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izartn · 7 months

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I'm craving good het romance, as one does from time to time. Where do I find good fantasy not only romance het pairings. Where is my queer het plot!!!

Has anyone some book or manga recs? Preferably something finished please, I don't want to suffer waiting to the author to complete or abandon the story or of they're gonna be canon XD

EDIT after list is written: Okay. This post has officially become my list of what kind and why of het pairings I like. You've been officially warned. (Also a rec list of what to read/watch?) Trying to avoid spoilers.

Also more than half of this list is about teen me readings, I really need to seek out books and Manga bc wow. Very teen me, and I think that I've outgrown their canons even if the ship dynamic is also that still compels me.

I like:

CANON

El/Orion from the Scholomance. Whenever Orion gets a bit of focus I'm just. Oh wow (if you read between the lines he's so simple and so fucking unhinged at the same time). El extremely denying any vibes until last moment, but also falling extremely hard. Them both being such a battle couple/pair in general.

Whatever you can call what Agatha has going on with her two beaus in Girl Genius. They're all three of them so crazy competent and gone for each other too.

Yona/Hak and her vibes with Soo-won too (that foils thing she has with him is perfect and usually handled to male charas only, I'm biting my arm) (the loyalty thing with Hak and the way he pulls her higher too) (just the frustrated ot3 vibes of it all).

Jang Uk and Naksu|Cho Yeong in season 1. Their devoted and unhinged vibes destroyed me, I loved them. They were perfect, they only needed a bit more physicality. Season 2 defanged Yeong way way too much (in favor of uwu and blegh, let the woman cut off heads) and I didn't like the postponed angst and romance without knowing her identity.

Iron Widow OT3, which look. Wu Zetian rules even when she misses and nukes a city and everything is fantastically creepy and the guys lovely developed charas too with very different personalities and backstories

Tana and Gavriel from the Coldest Girl in Coldtown. (and this one also has threesome vibes with Aiden, uh) I like it when she is driven to do whatever it needs doing be it save her ex or her sister, or killing an ancient vampire in the company of another midly crazed vamp who is also very devoted to her and rediscovering life. Also the whole aesthetic and vibes of this one fucks.

Kate and August in Monsters of Verity duology. Dark dystopic urban fantasy and monster/human plus tragedy plus narrativelt active morally complex fem protags? I was obssesed with it when it came out.

Kaguya and Shirogane, but specifically if they weren't so innocent. Their chemistry is super fun, but I want something a bit more grown up and less teen panic. See also, me at 11 being obssesed with Blair/Chuck vibes in season 1 and 2 of Gossip Girl.

I'm on a roll. I loved Gilbert/Anne both in the 80's series and in Anne with an e. Obvious rivals to lovers where the guy respects her intelligence and she also has to have a whole arc about herself before realising she likes him.

I remember being bewitched by Lyra and Will once upon a time when I read the Golden Compass trilogy. Same re:Nathaniel and Kitty from Bartimaeus despite these two never having comfirmed anything just tragic unfulfilled potential.

Bipa and Aer from La Emperatriz de los Etéreos de Laura Gallego; theyre my fave pairing of hers and one of the only ones I didn't grew distant from as I grew out of her books. She's so practical and also kind and warm hearted, and he has the head on the clouds and is also completely out of this world in a familiar way. (this is me identitying with the guy who only appears like. A quarter of the whole novel bc he has been trying to give himself over to a lovecraftian alien soul-eater blue star while Bipa has to do all the journey to bring him back and destroy said blue star). Laura Gallego is wild.

NOT CANON

Younger me also enjoyed Artemis/Holly, not sorry at all for that one. He's so gone for her as a person and she's so out of his league (bc of their ages, bc of their species, their incompatible moralities up to the last books, etc, etc). Unfulfilled longing that makes you want to be a better person, the ship.

Soul/Maka on the other hand have super married vibes despite nothing ever being official and I love them and want to set on fire all the fic there's is about them bc it's general romcom / modern setting without that battle partnership and soul trust + domesticity I love. Also extremely teen but alas.

Yatori from Noragami bc I love tragedy specifically and human/gods relationships are fascinating. Even if it's unfinished. Even if it's out of focus somewhat.

Bellamy/Clarke from the 100 for all of the three seasons I saw before abandoning the series. The plot was unsmokeable but their relationship perfectly done. I was resigned to a boring romance with Finn and bam. Complex relationships, Clarke being bi with Lexa, parallel leaderships arcs, etc. Oh wow.

When someone bothers to write Aredhel/Celegorm on her PoV and it hits incredibly HARD. Damn. Whether aroallo or full-romo. Let post rebirth Aredhel be wild and Celegorm reckon with the knowledge of what wrong he almost brought to Luthien given Aredhel. Aredhel loving Lomion despite everything and loving disaster Celegorm, but not forgetting what they did, the awkward bonding between Maeglin and Celegorm as two former bad guys. Or them avoiding a bad ending and dying together fighting on the First Age before the Second Kinslaying. Playful times in Valinor pre-darkening.

