#scribblethoughts

[eek-a-tron]

Q&A: The Current MCU

a.k.a. my thoughts on God Seeks Thief-related stuff

What do you think about the current state of the MCU?

Like many, I have lost much of my enthusiasm for the MCU. (Not all, just much.) I thoroughly enjoyed Phase One and Two, and I really enjoyed Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and Luke Cage (such halcyon Netflix days, man) — and thennnnnnnnn, I felt more than a bit let down by the end of Phase Three. I’ve caught some new/current offerings here and there, obviously, and I’m mildly intrigued for Blade (mostly because I was there, Gandalf: a super-youngling in the 90s goth times, and because I still find this very old Tumblr joke incredibly funny). For me, it comes down to an ongoing pessimism about the money-machine process by which most movies are ground down into “Wow, what a twist!!!!” content nowadays. Sure, comics regularly kill off beloved characters for drama, and they’re loaded with endless reboots and one-shots and special guest artists and re-envisioned tropes … but look, movies are a different medium, much to the great capitalist machine’s dismay. And ultimately, I think general audiences — and I, too! — dislike a Whedon-style, character-teams-and-fandom-breaking axe. It sours the fun juice, if you will.  (So does Whedon, ugh; what a can of worms.) I just think that if you build up beloved characters over the course of a decade and then systematically murder them simply to raise the stakes — particularly if they are, you know, women — I think the audience may start to feel that things aren’t, you know, fun.

To further illustrate what I mean, let’s imagine the general MCU plotting scenario with the Batverse. Let’s say the Batverse characters were relatively unknown to general movie audiences, and then they got built up over ten years via a plethora of films. Then, after ten years, they kill off Batman, they push Catwoman off of a cliff, they strangle the Joker, the beloved actor playing Nightwing dies, and we’re left with … Jason Todd/Red Hood and a time travel machine. (Sorry, ol' pouty buddy, you know I love you, but you’re here to make a point.) Doesn’t that sound awful? Especially if you felt that most of the lost characters would never really return, for either “stakes” or “corporate synergy?” I do realize that this sort of thing both does and doesn’t happen with the Batverse; the Batworld is constantly rebooted and the characters change around, only to return later in a different iteration. The characters themselves are tropes on tropes by now. They can have stakes, or not have them at all; it varies unendingly, like the sea. Their narratives can be as silly or as serious as one likes. It’s not that it’s better — because it isn’t? in fact, sometimes it’s really tiresome? — it’s just different. Longer-lived, if you will. More reliable? Maybe.

So uh, TLDR: Yes, I know my MCU shit is old shit. (Except for the parts scribbled around the Loki TV series, of course, which is only a couple of months old. Yes, the fic gets there eventually.) For awhile, I thought, Eek, who the hell wants to read old shit?! And then I decided, I do! If I want to see any GodCat content in the world, especially any bickery-bantery HEA content — my jam, my jones, my bread and my butter — I must go to the mountain and write it myself. Because the mountain, alas, will certainly never write it for me.

#god seeks thiefspiration #scribblethoughts #q&a #mcu #god dammit mountain #this goes out to me and the one person whomst cares! a duo in the caring force! #godcatstorming

[thunderjawsandlightning]

I am having the most intense godawful-hour-brainstorming-speculation on Carja culture concerning my current WIP and holy shit I am spiraling into too many questions about how this will work into this chapter that is taking far longer to finish writing than I ever anticipated.

#cor scribbles #scribblethoughts #wip: obs&s #work: of blood steel & sand

[papplejean17]

I get suffocate easily by people's presence and negative opinions that I choose to be alone and in peace. Of course with coffee or book with me.. Or both :)

#scribblethoughts #mykindofpeace

[satusketches]

If I weren’t so tired this would be drawn a little more careful. But you can at least have these scribblethoughts of Tiki’s.

#my art #Tiki

[ahlsi]

found my sd chip!

pictures of arts to come soon. :))

#scribblethoughts

[eek-a-tron]

I was tagged by: @destinieswritten (Aww yiss, substantive metacogs!)

What is your total word count on AO3?

50,420.  Still an AO3 newbie!

How often do you write?

It varies!  Without getting too personal since it’s incognito-city around here, I generally take 2 no-writing-at-all days to decompress, but otherwise I nab 12 minutes, every day, come hell or high water, to write.  (It’s something I’m trying.  I’m liking it.)  Scribbling-time runs far longer on my days off, of course, as well as during edits.

Do you have a routine for writing?

During longer scibblesessions, I try to start with a cup of tea, an outline-scan, and a quick read-through of the previous day’s work.  If possible, a change of location, moodboarding, and/or thematic music helps ... I‘ve filled my headphones with some fine ambient nature jams during BTB.

What’s your favorite kinks/tropes/pairing?

To write?  Okay. ;p

Kinks: BANTER OMG BANTER WITHOUT WELL-ARTICULATED BANTER THERE IS NO LIFE, power play, possessiveness/mutual possessiveness, and poetic locational awareness (ha).

Tropes: Is Canon Compliance a trope or a kink?  :p  Enemies to Lovers/Enemies to Friends to Lovers, basically anything under the Villainous Crush umbrella, Femme Fatales, Strong Leading Ladies, HEISTS, aaaaaand Men Who Love Women That Can Kick Their Ass, Scowlymen Who Wear Too Much Black Leather Like Seriously Where Are You Even Going In That The Sun Is Out You Gothic Weirdo, Gaslight Fiction, Fairy Tales, and almost any Period Piece, plz to combine any or all thx.

Pairing: Multishipper here!  Reylo because it involves my current official WIP, but also FinnRey, FinnPoe, and anything in my About section.

