#I can’t just absorb her experience through osmosis how do I make her understand

[bookmark-extraordinaire]

My mom is planning to go live somewhere else. Probably somewhere far from here, maybe not even in Italy. I am happy for her, don’t get me wrong, but she’s been smothering me all my life and I’m afraid that without her pressure I might just fucking decompress and die like a blobfish taken out of its depth.

Like she stresses me out. A lot. She’s been over my shoulder telling me what to do and how to do it for almost 30 years. I don’t know how to pay taxes. I don’t know how to pay bills or if I should make a bank account or something because those were things she always took care of. What am I going to do? I can’t even support myself *and* study at the same time without fucking dying.

[goodlucktai]

out past the shallow breakers

the untamed pairing: jiang cheng & wei ying, jiang cheng & lan sizhui word count: 3148 read on ao3

x

“He died!”

The words ring loud, sharp—in the pavilion where they’re taking their evening meal, surrounded on all sides by untroubled water, the words seem to carry for miles.

It’s unlike Lan Sizhui to raise his voice at all, much less to raise it toward a senior. His hands, resting politely on his knees under the table, have curled into fists.

“Everyone goes on and on as though baba has so much to atone for,” Lan Sizhui says, each word lurching from his throat like a line of fierce corpses shambling through brush. “What more is there for him to give? What more do you want? He died.”

Jin Ling is staring at his friend as though he’s never seen him fully before. On Lan Sizhui’s other side, Wei Wuxian’s expression is shifting rapidly from alarm to comprehension. His gray eyes are full of a painful understanding.

“Sizhui ah,” Wei Wuxian says, touching the boy’s shoulder. “Come take a walk with me.”

Jerking his head in a nod, Lan Sizhui pushes to his feet and then pauses there. His Gusu Lan whites, those extra lines and layers that denote him a member of the main family, ghost elegantly around him when he lowers himself in a bow that is every inch deep that it needs to be and not one inch deeper.

“Sect Leader Jiang, this disciple apologizes,” he says. The cheerful ‘shushu’ of earlier that morning might as well be a memory of another life. “My behavior was unworthy.”

He doesn’t grit it out, the way Jin Ling would probably have had to. It doesn’t even seem to cost him any pride.

For one, single, impossible moment, it’s as though Jiang Yanli is standing there, making her apologies to their mother for her brothers’ sake, to spare them any pain she could. It didn’t matter that the blame wasn’t hers. It didn’t cost her any pride, either.

But Jiang Yanli didn’t have a chance to be a part of her nephew’s life, as much as she would have wanted to be. This likeness isn’t hers, not truly. Wei Wuxian was always more like his sister than he or Jiang Cheng were ready to admit.

“Forget it,” Jiang Cheng says. His voice is hoarse, but in the stillness of the water and the silence of the pavilion, it carries, too. “Go on.”

Wei Wuxian shepherds his son from the table. He glances back at Jiang Cheng once, a grimace of apology on his face, but then Lan Sizhui’s hand finds the trailing black hem of Wei Wuxian’s sleeve and clutches to it, and that steals all of Wei Wuxian’s attention as easily as a slap or a shout might have.

The moment they’re gone, Jin Ling lets out a breath he must have been holding, and rounds on his other uncle with wide eyes.

“What did you say?” Jin Ling blurts. “I wasn’t really paying attention, but it didn’t sound like—I mean, it sounded normal.”

Jiang Cheng is still staring at the place Lan Sizhui had stood.

The last living remnant of a persecuted clan, so much an amalgamation of his two fathers that it didn’t make sense that one of them had been dead for most of his young life—holding a grudge and bowing his head at the same time. Lan Wangji, in Jiang Cheng’s experience, has never once let something go that he could nurse icy resentment for instead. Wei Wuxian has always choked down hurt like it was second nature, no matter that it must feel like swallowing nails every time.

It was a normal conversation, but perhaps that’s exactly why Lan Sizhui couldn’t bear another second of it.

“He died,” Lan Sizhui had said, as raw as a fresh wound, or one that kept getting torn open again before it could heal. “What more do you want?”  

#

“Ah, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian says the next morning, meeting him in the courtyard. “Did you sleep well?”

He’s smiling with a certain nervous energy that Jiang Cheng can only pick out because he spent the formative years of his life raising and being raised by his siblings. To an outsider, there probably wouldn’t be a single visible chink in that cheerful armor.

