#and there are stories to be written about other characters becoming teachers

[ilikethisacompletelynormalamount]

Since Andrew is taking some well deserved time away from the public at the moment, let's revisit (or visit for the first time, if you're new here) this stunning photoshoot from Mr. Porter, October 2019, when he was doing press for Modern Love and his Ripley casting had just been announced (yes, it's taken that long for it to come out).

Mr Andrew Scott’s big brown eyes are open wide in amused disbelief. “That was not an Irish accent,” he says in his musical Irish brogue. “That was a West Country accent.” How embarrassing for an interviewer who thought to connect with her subject by lightly mocking Mr Ed Sheeran’s ­– again – not-Irish accent in his cameo in Mr Scott’s episode of Amazon’s upcoming anthology series, Modern Love. Panic sets in. “It’s all right,” he says, soothingly. “It’s all right. Accents are such funny things.”

You know what else is a funny thing? Sitting with Fleabag’s “hot priest” – 2019’s most unexpected sex symbol – in a wine bar in Bermondsey, southeast London, talking about vulnerability, romcoms and love stories. Or, to take another angle: sitting across the table from the deranged Jim Moriarty and letting him pick out a rosé. That tickles, too. Having Hamlet express the need for a mini-break in, he doesn’t know, Copenhagen? Amsterdam, maybe? Surreal.

But actually, Mr Scott, who is wearing what can only be described as a modified sweatsuit (shorts and a zip-up sweatshirt, no shirt beneath) after our photoshoot isn’t funny funny. No, Mr Scott is serious: reserved and contemplative, but with the energy of a theatre nerd who, every once in a while, rests his head in his hands, cupping his fingers around his eyes to form blinkers while he thinks about a question you’ve just asked. In this quiet wine bar. He’s not an evil murderer, an agent of a shadowy organisation, or an overly excited (wink) cleric. He’s just a nice guy who sympathises about the difficulty of parsing the subtleties of the many accents in the British Commonwealth (and beyond).

Mr Scott is still hot off his run in Fleabag, even though the show ran from March to April of this year. A few weeks ago, he received a GQ Men of the Year Award, and just a few weeks after that, was in Los Angeles at the Emmy Awards where Fleabag cleaned up, winning three awards.

Of course, this is not Mr Scott’s big break. He’s been in the business since moving from Dublin to London 20 years ago to pursue acting. His dad worked in employment, helping young people find the right careers and his mother was an art teacher. “They were definitely into following your passion and doing that for the rest of your life,” he says. “Rather than, ‘You should be a lawyer,’ or whatever the fuck.”

And this has been a year for Mr Scott’s passions. Aside from Fleabag, and an episode of Black Mirror that landed on Netflix this June, he’s making a poignant appearance in the aforementioned _Modern Love,_­ which will drop all at once on 18 October. A series of discreet episodes, each one features its own starry cast (Mr Dev Patel, Mr John Slattery, Ms Tina Fey, Ms Anne Hathaway and, of course, Mr Ed Sheeran, among others), based on the much-loved New York Times column from which it takes its name. Mr Scott’s episode, which co-stars Ms Olivia Cooke and Mr Brandon Kyle Goodman, is loosely based on an early column written by the sex-and-relationships writer Mr Dan Savage about the unusual experience he and his partner had with adoption. “It’s just a really sweet little story. It’s not about a romantic relationship,” he says, (many Modern Love entries are not). “It’s simply about the relationships between people.”

He’s also currently filming in Cardiff for the BBC TV series of His Dark Materials. And maybe there’s a Marvel movie in his future? “Oh, fuck. Completely false,” he says. “Someone said, ‘Are you going to be in a thing?’ I said, ‘No,’ and I said, ‘There have been discussions.’ And it’s like ‘Andrew Scott has been in discussions.’”

That’s what happens when suddenly everyone wants you – to use Twitter parlance – to run them over with your car. The Priest, unlike his other characters, was a sex symbol, one that wears the hell (forgive me, Father) out of a cassock. But who could be surprised that Mr Scott turned a priest into the “Hot Priest” simply by saying “kneel”? (If you don’t know what that means, stop reading now, watch the show, come back.) In fact, he has been making words positively drip with meaning for nearly a decade.

Consider Moriarty, the insane criminal puppet master Mr Scott played for six years across four seasons of the BBC’s Sherlock, opposite Mr Benedict Cumberbatch in the titular role. This particular Moriarty – Holmes’ famous nemesis, who has also been played by Messrs Orson Welles, John Huston and Sir Laurence Olivier – is indelible and utterly idiosyncratic. “If you’re going to do it, I don’t see there’s any point in doing it without putting your own stamp on it. I never look at any previous incarnations,” says Mr Scott. The result of this thinking – in Sherlock, at least – was a Moriarty who is all sing-song eeriness, molten physicality, and questionable cutaway collars. “He was quite theatrical; he was grotesque, sort of the archetypal villain,” he says. Archetypal, indeed: the role propelled him into the world of maniacal superfandom. He might not have received a dedicated stan nomenclature like his co-star (ahem, “Cumberbitches”), but the role made Mr Scott a household name.

Of course, establishing yourself as adept at playing evil incarnate probably leads to people wanting to cast you in more Moriarty-like roles. “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yep, yeah,” he says, six times. “Yeah, exactly right,” (one more). “I turned down a lot. The shadow of that character took over for a little while.”  The craze got to be so tiresome that he asked the interviewer for a recent profile in The Guardian not to ask him about Moriarty at all (two years after he last appeared in the series). But now he sees a bigger picture, understands how being the object of abject obsession can be a good thing. “I think to answer your questions,” he says, tapping his fingers on the table, “it’s been really good fun.”

Mr Scott demurs when asked what it’s like to be the quencher of many thirsts on the internet. “People don’t say that to me. People don’t say, ‘Oh my God...” He shakes his head and trails off, perhaps in horror of what fans could be saying to him. It’s a little hard to believe that he wouldn’t be mobbed as he walks down the street. After all, one major British publication declared that Fleabag and the Priest were the only couple worth talking or tweeting about this year. (We guess Meghan and Harry, and Kim and Kanye can relax.)

“If I’m honest, it’s only really just starting to dawn on me, the global effect the show has had. People like a bit of transgression, they just do.” Any follower of his career, though, understands that it’s more than just good writing that makes him so very watchable (though good writing, is, politely, what he puts it down to). His chemistry is electric with Ms Phoebe Waller-Bridge, as it was electric with Mr Cumberbatch, and palpable even if you weren’t lucky enough to catch his rendition of Hamlet and – like this interviewer – had to watch a clip on YouTube.

Mr Scott’s character, Tobin, in Modern Love is the most subdued we might ever see him. There’s very little shouting, and none of the wide-eyed glaring that has defined his roles to date. Instead, he plays sweetly, quietly off a tiny baby, and tells goodnight stories to an adorable little girl. Perhaps this is a harbinger of softer roles to come. “I’d love to be in a romcom,” he says. “I love watching people fall in love, and how mad it is.” And yet: it was just announced that he will be playing Tom Ripley in a new adaptation of The Talented Mr Ripley. So much for avoiding the nutters.

“What always amazes me is how innocent we are as human beings,” he says, sidestepping yet another probing question about being so irresistible right now. “We are very easily manipulated by stories. If someone puts scary music behind someone and they’re told this person’s eyes are absolutely terrifying, you go: ‘Oh my God, that person is scary, and his eyes totally freak me out.’”

“But then,” he continues, “[you’re told] ‘the priest is hot, wait till you see him’. And then you look at his eyes in a very different way and it’s the manipulation of the storytelling. It literally changes your character.” Hmmm.

“The success is the writing,” he tries, again, to argue. But it’s hard to be convinced that an actor who’s hopped from one iconic character to another is simply lucky with writing. He sees he’s not getting anywhere and changes tack. “Acting is just a way of experimenting with different parts of myself. Vulnerability is something I’m really, really interested in. I think vulnerability is at the centre of every character I’ve ever played even if they don’t appear or present as vulnerable.”

Throughout this conversation, his eyes have flicked around the bar, and he pauses from time to time to comment on the other patrons. At one point, a woman is coughing so vehemently, he stops mid-sentence to remark, humorously, on whether she might be dying. Now, he spots something on the bar. “Oh my God, she’s reading Brené Brown.” We both turn to stare at the book.

“She writes a lot about vulnerability,” he explains, excited. “[Being vulnerable] is how you get ahead. I really, really strongly believe that. [Vulnerability is] strong, it’s really strong.”

Perhaps this is the secret we’ve been trying to distil about his appeal: Mr Scott uses vulnerability to bring us all into a space of fear or sadness or lust or anger with him so that every character he plays – whether it’s the hottest priest in London, a gay man in Brooklyn trying to become a father, or a murderous villain – thrums with the heartbreak that comes with being human.

“The more I work,” he continues, “the more I just think every story is in some way concerned with love – or the lack of it.” He smiles an earnest little smile and we both know this is the place to stop. “That’s the way life is,” he says. “It’s so fast and furious.”

https://www.mrporter.com/en-hk/journal/fashion/the-softer-side-of-mr-andrew-scott-1052122

#andrew scott #fleabag #modern love #ripley #netflix ripley #mr porter #blast from the past

[wellnoe]

xavier’s shouldn’t be a big school bc i hate it

#like. here's the thing. in my (limited) experience. #the school stuff when it gets too big #starts to feel wildly disconnected from all the other x-stuff #in a way that i dislike #and part of this #to me. #is that when the school stuff gets too big #you start bringing in adults as teachers who are not teachers #like there are x-characters who are capital T teachers #and there are stories to be written about other characters becoming teachers #but if the school gets too big and the cast of administration is forced to expand too much #then those characters #who are still appearing in other stories! #don't actually have a relationship to the school or students that matters or changes them #bc their entire other deal is concentrated elsewhere and they only appear as teachers bc you need SOMEONE to teach a class #except you don't! bc as much as 'xavier's is a school' for a long time that was a really small and concentrated thing #also i feel like. introducing waves and waves of students to be discarded each time somebody decides the x-men should be a school again #is annoying #lastly! i feel like there are interesting things about the place of the x-men w/in marvel's society #like the x-men have historically fought in some sense to conform to what is expected of them #in order to comfort wider society and assure them they are good #simultaneously! #the x-men (and the institute) are not really a part of that society #and i think making the school too big too normal too recognizable as a school unbalances that tension a bit #w.me

