#this was simultaneously very difficult and SO MUCH FUN to write tbh

[unclewaynemunson]

'What's your favorite holiday?' Steve asked while they were looking at the fireworks, pressed against each other in the dark of the night. They had been dancing around each other for months, ever since Eddie woke up in the hospital with Steve already at his bedside. They had taken their time to get to know each other better, to let that something between them grow and to figure out what it all meant exactly. But around the time Eddie graduated, it had finally culminated into what it had been destined to be from the start.

Eddie could barely believe they had only been official for about a month and a half, that Steve had only been part of his life for a little over three months. But he knew, with a certainty that he couldn't really explain, that he and Steve belonged to be like this. No matter how scary it had been to fall for him, it had been the only available option.

'Sukkot,' Eddie answered his question with no hesitation.

Steve leaned away a little bit to be able to look at Eddie.

'Was that the one that was, like, three weeks ago?'

'No, that was Shavu'ot,' Eddie answered patiently. He knew that Steve was trying very hard to keep up, and that the Hebrew words didn't exactly make it easier on him. 'The boring one that Wayne's obsessed with.'

Steve chuckled. 'So what is Sukkot?'

'I thought you'd never ask, big boy,' said Eddie, a wide grin creeping over his face. 'It's the best fucking week of the year. We build those huts in our yards where we're supposed to live all week. It's really awesome, we get to be outside all the time and Wayne tells all the best stories about how our ancestors escaped from Egypt and wandered through the desert for years. Back in Virginia, on the farm, it also used to be this celebration that the harvest was done. The best moment of the year, man, like when the summer holiday starts, y'know.'

'Sounds pretty cool.'

'Pretty cool?' Eddie repeated in a mock-offended tone. 'Pretty cool?! Stevie, how dare you, it's fucking magical! It's the awesomest of holidays! You know what? You're gonna have to join us this October and get the whole experience!'

'Are you sure?' Steve looked weirdly hesitant about Eddie's proposal and Eddie felt the excitement in his chest deflate like a popped balloon.

'Yeah, I mean... If you want to,' he said, reigning himself in a little bit. Maybe Steve thought it was weird, maybe he would never quite understand it, maybe –

'Of course I want to,' Steve cut off his spiraling thoughts, like the mere suggestion was completely ridiculous. 'But would it be okay? You wouldn't mind? And your uncle?'

'Why the hell would we mind, Stevie?'

'Well, I'm not Jewish...'

Eddie chortled. 'Yeah, we know that, dude. But you're always welcome in our humble little home.'

And Steve's face lit up in a way that the fireworks in the sky above them could never compete with. 'Alright,' he said. 'Then I'd love to celebrate this awesomest of holidays with you.'

******

And so it happens that a little over three months later, Eddie runs out of the trailer with even more excitement than usual when Steve's way too fancy car shows up. He basically jumps into his boyfriend's arms as soon as Steve gets out of his car – and of course Steve catches him, stumbling only a little bit while huffing out an “oomph” as Eddie wraps all four of his limbs around his body.

'Hello to you, too,' he murmurs with a soft smile on his face. He can't exactly kiss Eddie here, in broad daylight with all of Eddie's neighbors to see, but he lets his hands linger around Eddie's shoulders when he gently puts him down on the ground.

'You're excited.'

'We're building the hut today!'

'The sukkot, right?'

And the proud smile around Steve's lips makes it almost impossible for Eddie to correct him.

'The sukkah, babe. It's one sukkah, multiple sukkot.'

'Sukkah,' Steve repeats, his voice still as unsure as ever when he tries the Hebrew words that are so familiar to Eddie and Wayne and still so foreign to him.

'C'mon, Wayne's already waiting for us.'

Eddie starts tugging Steve along with him towards the trailer. He wishes he could do that by taking his hand instead of the sleeve of his jacket, but he's too aware of how careful they have to be here, out in the open in the trailer park.

They go around the trailer, where Wayne is already surrounded by a bunch of corrugated sheets and some big pine branches.

'We're building it here?' Steve sounds surprised. 'Why not on the porch?'

Eddie sees his uncle's face fall, and his own excited smile fades away as well.

'It's too eye-catching, on the other side,' Wayne explains to Steve. 'Too many folks lookin' to trash stuff 'round here, ya know.'

Almost every year, they find some graffiti on the walls of their sukkah at some point of the week. It has become better since they moved the hut to the backside of their trailer, hidden away from Forest Hills' main roads. Before, when they still built it in front of their home, they'd regularly find the roof or the walls demolished. Nothing ever happened when one of them was home: both Wayne and Eddie were protected from any serious danger by their own scary looks. But unfortunately, the sukkah did not enjoy the same protection when the Munson men weren't present to keep an eye on it.

Wayne doesn't outright say it with that many words – that's not his style – but Eddie can see in the arch of Steve's eyebrows that he gets it. That he understands that Forest Hills is not the kind of place where Hebrew should be spoken loudly and that anything more than a menorah in front of a window can be considered offensive real quick. He sees that Steve understands it, because Steve knows what it feels like to not be able to take his boyfriend's hand when they're outside. It's not the same, but it's similar, in a way.

When Eddie came out to Wayne, his uncle told him that he was sorry Eddie got dealt the wrong cards twice. But that's not how Eddie sees it. Standing here, in the quiet world behind the trailer, with his uncle, his boyfriend and a pile of junk that will soon turn into a refuge, he gets the confirmation of what he already knew back then: that he wouldn't have it any other way. Even if it means having to hide away from prejudiced eyes, he'd choose this right here over anything easier in a heartbeat.

Wayne takes off his trucker hat to reveal the kippah he often wears hidden underneath it, then turns Eddie around by his shoulders so he can attach a kippah to his curls with some hairpins. Eddie usually never wears one: he doesn't like being told what to do in any way, and he proudly wears the pentagram of the Church of Satan on his denim vest. But for events like this, Wayne insists the kippah is important, and Eddie has long since he moved in with his uncle learned that there's no use digging his heels in the sand about it. If it's that important for Uncle Wayne, he'll doesn't mind complying.

'And one for you,' Wayne states after Eddie's kippah is properly secured to his head, turning towards Steve with a third one in his outstretched hand.

Steve's eyes widen in an almost cartoon-like way.

'For me?' he repeats, as if he's unsure if he understands Wayne correctly.

'U-huh,' Wayne confirms with a nod of his head.

Steve's eyes flash back and forth between Eddie and Wayne, still clearly confused, like he's trying to catch some lie or a prank between the two of them.

'That's – would that be okay?' he stammers.

'Neshama sheli,' Eddie says, his voice soft. 'Of course that'd be okay. It's the polite thing to do, actually, when you're in shul – or in other Jewish places – whether you're a Jew or not.'

'Okay, cool,' Steve says with a little shrug of his shoulders. He's slightly too obviously trying to play it cool, and that makes Eddie realize something he hadn't really considered before: that Steve is nervous about this. For Eddie, sukkot is nothing but a holiday of fun. But Steve doesn't know any of those traditions, he doesn't know any of the unwritten rules. For all he knows, what they're doing today is something sacred and solemn – it makes sense that he's afraid to do the wrong thing or mess it up somehow. It's written all over his face: he's afraid to be disrespectful, to be an intruder, to somehow offend Wayne and Eddie without meaning to...

Steve takes the kippah from Wayne and places it on his hair, where it lies dangerously close to sliding off.

'Here, lemme help you.' Eddie digs around in his own pockets to find some long forgotten hairpins and slides up behind Steve, attaching the kippah to some strands of his soft, shiny hair. When he's done, he slides his arms around Steve's waist and tugs him close to his chest.

'Hey,' he whispers in his ear, nuzzling his nose against the soft hair right above it because he simply can't resist the temptation of touching Steve's locks in any way, ever. 'You don't need to worry 'bout anything. We're just gonna build a hut, that's all. And we're trailer park Jews anyway, we don't care about etiquette and shit. Or, well, maybe Wayne does, a little bit, but he's used to me, so... You're good.'

Steve chuckles, then turns himself around in Eddie's arms until they're face-to-face.

'Thank you,' he whispers in the space between them.

Wayne emphatically clears his throat, no doubt worried that the boys are about to forget he's still with them.

'You lovebirds ready to get to work?'

Slightly unwilling, Eddie lets go of Steve and flashes Wayne an excited grin. 'Alright, my dearest uncle, tell us what to do.'

The next hour or so is spent hauling corrugated sheets around and assembling them into a decent-sized hut. While Eddie is drilling their metal walls together, Wayne tells Steve all about the meaning behind what they're doing. He gets like that with every holiday: he loves the big stories, and Eddie has always loved listening to Wayne telling them.

'All of this,' Wayne explains with a gesture towards the half-finished sukkah, 'Is to remind us of what happened to our people a long time ago. They were enslaved in Egypt, far away from their homes. When they got out, they wandered through the desert for forty years, tryin' to find their way back. They suffered drought, storms, heat, famine... But G-d's protection was with them every step of their way, until He safely delivered them back to their homeland. For forty years, they didn't have no place to call home. They slept in huts beneath the stars. That's why, for one week a year, we still live in huts. We don't sleep here, 's too cold for that in Indiana –'

'I do sometimes,' Eddie cuts in.

'Your boy is crazy,' Wayne dryly states. 'But we live here as much as possible. The most important thing is to have all our meals in here, as long as it ain't raining too hard. We're not supposed to make a solid roof, y'know, 'cause it's supposed to be a reminder of how our people used to sleep under the open sky. It's a symbol for how we should submit ourselves to G-d's protection.'

Steve listens attentively and keeps asking Wayne all kinds of questions while they continue working on the roof, which they assemble out of pine branches that Eddie and Wayne took from the woods around the trailer park earlier that day.

'This day's extra special,' Wayne tells Steve when they're almost done, 'Cause it's a Friday evening. Means our first meal in the sukkah is a Shabbat meal.'

Usually, Wayne isn't exactly world's most diligent cook, but for days like this, he always tries to go a little bit bigger than usual. Not that their kitchen is suited for fabricating any kind of fancy meals – let alone that they can afford anything like that – but that doesn't really matter. Not to Eddie, at least, and he's pretty sure the same thing applies to Steve. The most important thing is that Wayne tries his very best to make days like those feel special. So while Steve and Eddie get tasked with setting up the interior of the sukkah, Wayne heads back to the trailer to make sure the food will be all done before sunset.

Steve and Eddie haul a bunch of plastic lawn chairs and a trestle table inside. After the furniture, they add some pillows, a truly hideous tablecloth, and a bunch of random clutter from the trailer to make it feel more homely. Eddie always likes to put this one Jesus sculpture they once got from the old Mrs. Brooks from number 70 in one of the corners, for no other purpose than to get on Wayne's nerves. Steve, on the other hand, actually cares about making the sukkah look good, and he comes up with the idea to walk around the trailer park and go into the woods to find some flowers as a finishing touch. Most of the vegetation around Forest Hills is withered all year round, but Steve manages to find some branches with beautiful autumn colors and a bunch of shiny chestnuts among the decaying junk.

'You manage to make anything pretty, huh,' Eddie notes when they're all done, with leaves of dark orange and golden yellow miraculously brightening up every single corner of the hut.

Steve smiles and pulls Eddie in his arms. Now, shielded by the walls of their dwelling, they can do that without worrying about the watchful eyes of nosy neighbors.

'Nah,' he murmurs, his lips ghosting over Eddie's cheek. 'I don't make things pretty, I attract pretty things.' And the way in which Steve's lips find his, soft and full of promise, tells Eddie that he wasn't merely talking about pretty things. It makes his heartbeat stutter and his cheeks heat up.

Steve pulls back before the kiss can become anything more than a promise, with a sparkle in his eyes and a soft smile still tugging at his lips.

'C'mon, let's go help your uncle with the food.'

By the time they're ready to welcome Shabbat, the autumn sun has long disappeared behind the trees and it's rapidly cooling off outside. Wayne puts on his thick plaid jacket and Steve borrows one of Eddie's favorite black hoodies. During this time of the year – when it's not yet cold enough to waste money on heating – the trailer doesn't really stay much warmer than the sukkah, so they're used to the cold anyway. Steve, however, is shamelessly exploiting the chill of the evening as an excuse to cuddle up close to Eddie at the table – not that Eddie minds that at all.

But when Wayne lights the candle and recites the blessing at sundown, it feels like the sukkah is actually much warmer than any other place in the world. It's because what's happening in this place is special, Eddie thinks. For a week, this hut is their home. It's designed to house two people – just Wayne and him – but Steve fits in this cramped space with them like he was always supposed to be here. And when Steve turns to Eddie to wish him a good shabbos with a smile on his face, Eddie knows that he will never want to celebrate another holiday – Jewish or not – without him.

Some fun facts for those who are interested: Sukkot 1986 indeed started on a Friday (October 17th) The use of corrugated sheets for a sukkah is actually quite common, and I took the liberty to interpret the skillful way in which we see Eddie drilling them down in the Upside Down, as him having plenty experience with creating a refuge with those things. For those who don't speak Hebrew: when Eddie calls Steve neshama sheli, he uses a common Hebrew pet name which literally translates to "my soul." I imagine Eddie loves calling Steve all kinds of Hebrew pet names and this is a truly beautiful one imo. I hope I did right to this really cool holiday with my lil story!

#don't mind me rambling about stranger things #this was simultaneously very difficult and SO MUCH FUN to write tbh #i hope everyone who celebrates sukkot this week is having a blast <3 #jewish eddie munson #eddie munson #wayne munson #steve harrington #steddie #stranger things #sukkot #judaism #fanfic #fruity ficlet

[sparxymcfly]

Do you have any bttf fanfics or crossovers that you'd recommend?

I CANNOT BEGIN TO APOLOGIZE FOR HOW LONG THIS ONE HAS TAKEN TO GET TO but simultaneously. :) You bet your butt I do! I've read... quite a few BTTF fics and combed through, I am fairly sure, a large chunk of what's on Ao3. Which ah! Does leave quite a considerable pile. But lemme give you some of my favorites!!

Fanfictions

‘Cause I Might Not Make It Back by Rose_of_Pollux - I feel the need to give small descriptions but also I ought to keep it brief! A post-game multi-chapter adventure following Marty sent back to 1932 with amnesia and both Emmett and Doc have to work to figure out what’s happened and how to fix it, all the while the perpetrator- after Doc’s time travel research- is still at large... It’s well written and very fun!

No Little Plans by cleflink - Another grand adventure! While not multichapter, this one is still a bit of heft at 11k, but MAN is it worth it. In which Doc takes Marty on a fun little road trip that turns WILD. But then, whaddya expect out of these two? It’s a seriously fun ride and as I don’t intend to try to spoil more than what’s in descriptions I’ll be leaving it at that, but I very much recommend it!

Future Boy: In The Beginning by Anonymous - Wow! A trans Marty fic? From moi? Who’d have thunk it. There’s many different takes on trans Marty, but this one is one of my favorites. There isn’t terribly much to be said that isn’t on the tin- Marty deals with realizing he is trans and going forward with that in the American 80s. There’s also a second fic in this series and you should read it too- do be warned of the tags, of course, but have fun!

Becoming Marty by butchcassidy - TWO trans Marty fics? Methinks there’s a trend here. Well, there is. This one is a lot lighter than the previous one, for what it is worth, but it’s just as lovely a take. As opposed to a stalwart fight, it’s more of a rocky road, so to speak. As it says on the tin- Marty becoming himself, and it’s very enjoyable :)

Fireworks, Family, and other post time travel Phenomenon by Moonyssoliloquy - Mouthful! But here’s a lovely little number about PTSD and Marty’s wonderful little found family. There isn’t much to be said without just spoiling the whole deal as it is rather short and sweet, but I gotta say, the writing is crisp and makes it very worth the click. Especially if you wanna read something that’ll just make you real soft for a minute :)

In Case of Emergency by Knickynoo - MMM SOME OF THESE WERE DIFFICULT because I’m endeavoring to pick just one fic per author when it comes up. PLEASE do look into these authors I’m linking bc honest to god very good work, every single one of em. Anyways I picked this one because I have a penchant for reading and rereading softer and easier things more than heavy ones and I would have liked to reread longer things before I recommend them and <3 not quite ready yet. Which, a bit of a laugh considering some of my earlier picks, but like a certain little time traveler I find grand adventure easier than confronting the hard stuff. Who knew! BUT EVEN THEN IT’S HARD. This one is cute and it’s about Marty calling Doc for help and it’s just. Give it a read just trust me, Nikki’s good at this stuff <3

He Ain’t Heavy. He’s My Brother by TaraTheMeerkat - OHHH my goodness I really do love this one. I’ve got a soft little spot in my heart for the 2015 kids and man if this doesn’t deliver so darn well. Trans Marlene? Check. The twins just being there for each other and loving each other? Check. Lovely characterizing on both of them? Check. Give it a read if you like them also :)

Doctor Fix It by Kharasma - ITS SO. This one’s another rather short and sweet, following a little snippet of Doc and Marty in 55. It’s so. It’s very nice and cute and only a little bit sad but then it’s soft again I PROMISE it’s worth it go read it :)

Crossovers

I don’t actually read that many crossovers tbh! And those I do, I typically prefer short and sweet ones, and/or crossovers that include things I Know about, although I’ve dipped my toes in the proverbial pool once or twice before. All this to say, here’s a few cute ones I’ve found, and do investigate yourself if you’d like! [Which is true of the non-crossover fics too but I feel Especially I should say here, since I don’t dabble in it much]. Most of em are short and sweet, so I’ll just be listing what the crossover is and you can decide whether you’d like a little smile about it <3

Departmental Affairs by kesomon - Back to the Future (Movies) x Star Trek: Next Generation.