Jiang Cheng, for all his failings, isn’t an outsider. Not quite. The door between them is closed—has been closed for years, almost decades—but Wei Wuxian isn’t the one who closed it. There almost certainly isn’t a lock or talisman keeping Jiang Cheng from forcing it open again.

It won’t come open again easily. There is so much stacked in the way. Hurt and betrayal and grief throw their weight into keeping it shut, weighing it down on either side.

But—

“What more do you want?” Lan Sizhui had asked.

“Fine,” Jiang Cheng forces out. Wei Wuxian blinks, as if he didn’t expect a forthright answer, or any answer at all. Something about his open surprise at the barest scrap of civility makes Jiang Cheng add, “If you’re awake this early, you didn’t sleep at all.”

His brother takes the opening for what it is, and bends into character. “Oh! You know me so well!”

Mo Xuanyu’s body is smaller, slighter, than the body that Wei Wuxian was born into, and his face is not quite the same, but Wei Wuxian’s mannerisms shine through so clearly that it’s easy to look past everything else. Even the way he stands still is entirely his own, his whole body vibrating with the necessary focus it takes to keep from bursting into movement again.

He is so familiar. The most familiar thing in Jiang Cheng’s entire, almost-empty life.

“I’m sorry about last night,” Wei Wuxian says. The words spill from his mouth like river pebbles, scattering around their feet. There’s that echo of their jiejie again, smiling around I’m sorry. “Don’t hold it against him, please. He’s so young, and he’s struggling to make sense of some things. He was happy that you invited him to Lotus Pier.”

The past-tense makes Jiang Cheng want to flinch, but he doesn’t. He just stands there in the peach pink morning and absorbs the beginning of a goodbye.

“So you’re leaving, then?” he mutters.

“I think we’ve definitely worn out our welcome this time,” Wei Wuxian says, easily shouldering the blame for everyone else’s bad behavior. They might as well be twelve years old again, kneeling here in the courtyard under Madam Yu’s furious eyes. “But it’s alright! Wen Ning sent word that he’s waiting for us outside of Yunmeng and Sizhui is eager to see him. We’ll go find some trouble to get into before we head back home.”

He won’t say a word about this change of plans to his husband, but Lan Wangji will still find out—whether Lan Sizhui tells him, or Wen Ning, or he just picks up something from Wei Wuxian through osmosis—and the next cultivator conference will be excruciating. And if the Jiang clan gets anything out of it, it won’t be anything good. And Jiang Cheng will feel slighted and angry for months, until the next time Wei Wuxian swings by for a visit. And having his brother nearby will soothe an ache in the pit of Jiang Cheng’s chest that he’s able to ignore all the rest of the time. And then, inevitably, Wei Wuxian will look wistfully at the water, or linger for too long by the flowers their sister liked best, or bring some other manner of ghost to the dinner table, and Jiang Cheng will lash out because it’s the only way he knows how to handle hurt. And then Wei Wuxian will extract himself and go home to Cloud Recesses early, and Lan Wangji will rightly guess why. And it just never fucking ends, does it?

The grief he carries around with him—he’s not wrong to carry it. It’s his. He was hurt, time and again, by a person he used to count on not to hurt him. He’s two times an orphan; once when his parents died, and again when his siblings did. He had to rebuild his home from the ground up, by himself, with his own two hands. Everything he has is what he was able to dig out of the dirt and ashes.

It isn’t Wei Wuxian’s fault that Lotus Pier fell. It isn’t his fault that the Wens were persecuted, that they had nowhere else to turn for protection. And it isn’t—

This one hurts; this one comes away bleeding. Jiang Cheng forces himself through it anyway.

It isn’t Wei Wuxian’s fault that Yanli died.

She died for him, but he didn’t ask her to.

Jiang Cheng feels his brother’s golden core thrumming inside his chest, hyper-aware of it now in a way he rarely was before—how it feels the way the sun looks in the morning, warm and brilliant and spilling color across the dull gray of dawn.

He didn’t ask Wei Wuxian to cut himself open for Jiang Cheng’s sake. He can’t be blamed for his brother’s choices. And if that’s true (and it has to be true or Jiang Cheng will go insane) then Wei Wuxian can’t be blamed for their sister’s choice, either. Yanli died for Wei Wuxian because she loved him, and Wei Wuxian gave Jiang Cheng his golden core because he loved him, and Jiang Cheng never moved on and never let go because he loved them, too.

