#i apologize to everyone for putting this massive post on your dashes but i have THOUGHTS OKAY

[bringmefoxgloves]

I saw your tags on the Daniel Matthews post and honestly I hadn’t even thought about parallels between Daniel/Gideon and Eric/John…but I’m thinking about it now…*holds out microphone* care to elaborate further?

okay sorry had to go drink some water, get out of pjs, start some laundry, make oatmeal, slice up an avocado, discuss the world and news with my parents, get a nice lil iced beverage for myself (an iced chai latte), and eat the last brownie from a family picnic i didn't attend. listening to no reptiles by everything everything on repeat LET'S GO

so like. this gets long. i should put it under a read more but fuck it. I actually slept last night and woke up before 5am, and have now been up for six hours already, so you're all gonna suffer through this as well. welcome to hell aka my brain on saw brainrot.

This is also kinda based off my tags on this post as well.

But like I said in that post, Saw is about families, made and unmade. It's also about self perception, legacy, and continuation.

John Kramer, in a metaphorical sense, is trying to rebuild his family. He lost Gideon, and he will never have a child of his own flesh and blood, so he improvises.

You can very easily see Amanda, Mark, Lawrence and Logan (but we don't want to talk about him and for good reason) as surrogate children. We joke about this being the worst murder family in the world a lot, but they are in a sense, a family. They're followers of Jigsaw in the real sense, but daughter and sons of him in a spiritual sense, a succession and legacy. And those children, I believe, are his attempts at replacing Gideon in his life.

But like any father with children, John has expectations of them. He wants them as impartial judges, as merciless executioners of his will and his philosophy.

They fail him.

Amanda, who is angry and too emotion driven, too in love with and hopeful for humanity to judge them without letting her feelings get involved. She is too much like a daughter, wanting her father's love and attention above all else. Which disappoints him. John has no love to give her, and has given as much instruction as he thinks necessary. He tests her until she fails, until she breaks and is laying on the floor dead before him in his final act on earth and alive.

Mark, who is in no way impartial, who departs from John's will and directives, who imposes his own overwhelming will on this broken family. He is too much the Cain, the killer of his sister. Too much Nero, killing his mother, Jill, and burning down the kingdom. Too tyrant and consumed with his own passions, but still a perfect mirror for John because he's too much John. John has no choice but to cut the tall poppy, to put down the rabid dog.

Then, there's Lawrence. Lawrence who does follow John's directions, but is in the end, a simple shell, broken beyond repair and an automaton with no heart in contrast to Amanda's too much. He follows, he obeys, he cuts and stitches up those wounds, he bends his will and his passion and his drives to John's unlike Mark. But he's a ghost, a caricature of John and his reputation. Lawrence, the man, never made it out of that bathroom, but Lawrence, the dutiful set of hands, the cutting sword, the walking insurance policy, did.

And, if you include him-Logan. Who is lost to the wilds of the greater world, to war and battle with no bearing on the insular familial cycle of Jigsaw's legacy. He never comes back, and John never wants him back, he has his hands full with the others.

All these willful and vengeful and ungrateful children, who do not accept the gifts John presents them, the paths laid out for them.

But there's the child that never arrived.

Gideon, his unborn son. Gideon, Hebrew for warrior, feller, one who cuts down. Gideon is there in John's mind, constantly, the measuring stick up against which all these children made by his hand, by not by his blood, are judged. Plan upon plan was laid out for Gideon. He was suppose to be John's legacy, his way to outlive himself. He was suppose to be born in the year of the Pig, a child filled with the dreams and hopes of his parents, but never was one to grow up and break their hearts.

He can remain everything John Kramer wanted because he was never alive, never realized fully in all the complexities of every living being. He was the perfect child and could make no mistakes, couldn't rebel.

And that brings us to Daniel.

Daniel is selected, chosen, to be the central figure in the nerve gas house. Daniel, Hebrew, God is my judge, except in the world of Saw, John Kramer is god, isn't he? He is chosen because, in John's eyes, he breaks his father's heart and yet still is the apple of Eric's eye. The nerve gas house is to temper Daniel, turn him into a purer version of an already largely innocent child. He wants to correct the faults he sees growing in Daniel.

John sees Daniel and sees Amanda, the attention seeking child calling for a father's love. John sees Daniel, who holds the potential of both his sons, the wrath of Mark and the duty of Lawrence. Sees what Gideon could have been, and how a son can turn away from a father. He sees Daniel and wishes to show Eric what he sees in Daniel, with a less than successful result.

First, Daniel survives. He was always suppose to survive. John couldn't kill what is perhaps the closest analogue to what Gideon could have been, he never could. And this was suppose to be a lesson to Eric Matthews, to open his eyes to John's idealized expectations of what having a son, a legacy, should feel like.

But, Eric fails. Eric doesn't see what John wants him to see, because Eric was always going to fail. He was a failure from the outset, too consumed by his work, too angry and hotheaded and unwilling to bend. He is a narrative foil to John, two fathers with the same problems.

Eric wants Daniel to bend to him, to obey the rules and structures. Eric lays his hopes and dreams within his son, like John did with Gideon. Eric received his gift of a son, but he's wasted it, in John's eyes. Eric wants Daniel to be upright and better, greater, than him, but he doesn't lead by example.

But neither does John. John expects greatness from his children, but he's not a god, he's just a man, prone to mistakes, just like Eric Matthews, in the end.

They both fail their children.

#saw #cai says things back #saw meta #YAY I CAN START THAT TAG!!!! #i apologize to everyone for putting this massive post on your dashes but i have THOUGHTS OKAY #long post

[pearlsteven-au]

The future.

Hey y'all, mod Hayden here. I wanted to post an update on where things are now, and what will be happening moving forward. (Don't worry, we aren't giving up on the AU just yet!)

Going to put the rest of this under a "Read more" so this doesn't take up half of your dashes.

So, as I said above, we aren't giving up on the AU yet! The past 3ish years have been... Hectic to say the least. For both mod Eden and I. I won't go into details, but its definitely been one hell of a ride. As of right now, we still aren't in a spot where we can keep working on the comic just yet.

HOWEVER

We are getting closer! Though, there is no exact date on things yet, so please do not hound any of the mods about it. There are still things going on. Anyway, we want to thank you all so much for sticking around. Our ask box has been quite full for a while, and I've decided to address that. There have been plenty of questions revolving around things that may or may not happen later in the story, so if we haven't answered your ask, don't worry! Its most likely spoilers :)

As for all of the kind messages we've been getting, we've put something together to address all of those.....

(As always with tumblr, click for better quality!)

We want to thank everyone who has ever sent these kind messages (and apologize if yours isn't on here. Like I said, the ask box is incredibly full, but I did my best to track all of them down.)

There are some however that stuck out to me that I'd like to address individually, however I am also going to do that in this post as well for ease of access.

For starters....

Thank you so much! However, all of the art posted thus far has belonged to mode Eden. Mod Hayden hasn't done any of that.

(Yet....)

Ikr?! When mod Eden first showed me the design concept, I was immediately in love!

....yeah. (Mod Hayden legitimately laughed when they saw this, so I decided it needed to be included.)

I still smile every time I see this. @spudinacup (sorry for the tag, but I think you should see this) is one of if not the biggest SU AU creators out there. I can't speak for mod Eden, however you were and still are a huge inspiration to mod Hayden. Kind of what got them to take the jump into helping with this AU. As for your current situation, I sincerely hope things get better for you. Just know there's at least one person who would be there if you ever decide to return :)

(Whoops, not the point of the post. Dialing it back.....)

All in all, we just want to give a massive thank you to all of the fans of this AU, whether you stuck around or not. If you didn't stick around however, but you end up seeing this post anyway....

Hi. Welcome back :)

(mod Eden whipped up a quick sketch!!)

#mod hayden #mod eden #pearl steven au #steven universe au #dont worry #we're here #and we still love you all #and we're getting closer to coming back I swear #stay tuned (please)

[bunny-lou]

Hello!! Im the anon with the ask from 2 weeks ago about how much i love your fics and how autophobia kicked my ass into hyperfocus so bad i ended up napping on the floor in the hallway and almost missing class after reading it

I just want you to know that i really appreciate you taking the time to answer said ask because i was massively anxious about having sent it as it was all pretty much nothing but an absolute ramble and since i was exhausted as shit (hadnt slept for more than 40 hours at that point in time) i didnt even remember what exactly i had said in it until reading it again just now after seeing it answered on my dash (didnt even figure it out it was my fucking ask until halfway through) so i was kinda worried about having come across differently than intended and sounding idk entitled or some shit by talking about wanting to read more from you whenever and only of possible (id fucking hate to sound like one of those "next chapter right now!!!! I dont care that you have a life!!! Write the fucking chapter now!!!" readers) and i was more anxious ab it after time passed without getting an answer (ngl i was p much straight up stalking your blog every few hours the first few days then i saw a post from you about how tumblr eats your asks and calmed down quite a bit) but yeah anyway i just really wanted to tell you how much i loved ypur stuff and how strongly i feel about autophobia and your writing in general hopefully without making you uncomfy or coming across as rude or anything i hope i succeed in doing that at least kinda

But yeah jsyk youre the first desc account i started interacting with properly after randomly becoming hyperfixated as fuck on descendants and your stuff is responsible fpr getting me more into the fandom and into desc itself so yeah thank you

And also i just wanna say that when i first started autophobia i REALLY didnt think my autistic aroace ass would like it since i never was into abo in the traditional form of the trope but goddamn did i fucking love ypur fic despite any initial assumptions i had made about it i loved carlos' characterization so much and i loved everyones characterization so much amd the whole plot and everything i felt it was So well executed i often daydream of like alternate events for my favourite fics but for yours i can conceive no alternate plot development that id like more than yours its absolutely chefs kiss

Anyway sorry for thia absolutely fucking gigantic rant feel free to ignore me apologies if its too much and (tldr:) thank you for everything!!

(Original ask)

I'm the actual worst at responding on Tumblr, I'm so sorry.

Your asks, both the previous one and this one, are so sweet! I never mind long asks, though it does take me longer to respond to them. Seriously, if it takes me a while to answer, it's because most of my work days are 10-12 hours and I do not have energy to reply, it's a busy life!! My mobile Tumblr (which is what I normally use) does not give me any alert that I get an ask, but if I check my mobile tumblr, my desktop tumblr will not show that I have an ask because it thinks I saw the notification on mobile (which I don't). So also blame the wonky app lol.

There are months of effort that go into all my pieces on AO3, especially Autophobia, so messages like these that show that people know how much effort I put into my work are so rewarding. And I love Descendants, it brought my such entertainment and joy during harsh periods of my life, I am in awe if my writing helped you to love a fandom as much as I do!

And I've had a lot of people tell me that Autophobia is their favorite ABO fic or the fic that got them invested in that trope, which also means so much to me because ABO is my favorite AU!!

Thanks so much for taking the time to send me such a lovely letter, it makes me smile so much!!

#asks #anonymous #autophobia fic #people being sweet

[gremlinwithakeyboard]

Gonna ramble briefly about this one post which I've seen on my dash a lot today.

So like I get that it's important to take responsibility and apologize when you hurt someone because your emotions are all wonky and stuff. But at the same time, we spend so long trying not to do that. It sometimes feels like no matter how much effort we put into working on ourselves we always end up having to take responsibility for our actions in the end. Especially when some of the time stuff like that is caused by other people putting us in situations where that's likely to happen. Like this one time a few weeks ago when I was out at lunch with my parents and I embarrassed everyone by getting up and running halfway across the room whenever a wasp showed up. Like ok I was freaking some people out. Sorry about that. But at the same time there were lots of other places to eat around that would be much less waspy? It's not like this was a random occurrence that's never happened before, and it's not like this would be their only opportunity to eat outside at this cafe. Idk sometimes I just feel like a cat who has to apologize for scratching the person who kept petting me when I clearly didn't want to.

I guess I was mostly ticked off by a comment saying to "just try". As if we haven't been. What if I don't want to sometimes? What if I just want to put in a normal amount of effort instead of the usual massive amount? I guess until we can afford therapy and get fixed we should just withdraw from everything.

Also humanizing your symptoms and explaining it without mentioning your symptoms is great and all, but sometimes you need to at least mention it to get your point across. Like sure for some people, explaining how much the criticism hurt your feelings works. But there are a lot of people who would be even weirder about it, and take it a bit better when you say it's a symptom of x. It sometimes stops the "it wasnt that bad just get over it" type comments. It really depends on the person I think. Sometimes implying "I can't help it and I will do it again" is what's needed to get someone to leave you alone. And sure making your symptoms your whole personality is bad, but at the same time it's nice to have a name to put to things. It can be quite refreshing even to realize that what you've got going on isn't normal. And while describing the symptoms in normal person terms can be the start of helping with them, often having a proper name for it can help as well. Now you've got something you can google for advice for. I feel like if you try to fully ignore that it's a symptom of something then there's a danger of falling into the mindset of "why can't I just do it" or refusing stuff that could help because your experience is normal. I've been feeling a bit better about myself since acknowledging my executive dysfunction and forgetfulness (though I still struggle a bit with that one) as such instead of just being lazy.

Basically I think there should be a balance between namedropping symptoms and using that to excuse stuff and describing it all in terms of emotions and stuff.

#dash commentary #rant post

[ironwoman359]

Okay smart ass. How come you and the other big blogs aren't saying shit about the racism and other problematic things happening in the fandom? Specially when almost all of you were always ready to put your opinions on something as petty as fans criticizing Thomas for how he wears a skirt.

Well, I cannot speak for other ‘big blogs’ because, while I am friends with some of the people who run the blogs that you’re lumping into the ‘big’ cateogory, we are not a monolith. We don’t have a secret group chat where we all decide “today we shall talk about Thomas wearing a skirt and ignore racism on purpose.” I can offer speculation that perhaps more people quickly added their own two cents on the skirt thing because when compared to everything else that was going on in the world, both on tumblr and off it, it was such a simple thing to digest. Everyone was craving something simple at that time, so it was an easy, cathartic thing to jump in and say “hey, don’t be mean in people’s inboxes” and proceed to stop thinking about almost just as fast. Anyway, like I said, I can’t speak for other people, only for myself. So since you apparently want me to, I’ll speak for myself. 

“How come you and the other big blogs aren’t saying shit about the racism...”

I am white. It is not my place to speak over poc about racism. It is my place to reblog their posts, elevating their voices without commentary. That is something that I learned this year, and it is something I intend to continue to practice. I do recall making one post in early June, about not using the b/l.m tag on fanart posts, but after seeing several poc express that they wanted white people to talk less and listen more, I elected to make no more original posts about the subject and stick to reblogging without comment. If you’re looking for some good posts about racism in the sanders sides fandom, here are a few good ones. Though most of the posts about racism that make their way across my dash and subsequently onto my blog are less fandom focused and more broad. 