Do you have a favorite fic of yours?

I haven’t written fanfic in so, so long.  Burn the Boats is the current consuming roller-coaster.  I had great times long ago with fic-pieces in the Batman universe, some gaslight London murder-mysteries, and also Arsène Lupin-plus-an-old-OC.  Mon dieu.  *sighs heavily in femme fatale*

Your fic with the most kudos?

BTB.  Quick, fic-bartender, a round of hugs for everyone!

Anything you don’t like about your writing?

It.  Takes.  So.  Looooooooooooooong.  I used to be able to write shockingly fast in years past, y’all.  Finding a balance between descriptiveness and simplicity is 90% of the battle.  I don’t know what’s different nowadays ... being out of genre-practice?  The research for canon-compliance?  The editing for overwriting?  The persistence of dissatisfaction?  *turns up collar, stares out window, CUTS FOR SCHLOCK*

Now something you do like?

Dialogue and flow, I guess. I like teasing out little fluttery moments, somewhere between dramatic, realistic, and amusing.  I also think mechanics are super-important, which is probably why I can’t stop myself from editing backward to reword for clarity or fix sneaky mistakes.

I tag: @saturninefeline and @ezfa!

#scribblethoughts #destinieswritten

[eek-a-tron]

Brainstorming a new, enjoyable, hits-all-my-buttons fic-writing concept:

Remembering I have no time and there are a million others anyway:

#scribblethoughts #spike is here to illustrate my brain #well mostly the eyebrow and the falling into an early grave :p #thank you spike

[eek-a-tron]

Good Scribble, Bad Scribble

Good Scribble-Day: *a frenzy of sensible outlines and ideas*

Bad Scribble-Day: *outlines are way too long, stares balefully at empty pages, pedantically replaces all double-dashes with em-dashes in already-posted chapters, calls it a day*

#scribblethoughts #sometimes em-dashes look too short #I use too many dashes #I blame Emily Dickinson

[eek-a-tron]

Spinebarrel.

So, I was scribble-editing a little side-detail about flowers for Burn the Boats, having remembered that we see a SUPER-quick shot of one at Rey’s place in The Force Awakens.  Before I went much farther, though, I decided I’d better look it up -- just to make sure it wasn’t some widely-known Star Wars-verse plant that my frenzied brain had blanked on, etcetera.  It happens.

Voila: “Rey, a scavenger on Jakku, once found a small spinebarrel growing in the sand, which helped her realize that anything could survive on Jakku. She made a hobby of collecting spinebarrels and nightblossoms to display in her home in order to remind herself that there was beauty even on Jakku as long as you looked hard enough.”

I love little details like that.  Lore randomness FTW.

#tfw headcanon becomes canon #star wars #the force awakens #spinebarrel #rey flower #rey likes the flowers #burn the boatspiration #scribblethoughts

[papplejean17]

I'm trying to open myself so don't say that I'm hiding by my books and art coz baby I'm trying to love you again but enough not to lost myself again.

#scribblethoughts #afraidbuthavingcourage

[papplejean17]

"Baby, you're so annoying af but I love you anyway."

- papplejean

#scribblethoughts

[papplejean17]

I'm taking courage of choosing the same mistake again by choosing you.

#scribblethoughts

[eek-a-tron]

“Do you think I am an automaton? — a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! — I have as much soul as you — and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh: it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God’s feet, equal — as we are!” — Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

All right, who is gonna give us the Reylo-as-Jane Eyre crossover that the WORLD HAS (PROBABLY NOT) BEEN WAITING FOR?!

*whispers* Me? It might be me? Someday? I don’t know. Part of me secretly wants to try this, with like, all the Byronic heroes. (Well, two or three.) Like, line ‘em up in their fancy Regency boots, man. Then put ‘em all into space. Every single one. Possibly as one-shots or mini-chapters, for sanity’s sake.

P.S. But then I’d have to look Wuthering Heights’ Heathcliff right in the face, you guys. And you guys, I totally hate that guy. :p

P.P.S. The bad parts of Kylo are all the Heathcliff parts YEAH I SAID IT.

P.P.P.S. Already have ideas for what Kylochester’s wife-in-the-attic would be. Yeah, I might have to do this. XP

#scribblethoughts #ficspiration #AU mic drops #jane eyre #charlotte bronte #reylo #kylo's already a walking space byronic hero #isn't it byronic #I see you heathcliff #still don't like you heathcliff #fairy tale vibes

[eek-a-tron]

(Such sweet comments lately, what is the deal, gaaaaaaaaaaah too much nice! I asked @bsuzie-q for permission to post a screenshot of her message here and she said okay.)

Suffice it to say, this made my eyes brim with an unusual salty substance. I don’t think there’s a nicer compliment than sparking, in some small way, the scribbler/artist/self-care being hiding in all of us. I have similar sentiments too — before BTB, it had been far too long since I’d written anything just for fun. (Aside: Y’all, why do we stop doing that? There’s only so much time, I know. Still. It‘s unfair. The world is poorly formed — understatement of a billion lifetimes — but sometimes it’s wonderful to reaffirm that people are still surviving and creating and working through some fantastic projects.)

Anyway. Thank you so much for this, Sue! It means more than I can say, and I hope someday you’ll work on a project that you feel comfortable enough to share — and again, if not, that’s perfectly okay too! The Process is long and varies widely in The Workshop of Life, or something. I dunno why I went all affirmation-y for this post; I guess my usual meep-morp silly side is on hold today. ;p

#comments! #burn the boats #scribblethoughts #bsuzie q #it’s getting done come hell or high water (just here scuba-ing for awhile) :p