They weren’t raised to love softly or quietly. Love between the three of them was always fierce, like a wild animal baring its teeth. Clinging to each other in a world that wanted to rip them apart. Even Yanli, who smiled and spoke with such sweetness, went to war because her brothers were there.

“What more do you want?” Lan Sizhui had asked.

Jiang Cheng lifts his head. Wei Wuxian is already looking at him, poised, as ever, to leave the moment Jiang Cheng gives him any indication that he should, like a bird ready to fling itself into flight. His brother, dead for thirteen years and back again, and only sometimes-welcome in the place he used to call home. Only sometimes-wanted by the person who used to be his family.

In a world full of people missing people they’ll never see again, Wei Wuxian is a miracle that Jiang Cheng is entirely unworthy of.

He’s right to carry his grief, because it’s his. But he wouldn’t be wrong—it wouldn’t be a betrayal—if he chose to set it down.

“You find trouble as easy as breathing,” he says, speaking through his heart, where it’s lodged in his throat, “so that shouldn’t be too hard.”

“Maligned!” Wei Wuxian cries with an air of great sorrow. “Blatantly maligned, by my own flesh and blood!”

Jiang Cheng can’t say what he wants to say. He can’t find the words. There’s only so much of himself he can dig up and expose like raw nerves before the pain of it becomes overwhelming, and he reacts to the hurt the way he always does, and shoves Wei Wuxian away.

“Don’t forget to say goodbye to Jin Ling, or he’ll never forgive you,” Jiang Cheng settles for. “And I’ll be the one stuck hearing about it.”

“I would never forget my favorite nephew,” Wei Wuxian says easily.

“And if you fuck up, and get yourself into a stupid mess,” Jiang Cheng adds, before he loses his nerve, “don’t let me hear about it from someone else.”

For a moment, Wei Wuxian doesn’t seem to know what to say.

“What if it’s very stupid?” he finally asks, his voice at once both faint and painfully fond.

“What else is new?” Jiang Cheng snaps. “Just send for me, and I’ll come.”

Above them, the pink and orange of fresh dawn make way for vivid blue. As Jiang Cheng stands in his childhood home with his only brother, while the market comes to life outside the walls and the breeze sweeps the smell of lotus flowers and scallion pancakes through the courtyard, the years seem to fall away. For a brief, uninterrupted moment, they’re both back where they belong.

“Aiyah, shidi,” Wei Wuxian says. “Of course you will.”

#

The next time Jiang Cheng sees Lan Sizhui is at the cultivation conference in Gusu, two months later.

The boy smiles politely but greets him as ‘Sect Leader Jiang’ again, and next to him, Jiang Cheng can feel Jin Ling wince. Lan Sizhui’s counterpart, the wildly opinionated and deeply un-Lan-like Lan Jingyi is giving him a frank, up-and-down appraisal.

“I mean, I’ll give it to you,” he says baldly. “You’re brave. Like, if Hanguang-jun hated me as much as he hated you, I just wouldn’t show up. You couldn’t pay me to show up.”

“Jingyi,” Lan Sizhui says at length.

“No, I know. I’m just saying. Young Mistress,” he adds, sweeping into a deep, performative bow in front of Jin Ling, “if you’ll come with me, your presence is earnestly awaited by Young Master Ouyang in the library pavilion.”

“Shut up, Jingyi, I swear,” Jin Ling snaps, but he lets himself be herded away with only a single worried glance back at his uncle.

Lan Sizhui is gazing up at Jiang Cheng with a complicated expression. Even though the explosive anger of that disastrous dinner doesn’t seem likely to make a reappearance, there is still something troubled in his eyes.

“I wanted to apologize, shushu,” the boy says slowly. “Properly, that is. For the way I spoke to you last time.”

Ah. So the stiffness isn’t born of lingering irritation, but worry. These Lans, Jiang Cheng thinks, with significantly less venom than he’s used to thinking of the Lan sect with.

He has a well of patience for his nephews that has never run dry. Jin Ling has stretched it nearly to the limit, more than once, but it will take Lan Sizhui more than one emotional outburst to come even close. Given that they’ve only been family (for given value of the word) for a short while, it makes sense that Lan Sizhui wouldn’t know that.

“It wasn’t you that I was angry with, not really,” Lan Sizhui says, explaining when Jiang Cheng has already largely guessed. “I know that you care about baba in your own way, even if a-die doesn’t think so. But—there are—”

His young face folds in frustration, less remarkably than Jin Ling’s does when he’s having a snit, but just a creased forehead speaks volumes in this repressed sect.