ESPECIAL MENTION

I loved Laini Taylor characters and worldbuilding but her love at first sight kind of romances left me cool which is sad given I liked like everything else about her stories. Including the two characters involved on the romances, but not the romances per se. I guess I'm too aroace to believe first sight as anything reasonable in a serious plot even with the fairy tale vibes her stories have lol.

I also love Reylo vibes and symbolism but hated what they did on the last movie with them and I'm weirdly unable to read much fic of them. So...

#my thoughts #recs #but also me ranting about my fave ot3 with het or otp het pairings #and discovering it's either extremely ruthless driven and morally grey fem chara who is tired of this shit #x her equally driven and ruthless partner who is also so so tired of this shit and all in with her shaneaningans #(maybe he's a bit softer than her having already tried it the hard way but he still loves her and they're both driven crazy by the world so)#or either book-ish and intellectual girl x her rival or childhood friend with whom she has a mutual understanding despite themselves #they adore each other but they realise it later #lmfao #my two sides: very angry at the world VS very intellectual and a bit passive-aggressive. FIGHT #also some exceptions but they mostly follow some of these archetypes which. yeah.

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mysticdragon3md3 · 1 year

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Nothing proves to me more that I got into Dimiclaude, because their archetypes were similar to my previous OTP AkiRyu, than the fact that there is a lot of werewolf-Dimitri with witch-Claude fanart this Halloween. Werewolf-Ryuji and witch-Akira was exactly what I had them dress as, for past Halloweens. lol

In some of the fanart, Dimitri could be Catmitri instead of a werewolf, but the results are the same. Whenever I gave Ryuji dog ears, they were pointed like a cat's, because Ryuji is a shiba inu dog.

Whenever people say, "Claude and Dimitri barely interacted in the canon; why are you shipping them?", I point to AkiRyu and say "archetypes". I think I like these character archetypes and these relationship dynamic tropes. <3

#otp #otps #relationship dynamics #personal preferences #archetypes #favorties #favorite characters #KhalidMitya #fe3hfuukasetsugetsu #akiryu

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sarahlizziewrites · 3 months

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Wanted to find out what Tumblr thinks are the most important ingredients for a satisfying fictional relationship. Think about your favourite ship, your own OCs, books or movies you've experienced lately. What drives you crazy about them?

P.s. I'm well aware that most fictional relationships have multiple or all of these, but you have to pick the most important one mwahahahah

If you think I've missed something put it in the tags, but first check what I mean by each of the terms below.

Spread it far and wide for sample size!

Definitions/interpretations below cut:

Chemistry: These people get on so well it'd be a crime if they didn't hook up. They are basically already fucking with their words. Think Mulder/Scully

Attraction: these characters are unreasonably hot for each other, to the point where they ignore all sense

Narrative symmetry: covers everything from being narrative foils, contrasting archetypes (e.g. grumpy/sunshine) - think Ineffable Husbands (deep down spark of goodness/"just enough of a bastard to be worth liking") (ps yes this one is Mulder/Scully too)

Obsession/devotion: enemies-to-lovers, friends-to-lovers, I'd-go-the-ends-of-the-earth-for-you, I'd-die-for-you. Think Orpheus/Eurydice from Greek myth, or Wuthering Heights

Tragedy: the love story is beautiful because you know it has to end. The world will be cruel to you but you fell in love anyway. This one is Orpheus/Eurydice in Hadestown. (Also, the potential for this kind of tragedy - the threat of a happy ending ripped away)

Something forbidden: we're not allowed to be together/we have to be together despite the odds/our families would never approve - e.g. First Prince

Fate: star-crossed lovers, soulmates, destined to be together, exes who find they need each other. "I'm the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition"

#fiction writing #writeblr #fandom #fandom meta #shipping #shipping discourse #romance #romance writing #romantasy

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donnatroyyyy · 3 months

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A (very long) list of my (semi) unpopular DC opinions

The Batfam shouldn’t work together as a whole big group as vigilantes. Whenever that does happen it ends up being character suicide for AT LEAST two of them and also usually ends up minimizing all of them to one of the skills/traits they’re good at (or the archetypes the writer wants them to be). The only exception to this is if it’s a long arc covering an actual catastrophe where each issue covers a duo or trio within the big group. Otherwise they should stick to no more than 4 ppl at a time in a team up. Also, this obviously doesn’t apply to them as civilians, they’re literally family obviously they’re gonna hang out as a group.

The Teen Titans (2003) is the best writing but (one of the) worst teams. On the other hand the original Teen Titans run and NTT run are the best teams (imo) but have either really bad or really mediocre writing. We as a society need an OG TT or NTT run written well.

