#there's lots of queer coded characters in that series imo

[hms-no-fun]

What's your opinion on the new HS^2 update? I'm really excited it's back but I'm a little worried. Like, the fandom has had a real problem with pretending all the horrible shit that caused it to end in the first place never happened. Is this just gonna sweep that under the rug even more? Is James Roach heading the project because he's less "problematic"? I love James roach and I'm sure he'll do great but what about all the transphobia? I just hope they finally fulfill the Toblerone Prophesy and make June Egbert cannon.

short version is, i'm cautiously optimistic! but this is a loaded question you've given me on a lot of fronts, so i'm gonna try to take it piece by piece.

to start with, the sudden revival of Homestuck^2 (now minus the squared) took me by surprise because to my knowledge, it was entirely dead in the water. my involvement with anything Official ended at Pesterquest, and pretty much the entire post-canon crew i was friends with in 2019-20 has moved on to greener pastures. i share a similar sentiment with @pochapal in that i would have put money on hs2 staying dead forever. i have, quite frankly, dreaded the inevitable day when official Homestuck media would resume production, because the fandom at large seems quite eager to sweep the ceaseless harassment and transphobia that ended hs2 under the rug and pretend that it just, like you said... never happened. when that california cafe used older Pesterquest-like character designs that omitted short chubby Terezi and black-coded Roxy, however well-intentioned and ultimately harmless that was, it felt like a sign of things to come. that, as you fear, the sharper & more personal queerness that we tried to bring to this series would be erased, in favor of something meant to simultaneously appease both tenderqueers and redditors, two sects of the fandom most responsible for the aforementioned harassment.

luckily, that really doesn't seem to be the case!

to your worry that James Roach was made director because he's "less problematic," i'll just say that's entirely the wrong way to look at it. it's not like WP (such that it even still exists) were cruising to get HS2 back up and running. by all accounts, James is the only reason it's happening again in the first place. i can't stress enough just how small an operation this Homestuck business actually is (or, at least, was when i was involved). this is not a Huge Corporation making cynical cash grab decisions. this is someone who cares about the material pushing to get something made where otherwise there would be nothing. check the new About page, where the principles of the so-called Homestuck Independent Creative Union are laid out in plain terms. this is something the original hs2 team fought for, so for this new version to start from there as square one is huge and a good sign of the possible longevity of the project.

next, let's talk about the question of this new team erasing the legacy of the old one. Kate Mitchell is on the record that she was reached out to about this new hs2, approved it, and declined to be involved. i don't know if the other writers were reached out to, but i have no reason to believe they weren't. this is a tremendously important gesture of good faith and goes a long way towards easing some of these worries.

but let's look at the composition of the team itself. do you remember The Perfectly Generic Podcast? originally hosted by future hs2 writer Kate, pgen became a flashpoint for community discourse, often opening doors between official homestuck and homestuck fandom. what made that show special was that, rather than relying on the imo tired genre of the liveread, pgen focused on a different topic each episode and explored it with one or two qualified guests. Kate's goal with the show was to encourage a more adult and quasi-academic discussion of homestuck, of its successes and its failures. if you weren't there, the weight i'm putting on pgen might seem overblown (not least because you can't find it anywhere anymore except on the internet archive). but it's not! when they decisively criticized the wild contents of the Skaianet debacle in episode 19, Andrew listened and worked to bring a more diverse group of creators into the fold. in the months after the Epilogues were released, Andrew issued a statement through pgen on episode 52 about how the Epilogues are meant to create bridges and offramps for the post-canon fandom. it's an essential piece for understanding the epilogues and their relationship to fanworks! that it wasn't included as the author's introduction to the Epilogues in the book version remains to my mind an astonishing oversight, but whatever. point is, pgen mattered to the folks in charge.

so let's look again at the writing staff of this new crew. James Roach first guested on pgen in episode 7, and would go on to be a regular. Haven, who did the Vriska and Roxy sprites in Pesterquest (and probably more stuff i don't remember), guested in episodes 81 and 87. Miles guested on episode 87 as well (unless it's a different Miles, i'm not familiar with their work and ugh this damnable linkrot). Floral, creator of one of my favorite hs fanworks & huge godfeels influence Liminal Space, first guested on pgen in episode 47, and would go on to be a regular (including once during my tenure as host to talk about Jade). on the technical staff side, Kohi built the hs2 website and has remained a backend mainstay both on the WP side and on Vast Error.

all of which is to say, if you were looking for a crew to cynically erase the past and appease the haters, these probably aren't the folks that'd be at the top of your list. of course, if you *really* wanted to cynically erase the past and appease the haters, you wouldn't bother reviving hs2 in the first place!

and that's the crux of the matter here. what cash is there to grab? what clout could possibly be chased? i struggle to think of a decision less obviously profitable and popular than continuing hs2 with a new crew right where it left off. i have to believe this is happening because the people involved want to make it.

so, yeah, i'm cautiously optimistic. i like this crew, i like the contents of the first upd8, and i'm glad as hell it's not a reboot! i'm grateful that by reviving hs2, the hs:bc crew have instantly yanked the epilogues & the post-canon project back into relevance in the broader community. and i always liked hs2 a lot! i was excited to see where they were going! i'm really looking forward to seeing more YIFFY!!!!!

but the thing is, this won't be the hs2 i wanted. i know that, and i'm not expecting it. my greatest hope for hs:bc, for this crew, is that they get the chance to take up the reins and drive this thing in whatever direction they feel most passionate about. if that winds up looking like the hs2 that was originally planned, great-- but more than anything, i want everyone on this team to feel just as empowered to leave a profound and personal mark on this series as the original team did, as i did working on Pesterquest. i hope the outline changes! i hope they take some really wild swings! i want to be surprised!! i want to be challenged!!!

above all, i want them to have the chance to pick a course, sail it, and see it through to the end regardless of what the public thinks. they deserve the chance that the original crew didn't get.

i have plenty of bitterness and cynicism in my heart over the events and circumstances of 2019-20, but as far as i'm concerned it has no place here today. i would never, ever wish the trauma and stress of that era on anyone. let the fandom at large react in whatever way it will, but i want things to be different this time. this is a second chance-- not just for hs2/hs:bc, but for all of us. even people who hate homestuck post-canon! this is an opportunity for everyone to choose to be better this time, and to push back when others might squander that opportunity. this team is not a group of celebrities, not an abstract fiction on the other side of the world, they are human beings who took a job. they've earned the opportunity to do that job, and they deserve to be treated with the respect and dignity that was so often absent a few years ago.

as to your last point, about june egbert and the toblerone. i've been saying for years that andrew's confirmation of june was less "the granting of a wish" than it was "a spoiler shared without input from the creative team." that there is any doubt about june's providence in hs2 can only be attributed to willful, aggressive ignorance on the part of people who refuse to engage with the written word in any way other than plodding literalism. the original team didn't unveil june ~immediately~ because they didn't think of june as a wish, they thought of her as a character in an ongoing story who needed time to develop naturally. i have never not felt entirely crazy about how thick everyone has been about this!

but will the new team make june canon? obviously i have no way of knowing for sure, but i'm gonna go out on a limb and say that probably the answer is "yes, when they're good and goddamned ready." just, please, for the love of god, don't go after every upd8 like "where's june? where's june? why hasn't june yet????" this was one of the worst results of the toblerone spoiler and it put INSANE pressure on the hs2 team. so just... just let this story be what it is. let this new team make the homestuck continuation they want to make.

and in the meantime, if you're really hungry for june... there's always godfeels :)

#homestuck #homestuck 2 #hs2 #homestuck beyond canon #hsbc #upd8 #pgen #homestuck renaissance #sarahposts #what pumpkin #hom3stuck

[thehallstara]

year in review

wanted to reflect on the things i've made this year. here goes nothing!

Games

ghost story is a point-and-click mystery made in unity as my final project for code coven's IGM course!! I genuinely think we managed a pretty solid concept and execution in two weeks, and if you like murder mysteries, this is for you!

lungs to burn is a short poem game made for the may 2023 bitsy jam, talking about wildfires, grief, and queer connection. featured in both indiepocalypse #43 and hand eye society's SUPERFestival. in general, the response i got for this one was kinda overwhelming (and a little confusing), but i'm glad it resonated with people! still very proud of it.

no postage required is another bitsy game, this time made for the trans game dev server jam. a somewhat-sequel to the end is near; or a letter to a lost love. there are definitely things i'd redo with this one but all in all, not too bad!