It Could Have Happened by Kitschgeist - Back to the Future (Movies) x Clue (1985).

An Unusual Meeting by jedipati - Back to the Future (Movies) x Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies).

Back to the Falls by lemonhead - Back to the Future (Movies) x Gravity Falls.

little high, little low by mrFutureBoy - Back to the Future (Movies) x Stuart Little (Movies).

Also, did you know Marty features in the most infamous fanfiction of all, My Immortal? I learned this because someone posted it spell-checked to Ao3, turns out Marty randomly appears for 2 lines to help ole Ebony time travel. The more you know :)

In Closing/A Warning [under a read more bc this is gettin LONG]

Mostly! A warning! Do be careful when exploring if you choose to dive into the Ao3 tag yourself! The fandom is wonderful and I've read so many amazing works since becoming a fan, but while investigating some of my old favorites and, notably, their authors for other works for this ask, I, ah... made the unfortunate discovery that one of said old favorites was written by someone who also writes. Ah. To put it delicately some of the most atrocious things I’ve ever seen! Especially within the BTTF tag itself! To keep it vague. They're incredibly present, it seems, in both writing and reading- it made me a little ill to learn, and I'm a tad bit upset I cannot take the kudos back on any of their fic I read but <3 I can at least put forth the warning to you all to Be Careful venturing in, if that kind of thing bothers you. Every author of the fics I've linked here is of course fine though! Checked them myself and they're cool, at least in regards to BTTF content/things easily checked. You should check them out too also because not only is checking authors good for That Sort Of Thing but also you get to see more of their work that might otherwise be swallowed in the swaths! Which I’ve said once already, but like, can’t say it enough methinks.

If you WOULD like to check out the tag yourself for more though [and you aren’t already some measure of connoisseur of the site], here is a link to a search I've already applied careful filters of my own to! Granted, there is.. nothing I can do about untagged ships, but I've at least "seen the belly of the beast" so to speak and chopped off as much as I can. It's extremely barebones- removal of the most upsetting content, really. Typically I myself would remove things like Major Character Death [nothing wrong with it! I'm just soft and need to be in the right mood to handle it], or would filter for English [since that's the language I read ^^;]- or perhaps you'd like to filter out crossovers!

Which, points of warning for that is that on one hand, if you don’t filter them out I can’t? Guarantee you might not find a weird thing or two? As I didn’t exactly go through every single page of these. But on the other if you DO filter them out, careful to note that this is the filter for the movies, and filtering out crossovers Will also get rid of any that include the game. [WHICH UH! Here is another link if you’d like the same filters but with non-bttf crossovers removed- may still remove results from individual non-movie continuities, but it’s a good jumping off point and also I’m Rambling] But this is just some basic starters to help you not have to want to burn your eyes out like I do when I do my occasional tag checks for new works <3

Sorry again for the long wait, but thanks for asking!! And I hope you enjoy what I've set out- stay safe out there!

#sparxy talks about something else (rare!) #PHEW #that was a lot #I ah! Have severe anxiety re: certain things and so I won't be publicly namedropping the author[s #as there's actually a second one as well from the crossover section] #but if anybody wants to know I guess you are free to dm me? #i know i'd personally wanna know so! extending the offer #but also re: crossovers #how aware of zero escape is the back to the future fandom out of idle curiosity #is there any overlap or will that eventual post/possible fic be a completely self-indulgent endeavor #akljfdssd #fics are so nice i love reading them #i would Love to actually finish one and add it to the pile #'sparx where have u been' mentally dead next question <3 #love yall #i probably Could have tagged this with literally anything to make it possible to find outside of my lil circle #but tbh with how much anxiety i am under this is probably for the best <3

[justastrugglinghotchocolate]

ueue for the writing ask game,, 3 4 5 6?

3. what makes you love writing?

I think just having control over the work while simultaneously having none. Eg. When I was writing TLG I had an entire outline of where it was going to go and how it was going to be. Then I actually started writing and it was clear that original plan wasn't going to capture the story, so I expanded it (a bit more than planned, but it's okay--I'm fond of most of the additions).

Also it's fun to make your own world come alive as best as you can. I think writing is one of the easier ways to breathe life into characters that lived in your head until then.

4. what does it take for you to be proud of something you’ve written?

Not much tbh! If I wrote it, I tend to love it--I'm always just proud to have put something onto a page! However, I do get a lot of dopamine when I finish a chapter and go back and reread earlier chapters and catch all of my foreshadowing. Which you all should totally do for tlg *wink wink*.

5. what do you think is the most important part of writing?

Enjoying it. At it's core, writing is hard. It's difficult to put thoughts into paper in a way that anyone could understand. So whenever I struggle to enjoy writing for a moment, I don't force myself to do any more than a paragraph. If in that time, my writing remains unenjoyable, I just stop until I feel that urge to write again.

6. are your projects driven more by character or plot?

Character, character, character all the way. My characters are the plot. I never write stories about things that happened, I write about the people who experienced them. Eg. Roland in the very first draft of TLG wasn't going to feature very much. His presence was so little, that I didn't even have a name for him. Suffice to say, it was a boring draft where everyone felt very out of character.

#ask answered #thanks for the ask! #hya!

[kinetic-elaboration]

February 8: Mountain Lion Mean Notes

Okay, so I was writing up notes on my Troped Western fic and then I clicked something and it all disappeared! I’m very upset and I hate the idea of starting again but like... I guess that’s what I gotta do :/

Mountain Lion Mean on AO3.

Written for @troped-fanfic-challenge​

So as I said in my notes, I watched Hell or High Water on the Sunday the trope document opened and immediately became obsessed, and that was my main inspiration. I saw it and loved it and, like with most things I love, my first thought was how can I do this too?? I didn’t want to do a straight AU of it, because it’s just too good and I don’t want to mess with that kind of perfection, but I knew I wanted a similar mood. I also figured pretty early on that I would try to include a bank robbery.

For the first days after the trope doc opened, I mostly just gathered inspiration and tried to think Western thoughts. In addition to HOHW, my inspiration included:

The Western episode of Charmed

A Western Rock playlist I found on Spotify

This post of southwestern gothic aesthetics

“Ranch Girl” by Maile Meloy (also the inspiration for it is new moon and twilight, which, fun fact, was originally going to be a Western; I didn’t re-read the story but it’s been haunting me since I first read it c. 2001 and is probably a partial inspiration for everything I write)

William Faulkner (especially “A Rose for Emily” and A Light in August) for the “town POV” narration

Sigrid Undset for the floating third-person-POV

The wikipedia article on Westerns, for succinct summaries of the themes of Westerns

The original aesthetic, quoted from my notes: “The vastness of the west, the frontier, a little uncivilized, a little dangerous, tough looking men who don’t talk much, extrajudicial justice, the heat and the desert…“

By the time I sat down to brainstorm, I had a few ideas and a few images already in mind. I wanted to include a bank robbery. I liked the idea of Clarke as a gunslinger and/or purveyor of vigilante justice. I thought I might use Gina as a bartender (this was during the half-moment I thought I might write a Bartender Mechanic fic; obviously neither of these things happened). And I liked the idea of including Murphy as some kinda criminal or unsavory type. The image of Bellamy as a taciturn cowboy came fairly early too.

I was a little uncertain at first if I wanted to do an 1800s western or a neo-western, mostly because I felt like the tropes I was attracted to and the images in my head fit better in the 1800s. But ultimately I settled on neo-western pretty fast, because I thought the imagery and themes would work better in the modern day. Plus I just thought it would be easier tbqh.

My first concern was to not just re-write a shittier HOHW. I was really caught up in the logistics of the bank robbery; including too much of that would necessarily make it a copy of the film, so I tried to keep just the bare bones of the robbery + the general justification (saving the family land). Then I added additional portions of the scheme--not too difficult since I knew I wanted Gunslinger/Vigilante Clarke in there, and I needed some way to show that she takes Justice into her own hands--and additional characters. Again, most notably Clarke, but also Raven and Octavia. The characters have their own backgrounds, personalities, relationships, and motivations, all of which make the story more mine imo. I’m satisfied with the balance of Obvious HOHW Influences and original content.

At some point, I described it to my mom as “Bellamy is Toby, Murphy is Tanner, and Clarke is canon Clarke but in the modern West.” Which I still think is accurate.

Including Clarke, though, and privileging the various relationships among the trio of Bellamy, Clarke, and Murphy, made me feel like I was making an it is new moon and twilight knock off except with Clarke for Raven. I still kind of see it, tbh, in the sense that twilight was itself supposed to be a western--I think it would be fair to say that Mountain Lion Mean IS the fic I set out to write in February 2020--and in the sense that I could have written a different story in the same universe as Mountain Lion Mean that explored the Clarke, Murphy, and Bellamy relationships in a way that is similar to twilight. As is, a lot of that is unsaid and unseen. The two fics have different focuses, so it’s probably only apparent to me just how similar they are. Just like, to me, Mad Women and The Wanheda Tape are the same story even though they have very different aesthetics and plots.

Some excerpts from my notes that I think are fun:

I really want to work with the themes (haha themes) of frontier justice and also the sense that the west is infinite but also small, that nature is hard and impossible to wrangle but that the opportunities are narrow and it’s easy to get trapped in it, the melancholy nature of it, the dichotomy of nature (huge, powerful) versus man (small, struggling against nature and against man). Or some such. Or Murphy just robs banks.

Bellamy owns a struggling ranch. Clarke is a gunslinger (don’t really know if I can use this trope in the current day but possibly?) who doesn’t trust the law. Has a conceal[ed]-carry permit. Is the best shot in three counties. Murphy’s been in and out of prison most of his adult life, mostly for crimes like robbery and assault.

How do they know each other? Possibilities: Murphy knows Bellamy through Octavia (idk why…but I do feel like O should appear, riding a horse) (background Octaven? Just a thought), Bellarke are exes, Murphy used to work on the ranch. Clarke has killed someone (someone Bad) and gotten away with it.

I do like the focus being on these three characters, who have a long history but aren’t currently close, coming together for a mission (to rob a bank) for the benefit of one who is struggling (Bellamy) even thought this is an awful lot like both Hell or High Water and it is new moon and twilight lmao.

I like that mood from HOHW where actually Toby was the most dangerous, and the smartest, and he won—the idea that Bellamy is the taciturn cowboy who’s not good at sharing his feelings but he’s also the mastermind in the end. Is that the twist? You get the impression Vigilante Gunslinger Griffin and Actual Ex-Con Murphy are planning something, but then it turns out to be Bellamy who executes the plan? [Not quite how it turned out lol in that I think it’s decently obvious that Bellamy was a major part of it the whole time but I did try to get some of this in with Octavia in the final scene--to really drive home Bellamy’s importance, as the ring leader, since otherwise one could ask, what does he even do?]

Midway through the planning process I came up with some more images to work from:

B and C out at dusk on the ranch, she’s shooting can, a bit of UST perhaps

M shows up at the bar and there’s an awkward silent entrance—perhaps he’s just out of prison

Murphy or Clarke guns akimbo [I picked Clarke to emphasize that she’s the gunslinger, but I had Murphy shoot out the security cameras to show that they were using his robbery experience]

Bellamy being silent and awkward

At this point, it was just about putting all the pieces together. That’s how I tend to plan Troped fics: I lay out all the pieces I need or want to include and then I figure out the shortest and most efficient distances between them. For example, I knew I needed a bank robbery and for Clarke to administer some vigilante justice--so I use that justice as a way to launder the money. They fake a will for her victim and “give” the money to themselves.

I did worry, and still worry, about the timeline re: the Bellarke marriage and the will because I’m quite sure it doesn’t make sense and doesn’t work. But it also... it doesn’t keep me up at night because the whole point is that it’s a scam!! Worrying about legality in a scam is sorta... lol. What I mean specifically is that I wanted it to be clear that Clarke does not kill Kane FOR this scheme. They use something she already did to their advantage. So she and Bellamy can’t be married at the time Kane is killed. That implies the murder was pre-meditated for the bank robbing purpose. But I’m also fairly sure (and I should know this because I took T&E but like...honestly can’t remember) that the people in the will are counted at the time of death, not the time of probate, or you could like... adopt extra kids or marry or divorce someone to affect the will. Plus all that stuff about simultaneous death etc. etc. Also, on a practical level, if Clarke wasn’t married, Kane wouldn’t have an obvious reason to write her spouse into the will. But I get away with this in my head by saying, first, no one’s going to say the husband that’s standing right there doesn’t count as a husband--the law is the law but it’s implemented by people and they fudge corners all the time. They do what seems to make sense even if you’d lose points for it on a law school exam. And second, the will could have been written with the assumption or hope that Clare would marry. Possibly even, though I don’t say this in the fic exactly, on the condition of marriage--Clarke gets 100% to share 50-50 with her husband if she’s married, 0% if she’s not. Doesn’t really matter. It’s supposed to read as outwardly clever and create Mystery and play with the Exes Aesthetic even if it doesn’t hold up the strictest scrutiny. (JDs don’t @ me.)

I justified including the marriage as a necessity because Kane could possibly leave money to Clarke’s husband but he wouldn’t leave money to some rando. I do stand by that part.

I also decided at some point that I wanted to include Background Octaven but be really subtle about it so it was something else the reader would have to piece together: that Raven has a girlfriend, then that Octavia has a girlfriend but, hey, isn’t Raven a bartender?--and then it comes together in the last scene as we see that their relationship was factored into Bellamy’s plan all along: some of the loot goes directly to Octavia and her partner, officially as payment for Raven’s services, unofficially because Bellamy wants to give O a gift. Anyway. Either it was too obvious or too subtle/boring because no one mentioned it but I thought it was cool lol.

At this point in my planning I basically had everything I needed, so I wrote a quick outline of scenes, as I always do, to see how it would flow scene to scene and if I had a place to put all the necessary plot info. I also ended up doing “what I need from this scene” lists for each scene so that I knew what I had to have on my mind to include before I sat down to write each one.

The actual writing was done over 3 days and fairly easily and quickly. I had a lot of fun not just with planning but with the actual process of creation. I think it’s because I was just honestly excited to be in this universe and play with this aesthetic.

Not to blow my own horn here but some parts that I was particularly pleased with were:

“Arkadia hasn’t seen a drop of rain in thirty-two days. The asphalt on the highway shimmers with heat; the air crackles with heat; the heat rises, stifling and strong, from the parched dirt and the cracks in the pavement.” Like I’m sorry but that’s a good image, I like that a lot. Whenever I felt discouraged, I just read that again and felt better.

The description of past Bellarke because boy howdy do I not care to write romance anymore but that was fun. I thought it was hot.

Transitioning Murphy laughing until the coyotes can hear into Bellamy hearing coyotes at night into Bellamy still hearing them during the day. I don’t know if it worked quite like I wanted to but in my head that is a very Cinematic transition, okay? I also like that even though Clarke and Murphy aren’t literally riding off together in that scene, for the reader, they are leaving the narrative never to be seen again. So they get their Dramatic Exit.