[bettsfic]

writing cheats

i know i’ve probably written about these all individually but i’m putting them together in one post. these are writing tricks that are extremely cheap and dirty; when you use them it feels like cheating and honestly by posting them i’m probably exposing all the easy moves in my own work, but more than a writer i am a teacher, so here you go, some writing cheats that have never steered me wrong.

quick character creation

what’s really annoying is when you have two characters sitting at a restaurant or something and the server has to come by. to what degree do you describe the server so that it’s clear they’re just a background character but that they’re not just a faceless form, so that the world has texture without taking up too much space on the page? rule of three, babeyyy: two normal things and a weird one.

she had pale skin and blue eyes but her hair was dyed black like a 2010 emo kid.

he was tall and broad, and he wore a sweatshirt with an embroidered teddy bear on it.

the woman stood there comparing the prices of toilet paper. she had a short angled bob and carried a keychain the length of a trout.

why does it work? it gives the reader something to hang onto, a brief observation that shows the world exists around your narrator. it also works when introducing main characters, but there’s so much action going on that you can’t take time to write a rich long paragraph about them. all you need is a little hook.

quick setting creation

i used to TOIL over descriptive paragraphs. for years i was like, description is my weakness, i must become better at developing imagery. i believed this because a famous writer once projected a paragraph i had written onto a screen and asked my cohort, “count how many images are crafted in this paragraph.” there were none. none! my friends were sitting there like, “we are TRYING” but they couldn’t find any.

i would say that after years of studying imagery development at the sentence level, i am, perhaps, competent at it, but what was more helpful was for me to shrug and tell myself, “i’m just not a writer who does that.”

anyway. my cheat is thus: 

there’s not much you can assume about your audience. the audience is not a homogenous whole. but your ideal audience is something you can guess at, and that means you can play around with their existing knowledge and expectations. 

if you say your characters are in a tacky shit-on-the-walls restaurant, if your ideal reader is an american who went to restaurants during the maximalist era of franchise design, they will conjure their nearest memory of one of those places. and for those readers who aren’t familiar with it, they’ll use other context clues to conjure that space. the point is, you don’t have to list every single stupid license plate nailed to the wall. you can leave it as one detail of one sentence and let your reader extrapolate from there.

if i say the dentist’s office looked like a gutted 90s taco bell, maybe no ideal audience would have ever seen a place like that, but a lot of people can mentally conjure a dentist’s office and a 90s taco bell and overlay them together to create a weird and fun image.

you can go even simpler than that: a bathroom the size of an airplane lavatory. a tiny studio apartment with a hotplate instead of a stove. a mansion with a winding stairwell. the point is that you want to define the size of the space and its general vibes.

in some ways detailed description can be overrated, because your reader conjures images even in absence of them on the page. and for those readers who can’t mentally conjure images, it doesn’t matter anyway; they take you at your word. the trick is to figure out what details are unexpected, relevant to understanding the story and its characters, and those are the things that you add in.

one other note: after working with hundreds of writers on drafting, for *most* of us it’s difficult to develop images and establish setting in a first draft. it’s nearly always something to be saved for a second or later draft. i think it’s because while we’re writing we tend to put character and action first.

nail the landing

there’s a joke i heard once from a writer i really admire: “you know it’s literary fiction if the story ends with a character looking at a body of water.”

and god it’s so painfully sad and true how easy it is to nail the landing of a given story by ending on a totally irrelevant piece of imagery. the final beat of a story followed by your character looking up at the sky and seeing a flock of birds in the shape of a V flying past. or maybe they’re sitting in their car and they count the rings of a nearby church bell. or maybe they watch an elderly couple walk down the sidewalk hand-in-hand. i don’t know!! when in doubt shove an observation, an image, whatever, something neutral at the end and it’ll sound profound. 

(this cheat is the only one that can really bite you in the ass because if the image is too irrelevant you risk tonal incongruity. for use only in the most desperate of times.)

sentence fragments

when writers ask me how to punch up their writing or start developing their own style, my go-to advice is to give up the idea of a complete sentence. fuck noun-verb-object. if you have a series of character actions, knock off the sentence subjects like in script action. if the clause at the end of your sentence is particularly meaningful, don’t separate it with a comma but a period and make it its own thing. if your character is going through something particularly stressful or heinous, that bitch is not thinking in complete thoughts so you don’t have to convey them that way. make punctuation bend to your will!!

rhetorical moves

this one opened a lot of doors for me stylistically. remember that famous writer who called me out on my lack of imagery? i always thought his prose was beautiful, that he’s one of the best living prose writers, etc. once i learned more about rhetoric though, i realized he just employed it a lot. 

usually when we talk about beautiful sentences it means a sentence that uses rhetorical devices. the greeks were like, you know what, when we give speeches there are certain ways to phrase things that make the audience go nuts. let’s identify what those things are and give them names so we can use them intentionally and convince people of our opinions.

i love shakespeare, i really do, but one of the big reasons he’s still a household name today and his plays are still performed is because every sentence of every goddamn play utilizes a rhetorical device. the audience is hard-wired to vibrate at the sound and cadence of his writing, like finding the spot on a dog that makes their foot thump. for five hundred years, william shakespeare has been scritching that spot for us.

i have no idea why, cognitively, rhetorical devices are so effective. i’m no rhetorician. all i know is that well-deployed anaphora makes a reader want to throw their panties on stage. my intro to rhetorical devices was the wonderful book the elements of eloquence by mark forsyth, a surprisingly fun read! hopefully that will open some doors for you the way it did for me. 

the downside to this is that once you know rhetorical devices, it’s like learning how the sausage is made. on one hand, as a writer, you’ll have a lot stronger grasp of style, but as a reader good prose loses some of its magic.  

pacing it out

many writers, myself included, rely on the tried and true “he bit the inside of his cheek” or other some such random action to help pace out dialogue. one time my thesis advisor sat me down and said “you’ve got to take all of those out.”

“all of them?” i said.

“all of them,” she said.

i thought, but that will weaken the text! it didn’t. once i cut what i came to call cheek-biter sentences i never went back. and now when i edit for other people i’m like, look i know where you’re coming from but just cut all these out and see how the scene stands. if it doesn’t feel right you can put some back in. a lot of times when you’re drafting you put those in the way some people say “um.” they’re just sentences you jot while you’re thinking of what the other character says, so from a writing perspective it seems like you’re pacing, but readers don’t read it that way. they just want to get to the next line of dialogue.

but sometimes you really do need to pace out a scene and i think there are other ways to do that that don’t rely on banal physical movements, such as:

interiority: a sentence or paragraph of relevant cognition, bonus points if you weave in background context. good interiority defines the voice of your writing.

observations: i know i just said description is overrated but idk sometimes you just need a character to note the back and forth clacking of one of those desk ball toy things.

character texture: maybe your character notes something about the person they’re talking to. a wilted pocket square. a mole that looks like it needs looked at by a dermatologist. a scar on their forehead. some detail that deepens or complicates our understanding of a character.

narratorial consciousness and access

this one is less a cheat and more a problematic opinion i have that doesn’t win me any popularity in writing circles.

i believe that if you’re writing in first person or close third or any narration which is dedicated to the mind of one character, you are only ever obligated to convey the experience of that character’s consciousness. and nothing else.

by that i mean, if your point of view character is unobservant? then they’re not going to even notice the flight attendant is missing one of their canine teeth. if your pov character is focused and obsessive, they’re going to think lavish, detailed paragraphs about that which they’re obsessed with and have no acknowledgement of the rest of the world. if your pov character has no understanding of time, does your story even need to be linear?

defining the scope of a narrator’s cognition early on can give you parameters in which to work. even if you don’t consciously do this, you still do it. if you write in third person limited present tense without really thinking about it, that’s your scope. i’m just pointing out you can choose to do it differently. you get to define your narrator. 

whenever we talk about narration we also talk about information access and the order of information being revealed/conveyed. writing must always be in order; even if you’re writing multiple concurring things, it still has to be rendered on the page in order one after the next, because the human mind can’t read two sentences over top of one another. 

if we’re restricted to the mind of a character, that means we’re also restricted by their knowledge and experiences, and this can be used to your benefit. i don’t want to take too much space for this but i do talk more about the relationship between narration and reality here.

in short, you the writer get to choose 

what the reader knows,

in what order they know it, and

its relationship to the presumed real events of the story, which develops the (un)reliability of your narrator

okay going to cut this off now before i go on more rants about narrative scope. i hope you found this helpful and go on to put some of these nasty lifehacks in your own writing!!

#writing advice

[dropthedemiurge]

Love for Love's Sake | Messages you didn't notice #6 | Sunbae Theory

I wanted to add this to my previous post about other messages and their translation and theories (here) but it was becoming too long, so I'm posting it separetely.

Guys, I kept thinking about the fact that we never got to learn more about the meaning of these "random" messages. And then I realized I was overthinking it too much.

ALL THESE MESSAGES WERE ACTUALLY FROM MYUNGHA'S SUNBAE WHO MISSED HIM IN REAL LIFE!!!

In the final episode there's a moment when the last message shows up, and the author is finally written.

"I hope that place sparks your hope. From sunbae."

After we learn Myungha's full backstory, we now know "that place" means "afterlife". And if you look back on all the messages it MAKES SENSE, if you think that these are messages that are still coming on Myungha's phone from a friend – or, if we consider that everything is happening in Myungha's head, these are the thoughts about him by someone else.

Sunbae missed Myungha who was suddenly gone from life.

[In May, there is Children's Day, Parents' Day, there is even Teacher's Day but there is no Day when I can meet you] [I was passing by and saw a bracelet that you used to wear long time ago. It reminded me of you. I wonder if you still wear that bracelet.] [I broke a vase that was a gift from you. Can it be repaired?] [I thought only you dressed like that but others do too. I knew it wasn't you but I still followed. But why would you be dressed like that] (last sent messages) [I miss you. If only I could go there…] [Everything depends on what you'll do. Get yourself together.] [I hope that place sparks your hope. From sunbae.]

Tell me if these messages don't look like they were written by someone mourning the loss of a dear person. Someone who might be still sending messages to the number that will never reply anymore (and Myungha never did!). A chat that has become a diary of memories and longing, filled with a ghost of someone whose specific details you keep noticing in your everyday life. There is no Day when they can meet anymore. If only he could see him again...

