#as well as andreas specifically but that would be explained in the post i'd think

[whatudottu]

The inner struggles of a worldbuilding nerd: “Just because an alien species looks similar to an Earth animal doesn’t mean they’ll function the exact same as them, especially if said species is sapient, and assuming such is pretty biased and Earth-centric” vs. “Haha giving alien species based on Earth animals biology and behaviors similar to their respective animal and exploring how said biology and behaviors might influence their society and culture go brrr”

That's why you go to a mental randomiser and pick the weirdest shit you can and pair it with your selected species; case in point, my talpaedans = armadillos + ants headcanons!

I have certainly fallen into the pitfall of 'base a series of headcanons of alien that resembles an Earth animal USING the animal as a guide' but I am no stranger to making things alien (another I have are orishan = clam + cockroach headcanons). Heck, if I either can't think of an animal or an idea I had for a more animalistic alien may end up treading on bad ground, I pull out a random sociological thing humans have done. I mean I can't think about vulpimancers without thinking about politics, both on Vulpin and outside of it, discussing local matters to international matters to straight up intergalactic matters and the ethics of Null Void imprisonment (you cannot tell me all the vulpimancers in there were even given a trial let alone a fair one).

It's good to start with a base that has happened before - convergent evolution and everything, very good template to work from - and you can pick and mix whatever the heck you want to make your alien, well... alien-! Either you randomise the heck out of it, you have a very specific idea that would help expand the worldbuilding, or you just want to orchestrate how you can logic something out and connect the dots later, it's really fun to just ramble the shit out of alien biology.

#ask #anonymous #xenobiology #worldbuilding #this time without a world directly attached lmao #i was literally thinking about some talpaedan headcanons today- and not just ant stuff #as well as andreas specifically but that would be explained in the post i'd think #petrosapiens my beloved i have made them quite reptilian but also partially buggy (exoskeletal and such) #also have got some cybertronian bug stuff but i'm not the first person to think of bug bots and also they're not animal-based aliens #i also have like a whole political history of vulpin from the introduction of the tortugan up until modern day that i have in dot points #not quite written to be a full ramble post but definitely got the points down ready for rambling #something something really like grabbing animals at random yada yada putting them to aliens that are vastly dissimilar is really fun

[rudjedet]

Totally hate to be a bother if there is already a post you’ve made about it, but I couldn’t seem to find any in the FAQ. I want to delve into writing historical fiction for Ancient Egypt eventually, as I’ve got an idea for a paranormal-romancey-esque story, and I want to make it as historically accurate as reasonably possible (since the protag is an Egyptologist herself). Do you have any advice for depicting it realistically/researching in particular areas or in any specific books? Thank you! :)

Nah no worries, I haven't answered anything like this specifically yet! So recommendations for historical accuracy and realistic depictions depend on a few things, the first of which is the time period of ancient Egypt your story deals with. I don't know if you've already made decisions about that, but the easiest Dynastic period to set it in would be the New Kingdom, since we have the most material from that time period. Any earlier than that and you have to deal with gaps in our knowledge, as well as a very different kind of Egypt from the image popular media paints (no horses or khepesh swords, for example).

There's a book I like to recommend for research into daily life specifically for fiction writing, which is Life of the Ancient Egyptians by Eugen Strouhal. It has a somewhat too optimistic tendency which borders on romanticising at points, but not in a way that would lead to awkward or harmful representations of the ancient Egyptians. Personally I think it's well-suited as a research work for fiction writers because it places emphasis on the good and human things. When you read it you get a good sense of ancient Egypt as the very verdant, very rich society it was, as opposed to the "dusty barren sand cities" image Hollywood likes to concoct. So in a sense, it takes the kind of liberties I'd like more writers writing about ancient Egypt to take.

Other than that, assuming you're wanting to write New Kingdom (though depending on whether you're writing about elite or non-elite), I'd see if you can pick up Andrea McDowell's Village Life in Ancient Egypt. It deals with the worker's village of Deir el-Medina and life there. Caveat: DeM isn't a "normal" Egyptian village but we do have a ton of information on it, and it isn't necessarily a bad thing to base any fictional villages on this one imo.