“...and other problematic things happening in the fandom?”

This is where I must repeat what I said the other day; this could relate to any NUMBER of things, and unless you are more specific I have no idea what you’re talking about. Are you talking about callouts for specific creators? There were two that happened over the summer that I know about, but A) again, those were about racism, so I chose not to muddle the conversation with my voice, and B) the works being discussed in those situations were works I was personally unfamiliar with, and thus did not feel like I had enough information to state an opinion publically (which again, as I understand it, would have been unneccessary additions to an issue I have no authority to speak on). 

So maybe you’re talking about the Twitter callouts, or the situation with the artists for the Storytime Madlibs video? Again, I felt as though I lacked sufficient need/information to make any statements about those issues. I have a twitter, but I barely use it, and don’t use it for the fander community at all. I had NO IDEA what any of that stuff people were talking about was, and still don’t, and since I don’t use Twitter and am not in that community, it seemed pointless to speak about. That is not to trivialize any hurt or harm that was caused or experienced during those events, just to say that I have nothing to do with them, which is why there’s nothing about it on my blog. (The joke I made about fandom twitter was supposed to be universal and relate to how all the twitter discourse these days seems to be a rehash of tumblr discourse from five years ago. Bad timing on my part I guess, oh well.) And, being 100% honest here, I don’t think I even watched the Storytime Madlibs video. If i did, I don’t remember much about it. I know that when it came out that the artists were underpaid, I reblogged one or two posts about how content creators should not be put on pedestals and are not perfect, but the rest of that situation was centered around the artists involved in that video, and since I was not one of them nor did I know any of them personally, it seemed like something that again, I shouldn’t bring up because I didn’t know anything about it. From what I understand, a solution is/was being worked out, but I haven’t heard anything recently. 

Or by ‘problematic things’ do you mean the existence of remrom, or unsympathetic sides, or how I’ve been in this fandom for over 3 years and our anon hate problem has never gone away, or the rampant purity culture, or the pervasive ageism, or literally a dozen other things, some of which are genuine issues and some of which are simply differing opinions being handled with all the grace of an elephant on roller skates? I’ve said it over and over again on this blog, but this fandom is not perfect. No fandom is perfect, but this one in particular has a reputation for being ‘pure’ and ‘wholesome’ for some reason; a reputation that it has never upheld by the way, because, shocker, fandoms are made of humans, and humans are not flawless porcelein dolls. We’re incredibly flawed creatures, and mistakes are inevitable. The sooner we all accept that and start treating our mistakes as an opportunity to learn and grow and do better next time instead of a signal that we were always worthless pieces of garbage that had no chance to do anything other than fuck up, the better off we’ll all be. 

And may I reiterate: look outside this website for a minute. There is SO MUCH going on in the world right now, every single one of us is utterly exhausted, we are suffering from a massive traumatic event, several massive traumatic events at once, actually, forgive me if my attention is spread a little thin at the moment. 

I’ll readily admit, there have been posts in the past several months that I’ve seen, read, and then not reblogged. Often this is because I feel as though the post that I am seeing does not have the full picture, and that it would be irresponsible to reblog only that part of the ‘discourse.’ And most of the time, I just don’t have the mental energy to go looking for the full story on whatever the Issue of the Week is. And I shouldn’t have to. Because at the end of the day, what I put on my own blog is my business, and no one else’s. There’s not some rule list that magically appears once you pass 1,000 followers that tells you what you must and must not do as a blogger. I am not required to weigh in on every little thing that happens in this fandom just because a lot of people in it follow me, and in fact, NO ONE is obligated to reblog something regardless of how many followers they have. If you are dissatisfied with the posts I make and/or reblog, you’re welcome to unfollow, there’s no rule that says you have to stay. But my energy is so limited these days, and I’m not going to devote what little free time and headspace I have to figuring out the ‘Correct’ take on fandom discourse.

I’d like to end by once again reiterating what many have said beffore, that racism is not the same thing as fandom discourse. It is always my goal to not speak over the voices of poc, and if in this post I have done that in any way, I’d like to apologize. Poc are welcome to DM me so that we can discuss it in any such instance, whether on this post or any other from the past or that comes up in the future. I am still working on unlearning racism, and know I am likely to make many more missteps on that journey. Stay safe out there everyone. 

#taylor talks #fanders #fandom discourse #racism tw #longpost #ask to tag #asks and answers

[morning-might-arrive]

Apparently the monster high fandom is rising from the grave again, so in celebration I wrote this instead of sleeping. I will be finishing it soon. Feedback is much appreciated! A series of misunderstandings involving a limousine and Spectra’s blog lead Jackson to the realization that he has way more friends than he thought.

Monday

It was 12:06 in the afternoon when Jackson Jekyll ascended the steps of Monster High. If he was quick enough, he could at least be on time for 5th period. He took his seat in Mr. Rotter’s AP contemporary literature class just as the bell rang and pulled out his class copy of 1984. The stoic teacher gave him a nod of recognition. A few minutes into the lecture, he felt a tap on his shoulder.

“You were not in creepateria this morning.” Abbey stated in her usual matter-of-fact tone.

“Yeah,” Winona added, “Ghoulia wanted to show you the new Fastpoint comic she got. She seemed really bummed you weren’t there. I can’t wait for you to read it though. It retcons the whole DeathCap Comics universe back to the way it was before the reboot. There was even-”

“Where were you, anyway?” Howleen hastily changed the subject.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry. We were at the doctor’s office. Something kinda came up unexpectedly.” Jackson replied, turning to face them. This caught the attention of Rochelle. She looked up from her book.

“Doctor? Is everything alright?” Concern dripped from her voice and Jackson instantly felt guilty. 

“Oh, yeah, everything’s fine. We’re in a little bit of pain, but…” Jackson’s eyes both glanced upward towards his helix piercing as he spoke.”It won’t be a problem for much longer.” The four ghouls glanced at each other suspiciously and then back towards Jackson. Abbey opened her mouth to challenge his last statement.

“Ladies! Mr. Jekyll! Do not make me have to separate you!” Mr. Rotter’s stern voice boomed from the front of the room. Jackson muttered a meek apology and turned back to his book, his ghoulfriends quickly following suit. He breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

40 uneventful minutes went by and then finally the bell rang, signaling the end of the period. “Don’t forget to read the next chapter!” Mr. Rotter yelled to his students, but most of them were too far away to hear. Jackson dashed to his locker and quickly called his human friend Chad.

“Hey! I just got back from the doctor’s office. Yeah, she told me to just take some Advil and just let it run its course.” unbeknownst to him, resident blogger Spectra Vonderguist was perusing the hallways looking for her next story.

“Completely done for, they said. Apparently there’s nothing they can do.” 

Spectra perked up at those words. She quickly pulled out her iCoffin and hid a few lockers down from Jackson’s. 

“It’s true. We don’t have much time left.” 

Spectra gasped and quickly snapped a photo of the scene in front of her. Did he say he was running out of time as in...death? Having always been a ghost, Spectra didn’t know a lot about death other than that it was something that happened to humans and to some breeds of monster. Even so, Jackson seemed a little early in his life to be experiencing it. In moments like these she really regretted snooping around in other people’s business, but she definitely had her blog post.

Tuesday

At 8:35 that morning, every phone in Monster High sounded at once as The Ghostly Gossip was updated. Conversations were halted and hallway traffic came to a standstill as several students stopped to check their phones. 

Normie’s days are numbered?

Yesterday, sources caught a phone conversation of one Jackson Jekyll in which he confessed to being told by a doctor that he didn’t have much time left on earth. This story is still developing, and more details will be reported as they come in.

Deuce Gorgon’s eyes scanned the short article again. “Dude.” Was all he could come up with after a couple of minutes. “What?” Asked Clawd Wolf as he approached his best friend. Deuce handed over his phone.

“Dude!” Clawd exclaimed. “If this is someone’s idea of a joke, it isn’t very funny.”

“I know.” Deuce replied in a stern tone that contrasted with his usual jovial one. “Maybe the ghouls know something about this.”

Clawd nodded and quickly scanned the hallway. Frankie, Cleo, Clawdeen, and Draculara were all crowded around Frankie’s locker. They were looking over Cleo’s shoulder at something on her phone and talking to one another in a hushed whisper. The boys headed toward the group.

“Hey, did you ghouls see that weird blog post?’ Deuce asked the group.

“Uh, yeah,” Cleo responded. “Why would Spectra post such a far-fetched tale? And expect anyone to believe it?”

“But why would she post something like this if it wasn’t true?” Clawdeen asked. “You know how seriously that ghoul takes her blog.”

“C’mon guys,” Frankie cut in. “Spectra’s gotten a story twisted around before, remember?”

“But-” Draculara started.

“But nothing.” All eyes turned towards a fast-approaching Heath Burns, flanked by Abbey and Ghoulia. “Look, if my cousins were dying, I would know about it. That ghost writer has lost her spark.”

“Am not so sure.” Abbey responded, giving Heath the side eye. “He was acting very strange yesterday. Said he did go to see doctor.”

Draculara burst suddenly into tears, clinging to Clawd and Clawdeen. “But that means we’re gonna lose Jackson and Holt-” the rest of her sentence was cut off by sobbing.

“There there, sweetie,” Clawdeen whispered, handing her best friend a tissue. “That does it. We have to put this whole thing to rest right now.

“Yes,” Abbey agreed. “We go ask Jackson.”

“Well we can’t just tell him we know,” Cleo insisted. “What are you even going to say? ‘Oh, by the way, Spectra eavesdropped on your private conversation yesterday and now there’s a story posted on the internet about you for the whole school to read, so can you tell us if it’s true?’ He’ll be mortified.”

Frankie stared at her. “That’s actually a pretty good point. Okay, we’ll meet in the library during lunch to find what we can about human death, so we at least know what we’re looking for. Sound like a plan?” The group collectively nodded. “Good. I’ll see you there.”

At 11:30 that morning, the group re-convened in the dusty confines of the Monster High library. Ghoulia moaned as she typed away at the computer in front of her. 

“Ghoulia says that when a human dies, they’re put into a box that is measured especially for them. The box is then put into a long black car to a place where it can be buried in the ground. It’s customary for the person’s box to be decorated with flowers, and then their family and friends are invited to a gathering to watch them be buried.” Frankie translated.

“Like some sort of going away party?” Clawdeen asked. “I’m glad i’m not a human. That’s pretty morbid.”

“But that proves it!” Heath exclaimed. “I’m Jackson’s family so if he were dying, I would definitely be invited to the going away party and so would my parents. This whole story is bogus.”

The other students weren't so sure yet, but they all let the subject drop for now.

At 2:56, the music stopped. Jackson blinked, suddenly aware of his surroundings. The sun beamed down and burned his eyes, and he quickly had to side step to avoid being trampled by the massive herd of students walking behind him. He’d apparently stopped in his tracks in the middle of the front walkway of the school. He looked down and discovered the cause of this to be his dead iCoffin. He plugged his phone into his portable charger and it blinked back to life. Underneath the time display was a message from Holt.

“You got any idea why D-low hugged me holding back tears this mornin? Did I miss somethin?” Jackson opened his phone to respond

“Um, no? I don’t think so. Did she say what was wrong?” He left it for Holt to find later and put his phone back in his bag. Not a moment passed before it began buzzing with a call from his dad.

“So anyway, I was all like ‘dude’ and she was all like-” Draculara recounted the events of the day and was suddenly cut off by her best friend Clawdeen, who pushed her back behind the doors to the school, pointing in Jackson’s direction. 

“You’re going to pick us up right?” Jackson asked into the phone.

“Okay. Yeah, we spoke to the florist yesterday. We picked out this really cool arrangement of Forget-Me-Nots. Pretty appropriate for the occasion, right?”

The two ghouls in hiding glanced at each other. “Do you remember what Frankie said? About humans getting flowers when they’re-”

“SHH!” the two turned their attention back to the human in question.

“Yeah, I know. Moms will be devastated. They said they won’t be back until 11 or 12 that night, and we’ll definitely be gone by then. But we’ll be sure to take a lot of pictures before we go!” He continued to the person on the other end. “Okay, see you in a few minutes.”

The girls gasped as Jackson put his phone away. Clawdeen pulled out her phone and pulled up the group chat. They had to tell everyone what they had just heard. 

#monster high #jackson jekyll #holt hyde #frankie #clawdeen #draculara #duece gorgon #abbey bomidable #Jackson and Holt use We instead of I #this is a hill i will die on

[faebriel]

ok ok I'm insane and couldn't pick one so have two (no need to answer both if you don't want to)

“You talk to him.” Not kindly, but he does.

“I’m used to him,” he shoots back. “I’m the only person who is.”

That makes Niki feel something, some uncomfortable tug in her chest. She mentally kicks herself. It’s not jealousy, she reminds herself, because despite the near-cliff jumping and the long nights without food and the nuclear fallout that has punctuated her last few months, being jealous of Tommy would be the least reasonable thing she’s allowed herself to be, maybe ever.

“You don’t believe me,” Tommy says flatly. “You never - eugh.” He cuts himself off with another ragged sigh, running a hand down his face. “Look, Niki, it’s - we were all together in Pogtopia, right? But I was there first. With him. And you didn’t see the start of it, it was horrible, and I’m glad no one else saw the beginning of it either but it was still just so shit and he kept saying all these terrible things about Tubbo and Fundy and you and,” he takes a shaky breath, “then, when I died, I saw him.”

Her breath catches in her throat.

Well, the voice in the back of her head whistles. If you were still wondering about all this afterlife bullshit, if you want to know where you’re going after your third life, here you go.

and

“You didn’t even - this isn’t about L’Manberg, Wilbur!” Niki shouts.

And then he stops, breathing hard, and he looks at Niki the same way he does whenever her voice is being drowned out in a crowd - the way he does when he wants to hear her, when he wants to know what she has to say.

“What else is there?” he asks.

Niki freezes. Stock still, unable to move, unable to breathe, ice threading its way through her gut, her chest, her shoulders, chilled down to the bone. With slow-dawning horror, she can feel hot tears welling up behind her eyes, sitting in her throat, threatening to spill over into a sob. She swallows - to keep her cool, to stay calm, to keep it together -

And then, something in her chest just snaps.

“You said you’d come back for me!” she cries, and her voice hitches on the lump of tears at the back of her throat and god, she sounds absolutely pathetic. Wilbur’s face softens immediately, which somehow just makes her feel even worse. “In Manberg. When Schlatt put me in prison, and you and Tommy were in Pogtopia, you said you’d break me out when it was safe. I waited for weeks , Wilbur. It was… it was horrible.”