Zines

Kriah: a personal zine about some of my experiences with antisemitism over the years. definitely a heavy read but honestly i stand by it just as much as when i wrote it? idk as someone who has a lot of trauma from years of antisemitic harassment, this has been a WEIRD fucking year, and it's weird to revisit something i wrote at the beginning of the year that feels even more relevant now.

how to the hold the pain is a collage/web weaving zine i did for this year's blaseball zine jam, using blaseball narratives as a way to view crip theory and vice versa. i spent a LOT of time reading through articles for this (both academic and other) and every second of it was worth it. genuinely one of my favourite things i made all year.

Fic

i wrote a lot less fic this year than the previous two for a multitude of reasons but i still put out a few bangers!! here's a brief selection of my favourites:

swallow your guilt (blaseball, 13.2k), a story about the new seattle garages, the old chicago firefighters, grief, and finally growing up, all through the biased eyes of one baby "ruthless" triumphant

spectroscopy, or a snapshot of a light and that which it absorbs (blaseball, 2.6k), the coda to my bright zimmerman series. i technically wrote this in the fall of 2022 but posted it in march so it still counts.

somewhere there's a fire burning (rogue one, 1k), a character study of bohdi rook between the destructions of nijedha and scarif. my first non-blb fic! and still a banger imo

i play dead, come alive (hatchetfield, 12x100), character study of stephanie lauter during the events of npmd. now officially my most popular fic and honestly i'm good with that!!! i think it's a solid little fic.

just all of corona borealis. i did some good stuff about grief and growth this year y'all.

the back half of this year was mostly filled with portfolio updating, job hunting, and just generally struggling with everything lol but!!! i still made some cool stuff and am hoping to get more back to making stuff next year! it's where i feel most at home. have fun checking these out if you do!

#s.txt #stara makes stuff #blaseball #indiedev #gamedev #zines #2023 #happy new year #...almost

[bari-apologist]

IM SO SORRY I LITERALLY FORGOT ABOUT THIS ACCOUNT😭😭

spoiler warning for latest chapters

Anyhow, the recent arcs have been very very good! I’ll take some time later to write properly about them, but I find it neat that in episode 159, we get confirmation that Bari is queer. Hes always been very queer coded but 159 just confirms it imo, like sure they don’t say outright but I don’t really see how it can be denied that he’s queer. I’ve already talked abt this but HTBAD has such great lgbtq representation, HTBAD does a great job of depicting all kinds of relationships (queer ones , platonic ones, platonic ones familial etc) it’s such a good series Eon’s writing is the best .

HTBAD being a series about love and second chances is what makes it so beautiful, the fact it can show the range of feelings people can have and how second chances aren’t a bad thing are so<333

HTBAD also just does a Great Job of writing toxic characters too, like they’re bad people but the fact that they’re complex makes them all seem very realistic. Especially for Yeongno, the fact we the readers see him spiral into the worst version of himself in real time is why it makes what happens all the more impactful. I think it should be noted that Yeongno DID have the chance to change, but because of the type of person he is he didn’t change for the better. He knows he sucks and doesn’t really try to better himself, but he tries to do good things which end up backfiring horribly because he has good intentions but awful really bad execution. He really should just leave Sunju alone, while it’s okay to want to make amends, hes way too hasty and forceful about it and won’t give her space which is really creepy too . I strayed a bit from the OG topic but Yeongno is a Great example of anti character development.

Yeongno in General is Just interesting , hes very regretful of his actions but he doesn’t really know how to have a healthy output for his feelings so he bottles them up. The fact that he’s a liar is what ultimately leads to things crumbling apart for him, if he had told the truth a bit earlier to Sunju in its full things would’ve turned out much different than they did . Although Yeongno isn’t totally irredeemable, the pain he has caused Sunju is unforgivable and at the very least should respect her wishes

In regards to Yeongno’s friendship with Bari, based on the way Yeongno treats Bari he seems to have a soft spot for him. Yeongno doesn’t really lie to Bari or try to deceive him (at least early series 💀), and seems to genuinely care about him (early series). Yeongno is Even depicted to be a little envious of Bari because he knows Bari is so different from him, Yeongno knows Bari has what he doesn’t , pure kindness , Yeongno wants to be like Bari, at least a little bit, but doesn’t really know how to be good like Bari. Goes to show just how much his desperation changed him for the worst .

On the topic of Bari’s friendships , Bari, Yeongno, and Miri all used to be much closer 200 years ago than currently. At least, Miri and Yeongno considered themselves Bari’s friends they did NOT like each other. They just put up with each other for Bari’s sake . It seems they all came together as friends because Bari was friends with the two of them , but 200 years changed both Yeongno and Miri and they ended up drifting apart cause of the time. Early series the trio are quite literally drinking their lives away so it wouldn’t be unfair to suspect they were all just at bad points in their life and that’s why they weren’t as close, but 200 years ago, post Bari’s failed ascension they seemed to get along a little better, this whole post is just rambles so I don’t have time to find the exact episodes but I really like the flashback episodes since they give lots of introspective on the imoogi’s relationship with eachother !

HTBAD is very much a Series that becomes better on the re read. It’s already phenomenal on the first read but once you read again new things start to stand out, and seeing the series in a different perspective makes it feel new. Eon’s planning for HTBAD is SO good if you haven’t already I highly recommend re-reading this series it’s such a good experience

[candyredterezii]

What would you say to convince someone to get into Monster High? What's so good about? I do think the girls look pretty (I guess that's a reason?), but what else does the show have?

OKAY OKAY OKAY!!

The characters themselves are very fun, and their personalities bounce off each other really well and leads to a lot of interesting perspectives both via relationships AND their personalities in general ... I can name like 3 off the bat who are so interesting to dissect into their behavior and personality

The backstories for the ghouls are also really interesting ... Though, some more than others! Some can be rather mundane, and some are legit like traumatizing ... It's interesting!

The relationships in the series are also all very enjoyable and make me warm and fuzzy <3

On a serious note, tho, too, the movies have delved into topics of racism, police brutality, and government corruption and such, and so much more I think

But on a lighter note! The webisodes and movies are absolutely hilarious.

I come back to this video time to time because it just makes me smile

Honestly though, the show and the lore it provides (ALTHOUGH INCONSISTENT AND FULL OF HOLES WITH ALL DIFFERENT CONTENTs) is super fun to explore and play with on a world building setting too !!

It's super fun, super silly, good and helpful messages, and also while not outright ever stated, it is def queer coded in some aspects IMO

#candyredask #anonymous #the webisodes arent rlly plot heavy but they're all super duper fun #and ive only seen one movie but ive heard good things about all of them SO

[reikunrei]

someone: yuki sohma isnt queer coded

me: thinks about all the times characters have called him a “pretty boy”, and all the times characters (boys) wanted to see him in a dress and fawned over him at the mere thought of it, and how he tried to force himself to be romantically interested in tohru (yes i am aware that he actually sees her as a mother figure instead of a possible romantic partner) and that is a very clear closeted queer trope that many real queer people go thru trying to force themselves to be “normal” when they dont know any better

#and by queer i do not just mean gay oh my god ghsdfjgkf #anyway idk why i made this i was just ghjdf it rubbed me the wrong way seeing someone #be like ummm no hes not queer coded #like lmao im sure he wasnt on purpose but it's all there lads #perhaps queer coded isnt the correct term for it #thhere's other terms but i cant remember them atm bc i am very sleepy #it is a subtext tho no matter if it was intentional or not #there's lots of queer coded characters in that series imo #not the greatest renditions of queerness whether subtext or otherwise #bc it was made it like. the early 2000s or w/e #but anyway im gonna stop now and. idk do smthn else #this was my one text post of the month see u in like february probably #i say things

[bisexualmikisayaka]

watching the karate kid deleted scenes and like... what is it about daniel larusso that makes men specifically want to destroy him. i know its partially main character necessities but it is kind of insane that just about every major conflict he has is like. some random dude gets toxically obsessed with punching his face in. i also know part of it is that daniel Cannot Shut Up and is a somewhat annoying ballsy little fuck who doesn’t know when to quit but like it just gets under male miyagiverse characters’ skin in a way that i feel like isn’t examined by people outside of tumblr enough