Octavia’s explication of the Theme and Bellamy’s possible motivations. I’m pretty proud of myself for actually having a theme and I think I did a good job of explaining it without being too heavy-handed. I also think it was perhaps risky to end with the POV of Octavia, a character who’s barely been in the fic before the last scene, but ultimately that decision felt right to me and I think it had a good flow, a nice mellow exit from the narrative.

What I didn’t like as much was a lot of the first scene. I think it has some great bits but it was the most re-worked part of the fic, and there are still some paragraphs and phrases that I feel are a little stiff. For example, this is a paragraph that I cut entirely:

Diyoza was sure the Griffin daughter did the deed back in January and she's sure about it still. She even gives a quote to the Sun-Times about it, despite her troubles with Green. But she had no proof then, not even a body to justify a murder charge, and she has little proof now. So no one believes the investigation will come to anything.

As you can see, it gives no new information. There were other sentences and phrases that weren’t doing work but were interrupting the flow, which also got cut, but I’m still not sure that the flow is perfect in the final version.

Also displeased that I edited out a * from the version on AO3, thus letting two scenes run together. How embarrassing!!! It’s fixed now though.

Overall though I’m so pleased! I love this fic and I love that I can love things again. This year has already been so hard, just like being battered again and again by waves of a storm, and it’s only 5 weeks in but this experience was so unabashedly good and I’m so grateful for it.

#the year 2021 #2021: writing bts #mountain lion mean #troped

[et-lesailes]

wildest dreams // rhee’s 1k celebration

details on rhee’s 1k celebration ! SPOTS STILL OPEN !

pairing: steve rogers x ghost!reader (? kind of?)

word count: 2010

summary: the battle with thanos has ended and all the long lost loved ones have returned to their respectful homes; however, steve has lost you, his beloved girlfriend, in the process. throughout his months of mourning, you still show up in his dreams, though this particular one seems the most eerie.

themes: mentions of death, sad boi hours to the max.

taglist: @viarogers , @evanstush , @chibi-crazy ,  @pining-and-tired , @songforhema, @sebabestianstan101 , @tanyam93 , @bval-1, @wonderwinchester , @little-miss-exo, @poerebel , @gogomez-509 , @patzammit, @a-distantdreamer, @malthestorytellerblog, @rainbowkisses31, @jbug491writinghelp, @melannie77, @gigistorm, @lille-kattunge, @teller258316, @rohaintahquil, @deidrashouseofpain, @firstangeldragonranch, @peach-acid, @allsortsofinterests​, @xoxabs88xox​, @heyiamthatbitch, @cptn-sgrogers, @heyyouwiththeassbutt​, @bangtan-serendipity​, @troublermalik​, @beardburnsupersoldiers​, @captainscanadian​, @rumoured-whispers​, @lemonster120​, @puddlejoy​

** if you have asked to be on my taglist and don’t see your name here, please let me know! i lost the note i had with all the urls and so everything’s been a bit messed up lately, my apologies!

note: submitted by @navispalace​. tbh this one was a challenge for me because i usually avoid writing sad things but it was a good challenge at the same time. i’ve never written something like this before so i hope it’s okay!

GIF:

It had been nearly five months now.

Five months since Steve had lost you, the love of his life, the woman he was supposed to marry and have kids with one day. Everyone was enjoying their time with their newly returned loved ones now that Thanos’ snap had been reversed for good, but Steve could never be reunited with you--- no, you had sacrificed yourself in order to save the world, and you were gone. Permanently.

He had been tempted to use the Pym particles to go back to a timeline where you were still alive. Before everything happened, before Thanos happened. But Bruce had warned him that it was too complicated, too risky. Natasha had reminded him of everything he had preached after the snap. He had held group sessions for God’s sake, telling people that they needed to learn to move on. He knew he would be a hypocrite and unfair if he simply ran away back to the past to be with you, especially when other people did not get such a luxury. But God, it was difficult. Life was difficult. Waking up to no familiar body beside him, the other side of the bed completely untouched. Seeing something that reminded him of you, making him smile and immediately pull his phone out to tell you-- and then remembering you were not there. The apartment being so damn quiet, no longer filled with your contagious laughter or cheesy jokes. No one to sit in comfortable silence with, no one to talk to about his day, no one to touch. No one to care for. Sure, he had the other Avengers as his friends, but obviously, this was not the same as a girlfriend.

The simultaneous best and worst part was that he still saw you in his dreams. Very vividly. He had literal conversations with you in these dreams, ones so real and eerie that he woke up wondering if you were actually dead. Loki had resurrected God knows how many times-- could there be hope for you, in this messed up world of magical stones and alternate timelines? Though the second he’d have these thoughts, he’d force himself to push them away. He couldn’t live with this much hope. It would only crush him even more. 

He took sleeping pills every night. Even if he was already dead tired. The thought of having to lie awake for even a minute, stuck with nothing but thoughts of you would send him into chronic depression. Bruce had quite literally made these pills for him in his lab, due to the fact that normal ones would not work because of the serum. Perhaps these pills had to do with the reason he had these dreams, but he was too scared to stop taking them. He just wanted this pain gone, and yet dreamland only seemed to make it worse in the long run.

Tonight’s dream took place in quite a random location. A diner. A very familiar one, Steve realized, as he looked around. He suddenly felt a presence directly behind him. Upon turning around, he saw you there, adorned in a beautiful lacy white dress. Steve now remembered why he knew this place. But why were you here? You hadn’t even been born yet, your parents probably hadn’t even been born yet. 

“Y/N. What are we doing here?” he asked quietly. As if you controlled this. He had no idea who controlled this, but he wished they would give him a moment of peace. You gave him a smile, a beautiful one he remembered so well-- one he was paranoid would eventually slip from his mind as each day went on. “I only got to meet you after you were melted from the ice.” You murmured, stepping closer to him, the white dress and light aura about you making you seem almost like some type of angel. “But I know I would have fallen in love with this Steve too, and I wanted you to know that.”

You lifted a delicate hand, gesturing to the nearest booth. Steve swore nobody had been sitting there moments ago, but as he looked now, he saw a figure he would never imagine he’d see again, unless in a very old photo. There sat a scrawny, pre-serum Steve Rogers, with his best friend Bucky Barnes sitting directly across. “Oh, these ladies, Steve, they’re somethin’ else. This one’s perfect for you, she’ll love ya, buddy. You got nothin’ to worry about.” Present day Steve couldn’t help but roll his eyes, though unable to help but feel a nostalgic fondness for Bucky’s obsession with double dating during this time period. He remembered this date, and he very much remembered that this girl certainly did not love him. Like all of the other double dates, the one meant to be Steve’s girl simply had her eyes on Bucky the whole time. It appeared the duo could not see you or him, though, and that was probably for the best. He could only imagine how pre-serum Steve would react seeing a girl as beautiful and ethereal as you. 

“Do we have to be watching this right now? Because you’re only going to feel secondhand embarrassment the whole time.” He told you with a flicker of amusement in his eyes, and you let out a laugh that made him want to smile and cry at the same time. “You know why I love you so much, Steve?” you questioned, turning to face him and stepping closer. “Because you’ve always been so confident about who you are, even before you became Captain America. Even now, you may be making fun of your past self but I can see that you still see him as a part of you. That kind heart, that determination, that loyalty…” you paused, looking to past Steve with a smile before looking to present day Steve, standing on tiptoes to give his cheek a light kiss. It felt like something light and feathery, not completely tangible yet just tangible enough for his heart to leap out of his chest. “You don’t change for anyone. You’re unapologetically you.” 

He gulped, tears beginning to sting at his eyes. “It doesn’t matter anymore. I don’t have anyone to be me with. I could only be me when I was with you.” You frowned and gently held his face, and he couldn’t help but let a tear slip. “That’s not true, Steve, and you know it. I’m not the reason for the wonderful man you are. You were always that by yourself. And that’s why I fell in love.” He was crying now, arms suddenly wrapping around you to pull you close to him. “Come back to me,” he muttered pathetically through his tears, fully aware that this was much more embarrassing than the diner scene, but he didn’t care. He felt your arms around him in return, the aromatic smell of your soft hair under his nose. “I’m with you, Steve. I promise.” 

When he pulled back, he looked around in confusion. The two of you were standing on the battlefield, the very one where you had been killed. This time, however, there was no Thanos, no merciless army, no Avengers, even. It was simply the two of you, surrounded by destruction and flames. He looked to you and you were wearing your battle gear, suited up with not a single flaw or blemish. If only you had stayed that way on that fateful day. 

“This was the only way, my love,” you whispered, stepping closer to him again. “But I promise you’ll move on. You’ll be happy. Please don’t ever give up on being happy.” He frowned, slowly reaching out to caress your cheek. “I… I’ll try.” He spoke deeply, his cheeks damp from his tears. “But…” he trailed off, looking down at the ground for a few moments before looking up at you. “I can’t keep seeing you. It’s too hard for me. I-- please, Y/N, you have to stop.” 

You blinked in shock before your face fell, and he immediately felt bad. “You’re right. I understand,” you whispered, and you sounded so heartbroken, he wanted to take it all back. Before he could say anything else, however, the scenery around him changed. His heart hurt even more than before as he recognized the small cafe nestled in the boroughs of New York City; the location of your first date. As he looked to the very same table the two of you had sat at, there you were, adorned in the same outfit. Pretty floral dress, sandals, nothing too extravagant and yet you looked like a goddess. He slowly came to sit in front of you. 

“Our first and last date,” you murmured, and his eyes widened slightly, more tears sliding down his slightly flushed cheeks. “Why.. why are you doing this, Y/N? It’s torture, I can’t take it.” You reached out and held his hands, smiling sadly. “I’m not the one doing this, baby. You are. You keep bringing me here. This is your dream, these are all the places and conversations you keep thinking about.” You brought his hand to your lips, kissing it lovingly. “You keep thinking about the past, Steve. It’s time to think about your future. I love you so, so much, and that’s why I want you to move on. It won’t be easy, but I believe you can do it.” He sniffed, unable to help it. “The diner…? I don’t get it, why am I dreaming of that?” he asked, perhaps trying to stall, getting an eerie sense that this moment would be over soon. You smiled and leaned forward, pressing another soft kiss to his cheek. “You’ll figure it out.” You whispered, looking up into his eyes for a few moments before standing up.

“I had a great time, Steve.” You spoke as if it was your first date, sending chills up his spine. “Thank you. For everything.” 

He woke up with a start. His face was practically soaked from all of his tears. As he looked towards your side of the bed, he only started to cry more upon seeing the untouched sheets. He got up from bed, grabbing his leather jacket and tossing it on along with a pair of jeans and his favorite baseball cap. It was around five in the morning, still well before sunrise. He ran outside and jumped onto his motorcycle, heading straight for the diner. He hadn’t been to that part of New York in God knows how long, he had no idea what to expect. He wasn’t even sure why he was doing this. It was a dream, for all he knew, it was all nonsensical and pointless. But as he thought about how vivid and real you and your kisses felt, he decided this was worth looking into. 

When he got there, he almost crashed into a damn lamppost from how shocked he was.

He hadn’t remembered the original name of the diner, but now, in big letters, a sign hanging overhead proudly stated, “Y/N’s.” He abruptly parked and dashed inside, staring at the menus and napkins on the counter personalized with the same label, the name of the love of his life. As he adjusted his cap to hide his face more, the lady behind the counter arched an eyebrow, looking to him. “Just one, sir?”

He stared at her for a few moments, a million questions running through his mind. He wanted to ask all of them, but for some reason, his instinct told him to go with it. To accept it, to have peace with it, to have somewhere to celebrate and cherish your memory. Perhaps it was you telling him all of this.

“Y-Yes. Just one. Outside, please.”

She guided him to a table outside, leaving him with a menu before returning inside. As he looked out into the distance, the sun now up and the morning just beginning, he felt the tears run down again, unable to help but think of how much you would like this place.

#steve rogers x reader #steve rogers fanfiction #steve rogers imagine #steve rogers angst #rhee's 1k celebration #requests

[synonym-for-life]

1 and 2?

Ohhh you chose some difficult ones for me!

1. What’s your favorite character(s) to write for? 

This one is SO HARD. I simultaneously want to put Steve Rogers here and in the most difficult to write for section. He’s so annoying 😂

But tbh, since I’ve finished my last Stucky fic  a hat, a horse (a Hyundai), and the will to ride? Scott Lang, man. Scott Lang was the most fun to write. I enjoyed every single second of writing about Scott. He brought me to tears because he is so fucking funny but he’s also so competent and ultimately ends up saving the day. Not to mention, he’s waaaay too nosy about Steve and Bucky’s relationship. So yeah...Scott Lang, man!

2. What character(s) do you find the most difficult to write for? Why?

I’m going to put Steve here because...not gonna lie, it’s hard. Writing Steve Rogers, especially writing from his point of view, is hard. I feel like one of the reasons is that he is a much better person than me. He is simultaneously so good and so, so, so fucking flawed. He’s also very determined and sure of his beliefs and values and morals, something which I actually question a lot so it’s hard to write that type of surety while also making it believable? But then again I also absolutely love writing about Steve. I adore him, I think about him all the time, he is my fave ever. 

I will say though, that it is A LOT easier to write him from someone else’s point of view because that way you can focus on his actions and you don’t need to peel back those stubborn layers of his inner self. Does that make sense? It’s weird because I don’t have the same problem with Bucky. I actually find him easier to write from his POV. I hope I’m making sense. 

This ask really made me think, so thank you! It’s so much fun thinking about this.

The questions are from this post!

#stucky fic #stucky #scott lang #synonymanswers #steve rogers #writing woes #fic writing #fanfic writing #fanfiction

[in-tua-deep]

How do you think things would have changed if Five has come back even younger than in canon? Like if he came back as 7 or 8 or even younger? Also, I love your writing. You’re an amazing writer and I love reading your stuff.

first of all that would be hilarious because as much as media has tricked you into thinking older child actors (who are easier to work with) are younger (I mean case in point, Five is supposed to be thirteen but the actor is fifteen and those two years can make a big difference at that age) or animated movies can’t decide on a size for their character, but for real seven-year-olds in real life are BABIES

that’s like. the equivalent of a second grader?? I think i was about to go into year three living in the netherlands. I thought the year six kids were ancient. I didn’t care about bodily harm and would just hurl myself into cartwheels and handstands (nowadays not so much)

That was about the age I was losing teeth for the Very First Time and also the age I almost gave myself a concussion playing on the playground equipment (I blacked out and woke up in the nurses office lmao) and I thought the singing talents of Sandy from Hamtaro were the greatest in the world (the twirling ribbon song was formative for me)

seven was also the age for me that i realized that romance was The Worst because my best friend george decided that the pulling pigtails version of bugging me was a sure fire way to get my attention or something like that. but like,, george and me had chicken pox together. we pretended we were cheetahs in our treetop bunkbed nest together (we had a very loose grasp of the difference between cheetahs and jaguars and other big cats, admittedly). He was my best friend he didn’t need to pull my hair or anything rip

like can you even IMAGINE if five came back as a second grader?? yeah like maybe someone would serve thirteen-year-old Five black coffee but no one is going to just hand this baby child anything with caffeine are you kidding me

his feet wouldn’t even be able to reach the peDALS OF THE CAR

wow this would inconvenience him so much

i can’t even find a picture of my brother that young smh but here’s him and me when he was? probably about nine or ten and I was actually probably about six and smiling with a closed mouth to hide the fact that i was missing teeth or something smh

that is TWO WHOLE BABIES right there i’m just genuinely dying at the thought of Five popping out and he’s just. a gradeschooler. that suit would have been swimming on him and he’s got little chubby cheeks built to absorb shock and whatever atrocious child haircut he had at that age 

(i have posted before about my genuine shock that five was ten in the comics. ten!! that’s a whole baby! a child! W H A T)

but?? does he pop up from jumping through his portal and look in the mirror and find that he’s missing some teeth? Can he whistle air through the gaps? i’m just picturing seven-year-old five getting socked in the face and losing some teeth or something and diego is right there to patronizingly tell him that it’s okay they’re probably just baby teeth and five is about to punch diego’s teeth out in a second if he keeps that up by jove

imagine five jumping and standing on the counter and he still can’t reach the marshmallows because they’re on the top shelf of the cupboard do you know how angry that would make him?? he would have about 60% less time for his siblings bullshit than normal because his small stature can only hold so much emotion at any one time and he has decided to go with seething rage for the foreseeable future

can you imagine how difficult that would be for Allison though?? Five at thirteen was bad but Five-at-around-Claire’s-age??? a billion times worse and she’s probably going to either be super avoidant because it’s painful or full on protective mama bear

it would definitely change a lot of plot stuff because i mean. no one’s going to let this tiny child drive. he can’t reach the pedals, duh. however, he might persuade one of the siblings (diego and klaus, probably) to drive him to griddy’s instead? Because with the options being “so help me i will walk there myself. alone. at night. as a small and innocent looking child” and driving him and keeping him company i think the latter wins out