“There are other people. Who say similar things. And they don’t mean it the way you mean it.”

Jiang Cheng knows that. He attended those meetings, too.

“And let me guess,” he says, “my idiot brother doesn’t want you speaking up for him.”

Lan Sizhui’s mouth twists. “He says that he did horrible things, and those people are well within their rights to feel about him however they want to feel about him. But—he did good, too. He protected my clan, even though he had to do it alone. I don’t remember very much,” he goes on, slightly quieter, “but I know that he made the Burial Mounds a warm and safe place for me. I know that I never felt scared or cold or hungry when I was there with him. And I don’t think most people could have done that.”

Jiang Cheng boxes up the involuntary pain that swells into place at the poking of this half-healed wound, and gives himself a moment to organize a reply. Talking to the mind-healer his chief physician recommended to him has helped a lot, not that he’ll give that smug witch the satisfaction of admitting it.

“Wei Wuxian hurt a lot of people, but so did everyone else,” he says when he’s certain he can say it without losing his composure. “We were at war. None of us are blameless. He was just the most convenient scapegoat. He still is.”

Lan Sizhui’s eyes are bright with vindication. He was born a Wen and raised a Lan, but there’s a streak of Jiang in there, too, Jiang Cheng thinks with pride. It’s that love that Jiang Cheng recognizes, the same kind of love that he and jiejie and Wei Wuxian had cultivated between them since they were children—the vicious, untamed kind of love that marches to war and claws its way up from hell and clings too hard to things it rightly should let go of.

“It isn’t fair,” Lan Sizhui says.

“No,” Jiang Cheng allows. “It isn’t.”

#

Wei Wuxian waves animatedly at Jiang Cheng from across the room, even though it makes Lan Qiren scowl at him. It’s reminiscent of every single stuffy banquet they had to sit through as kids, making faces at one another when Madam Yu’s eyes were turned away.

Jiang Cheng rolls his eyes in return, and Wei Wuxian lights up like he’s been handed a pile of gold. Lan Wangji gazes at him with a tenderness that would be absolutely absurd if Wei Wuxian didn’t actually deserve every scant inch of it that got sent his way, and even though the entire cultivation world is waiting, he spares a moment to tuck a stray piece of hair behind Wei Wuxian’s ear.

Sect Leader Yao scoffs, a bit too loudly. “Shameless upstart.”

Lan Wangji’s eyes turn so sharp so fast that it promises violence.

Before he can say anything that starts another war, Jiang Cheng turns fully around in his seat.

“Problem?” he asks shortly.

Baffled, Sect Leader Yao’s gaze skates around the room for a moment before landing back on Jiang Cheng.

“If you have something to say about my brother,” Jiang Cheng says, his voice a snarl, zidian sparking on his arm, “say it so that I can hear you.”

“Ah, this meeting is off to such a lively start,” Wei Wuxian says into the ominous stillness of the room. “Shidi, you’re so energetic, why don’t you kick things off?”

It would be the first time in his career that he’s the first to speak at a conference. Openly disbelieving, Jiang Cheng looks from his brother to Lan Wangji. Lan Wangji’s eyes are narrowed, but not as though he’s sizing Jiang Cheng up for a coffin, which is how he usually sizes him up. All he does is tip his head incrementally, conceding the floor to him.

Gods. It’s that simple.

“You are really not a difficult person, are you?” Jiang Cheng says aloud.

“No,” Lan Wangji agrees, this force of nature who turned the world upside down and challenged every single person in it, who would do so again and again and again, just to be able to sit there and hold Wei Wuxian’s hand.

And then, in the closest the two of them have ever come to an understanding, Lan Wangji adds, “Neither are you.”

[castielgeralt]

How to Study Plot and Character in Your Favorite Stories: 5 Easy Steps

What if I told you the best way to learn how to create amazing plots and characters in your own stories was by purposeful osmosis? First, of course, I might have to explain that “purposeful osmosis” means reading lots and lots of books and watching lots and lots of movies–and consciously studying what it is about them that works. With that explanation out of the way, chances are you’re in agreement. But chances are, you’re also not entirely sure how to actually make this happen. Just how do you figure out how to study plot and character in other people’s stories?

Not too long ago, Wordplayer K.M. Updike (she of the rad initials!) emailed me, asking:

[What is] your process for studying the plot, structure, character arcs, etc., of the books you read and the movies you watch? I’ve been wondering for a while how one goes about studying the writer’s work as they read/watch.