#this is inspired by the part in the kk1 deleted scene where daniel's like 'why are you doing this' #'we both know you could kick my ass. why bother' #(paraphrased) #and johnny gets within like three inches of his face and says 'maybe because i like to. you ever think of that?' #literally the most insane toxic homoerotic tension ive seen on screen since all of kreese and silver in s4 #and then when you add chozen and silver into the mix #and like silver especially with all of his shit about making daniel bleed and relishing in his pain #it's very. hm! much to think about with the implications of this writers! #i am hesitant to use the term female coded here but there's a lot of violence against daniel in the series #that happens in a way and is enacted in a way that is much more common with female characters and women in general imo #the sort of personal targeted viciousness the desire to see someone 'put in their place' as it were #i feel like you can also read it as queer coding specially the 80s shit #like daniel existing outside of the norms of masculinity generally unapologetically and through that he presents a threat to the order #taught by men like kreese #so johnny in particular feels the need to cut him down and reduce his threat to the heterosexual order #silver's more complicated than that and i haven't actually. seen kk2 so i cant speak to chozen #anyways. these aren't very fully formed thoughts and i am really just rambling here #might change these later but. Yeah. #daniel larusso #cobra kai #ck #the karate kid #its also very funny how like. the only other dude he forms a Significant Karate Emotional Relationship with goes in the complete opposite #direction and adopts him. mr miyagi took one look at the daniel larusso violence instinct and said no. my idiot asshole son now

[lynvaren]

I wanted to ask you about your take on 'shipping' gon and killua like romantically? your drawings are ambiguous enough (idk if thats the right word) but I was wondering whether you see them that way and what you think of the discourse of it's 'gross' or 'disgusting to ship 2 kids'. Thanks and I hope this doesn't come off the wrong way. Your art is awesome and always makes me happy (*＾v＾*)/

Hey! Ty for the question! This is like the longest running discourse huh... I'll do my best to share my perspective! Putting some of it under a cut because I accidentally wrote too much ^^;

I do see the ickiness of the phrase 'shipping two kids' when you put it like that, but I think that's because the word 'shipping' has this... umbrella connotation of like. HEAVY romance with adult and often sexual implications attached to it. Which is a huge red flag when u think abt kids that way?? and obviously you shouldn't??? and there’ll always be some nasty fans who do, but I think a lot of us see them the way we see most ships in kids' shows.

Because BECAUSE the thing is, we see romance all the time in children's media. Kids have crushes. Kids get into stupid relationships at 13 where all they do is peck each other on the lips awkwardly and pass notes to each other in class and hang out on ‘dates’ at each other's houses to watch TV. And it's totally normal! So when people say 'ew shut up gon and killua are only friends, stop thinking abt them like that, they're children' you have to wonder where that's coming from. Bc would they be saying the same thing about a boy and a girl of the same age?

To bring up specific examples: think about aang from atla (is a 12 yo with an enormous crush for a majority of the series, and gets together with her in the end) and sam and danny from danny phantom (are 14 yo), and these are shows with like. An actual on-screen KISS at the end. Nobody bats an eye at that, and not to be dramatic but the double standards are showing. It's implying that 'queerness' is what's vile and adult but like. Queer adults were once queer children, right? Gon and killua are 12 at the beginning, and nearing 14 at the end, so the discourse of 😡don’t ship 2 kids!🤬 stops being valid when you think about it in a larger perspective, in relation to similar media. Like sure, you’re welcome to see them in a strictly platonic way, but if the ONLY REASON ur not ok with a wholly harmless, innocent romance is because they’re children, and harass other fans abt it, then to me it sounds like a load of bull to cover up ur homophobia.

(also whenever I say ‘you’ i mean an abstract third person, not YOU you anon, if that’s not clear hjghfdgs 💖)

As for hxh specifically, my take is that the subtext is deliberate. Togashi would have to be pretty ignorant of his own writing if it weren’t; killua is so heavily coded as developing a very romantic, very boyfriend crush on gon and considering togashi’s history with queer rep it wouldn’t be far-fetched for anyone to call it intentional. And who are any of us to take that away from queer fans who see themselves in these characters? 

And as for me, using the word ‘ship’ makes me feel weird (which is totally a silly personal thing) but I think my feelings on killugon can be summed up by this exchange—

—which is a very underrated moment imo and explains killua’s feelings perfectly. They go from talking about dates to killua thinking to himself that he’d rather just stay with gon forever, and like... to me that’s IT. He doesn’t care about dating or romance when he can just be with gon. No dating experience with anyone else will be AS MEANINGFUL TO HIM as being with gon. Tell me if that isn’t the sweetest thing you’ve ever heard. 

So it’s my personal opinion that, all things considered, what gon and killua have transcends any platonic or romantic connotation; it’s more like a ‘you’re IT for me’ in whatever way you choose to see it. Do I think killua has a big fat crush on gon?? yeah. Do I think anyone seeing their friendship as ONLY a friendship is valid? also yeah. 

The only thing is that justifying them being strictly bff bros because 'they can’t be more bc they’re children ew’ isn’t gonna fly. Bc if you take it to mean anything more than an innocent depiction of young love then you're the one making it weird. As long as we’re not sick in imagining gross things then what’s wrong in just wanting them to hold hands? 

#is this what writing meta feels like #jk meta writers are too powerful #consider this a long-winded passionate ramble #also none of it is directed at you anon whenever i said 'you' i meant it collectively like. poeple. not you lol #ask apoorva #hxh #if this sounds unedited and rushedly written in half an hour that's bc it is #editing takes braincells which i don't have #also also think about naruto the whole love triangle stuff started from the very beginning when they were like 12 #like?? kids have crushes?? how is that news

[gins-potter]

Casting Thoughts

Yes, I did a long post when the rumours first dropped but hey now it’s confirmed plus we have characters descriptions, and I’m bored so let’s do this all over again people.  Under the cut because it got long

Sisi Stringer as Rose Hathaway

I said this in my other post but I’m pretty happy with Sisi as Rose.

Visually I think she’s a great fit, I love that they casted a WoC in the main role, and I think if she can bring Rose’s humour and sarcasm to the role, she’s going to do great.

The character description mentions Rose being “fiery and outspoken”, happy to jump into the action, and the strongest fighter in her class but struggling to toe the line, which is all very Rose-esque, especially in the first book.  It sounds to me like they have a good grasp on her character.

I’m a little disappointed we didn’t hear more about Rose as a character since she is the lead - it felt like the descriptions for Lissa and Dimitri both gave us a little more to go on - but it is only a very preliminary description so I’m happy to wait for more.

Daniela Nieves as Lissa Dragomir

Daniele is another one who I was happy with straight away.

She’s probably not what I imagined for Lissa visually but that’s not a bad thing either; I will be interested to see if they dye her hair a lighter colour (like a caramel-blonde) but personally that’s not something I need to see for her to be a great fit for Lissa.

I think she has a very sweet face which works well for a character like Lissa but I think she’s also going to be able to stand up in Lissa’s more fiercer moments which is nice to see as well.

The character descriptions mentions her as being “carefree and kind-hearted” who “coasts” through life until a death in the family thrusts her into a new role.  That sounds a lot like pre-series Lissa so I wonder if we’re going to see a bit of that in the show before Andre (and her parents??) die and see that change.  

It’s curious though that she’s described as the younger sister of the heir apparent - which would be Andre - so it sounds like they’ve changed it so Andre was supposed to be King.  Obviously a deviation from the books but I don’t hate it?  I don’t think it would change Lissa’s arc all that much because obviously she was always going to grow up to be an influential royal figure, this just slightly changes the dynamics of it.

The description also specifically mentions that she’s uninterested in “political machinations” and the “hypocrisy of the moroi royal society” which sounds very accurate to book!lissa as well.

All in all I’m very happy with what they’re doing with Lissa.

Keiron Moore as Dimitri Belikov

This is one who’s really grown on me since the rumoured cast list started circulating.  At first I was kind of eh about him but I can really see him as Dimitri now.

I will be curious to see if he grows out his hair or not though.