Roy struggling with a heroin addiction has so many more layers and nuances to it than struggling with alcohol because as a non-meta hero most of his fights were against something drug-related. As opposed to alcohol which is now seen as a normal thing for soldiers/heroes/warriors to fall on as a crutch, this medium uses alcohol addiction with every other character. Roy’s addiction to heroin would literally be an opposition to all that he’s ever stood and fought for, all that his family and friends ever fought and stood for, and way more interesting because of that.

Garth (like Donna) is one of the most powerful and interesting characters but is never given enough panel time. However, unlike Donna, writers would rather write him out of the teen titans before they actually write a good interpretation of him. And I don’t know why but his role in the Aquafam too has been dwindling with time.

Garth’s openness about his inferiority complex and his inferiority complex in general need more panel time, it’s one of the most interesting thing to come out of the OG TT run

This is a complicated take because it’s literally two opposites in one take, but the main difference in characters as seen in old comics vs. now is two things. One, the writing of characters was much better, much more realistic, and much more nuanced in old comics. Two, when there is a well-written character in modern comics its usually a more show not tell character so everything is shown to us through actions and stuff rather than straight up words or them psychoanalyzing themselves in their speech bubbles and that just doesn’t work with modern audiences because media literacy is a dying art. Also, there’s the variable of the influence of fanon over how characters are written in comics but that’s a whole other post.

Roy and Donna are literally THE OTP like I don’t even want to hear it, they’re literally DC’s percabeth.

Every single Teen Titan had an inferiority complex, some were just easier to see.

Selina and Bruce and Talia and Bruce are two very different relationships that can’t be compared. Also they will always live side by side till the end of comics, this love triangle was one meant to last, and it will.

Jason Todd as we know him right now should get the YJ Roy Harper treatment, we need to find out that he’s a clone and the real JT is somewhere in Africa working for UNICEF or something, that’s the only way to fix his character.

Also, ignoring the top one, if DC doesn’t want to commit to that because they’re cowards, they should at least not make him a part of the Batfam yet, it’s too soon for either side.

Kara Zor El is the perfect character to be a white lantern, her arc literally matches up perfectly with each of the rings, and she’d wield it incredibly

Kyle Rayner is top 3 GLs

In my opinion, Diana is best written when the most important thing to her in the world is the world itself. Like, usually I hate the whole “hero would sacrifice u, villain would sacrifice the world” thing cuz it mostly doesn’t really apply, but to her it absolutely does. Diana would sacrifice the closest person to her for the world in an instant if it was for the sake of the world. And this isn’t like an angst thing because they all know it and are all ok with it.

Also, Diana is one of the most if not the most powerful characters in all of DC, if DC did a Deadpool kills the marvel universe kind of thing they should totally use her because she is sooo powerful. (Afterthought: that’s why I hate most of her appearances in anything JL because they underpower her soooo bad)

I say this as a batfamily Stan, the batfamily is the worst family in all of DC and sadly the one that gets the most attention.

The OG TT are the epitome of superheroes in the sense that each and every one of them defines every part of a superhero spectacularly and always has.

Kory needs an arc where she leaves everyone and everything for a while because as of right now, not only do the writers only ever see her in relation to others, but she sees herself that way. She needs an arc where she finds herself in relation to herself, who SHE is. Away from the love triangle, and the titans, and the Titans, etc.

Babs is a better character outside of the love triangle than she is when she’s in it. (Also a better character as Oracle but that only really unpopular amongst writers)

Every single woman character in DC is written in relation to the men in the comics, even WW. The only exception is Oracle, not Babs, but Oracle, which is actually so twisted considering that the creation of Oracle as a character came hand in hand with an event that literally inspired the cloning of the phrase “fridging”

BOP is one of the best teams

Harley Quinn shouldn’t be a hero yet, she was abused for over a decade, we need to see more of her struggle to undo all of the manipulation and heal from the abuse as well as try to undo all the damage she’s done. The Animated Series is the best version of her arc but it’s still not good either.

We as a fandom(s) need to normalize the ability to consume and enjoy things we don’t necessarily agree with. For example, as I’ve stated before multiple times, I absolutely hate any kind of abusive Bruce, however, I still read those long posts about it and I still read fics where dck punches him cuz he’s an abusive asshole, it’s okay to consume media that you don’t necessarily agree with. And same with fanon versions of characters, I HATE coffee-addict Tim, I’ve still enjoyed hundreds of fics with him in them though.

Damian Wayne is the most compassionate member of the batfam and one of the Keats likely ones to willingly kill

Blue devil and kid devil have arguably the most interesting story and tragedy in all of DC and the only reason they’re not given a lot of attention is because their tragedies have to do with something we don’t like to see: the wrongdoings and flaws of heroes, especially ones we like.

Speed Saunders should’ve continued as a character

Hal Jordan should’ve stayed evil for a while, the end of the parallax arc sucks and is a stupid cop out because they weren’t ready for a fully new GL. I don’t think he should’ve stayed the villain forever, but maybe for a few years, especially if that meant they would’ve ended the arc better.

Mera is more powerful than Arthur, always has been and always will be.