This is an excellent question. After all, it’s easy for Stephen King to say:

Don’t get me wrong: this is a tremendous piece of advice. But it’s also pretty vague.

That’s it? We just … read? And the answers will, what? Come to us?

Yes, actually. To some extent anyway. The more we read and watch good (and bad) stories, the better our own storytelling instincts will get–without our having to do even one thing more.

But in the interest of upping our game here, how about we do a few things more? Today, I’m going to give you an actionable plan for how to study plot and character (and lots more) in your favorite stories.

1. Start With an Action Plan

The first step in being purposeful is, of course, to have a purpose. Often, you may simply want to observe the books you read and the movies you watch generally, letting the story’s own strengths and weaknesses guide your study. But it can help you dig down deeper if you have a list of things you want to consciously pay attention to.

I recommend a short list. The shorter, the better, in fact.

Why? Because your brain can only keep track of so many tangents at once (says the woman with twenty tabs open in her browser). You’ll get better results if you focus on one or two primary elements or techniques at a time.

For example, lately, I’ve been concentrating on dialogue (both because it’s something I’m working on myself and because I’m planning a series of blog posts on dialogue for sometime next year). I watch the ebb and flow of dialogue, taking note of what works and what doesn’t. What’s the effect–and why did the author intend it?

This isn’t to say, of course, that you can’t also take note of anything interesting, in any category, that reveals itself. But only consciously follow certain rabbits down their holes.

2. Arm Yourself With Highlighters and Pens

Jane Eyre: The Writer’s Digest Annotated Classic (Amazon affiliate link)

This is for serious studiers only. Seriously, I only do this one when I’m in full battle mode (e.g., like when I was dissecting Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, so I could write about its brilliant techniques in Jane Eyre: The Writer’s Digest Annotated Classic).

This is where you’re going to want to divide your studying into a few more categories–one for each color of highlighter. Go through the book, highlighting appropriately, whenever you find an interesting passage. Write notes with abandon in the margins. Then, when you’ve finished, go through again and type up your notes, expanding on them to fully record your reactions and new knowledge.

I say this is only for serious studiers primarily because this is a fast track to interfering with reading-as-pure-pleasure (and also to making a mess of your paperbacks).

This is rigorous studying at its best and will require your full brain power. No reading-to-get-to-sleep when you’re doing this.

3. Break Down the Structure

The surest way to get a grasp on plot and story structure is by consciously breaking down the structure in books and movies–as I do regularly for the Story Structure Database. How do I do this?

Start with an easy shortcut: divide the total page count of a book or the total running time of a movie by eight. Why? Because the major structural moments happen at each eighth of the story:

1. Inciting Event (12%)

2. First Plot Point / End of the First Act (25%)

3. First Pinch Point (37%)

4. Midpoint / Halfway through the Second Act (50%)

5. Second Pinch Point (62%)

6. Third Plot Point / Beginning of Third Act (75%)

7. Climax (88%)

For movies, I use my handy dry-erase board notebook to note the approximate minute of each turning point, so I can easily watch the run time and take note of what’s happening.

For books, I use little Book Darts bookmarks to mark the appropriate page at each turning point.

This way, I’m not totally adrift within the story. I can watch the clock or the page count and know to be on the watch for the respective structural moment roundabout there.

This is a fabulous way to grasp story structure as a whole and, just as importantly, to understand how the various structural elements can manifest in vastly different ways from story to story.

You can study my many examples in the Story Structure Database.

4. Examine Your Reactions

Whenever you finish a story, give yourself a moment before rushing off to the next thing. Just sit there and think about your reactions to what you just experienced. Ask yourself:

How did the story make you feel?

What did you like about it?

What did you dislike?

Do you think it was an objectively good story?

Did you dislike it anyway? Why?

Do you think it was an objectively problematic or even bad story?

Did you like it anyway? Why?

Within the answers to these questions lies your greatest opportunity for growth as a writer. If you can distill your often nebulous feelings about a story down into logical facts about what made you feel that way, you will then be able to add other authors’ effective weapons to your own arsenal.

I use this technique after every story I read or watch. It’s where I get the ideas for fully half the posts on this site.

5. Transcribe the Prose

This trick is especially useful if you’re trying to crack the code of, not just great storytelling, but great writing. What is it about some authors’ prose that makes it sing so effortlessly and powerfully? The whole point of great prose is that it’s flawless: we’re not supposed to think about it, we’re not supposed to see the cracks where the pieces are joined together. If we saw the cracks, that would defeat the whole purpose.