As far as I know Keiron is not Russian, there’s not a lot about him online, but there’s some instagram activity on his account linking him to UK based companies so that would be my guess as to where he’s from.  They’ve kept Dimitri’s incredibly Russian name so I guess we’re to assume Keiron might be doing an accent and they’re keeping Dimitri’s backstory relatively the same?  I’m not gonna be super mad if they change it just because I think it’s doable for him not to be Russian (I know, I know a whole book is set in Russia but lbr here they could make him from anywhere and just send Rose there in that book).

The biggest thing for me will be his chemistry with Sisi, Danila and Zoey had great chemistry (imo anyway) which saved the move a little for me, so it’ll be important that Sisi and Keiron do as well.  They’ve interacted a few times online which is cute so I’m hoping they were able to do some chemistry reads and that will translate on screen.

The character description mentions Dimitri as being “lethal, disciplined, discreet, and totally committed” as well as living by “a deep moral code” but with more going on “beneath his stoic, watchful surface” which sounds exactly like book!Dimitri to me.

They don’t really specify what his role at St Vlad’s is going to be but they do mention that he is a guardian so I’m assuming they’re keeping some sort of age gap between him and Rose.  They also don’t mention anything about their relationship in the description, be it student/teacher, platonic, romantic, whatever, but they do say he has “an expansive spirit that could threaten to expose the underlying tension between his sense of what’s right and his formal duty to the Moroi.” which seems like a nod to their relationship.

Andre Dae-Kim as Christian Ozera

This was one of my favourite casting choices from the original rumoured cast list and I still love it.

The idea of a non-white Christian makes a lot of sense to me and I think Andre could do a great job of Christian’s aloofness (in the first book) as well as his sarcasm and growing confidence across the other books.

His character description confuses me a bit though: “Intelligent and thoughtful, Christian is the pariah of the school and royal court, due to his parents’ unforgivable societal sins.” sounds accurate enough to the book (although idk if thoughtful is quite the word I’d use for Christian - maybe they mean it in the sense that he’s quiet and keeps to himself?).

Even “Well-read and hungry for knowledge” doesn’t sound that far off, idk if he was *that* particularly studious in the books, but it doesn’t necessarily not make sense either you know?

But “he searches for faith-based answers and discovers a kindred spirit who is also looking for the truth” ??? My cynical, irreverent asshole Christian is now a man of faith? I’m assuming Lissa is the “kindred spirit” (again weird word choice but maybe they mean she’s feeling lost because of the death of her family?) but I just cannot see Christian as being particularly religious.

I’m trying to keep an open mind about these changes because you never know they might play out totally different on screen, but I really hope they didn’t make these changes, particularly that Christian is studious and religious, just because they cast an Asian actor as him (because they feel a little like Asian stereotypes).

J August Richards as Victor Dashkov

This is one that didn’t appear on the original rumoured cast list (as far as I saw) and it’s so different to his description in the books that I kind of don’t have an opinion about it as a casting choice.

I’ve never seen him in anything before so purely on a visual level I think he could be a great fit for Victor, I just think it’ll really come down to how he plays it.

As for this character description: “Victor is a Moroi noble vampire with a heart of gold who’s highly regarded for his role as advisor and political strategist to Moroi dignitaries.” as well as mentioning that he has intelligence and influence, sounds pretty accurate to the book.  Obviously if Andre was the heir to the throne, Victor had to be shifted out of that role, but I think his book 1 arc could still work if they wanted it to.

The “heart of gold” bit obviously made me chuckle and I really hope they threw it in there as a kind of decoy to throw non-book-readers off the fact that he’s actually the villain in book 1/s1.

As for giving him a husband and two daughters, my thoughts are: why the fuck not? He didn’t have a love interest in the original books and I’m always down for more lgbtq+ rep.  My only concern is it maybe playing into the trope of evil/villain characters being queer-coded.  And as for having two daughters, well as long as one of them is Natalie I don’t mind.

Anita-Joy Uwajeh as Tatiana Vogel

Okay this is the most bizarre one imo, not because of the casting, but just the character description.

I mean “Tatiana is a Moroi vampire and political underdog who slowly takes the royal court by storm. Motivated by love and a sense of justice, Tatiana has a unique skill of making herself seem of no consequence until we realize much too late that she was always the one to watch.” sounds extremely Tasha Ozera to me, so like why not just make this character Tasha?  Nothing about this sounds like Tatiana, and Tatiana wasn’t even a Vogel anyway (well Vogel wasn’t even one of the 12 royal families), she was an Ivashkov.

In terms of Anita-Joy herself, well I mean we don’t really have a character to compare her to, is she supposed to be more like Tasha or Tatiana?  She looks fairly young, so my guess is actually on Tasha, but we’ll have to wait to see I guess.

Mia McKenna-Bruce as Mia Karp

This is another one that I was instantly a fan of.

I was so not a fan of Mia’s casting in the movie (I can’t even remember who played her tbh but I really didn’t like it) so this Mia is a lot closer to how I imagine her.

I think she’ll be able to carry Mia’s transformation from bratty social-climber to badass fighter really well.

The character description is interesting though.  “Witty, cutting, and just the right kind of ruthless when necessary, non-Royal Mia has a long-term plan to social climb her way into the ranks of royalty, with all the privilege and freedom that entails.” sound pretty bang on to Mia in the first book.

“A plan complicated by her instant chemistry with Meredith, a Guardian-in-training, as Mia struggles to reconcile her attraction to Meredith with her lowly status.” is an obvious deviation though, and one I kind of love???  Give me all the queer rep, and if we get to see Mia confront the issue of comp-het I’m so here for it.  

It’s kind of funny though because I’ve seen theories that Meredith is a replacement for Eddie and Mia/Eddie has always been my sort of rarepair ship.

The last name Karp is weird af though.  Is she supposed to be Sonya’s daughter?  And if that’s the case I wonder if we’re going to actually see Sonya turn Strigoi in the show’s first season or something and that triggers the change in Mia?  Interesting concept but I’m not sure how the timeline will work.

Rhian Blundell as Meredith

So this is another new one, and tbh I hadn’t given Meredith *that* much though in the past but she’s probably close to how I would have pictured her which is cool.

The elephant in the room with this casting is that Meredith’s role in the books was relatively minor - she was just kind of that character that got brought up whenever R.M needed a dhampir who wasn’t Rose/Dimitri/Mason/Eddie.  So clearly she’s going to have a bigger role in the tv show which I don’t mind but I do wonder if we’re going to lose a character - probably Eddie lbr - in order to have her.  They haven’t casted an Eddie yet as far as we know, but I have seen it pointed out that Eddie’s role in book 1 was pretty small so maybe they just aren’t announcing it.  But there’s also the possibility that maybe Meredith will sort of replace Eddie and be the third part of Rose and Mason’s friendship.

I’m very interested by this part of her character description though, “She has little patience for Rose’s volatility or Mia’s elitism, and regularly calls both of them out.”

Jonetta Kaiser as Sonya Karp

I don’t necessarily dislike Jonetta as Sonya but I am confused by this choice.  She looks fairly young, which tbf Sonya was young-ish I guess, but if Mia is supposed to be her daughter she doesn’t look old enough to have a teenaged daughter.  So maybe Sonya and Mia are sisters? Cousins? Just have each other’s last names for no reason? I really don’t know.  They also look nothing alike.

Other than that, I don’t really have an opinion about Jonetta as Sonya.  Obviously looks nothing like how Sonya was described but that’s not new nor a massive concern for me.  

I can’t really tell just from looking at her, and I haven’t seen her in anything, if she would play a good Sonya.  I think with a lot of the characters it’s going to come down to the personality they bring to the part and the writing.

I looooooove her character description though:  “Quiet, careful and decidedly odd, Sonya is not of royal bloodline and sits out on the fringe of Moroi society, preferring to spend her time in the library or her gardens. Not a person who likes a scene, nonetheless she has a quiet but profound power of her own. She is taken by surprise when a Dhampir Guardian named Mikhail shows interest in her, a relationship that will expose both the brightest and darkest parts of her heart.”  It’s everything I would probably want from a description of Sonya and I’m more and more convinced that we’re going to see Sonya’s descent into madness and transformation into a Strigoi play out in maybe the first season which I am so curious how they’re going to work into the timeline.