I'm not sure about the vase but Myungha wore a bracelet in the beginning of the story (that was the first detail we notice about him tbh when he looks through the novel draft in the very first scene).

Someone else on Tumblr has expressed a theory that sunbae is a friend (or someone who loved Myungha) who decided to commemorate his friend in a written novel because they wanted to give him a happy life instead of a miserable one Myungha lived in real life.

I am so on board with this theory, (even though I like the grim reaper/deity theory or Myungha creating the world for himself), I think sunbae did exist in real life. And he obviously cared about Myungha, whether his love was to teach him a harsh lesson or to commemorate him in a meaningful story. After all, isn't this what all authors do to their characters? They make them go through conflicts and breaking points in order to overcome it all and finally find a happy ending.

Maybe sunbae has regretted that Myungha was never able to accept the love that others wanted to give him so he wrote the story to change that. Maybe sunbae is actually Yeowoon who wanted to put Myungha in his shoes and teach him how to love and be loved – actually, remember young Yeowoon, who lost Myungha due to his decision to erase himself from the game, who cried and picked up a pen to bring him back, starting a mission to make Myungha happy.

Maybe this novel is a desperate attempt to make peace and hope that someone you lost could be still loved at last.

No matter what, Sunbae was surely grieving Myungha.

#haha joke on me i made myself teary writing this #love for love's sake comments #love for love's sake meta #love for love's sake #dropthemeta #kbl #korean bl #bl drama #bl series #tw suicide #tw death

[burst-of-iridescent]

Hey does everyone remember when Aang physically hurt Katara via burning her due to his own negligence with fire because he didn't listen at all to her concerns? But all of Katara's concerns were her being worried for him getting hurt and not herself, and then he hurts her badly, this never gets addressed again in the show, but I remember this vividly.

i actually like this scene on its own.

aang burning katara is a good character building moment because it's a brutal reminder of his own capacity for destruction. he needs to understand that his reckless actions can have horrific repercussions in order to fully realize the weight of his responsibility as both a firebender and the avatar, and it makes the moment where he uses zhao's recklessness against him more impactful. it also sets up the "water = life, fire = death" dichotomy that's part of katara's arc on viewing the world in binaries, which will later be broken down in book 3.

but ultimately the incident is still of greater significance to aang, and he's the one to bring it up in the guru and western air temple episodes, telling both guru pathik and zuko about his guilt over burning katara and his refusal to firebend ever again. this experience is also what leads him to accept zuko as his firebending teacher, and then finally forgive himself when he learns the true meaning of firebending. for the most part, it's a well-sustained arc and one of the few narratives aang has that is actually brought to completion.

do i wish that katara and aang had actually talked about his actions beyond this episode? yes. do i wish the aftermath had been focused a little more on katara instead of showcasing the impact of her physical injuries mostly through aang's continued self-flagellation? yes. but as a one-off incident contained to a single episode, i don't mind it.

what i do mind, however, is that this is not the last time the show is going to use katara as a lynchpin for aang's character development.

in the book 2 premiere, katara is turned into a pawn to propel aang into the avatar state. in the guru, her imprisonment is the reason that aang chooses to go back to ba sing se instead of unlocking his chakras. that is three separate times now that katara has been damselled in order to facilitate key turning points in aang's narrative, but not once does the same apply in reverse. there is never a moment where aang is the only one put in danger solely to drive katara's arc, the way she is in his. the closest we get is katara bringing aang back to life, but even then his death is still the result of his own choices and more integral to his storyline than hers.

now, compare this to the final agni kai.

at first glance, katara being put in danger just to complete zuko's redemption looks like the same tired trope, and had the scene ended at his sacrifice, it would be. but crucially, it's katara who continues the fight. katara who defeats the scion of fire nation destruction at the height of her power. katara who saves zuko just as he saved her.

in proving herself a master waterbender powerful enough to defeat azula and save someone she loves - someone who sacrificed themselves for her - from fire nation aggression, katara brings her own arc full circle. it is in triumphing over azula by saving each other that zuko and katara become the people they were always meant to be, and so their individual arcs are brought to their narrative culmination through bookending the other. the final agni kai works where the kat.aang moments fall short because it is of equal significance to both zuko and katara's narratives.

obviously, this is not to say that it's bad for certain characters to exist just to drive another character's arc. it's inevitable that some will be written solely to fulfill that purpose because a story only has so much narrative space, and it usually can't - and shouldn't - be divided equally amongst every single character.

but if we're talking about two main characters who end up in a lifelong romantic relationship, and it's the female character being repeatedly damselled to drive the male character's storyline within an already imbalanced dynamic... perhaps it's time to rethink a few things.

#anti kataang #zutara

[yuurei20]

(This was originally an ask received through Twitter)

"Back in GloMas (on JP), I think I remember there being a lot of madness surrounding Idia being close to Yuu. I think it’s because he referred to them as ‘Yuu’ rather than ‘Yuu-shi’, but I still don’t quite get it??"

Yes! Honorifics as a whole have already discussed more in-depth here, but Idia does drop his honorific for the prefect once in Glorious Masquerade.

Quick overview for those who may not know: when you don’t use an honorific with someone (-chan / -kun / -sama / etc), this is called yobisute (呼び捨て), written with the kanji for “to call” and “to throw away,” and the word might just not exist in English. It means “to refer to someone without an honorific."

Twst uses honorifics (and yobisute) to track the evolving relationships between the characters.

Deuce, for example, has a line about how he used to yobisute his teachers (i.e. he refused to add “-sensei” to their names) in middle school. To compensate for his past rudeness, Deuce now refers to every single upperclassman by “lastname-senpai.”

There is even a cute scene during New Year’s where Deuce greets Jamil by calling him Viper-senpai, but after Jamil feeds him an egg salad sandwich he changes—just once—to Jamil-senpai.

Epel is another character whose use of honorifics is significant: Epel is under order from Vil to always use honorifics with everyone. During Book 5 we see him using “-kun” with Deuce, up until Deuce refuses to let Epel fight the bullies trying to steal their blastcycle.

Deuce says that he is the one who took Epel out of the school and so he will be taking responsibility for his actions, and we get Epel’s first “Deuce” yobisute.

Cater might be the character who weaponizes honorifics the most.

He seems to be using honorifics as an over-familiarity-buffer-zone, as he is actively trying to avoid becoming too close to those around him (re: “Cay-Cay doesn’t really do long-term friends or found family").

There is one exception to Cater’s rule of honorifics: Trey.

During Book 1 Cater refers to him as “Trey-kun” for the majority of the story, until Riddle’s overblot makes things serious enough for him to drop it and call him “Trey” (even during these scenes, however, he keeps his honorifics for others).

The novel even comments on this directly, saying, "Usually, Cater does not ever yobisute anyone. When he calls to Trey, he always adds ‘kun’ to his name. This is probably one of his skills as a good-natured person. When Cater uses Trey’s name like this, it is only when he is really serious. Only when it is important."

This is all to say that, depending upon the character, yobisute can be a huge deal. It isn’t a black-and-white rule, of course—it varies by each character and their personality.

Kalim, for example, refers to everyone with yobisute, possibly because his status back home meant that he was simply never taught to defer to anyone, and/or because he legitimately considers himself to be close, personal friends with everyone he meets.

Idia is one of those characters like Cater and Deuce for whom yobisute is a big deal. There is exactly one person he refers to without any form of honorific, and that person is Ortho. Much like how he uses his tablet to avoid talking to people face-to-face, he is possibly, intentionally keeping up an over-familiarity-wall like Cater. 

The English-language adaptation has translated his honorific of “-shi” as “Mr.,” but it’s actually gender-neutral, which may be why the English-language game’s continuity is so inconsistent, and why the moment of Idia referring to the prefect without an honorific did not make it to EN: while the honorific disappears and reappears in English, he actually uses it to refer to the prefect in Book 6, and it is otherwise in 100% of all of Idia’s dialogue in the original game.

With one exception: Glorious Masquerade.

This is why JP lost its collective mind when it happened (the fan-art is delightful, like this short comic of the characters pointing at Idia and chanting "yobisute"), because it was something Idia had never done before and has never done again, and it was with the prefect!

(This was revealed to be a proof-reading error that was corrected in the 2023 re-release, with "-shi" added to the prefect's name in Idia's dialogue.)

Yobisute is usually very significant in the game, like during Book 6 where Azul, who uses the “-san” honorific with literally everyone except Jade and Floyd, uses yobisute with Riddle when he is in danger, and when Riddle uses it with Leona just before his overblot in Book 2.

Which means it will be interesting to see if Idia is going to continue with this yobisute-ing of the prefect outside of Glorious Masquerade! (which would be great for confirmation that it wasn't just a proof-reading error ww)

#twstask #twisted wonderland #twstlanguage #Idia Shroud

[mjparkerwriting]

introduction

about me

Hi! I'm starting this blog so I can track and share my writing progress. I'm looking to meet other writers and become more a part of the writing community.

I'm 24 and a teacher so summer is the best time for me to really write all day.

Outside of reading novels, I love watching movies and reading comics.

My favorite book of all time is A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini and as of 6/17/23, I am currently reading A Game of Thrones by George RR Martin.

about my writing

I have always enjoyed writing, even as a child. Now, I just feel like I want to do more. Growing up, I didn't have a lot of stories about people like me so my goal is to create engaging and memorable stories with well-written black and poc, LGBTQ/queer, and female characters.

Some of my favorite tropes are rivals/enemies to lovers, antihero protagonists, quests and prophecies, and the Amazon Brigade.

Right now, I am working on a fantasy novel. I've written one before, but things just didn't work out the way I wanted, so this is my fresh start. I'm about 54k words into this novel and my goal is 80-90k.

Like I said, I'm open to talking with and meeting new people. I'm down to beta your WIPs and share ideas and tips. Thanks for reading!

#writeblr #writers on tumblr #writerscommunity #poc writer #writers of color #writers of tumblr #women writers #writers #writer things #writing #creative writing #writing community #black writblr #black writers

[morganbritton132]

Idk if you’ve mentioned it before but what is everyone in the Party’s jobs?? We already know Erica is a kickass politician and Lucas is the family embarrassment doctor but what does everyone else do besides bug Steve lol?