“Niki…” a kaleidoscope of emotions flicker across his face, and he seems unsure which to settle on. “We got you out though, right? After the festival.”

“You looked for the button first,” she says quietly, and he stills.

Her sniffling sounds embarrassingly loud against the quiet background of night.

thank you sm!!! i’m gonna put these under the cut because they got a little long sorry (tw for discussion of suicidal ideation)

to preface: tommy is kind of the accidental but incredibly necessary invisible support beam for niki and wilbur’s making amends in bitter. niki cannot accept wilbur’s actions and apology without first acknowledging her own actions and making steps towards an apology, because otherwise it kind of falls flat? in that ending scene niki finally gets what wilbur is feeling and wilbur finally gets that someone else knows how he feels (it’s not perfect 100% yet, but…. that’ll get explored later)

onto the actual snippet! “tommy talks to wilbur - not kindly, but he does” was very important to me! tommy has stuck by wilbur ever since pogtopia, but the tragedy is that he is not equipped to deal with wilbur’s issues, and it shows. wilbur’s first stream after revival depicts this really clearly, where tommy tails wilbur around the whole time but insults him, is still stuck on calling him the villain, physically fights him at some point, etc. on one hand this isn’t healthy but on the other hand tommy is actually around, which is more than can be said for basically any other ally wilbur has had on the dsmp, maybe excluding his dad, who literally killed him lmfao.

this whole issue is exacerbated by the fact that tommy believes that he is the only person who properly understands wilbur, the only person who gets what happened to him, and feels like wilbur is generally his burden to bear. he failed to stop wilbur from both 1. hurting other people and 2. killing himself after the pogtopia-manberg war - and he doesn’t trust wilbur not to do either of those things again, so he’s stuck hovering around wilbur while wilbur is inadvertently setting off his own trauma and feeling responsible for any way he might fuck up and hating that but not wanting to leave. tommy’s memory isn’t perfect and he isn’t a perfect narrator, what he remembers from pogtopia the most were the scariest parts and that’s understandable but it means he’s holding wilbur to the worst expectations of behaviour (and he does so very vocally). the others showed up later, sure, but in tommy’s eyes he’s the only one who saw wilbur’s descent, and by the time they showed up wilbur had already changed irreversably. tommy tries to rationalise this by splitting the ‘different wilburs’ apart from each other in his head (he does this in canon too - there’s one quote from like late 2020 where he says he and tubbo need to keep on going for who wilbur used to be, not who he became, even though they’re,, the same person), and no one challenges that perspective, so he just keeps doing it even though it’s not healthy for him or wilbur.

and then limbo happened and, oh geez, THAT didn’t help jhfaskjjfsa

tommy is on a bit of a knife edge with niki in this fic. niki’s in this state of “ok, he’s annoying whatever, i’m moving on”, but all tommy knows is that she tried to kill him that one time, disappeared off the face of the map, joined a book club with two people who definitely do not like him, and now is just acting weirdly mellow and polite. she is not someone he wants near wilbur bc what the fuck is she gonna do? what is he gonna do? who knows. he’s frustrated that niki doesn’t seem to acknowledge how he’s feeling (especially bc once upon a time she would have been someone he trusted to acknowledge them - they were friends, they fought together) and he’s taking a big step by telling someone about his concerns here, especially bc tommy doesn’t really like talking about them at all. he wouldn’t be saying absolutely anything to niki if he didn’t truly believe she should stay away from wilbur, even if he’s wrong about him. (sometimes i think i write tommy as a little too emotionally mature here but it all goes out the window when wilbur’s brought up. idk if that balances it out)

ok onto niki: this is the first she has actually heard of limbo! she’s only just come around to the fact that resurrection is possible at all. death is kind of a touchy subject for niki both in general and re: wilbur in the fic - she’s coming off of a period in her life where suicidal ideation was, uh, a big thing (whether you want to read that into canon or not is subjective, that’s just the angle i went with in this fic). the sudden existence of a life after death, miserable as it is - and whether she really believes in such a place, when it only exists in tommy and wilbur’s words - that is a lot of information for her to absorb all at once. death is a weird connection point for tommy and niki here, coming right off of the fact that they’ve just acknowledged each other having those problems - tommy, out of, yknow, altruism, would very much like to keep niki out of that place, and niki is quietly reckoning with the fact that that is where she would have sent him. the concept of limbo from the perspective of a character with no experience of it, even secondhand, is so interesting to me like what kind of eldritch location would you feel like you’re living in asghjkl

(also - i gotta be honest the jealousy angle here but mostly when she’s talking later about dream not deserving wilbur’s companionship kinda came out after this post came across my dash while writing. whoops /j)

-

fun fact, this is the very first snippet of bitter that i ever wrote! all the way back in may!! this is like the moment of the fic - it's where the miscommunication that niki and wilbur have been having is shattered entirely - and so sticking the landing was uhhh kinda important to me lol.

wilbur's entire being in this fic is basically consumed by L'Manberg - he equates his self worth to it entirely. in his eyes, everyone (rightfully) hates him because of what he did to L'Manberg, because L'Manberg was corrupted and he himself with it, etc. niki tries to tell herself this, and while it definitely does form part of her issues with him, it was the betrayal that causes her this much pain - that he seemingly brushed her and their friendship off entirely when he supposedly left her for dead in manberg. because here is what we as the audience know: wilbur couldn’t leave niki in trouble when he heard her life was in danger, even when he was trying to find the button (pretty much the only thing he sees himself as having left at this point) and so he returned. here is what it looks like from niki’s perspective: wilbur told her to wait in manberg until it was safe to come to pogtopia, laid the place with TNT, went to blow up the place, and only returned when he couldn’t find the detonator (and then the first thing she saw him do in pogtopia was encourage the pit behaviour but that’s not what we’re talking about asdfgh). that is massive miscommunication and it’s been brewing between them for months - to make a quirky little reference to the title, niki has been carrying that anger with her so long it's gone bitter. it was never just about l’manberg with niki - not that anger, not her and wilbur’s friendship (hence the little flashback earlier in the fic, bc niki’s relationship to anarchism and statehood or statelessness juxtaposed with her friendships with wilbur and eret - she loves l’manberg bc she loves wilbur, but she loves eret too and those national ties don’t undermine that - is Real Interesting to me) - so when wilbur asks what else there could possibly be (because in his mind, what else could she have bothered staying around for?), she just fucking breaks.

“Niki freezes. Stock still, unable to move, unable to breathe, ice threading its way through her gut...with slow-dawning horror, she can feel hot tears welling up behind her eyes” - prose discussion time! heat and cold are two big throughlines in this fic - particularly for niki, cold is what she is. admittedly when i started with it i mostly wanted to subvert hot = angry and cold = dead but i kinda ended up enjoying this take on it for what it is instead of just as a subversion (also i like the idea of revived people running hot, their bodies r working hard to keep em going). she’s holding onto her feelings and refusing to deal with them, she’s frozen over. descriptions of cold are key to niki’s mental state throughout the fic - cold weight on her chest, feelings of frostbite when she and wilbur hug the first time, ice cold water during the dinner scene, waking up in the cold flat, etc. this was an attempt at describing a more visceral feeling of like, when you’re really mad and you can just feel the adrenaline running through your veins. always felt more cold than hot to me. when she starts to cry, the facade she’s been putting on is finally thawing out and cracking the ice she’s buried her feelings under. (also gives an excuse to write warm comforting hugs towards the end /hj). it’s a loss, it’s catharsis, it’s a whole mess.

and ofc this is all news to wilbur and he feels terrible, because as unintentional as it was, he really really hurt her - because the destruction of l’manberg fucking sucked but above all else wilbur hurt the people he loved because they loved him so much and not in spite of it, because they cared about him so deeply and his death was a massive blow to them. this hasn’t even dawned on him, because how could it? he respects deeply niki (lowkey respects her opinion more than his own at this point) so he has to listen, because it’s niki (“and he looks at Niki the same way he does whenever her voice is being drowned out in a crowd - the way he does when he wants to hear her, when he wants to know what she has to say” - because he does), and what she says fucking floors him. in his eyes, he failed her by putting her in danger and then by destroying her home - the idea that she valued him and their friendship so much flies entirely over his head until this moment, and he is forced to re-evaluate the mindset that has motivated him since… basically since pogtopia! the way i write wilbur is like… yes, he’s one of niki’s closest friends and he’s more aware of her insecurities and issues than most (which is why he does always take the time to listen to her, etc) but he does over-idealise her a bit. tbf, i think he does to some extent with everyone (calling tubbo strong on the anniversary stream, for example). also the fact that he really wasn’t around for niki’s lowest moments as a character! he still thinks of her the way she was in l’manberg - confident, steadfast, respected - and this moment shatters that for him as he realises exactly what effect he and his death had on her and everyone else, not just by his actions, but because they loved him and cared for him so deeply.

sorry that this got horrifically long!! and thank you so much for sending snippets in <3333

#ALSO SORRY THIS TOOK TWO WEEKS. LMFAO #asks #thespoonisvictory #dvd commentary #< i have successfully coerced a discord server into doing the dvd commentary on a regular basis and it is the BEST thing

[solesurvivorpaigeargot]

A Special Announcement: Introducing Monthly Subscriber Perks [BIG POST!]

Hey there Sketchy Friends, Followers, and Fans!

As you may know, I was recently agonizing over what perks I could offer to anyone who wanted to support me on a monthly basis via Ko-fi. There were a lot of suggestions from everyone, ranging from special commission slots to mystery-box sticker packs to be mailed out every month, and while some of these have been filed in the 'Maybe in the future' pile, I wanted to focus on ideas that

1 -- I KNEW I could execute on; stayed within skills I already had, and wouldn't need to do a lot of extra research for. 2 -- Wouldn't make excessive extra demands on my time; I'm already running myself pretty hard week to week between my online presence and being a homebody in meat space-- I can't put 100% into the community and still have energy leftover to make meals/take care of myself/look after my home. It just doesn't work that way. 3 -- Wouldn't have me making promises I couldn't keep; while this is kinda point 1 again, it's worth stressing. I didn't want to promise anything I couldn't deliver on and lose the trust of the community. It's just bad form.

With all of this in mind. I have come to a decision.

Starting in April, I will be recording all Sketchy Saturday sketches so it is possible to turn them into time lapse/speed paint videos.

Monthly subscribers will get 1 [ONE] sketch of their choice turned into a Time Lapse video per month, WITH A PERSONAL MESSAGE FROM ME IN THE OPENING.

If you'd like to know more about how this works on the nuts-and-bolts level, please keep reading! This cut is here to save people's dash from my long news posts XD

ANY amount at or above 1$ USD per month qualifies for this perk.

The personal message can be from me to you, or a specific dedication you'd like me to make to someone you know. I can also put it at the end of the video, if you'd prefer.

Monthly subs can request ANY sketch to be made into a video, not just ones they specifically requested.

Donators can get extra requests per 10$ they pledge per month-- so if you're donating 1$ USD a month, you're entitled to 1 video request per month. If you're donating 11$, you're entitled to 2, 21$ a month, entitled to 3, ect.

I will be keeping track of these requests-- both earned and used, via yet another one of my spreadsheets which will be publicly viewable, tracked with whatever screen name you're using on Ko-Fi.

If I start my monthly subscription to you NOW, will I earn a request for this month?

YES! I just haven't recorded any of the sketches so far this month, so you won't be able to use them till April.

Do unused video requests roll over?

Yes, but only month-to-month. You can collect video request credits all year long, but at 12:01 AM on January 1st, US Pacific Time, everything resets to zero. I'll be sending out messages on December 20th to remind people of remaining request credits they have, so monthly subscribers don't get screwed on their perks.

This includes if you support me for a few months, but then cancel your subscription-- you KEEP your earned video requests until you USE them, or the NEW YEAR rolls over.

Will you be mentioning the person who requested the video on that video?

Yes, in the video title, calling them the 'Sponsor' of the video, unless that person otherwise specifies that they'd like not to be named.

Can I request ANYTHING in the personal message?

Yes, so long as it is not in any way hateful or harmful. If you wanna use my platform to be an asshole, I don't want your money.

Should a message be deemed to be hateful or harmful after it has already been published, I may take the video down and re-upload it without the dedication. I take all responsibility for the messages uploaded onto my platform, and will apologize for any harm caused-- irregardless of its source. Video request credits may be given back to the requester on a case-by-case basis, after an investigation on how knowledgeable they were about the message being harmful. If it was an accident, the credit will be given back to be used again. If the harm was purposeful, the requester will be blocked and all their request credits considered invalid.

Where will the videos be posted?

YouTube! I already have an account all set up. The account has zero intent on being part of the Partners Program or seeking monetization-- it's simply a display space.

Will these videos be public?

YES! Your monthly donations and requests will be building up a whole new catalog of content for the whole community to enjoy!

Can the video I requested be made private?

Only until a specific date-- like you wanted to surprise a friend on their birthday, or [heaven help me] your dedication has a marriage proposal or baby announcement in it and you'd like the release of the video to be part of the event. I will not make a video permanently private and only provide links to the requester-- I will not fence content away from the community for money, I have an ethical issue with that.

Can I request the video have specific music?

Only if it's not going to set off the copyright bot on Youtube. Otherwise, I have a MASSIVE library of music that I can use from when I used to make time-lapse videos all the time, all sourced from the website OCremix.org -- they're remixes of video game music, kinda like Fanfiction.net but ONLY for games and SPECIFICALLY for transformative works of music. Tracks from that site don't trip the copyright bots, and I always link back to the original OCRemix video so peeps who like the track can check out the person who made it.

If you send me a track to use, you need to provide me with a download. Not a link to a youtube video for me to rip from. An actual, already downloaded and tested MP3, or the link to the page from which to download said MP3, legally.

No. Pirated. Music.

THAT SAID!! If you MADE a track, and want me to use it, I am 9000% down. Hell yes. Just nothing longer than 4 minutes-- short time lapse videos don't do well with long tracks.

I have a question that wasn't addressed here!??

Well, my friend, that's what the ask box is for :3 Hit me up, and I'll do my best to clarify whatever you'd like to know.

#Ko-fi updates #monthly subscriber perks #QandA #Sketchy Saturday

[rachelbethhines]

Tangled Salt Marathon - Happiness Is

This is possibly my favorite episode of season two. Yet, it is also the point the where the series starts to fall off a cliff. Only that’s not something that you would realize upon a first watch; just in hindsight and only with some basic knowledge of the behind the scenes drama that led to this and the fall out with the fandom that followed afterwards. 