From a personal point of view, I can recommend writing about the Middle Kingdom, despite the relative lack of material. Wolfram Grajetzki has some excellent and accessible (some for free) overview works that deal with this period that will give you a solid base. The Egyptian Middle Kingdom, and Middle Kingdom Studies (various authors) are great.

No matter the time period, I'd supplement with Gillian Vogelsang-Eastwood's Pharaonic Egyptian Clothing for the all-important "what are these people even wearing" question. imo, that's a big one in terms of realism. The same goes for Steven Snape's The Complete Cities of Ancient Egypt.

Now, as for the realistic portrayal of an Egyptologist character, my one big tip would be: do. not. infodump.

I know that sounds like just bog standard advice for any genre of book, but in this case there's a second reason to avoid them: having your Egyptologist main character infodump is the way to mark them out as not an actual expert. Not because we never talk about ancient Egypt in real life (we do), but because we don't really talk to ourselves about Egypt in the way of a novel infodump. Absolutely have them explain something super specific to another character, whilst forgetting that the other character doesn't have the full context to understand most of what the fuck they're saying though, that's something we do all the time. Just don't infodump basic concepts, that's half the job done when it comes to realistic portrayals of Egyptologists.

And as always, my evergreen tip: do your research, and then take the liberties your narrative needs to make it the best version of your story (while keeping respect for the ancient Egyptians themselves in mind, but I don't think I need to tell you based on the way you asked this question).

Lastly, I can't technically make any promises considering my health/energy for the foreseeable future, but if there's anything you want me to proofread, feel free to ask!

#egyptology #writing #writing advice #forgot to mention: vogelsang's book is no longer for sale but i have a PDF I can link you!

[hoefette]

All the petty things I hate about fate!winx and their shitty universe/world building because

I'd added most if these in tags of other posts but I'm still so mad lmao

The way characters, Aisha and Mrs Dowling specifically make references to explicitly human or American things like instagram and Harry Potter

These people are from a different dimension for ffs why are they concerned with or are even aware of this very earth-specific shit? Do they teach earth classes at school over there?

I understand not wanting to have them be oblivious so Bloom wouldn't have to explain it to them, but it simply could be ✨omitted✨

Why would you go out of your way to date your work like this lmao ew

Ms. Dowling calling Tinkerbell an air fairy.. I cannot breeve with the stupidity why did they keep that in there

Why is Ms. Dowling.. the headmistress.. teaching classes? Where are the other teachers?

We ended up with a trio of antagonists (I guess you could call them that?) by the end of the season anyway so why not give us the trix, why have the characters play double roles as friends of our protagonists and also the villains/bullies? They clearly wanted a delinquent trio, in which case they could've gender bent the trix if they wanted to keep all the unnecessary sexual tension.

It just feels like the production team was lazy, they didn't want to hire more actors, they didn't want to bother with making the world immersive or lived in or believable at best, they just didn't give enough of a fuck

They wanted to make this show and attatch Winx to it for.. what? Like did you even google the main plot points? The abridged version or sparknotes to get details on the very literal, basic characteristics of our main characters or their roles or the world they inhabit????

It lacks wonder and intrigue.. I mean Bloom moves to another dimension, a school for fairies and we don't see her marvel once at anything.. and that's because she might as well have been in Switzerland because she's in exactly the same environment she would've been in over there anyway.

They could've said Alfea was in Europe and I'd believe it because nothing about the setting makes it feel otherworldly. I'm sorry but I'm not impressed.

Why do the teachers and graduated specialists communicate via facetime ?? In the magic dimension. ??? Why do they text each other and those texts then appear on screen like .. oh look, like a bad netflix teen movie ????? HELLO ??? it's the way technology and magic could've blended in so seamless into the world THE WAY IT WAS ALREADY DONE/SHOWN. Missed opportunity. it just takes you out of it imo every time you see the ugly, bland, gray text bar. Some fucking flavour pls I'm begging

How stupid the specialist must feel clonking around with the skinniest shreds of armor, plastic swords on their backs and battery powered flashlights and cellphones in their bags. R we larping?? I know I'd be laughing and asking why we hadn't already come up with something more effective .. idk like guns. I'm surprised I ain't see one gun in there.