Wally West does see Barry Allen as a father figure and vice versa, it’s okay to see someone as a parental figure when you still have parents, especially when your parents are (canonically) borderline emotionally abusive and/or neglectful.

Any iteration of ANY hero being abusive is the worst writing ever because what the actual fuck, I’m sorry, but what happened to the whole they’re literally fucking heroes part??

There are so many characters that deserve solo series (or even mini series) but don’t get them because all the series are already being taken up by bigger characters (looking at you batfam)

So many characters get mischaracterized for the sake of other character’s stories (again, looking at you batfam)

Anyone who thinks Superman is boring either doesn’t understand him as a character or hasn’t read enough stuff with him in it (I recommend All-Star Superman and/or American Alien)

Anyone who relates to the Joker needs to turn themselves in at the nearest police station. (Unless it’s LEGO Joker, we like him)

The LEGO Batman movie is unironically some of the best DC media to ever exist

Atlantis and Paradise Island should be allies (especially once Diana, Arthur, and Mera come into the picture), I don’t know why they’re not

Lex Luthor is one of the most despicable villains because he’s a realistic villain, which is much scarier

Kon should be the next Superman

Connor Hawke should’ve stayed Tim’s age and Tim’s friend, it makes the most sense timeline-wise plus I think their dynamic was super cute.

Comic writers not making Roy openly refer to Ollie as his dad even though they’ve been father and son since they’ve debuted basically is actually so crazy to me

These next few are about Talia Al-Ghul because I love that woman:

Talia Al-Ghul Pre-Morrison was one of the best and most interesting characters in all of DC and that isn’t just my opinion, she was really popular amongst fans and writers for that exact reason

However, Morrison’s damage to her is near irreparable

BUT, if DC did want to repair it, I genuinely believe she’d be the best character they’d have character-wise and it would probably pull in a bunch of new fans

But even if they don’t, Talia Al-Ghul is one of the most important characters in all of DC and comics in general because she’s literally the documented history of WOC in media (especially Arab and Asian women) as well as their relation to white men in media. Her character and how it changes is directly tied to mainstream views on WOC at the time.

Talia Al-Ghul is literally of “I Bet On Losing Dogs” by Mitski, personified

Dinah Lance is the perfect example of a complex character done right and interpreted wrong/not interpreted enough.

If anyone should be the therapist within the hero community it should be J’onn or Red tornado, those are the two that make the most sense.

Helena Bertinelli is more important to the batfam than Jason Todd is.

Cassandra Cain shouldn’t be portrayed as mute anymore, it doesn’t make sense for her character or her arc.

The worst thing to happen to Poison Ivy’s character is Harley Quinn.

Mera is made to be a mother, whether to her own kids (Garth included) or as a mother figure to other kids.

On the other hand, Stephanie Brown wasn’t ready and doesn’t/didn’t want to be a mother, she gave up her baby willingly and will almost 100% not go out to look for her.

Lady Shiva’s appearances 99% of the time are out of character for her, the whole “training with Shiva” thing is also OOC for her, and Cass even existing is OOC for her. The reason that this continues though is because she’s been transformed from an actual character into a character tool.

Stephanie Brown and Cassanadra Cain are a good duo and anyone who hates on one but likes the other misunderstood both of their characters.

Dick hating Jason for what he did to Tim IS in character of him, and, in my opinion, correct of him

The rise in people who don’t like heroes’s pacifism is concerning. People calling Bruce a bad person because he doesn’t kill is concerning. People viewing Clark as boring because he’s a good person is concerning. People liking straight up villains more than they do heroes is concerning.

Anyone who recommends mister miracle should also tell them about the TW in the first few pages

Kingdom come isn’t that good, especially to non-Christians

Big Barda needs her own run. We need a Bug Barda run that covers everything from her origins to where she is now, and we need it done by a female writer who’s good at complex and heavy stories

Some of the most hated comic writers are some of the best at what they do

Chuck Dixon is just as much a blessing to any character he writes as he is a curse

Marvel’s comic writers and artists 80% of the town do a better job with their characters and their arcs than DC writers and artists.

DC should have sensitivity readers because the amount of racism in these comics is insane

It’s okay to put down a comic/run because you don’t like the art, it’s your time no one’s gonna judge you

Alex Ross’s art is actually nice, people just like hating

The Trinity should never be shipped with one another

Steve isn’t important to Diana at all, he’s barely in any of her comics actually, he’s less important to her (or at least to her character) than fucking swamp thing

Batfam is better smaller

It’s better to read the first appearances of characters, it helps you understand them better.

Lois Lane is the DC version of Susan Storm, aka the blueprint of women in that company’s comics, but also one of the most forgotten women in that company’s comics

Comics aren’t going to go anywhere arcwise for the characters long term, that’s the whole point. Batman will always have a robin. Love triangles will always be love triangles. They will all always stay young.

Old campy comics were better than modern comics.