Also is Dustin still with Susie or did that ship sail away in the EMTTS?? <333

So, fun fact about me: I am not a big fan of future AUs. I don’t particularly like reading them and I’ve never written one prior to the Tiktok Saga. I think the problem I have with them is that it’s really hard to determine where a character should be thirty-odd years down the road. How or why a one-off post about Eddie being bad with technology turned into all this, I do not know.

I don’t have everybody’s job picked out because I don’t really think about it until it’s relevant to the story, but luckily, I do spend way too much time thinking about this AU so I have few that haven’t been mentioned.

The ones that have been mentioned: Steve is a teacher, Eddie’s a musician, Nancy’s a journalist, Jonathan’s a photographer, Lucas is a doctor, and Erica is a senator.

I think Argyle owns a very successful marijuana dispensary in California where him and Jonathan live and it gives him the freedom to travel with Jonathan when he goes out of town for business. Argyle just has the vibe that should not be working a nine-to-five. Also, I think that Argyle as an old man stoner with long completely gray hair is just so cool.

Robin is also a teacher, but she teaches at a university in the linguistics department. She spoke four languages when she joined the party, she now speaks nine. She’s written a book. She has a kickass rating on Rate My Professor. She’s likely the front runner to take over the department once the current dean retires next year.

I really like the idea of Max becoming a physical therapist. She had a long road to recovery after Venca and spent over a year in physical therapy just learning how to walk again. She knows what it’s like. She knows when and how hard to push her patients, and she’s good at the job. This also makes Max a doctor so Erica includes Max when she says that Lucas is the worst Sinclair.

I’m less defined on what kind of careers that Will, Mike, and El have. I just haven’t found a job that I’m like, yes, that makes perfect sense for that character. I do think that Will has a career where he can be creative and that he’s successful, I just haven’t narrowed it down to what exactly he does.

Mike and El, on the other hand, I have no idea. I mentioned before that Mike had a band that opened up for Eddie on CC’s first national tour and I imagine that he did one summer or during his gap year before college (if he went to college). El, I like to think, travels a lot and has got to see the world and be free of the responsibility of saving the world. But those two, I think, are tough to pin down to a specific career.

Now, for Dustin.

Dustin has had a very successful career as a researcher and his career has taken him all over the world. Now what exactly does he research? That’s up to you. This man is a scientist and that’s all Steve and Eddie can tell you about Dustin’s job because it’s just over of their heads. He loves it and that’s all they need to know.

Dustin and Suzie are currently not together. They have dated off and on since they’ve known each other and have always split on good terms. It has just always been the wrong time for them because when they’re together, they’re great. They hit it off and decide to start dating again, and then they just get busy. They’re both top of their field and work crazy long hours all over the world, and the cost of that is their relationship.

I think they both kinda know that one day, they’ll meet up at the right time, but for now, they’re good friends and they date other people. Steve thinks that they’re soulmates and he’ll randomly give Dustin an update that Suzie is single again. Dustin is always like, “How do you know that?”

“We’re friends on Facebook.”

#Dustin: Why are you friends with my ex on Facebook? #Steve: I gotta know what my daughter in law is up to #steve harrington #eddie munson #eddie munson tiktok saga #the party

[12amphantasm]

People always meet you with reverence, “Father Andrew!”, they greet when you walk past, admiration heavy in their voices. They love you for how pious you are, friendly and loving, your patience and generosity.

And you love them, too. Just like the place you have stayed in for nearly twenty years, the huge complex composed of a humble yet luxurious church, the boarding school for troubled youths, the small but very warm house for the elderly, and the nearby university of theology - together known as The Hillset Private Conservatory.

God loves it all, every flower, every human, and whatever it might be that’s walking through these halls. __

The game is 18+ and meant for an adult audience.

Although the romance is strictly MxM, sexuality is relevant only for the romantic routes and the game can be played without engaging in intimate relationships, but at the expense of background information the player won’t be able to get in other ways. __

The game will be uploaded in parts, starting at least with 10k words. Planed release: Late April/early May 2024 ___

Written by a gay man, the romance is MxM only and stays true to reality, portraying genuine gay relationships, without stereotypes and harmful tropes.

“We Are God’s Most Beloved” is an old-school text-heavy interactive fiction novel and recommended to those who love reading.

Choices are meaningful instead of flavour and used only when they have an actual impact, this means there are long passages of text, which requires the reader to keep track of the story – just like they would with a novel. There is a lot to explore, attentive readers might find more game in this interactive fiction than one would expect.

The main genre is horror, even if nothing is outrageously explicit and often handled with a focus on the absurd, it contains horror-typical themes and tropes such as blood, body horror, surreal imaginary, and other commonly used elements.

In addition, mental illness, dysfunctional familial relationships, and physical assault play an important role depending on which route is chosen.

Hillset Private Conservatory, build in 1802, despite its long history, is a name few people know or have ever heard, and if one is aware of its existence, it’s rarely for good reasons.

Rumours have it that the owner was a paranoid man and the gigantic complex created solely to have a spacious cage for his family, namely his eight children, only for all of them to find an untimely death on this very property.

"It's haunted!", some say. "It's evil!", some claim.

Of course, nothing of that is true, the many teachers, counsellors, nuns, and priest can attest to that, and so would many of their students. At least a good portion of them. Maybe some, at least.

Now summer vacation has ended, and a new batch of fosterlings is about to arrive; frightened, misguided, and troubled teens in need of loving care, education, and a new chance at life.

Father Andrew, the only acting priest, will do his best, like always, to show them God’s brilliance and create a warm home out of these century old walls.

No railroading, no hand-holding

Life is full of choices, you have to make your own and live with them, ultimately missing out on certain things, or ending up utterly regretting what you did. There is no right or wrong, no road I, more or less sneakily, force you to take, choices are all equally valid and accounted for. ___

A fixed protagonist

Father Andrew is a fixed character, with his own likes, dislikes, appearance, and convictions. But how he navigates the world, how he reacts, who he becomes fond of or rather avoids, his interactions and how he lives his life, and, of course, what you learn about him, is up to you. ___

One end to rule them all

There are no bad endings or early finishes, all choices lead to the same endpoint, but how it looks like… is on you alone. ___

No stats

“We Are God’s Most Beloved” doesn’t require you to master stats, the story changes based on your choices, how you interact with the world and characters determines the options you will have, who likes or hates you, and how the story will play out. ___

Explicit - Yes or No?

You can choose to either read explicit sexual interactions or go for fade-to-black. ___

Romance

Three romantic interests are waiting to meet you, but you can play the whole story without romancing anyone, at the expense of sexual moments, additional plot-points centred around these characters, and potentially interesting background information.

No indicators are used, you have to find your own way, going by what you know about a character, evaluating the current situation, and acting accordingly.

Use the relationship stats to figure out what you did right or wrong, you have successfully entered a romantic route with a RO when the percentage reaches 50% and will deepen, or lessen, the relationship from then on.

There are no poly routes, entering one will lock you out of the others, and while you can’t lose a route once entered, how the couple ends up is based on your actions.

Keep in mind that “love” comes in many forms and players might find it worthwhile to forge bonds with other characters.

Profiles - Here

Father Andrew

Thirty-three years old, he was admitted to Hillset boarding school for troubled youths at the tender age of fourteen and hasn’t left the complex since. He’s very out of touch with the outside, basing his worldview, manners and morals on the old nuns and priests that raised him, often colliding with the new students’ modern ways. Friendly, polite and helpful, he’s easy to get along with on first glance but hard to truly get to know, which leaves him without friends and often rather lonely. __

Sister Lucia

Thirty-five years old, she’s one of the younger nuns but the strictness with which she loves doesn’t pale in comparison. She’s very fond of Father Andrew, who is her inspiration and has warped the image of how a priest should be until it became unrecognisable. Her hobbies are flower-arrangements, cooking things no one who loves their life should eat, taking care of the children in their school, and writing in her journal. __

Ẻ̶̛̬̲̀͋͑v̷̟̫̌̄͂ẻ̵͙̆̎͐l̸̨̙̠̻̜̐͌̓̂ͅͅy̵̡̲̼̔̑̾̀̀͐n̶̻̰̬͛͂͊̏̕͜͠

They might or might not be human. --

Moby

They definitely aren’t human, but God loves them anyway.

The love interests

Ryan Harris

Twenty-four years old and a student of Theology, he’s a graduate from the boarding school for troubled youths. While not overly intelligent, he’s diligent, curious, and not afraid of hardships. Father Andrew’s liturgy is his favourite part of the week and helping out something he takes pride in, as he does in his paintings that are full of creative flair and appreciated only by those with strong artistic sense. __

Connor Price

Thirty-one years old, he has been teaching English for eight years at a famous school and will do so from now on at Hillset - even if only because other schools refused to take him. He doesn’t like the enormous complex, dated appearance, long, dark halls, how everyone is just too nice, and Father Andrew, who somehow gives him the creeps. Connor spends his time reading, avoiding coworkers, and having long talks with the elderly in their care. __

?

You have to find that out on your own.

#interactive fiction #text-based game #twine game #game wip #if wip

[ride-thedragon]

NETTLES AND RHAENYRA, CHARACTER FOILS.

Because I'm not an English teacher

So the question is, How is Nettles Rhaenyra's foil?

1. Appearance .

Rhaenyra is a pretty standard Valyrian beauty. Silver locks, purple eyes, quite pretty, later on in life we get the change that she didn't lose the wait after giving birth to her kids and becùase of misogyny, her beauty has faded. Features like her long hair worn in the style of Visenya and so on are also mentioned. It's giving the Realm's delight in a real sense (not the weird sense).

Nettles, on the other hand, is juxtaposed as 'ugly'. She's brown, is skinny, has crooked teeth, a nose scar, and has short hair.

The maesters like to play to damn much, basically. But they are described as almost exact opposites. Short and long hair, skinny and fat, white and brown skin, purple and brown eyes, etc.

The narrative purpose is to ultimately show their different upbringing and places in this society.

2. Status

Rhaenyra is shown to be the princess, heir to the throne and queen throughout the book. No matter what happens with her, the security and privilege she has almost always goes over what other women have. Her only real threat is the men (and book Alicent) who have personal stake in her not ascending her throne. She's also entirely spoilt as princess and heir by her father and more so her uncle.

Nettles, on the other hand, is introduced to us as an orphan from Driftmark. We're told she could've been a thief and a sex worker by the time we met her. She has no name, lands, titles, or family that we are presented with in the narrative and her backstory for better or less is a patchwork of what her life was possibly like on Driftmark.