In the beginning Ms. Dowling says some nonsense about fairies having lost the ability to transform to explain why there are no wings, which means they could've transformed before. So are we to assume that this supposed to be set in the time proceeding the original then?? Because something is not adding up with where they should be as a magical society technologically if that's the case

How does the production team want to keep the dark academia vibes with torches lining the walls and also want them to be face timing each other, presumably from miles and miles away in the dark forest???

Pls pick an aesthetic and stick to it everything was so unnecessarily dark. Where do they charge their phones since it's the only device we see that is the slightest bit modern and dont fucking tell me they charge it with magic I will punch you in the face

Why is there only one major monarchy that we are shown? Why are Solaria the only ones contributing to the efforts to defend the school and where is this mysterious battalion we never see lmaoo it's all so bad its laughable.

Is this set in the kingdom of Solaria? And why does the queen of an alleged interdimensional superpower monarchy pull up in black SUVs??????????? Why does she pull up with Andreas?? Is he not the king of Erakleon?? Where are his soldiers and his battalion and just?? Huh!? The world just feels empty like nobody lives here fr

Are we supposed to believe that the specialists get paired up with fairies just as a normal occurence and that they have to 'trust each other' and not because the plot demands it suddenly half way through when all we've seen so far are the fairies doing normalish school and homework, and the specialists outside, being physical everyday all day. This was never even implied that they'd have to work together apart from when we see the faculty as youngins with Rosalind. But even then.. it's like well why are they even together lmao? Is this a special team formed from Rosalind’s protégées? Were they formed after graduating from Alfea or what is this?? Are they the ONLY team of specialist/fairies hunting every single burned one?? What?

Are we now supposed to buy that Musa is being switched to 'support' because that's where her strengths lie and not in combat?? Are we supposed to believe that these girls know hand to hand combat?? When was this established? We see Terra wrapping some baby vines around a dude and I'm sorry is that the practical application of her power? Is this what the fairies are supposed to do once they graduate? Or is it just a switch in curriculum because of the threats outside the barrier?? This is never made clear.

Because if not then what's the point of this?? Why do they suddenly have endless classes together when the expectation was never set for the fairies to be like soldiers or out in the field fighting ?

Where exactly are they supposed to be what was the purpose of including Aster Dell and why is it a joy ride away from Alfea lmao?? Where Bloom is from and also not from?? Plot pls make it make sense

Why are fairies from another dimension vaping or smoking weed?? They are not human so why are they engaging in specifically human vices, yol couldn't come up with anything else to characterize 'delinquents'?? Very lazy very como se dices.. no effort. Nothing a little more spicy yol could invent, at least change the name and some properties holy shit did yol even try ??

So its fairies everywhere, having a lil party in the east wing of a phat castle.. and they are playing beer pong and dressed in t shirts and jeans..

Can you hear me screaming? Can you hear me vibrating with rage?

Not one floating decoration or magical anything in sight. Just purple lights and subpar vibes

Stella's costume design: tragic. I won't discuss further because we don't have the space or time but just know that it was absolutely atrocious and I hated it. Giving very debutante vibes

The entire budget going to that lame transformation sequence that was not a transformation sequence and those horrible, barely-there fire wings

Edgelord bloom and all her fucking leather jackets. Why do 30 yo, white cis men think girls exist in a binary? They could keep her earlier characterization and make her a hothead.. Bloom literally screamed herself into a couple power upgrades in the original come ooonnnn

Let girls be feminine without it being a character flaw what is wrong with yol its 2021. They could make her more mature, more angsty or whatever the hell else and not style her like that

The way Aisha's abilities flipflop between episodes and scenes. Very inconsistent. One minute she's struggling with a drop of water and the next she is moving an entire body of water for her bestie Bloom to fake transform because the plot demands it. Why even add in her struggles at all if you're just going to ignore it?

Why was Stella with them in that scene? She didn't do anything literally.. Aisha pulled the water and she did .. nothing.

Who the fuck is Rosalind? Why would they add her in,, to add nothing to story? The company of light was a thing, they could've plucked one of them hoes to be the antagonist. Why did the winx club need their own Delores Umbridge? Valtor was right there if you wanted an evil educator type character.