Cheshire isn’t a redeemable character and shouldn’t be one. Women in comics should be allowed to be straight up villains and stay that way.

Cheshire having Lian is OOC. Cheshire leaving Lian is a racist trope.

Asian and Arabs are treated horribly by DC.

The New 52 is actually a good place to start for new readers, it was a good idea, but it should’ve just been an alternate universe (like mcu is to 616 kind of) or something (and it should’ve been down with the supervision of anyone who isn’t Dan didio)

DC has some of the best world building in the history of modern day media/literature especially considering how many facets of this world there were/are to build

Team rosters that are constantly changing are better than stationary ones unless they change too much/too fast

Canon is hypocritical 90% of the time, most times canon clashes and crashes and doesn’t make sense, so don’t worry about it, read a comic, count what you want to be canon as canon, throw the rest into to the “never existed” pile

I’m sorry to tell you guys this, but it isn’t an opinion, it’s an unpopular canon fact, one that even I don’t like: Dick Grayson likes pineapple one pizza

Something that I hate that been on the rise a lot lately is the fact that the fandom is so okay with character being sexualized just because they like how the characters look, I feel like we should keep our stances on this as they are with all over-sexualized characters.

Villains of the week are actually so fun, even more then the big villains sometimes.

JSA needs a comeback please and thank you (I’m begging atp)

Cassandra Cain shouldn’t be Orphan, ever, it makes no sense for her to take the name of her abused. The same way it doesn’t make sense for Jason to become red hood.

Complex characters who are dumbed down once can be dumbed down and mischaracterized every time after that, and this has been done A LOT.

The YJ shows is very much overhyped

The fact that DC overpowers their characters makes them more interesting, not less

Selina was right and in character when she left Bruce at the alter. She was not right and in character when she hid Helena from him, she wouldn’t do that.

Bruce Wayne is more fun to read when he has a pipe and fun colored robes, please give him back his pipe and his fun colored robes.

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krakkenchaos · 1 year

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Based on the trailers, I'm not convinced the Clone High reboot will be as entertaining as the original, but it's smart that it's seemingly leaning into the angle of "characters from a 2003 teen drama trying to adapt to living in a 2023 teen drama." It's a meta-humor goldmine because the fandom that emerged in 2020 when JFK clips randomly went viral on tiktok is a downright fascinating specimen of how our perception of characters in pop culture has changed over the last 20 years (I feel old.)

The clearest example of this is how Joan x JFK got warped into a wholesome OTP darling of the fandom. The actual show pretty explicitly characterizes JFK as an obnoxious playboy douchebag. That's the entire archetype of his character and it's exaggerated to extreme extents for humor. There's exactly two examples of the JoanFK "romance" in the original series and both were just the punchline of jokes that wouldn't be well-received today. The first is JFK being relieved that he's not gay when the "man" he was attracted to was Joan in disguise. The second is JFK having sex with an emotionally vulnerable Joan in the literal last minute of the show as a parody of the dramatic out-of-nowhere twists in TV shows of the time. It should be strange that this ship was warped into the definitive wholesome face of the fandom. But it's not strange when you look at Abe and the modern view of characters like him.

See, Abe is the character Joan is "supposed to" end up with. He's the awkward, dorky guy chasing the hot, popular Cleopatra while oblivious to the cute alt girl at his side pining to be more than friends. It's classic "she's cheer captain and I'm on the bleachers" stuff common in the 2000s. However, that trope became hated within the last few years because it's "pitting women against each other." Even more-so, Abe's character archetype has become detested. Abe is Ross from Friends and Xander from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Today, it's unpopular to have empathy for characters like that because their passive "nice guy" misogyny is recognized as just as, if not more harmful than the blatant misogyny of a JFK-type character. Meanwhile, fandom culture has fallen in love with himbos, hence why JFK has been shoehorned into that archetype despite still being an awful person in the show. There's so much comedic potential with this contrast and the reboot seems to be at least somewhat aware of it based on the joke from the trailer where JFK is commended for being "so sex positive."

#clone high #clone high 2023 #clone high jfk #clone high joan #joanfk

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theneighborhoodwatch · 1 month

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uhhh wally/barnaby for the ship thing?? idk if you ship them im just guessing because youve rbed some art for it lmao

(send me a character/ship to hear my thoughts)

when or if I started shipping it: [friendly shrug that communicates absolutely nothing]

my thoughts: IT'S FUNNY, I... I FEEL LIKE I SHOULD FEEL WAY MORE STRONGLY ABOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF THEIR RELATIONSHIP BEING ROMANTIC THAN I DO? especially considering that "eccentric and traumatized manic pixie nightmare guy obsessed with fulfilling some fictional archetype x his more cynical and worldly friend-slash-colleague who starts out supportive but eventually finds himself way out of his depth" was pretty much the Exact dynamic of the last ship i was invested enough in to call an otp. so far though, any moments they have together don't get much more out of me than "ooh, interesting, i wonder if/how that's gonna come into play later," or "oho, i think my friend who ships barnwally will get a kick out of this," or "aaaghghg fuck.... buddy comedy angst...." i think my thoughts on them right now can be best summarized as ... i am excited for when there is enough About them in canon to finally make me as emotional over them as i am about, like, franklydear or wally and home. but also even if their relationship is never explicitly or even implicitly romantic then i have more than enough reason to believe it will still be just as emotional and rich with Themes. TL;DR: i know they're gonna fuck me up Some day, but that hasn't happened yet.

