#also I love canon wales canon wales is very cute but my Tristan was a rugby playing beefcake not some twink

[breitzbachbea]

Ohh how about a director's commentary on Sophie's character :o

OHHHHHH THAT'S A GOOD ONE LET'S TALK ABOUT THE BEST GIRL

Send me a ⭐ for a director’s commentary on a story/section of a story/line I wrote

I think I made most of my Hetalia OCs, if not all, back in 2013 when I first got into the show. I've had a certain fondness for England (& FrUK) back then and was a big fan of the that one fanon version of Scotland, by an artist called repoko, I believe? That still meant, back then, there were three open opportunities for OCs from the British Isles, so I made a Wales, Northern Ireland and Ireland. Which I will use in my writing until the day I die, thank you very much, the canon versions change nothing. I was here first, motherfucker.

Either way - I haven't written anything set in the Hetaverse with them in years and I would approach them differently nowadays as well. In regards to how they're portrayed in LFLS: The two Irelands would have a much more fraught relationship with each other and Northern Ireland would be far more disillusioned with the world. I like one excellent interpretation by @oumaheroes on the uk bros and I'd broadly say that my OCs would work the same way in the Hetaverse. I also wouldn't use the same name in the Hetaverse as I do in LFLS; again, I named them when I was far younger knew far less about the world and the history of Ireland. I like the name Liam for Ireland and Ava for Northern Ireland. Although Orla would also be a nice option.

One more funfact before the rest goes under the cut: Soph's very weird hairstyle (a bob with bangs but a chinlong streak of hair in the middle, which she pins behind her hair) comes from my inability to draw 😆 I had the little art booklet that came with a special edition of Vol. 5 and I absolutely adored the way France's hair was drawn in it. However, I wasn't good at drawing it. So once I had drawn Soph and realized I had drawn a drastically different hairstyle than I wanted ... I didn't backpedal like "Oh, I can't draw it yet, but no, it is supposed to look like this!". I simply went "Guess that's her hair now" and ran with it. Luckily, in "Irish Problems" I had the chance to give it an in-story explanation.

Here's by the way the kind of hairstyle I was aiming for:

Sadly, I can't provide well what I achieved instead since I have no fotos of Soph in left profile saved, but let's say I aimed for the sky and shot myself in the foot.

Now, about Sophie O'Connel in Like Father Like Son:

Her character was introduced into Irish Problems more like an afterthought than a central pillar of the story. In my Hetaverse writing, the two Irelands didn't get along very well, but I knew I had to change this if I was to write them as siblings. (Or maybe Republicanism had gotten the best of me by then, who knows. I'm just kidding.) Paddy was the person through which recent Irish history with the Troubles was viewed, at least in theory. Sophie did retain some ties to Northern Ireland, with her brother having bought/rented her sheep and the land in Northern Ireland and she was always spoiled by the Scottish, Gavin and his father William in particular. Aside from this though, Sophie is very little informed by the history of Northern Ireland.

Part of the reason may also be that I made the non-sensical choice back then to split Nothern Ireland and Ulster into two different characters. Hannah, Gavin's girlfriend, is that Ulster OC and originally from Belfast. If I did intend to do more parallels between history and LFLS, I could use these two to represent two different strains of people with different histories and realities in Northern Ireland, though ... Not that it matters much, since Like Father Like Son tries to stay faithful to the characterisation of Hetalia and I love to be inspired by history, but there are no allegories to be made.

Thusly, Sophie is primarily a very lonely teenager, who's trying to juggle her normal life with the burden of her patchwork family's way of life. A lot of the characters in Irish Problems and the first half of Italian Affairs lack, if not character, at least narrative purpose. So Soph's primary function is to explore the nature of grief and loneliness. Slowly, as I manage to establish the world around her in her POV chapters, it also becomes a story about growing up. I always joke that Soph's subplot is the YA portion of the book, but it's the truth. While she is of course not singular in her theme of grief or family, Sophie is outside of the political framework of LFLS for most of it. The focus is on herself, the comparedly smaller stakes of teenagehood and young adult life. This also means she gets to experience and express her emotions in a different manner that's probably more akin to how the reader does. I think that is part why Soph's chapters tend to resonate so well with some people; her despair does not need to be extrapolated. She doesn't have a fight or flight instinct kick in that postpones it. She wallows in her powerlessness, because it has no dire consequences for her.

Aside from all of that, it is a lot of fun to write Sophie and see where the story will take her. While I don't think her journey of finding her place in the world will necessarily facilitate positive character growth with her surroundings, it'll be interesting nonetheless. She's much like her brother, loud, boisterous and equipped with a good sense of humour and a mischievious streak. Plus, she knows what she's invested in and is willing to work for it - You don't know how hyped I am to write more Soph farmwork. To let her be an even more pragmatic person than her brother suits her, I think. The same Irish fighting spirit, but not as worn out as the lads around her are.

#also I love canon wales canon wales is very cute but my Tristan was a rugby playing beefcake not some twink #also I am a bit sad all the island lads are ... lads :( Not even one woman among them #which is why I also always adored Soph way back when I still roleplayed hetalia with a friend and wrote stories set in the hetaverse #she was a gal amongst rowdy guys and she definitely tried to fit in with her brothers and be one of the boys #I hope you liked this! #Writing it did make me realize that Soph really doesn't get to be her own person a lot despite having a ton of personality #It'll be fun to figure out her differences with her brother especially once I do more research #beareplies #kitaychan #storie nostre #soph