Summary:  Rapunzel begins to feel homesick for Corona when she finds an old letter written by her father in one of the many lanterns sent from her previous birthdays. In attempts to uplift her spirits, Rapunzel explores the island and comes across a magical idol that brings instant happiness to whomever possesses it. Rapunzel begins to hallucinate her family and friends back in Corona and soon shares the idol with the rest of the group. However, everyone starts to become obsessive over the idol, desperately wanting it for themselves. Rapunzel tricks everyone into giving her the idol, but when the Lorbs try to help Rapunzel, they fall under the idol's control and soon begin to terrorize the village.

Let’s Start with the First Elephant in the Room; Frederic 

So throughout the episode Rapunzel is struggling with being homesick. Which is fair enough, that’s an understable reaction to being on the road for months by now. However, to showcase this Rapunzel keeps seeing hallucinations of her father. There are some other characters too, but her dad is the first person she sees and the only one in Corona with speaking lines. He’s the one to tempt her with the idol. 

Did we just forget that Frederic is her abuser? 

Look, even if you accept his apology in Secret of the Sundrop and believe he has learned his lesson, that doesn’t just erase the pain he caused her. Her thoughts about her father should be more realistically complex then this. Now add in how she makes a such a clean break from her other abuser, Gothel, but still holds him on a pedestal shows a disturbing bias on the part of the writers. 

Also where’s this love for Arianna? You know the only real mother on the show? The show that’s aimed at little girls? The one parent who hasn’t flat out abused the main character yet? 

Seriously, Chris, what the fuck? 

This is a Missed Opportunity 

So part of the reason why I like this episode is that we get insights into each of the characters and their desires. As such this is one of the few episodes where the group actual feels like a group friends. However, Cass’s vision is wasted here. 

So at first glance this seems to aline with what we know of the character thus far. She loves her dad and wishes to impress him. That’s only if you take season one into account, though. Later episodes will contradict this goal. If you wanted to set up praise and validation in general as Cassandra’s motives, then here is where that should have happened. 

Show her getting a medal, have cheering crowds surround her, have her be a hero, or something. You can’t claim her relationship with her parents as the driving force of behind her later actions if you don’t actually involve one of those parents as part of the resolution to her arc. 

Either she lacking attention from her dad or she’s jealous of Rapunzel. You can’t have it be both because those two things don’t intersect. Rapunzel is not and never was a threat to her relationship with her father. 

So Umm...I Don’t Think This Plot Point Has the Impact That the Writers Think It Does 

So this hilarious, and it is intended to be funny, but it’s not for the reasons that the show gives. 

The idea is that this is some shocking revelation. That Rapunzel would never do this under normal circumstances and it’s a hint that the idol is corrupting her. 

Only the rest of the series doesn’t aline with that at all. This is just the real Rapunzel behaving as the she normally would but without the usual veneer of excuses. 

It’s funny because it’s the show calling out Rapunzel hypocrisy for what it is plainly, not because it’s out of character. 

But funny only gets you so far. The show is perfectly happy to play up Rapunzel’s awfulness for laughs, but then conventily ignore it when it comes time for the characters themselves to call her out on it so that she can grow and learn.       

The show runs under the sitcom idea that comedy excuses all sins; which then backfires horribly when it tries to be serious and mature. 

You can’t joke that the king threw a random person in a stockade for little reason and then expect us to still like him when he persecutes a child. Same applies here. 

The sitcom set up only works when there is minimal at stake and all parties involved are equally awful in their own ways. 

Then Why Not Just Go Home?

Once again, there’s nothing at stake in season two. Rapunzel has no real reason to be on this trip. Nothing is stopping her from just going home if that’s what she wants. The idol only makes her happy because it shows her want she wants, but she could actually have what she wants as soon as the next ship arrives. So what’s the issue here? 

This is why you need external conflict in order to make internal conflicts work. There’s has to be something preventing the main character from achieving her goal or otherwise she just comes across as a dumbass. 

And Now Here Comes the Second Elephant; Varian 

I have several things to talk about here, and none of them actually concern the scene itself but the creator’s treatment of the character and the show’s fan base.

For you see, Chris did a very, very stupid thing.  

He wrote the character driving the plot out of the show. The character who also happens to be the most popular person in the series. Only to then use said character’s VA and this one cameo as promotion for this whole season. 

Needless to say, fans were disappointed.   

However, the Tangled fandom is exceedingly polite; more so than most. The lack of Varian was met mostly with confusion, and maybe a few off handed jokes, rather than anger. When opportunity arose people naturally had questions concerning the character.     

And that’s when Chris put his foot in mouth. 

This Tumblr post details how Chris got kicked off the Tangled The Series Discord by bullying a bunch of Varian fans while on there. 

https://starxapple.tumblr.com/post/617852117763391488/zhantiri-uuugh-fine-since-people-are-getting

I shan’t get into it fully, but for those who discovered the show after season two had aired, this caused a massive backlash from the fandom. 

A good chunk of the fandom just walked away, and rightly so. The few that stuck around despite these remarks found themselves harassed by certain sections of the fandom who saw Chris’s bullying as permission to pursue the same behavior. However, most importantly, the ratings plummeted. 

Season one hovered around the the 1 million mark, give or take a five point difference. The first part of season two dropped to half of that, and after this episode and the hiatus it sunk even lower, down to the mid-thirties. That’s over 20,000 people who just jumped ship over this. That’s not a normal decline. 

No matter what your personal feelings are of the character of Varian or how he was handled in the show, that’s still a massive PR fassico that cost the series big time. 

To add to this mountain of bullshit, there was also a massive walk out of crew members after season one had finished production. Most of them women. They even desperately threw out ‘we’re hiring’ calls to cover this. Which given that’s it’s Disney and that nepotism is usually how one gains employment in the entertainment industry, something unusual must have happened behind the scenes. Especially if most of the people who left were women. 

We’ll probably never know what really happened. People don't usually talk about behind the scenes stuff like that due to contracts and the aforementioned nepotism. However, all clues point to Varian.   

Something changed at the last minute concerning his story. Chris himself had confirmed as much when discussing the note and the Brotherhood. We also gotten other hints that content was edited out at the last minute. Plus the writing becomes more shoddy as the series goes along, showing how slapped dashed everything is together.  

Then there’s the rumors. 

I must stress to you that this is only a rumor. As pointed out earlier, most animators aren’t in a position to talk freely about what goes on behind the scenes. Do NOT harass them over it or make things awkward by asking them to clarify this. However it’s been suggested that the female crew warned Chris that removing Varian from season two and re-writing his story, along with making Cass the villain, would be a bad idea before they left and Chris didn’t listen. Much to his folly. 

Chris is no longer a Disney employee and has yet to move on to any other projects. He says he left, but I more suspect that Disney just didn't renew his contract and no one has picked him up since. I take no joy in the idea that someone may have lost their job, but if true, then Chris has little to blame but himself. 

So What Did Change?

We don't know anything for sure. We know from discussions about the note that there was a proposed Brotherhood plot that involved Varian that was then cut. There was also talks about a Cass and Varian team up in season three. 

This was then changed to the Saporian take over, which is foreshadowed in this scene. However even that got edited down and under the flimsiest of excuses. 

One of the writers, Ricky, suggested that they thought cutting back to Corona would be too confusing for the audience; which is a load of bull. I mean how poorly do you think of your audience’s comprehension skills that they wouldn’t understand a change of scene or a flashback? Yet you fully expect them to pick up on your lazy foreshadowing involving the mirror? So much so that you sent them on a quest to find it between seasons two and three.

Then there’s this gem from Chris. 

Ok ignoring the fact that you so totally could have featured both Gothel and Varian, seeing as they serve two different functions in the story and mean different things to Rapunzel.... What guilt?!!! 

Rapunzel doesn’t ever act guilty over anything involving her treatment of Varian. 

That’s when you realize Chris isn’t talking about her feeling guilty about Varian’s predicament. He’s saying that Rapunzel feels guilty of leaving her father behind with this ‘dangerous’ criminal. Which is a big fuck you to everyone. 

That’s why Frederic is the center focus of Rapunzel’s hallucinations. Why she’s more concerned for his safety over Varian’s trauma. Chris really be out here trying to use the abused 14/15 year old orphan as a scapegoat for the grown ass dictator who ruined countless lives. Because he thinks a grown woman should feel guilty for leaving her abusive father behind and pursuing her life’s dream.

Dude, I try not to assume the worst of people just cause they write fictional characters that I dislike, but Chris really makes things hard not to when he treats his self insert this way. 

Oh but we’re not done yet. 

When Varian Fans Complain About the Lack of Varian; We’re Complaining About the Lack of a Coherent Plot. 

Certain sections of the fandom, bolstered by Chris’s BS, try to act like simply being a Varian fan is grounds for dismissal of any criticism of the show and it’s writing. As if having personal preference for something makes you automatically ‘entitled’ or some such bull. Yet doing so ignores the fundamental complaint that they are making. 

We’re not whining about our favorite character not getting enough screen time. No one would have complained about his lack of presence in season two if they had properly resolved his story in season three and had Chris not been a dick to the fans. But it becomes evidently clear as the series goes along that removing Varian left a major hole in the plot. One that makes the entire story and the rest of characters suffer as well. 

Think season two is boring? That’s cause they cut out their main villain at the last minute and failed to replace him with anything. 

Upset that Hookfoot was brought along for zero reason?  He’s the replacement character for Varian who no doubt was going to appear in season two originally. 

Wish there was more on the Brotherhood and the Dark Kingdom?  Their story impact was greatly reduced when Varian was written out.

Are you a Eugene fan and mad about how the Dark Prince plot went nowhere?  That’s cause the original Brotherhood/Dark Kingdom plot was dropped when Varian was.

Dislike how Cassandra’s character was ruined with her villain arc?  She was originally meant to be possessed but was changed last minute to be a Varian rip-off in the hopes that she would gain some of his popularity.   

Wish Zhan Tiri, Demantius, and the Disciples actually went somewhere and that ZT had coherent plan?   That plot were changed last minute to make Zhan Tiri a scapegoat for Cassandra now that her story was changed to replace Varian.

And of course let’s not ignore the character who suffers the most from lack of Varian.... Rapunzel. 

Chris’s defense for leaving Varian out of S2 is that it’s “Rapunzel’s Story” and that Varian was only ever a plot device meant to push her along on her quest.  Which means that Rapunzel no longer has anyone pushing her along on her quest!!!

All characters are plot devices. If they aren’t there to serve a story function then they need to be cut. Even Rapunzel herself serves a plot function. She’s meant to be the protagonist of a coming of age story. Which means she needs both an external conflict to face and an emotional arc where she grows as a person. Varian is the plot device that serves both of those functions but he’s now been removed and is no longer allowed to serve his original purpose. 

Chris reached into the machine while it was running and pulled out one of the main gears and acted like he always meant to do that. He legit sat there and pretended that everything was running smoothly even as smoke poured out and warring alarms blared. He then tried to shove bubble gum in its place hoping no one would notice as everything fell apart around him. 

Cause he’s the thing; no idea is without merit. It’s all about presentation. Removing Varian from season three still could have worked, but it required A.) replacing him with another foe and B.) making sure his arc still got a proper conclusion. 

I’ll talk more about Varian’s half-arsed redemption when we get to it; but for now let's focus on the more immediate problem. No one thought to give season two an actual overarching conflict in light of Varian’s absence. 

That’s a fundamental oversight that pretty much signals that season two was re-written at the last minute. You have an overarching plot in an action adventure show but no main adversary? I refuse to believe that everyone involved was too stupid to do that on purpose; but if they were rushed and lacked a crew because they walked out due to last minute story changes....yeah that’d I buy. 

Because there’s more than enough options to go around; Lady Caine, The Baron and Styalan, Hector and/or Adria, Zhan Tiri’s Disciples ect. were all options. So was keeping the rocks a threat, or have Cass start her villian arc earlier; with proper motivation this time. They could have even come up with someone entirely new. 

You had over four years to plan this shit out; why is it not more well put together?! 

How Come Rapunzel Can Easily Admit Fault to Pascal But Not Anyone Else? 

Pascal should have sat perched on Varian’s and Eugene’s shoulders giving Rapunzel ‘I’m done with this’ looks all throughout season three. It’s apparently the only thing that she responds to. 

Why is the untalkative camelanion the only one allowed to call out the main character’s BS without going villain? 

Conclusion

That’s all there really is to talk about in this story. The actual episode itself is good. It’s the behind the scenes crap that bubbles underneath its surface that needed to be discussed. That way when going forward with the marathon you’ll better see what I’m talking about when I explain how future episode suffered from the lack of planning and foresight. 

#Varian #tangled #anti-tangled #anti-rapunzel #cassandra #tangled the series #rapunzel's tangled adventure #tts #rta #king frederic

[yooleestruck]

in which lee rambles about how great writers are

I don’t really know what this is. I don’t know if now is the right time to do this, or a really bad time, or if it makes any sense, but I want to talk about it! I feel like a broken record saying ‘the writing matters most, the writing matters most’ but maybe I need to show what I mean by that? So, here is an attempt. 

I’m sorry not all of these are the same length and not everyone is here, because every time I see that someone is a writer I do try to follow but I don’t always know/remember! Also I am weird about this sort of thing and don’t want to tag people in a monster-long post, so I’m just going to link. I also don’t want to make this a producers vs writers thing, it’s not, it’s just, when I say I notice writer-stuff, an explanation of what, specifically, I mean. 

Writers have a style fingerprint. I’m sure someone with an actual creative writing or English background could describe it all academic-ly, but my ex-chemist ass is just going to call it a fingerprint. 

My first game in Lovestruck was Starship Promise - I love Firefly, I’m a bisexual disaster scientist by education, it fit. But I had been REALLY put off by GIL when it first came out (this was back when they released stories in parts? And the heroine, which I will get to) and though I’d glanced at AFK, I mistrusted it after GIL and Medusa, who was who I was interested in, wasn’t out yet. So I resisted a LONG time.  I finally picked up LS and SP and played it explicitly because a friend said, you need to give this another chance, for a list of specific reasons. 

And when Atlas’s route came out, I read it a stupid number of times. I must have re-read his season 1 & 2 at least eight times apiece (he is still my most read route, despite the fact I have not read his last season because I want to leave the story open-ended)  so when I read Neil Dresner’s route, I recognized the fingerprint. Not only that, when I was reading Jett and the episodes with the paint scene (YOU KNOW THE SCENE) came out, my breath caught with how lovely it was, a particular in-between moment and touch, and even though it wasn’t a phrase I had seen, the style of it, had me re-reading (because it was gorgeous) again and again from the log for like five minutes and I thought, “I bet Melissa wrote this” AND SHE DID. 