Andrew Liner as Mason Ashford

Our last one and another one who doesn’t look remotely like his description but again? Not a surprise and not a problem for me.  He looks like he could play Mason’s goofiness really well as well as be a solid contender for a love interest for Rose.

“Charming, loyal and popular, Mason is Rose’s main competition in the quest to become the No. 1 Guardian-in-training. Though their relationship is casual on her side, he is hopeful she will finally look at him and see him as something more.” His character description makes a lot of sense, maybe him being Rose’s main competition is a bit of a deviation? But I think that’s more an indication that he’s supposed to be a strong fighter which isn’t inaccurate to the books.  The rest sounds great.

Other Thoughts

Descriptions of the show specifically mention friendship and classism as major themes which I am very happy to hear about because those are the two parts of VA that I love the most.

Am a little more worried about it being described as “sexy” though, if they shove a whole bunch of meaningless sex scenes in it just because it’s a YA show I’m not gonna be happy.

Seen the show compared to “Game of Thrones” and “Bridgerton” which at first had me like oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck not good not good not good.  But thinking about it more and trying to understand where Plec’s coming from with that description I wonder if means similar to GoT as in the cut-throat nature of the Moroi/Dhampir society cause I can kind of see that.  And as for Bridgerton I wonder if she’s referring to the kind of social-climbing aspects of it, because again that makes sense and it seems like a theme she really wants to concentrate on.  I hope that’s what she means by those comparisons, or that she just wants to compare it to popular shows to get people to watch it.  The worst would be if she tries to throw in a lot of unnecessary sex scenes to make it like those shows, because I hate when they do that, especially when the characters are teenagers.

Interesting to hear that Plec has known about the series since before Twilight or TVD - not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

Seems like it’s actually mostly (or all??) written by Marguerite MacIntyre which is interesting because I know people were worried about Julie Plec - I’ve never watched anything by either of them so I’m neutral at this point.

#wow this took me most of the day to write so i got absolutely no uni work done #oh well #worth it #vampire academy #va #va tv show #rose hathaway #dimitri belikov #lissa dragomir #mason ashford #meredith (va) #mia rinaldi #sonya karp #christian ozera #respond to this and tell me your thoughts cause i want to hear what everyone things #*thinks #keep things respectful tho guys

[disaster-j]

hi!! u mentioned in that post abt not me being offguns last bl that they both had done queer projects in the past and could do more in the future; i was wondering if u meant just their past bl projects like puppy honey and tol or if there were other projects that werent as “gmmtv bl series with hs students”-esque?

Hi!

No when I said that I meant they've both done explicitly queer roles OUTSIDE of the BL genre. For Off those shows were GMM shows since he only started acting after getting into GMM. But Gun has been acting since he was a child and has done several explicitly queer roles in indie movies and some guest roles in lakorns.

Off technically only has one explicitly queer role outside of BLs, which is Chuamong Ton Mon, a 2018 lakorn about Cin who is a "cinderella" type character who gets possessed by the ghost of a gay ceo and then he helps her get her life together. In the lakorn, Off plays the role of her younger half brother Sun who is secretly working to help Cin keep their family afloat. Sun gets recruited into the dead ceo's agency as a model and ends up dating Leo's previously closeted model character Justin. It's one of the few lakorns I've watched and I honestly recommend trying it out. The main plot is quite interesting and fun and all the side characters add a lot to the show too. And OffLeo make an adorable pair.

Additionally, a lot of Off's roles are often heavily bi coded imo. Zen from Fabulous 30 and Krathing from Richy Rich being the most obvious examples. Both shows I also recommend watching if you haven't yet but maybe skip the main character's storyline in Fab30 and just do Yui and Zen bc they're the real stars of the show and the only ones that matter. Yui is also explicitly aspec and it was really good to see her and Zen negotiate how their relationship would work without physical intimacy. Even though it could have been better executed it was still a pretty big deal for that time to have an adult female aspec character who not only ends up with the guy she likes but isn't "fixed" by her romantic relationship.

As for Gun he's done soooo many roles throughout his career that I couldn't possibly give out a list. Best to just go through his mdl page for details. But his most prominent queer role before he started doing BLs was as Tam in The Blue Hour in 2015 where he co-starred with Oab. The movie was also P'Nuchie's (not me director) directorial debut. It's one of Gun's best works in my opinion. Outside of that, a lot of his roles throughout his now two decades(?) long career have been queer/queer coded but most of em are from shows and movies that I don't have access to.

And lastly! This one may be a bit controversial but technically Puppy Honey is NOT a BL but a general romcom with a mlm ship. So their entry into BLs wasn't even through an actual BL. BLs were just so scarce at the time, in comparison, that non BL mlm ships like PickRome and PeteKao and even InSun from Edge of 17 got lumped into BLs and eventually got their own "BL show" through Our Skyy and for PeteKao DBK as well. (Although since PeteKao came from a bl novel idk if they're the best example here, but oh well.)

So yeah! Even though this will likely be their last proper BL I wouldn't say there's no chance of seeing either of them in queer roles again, whether individually or (maybe) together.

#off jumpol #gun atthaphan #offgun #thai bl #ask #anon #offgun ask

[lilium-major]

glee ships, ranked

i should not be allowed to do this because the last three seasons i have completely skipped around for the so-called highlights but whateva

also! this is based on opinion and how much i like the ship/how much content i consume of it. and not how toxic or canon compliant it is.

hehe let’s do it

KLAINE (kurt x blaine) - and listen if u have klaine slander ur entitled to that. it is in no way a perfect ship, it has its moments for sure. but this is not the place for your discourse so kindly take that somewhere else. anyway i love these guys. so freakin much. they have such good chemistry and the way that they look at each other… chef’s effing kiss. this isn’t just a klaine post tho so i’ll keep it moving.

FABERRY (rachel x quinn) - eeee what do i even say?! first of all quinn is so queer coded it’s unbelievable. like ur telling me that girl isn’t a lesbian? come on. and second, i never saw rachel as gay until i came across this ship, but i see it as being kind of an insecurity of hers. like, she’s got all this stuff going for her and a secret she doesn’t know how to let out? idk. queer!Rachel doesn’t usually cross my mind except for in this ship cause it’s so cute and i love it

BRITTANNA (brittany x santana) - first of all this was the first canonical wlw ship i was ever really exposed to and they hold a special place in my heart for that considering i like girls 💅. but in all seriousness, i love their chemistry, i love santana’s whole “i hate everyone but you” thing and brittany just being fabulous and perfect. they are two of my fave characters also so…

BLAM (blaine x sam) - okay, so i don’t consider myself a multi shipper, but… if i had to pick up a backup for blaine, and if we’re staying within canon, relatively, i would have liked to see this as a hook up or a short lived thing in season 4 after blaine cheats on kurt :( or maybe in season 6 before the wedding bevause if everything is so effed up anyway might as well exchange that whole karofsky situation… yikes. it’s not endgame for me because they’re just bros but i do really like the idea

QUINNTANA (quinn x santana) - this was the gateway drug that led me to faberry which is why it’s in number five. i’m not going to lie, they had a lot of sexual tension in seasons 3-4 and that hookup at the ‘wedding’ was long awaited. again not endgame, but it’s more endgame material than blam. the reason it’s lower on the list is because i don’t care as much about their relationship dynamic as friends as i do with blaine and sam.

PEZBERRY (santana x rachel) - i need to stop prefacing like this because pretty much nothing on this list qualifies as endgame anymore after britanna. this is cute. would i read a fic about it? yeah. would i gush over fanart? sure. would i freak out of this had been canon in any way? definitely. but it’s not a hardcore ship, and they wouldn’t end up together.

MIKE X TINA - we’re really getting to the idc section of this post, because i have literally zero opinions on mike chang. i love tina though, and i think she was the best when she was with him… particularly in season 3. i love season 3 tina. love her!