What makes me happy about them: they genuinely like each other! i feel like with welcome home's whole Thing of its characters' predetermined roles coming into conflict with their reality it'd be really easy to have one of them secretly hate or resent the other from the get-go, but - no, wally trusts barnaby to always have an answer for what he's feeling or experiencing and barnaby is gentler and more upfront with wally than he is with almost any other character (although considering his general personality that may not be saying much HAHA.) it makes it a lot easier to get invested in them and subsequently dread what effect The Horrors will have on their relationship.

What makes me sad about them: so, like. wally probably knows why he and barnaby are friends to begin with, i.e. he probably knows that A Higher Power decided that they should be friends, and so it was done. the possibility that wally can exist beyond what his audience/creator(s) expect of him does not seem to have ever occurred to wally himself. what i'm getting at here, is that. wally may genuinely like being friends with barnaby, yes. but liking something because you chose to seek it out and liking something because you are under the impression that you will somehow cease to exist without it are Two Very Different Things, and the latter is. very dangerous for any kind of relationship. and, fuck, barnaby - if i was barnaby and i found out that that was how my best friend (who i may or may not be in love with) saw our friendship the whole time - if i found out that was the truth and i never noticed it? i would never be able to forgive myself. even if that friend ended up doing things that hurt me or other people or themselves and i was rightly upset with them for that, there would always be that little voice in the back of my head telling me that if i had just looked closer for two seconds i could have fixed it. i could have helped him. i could have shown him i was a real friend.

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: i don't seek out WH fic all that often, but i remember when it first became a thing a lot of explicitly romantic barnaby/wally fic made barnaby a little too earnest/mushy for my liking? like yeah, he cares about wally and is gentle with him and everything, but he is also very quick to tease wally and to dress up pretty much everything he says in at least on layer of irony/clowning around. this pooch does NOT have the emotional self-awareness for the things you want him to say!! i also dislike when authors make another character (usually home or. howdy?) like, over-the-top abusive towards wally so barnaby has more incentive to get with him, but i just don't like character assassination/flanderization in general, so.

Things I look for in fanfic: honestly, just, like. more stuff that actually interacts with WH's canon. i feel like a lot of the stuff i see for them is either AU fic or smutty oneshots that don't do a whole lot to incorporate canon elements. which, like, do whatever you want forever, but i'm Starvin' over here.

My kinks: y'know i was gonna be like "teehee, wrong blog! you're not getting that here, silly!" but. i actually have no idea what kinks i would consider Only in the context of wallaby. uhhh. ask for my nsfw blog if you wanna hash that out i guess.

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: i'm very curious to see if canon is going to end up making a case for laughingstock. i don't know if it will but i think it would be very funny. as for wally... [looks at his relationship with home] uh. [looks at his relationship with W/the WHRP] umm. [looks at his relationship with the audience] fuck. maybe work on yourself a little bit before thinking about sharing your life with someone again, buddy.

My happily ever after for them: an animated music video set to on melancholy hill by gorillaz. it opens with wally sitting in front of home's burning remains at night, gazing mournfully into its eyes one last time. the only sound we hear is the crackling of the fire. we smash cut to black for a split second before the song begins to play, paired with the visual of wally driving down a long highway at sunset, in what is very clearly a hastily painted over mail truck that used to belong to eddie's post office. after the opening instrumental of the song, the footage alternates between three perspectives: wally traveling to his unknown destination, complete with all the hitchhiking, gas pumping, pit stopping, and otherwise less glamorous parts of road travel; the other neighbors trying to put their lives back together after The Bullshit, in particular following barnaby's melancholic point of view as he visits each one/attends their various get-togethers; and finally, the neighbors Braving The Horrors back in the day to fight for a life that best fits their needs rather than that of their long-dead makers. as the song begins to roll to a close, we see the mail truck pull up to an unfamiliar looking house, with a handful of neighbors hanging out on the porch and barnaby leaving out the front door to grab something. the entire scene takes place at sunset once again, meaning everything in is in silhouette. barnaby stops dead in his tracks when he sees the truck, and the others soon follow his gaze. wally opens the door and steps out, his body language hesitant as he takes one step towards barnaby. barnaby begins to walk towards him. we smash cut to black on the final note of the song. the end.