The camera work was so bland during the down beats, stagnant and fixed during a fairy party and erratic and ugly and disorienting during the fight scenes

I'm not getting over the fairy party because it was a good opportunity for the production and everyone else to show the differences between where Bloom was and where she is now but instead it just looks like a regular teen high school party?? This could have been set in Switzerland fr.

Everyone's just kind of standing?? You mean to tell me these people are from all different places in the magical dimension and their customs are all the same? They all throw parties like this ??

White and flavorless I am very bored

I guess the main question or takeaway I have is just.. who is this for? Because everyone, including the showrunners keep saying that it's for us, the fans of the original. But apart from the characters sharing some names, there are really no other similarities. So again, who was this supposed to appease or placate or satisfy? Because it sure as hell wasn't the winx club fans.

Overall, this feels very much like something I wrote and probably published on ff.net when I was 13 because I thought girls couldn't be taken seriously if they liked pink, and injected angst into everything that didn't need it and had no idea how to structure scenes or dialogue. It's just bad, objectively and N*tflix will keep making shit like this because apparently some people have bad taste??? Idk yol, be easy

#im never gonna stop i dont care i dont care #and i dont even usually make my own posts i just be reblogging and vibing #but im passionate abt this because he originak was the reason i wanted to learn how to draw #it was the reason i wanted to learn how to write and tell stories #it shaped a lot of shit for me because it was the very first one of its kind id ever seen #i ran home from school to watch it and argued with my friends about who got to be flora #i forced them to make cardboard wings with me and to perform the opening song during a school talent show #thank god we didnt get to perform otherwise we would all have died of embarrassment in hindsight #but ye i just hate to see things that obviously are very dear to a lot of people be treated with such casual indignity and its a disservice #a disservice to the fans and to the people who had probably want to create it as a passion project #to the people who spent hours and hours in rewrites and fanart amazing fanart and post series continuations #no one is saying the original is sacred and cannot be touch #this fandom actively calls out the bullshit rainbow has done and continues to do to the characters we love.. i havent spoken to one fan who #doesnt have an alter dedicated to their downfall. we found a piece of ourselves in these gorls and they were stripped and caricatured and #played for laughs so netfilx can make money and its just very upsetting to see. #so again fuck you brian young fuck you ignio and rainbow and fuck whoever the costume designer was #mine #text #fate winx club #fate: the winx saga #f:tws #winx club

[karazor--el]

Melissa Benoist explains why directing Supergirl's Lex-centric hour was 'daunting'

Melissa Benoist explains why directing Supergirl's Lex-centric hour was 'daunting'

Supergirl

Supergirl definitely isn't complaining about her latest team-up with Lex Luthor.

This Sunday, The CW's Supergirl returns for the final run of season 5 with a Lex-centric episode that marks Melissa Benoist's long-awaited directorial debut. Benoist has been dying to get behind the camera since season 3, but wasn't able to until now because of scheduling conflicts. Luckily, it seems like it was well-worth the wait because she got to helm an episode that diverges from the show's usual structure and perspective, which she admits was initially quite daunting.

Cleverly titled "Deus Lex Machina," the flashback-heavy hour essentially starts on day one of the post-"Crisis on Infinite Earths" world and sheds light on all of Lex's (Jon Cryer) behind-the-scenes machinations we haven't been aware of — from manipulating Eve Teschmacher (Andrea Brooks) and his sister Lena Luthor (Katie McGrath), to pitting Supergirl against Leviathan. In other words, it's very similar to season 4's "O Brother, Where Art Thou," except this time around the criminal mastermind is trying his hardest to keep his Kryptonian hatred in check so that he can focus on defeating Leviathan.

Below, Benoist walks EW through her experience in the director's chair, working with Cryer, and the challenges of handling such an exposition-heavy episode.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: What jumped out at you from a directing perspective when you read the script for the first time?