FINCHEL (finn x rachel)- again, i don’t care. finn is a very neutral character imo - like i never really felt strongly one way or the other about him his whole time on the show. but, i liked seeing him happy with rachel, even though it seriously got in the way of my otp

ARTINA (artie x tina) hated this in season 1, hated it in season 6. but, it would have been cute if the writers had given it more thought instead of just making it a side ship, because they were obsessed with having everyone in the glee club pair up. ugh, i don’t know. it could be okay if it was actually done well.

ok, now onto the ships i don’t really like but decided to share my thoughts on anyway. ugh…

HEVANS (kurt x sam) - no? i mean, there’s nothing inherently wrong except they hardly have a relationship, at least in the better part of the series. i just don’t see the appeal tbh. no hate to hevans shippers though :)

PARTIE (puck x artie) - listen i don’t like pick and i definitely wouldn’t say i ship this… but it’s interesting. i’m not opposed. i’m sorry idk what this is either

PINN (?) (puck x finn) - listen… tina’s dream sequence where they were supposed to be playing kurt and blaine? it was freakin cute and while i just think they hate each other too much to ever have a romantic relationship, i think a one-sided pining situation is cute for them, or maybe a short lived high school thing. i’ve said it before and i’ll say it again. not endgame.

QUICK (quinn x puck) - it’s inherently problematic. i could go on and on about how quinn deserves better but it would be awful not even to mention the degree to which this is messed up. puck literallt sexually assaulted quinn- he got her drunk so he could have sex with her. it’s a big no for me. besides, even if that didn’t happen, these two would never make it.

#klaine #kurt x blaine #faberry #rachel x quinn #britanna #glee #glee fandom #glee fanfiction #blam #blaine x sam #quintana #pezberry #finchel #mike x tina #tina x artie #hevans #partie #puck x finn #quick #puck x quinn

[lesbiansfortobio]

WLW Coded Characters!!

Nami (One Piece)

Sexuality: Lesbian

Nami from One Piece is easily one of the most obviously queer coded characters in the entire series along with our ace king Luffy ofc.

The most recent conclusion about sexuality that scientists and psychologists have made is that early childhood does effect your sexuality. Nami’s childhood was spent closely with her adoptive mother and sister and was constantly surrounded by positive and strong women. She was also forced to join a solely-male based pirate group named the Arlong Pirates, who put her through extremely traumatizing experiences since she was 4 years old.

In the manga her relationship with princess Vivi, especially at the end during the bath scene well... I’ll let that panel speak for itself.

and while yes some people may say the panel where Nami calls Khalifa sexy (which is totally gay IMO) but tbh it’s her own internal monologue so it’s honestly just really fucking gay.

Yachi Hitoka (Haikyuu)

Sexuality: Lesbian

Yachi is so clearly lesbian coded it’s painful tbh. I mean you could maybe ignore it if you watch the anime and read the manga with your eyes closed!!

Her introduction to the show was just her talking about how pretty and sexy Kiyoko was. You could make a strong point in arguing the fact that she only joined bc of a moment of gay panic she had after seeing Kiyoko.

She stared at Saeko’s titties for like three minutes, it’s okay girl me too <33

The bath scene with her and Kiyoko? Please watch it and try to give me a single heterosexual explanation for a single second of this clip (oh wait! You cant.) https://youtu.be/a1asEZ2vGo8

Momo Yazuru (MHA)

Sexuality: lesbian

I’ve seen lots of debates about this tbh, but personally she gives off clear WLW vibes (coming from a lesbian). I mean have you seen her and Jirou? Yeah, that’s what I thought.

To be fully honest it’s been a WHILE since I’ve watched or even been involved with My Hero Academia, so my evidence thread probably isn’t going to be that long.

Her and any other MHA woman, like seriously. She just gets totally flustered and plus her relationship with men just seems so much more business like than with women.

Call it fan service but again, momojirou in official art? BIG lesbian vibes.

Jirou Kyouka (MHA)

Sexuality: Bisexual

Okay so I swear I’m not trying to push this Momojirou agenda I just literally can’t think of anything else substantial (it’s been a while)

That one specific picture in the MHA movie where she’s staring at Momo’s tiddies and blushing. Or in the helicopter scene, or in the tent scene, or basically any other time momo’s tits are out.

The way she’s constantly blushing around other women and again, just seems way more comfortable around them. She acts similarly around denki too (also ship them, they’re v adorable).

#wlw mood #lesbians #sapphic #mha #mha headcanons #one piece #cat burglar nami #nami x vivi #headcanon #haikyuu yachi #hq yachi

[hopeshoodie]

go off in those tags mama

Ok no but I want a dedicated post to talk about characterization in cmm because as much as I’m actually enjoying playing it, the characters are clearly written by different writers.

Or at least, they’ve done that thing where a show goes on for too long and the characters become caricatures of their most extreme traits in the later seasons. These are all my interpretations of the S2 characters, feel free to check me or share yours in the reblogs or replies-

Lucas: They straight up made him a prick, and not even in a logical way. Lucas was a little pretentious in S2 (using a varied vocabulary, being picky about how he presented himself, preferring expensive drinks, etc) but he made a clear effort to skip over it and be polite to everyone. But in CMM he straight up is rude to people, threatening to leave and shutting jokes down. Honestly, that would be more in-character for Rahim to do, because Lucas never openly disliked the humor of other islanders like Rahim did. And you’re telling me that the dude who was established as wealthy doesn’t know what octopus looks like, doesn’t like horses? It’s fine if he does, but no one addressed the dissonance between it and his personality. I’m fine with Lucas being a little gruff with anyone, but he’s not doing it in a nuanced or in-character way.

Priya: Of all the islanders, her and Rahim are the most out of character imo. Priya was established in S2 to be a super interesting character- on her face she’s pretty basic, enjoying boy bands and perfumes and basic chat. She’s very confident and states multiple times that she’s mature, despite doing a lot of immature things when her feelings get hurt. She’s careless with other people’s feelings and likes being pursued more than she likes being intimate. She had taste (according to the other islanders), she was a little bit goofy. We see like… None of that in CMM. In fact we actually see the opposite- they took her affiliation with sunflowers, which she explained as deeply meaningful, and made it a throwaway joke about asking people to wear “only sunflower print” to her funeral. Priya would die in S2 before wearing sunflower print- all of her clothing is un-patterned and she clearly cares about fashion. They stripped every personality trait from her and replaced it with horny.

And that’s the other thing- I’ve wanted Priya as an LI for a year. We wanted her to be the softer sapphic option to contrast Marisol’s slowburn angsty route. But I replayed the wedding episode yesterday, they didn’t edit it to make Priya seem like she was questioning. Instead, they just made her 180 on her sexuality in cmm and made every other line she says just her lusting after MC. It would’ve been so easy to fix, too. Just tone down her “I’ve been thinking about you” every line to be a couple of her being super excited to see MC. Maybe they kiss once in the bedroom, but we cannot have her be ready to commit to dating MC by episode two. It just doesn’t make sense. And the way the justified it by having her say ‘lol didn’t you notice how I always complimented you, I was attracted to you’ felt like a slap in the face rather than a callback. Like Fusebox was saying ‘lol we queer-coded her but then made her straight, remember that?’. I just… Hire a sapphic writer, please. I would believe Priya examined her sexuality after the villa or even after the wedding, but the way she talks about it isn’t nearly conflicted or in depth enough to make sense. Yes, this spinoff is supposed to be fan service, but… It’s a yikes from me.

Gary: They just straight up made Gary a bumbling idiot in cmm. Yes Gary was slower on the uptake than other islanders in S2- he didn’t recognize jokes right away and took things too literally- but he wasn’t outwardly stupid. In fact, two different times we saw him get quiet and try not to admit it when he didn’t understand things. And even then, he always laughed it off. In cmm he’s just brashly stupid in a way that’s not really funny or endearing (to me).

Rahim: This one bothers me the most because I love Rahim so much and because no one’s talking about it? Several people say things to the effect of ‘that’s just our crazy Rahim LOL’, but??? Was he ever established as the unpredictable wildcard in S2?? The only thing I can think of is that he surprised everyone by spending lots of money on dates (but that’s in-line with his character because he’s super awkward until he’s in love and then he’s SUPER romantic), but other than that he was literally never an endearingly unpredictable sort. Everyone agrees the horse thing was weird, but a lot of his other dialogue has this ‘lmao I’m craaazy’ vibe. Rahim was always quieter, avoidant of conflict, nerdy, and awkward. You could argue that his awkwardness goes away as you get to know him, but even if you were with him from day 1 in S2 he never gets this outspoken. Plus he was picky and judgmental in S2, but we see him in cmm just be super comfortable and supportive of everyone else. I love that Rahim’s here, but he’s so ooc he might as well be Henrik if they wanted a ‘goofy, outgoing, friendly’ character on the cast.