(i’d nix griddy’s altogether but i’m way too invested in hazel and agnes getting together tbh)

hey wait does being that young mean that five doesn’t have his umbrella tattoo?? huh. well regardless if diego and klaus accompany him then the plot point of agnes telling the assassin squad about the tattoo can still happen so i guess it’s a moot point

but honestly the drama of having this tiny child just. completely annihilate the hit squad is hilarious to me, and it would also hit home the fact that hey! five might be telling the truth about everything and isn’t messed up by time travel! i mean whomst the fuck else would walk into a room and zero in on the seven-year-old no one else knows exists or is assumed dead by literally the whole ass world (and even if they didn’t he’s supposed to be 29) and demand he come with them and shit like man

Klaus: hey five what do you have

Five, stabbing his own arm to take the tracking device out: a knife

Diego: NO

other fun points include: the siblings bodily picking five up and five behaving like a very aggressive small breed of dog while simultaneously being super touch-starved and secretly appreciating being carried but would never admit it (whilst sober that is)

either they kept the old uniforms and five wears that or they have to scrounge up whatever they can find which means that five is dressed in some of claire’s clothes allison found stuffed in the bottom of her suitcase until they can go shopping and i’m not sure which is better tbh

hazel and cha-cha assuming that five is actually either diego or klaus bc those were the two adults in the coffee shop with the umbrella tattoo and eventually being confronted with the fact that their legendary adversary is a gradeschooler

five just being. so tired. all the time. my bedtime at seven years old was probably like. 8:30PM. kids need a lot of sleep!! so just five trying to keep himself awake because he has important stuff to do!! but doing the nod and bob because he can’t keep his eyes open

the trying-to-be-helpful but mildly-condescending strangers who stop five or talk down to him increase by tenfold. Teenagers out an about on the street along? eh. a seven-year-old? five is going to get so many concerns “where are your parents, sweetheart?” that he IS going to snap and kill a well meaning middle aged woman in the middle of the street

in a similar note the number of people who assume that he is the child of whatever sibling he happens to be in proximity to also increases tenfold and five does Not Appreciate This (and neither do half the siblings tbh bc now they have to pretend that they are responsible for this tiny feral child)

“FUCK” five says, loudly, prompting gasps from the delicate natured passerbys. 

“you can’t fucking say that, dude, you’re like. a baby.” klaus says, equally loudly and making everyone in earshot 70% more scandalized

“I am not associated with them” diego informs the masses with an edge of desperation

luther is just. so massive next to this tiny version of five. he could hold him in like, one hand. and maybe luther at one point was really good with kids but with his new body he’s awkward and it’s very sad

no one bats an eye at child Five toting an Entire Half of a Mannequin that is probably as big as he is around. Billy’s kid is currently emotionally attached to a brick he found in the alley behind his school. Gertie’s granddaughter refuses to leave the house without an old sock filled with pebbles tucked under her arm. Gary’s stepkid found a piece of driftwood on the beach and now it’s in their bed every night. Kids are weird and at least Five’s has a face for him to talk to i guess??

instead of luther threatening dolores he just looks at five with this gun that is way too big for him to have a hold of really and just. reaches out and scoops five up under his armpits and he’s just furiously wiggling and growling and luther is like “nope not putting you down until we agree that murder is not a solution”

every interaction with the handler is probably about 112% more creepy honestly but also what about the job?? either five a) gets an appropriately child sized desk like the ones you find in an actual gradeschool or b) he gets some kind of boosterseat for his chair and just has to sit at this desk that is comically oversized for him

the squad go to a restaurant and the server brings over the menus and hands five a children’s menu. without a word klaus just plucks it from five’s hands and substitutes it for his own because they have been kicked out of six whole restaurants and he is willing to eat the children’s chicken nugget meal if he had to god damn it

the apocalypse doesn’t happen because vanya is literally incapable of hurting a grade schooler right in front of her regardless of how pissed off at her family in general she is. that is a whole child. vanya works with children for her job. she can’t hurt an entire child in front of her?? like she can destroy the world and all the abstract children but this one child right in front of her? who is also her long lost brother and former sole confidant as children who wasn’t there for any of the general bullshit she just went through?? not so much

but like. even after the stop the apocalypse there’s still the issue of what to do with this entire child. like at least as a teenager five would be able to be somewhat independent but seven-year-old five can’t reach the sink to wash his hands without a step stool 

just the squad coming together to look after five without quite letting five know that’s what they’re doing because they don’t want to wake up to a knife in their chest or anything smh

five and claire meet and become an unstoppable duo of terror. patrick is an actually competent parent who is so exhausted 24/7 from raising his daughter that he just accepts five immediately because?? his brother-in-law being a time travelling 58-year-old in the body of a grade schooler who is partially feral from over forty years alone and probably has untreated ptsd? okay might as well happen

patrick “i didn’t trust allison with a child and yet i still trust her way more than the rest of you so i’m going to schedule five a doctor’s appointment or something because god knows he’s probably not up to date on his vaccinations and he’s hanging around claire and i doubt any of y’all even thought about that” hargreeves

the hargreeves all go to an amusement park as a family bonding activity. the mistake becomes clear when it’s revealed that five is too short to go on half the rides. the resulting meltdown gets them all kicked out and Diego just has five tossed over his shoulder still hurling insults at the ride attendant as they hoof it out of there

the family has to figure out everywhere they can go within walking distance because there’s still a cold war going on between allison and five over whether he has to be in a booster seat for any car rides or not

it’s basically just shenanigans with the family and five trying to figure out how to coexist and compromise and also look after one another when it’s been every man for themself pretty much all their lives

#this post is a mess tbh #far tua long #tua #the umbrella academy #five hargreeves #number five #i think seven might have been the age i learned to ride a bike without training wheels #but i also had one of those little seats on my mum's bike for when we actually had to go somewhere at some speed #to be fair i lived in the netherlands which is like the bike capital of the world or something #i rambled so much but like #seven is a CHILD #i feel like movies and tv shows and animated stuff messed up our perceptions on how child a child is but here we go

[full-course-identity]

Give me your thoughts on uuuh Jake

wew boy

okay. gonna word dump this, and probably other interpretation asks, so I can get the words out there.

from my POV, there’s 3 types of canon Jake + 1 fanon vers + my personal interpretation. lemme explain what they are;

Book Jake, who I don’t have enough experience with bc I STILL haven’t finished the book… >_>;

2River Jake, who is kinda oblivious and very in-the-moment impulsive (not so bad he’s jumping place to place ADHD like Rich, but like, not considering that maybe dropping everything to seduce Madeline or Christine is a bad idea when he clearly really likes Chloe). these are debatably survival mechanisms bc of his family (and wealth, if you want to go into the “being rich actually traumatizes you and locks you into dissociation” theory–but to be fair, this is partially reliant on thinking Jake is Genuinely Rich. … well, not Rich as in… yeah); ignoring any pain he feels in favor of getting dicked down and forgetting about everything for a while. very “I’m not sad, I’m busy!!!!!” 

Bway (possibly the new canon general for all Jakes since it sounds like London’s is modeled after him but just… toned down), who is still oblivious, but towards other people’s emotions instead of himself; he’s manipulative, a little impulsive but a lot more malicious about it, and he knows exactly how hurt he is about his parents. this jake’s awareness of himself makes him act worse because he knows this is the only thing that seems to help and it’s basically the only thing he actually has control of. his wealthiness is undeniably present and Bad here because the reason taking what he wants and not caring that it hurts people is his main coping skill is pretty much only because he’s been allowed that privilege all his life. i tend to think this version of him should be done by a white cishet dude (despite jake’s actor on bway being genuinely FANTASTIC) bc being marginalized in a high school should’ve curved a lot of the “endless power and privilege” he gets for being rich (Not That One). 

[i… think this jake has ‘better’/more nuanced writing in BWay… but i don’t think it fits the musical nor is it the overall direction i think it should’ve gone. BMC feels best to me when there’s a heavier element of Dark Humor that briefly nods to a Larger and more Fucked Up world behind the bit we see in the musical. making it largely a twisted comedy, maybe even ramping that up further with more whiplash lines like jake’s “which means the house is empty, so that’s fun”]

Fanon Jake is… like most of the fanon characters in BMC, a bit… “bipolar” (like, radically shifting depending on the situation). the BMC fandom has been born with heavy engagement from minors in the current fascist climate of fandom as a whole. as a result, you have three general uses of jake that as “approved of” by somehow the exact same people despite being conflicting in a lot of ways. THIS IS NOT ME SHITTING ON FANON, i actually think most of this fandom is just a casual romp for most people and that shouldn’t be snatched away from them nor mocked nor treated like you HAVE to be logically consistent when this is just a fun hobby for most… but there are still trends i notice:

1: Jake the sweet bi disaster who loves their significant other and is just a little bit hopeless in their silliness and Down For Whatever-esque personality. this is often used for shippy pictures and memes and cute little oneshots, plus, of course, fluff.

2: Jake the tragic abuse victim who is extremely sad and has to learn to love again and has always been selfless, plus or minus a permanent disability post-fire. this is of course used for hurt/comfort, plus in combination kinda with michael in the bathroom-esque posts and tragic art, often also used as an example of the squip being the worst for jeremy or rich guilt trauma. also: aesthetic and moodboard posts.

3: the one I have the least good will towards: Jake the “why does everybody woobify mlm? You can’t portray him without flaws! queer boys aren’t your fetish!!!” with an attached, clunkily written reasons why he was an asshole that is also simultaneously watered down so you don’t think he’s a Monster bc then you’d be vilifying queer men (well, more like they’d feel bad about their cutesy-er ‘emotional support’ art and writing which is Totally Different from all the other cutesy emotional support art and writing). 

basically, Meta Trying To Make Jake Reasonably Flawed But Not Evil in this fandom is RARELY genuine–it’s more often than not moralistic hand-wringing made so that they can wash themselves of the guilt for actually enjoying something with a character they portray as mlm, or otherwise the guilt of enjoying anything romantic or sexual involving men or queer people period when we’re apparently not supposed to do that anymore, as decreed by the radfems infesting our spaces. 

and, well, or you’re an mlm writing this post, you’re probably young and still feeling extremely sensitive and scared about your identity. i once saw a very wise post by a trans person who had been trans for a long time, who said that when you first come out as trans (or queer in general, but especially trans people who are beginning social or physical transition and coming to terms with themselves) you are obvs on High Fucking Alert and so you’re insecure and scared of anything, ranging from “obvious transphobia” to “just trans people enjoying themselves and exploring transphobia in fiction or else their own sexuality”. again, this can relate to a lot of identities tbh, and as such young mlm either cis or trans can get very Itchy about people enjoying mlm content.

anyway.

wrapping it back around to me: i edit jake on a case by case basis (sometimes i even make him eviler or meaner based on what’s set up during Bway, he’s just not my usual go-to villain), but i tend to think of him as a tragic Mr. Peanutbutter-y sweetheart who kinda knows he feels like shit yet also knows that if he stops to assess it, it would make his life a lot harder in a time where he can’t afford that. his relationship with chloe is extremely toxic (chloe abuses him horribly, specifically), and so he tries to claw his way out of it only to be continually back in by chloe and her bullshit. 

this is why he doesn’t really get... well. he genuinely thought the thing with christine was going to be permanent; he wasn’t jerking her around, he thought he was over chloe and wanted a girl as cool and fun and genuinely nice as her. afterward he Gets It, and so feels Really Bad--at a time where he doesn’t have his house, his legs are broken (i don’t tend to put him in a perma-wheelchair), his parents have abandoned him, and he best friend is in the hospital. guilt crashes in on him from all sides, and he just has to... pretend it isn’t, even as he can no longer stop himself from thinking about it.

if i was to do a jake focused story, it’d probably be a dating sim where you play as him and watch his life change in conjunction with his attempts to find happiness again; you can either choose decisions that help him greatly or ruin his life so ver much... hmm. lets file that under hashtag “story ideas i’ll never use even though they could be great”

to wrap this up: i like jake. i don’t... really enjoy most of the written content (fanfic, meta, sometimes even the storylines on ask blogs) in this fandom about him or... really, most of the characters, which i feel bad about--i’d enjoy it more if it was every in conjunction with my usual Wants in a fic, which is, like. extreme angst.

BUT

i do still like jake, and i can super enjoy his portrayal in memes and visual art

he’s just not my total fave, but like, the reason he tends not to come up a lot in my content is more what i’m focusing on and why. i’d be happy to use him in stories if his presence fit.

as a bonus

here’s the ships i’m happy to use him for, generally: deere, michael/jake, brooke/jake, toxic chloe/jake, and of course, different ocs/jake

his identities/labels: cis, bisexual/romantic... tho sometimes i actually go for bisexual and aromantic! outside bway and eviler jakes, i’m good with him being any race, and even then it’s just a matter of suspending disbelief re: privilege theory. also, PTSD probably, and maybe generalized anxiety as a result. maaaaaybe autistic too? adhd would be a hard sell for me since he seems super put together in a way that’d be extremely difficult for every form of adhd, but i can see him being neurodivergent on the spectrum + like dyslexia maybe. oh, and i sorta-kinda think he may be color blind? but really i’d drop that at a moment’s notice if it’d be easier to write him without it lol.

his interests: one is more or less sports in general, tho i think that, unless he went straight for track or swimming or something Olympics (which he probably can’t do now...), that’s a high school or some college only focus for him. so, besides sports, i think he’d kinda like the satisfaction and steady growth of Collecting Rare Things That You Have To Look For, like cool rocks, bugs, etc. 

as for careers... some form of doctor something, maybe a businessman of some sort but he’d likely try to curve his power in that field as much as possible; he inherits his parents' assets and company or whatever, but he probably takes a backseat to that and only really has it out of a sense of ‘it’s my job as my parent’s kid to keep the company going--without engaging in the same awful legal issues they did--for as long as i can’. one of my fave jake-is-there stories, vanceypant’s spicy bis-focused fic 1999, has him owning a restaurant, and that was cool as hell.

also jake loves dogs. especially golden retrievers. yes.

