I loved as a child, back before I had the proper knowledge and self-awareness to know or express it.

Looking back on my life, I’d always gravitated to and resonated the most with stories and media with queer content in text or subtext. And sure, this cartoon was/is no Sailor Moon or Revolutionary Girl Utena with explorations of gender roles and queerness. It’s no Steven Universe or She-Ra with out and proud queer characters. It’s no The Little Mermaid or The Happy Prince where the stories were made by queer authors and subtextually about queer experience.

However…

However…!

I was surprised to find how deep the gay subtext went with Pinky and the Brain. Hell, I still am. This little Warner Brothers, Looney Toons-pedigree, continuity-light show about two lab mice trying to take over the world in bizarre, hilarious ways has such a weirdly continuous, heartfelt, touching, engaging, and sometimes outrageously raunchy queer undercurrent to it. All done in the 90s! It’s kind of baffling.

This is not to say that the creators and writers of the shows deliberately set out to do this. I don’t believe that anyone involved sat down and said to themselves “I’m going to make this so fucking gay!”. Sure, the voice actors of both Pinky and the Brain have said that they played the dynamic with “the energy of an old gay couple” and they’ve said plenty of suggestive or outright not safe for work things in the character’s voices in interviews and at convention panels. I firmly believe that they’re just having fun as the characters, just as much as I believe the writers were probably just having fun and putting in the gay subtext and suggestive lines as a kind of long running joke and seeing how far they could take it.

(By the time of the Pinky and the Brain comics, however, I’m not so sure. Some of the stuff they got away with in those issues is…amazing, to say the least.)

Regardless of actual intent, I think the writers of Pinky and the Brain (both old and new), have accidentally created a sort of subtextual, yet pretty powerful love story. And you know what? I want to rewatch this story for myself and write down my thoughts as I go along. I tried something similar quite a while back with Droids, and while I kind of ran out of steam as my life got busier and never finished, I have time now for something like this.

I should also say that I’m not out here to, like, convert anyone into shipping cartoon mice together. I imagine most people see Pinky and the Brain as nothing other than very close friends, and that’s a completely valid viewpoint to have. I doubt there will ever be some sort of canonization of a gay relationship between the two, as I imagine most of the writers on the new show (and hell, on the old one) are heterosexual themselves and would view such an idea as “ruining the comedy and the dynamic of the characters” or something similar. I’ve been in the fandom game long enough to know better than to hope and expect any media to sincerely tackle queer relationships in stories that only have the subtext there, especially in comedies.

I guess I’m doing this more to explore something I loved as a child and to see if I can find just as much if not more enjoyment from it as an adult, albeit maybe for different reasons. Hell, it’s also an opportunity to peek into a kind of time capsule from the 90s regarding how far queer subtext could be pushed back then, even when heavily couched in comedy. This is just a little project I wanna do for fun in my spare time. And hey, maybe a few of you out there will have some fun reading it too, who knows?

Either way, see you sometime soon in the new year.

#Pinky and the Brain #PatB #A ''little project'' I say as I look at the 65 episode list of the spin-off series... #What have I gotten myself into?

[putris-et-mulier]

This shit is why I prefer reading scanlations (as opposed to licensed manga in a graphic novel)

Note: I talk about fangirls and fanboys not referring to gender or sexuality, but in the social structure way of being in a geeky subculture split into two subcultures of its own: consumerist geeks (fanboys) and creative geeks (fangirls)

Honestly, and this is super overdramatic, but I kind of feel loved when I read scanlations. Whether it's funny things like this to cover up unavoidable things that the licensed version could easily get around or a word is misspelled it makes me appreciate the work people have put into it and how proud I am to be part of that tradition.