#banbanfan01 #welcome home #ask #barnwally #wallaby #barnaby b. beagle #wally darling

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chrysopoeias · 1 month

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Not to get all emotional over your Riza as a mom post but it got my brain all churning - I saw a post recently about women choosing to break the cycle of abuse by loving their daughters and just there was this line of like, “she invented a love she never got to receive” and I just think the struggle to do that would apply so much to mom!riza (I actually only can imagine her having daughter(s) ahaha). Anyway thank you for that post!!

Yeah I think Riza will attempt that. Wether she succeeds or not is a different matter... Like explicitly I do not want Riza to turn into the archetypical ‘good mother’ that solves all her (generational) issues, simply unlocking this skill by giving birth. Where she always does exactly the right thing on instinct, and the child(ren) grow up to be the textbook definition of normal and well-adjusted.

The vast vast majority of people reproducing have absolutely no clue on child psychology and development, or how to parent in the first place. They just have their best intentions, ideas of what they will do different/the same as their own parents, and their biases and believes of what is normal.

For Riza this is intentions to do things different from her father, and her being used to military regiment/culture. Her father neglected and abused her, so her doing the opposite and loving(tm) the kid(s) can still quickly turn into her being overprotective and overbearing, or being way too strict influenced by her own military experience. And what will happen when she has depressive and PTSD episodes her whole further life? What if instead of being consistently neglecting like her dad, she is an unreliable mother in a different way. Where she cannot always be there for the children in the way they want and need for days, weeks, months?? Just being a powerless child and watching your mother suffer seemingly randomly is incredibly difficult, perhaps even more frustrating when the reason of her suffering are invisible (mental) and hard to explain. Riza just loving her children may not be enough.

I do not want it to be suffering and tragedy 24/7 in this AU timeline, but I do like to emphasis and explorer the darker and tragic sides more. Interpersonal relationships are difficult, even with your own children. I dislike when in fanon having children is treated as the ultimate reward at the end of a story after all the conflict is over. Like this is the big happy end goal, and we can all sigh in relieve as long as we know our otp reproduced and got their reward, phew. When having children is such a massive source of conflict and challenges lmfao.

But I’m just a friendless childless doodle blogger, so what do I know ヽ(；▽；)ノ

#ask #thanks anon!#in the fic that orginally inspired my interest she had a daughter but now i am attached to the two boys theo and i made up ;u;

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10shikigami · 6 months

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fellas is it gay to look at your best friend like this: 1 / ∞

#renga #reki x langa #sk8 the infinity #sk8edit #mine: edits #**#mine #edit: renga looks #edit: fav renga moments #they are in love #i don't know what else to tell you they're fully in love #look at how langa looks at him #otp: archetype

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veliseraptor · 3 months

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Psst top Wheel of Time ships and characters? (Also can I ask for any of your thoughts on Nynaeve?)

I should do a whole separate post on Nynaeve honestly but suffice it to say for this one that I love her very very much, didn't appreciate her nearly enough on my first read but appreciate her more every reread since.

since I love lists, here's a couple lists for you

CHARACTERS

Rand al'Thor. I don't usually latch onto protagonists but when I do they're depressed and a mess! And that's Rand for you. I really appreciate the way that Jordan plays with the Chosen One archetype specifically by looking at the damage it does/can do to a person, and the way that Rand is gradually wrecked by the weight of prophecy and expectation such that the only way to escape it, in the end, is to become not himself. Whatever my feelings about his ending (not entirely positive), I think there's a very painful and poignant statement in there.

Ishamael/Moridin/Elan Morin Tedronai. Who doesn't love a fatalistic villain longing for oblivion and believing that serving evil is the only way to get it! I'm sure that's universal. I wrote sort of a character study of him and I think personally it is one of my underappreciated fics. Couldn't say why, I don't know how this isn't a subject that everyone is clamoring to read.

Min Farshaw. My beloved since the first time I read the series and I don't think it's just because she had short hair like me, though that's probably part of it. I think I just enjoy the way she thinks, her narration, the way she's simultaneously deeply caring and a little bit snarky, the way that she interacts with fate and inevitability. I don't know, I struggle to articulate it. I just know that I loved her first as a character and I still love her.

Tuon (Fortuona) Athaem Kore Paendrag. My problematic fave (other than, I guess, the aforementioned nihilistic actual antagonist). I just...she's fascinating. She's a cipher. She's the embodiment of an evil empire and absolutely going to oversee its downfall. She craves absolute control and copes poorly with not having it. Her dynamic with Mat is my favorite relationship in the series. What a gal.

Nynaeve al'Vere. In contrast to Min, I didn't appreciate Nynaeve enough on early reads (I didn't dislike her, I just didn't appreciate her enough), but that's thoroughly changed and at this point I do think she's one of my favorite characters. She's so contradictory and an unreliable narrator but in a very particular way that I feel like I don't run into very often. She's so much fun to read about, and also trying so hard to prove herself, and so determined to help people (even when they maybe don't want to be helped). She's a healer first and foremost and never loses sight of that, or of her resolve to protect her people. What a gal. But in a very different way than the above.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Mat Cauthon and Aviendha.