As a result, simply reading great prose isn’t always the most effective way to learn how to write awesome prose of your own. What you need to do is sit down with a notebook and pen and a favorite book–and start transcribing passages. I recommend doing this longhand, with an actual pen, since this will slow you down and force you to think about and absorb each word and punctuation choice.

I used to do this every day, and it never failed to amaze me how it allowed me to suddenly see the building blocks the authors had used in crafting their prose. Their seemingly inimitable mastery of wordcraft was suddenly within my grasp. It was something I could learn–and that you can too!

Afraid Studying Will Ruin Your Reading? Don’t Be

Although you can learn from other authors, such as me, who break down stories and share what they’re learning in blogs and books, you’ll get more out of the experience by also doing it yourself. Start approaching your book reading and movie watching purposefully with an intent to logically identify and utilize the tools handed to you by authors you love.

But what if it ruins your reading and watching?

It’s true, it might. Some authors use these practices and find themselves growing hypecritical. But, frankly, it shouldn’t. The more I learn to identify how other authors are using the craft, the more I appreciate their stories. Give it a try. You’ll transform both your appreciation of stories in general and your own writing.

[auspiciousinformant]

Core Character Ranking - No Straight Roads

At this point with the game having been out for well over four and a half months, I figure that with having a small piece of fiction under my belt, and with the fandom having cooled down from the initial release but still hot enough for content to steadily be coming out from the fanbase, now is a good time for me to share my thoughts on No Straight Roads - rather, what I call the Core Characters of No Straight Roads.

I call them this because they are the collective protagonist main characters and antagonistic bosses - not filling up one bucket or another quite satisfactory. I might even make this into a series if anyone cares enough to hear my thoughts on other pieces of fiction. If you’re interested, continue below the line.

Oh, also, spoilers for No Straight Roads if you still care about that.

Disclaimer before continuing onwards - I’ve never actually played No Straight Roads! I’m not exactly a person with enough wealth to throw at my own interests and hobbies, but I feel I’ve absorbed enough through culture osmosis, 100% walkthroughs of the game, and other people’s interpretations of the game to be able to make my own informed opinions on the characters.

Also, this isn’t a “bosses” ranking list - this is a character ranking list. Meaning that individuals are going to be ranked rather than the whole. For example, Sayu will be divided into the four members behind Sayu (hereafter refered to as “Team Sayu”) as well as Sayu herself. This also means I won’t fully go on the gameplay mechanics as I don’t have enough experience with it to make a fully informed decision. I will talk about what I’ve seen though.

With that in mind, we’ll be starting as all of these lists usually do, from the bottom ranking to the top: ________________________________________________________________ 20. Eve

Now, this may come as a shock, but I absolutely despise divas. Eve was entertaining enough, but through her videos she was only relatable and likable to me before she and Zuke broke up. Mostly because I could relate with her self-loathing and her found happiness.

Still... setting someone’s hair on fire? And then being confused as to why that happened? Then completely blaming the victim and using that mistake as fuel to shut out any other potential kindred relationship for the future? I’ve seen people who do that; it’s pathetic at best and annoying to see at worst. Thankfully, due to Zuke, she does eventually come around.

Her music and boss fight are interesting enough I suppose. I like how the perspective changes and I adore when you have to switch over to Mayday and it becomes a fully chaotic mess of limbs, doubt, hatred, and rage. I live for that chaotic aesthetic.

Otherwise, she’s just... the weakest character to me in No Straight Roads.

Maybe she’ll Eve-ntually earn my respect in supplementary materials.  ________________________________________________________________ 19. Sofa

The first member of Team Sayu I’m mentioning and he’s this low on the list. Ouch. Not to say that I hate him, the hate started and ended with Eve - he, along with the others don’t really have much of a personality canonically that I can see to judge him on. But in terms of his design, I’ve never been much of a fan of “overweight and silly” outside of Doctor Eggman/

Do not take this the wrong way. I am in NO way fatshaming ANYONE.

I just have never liked that design in fictional characters. See Hifumi Yamada from “Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc” for more on what I mean

Still, he’s a core member of Team Sayu and from the fanfiction I’ve read he’s one of the better characters to write with. Maybe if we got a spinoff or other related materials, he’d go up a few numbers in rank, but as it stands, he’s the weakest of the group.