Noah: This is the only change that I really liked, but clearly we have to acknowledge that Noah is way more forward. I believe this change, because he’s had time to self-reflect and also he’s not on tv being scrutinized this time. It makes sense for him to be more flirtatious now that he knows everyone and is more comfortable, especially if he and MC are happily married.

I feel like Bobby, Marisol, Chelsea, and Lottie are all pretty in character, but maybe that’s because they just haven’t had a lot of lines yet. And Rahim/Priya are really the only characters that bother me. Don’t confuse my being critical of the writing with the series being bad- it’s not!!

#i'm hesitant to put any negativity in the tag so i wont tag it #tbh it's not even negativity really just my thoughts #also i know you didn't mean anything by it (probably just a reference to rahim's line) #but could you please not call me mama in the future? #im not upset or anything!! #it just makes my brain feel bad #idk i've been experimenting with he/him pronouns and it's not something that upsets me i'd just prefer you not to use mama #bestie and babes is fine lmao #mama just feels loaded genderwise and also it feels appropriative for me a whitie to say

[tincansamurai]

new matrix take

a niche trans internet celeb said “you’ll like matrix 4 if you like eva 3.0+1.0″ which makes a lot of sense and also i didn’t like either of them beyond “i know that reference” and “cool fight”

the point of it seems to be “ok clearly you misunderstood what we were trying to say. so we’re going to say it again but more obvious. this series is about community and friendship and love.” there are no trans characters and the queerness consists of one joke, delivered by the good cop from sense8, and one vaguely lesbian hug between two elderly women. it seems safe to say, imo, that any trans readings of the matrix are incidental and not intentional allegory, otherwise this movie clarifying what the series is about would include at least an offhand they/them background character. maybe i missed something but it seems like the main thing lana wachowski wanted to stress is that trinity is also cool not just neo

idk man, even john wick has a trans character, if the matrix was really truly deeply trans you’d think they would push for more than nothing at all. sure, they joke about how the studio is in control and only lets certain things thru, but surely they could have at least included another character like switch who is easily read as trans. bugs does not count, she is at no point anything other than a woman with blue hair, to the point she is even considered a comparable replacement for trinity in the matrix code for a few minutes.

after years of “the matrix is soooo trans” takes it’s almost funny how the movie doesn’t even try to touch on the issue

it was fun to watch, but i struggled to get any new ideas from it. it was really just “ooooo remember this part of the matrix?” and “you remember this part but you didn’t get it so we’re explaining it again with smaller words”

#matrix resurrections spoilers

[napo-con-fritas]

nico diangelo 🤍 cause we love emos in this house

@tywinz thanks for the ask, miga!

Why I like them: at first, because by the time I read TLO he was around my age, and for some reason I loved him at once, as the series progressed I started to appreciate the hardships he went through, and the depth of his character

Why I don’t: I dislike fanon Nico, they’ve stripped his personality down to “uwu baby” and Solangelo, as if those were his only traits :((

Favourite scene: when he’s trying to convince Hades to join the fight against Kronos. If you ignore they’re discussing war and the fate of the universe, it’s such a typical insistent teenager vs annoyed parent scene

Favourite season book: The Titan’s Curse

Favourite line: “And woah! You’re the wine dude? No way!” <- what a darling. Also any moment in which you can actually feel his hands moving I need hand moving rep all right?

Favourite outfit: I just want to see him in a normal, ugly, CHB orange T-shirt. I get that it’s cool and new merch to have a Hades Cabin shirt, but I felt like that was still Nico not feeling integrated, let him be “uno más del montón”, instead of someone special (or different)

OTP: Solangelo but in special circumstances, not canon Solangelo, definitely not fanon Solangelo either. I like the combo of Apollo child x Hades child

BrOTP: I once read a fic that made Nico and Cleo from TKC friends, for some reason I loved it, I think it’s such a pure friendship. Percy and Nico had a lot of found family trope potential, same for Jason. Reyna is already found family trope and I’m here for it... ToA not withstanding

Headcanon(s): off the top of my head:

the Di Angelos were nobility

Nico speaks several languages

Sally adopts him after HoO

he loves football ⚽️

eventually he remembers his whole past

he goes back to Italy for med school

he’s a relatively practicant Catholic (fuck the Pope tho) no I’m not projecting

Unpopular opinion: I don’t think Rick intended him to be LGBT before MoA, in PJatO he didn’t feel queer coded, I had actually thought Bianca was gay. I think (you’ll hate me here) that his emo phase is a teenage thing, people’s interest vary a lot during adolescence, by the time he’s 20 he might’ve become a hipster

A wish: that he gets better with therapy and becomes a happy person again

‘Oh god please don’t ever happen’: other than dying...?

5 words to describe him: resilient, sarcastic, troubled, astute, caring

Nickname(s): Nico imo is already a nickname, his name is Niccolò or Domenico, or something of the sort, I like the Niccolò best (via my hc of him being nobility, he probably has like four names and I need one to be Salvatore)

#i hope i haven’t disappointed too much #nico di angelo #percy jackson #jason grace #reyna avila ramirez arellano #will solace #cleo from rio #cleo #tkc #pjo #hoo #toa #riordanverse #ask game #asks #thefangirlsnewgroove

[orange-plum]

OK, after yesterday’s episode, watching the SK8 community react, and giving myself some time to get my thoughts together, I think I’ve come to a conclusion in my head about Renga mainly, and SK8 as a whole.

I agree with the community. I think SK8 is a canonically LGBTQ+ show. There are enough scenes to blatantly show this. I know sports anime’s tend to queerbait a lot and make relationships seem more intimate with men than other shows, but still. Even by sports anime standards, SK8 does seem to take it a bit further than just “see what you want”. There are canonically queer characters we follow, and the shots/visuals of some character dynamics are intrinsically queer coded. So with that I can agree.

As for Renga . . . I can somewhat agree/disagree with the community. And while their reunion scene has gay implications, I can’t say I am 100% on board with what I see a lot of the community celebrating. The overall message of what I’ve been seeing is “It’s a confession. You don’t have to explicitly kiss or say I love you to be in love and confess. If this was a man and a woman, you would’ve eaten that up as romantic.”

Yeah, I def agree with that overall as a statement. Langa, at the very least, came out on the show. And the way he describes his heart racing with Reki, that he loved snowboarding because he loved his dad, and he loves skating cuz he loves Reki, he’s at least part of the canon queerness of SK8. But Reki, IMO, from what I’ve seen, hasn’t given me a big inclination that he’s pan/bi/gay or whatever he is. We know he likes girls because he’s expressed it in the show, but I haven’t seen any inclination for boys.

And yeah, I’m a big Renga shipper, but I don’t just want to project onto the show my wishes, or see what I want to see by doing mental gymnastics. I really want to look at it and say to myself “Is this character queer coded?” Him blushing because Langa showered him with praise isn’t the same. Lots of people, especially people with low self-esteem (as Reki had been going through) get embarrassed when thrown compliments. I do see potential for Reki to be a “gay” character, but at the moment, I feel myself flashing back on Killua and Gon from HxH.

Not to get crazy into that but Killua is a canonically gay character in HxH, and it’s heavily done in such a manner that he doesn’t even have to explicitly say it for the audience to know. Togashi did a great job with him. And while I ship Killugon, and Gon has the capacity to be a “gay” character, I was never given any blatant implication that he harbors any romantic feelings for Killua. Gon’s love for Killua is just love. I’m not even sure if Gon can experience romantic love, but that’s a whole other can of worms.

My POINT is that while it isn’t necessary for Langa and Reki to kiss or say the words “I like you” for the audience to feel if they do or not, I don’t want to KEEP settling for this narrative in gay media. In a world where it is soooo hard to find explicitly gay canon confirming stories, I think it is necessary to get more confirmation. At least until gay content is so normalized and accessible. It’s super important IMO at the beginning to start pushing for the explicit proof. No wiggle room for people to take away LGBTQ+ voices for their stories, for people to dismiss “gay” characters, to downplay our stories and say “they’re just friends, you’re just pushing shipping” to people who consume this stuff. It sucks to even have this debate anymore when a story is clearly ours.