Unlike Rhaenyra, we don't follow every salacious rumour and really don't know much about her past.

3. Dragons

Rhaenyra’s dragon Syrax was a cradle egg hatched to her, a Targaryen custom. She's also the youngest dragonrider at 7 I believe.

Nettles claims her dragon at no older than 16 years old. He is a wild dragon (a distinction given to hatched Targaryen dragons that haven't been riden and live away from the keep) and slaughters many before she claims him.

4. Virtue

The notion of virtue in asoiaf is extremely complex, especially with these two women and the vastly different backgrounds. But virginity and speculation also develops both their characterizations in the narrative.

Rhaenyra allegedly "sleeps" with Daemon to practise what she wants to do with Criston (she's 15-). In the show, it becomes obvious that she almost sleeps with Daemon and officially sleeps with Criston. Either way, promiscuity and naivety are written into her character. The only point of conflict is who is involved with what happened in these instances less than what happened. Later on her promiscuity is brought up when Ser Harwin Strong is said to be the father of her first three children.

On the other hand, Nettles' sexual promiscuity is given to her in the narrative. The claims of her being a whore or sleeping around with shepherds are claims made by men who don't know what she was doing at that time. Men who made similar claims about Rhaenyra and their involvement in her loss of virtue as well. Where these stories differ is in Maidenpool, where the assumption of promiscuity is given a different voice.

This time, maids are alluding to an inappropriately close relationship between Daemon and Nettles (yet again, he finds himself here).

5. Daemon

Speak of the devil, and he will appear.

His dynamic is important to these women and their place in the narrative. Saving one dooms the other, leaving with one isolated the other. His decisions ultimately affect one while benefiting the other.

The cruellest example of this dynamic is him letting Nettles go after being the reason she is trapped in the narrative and ultimately dooming Rhaenyra by choosing to kill Aemond instead of going back to her.

His dynamic with both was also comparable with gift giving and quality time and even inappropriate relationship he developed with both of them, notably around similar ages. ( Both these relationships have significant power imbalances).

Between them both, his affection to one affects the other detrimentally.

6. Jace

Specifically in reference to his death, it's notable that within the narrative, while Nettles is described as crying by herself in response to his death, Rhaenyra is hardened by it.

Also, as symbols for legitimacy and legacy, Jace is the reason Nettles is recognised as a dragonseed, and Rhaenyra's line is secured as her first born, but in his absence, Nettles is delegitimised and said to be not a dragonseed. Around that time, Rhaenyra is beginning to be questioned by all the men around her as well, whereas before, Jace was a notable voice in decisions.

7. Dragons in the End.

They both meet their 'end' in the narrative with Dragons. Rhaenyra is killed by her brother's dragon Sunfyre burns and eats her, killing her in front of her son.

Nettles, however, escapes the narrative on dragonback, with the stories that follow explicitly explaining how dragon fire protects her and leads her to become a deity for the burned men.

8. Children

In the narrative, Nettles has no children. Children would explicitly be a burden in her described circumstances as a mouth to feed and someone else to care for. Effectively, children would trap Nettles in a cycle of poverty and inability to experience ethe freedom presented in the narrative.

Rhaenyra is expected to have children to secure her legacy and reign. Children, especially sons, would be her greatest benefit to ensure her ascension to the throne. They are her biggest strategy and losses throughout the war because of that reason.

This dynamic carries out to a head with the death decree for Nettles. The possibility that she would have a child by Daemon is a definitive reason that her 'treason' calls for her head. A child would give her a claimant but also be proof of infidelity by Daemon. It would be a slight to Rhaenyra’s pride and grief as she at this point has lost 4 children during the war.

9. Loyalty of men

This is one of the most interesting for me because the disloyalty of men for Rhaenyra meant the loyalty of men to Nettles. When the Mootons decide not to kill her, they are traitors to Rhaenyra. When Daemon lets her leave, he's a traitor to Rhaenyra. When Corlys stands up for both her and Addam, he's treated like a traitor. Furthermore, the Mootons turn to Aegon’s side directly after because they did not obey her for two reasons, Nettles being accused and sentenced without trial, and Rhaenyra wanting them to break guest right.

Within the narrative, at that point, loyalty to Rhaenyra was a sentence on Nettles' life, and loyalty to Nettles was treason to Rhaenyra.

Conclusion.

In other ways, like the impact of their legacy, the symbols of their identity (dragons), other ways that their narratives with Daemon (the stories) play out and so on juxtapose these women against each other in the narrative. Age and innocence in both a meta and narrative sense also play into Nettles being a foil for Rhaenyra’s character. Personally I think the reason ts written that way is for Nettles to cause a Stark difference in behaviour with men like Daemon and the Mootons as well as to show the contrast of what is expected and what is to be done and what actually happens.

Hope this helps 🩷🤎

#hotd #house of the dragon #nettles #nettles asoiaf #netty #a song of ice and fire #rhaenyra targaryen #queen rhaenyra #rhaenyra x criston #rhaenyra x daemon #nettles and sheepstealer #sheepstealer #syrax #the mootons #character foils #stop the propaganda #why would George put a character in that could be taken out easily #thats not how writing works #unless you're me #yall are acting dense and ik yall know better #dont play with me #daemon and nettles #daemon x nettles #nettles x daemon

[kaladinkholins]

Blue Eye Samurai & Themes of Breaking Free from Binaries and Boxes

Mizu must choose between being a woman or a man, between feminine and masculine.

Mizu must choose between being Japanese or white.

Mizu must choose between being human (loving) or demon (hateful).

Mizu has struggled against the chains placed upon her since birth, but no matter how much she writhes and pushes against them, the chains remain. And they will continue to, until she learns to accept all of those facets of herself and suppress none of it.

Mizu must realise that she is both feminine and masculine; Japanese and white; human and demon. Mizu is all of these things and everything in between and at the same time she is none of them. She is simply Mizu. Only upon accepting this can she slice through the chains and find freedom.

But Mizu isn't the only one faced with these stifling binaries and predetermined paths. Each of the main four characters represent this theme as well.

"This is the world. It grants women a fixed number of paths. Proper wife or improper whore." -Seki, to Akemi

Akemi, as a woman, must choose between being a wife (modest, meek, but rich) or whore (sexually liberated, willful, but exploited). Both of these would amount to defeat, both of these are cages. So what does she do? With the cards she's been dealt and the rules outlined for her, she decides to change the game so she can win, manipulating her husband (and father, who is now under her care) to give herself the advantage. This way, she blazes her own path ahead to achieve power for herself.

"As it says, there are four paths through the world. The way of the farmer, the artisan, the merchant, and the warrior. Each of these can lead to greatness. I never even cared which path, so long as I found mine." [...] "I know I can't touch greatness any more than I can swallow the sun. But, I can help. I can help greatness." -Ringo

Ringo, partially due to his disability, faces barriers succeeding any of the predetermined paths set out for him, but freely moves between each one in search of one that can lead him to greatness. However, upon meeting Mizu, his horizons expand. Now, he forges his own path, deciding to rise beyond a quest for his own greatness, choosing to instead to help greatness. This is similar to the role teachers take. Teachers do not get to be rich or successful or written into history books, but they help, teach, and inspire others so that they can rise up to their fullest potentials.

"Eighty-four thousand Dharma doors. For me, there were only two. The net or the sword. I could become my father, or I could cut my way free of the net." -Taigen

Taigen, born and raised impoverished, had only two options to survive. He could either be a fisherman and remain poor, or he could strive to work hard as a swordsman in the hopes to one day escape poverty. To him, it was a choice between a life of suffering or a chance at glory. Either way, the chances of dying (from either starvation or getting killed) were present, so obviously he'd taken the chance to run away and try his hand at greatness. But then, he lost his honour, and thus lost everything. Now his only choices are to regain his honour or simply kill himself. He tries the former, but upon bonding with Mizu and Ringo, he finds out there is more to life, that there is a third option open for him he'd never realised before: happiness. Rather than just mere survival, or toiling for material gain, he realises that life is about living.

Overall, the story is very multifaceted through its exploration of societal expectations and norms, and how people are forced to conform, but also the ways they can break free from those boxes.

And in my opinion each of the characters represent differing aspects of marginality, and can be analysed from differing perspectives.

Akemi's story is a predominantly feminist narrative about the marginalisation of women.

Ringo's story is a predominantly disabled narrative about the marginalisation of disabled folks.

Taigen's backstory is a Marxist narrative about the marginalisation of the poor and working class.

Mizu's story is most prominently a postcolonial narrative about the marginalisation of racial Others, ethnic minorities, and hybridised identities. However, as the protagonist, Mizu's story is the most multilayered and thus also heavily features feminist, queer, and Marxist themes due to her complex relationship with gender as well as her background as an orphan living on the streets.

I just found it very interesting that, altogether, the four main protagonists each represent groups that are fighting against an unjust system.

Even Takayoshi, son of the shogun, who should thus be one of Japan's most powerful men himself, is instead seemingly powerless as he is silenced and manipulated by his own mother due to his disability—his stutter.

I also find that these themes of breaking free from conformity and expectations are very interestingly displayed in Taigen, who had thought he'd found a way to join those unjust systems and play by all its rules, and by doing so he had played the role of antagonist. Because one of the central conflicts of the show is Man Vs Society, in which society is the antagonist and the man is Mizu, among others. So by becoming one with that cruel society, Taigen in turn also becomes Mizu's antagonist. Only when he is stripped of everything, all his years of struggle immediately stomped into the dirt as soon as he loses a single duel, only then does he shift away from his antagonistic role. Disgraced and dishonoured, he, too, now rejoins the margins of society, becoming an outcast alongside Mizu and Ringo.

So, TL;DR the society and world portrayed in Blue Eye Samurai is shitty for pretty much everyone unless you're a rich, corrupt, able-bodied cis man. Thus, essentially no one is free and everyone is restricted into neat little boxes where they play their roles and stay in line while the rich and powerful benefit. But Mizu, Akemi, Ringo and Taigen challenge this, and slowly they will rip the boxes go shreds—choosing what they want, and what they want to be, for themselves.