SHIPS

Mat/Tuon. I said their dynamic was my favorite in the series and I meant it. They have such a good courtship, the way they dance around each other and play off each other and play their relationship like a game of strategy is so much fun for me.

Rand/Min. If Min was my first favorite character then Rand/Min was my first OTP (and incidentally the first pairing I wrote porn for!). I think my favorite thing about them is the way that they're friends, or feel like it, in a way that Rand doesn't always feel like friends with the other ladies. Sometimes I appreciate that in a pairing. They just seem like they enjoy each other's company even outside of the romantic aspect, and I love that for them.

Aviendha/Elayne. Welcome to the gayest ostensibly sister relationship in the whole series!!!! No honestly though on reread I was like "how is this not explicitly a thing, I mean, I know why, but Jordan you've established some people are gay in this universe and you have Aviendha lovingly describing Elayne's naked body and, again, the gayest sister-making ceremony I've read, and tell me that they're not totally and completely, romantically and sexually, in love? Fie, I say. Lies and foolishness. They're in love and they're so valid for it.

Nynaeve & Rand. Sneaking an & ship on here! Especially as the series goes on, their relationship is soooo important to me. There's a short list of people who care about Rand-as-Rand with no ulterior motives beyond that, and Nynaeve is near the top of that list. And I love, too, that their dynamic isn't romantic in the least.

Tuon/Egwene. @highladyluck pretty much single-handedly sold me on this one and I'm so glad she did. Absolutely brilliant and galaxy brained. Egwene should've lived just so she and Tuon could have a hideously complicated enemyship. The missed opportunities.

BONUS: Rand/Min/Morshamael Tedronai.

#conversating #anonymous #will say that faile/berelain almost made it on as a bonus #wheel of time #wot book spoilers

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idrellegames · 10 months

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Not an ask. But thank you so much for the aspec representation in Wayfarer. It's so refreshing to see an alloaro character like Veyer that is canonically alloaro and isn't the character archetype that sleeps around a lot and you just hope that they are around but then they eventually gets "fixed" by love. Anyways thanks for being awesome.

I so very rarely see alloaro characters handled with respect in fiction since it's so easy to boil their traits down to "noncomittal person who sleeps around until the right person comes around and fixes them". It's the flip same of the same coin as romantic asexuals, where the character gets boiled down to "inexperienced person who has never had sex until the right person comes around and fixes them."

Sexual attraction and romantic attraction are so often tied together as a single experience. And it is this way for many people, but not for everyone. Just speaking generally as an ace person, my experience is that aromanticism and asexuality are more palatable for non-acespec folks when they're treated as something that goes hand in hand. But being aroace isn't the only way to be aromantic or asexual - there's a huge variety of way people experience attraction and calling treating romantic and sexual attraction as the same thing is a disservice to everyone (even for allosexuals whose sexual orientation may not match up with their romantic one!).

Within the context of storytelling - at least in western writing - there's a narrative demand to meet certain expectations otherwise the trajectory may fall flat and be seen as unfulfilling. A committed relationship that includes both romance and sex is typically the desired end goal with fictional relationships (look at any romantic comedy, even going back to Shakespeare - Shakespearen comedies always end with a wedding). You can also look to the prevalence of the OTP in fandom - there's a desire to see your favourite characters get together in a specific way and to have that relationship come to fruition. And it is quite fun! I don't mean this as a knock against it - I enjoy OTPs myself, I love romance in fiction so much. I love a satisfying romance arc. Most of my OCs for video games have relationships and its a focal part of their character development.

But this does mean that aromantic and asexual people often sit on the sidelines because they don't fit perfectly into that type of story structure. So it can be very difficult to include them. They blur the lines of the format. They make it a little messy. They don't match the expectation.

I think with aromantic characters, too, both writers and audiences don't know what to do with them. There's always this lingering sense of disappointment that romance is off the table, that their arc isn't going to culminate in a committed relationship. Even in the world of IF and gaming, we don't have terminology to classify aromantic characters who can have some kind of relationship with the player character because the terminology is Romance Option (RO) or Love Interest (LI). Wayfarer's character roster is evidence of how much of a stumbling block this is - Aeran and Veyer are included on it as "romances", even though they aren't in the traditional sense (Aeran falls into the "conditional" label, Veyer is in the "tryst" one, but neither of them are technically "romances" in the traditional sense).

As for Veyer themself, they aren't interested in romance. They are in their 60s, they've been around the block a few times, they know what they do and do not want. They know what their life is like and what they can and cannot commit to due to outside factors. They may be smitten with people they find interesting or intriguing, but romance or long-term commitment isn't a part of that.

This doesn't mean that they can't be compassionate or genuinely care about their partners or enjoy their company, they're just going about it in a different way.

#wayfarer #wayfarer if #wayfarer characters #veyer krellion #aromantic #asexuality #romances #answered

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