Physical touch! (& in-betweens)

Melissa-grey has a particular way of writing about physical touch in very emotional moments that is very real and grounded and ironically the effect is just magical. It creates these so skillful “in between” moments, those little things that aren’t dialogue and aren’t metaphor but SHOW you that this closed off person is cracking for their little ray of sunshine. They are SO subtle and so beautiful, like, the heroine noticing the scent of a pillow, or a softening of an aborted hand movement.  She sets up and executes these moments of physical touch as a conduit for emotional touch with characters who aren’t ready to admit he latter and it’s DELICIOUS. Those little in-betweens are what I live for in story - and it includes all the supporting cast moments, who swell up to make the world feel lived in, and balanced (I loathe love stories where no one else exists! That’s a recipe for disaster, people need networks) I noticed when she stopped writing, and because I missed it, I went and bought the entire Midnight Girl series, as well as Rated (I hope that is flattering and not creepy!) and that style of writing is so unique, that without KNOWING, I picked it up in four separate routes (noticed in Sev’s s1, too!) 

Pacing (& friggen heartache)

Another fingerprint! Ripping your heart out! Arthoure has had me in tears, MULTIPLE TIMES and I get very grouchy about it every time because I am the least sentimental and romantic person that I know (I once MOVED STATES to avoid an ‘I love you’ conversation. I once said ‘yikes’ in response to an ‘I love you’ and I once broke up with someone because I thought he was going to propose. I’m a bitch) but I think it’s because of pacing! I know that producers play a role in that, but that actually makes it more impressive, because making each bit of story feel like it fits precisely the amount of space it needs when you don’t really get a say in how much space that is has got to take a MASSIVE amount of effort. Every little hint, every emotional beat, every character tell, they drop at a consistent build so the emotional payoff is just brutal (in a good, cathartic way?) every time a route makes me cry I wait and see and YEAH ITS ALWAYS ARTHOURE. The sweep and sentiment of Remy’s season 2 is unparalleled. Across Time is gutwrenching, and I actually stopped reading Renzei at one point because I was so emotional over it I had to like, LEGIT TAKE A BREAK to recover. Pacing and heartache. I have to stop and wonder - is it because the routes themselves are so gut-punching? OR is it because she knows how to wring every last emotional drop out of whatever story framework is handed to her? Because, Ezekiel’s villain costume is a bit silly (there I said it, it is) I get the cobra helmet shape in theory but in practice, ooof, but POINT BEING despite being skeptical I’d be able to take his story seriously as a result, I was hiccuping from crying so much (and I am gosh darn adult, in my thirties, with three degrees and a high-stress job at pretty major company. I DON’T CRY EASY)

 Dialogue (& heroines!)

Xekstrin is the gosh damn master of dialogue. Clever, witty banter that doesn’t go where you expect it to, meandering but natural topic changes that are delightful to follow and feel real, and--special shoutout for this, okay--the navigation of viscerally important topics like consent, kink, self-worth, power in relationships, self-sacrifice, and apologies in a way that is not stilted or forced at all (listen, I know Viv & Lyris are the most recent and they are amazing but I remember this first hit me when I was reading Astraeus, and I spent half the route with my jaw on the floor going, oh shit,  oh shit. The communication! The navigation of the complexity of emotion going on, chef’s kiss! Casual isn’t the right word, but, natural, maybe?). I don’t actually take that many screenshots of the app--it’s usually single lines that get me--but when I do, they are almost always conversations from one of her routes, because they’re so damn good, and often so unexpected, and yet always make such perfect sense for the characters involved. Dialogue is SO HARD OKAY. Actually try and transcribe a conversation sometime, it’s nuts how people talk vs how most people write people talking. Xekstrin also writes some of my absolute favorite MCs, and going back to fingerprints, I was reading Lyris s1 and right there in the first tavern scene, as we were following along with the heroine’s thoughts I went, ah, yes, I know who you belong to and I am SO EXCITED. Being able to give the heroine unique thoughts and quirks, to make her genuinely relatable, without overriding the necessary template of the genre dictates, is a skill all of its own. But I love her MCs! There is a beautiful balance of compassion, competence, and dash of bratty, wild, fun mischief. I can actually cheer for them. I can actually get behind them. I WANT the love interest to flop at their feet for who they are, not just because the story says so. And that comes from how the heroine’s thoughts are written, from her phrasing in conversations, how she sees situations, not just a producer saying ‘she is a strong lead who is self conscious about her ears and she’s nervous in the council meeting’ or whatever. I AM REALLY STRUGGLING to articulate this if you can’t tell from how long I have been blathering. Maybe this - the heroine is the same across every route, presumably, yes? Everyone has the same base. I NEVER question, when xekstrin is writing, why the love interest falls in love with her. Side note - I had hard written off GIL after a bad experience with the standalone app. I only read Aurora BECAUSE I learned she wrote it, and I would have SO MISSED OUT otherwise.

A complete aside in which Lee grumbles about heroines and not writers!

(Complete side vent: Often, the heroine is, if not a blank slate, a sort of collection of assigned traits, and she often remains so unless the story demands she become otherwise. Which is fine! I don’t personally, but I know a lot of folks self-insert, and so erring towards that makes sense. Almost all the otome I’ve played were originally written for a Japanese audience. When I played original Voltage games, starting back in 2014, I always had to remind myself - different culture, different culture, different culture, and it was not possible for me to relate to most of the heroines. I still enjoyed the stories, but I rarely cheered for the heroine’s romance, especially in some of the slice of life stories. I understood her, but I rarely wanted her to get with the love interest, I wanted her success to come in other ways! Another game company, Cybird, tried to ‘Americanize’ their heroine to IMO disastrous effect - it was such a stereotype, and made no sense since they didn’t also Americanize the context, so she come across as, frankly, ridiculous. And frankly, Voltage’s GIL heroine REEKED OF THAT. When they first posted her on social media I was legitimately annoyed about it, like could you lean into this more? I think not. So when I talk about being able to relate to and cheer for the heroine, it’s a big deal, because my blatant mistrust of Voltage and their ability to craft a heroine I could tolerate was a BIG factor in how long it took me to give Lovestruck a try. I was willing to tolerate it in translated stories, I was so skeptical of -en only ones.) 

Metaphors (& balance)

literacouture writes beautiful metaphors for connection between humans! I’m really bad at keeping track of who writes what, but I purposefully kept an eye out on tumblr after reading Cal’s route, because there were some lines that were pure poetry, and I wanted to keep an eye out for more. It is HARD to spin metaphors prettily without delving into trite, painful, purple prose cringe territory, and it’s navigated beautifully in Cal’s route. There’s a balance between those spin-out moments and things that are tangible and anchoring and make it feel authentic and unique to the two characters involved, instead of just ‘I am trying to make this sound romantic and this is a romantic phrase so here it is’. That balance is really necessary. You NEED the mundane alongside the metaphor or it doesn’t feel authentic. Also. Trying really hard to write this without throwing any authors or producers under the bus, but...listen. I love Sin with Me. But the world logic (or LACK THEREOF) drives me up a wall. I don’t read Cal because of his character traits or sprite or (sigh) his story. I read him because literacouture writes a beautiful romance.

 So anyway...

There are more! When I am less tired and don’t have meetings, I will try and write them up (Please know there are so many routes I love, and so many things I do recognize across chapters! I don’t even HAVE words for what theivorytowercrumbles accomplished with Helena’s story not to mention how much I adore Cyprin,  SummerLightning’s handling of Onyx’s past relationship was so deftly done when it could have so quickly become ‘milk abuse for plot’ and joidecombat gave Sev a fresh, mischievous energy and navigated the dream/reality line with SUCH skill, and so on and so on.)

I’ve written a lot of reviews. And I try to give nods where I feel they’re due - sometimes, it really is obvious that the whole team’s work came together to makes something great, the world, the plot, the arc, the art, the words, and the music all fit into place in a  well-crafted tour de force. And sometimes one piece or another is lacking, and I’ll admit I’ve left some...less than kind reviews to that end (I try and soften it, because I know there are humans on the other side of everything, but I’ve been harsh more than once with my opinions).  I’ve read routes with plots that made me want to tear my hair out because I DO value consistency and logic to a degree, even if I’m going to accept at face value that, say, space travel is a thing or demons turn to sand when stabbed. 

In the end, these are romance stories. So I will let a lot slide when it comes to plot. What sells a story are the words - not the outline.

And if Voltage doesn’t believe that - just remember that Hamlet existed long, long before Shakespeare wrote it. His was the version that lasted, because the people liked it best. The plot, the world, the characters, they all existed a hundred times over. Even just look at fan translations of manga. Why do people keep translating, even if someone else has? Because the words someone else picked don’t do the story justice. 

I don’t know. I’m talking in circles because I don’t know my own thesis! 

Maybe it’s just - the worlds these stories in are nice. But when I say I’m a fan of something, the premise is like. 10%. The rest is the writing. 

#lovestruck #lovestruck voltage #lovestruck writers appreciation week #this isn't exactly one of the prompts #but #it's in the spirit of it #brevity may be the soul of wit #but that just means I'm not very witty I suppose #this is not a complaining post #except for maybe one section where I go off on heroines COUGH #but it's flagged

[morizukorn]

Aspiring Heroes Chapter 3 is out!

Hey everyone! I just want to apologize for not posting any updates about my fic here in Tumblr for a long time, I’ve been on a messy schedule this month that’s why, making time for simple things is getting difficult, but I really wanna make up for it and by doing that, I already uploaded Chapter 4 in just two weeks compare before, every 2 weeks is probably will be my schedule for this Fic, I can’t assure though, it depends on how school will treat me lol. Anyways Chapter 3 is out! Hope you guys will read :)

Rating - T

Title - Aspiring Heroes

Genre - Action, Fantasy

Summary - A girl born with a powerful quirk sets foot in the most prestigious school for hero training to be a hero.

Preview: Chapter 3: Quirk Apprehension Test

Ikoaru Akamine's POV

After sensei's pumping words, everyone had a massive buildup on their faces. The Quirk Apprehension Test is about to start, we moved on from the softball throw test for now as ordered by Nezu-sensei.

First Test: 50-Meter Dash

A 50-meter line is vertically drawn on the ground, both sides are to be used by two students each, separating them from each other, not necessarily to race but to add intensity for both players as they will run the whole 50-meter line with the use of their quirks. Spectating in the side is a robot proctor and next to it is Nezu-sensei, while all of us line up for our turns.

And so it begins...

First of all, Eizo positioned himself on the starting line along with another classmate as his competitor.

"On your marks, get set..." the robot proctor said in a high robotic voice.

Before the robot proctor even said the final word to commence the start, Eizo's right eye glowed in full red. "Boost..." he whispered, looking straight still.

"Bang!" The robot proctor emitted and the two students started running.

Eizo's right back leg immediately turned into a rocket thruster, without even a second to waste the engines quickly fired up and Eizo accelerated up through the finish line. "3.27 seconds! Holy! That was so fast!" the robot proctor shouted.

Wow! Eizo really is a robot...

"I'm sure that gave Sensei some impressions," Eizo said as he calms himself down, his formed thrusters on the back of his leg reassembled, shifting back to his normal leg.

Niikura Eizo

Quirk: Half-Cybernetic

His left side is a normal human body while his right side is a cybernetic body that gives him the abilities of a robot. He's a cyborg!

Note: Eizo is still considered as a human being for his intelligence is human, not artificial.

"Impressive Eizo-kun, just don't scare us with your eye, It's like your trying to kill us," Sensei jokingly commented.

"M-my eye... I didn't mean to! Sensei this is just me being serious, forgive me for scaring you all!" he apologized, bowing many times while covering that glowing red eye.

Eizo's seriousness made everyone laugh especially Mei. "You're taking this too much, Eizo," Mei commented, tapping his metal back.

"At least I got 3 seconds, I'm the highest," Eizo competingly replied.

"Congrats! But I'm not here for the competition. I'm here, for other things..." she smirked before walking on the starting line along with another classmate as the competitor.

"Okay! This test needs some flavor!" Mei shouted.

She then unzipped the back part of her PE uniform, which for some reason hers has one, revealing her back which has a colored scaled pattern attached to it like she has a tattoo, delicately attached on her soft skin, looking very smooth. Everyone wasn't ready for what she's about to do.

Nezu-sensei was about to call her out but the scales then pulled themselves off from Mei's skin, unfolding as it reaches out to her uniform, forming her butterfly wings. All of us were stunned. Her wings are aesthetically beautiful.

"Wow... So that's what I missed when she helped me at the cafeteria, it's so pleasing in my eyes..." I whispered, it's like I'm hypnotized.

Meanwhile, Eizo just stares at it apathetically.

The test starts. "On your marks, get set..." the robot proctor said.

Mei flutters herself from the ground, her antennas immediately gave her the wind signal, preparing her wings for a takeoff...

"Bang!"

As the robot proctor projected the starting sound, Mei vigorously swung her wings, giving her a boost in the air, continuously gliding with her wing spreading fully, it's like she wasn't even consuming energy, her wings do all the work until she reached the finish line.

"5.36 seconds!"

Mei gracefully dropped herself down and gave us all a wink to our surprised faces.

"Kumei Chou"

"Quirk: Butterfly"

"She has butterfly wings, antennae, her hands are sticky and her tongue also acts as a proboscis which can stretch up to 2 meters, basically she's a human butterfly!"

Everyone was so pleased with what Mei has shown that everyone was fangirling over her. Suddenly it's my turn because almost everyone who was on the line went to Mei, I put myself on the starting line, and unexpectedly out of all people, the other competitor is Shizue and he still has that cold face as he prepares himself.

Are you serious!? Damn it, Mei, why do you have to steal everyone's attention and leave me with this one; nonetheless, this is an opportunity to strike back. But wait! What will I do on this race...? Do I even know how to use my quirk!? How did I even use my quirk yesterday?

"On your marks, get set... BANG!"

W-wait!

With no other choice, I started running. I tried my best to release something from my hands as I moved but there's nothing, meanwhile, Shizue's running with his hands spread behind his back, releasing a blast of his flame quirk, gaining a big boost from the impact while I just run as fast as I could.

"5.13 seconds!" the robot proctor announced as Shizue reached the finish line.

And he finished first...

"6.56 seconds!" the robot proctor announced as I stepped on the finish line.

6.56 seconds... Did I do well...?

"I did well... Right?" I heavily sighed, looking around, everyone seems to be minding their businesses, good thing only a few heard my results...

Second Test: Grip Strength

Each student is tasked to grasp a hand-held device that will measure the force of their grip in kilograms.

"OK... Huuuurghhhh!" I gripped the device with much force that my hands can release, receiving small pain as I clutch intensely, after a few seconds, I looked at the hand-held device and my force is just 52.0kg.

I really should work out more...

"Woahhh, 450kg!" a classmate suddenly cheered.

"Wow! You're like a gorilla!" Mei praised.

450kg! Is that even possible?