#be more chill #bmc #jake dillinger #kadabralin #bmc meta #meta #character interpretations #wow this... is long #holy shit sorry about that

[dillydedalus]

what i read in july

THAT’S MORE LIKE IT aka i’m finally out of the (relative) reading slump for good & my bro james joyce was there

men explain things to me, rebecca solnit the original mansplaining essay is great, and still scarily relevant; the others in this collection (most on feminist issues) are also quite good; some aspects are a bit dated & problematic so be aware of that. 2.5/5

erschlagt die armen!, shumona sinha (tr. from french, not available in english) short but very impactful novella about a young french woman, originally from india, who works as an interpreter in the asylum system and becomes more & more broken by this system of inhumane bureaucracy and suffering, until she snaps and hits a migrant over the head with a wine bottle. full of alienation and misery and beautiful but disturbing language - the title translates to ‘beat the poor to death’ so like. yeah. 3.5/5

fire & blood: a history of the targaryen family I, george r r martin look, it’s a 700-page-long fake history book about a fictional ruling dynasty in a fictional world, and i’m just That Obsessed & Desperate about asoiaf (and i don’t even care about the targs That Much). anyway, now i know more about the targs than any ruling family from, you know, real history, which is like, whatever. this is pretty enjoyable if you are That Obsessed, although i will say that some bits are much better than others (there are some dry dull years even in everyone’s fav overly dramatic dragon-riding incest-loving family) and the misogyny really is. a lot. too much. way too much. BUT i did really like Good Best Queen Alysanne (her husband king joe harris is alright too i guess) and i found my new westerosi otp, cregan stark/aly blackwood, who both have Big Dick Energy off the fucking charts. 3.5/5 (+0.5 points for cregan and aly’s combined BDE)

the old drift, namwali serpell hugely ambitious sprawling postcolonial nation-building novel about zambia, told thru three generations of three families, as well as a chorus of mosquitoes (consistently the best & smartest parts). there is A LOT going on, in terms of characters, of plot points, of references to history (the zambian space programme) and literature (finally my knowledge of heart of darkness paid off) and thematically, and honestly it was a bit too much, a bit too tangled & fragmented & drifty, and in the end i probably admire this book more than i liked it, but serpell’s writing is incredibly smart and funny and full of electrical sparks 3.5/5

a severed head, iris murdoch the original love dodecahedron (not that i counted). iris murdoch is fucking WILD and i love her for it. this is a strange darkly funny little farce about some rich well-educated londoners and their bizarre & rather convoluted love lives. not as grandiosely wild as the sea the sea, but fun nevertheless. 3/5

midnight in chernobyl, adam higginbotham jumping on the hype bandwagon caused by the hbo series (very weird to call the current fascination with chernobyl a hype bandwagon but you know). interesting & well-written & accessible (tho the science is still totally beyond me) & gets you to care about the people involved. lots of human failure, lots of human greatness, set against the background of the almost eldritch threat of radioactivity (look up the elephant foot & see if you don’t get chills), and acute radiation syndrome which is THE MOST TERRIFYING THING ON EARTH . 3.5/5

normal people, sally rooney honestly this is incredibly engrossing & absorbing once you get used to how rooney completely ignores ‘show don’t tell’ (it works!), i pretty much read the whole thing in one slow workday (boss makes a dollar, i make a dime so i read books on my phone on company time, also i genuinely had nothing to do). i also think rooney is really good at precisely capturing the ~millenial experience in a way that feels very true, especially the transition from school to uni. BUT i really disliked the ending, the book never engages with the political themes it introduces (esp. class and gender) as deeply as it could and the bdsm stuff never really gets TIED UP LOL. so overall idk: 3.5/5

störfall: nachrichten eines tages, christa wolf quiet reflective undramatic little book narrated by a woman waiting to hear about the outcome of her brother’s brain surgery on the day of the catastrophe at chernobyl - throughout the day she puts down her thoughts about her brother and the events unfolding at chernobyl, as well as the double uncertainty she is trying to cope with. really interesting to read such an immediate reaction to chernobyl (the book came out less than a year after chernobyl). 2.5/5

the man in the high castle, philip k dick it was fine? quick & entertaining alternative history where the axis powers win the war, some interesting bits of worldbuilding (like the draining of the mediterranean which was apparently a real idea in the early 20th century?) but overall it’s just felt a bit disjointed & unsatisfying to me. 2.5/5

fugitive pieces, anne michaels very poetic & thoughtful novel about the holocaust, grief, remembrance & the difference between history and memory, intergenerational trauma, love, geology and the weather. i’m not sure how much this comes together as a novel, but it is absolutely beautifully written (the author is a poet as well) and very affective. 3.5/5

american innovations, rivka galchen short collection of bizarre & often funny short stories about neurotic women whose furniture flies away, or who grow an extra breast, or who are maybe too occupied with financial details. very vague & very precise at once, which seems to be the thing with these sort of collections. 3/5

fool’s assassin (fitz & the fool #1), robin hobb YAASS i’m back in the realm of the elderlings!!! i thought this was one of the weaker installments in the series - i still enjoyed it a lot, and Feelings were had, but it just doesn’t quite fit together pacing-wise & some of the characterisation struck me as off (can i get some nuance for shun & lant please?) and tbh fitz is at peak Selfcentred Dumbass Levels & it drove me up the fucking wall. molly, nettle & bee deserve better. still, completely HYPE for the rest of the trilogy. 3.5/5

JAMES JOYCE JULY

note: i decided not to read dubliners bc it’s my least fav of joyce’s major works & too bleak & repetitive for my mood right now AND while i planned not to reread finnegans wake bc……. it’s finnegans wake…. i kinda do want to read it now (but i also. really don’t.) so idk yet.

a portrait of the artist as a young man, james joyce y’all. i read this book at least once a year between the ages of 15 and 19, it’s beyond formative, it is burnt into my brain, and reading it now several years later it is still everything, soaring and searing (that searing clarity of truth, thanks burgess) and poetic and dirty, and stephen is baby, and a pretentious self-important little prick and i love him & i am him (or was him as only a pretentious self-important teenage girl reading joyce can be him - because this truly is a book that should be read in your late teens when you feel everything as intensely and world-endingly and severely as my boy stephen does and every new experience feels like the world changing). anyway i love this book & i love stephen dedalus, bird-like, hawk-like, knife-blade, aloof, alienated, severe and stern, a poet-priest-prophet if he could ever get over himself, baby baby baby. 5/5

exiles, james joyce well. there’s a reason joyce is known as a novelist. this is….. a failed experiment, maybe. a fairly boring play about an adulterous love-square and uh… love beyond morality and possession maybe??? about how much it would suck for joyce to return to ireland??? and tbh it’s not terribly interesting. 2/5

travesties, tom stoppard a wild funny irreverent & smart antic comedy inspired by the fact that during ww1, james joyce, lenin, and dadaist tristan tzara were all in neutral zurich, more or less simultaneously; they probably never met, but in this play they do, as dadaist poetry, socialist art critique, and a james joyce high on his own genius & in desperate need of some cash while writing ulysses, AND the importance of being earnest (joyce is putting on a production of it) all collide in the memories of henry carr, who played algernon & later sued joyce over money (tru facts). not my fav stoppard (that’s arcadia) but it’s funny & fizzy & smart & combines many many things that i love. 4/5 

ulysses, james joyce look i’m not really going to tell y’all anything new about ulysses, but it really has everything, it’s warm & human(e) & cerebral & difficult & funny & sad & healing & i always get a lot out of it even tho there’s bits (a lot of them) i’ll never wrap my head around. ultimate affirmation of humanity or whatever. also stephen dedalus is baby. 5/5

dedalus, chris mccabe the fact that this book (sequel to ulysses about what stephen dedalus might have done the next day) exists and was published ON MY BIRTHDAY is proof that the universe loves me. 

anyway this is very very good, very very clever, extremely good at stephen (less good at bloom but his parts are still good), engages w/ ulysses, portrait & hamlet (& others) very cleverly & does some cool meta and experimental shit. y’all it has stephen talking to a contemporary therapist about how he’s stuck in joyce’s text which is all about joyce & very little about whoever stephen is when he’s not joyce’s alter ego/affectionate but slightly amused look at younger self and ithaca is an interview w/ the author about how his relationship to his dad influenced his response to ulysses and I’M INTO IT. the oxen of the sun chapter replaces the whole ‘gestation of english prose’ w/ just slightly rewriting the first pages of about 10 novels published between ulysses and now & it does lolita w/ “bloom, thorn of stephen’s sleep, light in his eyes. his sire, his son’ and i lit. screamed. anyway i don’t want to give this 5 stars (yet) bc i think some of the experimental stuff ended up a bit gimmicky & didn’t add that much to the text but fuck. that’s my boy & i want to reread it right now. 4.5/5 ALSO it’s a crime no literary weirdo woman has written ‘a portrait of the artist’s sister’ about delia ‘dilly’ dedalus, shadow of stephen’s mind, quick far & daring, teaching herself french from a 3rd hand primer while her father drinks the nonexistent family fortune away and her older brother is getting drunk on a beach & starting fights w/ soldiers bc he’s a smartarse

#the books i read #long post

[lunima]

Shipping Info Meme

Answer the following for your muse so people know how shipping works on your blog.

WHAT IS YOUR OTP FOR YOUR CHARACTER?:

In her canon probably Ez / Death ( NOT IN THE WAY UR THINKING AJEGND ) Because she’s veritably the First Spirit and conscious life incarnate, she has a very special relationship with Death. She has so much tenderness in her heart for them. Because she is what she is, Ezra doesn’t have the same fear of death others might. Death is a loving guide that leads you to somewhere better. Every path leads straight to Them. Because she’s immortal, unless her body is dying they cannot be with each other. There’s always that thin veil that separates the two. 

Most of my ships are ones that have yet to be developed on the dash, but my partners and I have talked about extensively on discord and what not. Ezra’s longest and most established ships to date are with Jordy’s Original Character, Ryan @urulxce​ and also her Peter Quill @elataan​

WHAT ARE YOU WILLING TO WRITE WHEN IT COMES TO SHIPPING?

Just about anything tbh ( within reason ofc, y’all already know ) I’m here for all of the genre’s and all of the plots.

HOW LARGE DOES THE AGE GAP HAVE TO BE TO MAKE IT UNCOMFORTABLE?

No one under 21 tbh. Ezra is physically 25-27 in a lot of her current verses ( and spiritually older than time ) and and even if it’s legal anything younger is just weird to BOTH of us. If u can’t buy a drink in amurica ur a baby.

ARE YOU SELECTIVE WHEN SHIPPING?

I always say that I am but as soon as someones like ‘...yo... u wanna make ‘em kiss.’ I’m like ‘u bet ur sweet ass I do...’ lmao. The thing about shipping with me is that it takes like 293085 years to actually make it onto the dash ( at least on my end ) Once the first interactions are out of the way and we have a solid plot in place, I love love love talking dynamics with my friends. It makes writing threads more enjoyable when you know where they’re going and lbr its just fun to scream and your pals and fling angst and n.sfw at them when they least expect it. 

HOW FAR DO STEAMY MOMENTS HAVE TO GO BEFORE THEY ARE CONSIDERED NS/FW?

I like to be safe, so if clothes start coming off in any capacity I generally start tagging.

WHO ARE OTHER THE CHARACTERS YOU SHIP YOUR CHARACTER WITH?

I have some WONDERFUL and v soft ships with @crownedclaw ,  @cailicah , and  @fateinexorable ! Jaime, Cain and Shane are so good to my girl.

DOES ONE HAVE TO ASK TO SHIP WITH YOU?:

PLEASE, GOD. As a female OC ( hell, as a female character in general ) I never want to push my luck with anyone, especially canon characters ‘cause well... you know lol. If you wanna ship just COME AT ME and we’ll talk about it and see how we can bring them together in an organic way, or if you see potential in a thread we have. 

HOW OFTEN DO YOU LIKE TO SHIP?

I don’t really have an answer? I suppose whenever the fancy strikes. I like to keep shipping a fun and laid back thing so it’s just whenever it happens~ Ez is simultaneously easy AND difficult to ship with at the same time. She has A Lot of shit going on and a lot of baggage associated with it that can make her... Challenging. But being what she is, this chick’s got a LOT of love in her heart and desperately wants to BE loved sometimes so here we are ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  If ur ready for a damn ride buckle up sonny. 

ARE YOU SHIP OBSESSED OR SHIP MORE-OR-LESS?:

More-or-less unless we’ve already got something going. THEN I’d say I’m pretty ship obsessed ( just ask the aforementioned people. I’M NOT SORRY!! ) 

ARE YOU MULTISHIP?

Yep! 

WHAT IS/ARE YOUR FAVOURITE SHIP(S) IN YOUR CURRENT FANDOM?:

I AM MY OWN FANDOM!!! Honestly I haven’t gotten around to plotting any canon relationships for Ezra, outside of her lil shadow demon buddy ( which is more of an unspoken thing??? maybe?? she won’t tell me so we don’t know yet ) 

FINALLY, HOW DOES ONE SHIP WITH YOU?:

I feel like I’ve answered this one already :thinking: deadass just interact with me and we’ll see where it goes from there. The only lasting ships I’ve had over the last few years are with friends I talk to on a semi regular basis. Communication is SO important or things just tend to fizzle out ( story AND ship-wise ) you have to be excited to want to write these things and p much the only way that happens is if you hype each other up out of character~

Tagged by: @fractempyreal !! Thank you friend!

Tagging: @voxaer / @cailicah / @desperatous / @liberons / @silverskins / @fateinexorable / @arcusignis / @crownedclaw / @knightfailed / @starszakrew / @glysimachia / @magicrot / @asheat + ANYONE ELSE THAT WANTS TO just say I tagged you~

#out. #DASH GAMES #SOME OF THESE ANSWERS FEEL REDUNDANT I'M SORRY #i'm half asleep and i got therapy in a hot minute #tldr: shipping is fun b my fckin friend ig #I HOPE YOU ALL ARE WELL TODAY! #i'm feeling much better and I can't wait to take a nap when I get home loll #until later my guys <33333

[i-might-be-a-kpop-fan]

KPOP SONGS! Part 1/?

So I thought I’d make a list of the songs in my „kpop“ playlist and write a little about them because I’m bored. These are supposed to be chronological, but after looking at the list I’m not so sure about that, also because I love to buy music in bulks. 

THESE ARE JUST MY OPINIONS/EXPERIENCES TAKE IT WITH A PINCH OF SALT AND DON’T KILL ME! 

PT.2

Also write me if you wanna chat about it :D 

View - SHINee: 

One of my favourite songs of the group, tbh

It has such a chill vibe and simultaneously just gets me dancing like crazy

Theres nothing bad with this song and it always either gets me down or going

One of the first songs, next to classics like the broken doorbell and the one about the devil, that I listened to of this group

The dance is a masterpiece 

Woof Woof - Shinee:

You may think, „why?“ (As I do every time I hear this song), but to be honest here I just really enjoyed watching the performance and it’s an instant (good) mood maker.

I enjoy fast songs and the brass style of this and the real instruments make this a fun song to listen to

Also: This is so Key, I had to have it

Watch the performance and be enlightened 

Hello Bitches - CL:

The Queen herself, her majesty and frankly my mom

What should I say, I watched the video, fell head over heels for her and here we are….

Always makes me feel like I’m the baddest bitch on the block and manages to pull me up when I’m feeling my lowest

Also a good song to put on your ears and just take an anger walk (when you need to let of some steam) just matching your steps to the rhythm is perfect for cooling down and getting you back on your badass level

Watch the MV for clean skin 

Ready or not - MONSTA X:

Ok ok, I don’t remember why I bought this song haha

MONSTA X is one of my favourite groups and the first relatively new group I got into so I guess I bought a lot just cause I wanted to?

I do have this habit of buying songs based on the sample you get on iTunes soooo…it seemed fire then but now I don’t like it as much.

I don’t listen to this song a lot, barely tbh.

Rapline is on fire as always (My favourite part of about every MX song)

Yet still it IS MONSTA X so…you know it’s good.      

Beautiful - MONSTA X: 

A yes starting the song of with rapline isn’t gonna give me a heart attack at all NONO, I’M FINE!

I really love this song and it brings back memories haha

The MV is also worth a watch (or five, you know just to be sure)

„Two finger, thumbs up“ *sighs in bias wrecked*

I also love the line Wonho sings because you can hear his lisp so clearly which at first I found really annoying, but really grew on me…

„So beautiful“ just like this song (and dance) „too beautiful to handle“

Spotlight - MONSTA X:

Okay is it bad that I didn’t realise that this song is in Japanese?

Didn’t care bought it anyways. I mean I don’t speak Korean or Japanese so what does it really matter?

As always a good song, favourite part? rapline 

Good song to dance weirdly to

Trespass - MONSTA X:

Oh my! They have grown so much since this song but I still love it so so much, it puts me in good mood and also makes me feel like a badass at the same time

The MV is just cute compared to who they are today

I feel like every „hip-hop“ group has a song and MV (or phase) like trespass

„Excuse my charisma!“ I C O N I C

If you just got into MX, listen to this (as I did) otherwise they’re not gonna make a lot of sense to you.

This is also a song that shows vocal lines progress really well, they’re kinda hard to distinguish in this and develop their colour in later songs

Shine forever - MONSTA X:

This is a song my 12-15 year old self would’ve cried to in bed late at night

It’s chill but also has a super sad vibe? It’s really soft for MX but the rapline gives it the kind of edge that it needs to have this original MX sound

Also watch the MV it’s a cinematic masterpiece! So aesthetic and everyone is so so beautiful in it

All in all I love this song for chill moments or for crying (lol)

Dramarama - MONSTA X: 

Might this be my favourite MX song? No it isn’t but it’s damn high up

One of the first songs I listened to from them and well, I was hooked (Yes I’m a relatively new stan)

The dance to this is so fantastic, I love groups who dance well and have this kind of choreography

„DRAMAMARAMAMARAMAMA HEY!“

The MV is what really got me though! The kind of storytelling is just amazing and was something kinda new to me and lead to me watching every Kpop MV i could find (I still do that)

It was fresh, new and exactly my style and I love this song to this day

Everybody - SHINee: 

Okay, so this is a classic I thought I would enjoy more than I actually do

I barely listen to it tbh, which is sad because it is really not a bad song, but I don’t know there are songs I just like more than this

I love the dance though, very difficult and they pull it of so perfectly

As I said, it’s a classic   

Very unique for it’s time 

Loser - BIGBANG:

Have I cried to this song before? maybe

Ugh what can I say it’s just so so beautiful it makes my heart all fuzzy

Beside it being kind of heart breaking, it’s also a super chill song

I don’t know but sad/melancholic songs from generally up-beat artists always have a greater impact on me

It’s a masterpiece that deserves a good 100 listens before it even gets remotely annoying. Though I have to say that I have to be in a certain mood to fully enjoy it. I can’t listen to it if I’m in a high energy mood

BANG BANG BANG - BIGBANG:

If you don’t know this song what are you even doing?