Sofa-r so good, let’s move on before these puns go too far. ________________________________________________________________ 18. Mayday Yeah. I’m not a huge fan of Mayday herself. Hotheaded protagonists are fine here and there, but she’s so hot-headed I’m surprised that she didn’t have the fire aesthetic as well. I guess with it all being taken by Tatiana, they could only give her a warm color scheme so it wasn’t redundant.

Her gameplay seems fine, if a bit basic. The heavy hitter is also a hothead, who could guess. I kinda like how someone as scrawny and small as her also has the biggest heart and temper. Also the gags that come from her relating to the other bosses are hysterical and make for good protagonist material. Still, outside of her interaction with DK West, Zuke, and Team Sayu, as well as the very end of the game, there’s a lack of enough “heroic” traits that makes Mayday fall flat from just shy of ranking higher.

I don’t have a clever pun, joke, or one-liner for Mayday, so let’s go to the next person in my list. ________________________________________________________________ 17. DJ Subatomic Supernova I have never really liked disco or dance music at the best of times, but I love space. So what happens when you mix something I feel lukewarm to, something I absolutely adore, and combine it with a trait about a person I absolutely also despise?

You get space helmet man who likes fresh ice cream and goes on for minutes about how great he is and how everyone else around him are plebeians - not knowing how pretentious the stage name “Subatomic Supernova” is.

If I had made this list when I had first seen No Straight Roads, he’d be only just ahead of Eve just because I dislike her so much more than I hate egotism of DJ Subatomic Supernova. But he’s now gone higher on the list since he’s grown on me thanks to the fandom and me realizing the game is parodying the stereotypes and the industry of music. Also, Zuke’s drum solo is AMAZING with the EDM version of DJ SS’s theme. He’s even gone so far as to become half of my second favorite paring in the NSR fandom!

Shine on, you funky space man. ________________________________________________________________

16. DK West Ewah! Older of the two brothers by age, younger of the two by maturity. I absolutely love this goofball. His shadow powers are absolutely amazing to watch and while I normally don’t like rap outside of Eminem (and even then only select tracks), he grew on me a lot. He’s so unique and the culture he’s based on from what I understand was researched with a lot of respect and care.

I’ve heard (and seen) that the third fight ramps up the difficulty way too much, but considering that Mayday is attempting to repair a broken household, it makes sense it’d be such a heavy undertaking from a gameplay and story point.

Also DK West Encounter 1 is a smash hit, telling us everything we really need to know between DK West and Zuke while being an absolutely great song that reminds me of Epic Rap Battles of History for anyone that remembers that.

He overshadows his previous competition by a large margin, and I can’t wait to see more of him if that’s possible. ________________________________________________________________ 15. Yinu’s Mom As the real mastermind behind Yinu’s position in NSR, it suddenly makes so much sense as to why a literal child is in such a strict EDM hierarchy like NSR. What keeps her from going above and beyond this ranking isn’t anything more than just the pressure she puts on Yinu to perform. During the fight, and what I can only presume also happens outside of concerts in the universe of No Straight Roads, it seems like she entirely forgets the reason Yinu keeps playing the piano in the first place.

However, I am a huge sucker for family dynamics, and her stopping her assault due to the memories that Yinu was able to drag out of her through the broken piano by playing Heart of the Prodigy is enough to almost enough for me to reach the level of emotional catharsis as the ending of Pixar’s “Inside Out” did for me. And the way she shielded Yinu when they were falling, the gasp of fear that she might not survive the fall - just pure, amazing storytelling through “show, don’t tell”.

I will say, the more morbid part of me that enjoys things like Danganronpa, Your Turn To Die, and Nonary Games, had the thought of “if it weren’t for the fact that Mayday and Zuke also fell from that height and survived (and that this game is meant for younger audiences), Yinu would have became an orphan.”

Mother of the Year award goes to Yinu’s mom for being the most realistic, sympathetic, non-dead mom in fiction. ________________________________________________________________ 14. Yinu I love classical music, but I don’t really like children. Yinu is an exception to my general dislike of children. The promotion that was released before the game was a little eye-rolling, but it was also funny. Fortunately, in the game, Yinu is so much more mature and interesting than the promotional material lead us to believe. The way the piano plays plays in the base version of VS Yinu conveys just how talented she is at nine years old. It’s a shame that it slowly gets covered up by the EDM version as the battle goes on.

But her reasoning for playing the piano, through the photos you get from Yinu’s backstory is all the more reason to respect this literal child. She turned the loss of her music teacher and father into a shining passion for music. The piano being the very memento of her deceased dad - looking at the photos and then realizing what you did in shattering her piano creates a fantastic retroactive look at just how destructive Bunkbed Junction’s revolution really is to people.