I looked to where the noise is coming from and saw the student who just grasped the device which made everyone from the class seem impressed and to my surprise, he really is a gorilla wearing glasses and his huge hands are literally near on crushing the device.

"But... I am a gorilla..." the gorilla student replied to Mei awkwardly.

Third Test: Standing Long Jump

Students are tasked to clear a long sandbox with the use of their quirks.

Once again, Mei took the spotlight. Using her wings, Mei floated in the air as she jumped with much control, not even worrying about any mistake as she levitates freely, securing a pass on the assigned sandbox for the test.

Mei has wings which is an instant win for her, so lucky...

Another classmate followed up, a girl with an intimidating aura placed herself on the starting line, bending her knees in preparation before she vigorously let all the stored power out, jumping so high from where she was standing, no doubt she cleared more than the required distance of the sandbox, she stayed in the air for some time before landing like a badass superhero.

There's no way she just flew like that...

Finally, it's my turn and the pressure is on, I bent my knees then jumped from the starting line with my hands spread on my back, hoping my quirk will react again so that it can boost me towards but...

"1, 2, 3, go! Heeeeeeeeeeya!" but nothing happened, I just landed within the sandbox, hitting my butt hard on the ground.

"Owww..." I whimpered.

This is so embarrassing...

Fourth Test: Repeated Side Steps

The students must move between three lines by one to the other fast.

A student whose face is covered by the hood of his uniform took first, he prepares himself for the test without even removing his hoodie, and from the darkness inside of it, his eyes glowed in red, and in a blink of an eye, he quickly sidestepped all the three lines, his hood didn't even fall off.

That's possible!?

Everyone was speechless and amazed at him but he didn't give any response and just walked out. And same as before there's nothing special that happened on my turn.

The test continued with Distance Run, Seated Toe-Touch, and Sit Ups with each of my classmates getting their chance to make their quirks shine. Nothing happened for me, I'm getting very stressed about all of this.

What should I do...? Why is it not working!?

I looked at the palm of my hands then tried doing any hand technique I know, getting more desperate as I try to make it work.

"You do know that's not how it will work..." Nezu-sensei said, appearing out of nowhere.

"Sensei you're here! I'm sorry..." I said, never expecting him to express his concern.

"During the entrance exam, your performance was different, please don't fall behind, Akamine-chan," he said before he left.

Sensei saw me during my entrance exam...

"Ikoa-chan!" Mei suddenly called, along with her is Eizo.

What's with everyone appearing out of nowhere!?

"Sensei was talking to you, Ikoaru," Eizo mentioned.

"Yeah, it's about my quirk, you guys shouldn't worry about it," I replied.

"Oh, actually we noticed that too."

"I think everyone did. The truth is, I don't know how to activate this quirk of mine, I don't even know what it is called or any stuff about it..."

"Didn't you just used it on Shizue yesterday?" Eizo curiously asked.

"No, It just trigger by itself, I was begging at that time... Maybe it's because I'm being pressured at that time that's why I triggered it like an emergency or something..."

"I find that weird and questionable, most kids will get to discover their quirk by the age of 4 and then they will just get used to it as they grow. If I may ask, how did you passed the exam, Ikoaru?" Mei asked.

"I don't know honestly, I don't remember... Shizue told me yesterday that I didn't even do anything at the entrance exam and yet I'm here..." I answered.

Both of them gave me a puzzled look.

"Okay look, today is just our second day, there's more time, don't beat yourself up," Mei said.

"Mei's right, don't overthink too much about it and just be yourself," Eizo added.

They're very concerned, I'm glad they care.

"Thank you... Don't worry, I will do my best!" my mood has lifted as I deliver a smile, they both nodded happily as they saw my sudden change of expression.

Finally, everyone had finished the current test, moving on to the final one. "We will now be having the final test, I'll give you a short break then we'll start!" Sensei announced. Everyone then replenished themselves. It's the final hurdle, I can feel everyone's solemnity.

I need to keep up!

Final Test: Soft-ball Throw

Students are required to throw a softball as far as they could with the use of their quirks.

Firstly, Shizue blasted the ball through a form of an explosion from his flame quirk, relying more on the impact of it, the ball reached a farther distance as expected.

"205.3 meters!" Sensei announced, looking at the device he's holding.

Next, Eizo's elbow is the part that turned into a thruster this time, the engines of his thruster boosted with much control, Eizo did 360-spins as he moved before throwing the ball from his grasps, giving it a much bigger momentum that resulted in him scoring a longer distance.

"401.6 meters!"

Other students also showed their best way of throwing the ball with their quirks, until finally, it's my turn. I walked through the circle, feeling calm as I can be, I felt Sensei's observing stare and my friend's internal cheer for me as I reached the center.

Everyone brought out the best of themselves, I want to show them what I can do as well...

"Good luck, Akamine-chan," Nezu-sensei said, giving me the ball.

I grasped it and closed my eyes, giving all my focus onto the ball, hoping that my quirk will work this time just like yesterday. A second passed and I've regained my confidence, I'm ready to show what I can do...!

Full Chapter Links: 

FFN- Aspiring Heroes Chapter 3

AO3- Aspiring Heroes Chapter 3

#bnha #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #fanfiction #mha #OC #original story #Multiple POV #spin-off #shounen #action #fantasy #adventure #school #anime #high school #heroes #hero #Villains #prequel #bnha spin-off #bnha prequel #rivalry #rival #character development #nezu #developing friendship #shounen fights #ao3 #ffnet

[ofhomeland-a]

hello happy new year ! even though i’ve been on tumblr on and off for almost like 8 years or something , i’ve only been writing dinah on tumblr since october 23rd and even though i don’t interact with nearly as many people as i’d like to , it warms my heart that this many people enjoy what i write ! they enjoy my portrayal and they share the same love that i have for my muse , and that means everything to me ! because dinah madani ? oh , boy ... she stomped into my own home and snatched my own heart from my chest ; i love her so much , and i love writing her character so much . so uh , i know this is such an ugly post , but i was taken by surprise when i took a quick look through my followers this morning .

first of all , i want to thank each and every one of you for following me and wanting to interact . i appreciate you all not only for enjoying my content and portrayal , but just for existing and getting through it all . you’re here , it’s about to be a new year , and i’m proud of you for that . 

second , i do want to shout at a few people real quick because that’s what people do on these things , right ?

CLOSEST FRIENDS

@agentstein / @catwalksilhouette / @brightwasright / @finaldisorder — we’ve been at this for almost a decade . we met on this hellsite and we formed a relationship on this hellsite and now you’re my best friend and fiance . you support me and indulge all of my weird ass ideas . nothing is too ‘ far out ’ for you ; you never make me feel insecure about my characters or ideas . love that for me . love that for us . you’re the best and i’m just so thankful we met on our jim and molly blogs so feckin’ long ago . you’re the light in my life , and the main reason i continue on . as with every relationship , there are bumps , but god damn we work through them like the champions we are . keep on keepin’ on , you funky little love bug . i love you more than life .

@kingoftheravens / @apogexn — *slaps top of head* this bad boy can fit so many creative ideas in it !!!! no but really , no matter how often i disappear , vicious is DEADASS always here to welcome me back with open arms with zero guilt trips or anything like that . we met ( briefly ) on this blue hellsite like 5+ years ago , and i always really looked up to her as a person and her amazing world building . she was actually one of the first people i met when i made loki all those years ago , so ofc when i saw her url floating around once i made brock , i had to reach out despite being scared to , and i’m so glad i did . <3 vicious , ily and you’re just spectacular . thank you for being such an awesome friendo .

@kupale / @hadncchoice — GOBS i know you aren’t here , but i miss you terribly . we’ve been through ... a lot together LMAO but we came out stronger because of it ! i’m so glad you decided to stick around , and i’m so glad we stuck with each other through it ! i know i speak for milo too when i say this , but you’re amazing . you’re a trooper and you’re going to keep trooping on . i miss you !!!! <3

@soulstcne — !!!!!! this is another one that is literally always here and ready to welcome me back with open arms whenever i disappear and decide to come back . i can never repay your kindness and patience , but i absolutely appreciate it more than anything . shauna is always ready to plot and just spitball ideas ALL day and i love it so much ! also ashley ?? whew , she’s just as amazing <333 

BABES

@zombleeds / @griefends / @whisperswar — MELANIE . ICB !!! i know i’ve said this 100 times , but i remember being in awe of your frank when i wrote on my bucky and i’m just SO glad i decided to reach out to you !!! i know once i stop being a massive potato , we are going to write beautiful and heart breaking things >) thank you for being so positively amazing !!!

@jigscw — i know we don’t talk often , but i just wanted to thank you for always indulging my random IM’s screaming about either dinah & billy or krista & billy . you’re honestly really easy to talk to , and your billy is just CHEF KISS . i love him !!! i love the way you write him ! the tone !!! HHHH everything . thank you for writing with me !

@cynicomplex — listen i know we don’t talk a whole lot , but i appreciate you so much ! i love how open you are to my dumb ideas , and you always support them ! i also love how much i love our two idiots here ..... they’re so dumb and i just can’t with them . i know we’ve only written a few things together , and haven’t really gotten too far in any of them , but the chemistry between dinah and devrah is undeniable ! soon they’ll see they belong together ... soon ... 

@affcgato / @readyforyours / @idumean / @takeseffort / @huntersprayer — i’m so glad i accidentally liked a random thread between you and someone else , because it MADE me reach out in order to apologize for being awkward . i’ve always loved your characterization , no matter the muse . you’re such a sweet and amazing person , i’m really glad we’ve started talking !! also , i just want to point out that fact that you’re incredibly strong , and i am so proud of you !! for getting through the BS that you did !!! and the fact that you’re able to come back ,,, <3 i really hope to plot with you very soon ( with any of your muses ! ) but i just ned to stop being Potato first !!! 

@tocxmply — I KNOW I’M A SLOW ASS POTATO , but we’re 2 replies into our thread and it’s already got me feelin’ some type of way . i love your take on bucky , i love your writing , and i love your dedication . thank you so much for not only following me , but also entertaining my ideas and helping me plot something wonderful . you’re wonderful !

@hakune — !!!!! we haven’t written yet , but when we do .... oh the dash isn’t prepared for it !!! i love your characterization , your write all of your muses with such dedication and love , it’s amazing to see . also your energy on the dash ? top notch . i’m living for it !! 

@warhunting / @blcckbiird / @knifesavvy — i’m sorry you have to put up with so much from shitty people in your inbox . every time i see it , it makes me so angry . but honestly , you’re such a strong person and i’m proud of you for continuing to do what you love ! also rick and dinah ? cuties . i hope to continue developing them in 2020 !

@ikumkani / @sundiety — wow ... your conviction . your energy !!!! your writing !!!!!!! i really admire you and T’Challa , like ... you write him and about him with such a dedicated passion , i can FEEL it radiating from every word ! i love the fact that i can hear his voice in my head with every word , and those headcanons ??? i can’t . also hold on a second , SOL CAME INTO MY OWN HOME and stole my heart , okay . i love her concept , i love her ! i love reading about her , and learning more about her . thank you so much for blessing my dash with your wonderful creations .

@putrifyre — i’ve said it once and i’ll say it 100 more times : I LOVE TASS . I LOVE HIM !!!! I LOVE EVERYTHING YOU HAVE ABOUT HIM . i love how emotional he is !! how loving he is toward his SO’s ! how Soft™ he can be !!! one wouldn’t expect it coming from someone like him , and that really just adds so much to his character ! i’m in love with everything you have for him !! and then you !! oh , you’re a gem ! i know we’ve only spoken a few times , mainly because i’m Shit with keeping up w people , but you’re so ,,, nice . you’re so easy to talk to !! 

@arrowfcrged — !!! omg I LOVE victor , and I LOVE his and dinah’s dynamic so much . and i LOVE how sweet you are ! you’re very welcoming , very fun , and you’re always up for plotting and tossing ideas around ! love that ! thank you so much for writing with me , and for inadvertently helping me figure out dinah’s own sort of vigilante verse . writing with you definitely assisted in fleshing her reasoning out , and it’s wonderful that i was able to do that with you <3

LOVELIES

@cthlicdevil / @warstrike / @boundedbygrief / @elataan / @lcdiablcblanc / @stormweathered / @riddel / @deferentially / @rouqehair / @deivll / @venomtm / @hoyled / @prcsopa / @sniperwithasmoke / @br6vo / @detectiev / @dunnithole / @wardogsong / @hittcr / @fbiartist / @huntreborn / @becomedeviant / @craene / @warcharged / @lasw3ll / @childhealcr / @standsready / @tlmebreaks / @codedhonor / @marredset / @aresblessed / @avocadefense / @fairdoves / @wristful / @falsedking / @hlekter / @miserybled / @cadisfly / @brightprofiler / @healsiick / @thestarskiller / @palespyder / @shitgiven / @ashtouch / @awbartonno / @hopeswrath / @geneticempath / @conflyct / @lucifeyr / @tapewormking / @suppetior 

happy new year , everyone ! let’s make it a great one <3

#ooc. / oh worm? #(ooc.) #long post. #aaaa here's this

[grandmascottlang]

a beauty and a beast ch.1 (b.b.)

So. I am so freaking sorry that this has taken weeks to come out. So much happened that I don’t really want to get into, but it really prevented me from being able to finish and post this story, and I’m really excited to write it! This is for @sincerelymlg‘s writing challenge! I hope you enjoy this! (Also note: I changed the story a little bit so that it is more modern but it still follows the main story!)

Masterlist | Taglist | Buy me a ko-fi?

Summary: A tale as old as time between a beauty and a beast. [Modern!Beauty and the Beast!AU]

Warnings: Fluff, angst, slightly unedited writing, Bucky isn’t in this part (sorry!), also if you squint there might be a Good Omens reference or two lol

Words: 1.6k

[A/N: I just revamped my taglist and deleted everyone on it so I wouldn’t have to go through over 200 accounts to see who was active. If you’re currently not on my taglist and want to be added, please click the link above! On top of that, if you add yourself to my taglist and don’t interact within three stories (which includes this one!) you will be removed.]

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there lived a young woman who was obsessed with reading, writing, and anything else that had to do with literature. She lived in a small town where everyone knew everyone. But when she was reading, she was in her own little world. And people didn’t like that.

The people of this village liked people who were open and very involved in the community, so when someone was reclusive and shied away from most community events, rumors were started.

“Maybe she’s crazy.”

“Maybe she’s ill.”

“Maybe she’s waiting for the right moment to leave.”

Leaving the community was almost as scary as someone finding the small town that was in the middle of nowhere and attempted to move in. Needless to say, the people feared change. The very thought of change irked them to their cores, scorched their souls, reeked of treason, or rather, resentment.