One page takes multiple people working together just to share something they already have with other fans and depending on the fandom also made it mandatory for work like this to be done by people of different races regions of the country. The Internet was a huge boon because before that it was strictly zines and people in your neighborhood but it also added an element of people from different countries also being required to interact.. It's a lot easier now but in the 90s fangirls, much like our foremothers, somehow worked as a hive mind. No matter who you were or what languages you spoke you could contribute. (Six And I would argue you still can.) I was so lucky to near different Asian communities as well as like a lot of pop culture from Asia. When we were able to go, and had money, we would go and pick up specific titles, if possible, of things the translators wanted or else just get anything that seems the most unfamiliar. It could become a prized jewel of an OTP.

I think it's harder to feel like a community now because the "regular" fans who can't produce art or fiction or translations or brilliant meta have a lot less of a role. They are who kept the community tight and in contact with each other while those of us who could would lose a couple days because we were scanning every single page of a stack of graphic novels or magazines. I knew that if I ever needed to know or find anything I could just shout it out into the fangirl void and I would get an immediate answer because the "regular" fans were librarians on speed. That's how I met one of my closest friends, cosmic, the one I do the podcast and everything with. One of us was very loud and had a platform while the other lurked everywhere and saved everything. When I found out years later that she had seen something I had made before we met and she liked it was amazing. I wasn't upset that other people had taken it and put it on other websites or that she had taken it (and probably immediately delete it, such a jerk) I was really honored. 

It always breaks my heart when someone writes in about the podcast or something else and says that they wish they could have friends with a relationship like ours, not just because we are close but because we like different things and have different opinions and not only still get along, we respect each other's opinion and genuinely listen to each other even if we both know we will never let the other person have the last word. I've never met cosmic in person but I've known her for almost half my life exactly but I love her, she's my sister, and we wouldn't have met if the two of us were in fandom now because of the strict class differences.

The "regular" people who surfed around saving pictures and reading over any public conversation knew everything and if they didn't know they knew someone who did. Don't get me wrong, those people who didn't talk to anyone, whether to be informative or just be friendly, were despised lurkers.

The "regular" jobs are easier now but the etiquette laws are a lot more strict. It was a lot simpler when it was all just illegal and "credit to whoever made this" was widely accepted. Mostly because someone would immediately tell everyone who the creator was and people were genuinely interested in the answer because seeing anything new meant that there was something going on somewhere that you aunt and there could be things you have seen yet. It was also a lot easier to excommunicate people from the community who did things like steal fanart/fic because everyone had one IP address.

Everyone's biggest concern was sharing source material with each other, I see fans now who make gifs who are adamant about people not using them or if they do use them to credit them even if they put a watermark on it and I… That perplexes me.

Gifs were my shit, I did them for years and I started back when you did it by taking a screen cap of every frame but you would have to rewind after taking one cap and go back to hope you can identify the next one. It's because videos were impossible for so many people to view but gifs were something everyone could load at least one of if they had a few hours. It was imperative to the fandoms that connected overseas or through a different language like anime and manga fandoms. I would put hours and hours and so many fucking hours into making these things because I was an American with a good Internet connection and parents who hadn't yet found out the dangers™ of the World Wide Web™. I would lovingly make gifs of my OTPs and then begrudgingly make gifs of my nOTPs of things I was even an anti-fan of (usually a competing boy band fandom) because I had the ability to do it and there were tasteless bitches out there who couldn't and might not be able to see it unless I did it and I did this for them and I did because they were my sisters.

Also it made a fandom look bad if the anti-fandom had them out before you.

So, just like sisters.

It's so much easier to make gifs now and the majority of people have the ability to watch the original videos so people making gifs are doing the ones that they love to share with other people that also love them. But that's it? You don't want people to save them and post them as many places as possible so everyone can see what you love? Is that love? It sounds like an abusive relationship, like, "your family is allowed to come over if I know about it in advance but you can't go out with your girl friends anymore" kind of thing.

I get that a majority of fandom still only follows things through gifs so the work is still important but it's so easy to do now and unless you are in a rare fandom someone else is probably already making it. That's why I stopped; but that's another holdover I have from old fandom culture because if I made a gif of something and then someone else did it was a huge insult, and insult I would not make. 