#blue eye samurai #mizu blue eye samurai #taigen blue eye samurai #blue eye samurai meta #akemi blue eye samurai #ringo blue eye samurai #also all of four of them are mistreated by a parent to varying degrees. for ringo taigen & akemi it's their dads. for mizu it was her mama. #plus mizu's dad is believed to have assaulted her mom so. #they all have parental trauma lmao..... #the more i think about this show i go crazy #scheduling this post #shut up haydar #meta dissertations.pdf #mizu is non binary in every way !!!! #she just like me fr !!!! #fandom.rtf

[thecleverness]

But the Netflix series has turned many of the trilogy’s various protagonists into a collection of friends, all scientific prodigies in their 30s who studied under the same mentor at Oxford University. They’re dubbed the “Oxford Five,” and they include Auggie (played by Eiza González), a nanotech expert and the show’s version of Wang; Jin (Jess Hong), a brilliant theoretical physicist who gets sucked into playing the VR game; Saul (Jovan Adepo), an aimless researcher and Auggie’s on-again, off-again love interest; Will (Alex Sharp), a selfless teacher who has long harbored a crush on Jin; and Jack (John Bradley), a wealthy entrepreneur who left academia to run a snack company. All are rather well-adjusted versions of their written counterparts. (Wang, for instance, is a middle-aged workaholic who neglects his wife and child as he searches for solutions.) The result is a story that certainly feels more conventionally TV-worthy—but it essentially abandons one of the books’ most interesting themes: that of the loneliness and terror that can come with the pursuit of knowledge and progress. Part of the pleasure of reading Liu’s dense story is in observing how he shuffles characters in and out, discarding protagonists in favor of new ones from one book to the next. Given a conflict that won’t manifest for centuries, the story becomes about which theories last—and how so many of the figures who come up with ingenious plans must learn to share them and convince others of their worldview.

What Netflix’s ‘3 Body Problem’ Can’t Solve

#review #3 body problem

[pedroscurls]

Hi there! I’m J. Below the “keep reading” line is my ultimate masterlist for the stories I’ve written for Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Pedro Pascal characters! Please note that all stories at 18+ and this list is very long, so if there are any issues with any of the below links, please let me know! 

Happy reading!🫶

1️⃣ = One-shots || ✍ = Multi-chaptered stories / WIP (✍️✅ = complete)

FRANKIE “CATFISH” MORALES (triple frontier)

1️⃣ Always Here For You: Frankie comforts you as you cope with your grief. (Francisco “Catfish” Morales x fem!Reader || part of the pedrostores 1k celebration)

✍ Chance Encounters: You’ve suddenly and tragically lost your best friend and can’t handle the grief. Until four strangers give you a glimmer of hope that things will (and can) get better. (ultimately a story about working through grief with the help of our four boys from Triple Frontier)

1️⃣ Hold My Hand: For years, you have been in love with Frankie. Everyone else saw it, except him, and you never had the courage to tell him how you truly felt. Instead, you stuck by his side even when it hurt. And after Colombia, he hadn’t been the same. You knew he had demons (being a veteran and all), but this… This was different. Would Frankie finally open his eyes and realize that the woman he was meant to be with had been right in front of him all along? (Francisco “Catfish” Morales x fem!Reader)

✍️✅ Third Time’s A Charm: There is history between you and Frankie. In fact, you have both broken up twice and yet, you still seem to find your way back to each other. Could this third chance be the last and final one? (Francisco “Catfish” Morales x fem!Reader)

JAVIER PEÑA (narcos)

1️⃣ All We Are: You and Javier have history and have been in this endless cycle for years, always trying to “one-up” each other, but what happens after a night of steamy, dirty sex that the truth finally comes out? (Javier Peña x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Innocent Eyes: Javier and his partner, Steve Murphy, finally have one night off. So, when they go to a local bar to unwind, Javier certainly wasn’t expecting you to walk through the doors. (Javier Peña x fem!Reader)

JOEL MILLER (the last of us)

✍️✅ Always Been You: You and Joel have become best friends, but as the years pass, you both realize that the love you have for each other goes beyond just “best friends”. Will either of you have the courage to express your true feelings or will you both just remain secretly in love with each other? (no-outbreak!Joel Miller x fem!Reader)

✍️ Broken Souls: What happens when you realize love isn’t enough? And when years later, you meet again that all the pain and heartbreak comes rushing back… Like it never left. (Joel Miller x fem!Reader)

✍️ Dirty Little Secret: When your best friend and his fiancée, Sarah, have their belated engagement party (kicking off their pre-wedding parties), you meet the father of the bride and realize that he’s completely off limits. But you always did like older men, and Joel? Well, maybe he could be your dirty little secret. (age-gap, no-outbreak!Joel Miller x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Guys Night Out: Tommy takes Joel to a strip club. (Joel Miller pre-apocalypse x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ In Case You Didn’t Know: Joel steps out of his comfort zone and puts his feelings into words the best way he knows how. (Joel Miller x fem!Reader)

✍️✅ One Drunken Night: Reader’s date stands her up, so she decides to stay at the bar anyway. Then, she meets Negan who unravels her entire world. All the while, trying to navigate her relationship with Joel. (Negan x fem!Reader, Joel Miller x fem!Reader, TLOU x TWD crossover)

✍️ The Teacher: You have been on your own for over a year and after Maria saves you and brings you to Jackson, you try and settle in, doing your best to contribute to the community. Though, it doesn’t help that your neighbor, Joel Miller, reminds you of a special person from before Outbreak day. (Joel Miller x fem!Reader)

MARCUS PIKE (the mentalist)

✍️ Second Chances: After Marcus moves to DC - alone - he’s determined to just focus on work. After a failed marriage followed with his failed relationship with Lisbon, Marcus believes that love just isn’t in the cards for him anymore. Until you move in next door. (Marcus Pike x fem!Reader)

DENNY DUQUETTE (grey’s anatomy)

✍️✅ Dear Maisie: Maisie receives a letter. (Denny Duquette x fem!OC)

✍️✅ Love At First Sight?: Jess meets an unlikely stranger that changes her life forever. (Denny Duquette x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Our Confession: Denny has a confession to make. (Denny Duquette x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Our Happy Ending: Denny and Izzie finally have their happy ending. (Denny Duquette x Izzie Stevens)

1️⃣ Our Own ‘Getaway’: Denny notices the change in your demeanor and despite being stuck in a hospital, he decides to comfort you in a way he only knows how. (Denny Duquette x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Reassure Me: After being released from the hospital since his heart transplant, Denny feels a bit self-conscious with his new scar. (Denny Duquette x fem!Reader)

IKE EVANS (magic city)

✍️✅ Fatal Attraction: Diana is newly married to Ben Diamond, also known as The Butcher. However, after meeting Ike Evans, the charming older gentleman of the Miramar Playa, she can’t help but indulge in an intimate relationship with the man. Can she keep this a secret from her dangerous husband? (Ike Evans x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Fever: Ike’s entertainment manager hires a burlesque dancer that catches Ike’s attention. (Ike Evans x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Gender Reveal: Ike and Vera find out the gender of their baby. (Ike Evans x Vera Evans)

1️⃣ Playing with Fire: Your father stays in one of the suites at the Miramar Playa, and the hotel’s owner, caters to his every need. But, when you finally see what this man looks like, you cannot help but tease him every chance you could get. (Ike Evans x fem!Reader)

✍️✅ Sway With Me: Ike, a business professor and hotel owner of the Miramar Playa, meets an unexpected woman that catches his interest. (Ike Evans x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Your Secret’s Safe With Me: Ashton has a secret that only Ike knows. (Ike Evans x male!OC)

JASON CROUSE (the good wife)

1️⃣ I Won’t Give Up: Jason reminds his wife, Jen, just how important and loved she is. (Jason Crouse x OC)

1️⃣ Let Me Make it Up to You: Once at home, waiting for Jason, a burglar enters your home. (Jason Crouse x fem!Reader) 

1️⃣ Let’s Stargaze: After a long day at work, you decide to cook dinner for Jason and your son, Luke, while the two stargaze out in the backyard. (Jason Crouse x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Not What It Seems: Deciding to bring Jason lunch, you weren’t expecting to witness when showing up to his office. (Jason Crouse x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Old Friends: It’s been twenty years since Jason and [Y/N] have seen each other. (Jason Crouse x Reader)

✍️✅ Protect Me: Samantha, a freelance writer, moves to Chicago. She didn’t expect to be a victim of a stalker, but what happens when she seeks professional help from Alicia and Lucca? Then Jason Crouse, the private investigator, comes in and offers his help. (Jason Crouse x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Sunday Funday Surprise: Jason and his daughter, Susie, plan a surprise for Mother’s Day. (Jason Crouse x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Take A Bite: Jason introduces Alicia to something new. || part of jeffreydeanmorganrarechar/ladylorelitany‘s Red Velvet challenge. (Jason Crouse x Alicia Florrick)

1️⃣ Teasing is a Fun Game: After a few trysts with Jason, he shows up unexpectedly during your lecture and all you can think of are the intimate moments you two shared. (Jason Crouse x Reader)

1️⃣ The Newest Family Addition: Jason and Jen tell Susie the good news, but as the months progress and Jen’s baby bump begins to show, Susie becomes anxious that her parents will replace her. (Part 2 to Sunday Funday Surprise).  (Jason Crouse x fem!OC)

1️⃣ The Other Sister: You accidentally walk in your older sister, Alicia’s, apartment to find her newest affair naked on her bed. (Jason Crouse x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ You Are Mine: Jason reveals his jealous side. (Jason Crouse x Reader)

MAX (the resident)

1️⃣ Coffee Date: Since Max wasn’t going to make the first move, you take him by surprise and ask him out for coffee. (Max x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Similar Personalities: Max needs some comforting and turns to you to make him feel better. What he didn’t expect was for you to find out his secret, and more than willing to partake in one of his fantasies. (Max x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ The Breakthrough: What if Juliet didn’t stop Max? Would that have changed everything? (Max x Juliet)

1️⃣ You’re Safe With Me: Max didn’t expect for you, the new tenant, to be newly divorced with two young children. However, the more time he spent with you, the more he realized that you had taken him out of the walls and shown him a world that he always knew he could live. (Max x fem!Reader)

NEGAN SMITH (the walking dead)

1️⃣ A Broken Facade: Negan gives Father Gabriel his confession. In doing so, a vivid memory enters his mind about the one person he failed to protect. || part of flames-bring-a-ton-of-ash writing challenge. (Negan x Lucille)