[Name] was never one to shy away from these rumors, she didn’t want to be like everyone else who acted almost robotically, she always thought of her village as one of the cities that she read about in dystopian societies. It was too perfect for her, and nothing in the world should be and truly is perfect. 

Her adoptive father, Steve Rogers, was always encouraging her to break out of the norm and be her own individual instead of being what everyone expected of her. She excelled in school and aspired to be a famous published author after she made it out of her hometown.

“Dad?” She asked Steve one day.

Steve cocked an eyebrow at her, briefly pausing from his writing. He was in the process of writing a fictitious war novel, most likely another one of his best sellers (except of course in the town the two lived in, where becoming a writer was looked down upon and shunned). “Hm?” He turned around in his spinning office chair to look at his daughter. “Something you need?”

“I just wanted to run an idea by you quickly before I head over to the bookshop and before you leave for your convention! My favorite author, besides you of course,” she chuckled, always having admired her old man’s writing, “is gonna be over there signing! I found out that he was going to stop here during his book tour at the bookshop!” She began to converse with Steve about his thoughts about the idea and afterward, she grabbed the book that she wished to get signed along with her bag and bolted out of the house, yelling a quick “Bye, dad!” as her hand turned the handle to go outside.

On her dash over to the bookshop, eyes tracked her path, followed by sneers and rude statements being said to her. Seeing someone run to the bookshop was odd, and to the town, she really was an odd girl.

She opened the door to the surprisingly large bookstore (which looked from the outside as if it took up an eighth of the space as it did in reality), heading to the second floor of the store. 

“Hello, [Name]! Good to see that you’re back again! Are you here for the book signing?” the store owner questioned her, a bright smile on her face.

“Vienna! I’ve missed you! I’m sorry I haven’t been able to stop by recently, but I’ve been working on my own writing so much that I really haven’t thought of giving myself a break,” she giggled, scratching the back of her neck in embarrassment. “And yes! I’ve been so excited about this for weeks! I’ve been telling my dad about how much I love his book and when I saw our little village on the book tour list, I screamed!”

“Oh, stop it, girl, you just stopped by last week to pick up a book! Don’t apologize. And I was so excited! His agent, however peculiar, reached out to me and asked if he could stop here during his book tour and of course, I said yes! He is one of my favorite authors after all, too!” Vienna said, beginning to ramble off about the email that she received from the author’s quite… odd agent to say the least as she began to lead [Name] over to where the book signing was.

“Anyway, as soon as you get your book published, you have to let me know! I really wanna sell it here; I have to support my best friend!” Vienna smiled over at [Name] before stopping in front of the author’s signing booth.

[Name] smiled back, waving as her friend, the bookshop owner, began to walk away to reshelve some books that had just been shipped to her store.

She pulled the book out of her bag, smiling at the blond man in front of her. “Hi, I’m [Name] and I absolutely adore your books, Mr. Fell! All of your historical fiction seems very real but at the same time, extremely entertaining and interesting to read, it’s impossible for me to put a book down!”

“Have fun this weekend, old man!” [Name] waved her dad off as he pulled out of the driveway, smiling at her before focusing his attention on the road.

[Name] walked back in the house, closing the door behind behind her. She told Steve to text her as soon as he was boarding his plane to the convention, and the name of it had slipped her mind. While she waited for his text, she picked up the book that she was currently reading and waited, passing the time with a good book.

After a few hours and no word from Steve, [Name] began to get worried. Seventeen of her calls went to voicemail and she grabbed her car keys and dashed out of the house.

She remembered her dad saying that he was going to take a short cut to the airport through the forest by the town and she began her drive in that direction.

She couldn’t remember there ever being a forest by the town until a few months ago and the woods seemed more mysterious than they initially had. As she drove deeper into the woods, it got darker and became almost pitch black when it was only an hour past noon when she started driving. On top of that, it was the middle of summer and it was snowing. Something wasn’t right.

Her headlights reflected off of something and she stopped the car. She hopped out and didn’t worry about her feet getting wet from the snow. She had other things to worry about.

She walked closer to what her headlights were reflecting off of. Steve’s car was totaled and his phone was in shambles. She could see spots of blood staining the snow red, leading away from the car and deeper into the forest.

She shivered from the cold and headed back into her car, following the general direction of the blood. She was also shaking from the thought of what could’ve happened to Steve.

[Name] drove for about twenty minutes until she stumbled across a clearing in the forest, revealing a mysterious looking castle. ‘Why have I never seen this place before or at least heard of it?’ she questioned herself as she opened her car door, exiting her car. She slammed the door shut, seemingly in awe of the massive structure in front of her. She walked up the marble staircase, continuing to follow Steve’s (or at least what she believed was Steve’s) blood.

The castle oozed an aura of nobility and richness, but it was covered in vines and in different places, the castle looked almost faded away. It looked very regal, yet run down at the same time. The doors were a great example of this: they were large, ebony-wooden doors that were carved to portray a scene of a knight riding on his horse into battle and the night seemed to be almost faded into the background, with moss covering his face.

Once [Name] had opened the doors to the strange castle, she looked around the grand foyer. “Dad? Dad, where are you?” she screamed. She began to look around more frantically when she heard a faint “[Name]?” from somewhere deep in the castle.

The castle was fairly well-lit, the girl looked and admired all of the architecture, it seemed as if it had been ripped right from the pages of her favorite novels. It was very fairytale-esque and the girl questioned how on Earth no one had mentioned that such a place existed only a few miles away from the town.

While she marveled at the architecture, she also noticed that every piece of furniture, every decoration, had a very antique feeling to it. Even though many of these items seemed outdated, they looked as if they had been used regularly and recently, however, the castle seemed deserted and empty.

There was a candelabrum placed on a small, oddly placed table. The candelabrum was immaculate and very well detailed, with gold leaves and vines traveling along all of the different “arms” holding up the candles. There wasn’t a single spot on it that faded with age and it looked shiny as if it was new. There was a box of matches next to it, clearly placed there to light the wicks of the candles. 

The table stood next to a large, dark oak door. When [Name] opened the door, there was a staircase leading downwards, without any lighting leading down into the passage.

[Name]’s first instinct was to reach for her phone and use the flashlight on it, but she couldn’t find her phone anywhere. She facepalmed after remembering that she left it in the car’s cupholder and she knew that her dad was more important than any phone.

She struck one of the matches on the striking surface, lit the three candles on the candelabrum, and began her descent further and deeper into the castle.

Permanent Taglist (Strikethrough means that I wasn’t able to tag you!)

@sendspidermanpics @coffeebucko @eternallovers65 @ymeradonnadx @spidey-pal

#marvel #bucky #Bucky Barnes #james barnes #james buchanan barnes #white wolf #marvel x reader #avengers #avengers x reader #bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #catfa #catws #james barnes x reader #the winter solider imagine #james buchanan bucky barnes #series #beauty and the beast au #bucky x y/n #bucky x you #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x y/n #james barnes x you #james barnes x y/n #winter soldier #winter solider x reader #winter solider imagine #winter solider x you #winter solider fanfiction

[imightbeapotatobutihavestandards]

He’s Hurting Me

So this was an idea for a fic that I’ve had for a while, I wanted to post it once I’d written everything... but since Article 13/11 are going to be passed soon and will try to ban me from being creative and posting any fanfiction or fanart, I wanted to post what I’d done... and hopefully finish it.

part 1 | part 2 | part 3 

Summary: Patton, Roman, Logan and Virgil have been all been friends since high school, and though an unlikely group they’ve been with each other through everything. Now, they’re all adults, with jobs and responsibilities, but they’re still close. Though recently Patton’s been becoming more distant... While Patton faces struggles of his own in the present, every other chapter jumps back to the past and explains what the group has overcome, together. 

Based very very loosely on the song He’s Hurting Me by Maria Mena

Pairings: Prinxiety, lil’ bit of logicality... the ships are more in the background 

Warnings: None in this chapter, just a quick movie night with the bois

Part 1

Patton sat with his back leaning against the couch, one leg crossing over the other at the knee. He sighed deeply. He was so tired. He lightly pushed himself up, curling his legs up so he was sat cross-legged, and moved his glasses so he could rub his eyes with the heels of his hands. He pushed his hands to his head, running his fingers through his hair and glancing back up at the TV. It had been his turn to choose the movie this time, and he’d decided that after a long day at work, he wanted something light-hearted, so he’d chosen Tangled. Roman had been more than happy with his choice, immediately dashing over to his overwhelming collection of Disney films and finding it with ease.

Patton glanced behind him, looking onto the couch; Logan was to his left, sitting like a normal person, legs hanging over the edge of the couch, arm on the arm rest, even his posture remained impressive. Roman and Virgil… not so much. They were a mess of limbs, it was difficult to tell who was what, especially in the darkness of the room, but Patton was fairly sure Virgil was curled into Roman’s lap, the younger man’s legs pressing against Roman’s stomach. One of Roman’s arms was hooked around his boyfriend’s waist, the other was resting on his legs, occasionally moving in slow circles over Virgil’s knee. Patton noticed, as well, one of Virgil’s arms was draped across Roman’s shoulders, his hand resting in the other’s hair, ruffling it lightly. Both of them were intently focused on the movie, and Patton couldn’t help but smile gently. He was so proud, and happy for them, that they’d stayed together as long as they had, and that they still seemed as happy as they were at the start. Sure they fought, a lot, but it wasn’t normal people fighting, in fact, it wasn’t even fighting.

They were both polar opposites, Roman’s loud outgoing personality completely juxtaposing Virgil’s timid, introverted nature, they were destined to argue. And they did. Frequently. But it always felt like more of joke, they never seemed to be serious.

Patton was sure they must have had disputes, real disputes, where they questioned whether it was worth continuing, but they never let that side of them show. The worst argument he’d seen them have was over pineapple on pizza (“It doesn’t belong there Roman!”/”WHERE IS YOUR SENSE OF ADVENTURE VIGRIL?!”) But all couples fought, it was normal. It was always scary. It always left you feeling like a hurricane inside. But you always realise how much they mean to you in the end. Patton was sure that happened to them too. And they always seemed so loving, and caring, and...right together. It gave him, well, hope. In a sense. The amount of care, trust, and love in their relationship, was something he aspired to. His relationship wasn’t quite at that level yet, but it hadn’t been going on for nearly as long, so he couldn’t expect that.

Patton got lost in thought again, he thought about all the things Virgil and Roman had gone through, how much they had changed, and how much they hadn’t. It was the same for all four of them. They had grown so much, changed so much, adapted, in a way, but they were still here, together, in complete happiness, watching Disney films together. Even this, their movie night tradition hadn’t changed, even if they usually had to ditch the onesies. Patton was slightly downcast at that, but he understood; every Friday, everyone would come straight from work, round Roman’s (and Virgil’s) and they’d chat, mess around, and watch a film. It became difficult to always bring onesies, not to mention driving home in one was unacceptable for Logan, so he’d only bring his if he planned on sleeping round. It was funny, thinking of them being kids again, relaxing after school, dreaming of the future, wearing an assortment of onesies. Now that had been replaced with work clothes, it had been replaced with the future they were dreaming of. For Logan, that was a black shirt and a tie, as a teacher he had to look presentable. He’d always been inquisitive and had a longing for knowledge, it only seemed reasonable to pass this knowledge on. Roman wore a white shirt, his favourite jacket thrown over the top, and black jeans; despite working at the same school as Logan, Roman had assured him several times; “Drama teachers don’t need to look smart, our job is fantasy, what good is a tie there?” Roman had always been into theatre and actually gotten pretty far, being in several shows, but now his main priority was teaching. He really loved working with younger, enthusiastic kids and giving them a place to truly express themselves. Virgil wore pretty much his normal outfit, black shirt, black ripped skinny jeans, and had obviously put on his favourite hoody as soon as possible. Virgil worked at a small antique store, it was quiet and the atmosphere was calm. The owner had taken a liking to him and made working there even better, it was funny but Virgil really did love his job. He didn’t want the pressure of teaching, or running his own company, and sure as hell didn’t believe in himself to put his work out there, but running a quaint old shop with sweetest elderly woman he’d ever met was incredibly appealing to him.

Patton looked down at himself; pale blue polo with a cardigan wrapped round his shoulders… he didn’t exactly have a dress code. He owned a coffee shop, and ran it with his brother, Thomas. It was doing strangely well, Patton had thought, and he really loved it. He and his brother had designed everything, it was something they could call theirs, and it was perfect. They’d filled it with plants, fairy lights, board games and rainbow pillows and blankets. The walls were covered in short motivational quotes, such as “Stay strong,” and “Keep going,” in beautiful cursive font and a faded watercolour background (courtesy of Roman.) It was small, friendly, if a bit cheesy, but people seemed to love it. Though no one more than Patton.

Patton sighed to himself again, feeling sentimental. His life was good now, it was better than good, great even. He ran a pretty successful business with someone he knew he could trust entirely, he had amazing friends who he’d been through so much with, he had a lovely house, and he had his loving boyfriend. Yet he felt in himself a longing deep in his heart, pulling him back to his high school years, forcing him to remember how all of this started. High school wasn’t the easiest time, yet for some reason remembering it felt so easy, it was comfortable thinking back on the nights they’d spent on group projects, times they’d gone to support Roman on his numerous shows, times he’d just sat and talked to Virgil for hours, times he and Logan would go for walks in complete ease. That felt so far away now, so far gone, he hadn’t been able to hang out with any of them individually for so long, he’d always have to cancel last minute if they offered. It was sad, Patton was sure their friendship would always be such a massive part in his life, but recently it felt like he was slipping away, fading out like a half forgotten memory or an old photograph. Even movie nights he usually had to leave early. He had to leave early.

Panic began surging through his chest, eyes going wide. What was the time?

He jumped out of skin when he heard his phone buzz, he immediately slammed his hand on it, frantically grasping at the sides and bringing it up to his face. A message brightly illuminated his screen, he should have been home ten minutes ago, his boyfriend’s name was displayed above his message:

Mike:

You’re late.

 Patton’s heart seemed to stop, how could he have been so stupid? He knew Miked hate it when he was late, still he did this. He’s probably so hurt, and worried, and upset. Patton felt the guilt and panic rot his insides, and a sickening feeling crawled up his throat. He felt like he couldn’t breathe. Guilt. That’s what this feeling is. Guilt.

Patton shot up, startling the others, pausing only a second to type out a reply, then immediately began frantically dashing about the room, grabbing his stuff and uttering apologies as he went.

“Guys I am so so sorry, but I’m late and- Oh God, I have to get going, I’m sorry again g-“

“Woah, woah, hold up.” Virgil stated, confusion eating his words. “It’s only,” He paused to quickly check his phone. “Patton it’s 7:40, you have to be back at 8, chill.”