This is kpop-history right here

Also one of the first songs I listened to from them and well, it was amazing

Dance till you collapse thats how great it is, okay?

I don’t know what else to write, listen to it!

(Also maybe a song that you can show to non kpop friends, so I have heard)

WE LIKE 2 PARTY - BIGBANG:

This song seemed oddly familiar the first time I heard it but I still can’t figure out why

A chill party song that kind of reminds me of American High school movies?

I love this song for chill evenings and summer nights outside.

I don’t listen to it often as I’m rarely in the chill summer night mood haha, but I still absolutely adore it

„Could you play a love song?“

IF YOU - BIGBANG:

Have I cried to THIS song before? haha yes….

What I said before (for Loser) also applies to this song

Everyone sings in this song and it’s beautiful

Also a song 12-15 year old me would’ve cried to in bed and a title I would’ve scribbled on the cover of my notebooks

You want feels? They got the feels

SOBER - BIGBANG:

So this is my favourite song of the group without a doubt!

I love the melancholy of it and the bridges especially!

WATCH THE MV…AND THE MAKING!

This song is perfect in it’s entirety and I will die for it!

Also a song to cry to but only if you’re in a certain mood, lol

The „doctor, doctor…“ line broke my heart in multiple ways and I will always flinch at it

It’s just such a good song, what am I supposed to say?!  

#bigbang #v.i.p #Sober #Loser #Bang bang bang #if you #we like 2 party #gd #g-dragon #t.o.p #seungri #daesung #taeyang #SHINee #shawol #everybody #view #woof woof #jonghyun #kim jonghyun #taemin #lee taemin #key #kibum #lee jinki #kim kibum #onew #choi minho #minho #Monsta X

[sage-nebula]

PSA:

Choi Saeyoung, a.k.a. Luciel Choi, a.k.a. Seven, a.k.a. God Seven, a.k.a. Agent 707 is not stupid. 

This seems like it should be a statement of the obvious, but given the rampant amount of fan content I’ve seen that portrays him as a ditzy airhead at best, and barely able to function at worst, I feel it needs to be said. Saeyoung has an IQ over 300. He’s fluent in 17 languages according to the RFA guidebook. He can construct robots with advanced A.I. in a matter of hours, while being heavily distracted by other things. He’s able to simultaneously hack from multiple devices at once, and while this is ridiculous, it still is impressive that he’s able to type accurately enough with his toes to continue his work while doing so. Most of what he does he does on a couple hours of sleep at best, and in fact spends most of his time severely sleep deprived. Still, he gets his work done, and according to Vanderwood he used to do so robotically, with a level of perfectionism that Vanderwood describes as, well:

I’m not wild about how the word “OCD” is used so loosely here (shame on you, Vanderwood), but the point stands. The idea that Saeyoung is a ditzy slob who ~miraculously~ gets his work done, but needs to be babysat in order for that to be accomplished, is complete fanon that has no canonical basis. Saeyoung being methodical, dedicated, serious worker is not an isolated incident or an anomaly; in all of the flashbacks we have of his childhood, he is dead serious. He’s completely serious and focused when studying the book on computers that Rika gave him, to the point where Saeran has to try multiple times to get his attention. In the flashback we have where he was talking to V at the church, we learn that he has already done some dodgy hacking jobs (despite being about twelve!) that he has received payment for, and once he’s assured that V and Rika will take care of Saeran, he’s completely serious about going into the agency in order to try and save himself and his brother from their father’s pursuit. Saeyoung did not mess about and joke around in childhood. He was a very serious young man as a result of the circumstances he was born into.

And you can’t argue that this is something that went away, because we see this in the present day. While he does like to troll around and joke with others, not only is he never the airheaded ditz that so much of the fandom seems to love portraying him as (there’s a difference between being silly and being stupid, and it’s one that should be minded and toed), but we see in his own route that he can and does serious up real quick when he’s out of the messenger. While he does bite back at Vanderwood with sarcasm and obfuscated nonsense, Vanderwood’s oscillating threats and words of firm encouragement (tough love, tbh) make him get serious and admit, multiple times, that he needs to focus and get his work done. Additionally, once he leaves his house to come to the apartment (and particularly once he sees that “the hacker” is Saeran), he drops the 707 act completely. He says, multiple times and without apology that the 707 who was bright, lulzy, and loved memes was AN ACT, a fake front he put up in order to hide the fact that there has never been a single day when he wasn’t depressed. Observe some receipts:

(I don’t have a screencap handy, but there’s also a line when he’s talking to MC while she’s sleeping that he reiterates that she’s like the 707 in the chatroom, but he is not: “This complicated and icy person is me.”)

This isn’t to say that Saeyoung doesn’t like to snark or joke around, because of course he does. He wants to play and have fun, he wants to have a happy life, he does like goofing around to some degree. But it is saying that portrayals of him where he is nothing but a ditzy memelord are out of character, because that is not who Saeyoung is. Even in other routes where we don’t learn his full backstory, we see his true, serious personality shine through when things start doing down with the hacker / Saeran (this is especially prominent in Another Story, I feel, where he starts getting very concerned about Saeran’s involvement, and is dedicating all of his energy to combatting Saeran’s hacking + trying to make sure V doesn’t die on him). Saeyoung is blindingly intelligent, and while he might obfuscate that at times for his own benefit (e.g. to annoy Vanderwood to get back at him, or to make people stop paying attention to him when he wants to be left alone, or to hide the fact that he is severely depressed because he doesn’t want people wondering about him, et cetera), that doesn’t mean that he’s actually stupid, because he’s not. Far from it. In fact, he’s far more likely to snark at others (e.g. Yoosung and Zen especially) when they make rudimenary mistakes, or to express surprise when someone else is on his level (e.g. that Vanderwood was able to guess the Arabic passcode to get into his house). 

(And as a quick note about his eating habits and messiness, since those need to be addressed as well: Having a messy house with crumbs, soda cans, and dishes piled everywhere is a notable sign of severe depression, because depression can make it extremely difficult to summon the motivation to do things such as clean up, eat proper meals, et cetera. The fact that Saeyoung’s house is always so filthy, and the fact that he doesn’t eat a proper diet, is more than likely meant to be a realistic portrayal of the chronic severe depression that he canonically has. So when you’re writing a Saeyoung who is with MC, you might want to keep in mind that if he’s in a much better place in his life---and particularly one where he could potentially seek help for his depression---you shouldn’t write him as an incompetent man-child who is unable to keep the house clean, because a lack of maturity was never Saeyoung’s problem in this department. Severe depression was.)

Saeyoung is a complicated character, and because of that he can be very difficult to write and keep IC. I get that. But please, for the love of cats and hackers everywhere, please try to remember that he is not a ditz. He’s a literal, CANONICAL genius, and while he does still enjoy joking around and having fun, very often his joking is a front that he puts up as a means of distraction or trolling, and he’s always, always more alert, observent, and on top of things than people would expect him to be.

This has been a PSA. Thank you.

#mystic messenger #saeyoung choi #luciel choi #707 #choi saeyoung #god seven #this has been a rant more like but i'm so tired #so tired of seeing my boy so butchered #i often feel like many who dare to write him haven't even played his route like #please just. please respect him #GIVE THE DEFENDER OF JUSTICE THE RESPECT HE DESERVES THANKS #my irreverent hacker bf #space station fiancé #i could write literal books about the depth of his character but this will have to do for now #pls respect him thank u

[ectoflowermaid]

Homestuck Beach Headcanons

John: hot sand hot sand hot sand *makes it to the water* cold water cold water cold water (this goes on for like an hour before he settles finally). Brought one of those fake shark fins and straps it to the top of his head. He fools no one. Brought approximately 53 kites and loses All of them because Dave said “hey I bet your kites can’t hold up against your windy thing”. He was right. Tells Karkat that the ocean speaks to ppl through conch shells, he holds one up to his ear, nods, “sorry Karkat, the ocean says you’re an idiot”. Karkat is horrified and John is dying trying to keep a straight face.

Dave: has a SBAHJ swimsuit and a SBAHJ surfboard. Challenges Jade to a surf-off. “Are you sure, Dave? I’ve had a lot of practice and it’s not as easy as it looks! I’ve got it, Dave reassures her. How difficult can it be. She warned u, bro. She warned u about the surf. He does not get back in the water. Fills a bucket with crabs of various shapes and sizes throughout the day, at the end he calls Karkat over to where he’s standing by the waters edge. Hey. Hey Karkat. Look what I found. He pours the crabs out at Karkat’s feet. Karkat looks unsettled. Dave. Where did you even find all these crabs Dave. They’re your children Karkat. I did this for you.

Jade: spends the whole day in the water and also she is a surf goddess did I mention that? Doesn’t put any sunscreen in and everyone is concerned but she barely even tans. After getting out of the water she does the Wet Doggo Shake™ Jade can u pls just warn us before u do that pls you’re getting us all soaking wet. Smells suspiciously like wet dog but everyone is too polite to point it out. Helps Dave collect his crabs bc she has an uncanny knack for finding them (she’s sniffing them out with her doggy nose but doesn’t tell Dave bc she wants to show off).

Rose: builds sand castles with Kanaya bc Kanaya is deadass terrified of the ocean. They surpass sandcastle tbh it’s more like a sand palace. Rose found a bunch of nice purpley shells to decorate with and also some rocks that look suspiciously arcane and vaguely powerful. High tide somehow wipes out the group’s chairs but doesn’t touch the sandcastle. Hm. Chastises Dave for building dicks out of the sand. Is there something you’d like to tell us, Dave? *Dave sweating* what’s a penis I don’t even know anyone named Karkat. Rose smiles innocently. Of course not. Throughout the day, Rose brings water for Kanaya to drink and also to dump on her so she can regulate her body temperature. Since she’s a cold-blood her body temp is lower so she overheats v easily.

Kanaya: is deadass terrified of the ocean. Does the detail work on the castle she and Rose are making, carves out little stairs and turrets and makes flags out of spare ribbon she keeps in her bag. It’s beautiful. She cries at the end of the day when they have to leave it even though they’ve taken lots of pictures. . Karkat comes up to her with a conch shell and holds it out to Kanaya, “john told me the ocean said I was an idiot Kanaya what is it saying I can’t hear anything” She takes the conch shell and listens. Mmhm. Yes. Oh My. “What did it say???” It Was Really Quite Rude, I Shouldn’t Repeat It. Karkat is about to cry. Kanaya and Rose secretly fist bump.

Karkat: oh boy this has really been A Day for him. He’s nervous around the ocean already but apparently it thinks he’s an idiot??? He loves the crabs they remind him of his lusus, it was slightly horrifying that Dave put a bunch of them in a bucket for obvious reasons. Wants to be buried in the sand, Jake helps him dig a big hole and he and Dave and Dirk all work together to make it big enough and fill it in afterwards. Dave writes “im gay” underneath Karkat’s head poking out and Karkat yells at him for taking pictures. Sollux falls asleep on his towel and Karkat writes “beefucker” on his forehead.

Terezi: before they got there everyone told Terezi not to lick the sand. Guess what she did. Also, accidentally popped the beach ball with her teeth because she was licking it. There’s a theme here can u find it. Is in the water a lot because Vriska is desperately trying to regulate her body temperature and has v little energy to say mean things which everyone is grateful for. To make her feel better, Terezi engages in wildly uncreative insults that Vriska can easily latch onto without having to put much energy in. “Hey Terezi is the water cold?” I don’t know john, is your FACE cold? “Terezi that doesn’t even make any sense”, your face doesn’t make any sense! She cackles as if this is some High Brow Humor every single time.

Jake: has an irrational fear of seagulls, they keep coming for his food and that makes him nervous because the monsters on his island were one thing but this? This sly and wily creature? Dirk is like,,,buddy,,,it’s just a seagull? It’s just a bird? “They’re eating my fries, Dirk, I won’t stand for it!” Jake has a little ukulele that he knows like five songs on, he sits outside by the boardwalk and just strums it sometimes after dark. One night, two little kids come by and give him 6 dollars in crumpled singles for his playing and he started crying he was so touched.

Jane: is having the TIME of her life, and is also the Mom friend. She’s simultaneously kicking ass at beach volleyball and reminding everyone to put on their sunscreen and reapply every two hours please! She’s also having a good time experimenting with cooking seafood some nights, though once she made the mistake of bringing in crab and Karkat did Not take it well. It took an hour to calm him down. Jane felt awful and made it up to him by buying him a nice hoodie w a happy crab on it. Bought a cute little blue boogie board and hangs out with Jade and Roxy in the water, she’s not very good at it but she likes swimming around a little.

Dirk: he’s that one friend that goes way too hard in casual games tbh. Like, they’re just playing a friendly game of volleyball Dirk can you please stop spiking it every five seconds. The grind never stops, Roxy, don’t hate the player hate the grind. Jane looked at him w so much disappointment in her eyes after he said it that he felt the force of her stare physically and had to take a step back. Tries to show Jake that seagulls aren’t scary by feeding them, but they start attacking him for his fries which does not help prove his point at all.

Roxy: “the babe” Lalonde has been ready for a beach trip her entire life. She is checking out the lifeguards, she’s checking out the other gals and dudes strolling about the beach, she’s got her best friends with her, what more could she want??? She buys a cutesy pink surfboard and Dave makes fun of her for it and she smiles sweetly. Oh sorry Dave? I forgot you were so good at surfing?? No one knows how or when Roxy learned to hang ten but THERE SHE GOES. She finds a lot of pretty shells and rocks and sand dollars and is just enthusiastic about everything tbh. She brightens everyone’s mood always.

Calliope: cherubs can’t float so Roxy’s overprotective ass won’t let her near the water unless someone is with her and making sure she’s safe. This is Fine with calliope bc that means that she’s never alone and therefore she’s never lonely and really that’s all she’s ever wanted so!! She’s v content to watch Jade and Roxy surf, she will sit w Jane sometimes when she isn’t in the water. She also likes digging for sand crabs with Karkat bc she likes their little legs. She wants to dig deep enough to find a lobster and no one has the heart to tell her that’s not how it works.

Sollux: this idiot. This boy. My sweet sweet son. Makes the horrible mistake of falling asleep on his towel. He was underneath the big umbrella when he started, but as the sun moves and he’s not putting on more sunscreen?? John, Dave, and Karkat take it upon themselves to not only write “beefucker” on his forehead, but also draw dicks on his whole body in sunscreen so he burns (trolls turn a darker shade of their blood color) and ends up with these pale gray dicks surrounded by a horrible dark, mustardy burn.