MELISSA BENOIST: Considering it was the first time in the director's chair for me, I think I'd be remiss if I didn't say how terrified I was. That just went without saying, that I was scared, but reading it also had this thrilling aspect to it because I was going to get to be the one to visualize it and make sure the tone was coming across. I guess only since season 4, we've had these episodes that were a departure from the story and took a step back and gave us Lex Luthor's point of view, and this is one of those episodes. So, I couldn't believe how lucky I was that I got to be the teller of that particular story for our season, where we recap the entire season from Lex Luthor, Jon Cryer's eyes. And I was very excited to get to work with him closely in an actor-director relationship. Aside from the initial terror, and wondering whether or not I was capable of doing it, I was so excited and immediately just imagining what I wanted to do and thinking of shots.

How would you describe the tone of the episode?

Tonally, it's difficult on these kinds of shows when an episode is from the perspective of our, for lack of a better term, villain, and he is one of the ultimate villains in the DC Universe. So I wanted to keep the tone light enough while still having that dark, macabre Luthor feeling to it. I wanted it to still feel like an adventure, like an episode of Supergirl, and he was the hero for our episode, whether you hate him or not. But it's hard to hate Lex Luthor, he's so delicious.

By nature, this episode is very expository because it’s explaining the season from his perspective. What challenges came with that?

I'm glad you pointed that out because that exact point was the most challenging aspect and the most daunting one because there are a lot of time jumps that let the audience follow Lex as he [learns about Earth-Prime]. It starts the day after Crisis. So in the way that we had Kara Danvers wake up after Crisis in her loft and it was this new world, Earth-Prime, this is Lex's telling of that. So, we time jump a lot, there's a lot of exposition, exactly, a lot of themes that we had to catch people up on. So that was a little daunting to make sure that yes, it was expository and informing the audience what they needed to know to understand, but also keeping it moving and entertaining and not just feeling like an encyclopedia, if you will.

One thing that stood out to me when I watched it was that it’s mainly built around scenes in which Lex is having one-on-one conversations with someone like Eve and Lena, often manipulating them. What was it like to work with Jon on those scenes?

I mean, that was the dream. Working with Jon Cryer, I felt so spoiled rotten that he was the primary actor I was getting to work with, and the cast surrounding him too, because we get to see Eve Teschmacher and Lillian Luthor [Brenda Strong] make [their returns]. All these characters that kind of surround his orbit, they're all so deft when it comes to those kinds of scenes where it's really wordy and talkative. He's an evil genius and manipulative, so I had to really keep track of who he was manipulating when and for what reason [Laughs] to make sure that each scene was really clear where it fit into his master plans and where it was taking us, and how it affected the super friends. But working with him, he's just so smart and far more experienced than I as an actor. Honestly, I felt bad. I didn't feel like I really needed to give him that much direction. It was more just playing, which I loved, and that's part of the reason I love being an actor — when you get to really just bite into the words and what's on the page and really play, and there's no wrong answer within the arc you're telling.

The photos from the episode revealed that Kara and Lena finally share a scene together, which they haven’t done since the 100th episode. What can we expect from their interaction?

I don't know how much I can say about how Lena and Kara interact, but they do and it's the first time we've seen them interact in a while. I think people will be excited to see the scenes between Kara and Lena, and that Lena does play a big part, obviously, because this episode revolves around her brother. There's quite a bit of Lena Luthor in there.

A lot of Arrowverse stars have directed episodes: David Harewood, Katie Cassidy, and Caity Lotz. Did you get any advice from them?

Of course. David Ramsey, as well has been really helpful. These shows are so specifically involved as actors already, the schedules are grueling, we’re there so much and we all get to know these so well. we spent a lot of time with each other on a crossover, so I did get quite a bit of advice from David of course. He gave me book recommendations and just every day we would kind of talk, especially when he was directing. I got to watch him and he has such a great fun, positive directing vibe about him. I didn't get to talk to Katie Cassidy much about it, but everyone was very supportive and excited and everyone has great ideas.

How did you feel your experience as an actor influenced your directing approach?

Well, I think, just innately, we approach the script a certain way just without even thinking about it. Thinking about tonally what emotions are there or what is driving a character, our objectives and our goals. But more than that, just for this show specifically, I feel like it's become a second skin and I've spent so much time with the characters, not just the ones I play. So it’s almost a little unfair because since day one, I've just seen how each character's arc has progressed and changed, and grown. So that really informed my approach to it all. And really we all just want to tell good stories, and that was my main focus the whole time.

Supergirl airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on The CW.

EW.

#supergirl