“No, no no no no, Mi-We decided to change it, I’m meant to be home by 7:30, and you know how he gets about time.” The eldest rushed out.

“What? 7:30?! That’s barely anytime at all! We haven’t even had our deep chats yet! The film isn’t even finished yet!” Roman gestured dramatically towards the TV.

“Indeed. Patton, I understand you want to get home, but surely you can explain to Mike you want to finish the movie. That is what movie night is for. You aren’t a child anymore.” Logan interjected, but Patton was already shaking his head.

“I’m sorry guys, I really am, I’ll try and stay longer next week. Promise.” Patton called, already heading out the door.

“Patton! Wait!” Logan called, standing and following him to the door.

“I’ll see you Lo! See you guys!” The door shut, the cheery tone carrying the words felt somewhat hollow. Logan sighed heavily, letting his shoulders slump forward as he walked back.

Virgil was standing by now, and Roman sat bolt upright, almost lifting out of his seat. The tallest shook his head as he re-entered, running a hand through his hair, then straightening his tie.

“I’m really… worried about him. He’s spending less time with us, barely answers his phone, seems constantly on edge. He’s isolating himself, removing himself from his own life.” Logan sighed, falling back onto the couch.

“It’s not him though, is it?” Virgil growled, Roman saw the anger building up in his boyfriend, it was flashing in his hazel eyes. Roman gently wrapped an arm around Virgil’s waist, pulling him back into his lap, lightly rubbing circles on his arm to calm him.

“That is, a fair assumption.” Logan continued. “But he doesn’t see what’s happening, he doesn’t understand the level of control that parasite has on him.” His voice was almost a whisper, but it cut sharp, causing Roman to lift his eyebrows.

“How… What can we do?” Roman questioned. “He won’t listen to us, even if we tell him the truth. You know he won’t. He’s always been a romantic, any issue, he’s convinced he can conquer it. He’s convinced love will conquer it.”

There was silence as the three of them thought. Patton had pulled them all together. Created an environment they were all comfortable. Given them all a family of sorts. He’s practically rescued them; he’d cared for them when no one else had. He’d always been there for him...and now they can’t be there for him.

I really hope you like this! Any questions feel free to ask me, part 2 will be out very very soon.

#thomas sanders #roman sanders #logan sanders #virgil sanders #patton sanders #logicality #eventually #prinxiety #sanders sides #sander sides au #au #alternate universe #highschool au #abusive relationship #fanfic #fanfiction #he's hurting me

[wandaposting]

Eeeee, I meant concerns about lizzie, I'm curious.

+

Hi, are people hating on Lizzy? She’s so sweet and funny and adorable, I adore her

+

heeeeyyyyy i saw you mentioned somewhere legitimate criticisms against lizzie olsen and i’d love to hear them if you’ve got the time - i saw your breakdown of criticisms against wanda and you’re obviously very educated about this, and i feel it’s important i know as much about the celebrities i love as i can. so if you wouldn’t mind i’d really like to hear what the legitimate criticisms against lizzie are?? thnx ily

hehehehehe I THOUGHT U MEANT LIZZIE, FRIEND!!!

I’m gonna preface first by saying I’ve called her flawless bean uwu before this and I’m gonna keep calling her flawless bean uwu after this, because that’s what I do, and also because she’s legit a lovely and down to earth person by all accounts and I feel heckin blessed that she plays our girl.

Something else to keep in mind that just about every actor who plays every major character has people ragging on them. There’s an Anti Tom Holland tag. Why is there an Anti Tom Holland tag? I don’t know, but there’s a vocal minority against just about everyone, especially if they’re white in Woke Tumblr/Twitterspace. Haters gonna hate, and we don’t have to pay attention to them. The response to just about every cast member in the MCU has been massively positive where it matters.

But that doesn’t mean I can’t put my critical thinking hat on, think about the times she’s said stuff I’ve disagreed with, and consider the validity of some of the vocal minority that is her detractors.

She doesn’t seem to understand the comics. Or to rephrase this, she hasn’t conveyed an understanding of the comics as thoroughly and eloquently as, say, Tom Hiddleston (who may be One Of Us in the way he waxes beautiful, beautiful meta). At this point it’s easy to pull the Ignorant card, but I think it’s more complicated than that. I stand by my earlier position that Comics Wanda is a Clusterfuck (I say, with endearment), and to have a thorough and eloquent understanding of Comics Wanda is to acknowledge this fact. Comic clusterfucks don’t help someone who is trying to formulate a narrative about a character and get into their shoes.

So she took that big pile of Wanda-related comics they gave her when she first got the role, and she formulated her own narrative to tie it all together. Some parts of that narrative may be different from yours or mine. Other parts of that narrative may be oversimplified. And other parts are certainly different from the narratives of Woke Tumblr/Twitterspace. It’s what she’s got, and it’s not less or more valid than the rest.

I can see why people with their own strong opinions about Wanda would object to things Lizzie has said (I can’t pull up videos right now, but she’s said stuff like “she’s crazy” back in 2015). I’m personally uncomfortable with how she hypes No More Mutants, and I go through a mini internal crisis over whether I should reblog posts that hype No More Mutants every time I see them on my dash. (For those who have seen the Haunting of Hill House, it’d be the same as hyping and praising the deeply troubled Olivia Crain circa Episode 10, if she also happened to psychically massively alter an entire population of people during her meltdown. Also Bendis just sucks at writing OP characters in OP scenarios. And dialogue. And a slew of other stuff.)

She’s also used the term “gypsy” to describe the twins. Some people consider that a slur, others do not, and others have no idea that any drama surrounding the word exists. (Jason Momoa literally named his production company Pride of Gypsies.) I can’t speak to whether it should be considered a slur or not, but I can say that popular culture is clueless about it thanks to… popular culture, and movies like Hunchback of Notre Dame. I didn’t even know it could be considered offensive until I dug deep into the Comics Wanda fandom way back when, because it definitely doesn’t hold the mainstream connotation that “this word is vile and intended to be vile” like other racial slurs. I suggest to those who do consider it offensive to have patience with those you’re informing, because it’s an uphill battle for those reasons. But I’m sure Lizzie never said it again after it was pointed out to her, and Mark Ruffalo has apologized for reacting in poor taste when it happened.

Then there’s the elephant in the room. The big enchilada: the belief that Wanda Maximoff should be played by a Roma and/or Jewish actress. I’ve already deliberated my thoughts about this at length, but to summarize: Comics Wanda is still a Clusterfuck (I say, with endearment) that leaves plenty of room for many, many, many different interpretations and adaptations of Wanda to exist. Lizzie’s great in the role. I’m sure a WoC would be great, too. Heck, I’ve seen some great fancasts floating around, so good on those. But my take is that there’s nothing morally wrong about Lizzie being in the role–you can prefer that someone else be in the role, you can be disinterested in Lizzie’s Wanda because she’s not your tea, and hey, that’s valid.

To those who think Lizzie should be smeared for not stepping down and allowing the role to be recast because it’s the Right thing to do, I say fuck that, those are the kinds of people that are too high up on their high horse for me to understand.

So I’m still gonna be here calling her flawless bean uwu, with the caveat that I do disagree with some of the things she’s stated and probably will state and that’s okay. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

#answered #wanda maximoff #scarlet witch #elizabeth olsen #meta #yep still using that tag

[skyahq]

WELL. it’s me again. i’m sam ( she / her, 21, est timezone ) and i also play parker! this is sky who i’ve had for a while but haven’t really done much with bc my muse for him hasn’t been the best, however i think i’m all sorted with him now so, character info under the cut! tbh it’s literally the exact same intro as before with just a few slight changes but feel free to still give it a read and please message me if you’d like to plot because i would absolutely love that!

FIRST. let’s just. let’s get it out of the way right here and now that this is a sideblog so i will be messing up and posting shit to the wrong accounts sometimes bc i’m dumb. let’s laugh abt it now so we don’t have to do it later. k cool we can carry on now

「 CODY CHRISTIAN, CISMALE, 25, PARAMORE. 」┈ did you read that latest viral gossip issue on SKY ARLO? he is the DRUMMER in BETTER NOW, one of my favorite ALT ROCK groups. they’ve been releasing music for FOUR YEARS now, but viral gossip has only been talking about them for the last TWO YEARS. get this, i think i heard HE’S THE ILLEGITIMATE CHILD OF A WEALTHY PUBLIC FIGURE. they’re known as the CALIGINOUS of the music industry, since they have a rep for being TRENCHANT but SELF - SERVING, but who knows. maybe that will change once they become #1.  

born and raised deep in the swamplands of louisiana, sky’s only parent was a single mom who was nowhere near old enough or prepared enough to have a kid, tbh. she did sincerely try to take care of him at first but she had a drug problem that got very out of hand very quickly. sky was barely even five years old when the state stepped in and had him placed into the foster system.

has the slightest of southern accents but if you point it out he will deny it

will occasionally speak a little cajun french though bc we stan a multilingual grump

spent the rest of his childhood without a family or stable home. he was shuffled all over the state — placed in group homes, orphanages, and many different foster homes which were unfortunately very neglectful and unsafe sometimes. by his preteen years he was practically living on the streets of new orleans, survival instincts sharply honed.

he learns fast and had very quickly become an expert thief, pickpocket, and con artist, but that doesn’t mean he never got caught. he did. a lot. like his juvie record is longer than your arm

somehow still found time to experience your typical teenage first love resulting in unbearable heartbreak with a girl who lived on the streets and ran scams just like him. it was a bonnie & clyde together forever type of romance until it wasn’t cause the girl shockingly ditched him while he was in serious trouble in order to save her own skin and he never saw her again

not long after that he turned seventeen AND THEN SOMETHING SUPER IMPORTANT HAPPENED. by that i mean he was sought out by his social worker who then proceeded to 1) tell him his mother had died and 2) take him away to california because apparently there was a family out there who wanted to adopt him! and they did!

his new family wasn’t actually new though because the man who adopted him was his biological father. he and sky’s mother were lovers for the brief time wherein sky’s father was visiting louisiana in his late teen years but he left before ever finding out that he was going to have a child. he’d never stopped thinking about sky’s mom, however, so he’d do some digging every few years. of course by the time he finally did find her it was because of an obituary and then he’d heard about sky and just knew that this was his kid.

sky learned about all of this right away upon meeting his father and to say he didn’t take it very well is a MASSIVE UNDERSTATEMENT. he was furious. after all, his father had a whole new family! a wife and kids and a very prestigious job AND OH YEAH MILLIONS OF DOLLARS TO HIS NAME BUT HE’D NEVER HELPED SKY EVEN ONCE. it didn’t really help that he was clearly trying to make up for his absence in sky’s life by being present now that he had the opportunity and anyway, it turned out he had ulterior motives for that.

basically, a large part of his dad’s wealth was in fact inherited through the family. they’re all old money posh so finding out that the next family patriarch had an unknown son who was technically his firstborn was terrifying. blood or not, they couldn’t just hand centuries of traditions and carefully cultivated wealth over to a high school dropout living on the streets. so, sky’s dad was just keeping him close while he talked to lawyers about whether or not sky had any legitimate claim to anything owned by his family and of course, the sneaky street smart kid he is, sky figured out what was going on pretty quickly and bolted back to the streets.

he was still seventeen at the time and he’s lived in los angeles ever since but hasn’t had any contact with his father or seen a single penny of that family money

so yeah he’s illegitimate, no actual rights to their fortune

lived on the streets in los angeles for a while, but with a little hard work ( and a lot of thievery and conning ) he was eventually able to get himself a little apartment while working various jobs

nothing really stuck until better now, but when he first joined the band he’d literally never played the drums before. ever. not once before in his entire life. did he lie anyway and say that he was a Drumming Expert™ because he’d get paid to play gigs with them and happened to be broke af at the time? why yes he absolutely did

since then they switched lead singers with sweets having joined the band four years ago and they’ve released one album that was lit af! they’re currently in the middle of putting together their second album and since sky’s found out that he actually really loves drumming things have been pretty good for him. he lives in a nice apartment and finally has enough money to get by without conning or stealing. he still doesn’t really know how to deal with being a celebrity but tbh he actually adores the attention? he loves having fans? people in his life who seem to genuinely love and care about him? what is this new and exciting concept he’s confused but happy nonetheless

never ever talks about his dad / family though

as usual i was Extra™ and went off with the backstory stuff, but we can move onto personality now!

by default assumes that literally everyone he meets is going to betray him. is truly on some x files trust no one shit

except he does actually genuinely trust a few people for now i’m going to say just his bandmates since i imagine they’ve been through a lot together at this point but that’s open to expansion

street smart, charming, flirtatious ( especially around pretty girls ), witty, perspicacious, determined, tough, mistrustful, surly, reckless, uncouth, self-serving af sometimes

also v v sarcastic and STUBBORN

all of sky’s save his own skin above all else stuff? kind of a lie. he’s got a soft spot for people in need of help and though he might do it begrudgingly, sky often will actually put others before him.

the other personality traits i listed are pretty spot on though

literally always has his drumsticks with him and brings them everywhere. will drum on anything and everything until told to stop then he miiiight apologize? but go right back to doing it again not even five minutes later ngl

street smart af but book smart? not so much. he picks up on things pretty quickly but he’s still pretty dumb lmao and will in fact say some stupid shit at least 2932589843794836708 times a day

however he’s not always much of a talker. he’s gotta be in the mood bc if he isn’t but you try to have a convo with him he’s gonna be even more standoffish than usual

when he does talk though, sky is often sarcastic, pessimistic, and surly

he’s permanently grumpy

except he also has many soft spots that are very easy to find

stale cinnamon roll, been in this world too long, too cynical w/ a dash of sinnamon roll

he’s usually a cute little ray of sunshine around fans though bc they just?? make him so happy?? it makes him so happy to know that people love better now and that they LOVE HIM OK

though if ever called out for smiling he would immediately deny

will absolutely throw hands if he has to

TL;DR - louisiana born street smart drummer for better now with an accent he denies having and an extremely rich family who wants nothing to do with him but it wasn’t like he ever cared anyway. charming and flirtatious but also can be grumpy and pessimistic. expert pickpocket and con artist. has no idea how to handle being a celebrity but he not so secretly enjoys the love he gets from fans. has trouble trusting and allowing himself to get close to anyone & everyone.

finally…it’s over. if you actually read this far then i applaud you. i don’t have any specific plots in mind EXCEPT FOR POTENTIALLY HALF SIBLINGS RELATED THROUGH HIS FATHER SO PLEASE MESSAGE ME IF YOU’RE INTERESTED BC Y E S but if you know me then you know i want all the plots so feel free to message me and we can definitely work something out! as usual i’m super excited to write with you folks!

#viral:intro #it's honestly just his previous intro with just a few changes #but #let's try again here