#homestuck #john egbert #dave strider #rose lalonde #jade harley #johnkat #johndave #johnrezi #davekat #davejade #rosemary #kanrose #kanaya maryam #karkat vantas #terezi pyrope #vriska serket #vrisrezi #roxy lalonde #jane crocker #dirk strider #jake english #dirkjake #janeroxy #callieroxy #sollux captor #solkat #strilondes #homestuck headcanon #beach au #my writing

[6ad6ro]

dark souls

an analysis of every game in the dark souls series by a big fan, but not a fan-boy. someone who isn't so clouded by toxic competitiveness and false pride that they can't see the obvious flaws. a sorta guide for the average person so they can enjoy all the great things souls has to offer, while avoiding the substantial amount of garbage that 95% of players will genuinely hate.

tl;dr - play ds3 or bb first. they’re the best and most fair. maybe watch playthroughs of others to see if you can handle the series’ flaws. a more detailed, WAY longer write-up is underneath the readmore cut! - souls games from best to worst - 1. dark souls 3 GOOD: best souls, best action, great aesthetics, best mixture of everything series did right, best starter game, most fair, least issues. BAD: broken early game co-op due to smurf invaders ruining it for everyone. still has issues that are in every souls games like no offline pausing and artificial difficulty. 2. bloodborne GOOD: fresh new take on souls, made the action better, fair difficulty, souls for people who don’t care about tolkien fantasy, another great starter souls. BAD: confusing multiplayer, shorter than most souls, aesthetic direction limited variety of everything, “chalice dungeons” suck. 3. dark souls 2 GOOD: co-op is the BEST in all of souls, fixed many difficulty and balancing issues brought in by ds1, not a miyazaki game but that can be a good thing sometimes. BAD: without co-op is probably worse than demon’s tbh, rigid laggy combat, kinda linear compared to ds1, not a miyazaki game and you can tell. 4. demon’s souls GOOD: really started it all and deserves the credit, short but sweet, weirdly happy but still evil aesthetics, feels like a fun set of obstacle courses, many ways to mitigate the difficulty. BAD: horrible co-op, confusing mechanics, comparatively too short, almost level-based which takes away from exploration, “world tendency” isn’t great, still very rough around the edges. 5. dark souls 1 GOOD: best aesthetics/music/characters/world/lore of any souls, originated souls exploration, plenty of secrets and replayability, HUGE game, the fan favorite, the deepest levels of masochists will love the abuse from this game, an exploit in all versions to “cheat” and help mitigate the bullshit. BAD: almost not worth playing due to insane cheapness and difficulty right from the start, the fanbase of ds1 is so toxic and horrible and elitist i have to include it, “ornstein and smough”, “curse”, even the world exploration is frustrating in this one, i have never labeled a game as “abusive” until now, is so broken that i have to include a cheat as a fix. 6. dark souls 2 on ps4 GOOD: a remixed version of ds2 that manages to feel very different, way better visuals and 60fps, potential for co-op paradise with ability to play through all of ds2 with 3 friends simultaneously (i wanna try thisss). BAD: worst souls, least fun single player of the whole series by far, most of the balance and fairness brought in by vanilla ds2 is gone, literally patched balanced bosses to break them and make them artificially unfair, feels like a sloppy ds2 fanmod made by a ds1 purist, combat seems even laggier than the original, as much as i hate on ds1 at least it was a fully original game, just go play the other versions unless you’re desperate.

THE READMORE

this will kinda be in order of release. one last thing to note before starting the series is that souls IS inherently cheap and unfair by design. even avoiding most of the worst parts and doing extensive research won't save you from all of it. the concept of souls is that wasting your time retrying parts isn’t enough of a punishment for errors. the creators wanna really hurt you. and they refuse to include difficulty settings! but imo some of the pain is worth it tho, because the storytelling, world exploration, and aesthetics might be better than any game in the last ten years. and highly competitive, “i wanna prove myself” types will eat this gameplay up. this is like if castlevania symphony of the night and silent hill had an incredible but problematic baby.

demon's souls: GOOD! a gorgeous, tough, medium-sized game that really started it all. rough around the edges, but so cool! don't skip this one. this is like your favorite band right before they hit it big. it's still hard, but a lot of the difficulty can be dealt with by choosing an overpowered starting class (royal), and grinding for levels and healing items. the aesthetics are through the roof. it's somehow a happier game than any other souls, which makes it stand out imo! sadly no expansions for this game. i'd have loved more!

there's some bad stuff for sure though. like having to keep track of inventory carry weight. and other things that became staples of the souls series but are really horrible design. like inability to pause even offline. plentiful cheap traps and "gotcha" guess and check mechanics everywhere. super easy to accidentally attack an npc and literally break an entire playthrough. horrible autosaving. confusing awful multiplayer. forced invasions by (usually) smurf players who aren't looking for a fair fight. i'd say "play this one offline" but sadly the servers just went down for good so you don't really have a choice anymore.

it's also comparatively short. maybe a third the size of ds1. maybe even less. and the whole "world tendency" mechanic is just... so so confusing. meaning most players will miss out on a ton of content. it was a cool idea, but it just kinda didn't work with how they did it. too much research required for too little reward. in it's defense, that made the whole game feel very mysterious? idk even with the issues it's still a fav.

dark souls 1: TERRIBLE! i have a lot to say about this one. it's a bit sad, because truth be told this has THE best style and THE best lore and THE best music THE best characters and THE best world design of any souls. aesthetically, this is the pinnacle. it's also a HUGE game with tons of replayability and hidden stuff everywhere. it even has dlc that's really really cool! as far as world exploration goes, this had my favorite part in any souls game ever ("under the tree").

BUT... you have to actually play the game to see all that, and that's the problem. it's just not fun to play unless you're an insane masochist and don't value your time. they kicked up enemy numbers like crazy, made the ai way smarter, REMOVED grinding for health items, and made grinding for levels not that effective at all. everything in this game is tedious work. escapism that's harder than real life? no thanks. there's artificial difficulty walls everywhere you turn, usually in the form of bosses.

seriously the bosses in ds1 are the worst. think of a normal tough game. take that difficult last boss fight. imagine you're now fighting three of those final bosses simultaneously (stun-lock included). now imagine that fight is at the start of the game. and that's the benchmark of ds1's bosses. they aren't ALL that impossible, but a lot of them are. there's this one particular boss fight, "ornstein and smough", that is by far the most misplaced, unfair, stupid boss fight i've ever seen in any game ever. whoever developed it is truly a moron. i almost forgot about the “curse” status effect! about half way into the game, you’ll run into this. it requires an expensive and rare consumable item to deal with it. it’s very easy to miss these until it’s too late. why am i bringing this all up? because not only does curse kill you almost instantly, you respawn with half your health missing until you heal it. imagine all your hard work leveling, all gone to waste from just a single status effect. and this is before teleporting between bonfires was just a part of souls games from the start, so even if you figure out where to go to heal it, you still need to slog through some of the worst areas with half max health to get to them. and then there’s always the risk of getting cursed again when you go back? big issue, because most likely where you’re at in the game the curse removing items aren’t unlimited. bad bad bad bad baaad design.

but, thankfully, there's a way around all these issues. kinda. CHEAT! there's an exploit that lets you consume boss souls an unlimited amount of times even on consoles. it still takes a while to do. it's not instant god mode. on the contrary, the game is still super hard even if you're over-leveled. by doing this, ds1 will feel more fair, like the other souls games. you'll have way more fun.

i NEVER cheat in games normally, but cheating in ds1 takes a bad, horribly flawed game and fixes it. you may hate cheating, but this is more like ripping off an evil casino or like the mob without taking any risk, since the game is so so so unfair to begin with. if you don't wanna cheat, i'd say play the first parts and then watch a playthrough of the rest. the deepest levels of toxic elitist souls fanboys absolutely WORSHIP this game. don't listen to them. even the creator himself has moved away from a lot of this games bullshit.

dark souls 2: GREAT! those same souls fanboys i just mentioned? hate this game. because it's noticeably easier. because it made co-op viable. because their impossible game was suddenly moderately more accessible to everyone else. it's still super tough, super cool, super beautiful. the original creator may have stepped down from this one to do bloodborne, but it's still DEFINITELY souls. and it's an overall better game than ds1 by a long shot simply because your ticket to fun doesn't come at such an unreasonable cost. oh and omg they added back grindable healing items! they also removed the STUPID tutorial area/mandatory boss fight before you can level that every other souls has. and just a lot of the other player-unfriendly changes made between demon's (des) and ds1 have been sorta reversed.

it might seem weird but, since the game is comparatively unpopular, it keeps the majority of toxic soul elitists from playing. the kind of people who get off smurf invading so they can bully others? to stomp new players so they can feel misplaced joy in their otherwise pathetic, purposeless existences? yeah not really here thank god! most invaders are regular people looking for competition, and usually even have a good sense of humor.

outside of that making online totally do-able in this one, it makes online co-op really fairly easy. in comparison to des and ds1, i mean. it's still unintuitive silly bullshit, but imo in this one it's SUPER worth it. amazingly fun! get a good friend. play through the entire game together! a++++. just make sure to keep that soul level similar to each other!!!

there are bad things tho. the single player isn't nearly as good as cooping through the whole thing. the aesthetics aren't quite as good as ds1. the exploration is kinda worse. the gameplay feels weirdly sluggish sometimes too. it's just insanely tanky. people that wanted "dark souls 2: more dark souls 1" would be a bit put off by this bc it was more like how ds1 was to demon's souls. unconnected in lore. imo i kinda liked that but... still. it's biggest flaw was it's lesser story/lore polish compared to the other games.

oh, and while the dlc zones (THREE whole big dlc this time!) are pretty cool, the bosses are just crazy tough to the point of not being fun. still worth getting the dlc for the awesome levels, but the bosses were disappointing in their frustration.

dark souls 2 ps4: THE WORST! this is a sorta weird one, but it deserves it's own little analysis. theoretically, this should've been really cool. a tougher, remixed version of ds2 with dlc included and better graphics/framerate. tbh the game IS beautiful. some if the little touches and changes, while subtle on the surface, completely change how you path through the entire game. it's what "zelda oot master quest" WISHES it could be. also, theoretically, you can play co-op with up to three other people this time (was two before)! neat!!

*should have been neat. because their "remixed enemy placement" really just added way more way tougher enemies. made everything insanely harder. certain bosses that were tough but fun before now just devastate you with no explanation. imagine a shoddy fanmod made by a ds1 fanboy "to fix the casual play". that's what this feels like.

ds2 rode a fine line between cheapness and fairness before, but now all the balance is gone. frustrating annoying bullshit. if you're that kind of ds1 masochist i mentioned before, this is the ds2 for you. everyone else should stay the fuck away. just replay the ps3 version again. i suspect the reason it's like this is they balanced it around the ability to have 3 people helping you at all times? which is idiotic. bc the co-op was a way to compensate for the super hard bosses and invasions. but if you then raise the bar like that, it'd make any single player parts totally unfair. which is exactly what happened. btw i only played the dlc on ps4 and not on ps3, so maybe that's why i was wishy-washy about it?

had they included both the original enemy arrange of ds2 WITH this one, it woulda been cool. but as it stands now it's a much worse version of ds2 for more money. no thanks.

bloodborne: AMAZING! it's so odd to me. people kinda ignored des compared to ds1. they didn't like how ds2 was it's own thing compared to ds1 (see a pattern???)... but then the most drastically different souls game comes out, and almost everyone unifies and loves it. but i'm not complaining, i love it too!

suddenly super fast paced action in comparison. jrr tolkien replaced by hp lovecraft. a smaller game with more polish. it's great! some of the reactionary gameplay was traded for rewarding aggression and risk. but truth be told, that made the game easier. imo bb was the easiest souls game at that point by far. might still be?

but that's not a bad thing, because souls games are so inherently hard and cheap, that the "easiest" souls ends up being the most balanced and fun. the gameplay is just so much more responsive and better than any souls ever came close to being. as much as i missed shields, it was just better. no more slow responses. gameplay feels more like an action game "should".

tho there are a few flaws here too. there are still a few unfair bosses. not like ds1 or ds2dlc... but just the same, they kept up the annoying trend of moderately difficult and insanely interesting/fun world navigation, but with bosses as disproportionately difficult brick walls in your way of the game you really wanna play. the co-op was the most confusing souls co-op yet, to the point i've never even done it (thus could be all on me but still).

there's a whole big (technically optional) chunk of the game called "chalice dungeons", which should've been this amazing roguelike maze of seemingly endless exploration. think souls meets diablo. but it ended up more like the most boring (and often cheap) repetitive thing you've ever done in a souls game. the assets uses to make the random dungeons were too few and so every dungeon felt kinda the same. and they locked a bunch of REALLY good content behind this dungeon slog. i'd say use em for a bit of grinding and then ignore em completely.

my last little complaint, and i'm torn on this, is actually something i praised before. the aesthetics. in all other souls, even though it was "knights n dragons", there was a TON of variety. bright, beautiful locations. dark, evil places. alien landscapes. bizarre abstract things. legend of zelda. silent hill. but in bb, it's mostly just dark. everybody wears edgy black. it's all the same. the weapons and outfits are way more limited. it's more focused for sure, but there's just... less of everything. but souls is a confusing complicated nightmare of gear management, so this might be a good thing to some people.

dark souls 3: THE BEST! this is it. the best souls. they combined the greatest parts of every souls game into one. the amazing combat of bb, but with all the customization and variety of the other souls. the good kind of lore that was in ds1. it's actually the lore sequel to ds1 that everybody wanted, all while being it's own thing as well. there's even a weird aspect of navigation simplicity like des had? oh and it's possibly the easiest souls yet. they even removed soul memory to make co-op way easier! just everything is more intuitive.

a wide variety of aesthetics and locations. a "best of souls" while having it's own unique things. the "weapon abilities" feature is great. everything was polished and optimized. if this truly is the last souls game they'll make, then they went out on the highest note.

okay but now here's the flaws, lol. the removal of soul memory, while it should have made co-op simple and fixed it in comparison, it actually created a whole new HUGE issue. it made things so so easy for smurf invaders. in the earliest areas, you can't take more than a few steps in co-op before some loser with a obv troll name pops into your game and takes almost no damage whatsoever. you won't beat them. they're cheating.

smurfing via high end gear to this level is cheating. there's no other way to look at it. nobody would call an ant vs an elephant a fair fight. so to save time and resources that you need to play online (it's complicated), you have the host disconnect. and then you try again. it's tedious. i'm sure it's made countless new players just give up on co-op completely, and maybe even the whole game. souls smurfs are all so pathetic like i genuinely wish they would find a way to ban them. this is the biggest issue.

another thing is it's sorta linear. maybe even more so than ds2. it's not awful like i think there are more branches than bb but still it's definitely no ds1 in that regard. there are also a few cheap bosses. "nameless king" (optional), "sister" (end dlc thus optional), and "dlc dragon" (forgot his name but double optional). i also think "dancer" (mandatory) is a bit bullshit, but it's also really cool so...

the first dlc, while looking very cool, is kinda tiny and lackluster. it does have amazing npcs/lore... but as stated before, the final boss of it is awful. souls boss formula at it's worst. the second dlc is MUCH better, with maybe my favorite end bossfight in all of souls. it's so hard, but fair. they made the garbage secret bossfight in this dlc thankfully optional. oh and the dlc itself is beautiful and large. and very fitting in regards to lore.

it's kinda hard to not mix in good with the bad on this game. i genuinely love it. most of the typical souls bullshit is easier to avoid, but it doesn't take anything away from the good parts. if you played one souls game, play ds3.

well that's it. srry if it was too long. tried to make it as short as i could. i'm sure i forgot a few points, but i'll rant about this stuff even more extensively in my ds3 letsplay i'm sure. thanks for reading! hope it helped people interested in getting into souls!!

#dark souls #long #souls #gaming #from #anikiii

[calzonekestis]

@agent13: Jackie hasn’t been active in quite a while, but she’s always been kind to me and her blog has has A+ opinions and content. 

@ar-se-ne: IDEK how long I’ve been following Cristian, but he’s a really nice guy with whom I have similar interests. He’s also someone that I’ve kind of of been inspired by in some ways. I don’t want to get too personal information, but it involves introspection and self improvement and yeah. I’m proud of him. He should be proud of himself.

@chujo-hime: I remember like circa 2012-2013 I had a ~moment~ because the webmaster of FYBN followed me. Chujo always has quality content, and is someone I respect for being very genuine and respectful. If something’s drawn her ire or made her bitter, she has a reason for it, and can write a solid meta on why it’s bullshit. At the same time, she’s someone who I’ve looked to when I consider how to handle my own fandom disagreements. It’s not worth arguing with people on the internet, it’s never fun. So long as people enjoy what they enjoy? Stay in their lane and let others do the same? We can all get along~~~

@cimikat: Katie is another person who I don’t even remember following. I can’t really remember my tumblr experience before her, though? I can say without any hyperbole though that she’s probably the nicest person I’ve ever encountered on this website? Literally, I can’t think of a single time I’ve seen her be salty. Upset and disappointed, sure, but she doesn’t wallow in negativity the way some people do and have in the past. If she enjoys something, she’s enthusiastic about it. If she no longer enjoys it? You won’t see her b*tch about it. She’s just very upbeat.

@dazzledfirestar: Daz shares my love of certain villains (Sin and Crossbones) while fully recognizing they’re deplorable human beings. That’s just one of the more superficial reasons I respect her. She’s another person who’s also genuine, and whom by following I feel like I’ve actually learned a lot? And I actually like to learn. Ignorance isn’t always mean spirited, and in the past I’ll admit I’ve been an ignorant white boy. Not that I was prejudice, there was just a lot I was either blind to or unaware of.  I’ve learned a lot about Romani culture by following Daz. A lot of history, a lot about the struggles and persecution they still face to this day. I also learned lot about the LGBT community; which honestly was a big help when I was trying to figure out/accept my bisexuality.