1️⃣ A Flood of Old Memories: While singing in the shower, Negan overhears the song that brings back old memories that he has tried to suppress for so long. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ A Hands-On Demonstration: Negan shows you just how it’s like to be pleasured by a real man. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ A Private Dance: As a new dancer, you try and familiarize yourself with the regulars, listening to the other women’s advice. However, your eye catches a man in a leather jacket sitting towards the back of the room. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ A Proper Thank You: An underestimated, young Savior saves Negan’s life and he repays her the only way he knows how. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ An Unwanted Flashback: After Negan makes Carl face down onto the pavement, flashbacks from the Claimers enter the young boy’s mind and goes into a mental breakdown. (Negan x Carl)

1️⃣ Baby, I’m Back!: After his month-long supply run, you and Negan show each other just how much you missed one another. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Coach Negan: Coach Negan takes a liking to you and after he witnesses the bullying that you endure, he shows you just exactly how special you are. (Negan x fem!Reader)

✍️✅ Coach Negan: You always loved sports. Most specifically, basketball. After deciding to join the new season after a very embarrassing last season, you believe that you could change the team’s bad luck and bring them to the championships, but you weren’t expecting the team’s coach to be as good looking as him. It was going to be tougher than you planned. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Control: You and Negan have the same temperament, and when you both get into an argument, it is always a battle of power and control that ultimately leads to angry, rough, dominant sex. In this instance, who wins the argument? (Negan x fem!Reader

1️⃣ Goodbye My Lover: Negan knows what’s to come, but he can’t seem to come to terms with it. Lucille was the woman he loved, despite everything he had done || Inspired by “Here’s Negan” (Negan x Lucille)

1️⃣ Hurt Me: You finally have enough of Negan’s behavior towards you. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ I Don’t Wanna Live Forever: Negan realizes the truth to the saying, “you never know what you have until you’ve lost it.” When you, one of his wives, decide to leave him, you wonder if you’ve made the right decision and Negan starts to question if he should have let you go in the first place. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ I Know Your Secret: After a year from being accepted into The Sanctuary, you had become one of Negan’s top Saviors. During a night of fun with the rest of your fellow Saviors, Negan drops in and decides to tease you for hiding such an “important” secret. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ I Truly Am Sorry: Witnessing your father’s death broke you and the one man that has been haunting your nightmares finally show up for the first pick-up. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ I Trust You: Negan asks Mary an important question that will change her entire life. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ It’s Over: Negan doesn’t understand that your affair with him is over. You, however, had enough and finally lose control || part of @embracetheapocalypsewithme‘s 400 Follower Negan Challenge. (Negan x fem!Reader)

✍️✅ Just the Three of Us: You meet Negan and Simon at a bachelor party and realize a hunger you never knew you had. What happens when you finally are able to have each of them and then suddenly, the world collapses? (Negan x fem!Reader x Simon)

1️⃣ Let Me Take Care of You: After sorting out the supplies from a successful run on a hot, summer’s day, you accidentally cut yourself after opening a box with your knife. Negan takes notice and decides to take care of it himself. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Let’s Make A Deal: After the deaths of Glenn and Abraham, Rick and the rest of the group have been on edge. Hannah didn’t know what she had gotten herself into when joining this group, but she was just about to find out what had everyone working their asses off. Negan shows up and offers her a deal that she cannot refuse. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ My Not-So Little Girl: Pre-apocalypse AU. Negan gives his daughter, Casey, advice on how to drive and it gets out of hand. || Part of flames-bring-a-ton-of-ash writing challenge. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Now, What Do We Have Here?: You have been living in the Sanctuary for two months now and neither men showed any interest towards you. Though, it is a good thing that you’ve got a vivid imagination and after a long day at work, you decide to let out some steam. (Negan x fem!Reader x Simon)

✍️✅ One Drunken Night: Reader’s date stands her up, so she decides to stay at the bar anyway. Then, she meets Negan who unravels her entire world. All the while, trying to navigate her relationship with Joel. (Negan x fem!Reader, Joel Miller x fem!Reader, TLOU x TWD crossover)

1️⃣ Our First Night: Lara has a big crush on the leader of the Sanctuary, Negan. Tonight, though, she finds out just exactly how mutual the feelings are. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Save Me: Rick and Shane receive a call about a domestic disturbance, but so did Negan and Simon. (Rick x Shane x fem!Reader x Negan x Simon)

1️⃣ Straight for the Castle: King Ezekiel’s daughter, “Princess” Ramona, has a plan to overthrow her father and take over the Kingdom. When her plan finally goes through, Negan shows up at the gates of the Kingdom while her father was on a supply run. (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Talk Dirty to Me: You can’t help but be attracted your leader, to your Savior, Negan. What happens when he brings you back to his office? Will it finally happen? (Negan x fem!OC)

✍️✅ The Moon: Luna, a shy and timid woman, encounters Negan who is the complete opposite. Negan tries to break her out of her shell, but will it work? It was going to be tough, especially since he reminds Luna of her late husband… And not in a good way. (Negan x fem!OC) 

1️⃣ The Physical: Going to the doctor’s have always been a big fear of yours and now that you were waiting for your doctor to enter the room, he walks in with a large grin and deep dimples || part of noodlescupcakes 1st Writing Challenge. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ The Proposal: @a-girl-interupted​ requested: “I had an idea of a character with negan where she eventually becomes his/a wife and somehow he realizes how important it would be to her to have an actual proposal and wedding. We dont want to Negan too soft and the details are up to you but I would cry to see this” (Negan x fem!OC)

1️⃣ The Punishment: You hire a lawyer after being wrongfully accused of a crime. However, your lawyer, Negan, has a different way to punish you || pre-apocalypse AU. part of flames-bring-a-ton-of-ash‘s writing challenge. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Unknown Feelings: Negan takes notice of one of the new Saviors during their weekly game night with the rest of the guys. Though, what he doesn’t expect is the feelings that follow… (Negan x male!OC)

1️⃣ You Belong to Me: You didn’t realize what you were getting into after stealing the supplies. However, what you also didn’t expect was to be attracted by the man who ultimately had your fate in his hands. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ You, Doll, Are Special: You and Negan finally give in to one another. (Negan x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ You’ve Got A Friend in Me: Negan realizes that Fat Joey has a sister. Little does he know, she’s also got a voice of an angel. (Negan x fem!OC)

THE COMEDIAN (watchmen)

1️⃣ A Double Life: Eddie secretly leads a double life, but as his wife, you think it’s time that he hangs up his costume as “The Comedian.” (The Comedian x fem!Reader)

1️⃣ Opposites Attract: Can the God of War and the Goddess of Love and Beauty – both opposite sides of the spectrum – find a way to meet in the middle? || part of jeffreydeanneganstrash 1k writing challenge. (The Comedian x fem!OC)

1️⃣ Unsteady: Eddie turns to you for some stress relief. (The Comedian x fem!Reader)

#jeffrey dean morgan #jeffrey dean morgan fanfiction #pedro pascal #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfic #jeffrey dean morgan fanfic #jwritesfanfics masterlist #ultimate masterlist #jwritesfanfics ultimate materlist #negan #negan fanfic #negan fanfiction #joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller fanfic #the walking dead #twd #the last of us #tlou #jason crouse #the good wife #jason crouse fanfiction #jason crouse fanfic #the comedian #denny duquette #jwritesfanfics oneshot #jwritesfanfic multichaptered #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal characters fanfiction #pedro pascal characters fanfic

[jackoshadows]

What I don't understand is why Sansa stans, who want to get rid of Arya in Winterfell, go for the laziest fanon of Arya being a tourist - a theory that's borrowed from ultimate hacks D&D and the garbage TV show and which ending GRRM has repeatedly disavowed.

Arya becoming some kind of world explorer at the end pretty much ignores her book story, narrative arc, characterization and throws away the material in her so far written 32 pov chapters for an ending they came up with because of a made up headcanon. An headcanon which is far removed from the book character.

If one wants to get rid of Arya in Winterfell to make way for Sansa, the least they could do is actually read Arya's chapters and attempt to come up with an ending that makes more sense for the character.

Arya is a character who wants to help. From Mycah to Weasel to Samwell Tarly, Arya is someone who stands up against injustice even at great risk to herself. She's selfless and would sacrifice her personal happiness for the greater good. She wants things to be better, for herself, for her friends, for the smallfolk.

One ending could be Arya Stark as a leader of the Riverlands, helping rebuild from the ravages of war, helping the people who survived. Arya, who has the empathy and the skillsets to help them, who has listened and learned from her father on how to govern. We see Willow Heddle take care of orphans and managing an inn with a quiet efficiency that mirrors Arya's and Gendry hanging around helping her. I could see Arya and Gendry continue their relationship, fall in love, marry and settle down in the Riverlands while Arya either rules the Riverlands as the Tully heir/Cat's daughter or as Lady of Harrenhal helps Edmure Tully rebuild the Riverlands.

Or, if Jon Snow leaves for beyond the Wall as the leader of the new territories and lands there, maybe Arya goes with him. Considering their close bond and love for each other and the fact that home is where each other is - something else that is again established in the books - if she had no choice but to leave Winterfell, going with Jon Snow to help him lead the freefolk beyond the Wall could be another option.

Or if Bran does end up becoming King on the Iron Throne, then she could stay in KL to help her much loved baby brother. She wouldn't like leaving Winterfell, but Arya is a character who sacrifices and does what's right, no matter how hard it is for her to do personally. Plus, she wanted to be a king's councillor and build things. Her training and skillsets with the FM would also make her alert to any future LF/Varys types trying to plot against Bran - not that someone who can see into the past and present needs a master spy...

Or Arya and Brienne start a school for young girls who are interested in learning different things and have teachers who actually develop their talents based on what they are good at instead of being hateful for what they cannot be.

In my opinion, any of these endings is better than 'Arya, world explorer' an empty, nonsensical ending that has no connection to the character's book story and is actually contemptuous of the suffering and trauma this child has been through over several books. Meet new people and learn new languages? What do these folks think Arya has been doing so far? The girl's been traveling from her second AGoT chapter, meeting countless people. sailed the narrow seas, engaged with new cultures, learned new languages. She's been there, done that.