So, while IDK if I’d say SK8 is queerbaiting, I def feel a certain kinda way with being satisfied with stories being told with implied confirmation instead of visual or verbal. I don’t want to settle for crumbs anymore or the bare minimum. It’s 2021, even a lot of children’s animated shows are finding a way to kiss and say I love you or even going so far as to say “I’m gay.” I’m not going to shit on SK8 for that, because it is a good queer coded show with some canonically LGBTQ+ characters/scenes.

But I won’t lie if I say that I just wish they would push it farther if that’s the narrative they want. There are so few anime out there for gay people with explicit confirmation that isn’t fetishized. You can probably count on both hands the amount of anime that does that (GL is different, rn I’m talking about BL). So I’m not completely with the community on this. Until there are a lot more stories for LGBTQ+ where you don’t have to question if this character/relationship is canonically gay or not, I’m not gonna be completely satisfied with saying “I want to skate with you forever” essentially.

IDK that’s just my take on it.

TL;DR: I appreciate that Renga seems at the very least semi-canon, but I’m not happy with series not taking the plunge and showing us explicit canon gay confirmation, when we live in a world where so few things in media (at least with anime) exist. It just seems like a half-celebration in my heart, at least.

#personal #sk8 #sk8 spoilers #dont come for me these are just my thoughts #im also not shitting on sk8 i love that show #so dont twist my words pls #its a bittersweet thing the renga reuinion ngl #but i say this also because ppl will just take anything and roll with it even if its crumbs #like confirming cherry prefers italian food and ppl went with that everywhere #you can see that as gay or as intimate bffs #its not enough imo i just dont want to settle for crumbs anymore i want blatant in your face gay media #that is all oop

[impatient14]

Not to be “annoying on main” but like most things here in the year 2020, a lot of the nuance and reason surrounding the fandom’s fight over Dean’s queerness is lost to the wily temptress that is extremity, and I want to throw some stuff out there in case anyone is thinking the same things and just needs to hear that someone else is too.

To my followers and anyone who dares look through my blog (honestly don’t recommend it), it’s obvious I’m someone who enjoys the Dean/Cas pairing. And when I say enjoy, I mean I absolutely get feral about a wide range of topics that involve their relationship, depiction, and reception. I’ve always kept my opinions within the confines of my blog, though, and I’ve never--not once in the decade of my life on Tumblr--gone into inboxes to send hate or even indirect someone with hate or drama on my blog. That shit just ain’t kosher.

That being said, some of the anti-destiel arguments out there have merit.

Like, for example, Destiel shippers not liking the show. Personally, I did like Supernatural originally, but I also recently recommended new watchers who came for Destiel to just watch certain episodes. I’ve stopped watching Supernatural several times throughout my Supernatural journey (which started in real time with season one), because the writing can be down right awful. There were lots of great examples of writing too, but it wasn’t consistent enough for me to keep watching in real time. So I'd watch a season behind on Netflix. At some point, things got bad enough (the bro-dependence, recycled or unimaginative plotlines, the terrible treatment and fridging of female characters) that I did keep coming back for Dean and Cas only (and honestly, it was sometimes only Castiel). 

Another worthy anti-destiel point for consideration is the fact that other than destiel shippers, a lot of people who watch Supernatural don’t care about Castiel. This seems to be correct. I’d wager to say that the vast majority of Supernatural watchers did not invest even a portion of time, energy, or emotions in Castiel that we did. That’s cool. I’ve been a casual viewer of a show and been blindsided by things that their fanon saw coming a mile away. Everyone has different perspectives, and the idea that Castiel isn’t integral to the plot when you remove the possibility of Destiel is absolutely correct.

However.

Why did they keep bringing him back? It’s true that he could easily be written out when his relationship with Dean is bro-ified, but his deaths never took until the end (and even then it didn’t). Sure, it could be “pandering,” but if only 1% of the Supernatural fandom ships destiel (as stated in one argument), it seems like a strange choice monetarily. Misha, as a series regular, wasn’t exactly giving out his services for free (eyyoo), so producers and the network wouldn’t give a second thought to the vitroil and threats creators and actors would get if Misha were written off. (Side note: I categorically *hate* the social media accessibility that lets people directly interact so negatively with creators to the point of dangerous conditions. It’s the most ugly and embarrassing side of fandom.)

It could be argued they kept bringing him back because they knew hellers and Cas lovers would continue to buy his Merch and what not, but I can’t imagine the small percentage of viewers who are invested enough in Castiel to buy his Merch would compensate for Misha’s annual salary. (But honestly, numbers aren’t my thing so *shrug*) But it could also be argued that the perceived destiel headache for creators, plus the retention of Misha’s salary, would be enough to get rid of him if not for a crucial role he plays in the show. Creators have repeatedly said that Cas’ whole character revolves around his relationship with Dean, so that means the writers felt that the Cas/Dean relationship was important to the fabric of the show--in whatever way you’d like to see it. Does that mean viewers have to see it that way? Definitely not. But that’s not the story the writers are telling you they’re writing--

Oh, that sounds familiar!

All the textual gay jokes, narrative devices, and creator interactions (not just Misha, but writers, producers, and other actors too) created the metaphorical pink elephant, not the shippers themselves. And to be told otherwise is some gaslighting bullshit. I agree some fans take it too far and freak out at the mere mention of a non-destiel reading, but the foundation for a destiel reading is based in text, not just in the shippers heads. The relationship between the Supernatural creators, actors, and fandom is undoubtedly toxic, which is why I think it makes it easier for them to deny various romantic interpretations of Dean and Castiel's relationship, but (and i hate to do it) in their defense, they definitely wrote enough into the text to justifiably claim Dean's a nohomodudebro. However, they've also written enough into the text to legitimately doubt (not definitively deny) his heterosexuality.

IMO (for the maybe two people wondering) Dean became bisexually coded in a very complicated conglomeration of a homophobic “its funny to be gay” kind of way, the chemistry between Jensen and Misha, countless production decisions, and Castiel’s growing and canonical love for Dean---which all makes the matter impossible to ignore. On more than one occasion the writers made choices that welcomed a destiel reading--not confirmed--but welcomed (which is, wait for it, queerbaiting!). I’d be shocked if no one read Dean as being queer coded and secretly in love with Castiel, who btw, is absolutely 100% romantically in love with Dean Winchester. The writers kept making decisions that fed hellers so well because Castiel is in love with Dean. It’s not just Misha who has confirmed it btw, but the writers themselves. You’re allowed to read it differently, just like destiel shippers read Dean differently than the writers have claimed, but you don’t get to tell other people they’re wrong--just like destiel shipping should never have gotten to the point were anyone who didn’t see destiel was reading the show wrong. However, the difference between saying Cas’ love is platonic and saying Dean’s love is queer is the difference between having zero textual evidence for a platonic reading of Cas’ love, and having lots of textual evidence for Dean’s heterosexuality. (Personally? My headcannon for Dean fluctuates between “so closeted he doesn’t even know he’s actually bisexual” and “very much aware he’s also into dudes but is pushing it down because : Winchester ™.” However, I’m more than happy to admit that my headcannon can’t be reasonably confirmed as fact. It can, however and like most headcannons within the destiel fandom, be comprehensively and intelligently argued to the point of exhaustion.)

The only reason to deny that 1.) it’s reasonable to read Dean as being queer-coded, not canonically bisexual, but queer-coded via textual and production decisions, and 2.) Castiel is romantically in love with Dean-- is if you’re someone who can’t give credit to the opposition just because they’re the opposition. Just because I hate Trump and think he’s the spawn of Putin’s asshole doesn’t mean I can’t admit he did *some* good work for criminal justice reform. The credibility of your argument goes to crap when you can’t admit when someone else has a good point- even if you don’t agree with their overarching theory or idea.

Obviously, the state of the Supernatural fandom is pretty much what it will be forever. Getting thousands of people to admit that its normal to find evidence to support an argument you don’t agree with (something philosophers do all the time because there is no such thing as truth and the world isn’t black and white and its shades of grey that make the rainbow bright and on and on and on), is definitely not in the cards for us. But, this is just me, throwing my altogether unnecessary opinion out there. 

(If you’re one of those people that like to troll people just for having an opinion and expressing it respectfully, please consider not doing that. I am but a baby in a trench coat.)

#destiel #destiel meta #destiel fandom #deancas #dean winchester #castiel