@diaryofawriter: What do I even say about you? believe we met because we both RP’d in the same fandoms and enjoyed the same content. Comics, OUAT, Harry Potter, and Star Wars. She’s both listened to me flail or rant countless times, either feigning or expressing genuine interest… for that I’m truly appreciative. She’s also helped me when it comes to letting go of things that are no longer fun or enjoyable for me (OUAT) and focus on the things that do bring me joy. A role model in that sense. >.>

@diisnerd: Leah. Leah was someone I met though a mutual friend, and while they’re closer than I am with her… I let me just say I have so much fucking respect for Leah. She’s just a good, loyal, protective, and caring friend. We have a lot of the same interests, too. We don’t talk all that often about them, but when we do it’s always an enjoyable conversation.

@dreamimpcssiblethings: Kath. Jesus. You know how much you mean to me, I should hope. You’re one of my best friends. It’s not even that we like a lot of the same things (we do) but you’re just very hard not to like? You’re super intelligent, super passionate. Be it about fandom things, classic literature, or just life. If one good thing came out of the rise and fall of my OUAT fandom, it was meeting you. All the salt is worth it for knowing you~

@ilikethequiet: Ally was one of the first people I met in the OUAT fandom, via a mutual friend/aquiantence. She’s a wizard when it comes to making edits and graphics. She’s someone with whom I’ve been salty on many an occasion, and I lured her into the iZombie fandom with me when our favorite actors transitioned over to that show. She’s just a delight. She also somehow made an AU graphic for a trashy ~problematic~ hateship look classy? Real friends hunt down topless screencaps so they can make you smutty collages for your birthday.

@jjoelswatch: Sarah is one of the first people I can remember following on tumblr. She’s another person where I wouldn’t recognize my dash without her. I’m starting to sound like a broken record, but I really respect her. She’s just a good person, very down to Earth and very witty. We don’t talk that much, but it’s always very pleasant when we do? Sarah was the first one to reach out and respond when I came out as bi. I’m still not out to my family. When I posted that little confession, I didn’t know what to expect. I simultaneously cared and didn’t care how people responded. It was weird, because it was something I had tried to deny and rationalize for so long. It’s something that no one should even care about, but Sarah empathized and realized it was kind of a big deal for me? Her reassurance that I wasn’t alone, even in such a short and concise message meant a lot. She’s one of my favorite mutals tbh.

@kennyhoemega: Bethany is a Goth Goddess. I’m not just saying that because she demanded the best compliment. On a superficial level, she’s just really pretty?? Now that’s out of the way, let me tell you legitimate reasons why she’s one of my favorite people to follow. She’s got great taste in music, she loves Star Wars, dabbles in Marvel and Harry Potter. You see a theme here with people I follow. She just also tends to reblog really neat things unrelated to those? I’ve gotten into astrology because of her. It’s mostly her fault that I’ve started watching wrestling again, bc there’s nothing good on TV and her passion is contagious and the gifs she reblogs are wild. She also has the best tags out of anyone I follow, bar none. I don’t even know when I first followed her either, around 2012 or so, but I know that it was absolutely 100% Sarah’s fault. Thank you, Sarah. TBH the first time I remember interacting with Bethany was when I added a gif and sarcastic comment to one of her salty posts about people trying to woobify Brock Rumlow. The next day, I realized this was likely not the best way to make a first impression? Fortunately she assured me that she got it, and that we were cool. Which is a relief, because as I’ve told her (and IDK if she believes me) she’s probably one of the coolest people I follow? It’s come to light that neither of us are big talkers, so we don’t actually talk that much… but she’s really rad. IDK when it started but she’s consistently been in my tumblr crushes for ages. Lots of mutual reblogging, again, lots of respect. She’s witty and intelligent. That’s not butt-kissin’, I’ve seen her post about certain tests and looked them up out of curiosity and wow. Yeah. Bethany also has the longest compliment, so that should make her happy. There was something about my needing a nuclear bunker if she wasn’t on this list. She deserves it though, she’s another one of my faves.

@kittenspawn: Nichole is my unofficial big sister. I say that as someone who actually has a big sister. She messaged me in 2012 with questions about Bucky and Natasha, and from that point on she was screwed. She got me into Hellboy in turn, but I like to think I’ve thoroughly corrupted her and caused her to spend far too much money on certain things. Nichole is someone who I can go weeks without talking to, and yet we can fall right back into conversation as if we talked the night before. She’s been a terrible enabler over the years, but she’s also been there for me during some difficult times and when I’ve done very stupid and questionable things. I know she’ll say I’ve been there for her as well, but the scales are seriously tipped here. When I need advice, or when I need to talk to someone about something serious… she’s the person I go to. I can always count on her, and she’s pretty much family at this point.

@ohmygil: Gil. I think I found you through Davis? You’re just a very sensible person, and very rational about a lot of things. It’s refreshing to see that on the internet these days. You’re someone who I don’t think I’ve ever had a actual ‘discussion’ with, but I’m including you here because I really enjoy your presence on my dash. I stopped reading DC regularly with the New 52, and pretty much all my DC intake these days is absorbed through your blog. You also get points for liking Superman. Some people think he’s too powerful, or a big boy scout, and while I’ve never regularly collected his titles I am a fan.

@prof-anity: …You know, I was tempted to leave you off this list just to be a dick. Yours would be the longest entry, so I’m keeping it short because what is there to even say? How much needs to be said? Seven years ago you met a bitter teenage douchebag on a message board. You made the mistake of accepting his friendship when he reached out to you. You’ve stuck with me through highs and lows, man. It’s one of those relationships again, where we may not talk every day. We may not be up to date on the details and goings on in each other’s lives… but you said it yourself. Our friendship has been one of the best constants in the past seven years. A third of your life, btw. Isn’t that depressing? You are, truly, the best friend I have ever had. One day I’m going to meet you, hug you, and then insult you to your face. You’re truly a brother to me. I love you.

@readytocomply: Stef! Stef is a delight. Always pleasant, always fun. She’s also super creative? She makes great edits, great cosplays, and is just pretty damn great over all. Stef is another person who I try to model myself after when it comes to shipping things. Re: Multi-Shipping. Stef ships Steve and Bucky. I do not. Stef also ships Bucky and Natasha. Stef respects canon and appreciates Sharon Carter. All this may sound inane but I’m glad I didn’t meet Stef until I did, because 2013 Tim might have been a little asshole re his ships and missed out befriending a great person because of his own stubborness… that could cross into douchebaggery. Stef has quality content on her blog at all times. Sebastian Stan. Marvel. Star Wars. Mark Hamill.. Harry Potter. Tron. Just general film. Chicken nuggets. Stef is a quality person with a quality blog.

@rocktheholygrail: Dana is someone I met through the iZombie fandom, and she is another wizard. A gif wizard, who has too often indulged my requests or suggestions. She’s another person whose enthusiasm is contagious. I was able to convince her to watch the entirety of Prison Break (save the revival) in less than a month before it was taken off Netflix. I don’t think I ever apologized for that. Dana also is trash tho, bc like me, her favorite iZombie character is the trashiest. I say that tongue in cheek, at least the first part. It’s really been great though to have someone who recognize a character as both human and horrible, and who is capable of watching and enjoying them despite their being problematic. If this was another fandom, I’d expect to be judged or ostracized, but instead I’m enabled once again.

@swanmagic: Gia is another person who doesn’t post on tumblr much (at least her personal) these days, but I’m including her because she’s been one of my favorite RP partners for years and we still talk from time to time on twitter. She’s just a great writer, great person, great friend. She’s another person who has excellent (and varied) musical taste.

@thealbooty: I met Alberto through Davis. It’s another thing where I don’t remember the circumstances, there was just one day where suddenly Alberto was in my life. Alberto is just a good guy… and I just mean good. He’s pure. If Davis is Spongebob, I’m Squidward and Alberto is Patrick. Only not as dumb. We don’t talk as much these days which makes me sad, but I love him too. Back in the day the three of us used to have group Skype chats and watch movies together. There was one day when Davis couldn’t make it or wasn’t online, and he and I just watched Hellboy and chatted for a few hours. That’s when Alberto went from being a friend of a friend to my friend. I’m glad he’s my friend.

@thejazzdalek: Max is another person, like Gil, who I’ve never really had a discussion with? He’s followed me for ages though, both on tumblr and on twitter and I appreciate that. I don’t really know him that well after all this time, embarrassingly. He seems like a nice guy, though. Big into Doctor Who, OUAT, DC, Marvel, just sci-fi and fantasy in general.

@timelessmulder: Emily-Alice is someone who I’ve been mutuals with since like 2012 I think. I don’t even know if we’re in the same fandoms anymore, but we keep following each other regardless. Over the years we’ve discussed everything from OUAT to DC, and these days when we talk it’s mostly to pick apart The Flash. She’s someone who has been with me for ages though, and has seen things.

@uhohjonsnow: So Betty is one of the first friends I actually made on tumblr when I engaged in fandom? I was an obnoxious teenage white boy who thought he was straight and acted like it, and she tolerated me anyway. Again, she’s someone who was witness to a lot of nonsense. We really were dicks to each other, lmao. I adore her though, bc she really is sweet and laid back. We went for years without talking,not due to any falling out, but we just drifted apart. She actually took a year off tumblr and recently returned, and we reconnected. She also accidentally deleted her blog and started fresh, so um, go follow her!

@uminoko: We’ve been mutuals for like years, and she’s just a nice person? Again, that’s a pathetic compliment, but it is true. She’s also another individual who I feel I’ve learned from by following? Part of that has to due with her being a former civil rights lawyer, but beyond that she’s just yet another smarty pants who I don’t talk to that much. She also  messaged me privately when I came out, and made me laugh when I needed it. Also, she’s an actual Russian who is a fan of Black Widow and Winter Soldier.

@uncleclustersthirdbrain: Donnie. This might be a little weird, because Donnie and I only reconnected like two weeks ago after three years of not really talking to each other? Again, there’s no bad blood, and he deserves to be on here. I’ve actually known him for five years, we met through his girlfriend Morgan. Donnie’s another person who has seen things, re seen me at my worst. Most obnoxious, outspoken, salty, dickish… and so on. I’ve always sort of looked up to him, though? Back when 17 going on 18 year old Tim met him, there was a sort of ‘notice me sempai’ thing going on. He’s yet another person who is too cool for me. In spite of toolish tendencies, there were times when Donnie reached out to make sure I was okay when I was being dramatic and having anxiety attacks over damn comic books. It sounds ridiculous, and it was, but at the time comics were my escape and how I dealt with a lot of tough shit I was going through. I was invested. Heavily invested, to an unhealthy degree. He’s just a good person who cares about his friends, and people in general. He’s also a fucking brilliant writer, who just recently put out his first comic. So I’m going to use this as another excuse to pimp it for him. Not because he’s my friend, but because I’m a selfish bastard who wants to read more and wants you to give him money so he can make more. He makes no personal profit from it, all the money goes towards paying his artists and the production. I’ve pretty much walked away from buying monthly comics, but as I’ve told Donnie, this is one I would pull. The first issue of And The Hare had some of the best dialogue I’ve read in a comic in easily the last year. At least.

@xeleyan-tequila: I met Chelsea through the OUAT fandom, and like me she gave up on the show a long time ago. She’s another person I don’t really talk to that much these days, but she’s a lovely person with a lovely blog who posts a little bit of everything. There are personal details to our relationship I won’t get into bc it’s no one’s business, and though we’re still friendly we sort of fell out of touch. I enjoy following her though, and she’s a wonderful human being.

#cw long post #long post for ts

[fantastic-nonsense]

I'm sorry you're disappointed in TLJ. TBH, having followed you for awhile, I've come to expect you to be disappointed is almost everything. I'm sure part of it is you being hyperbolic, but you seem to have such a grand vision for them and then you always seem so disheartened when it comes. Hype never lives up to reality. The crowd sourced speculation will always be better. Maybe lower your expectations for these things so you can enjoy them? The way you about talk all about it sounds exhausting.

Okay, I’ve let this sit in my inbox all afternoon while I thought about it, and here’s what I have to say:

Yes, about 75% of my reactions are hyperbolic. It’s been sort of an evolution in how I express myself on this site, but the long and short of it is that I am very bad at masking emotional investment in things over the internet and thus just decided to embrace it. Additionally, as an English major and an extremely analytical person by nature, I tend to talk more about the things I didn’t like or thought could have been handled better even when I love something or liked it overall. Does that make me sound like a generally negative person about things I claim to love at times? Absolutely, and I’m sorry that it sometimes comes off that way, because make no mistake: I love these pieces of media. I love the characters and I love the story concepts and I want them to do justice to both the characters and the plot arcs involved…which is also often why I appear to care more about what writers/creators did wrong than what they did right. 

I also have zero issues duking it out with people I disagree with about things. I’m a person who loves arguing for fun…that is also going to color the content that appears on this blog because arguments are, in a lot of ways, negative and often involve me debating people who violently disagree with me on any number of topics. However, anyone who has followed me long enough (say…4 years or so) will intimately know the level of utter burnout and emotional exhaustion that happened to me in regards to the Legend of Korra fandom and my complete non-desire to engage in any substantial amount of argument on any level for months afterwards, and how I engage in infinitely less fandom wank and debate in general since I left the Korra fandom; except for occasional extended conversations, debates, and pieces of meta, I generally stick to short, snarky comments or a bunch of shady posts on a subject and then let it go. Have I gotten involved in serious fandom drama since then? Yes. Was it anywhere near the same extent? No.

In terms of my grand expectations and exhaustion, I think my ultimate problem is less that I have exceedingly grand expectations and more that some franchises manage to dash multiple hopes at once while simultaneously dealing poorly with things I had already braced for (aka, I expected TLJ to sideline Finn and I had braced myself for disappointing Luke characterization for months, but I didn’t expect to have to deal with both of those things on top of everything else that is apparently coming in this movie). Like The Kenobi Theory was a potshot in the dark and I knew that and was perfectly fine with it not happening, so that was never a problem for me either; it’s just the combination of all of the various aspects of the plot together that are…bad for me.

I can easily deal with one or two serious issues in a piece of media that I otherwise love (Wonder Woman, for example, where I had serious issues with literally every bit of mythology in that movie but loved the movie overall, or The Force Awakens, which despite my occasional meta and discussion about shallowness and plot holes I actually love quite a lot), but when that media seems sort of….intent on crushing any hope I had of quality writing and satisfying narrative arcs, it’s difficult, you know?

For Star Wars specifically, I think that for me, it’s the only franchise outside of something like Harry Potter able to be such an emotional trigger button. I’ve been majorly invested in the fandom for over ten years, since I was almost twelve years old. I practically lived and breathed the series for about six months as a teenager, and even when I moved on to other things, it was always there. When I look at what I consider my “base level fandoms” (aka, the fandoms I always return to if there’s nothing else on my mind at the time), there are three: Harry Potter, DC Comics, and Star Wars. And while I have exceedingly low expectations of anything related to comics ever because of all the shit I’ve read and been through with those characters (my reaction to anything that happens in comics now is basically just that one vine that’s like “this again? give it a rest buddy”), I think to have such a narrative disappointment come out of something that is one of my three base fandoms is difficult. Like…I’m going to deal with it just fine (like lol, I’m not emotionally traumatized or anything, just angry), but it’s disappointing in the way that opening your Christmas presents on Christmas morning and finding a pair of socks instead of that Barbie Doll you saw at Walmart is. And I’m going to deal with it how I always do: snarky comments, shade, occasional arguments, genuine anger, and then moving on.

I appreciate you being concerned for my emotional wellbeing and for bringing up how my words may make me look to those who follow me, but I think the bottom line is that I’m perfectly fine, just disappointed in most media as a whole right now. I would like to leave off on a positive note, so I’ll leave you with the reassurance that generally I am much happier about a piece of media than I may seem to be due to my general tendency to talk more about things I didn’t like rather than things I liked and that IRL, I am actually a solid realist with optimistic tendencies rather than the pessimist I may sometimes seem to be online.

#personal #replies #long post #hope this answers your questions comments and concerns #Anonymous #sidenote: I'm actually a fairly emotionally stable person IRL #about me