Fanart/fic is different so although my being old school makes me less sympathetic to people who don't watermark (and people who cut off watermarks were the scum of the earth) it's also less important than the issue that corporations that have been stealing fanart/fic. Fanart/fic being published, putting fan works under their licenses, it's the thing is a community should be at least concerned about. That goes for people whose fanart is shown on TV or fan fiction is read on TV or a podcast. Fangirls from my era have literally put together legal teams to fight this. I'm proud that a lot of us have used our grown-up skills to still participate in fandom and aren't ashamed of their age.

But gifs? The tiny moving picture you made purely for self-indulgence makes you mad? I get that we came up in different fan cultures but I saw a gif on this website that I had made a decade ago on servers that no longer exist and I cried.

I had made something that I loved and not only did other people love it enough to keep it this whole time but it was thing that people who weren't even born when I made it are enjoying. They are looking at the same little pixels as their foremothers did having the same experience as generations of fans from around the world.

I sound like a fucking hippie but I swear to God I was born in the 80s and I have an obscene amount of Terminator trivia to prove it.

One of our foremothers, who in respect will remain nameless, literally invented slash as the Western genre and she didn't want anyone to know who she was. That seems a little extreme to me but that was the generation before me and so I suppose my generation probably seems out of date.

Regardless of my communist attitude I would be pretty disgruntled doing that job in this current time because you are required to do a great and unique job or no one will even notice what you made. Even if you have a huge talent for it seeing anyone insult you or just not be thankful would be infuriating.

I can also sympathize with the "regular" fans now who feel like they don't have a place. I've had a lot of people tell me that they feel guilty or they are embarrassed that they can't make anything, they can only share it, and I've also had people tell me that they wanted to get into a fandom but because they couldn't make anything they didn't bother because no one cares about them. They didn't watch movies or read books or comic books or listen to music that they may have come to really love and would play an important role in their life. They stick to their wheelhouse and their wheelhouse is what society says people that look or live a certain way determines what the you are allowed to consume.

If that isn't obvious I'll put it simply: diversity becomes more and more scarce this way. People always start with what they are expected to enjoy. Everyone comes into their hobbies and interests starting with what they've been given, already we start out with segregated media/merchandise depending on any minority or "demographic" but people coming into fandom are now coming in already segregated, even amongst people geographically similar to them. The culture of fandom, at least girl fandom, depended on people of different kinds to work together. Diversity is the lifeblood of a subculture like this/these.

The "real" fandom, the part of fandom that has kept the culture going since even the 1700s going, are the ones wasting their time with this because they genuinely love it, if you found something you love that much the fandom becomes your family. Kind of like Drag… Which makes sense because it's art based off of pre-existing work. We form a relatively diverse (based on subcultures) patriarchal communities with people who become closer to us than family, and we half ironically use matriarchal terms and even feminine pronouns universally. Straight dudes in our community were flattered when people assumed they were girls. If a straight dude could pass as a girl on a message board he would get all of the straight girl ass.

I'm not saying that's great or isn't incredibly problematic, I'm just saying… What am I saying? I guess I'm saying that smart straight guys not  afraid of masculinity's fragility enough to be effeminate always have stacks of girlfriends. Guys that try that now and fail call it being "friendzoned."

Maybe that's why I love straight guys, I knew all the greatest ones because they were the guys that got into our communities. They were all annoying perverted assholes but they have been some of the best people I've ever known. And they were smart enough to know how to socialize with women naturally enough to understand their relaxed social cues and then they know what the flirting language is amongst general straight women and they use the girls own language to seduce them. That's a good strategy and also safer because you both will have the same expectations of how to broadcast what you are thinking or going to do. And you know how people think that people with foreign accents sound sexy? It's like that but instead of the tone of your voice you could just use a regionless DVD player and some anime.

Straight girls now just have… A bunch of grandmothers around them (you know, people that you don't really want to touch and won't stop telling you what to do) just going on and on about how disappointed they are in you but refusing to even attempt to speak your language so you understand just enough to know you want to get out of the room as quickly as possible and if they suddenly died it would clearly be God's will.

#Christy creare