What's even more ridiculous is that it's Sansa stans who often engage in the oppression olympics of Sansa having suffered the worst, that Sansa 'deserves' Winterfell because she suffered the most abuse, that the only ending that makes sense for Sansa is being back in Winterfell because she suffered so much etc. And yet according to these very same folks, Sansa is going to roll up her sleeves and tirelessly work to lead the people of the North, while Arya is going on a cruise ship vacation and vlog about the new cuisine she is trying out...Hey, maybe after having suffered the most of ALL characters in the series, maybe it's Sansa who deserves the cruise ship vacation, you know?

We have the author himself saying that Arya's harrowing experiences and journey through Westeros and Essos has aged her up so much that he considers the character older than some of the 40 year olds in the books! And yet there are still people harping on and on about tourist Arya ffs.

I personally think Arya will be in Winterfell at the end of the books, either helping her younger brothers Bran/Rickon lead the North or more probably as a leader in her own right.

Arya is a central character in the series, the female character with the most POV chapters. There's no way GRRM has one of his lead female characters end up playing a supporting role in her brothers or sister's story. No way.

The author has given her the character development in the books to lead the North. She has a hulking huge grey direwolf at her side - the sigil of house Stark. She is the lone Stark who has the Stark look. Her direwolf is named after the first Dornish princess who changed female inheritance in Dorne - a big clue for a character who has chafed against patriarchal restrictions on what women can and cannot do. I mean this is how we are introduced to Arya Stark in her very first AGoT chapter:

“The Lannisters are proud,” Jon observed. “You’d think the royal sigil would be sufficient, but no. He makes his mother’s House equal in honor to the king’s.”

“The woman is important too!” Arya protested. - Arya, AGoT

It's clear to me that her arc is heading towards her being the first Lady of Winterfell/Wardeness of the North, nicely bookending her arc which started with her wanting the woman to be as important as the man, arguing for equality when it comes to their house. That's how organic story telling and building a narrative actually works.

I am aware of the principal Internet forums about A Song of Ice and Fire and I really used to look at the American and English groups. Nowadays, the most important site is Westeros, but I started to feel uncomfortable and I thought it would be a better idea not to get to these sides. The fans use to come up with theories; lots of them are just speculative but some of them are in the right way. Before the Internet, one reader could guess the ending you wanna do for your novel, but the other 10.000 wouldn’t know anything and they would be surprised. However, now, those 10.000 people use the Internet and read the right theories. They say: “Oh God, the butler did it!”, to use an example of a mystery novel. Then, you think: “I have to change the ending! The maiden would be the criminal!” To my mind that way is a disaster because if you are doing well you work, the books are full of clues that point to the butler doing it and help you to figure up the butler did it, but if you change the ending to point the maiden, the clues make no sense anymore; they are wrong or are lies, and I am not a liar. - GRRM

#Arya Stark #Fandom wank

[lesbianutena]

one thing i am so grateful for in utena is that it refuses to demonize gender nonconformity or butchness… so many stories with a character like utena would present her wearing the rose bride gown at the end as a Positive Good because “Let Women Be Feminine!!!! and wear dresses and makeup and skirts!!!!!! #girlboss!!! 👛👗🎀🛍💄”

it is rare to find media that includes masculine women/gnc people to begin with, but it feels like stories which present our existence with any nuance beyond “just a phase” or “toxic masculinity” or “man hater” are all but nonexistent.

and yet the first arc culminates in utena trying to conform, trying to be normal, trying to be feminine — not because some teacher dress-coded her with a written rulebook, not because she realized that her gender-nonconformity was ~a phase~, but because she was manipulated in a much subtler and damaging way. she was told over and over again that she could never be good enough as a “prince”, that she could never have agency or fall in love with a woman or try to protect the people she cares about, because she’s a “girl”. and that arc resolves thanks so much to the love of other queer women: wakaba loves her enough to call her out when in any other story she would be giving her the “makeover”. juri gives utena her sword from one gnc person to another when in any other story she’d be the mean bullying lesbian who’s #notlikeothergirls. and instead of becoming the image of a good straight gender conforming woman, utena uses that queer love to reclaim her true self.

i love utena because she’s not a good, palatable gnc person. she’s not the palatable tomboy that’s gender-conforming in every way that matters and especially not a Gross Yucky Lesbian. she presents masculine. she acts in ways that are scolded (and admired!) for being too “boyish”. utena self-refers using masculine pronouns. she’s called “girl-boy” in a way that felt very true to my own experience growing up. she wants to be a prince, not a princess, and eventually she abandons those gender roles completely. she falls in love with a woman and loves her enough choose her, and enough for her to save herself. i just love utena.

#just. ugh #i feel like this is such a common experience for queer folks too #like trans people lesbians butches etc etc etc #rgu #rgu spoilers #rgu meta #utena tenjou #revolutionary girl utena #shoujo kakumei utena

[katapotato55]

How to write a good metaphor

yall seemed to like my post on "how to write good horror" so i figured i should make another one of these.

1- do. not. explain. the. metaphor.

don't.

"oh but how will the audience know my deep and meaningful message- "

SOME PEOPLE WONT GET IT. if you explain what you mean then suddenly the metaphor won't be deep anymore. it becomes a generic forced message.

i know you are tempted to make a character infodump about everything, fucking don't.

followup on this:

2- a good metaphor should potentially have multiple interpretations.

"but i don't want people to get the wrong impression of the story!"

then you either need to make damn sure its an elegantly written metaphor, or none at all. the death of the author is the idea that everyone has their own vision of a story they read, rearguards of authors intent. you need to come to terms with this or else you won't improve your writing skills.

you need to trust that your audience is intelligent enough to understand the metaphor on their own without bashing them over the head with it. sometimes people misunderstand meaning, it is a fact of life.

The game little inferno was thought of as a metaphor about pollution, in which later the creators went out to say it was actually about capitalism and wasting your life with things like exploitative mobile games. you just need make it SUBTLE and hope for the best.

3- The story/gameplay/etc should inform the metaphor(and sometimes reference real life examples)

To mention little inferno again, the "you must wait x amount of time for in-game item to be given to you" is a mirror of mobile games in the real world that use timers to leach money from you.

another example: analogue horror.

broken old technology is scary on its own, but many good analogue horror artists tend to use this to the advantage.

analogue horror can be used as a metaphor for dying trends and technology, like how in the 30's through 70's we used asbestos in the walls. Analogue horror makes a great parralel to this idea (see Blue_channel by gooseworx for a good example.) . the audience questions WHY this is on an old CRT tv and not just a smartphone, perhaps to imply this was an event that happened years ago.

undertale is another example, where most RPG's encourage you to fight and to level up, undertale uses this as a simple metaphor about obsessive control and being cruel to get an arbitrary achievement (i recommend the escapist's video on "why i didn't review undertale" on youtube for way better examples)

tldr: a metaphor is stronger if you lightly reference real life occurances and implement your metaphor in the medium presented.

4- the curtains are blue because they are blue.

not everyone is going to understand your metaphor

and not everyone is going to notice every single little metaphor you add to your story.

remember those teachers that would constantly stretch to imply something in a story is a metaphor and that the curtains are blue because of some deep metaphor for death and sadness and shit?

those teachers are full of it. ignore them.

metaphors are allowed to be simple. not every metaphor needs to be a hyper deep depth defying world changing thing. I could even argue a bunch of small metaphors connected to each other can be better than one big metaphor depending on your story.

relax. don't think too much about it because your average audience member won't.

5- study movies, tv, books, games, etc and understand why their metaphors work.

don't fall into that "the curtains are blue because of a deep message" English teacher mindset mind you.

"but how do i tell what is and isn't a metaphor?" you may ask

simple. trust your gut. you won't understand everything you come across but the human brain has a way of telling what is and isn't a metaphor in stories.

(spoiler about bugsnax)

I could argue Bugsnax is a metaphor about drug abuse and addiction. The characters have personality traits commonly associated with people vulnerable to drug addiction. An athlete, a hippy, a married couple going through a rough spot in their marriage with the threat of divorce, a mentally ill person with trauma and paranoia, etc.

It isn't obvious, many people may disagree with me, but you can't deny that there are signs i may be right.

(end of spoiler) the point i am trying to make: don't stretch to find a metaphor when you don't see one. if you are curious google other people's theories and make your own opinion. metaphors are hard and you will learn over time. and finally 6- do not ever do "it was all just a dream" or "the character is secretly in a coma" etc this applies to writing in general but it is still related to metaphors. the only time i have seen this done well is driver san francisco, but what it did right was A- make it so the players can guess ahead of time the mystery, such as the radio saying voices of your character in the hospital, or if you zoomed out you could hear a heart monitor. and B- it didn't completely un-do the entire story. that is my core issue with this trope. it either wastes your time un-doing the entire story readers worked hard to finish, or it is just nonsensical and terrible. "dora the explorer is actually in purgatory!" "spongebob is a metaphor for the 7 deadly sins!" "ash is in a coma and that is why he never ages! " ooooor it is a cartoon and you are forcing meaning that doesn't exist in something that doesn't even imply it. the world being a bit weird is not enough to be a metaphor for anything. If you want to make a good metaphor: do more effort than just slapping a lazy "it was all a coma" thing at the end. Like horror, stuff like this needs to be built up properly. also consider authors intent. I understand death of the author and all of that, but do you really think a retired marine biologist made spongebob to be a complex metaphor about sinners in hell ? (rip Stephen Hillenburg btw. we didn't deserve him.) thank you for reading, hope this helps. and please, learn to understand the tropes of metaphors before you attempt to make the story of a generation. edit- adding a couple more things i forgot 7- "the darkness is going to destroy the land or whatever!" i see this used all the time. spooky wookey dark shadowy bits going to destroy a land and is the hero's generic bad thing to fight. stop it. it is not a deep and complex metaphor about depression or whatever the hell you are on about. its lazy and stupid. 8- a story should stand up on its own regardless if audience members understand the metaphor or not I don't like Gris. it is a very pretty game with lovely visuals But also the entire story is just the main character moping about artistically and shit and go on about how artistically sad and dramatic this all is. if i don't understand the story without understanding the metaphor, then your story and your metaphor sucks. an example of a metaphor done well: spiritfairer without the metaphor, it is a simple game about running a traveling boat. even if you didn't care too much about the deeper meaning it is a cute story and the gameplay is fun (spoiler) if you look deeper, it can also be taken as a metaphor about greif and learning to accept your loved ones will one day die. things like the boat being filled with empty houses you can't remove is a good example of this. (end of spoiler) your story needs to stand up on its own to be good. don't use a metaphor as a crutch.

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