We’re not even half-way down the list, and yet we already have great characters like this, so let’s keep looking. ________________________________________________________________ 13. Dodo There’s been a huge gap since the last Team Sayu member. So what makes Dodo so great compared to Sofa? Well, the deep voice that comes from the scrawny, blue man is funny to me. It caught me off-guard the first time I heard it and had me giggling for hours afterwards after I paused the video to regain my composure.

That, and mocap work is hard work. On top of that, though he’s mostly not the face everyone remembers when fans think of Sayu, it takes a lot of talent and self-confidence to dance like a cutesy mermaid despite being a male, at least in my opinion. So I see him as having high confidence, but also being like Zuke in the “chill and mostly quiet” department.

There’s not much else for me to say, since most of Team Sayu doesn’t have blatantly obvious character traits. So let’s move on. ________________________________________________________________ 12. Sayu Sayu herself is... well, not real. It’s like trying to judge any number of the Vocaloid/UTAU voice banks. Sure you can place any number of personalities and messages into it, but in reality she’s just been built as a “cutsie, wootsie, pink mermaid” idol.

Still, the personality that Team Sayu gives her is fantastic. Her fight is annoying, and lackluster even to watch, but her song is amazing in all of its forms, even if for me the vaporwave version is the least effective of all of them - and Analog Aquatics is the BEST lead-up song to it, even ahead of Heart of the Prodigy.

Hatsune Miku? Who’s that? I only see Sayu as the best Vocaloid. ________________________________________________________________ 11. Remi Technically the creator of Sayu in the first place and her designer, Remi seems to be the “all according to plan” type. To think that his passion for art would lead to a career such as NSR, and a close-knit friend group like Team Sayu. It’s something that I’m sure that every artist has had as their goal at one point or another.

I highly respect anyone with the ability to put their artwork out in public, both in real life and as a character. Even so, there are characters I like even beyond Remi, and once again, we don’t have much to go off of for him outside of the very few times we see him in Sayu’s battle.

Almost all of Team Sayu has been covered at this point - heck, even Sayu herself has already been covered. So where’s Tila you ask? Well, we’ll get to that, but not for a while. ________________________________________________________________ 10. Tatiana “Kul Fyra” Qwartz From the very moment we first hear her voice, we can tell she’s all business and order. When we watch all of NSR reject the rock music outright and listen to Tatiana’s speech afterwards? How she seems to disregard her artists own safety and prioritizing undermining Bunkbed Junction’s efforts just because she can’t bear to remember her old bandmates? Wonderfully selfish for a heartbroken character.

Also, for those who hate her time-oriented powers and how weakly linked they are to Tatiana herself? Consider this: She’s almost 50 years old by the time Bunkbed Junction starts their revolution. She’s lived long enough to be anyone in the cast’s mom - probably even old enough to be Team Sayu and Yinu’s grandma. She has only seen a progressive march of time erode at everything she ever loved and cared about.

The blazing passion within her is brought back to her through Bunkbed Junction’s actions, but through a reversal of time and a reflection of her memories. Bunkbed Junction literally shatters the world view that she constructed for herself to ignore the regret and pain that had been slowly eating her up inside without her ever even having fully realized it in the first phase. By the time Tatiana reverts back to using her Kul Fyra form, she’s trying so hard to list any number of reasons to ignore her past and focus on what little time she actually has left to work on the future.

This was a bit of a longer explanation and reasoning, but for a character as amazing and symbolically complex as Tatiana, she absolutely deserves it. And as you’ll see for the next character, this is only a fraction of my love for the characters of No Straight Roads. ________________________________________________________________9. Neon J And here we start with my absolutely favorite characters, the ones I not only enjoy reading and writing about, but that in canon I can wholeheartedly accept them for who they are, flaws and all.

My grandpa was in the navy, and to make a long story short there were some complicated things that happened that required me to live with both him and my grandma when I was really little. So already there’s something that I can latch onto and adore. Even with how cringy Neon J is at the end with him attempting to try to give an epic war hero speech, my grandpa can be the same way sometimes, and that’s okay. They kind of act similarly outside of that as well.

His design is so sleek and smooth, and sometimes I forget that he’s actually a cyborg, unlike his sons boyband creations. Normally I hate the military, war, and what it all represents at a cynical level, but when it’s portrayed in a way like No Straight Roads did for Neon J and 1010, it reminds me of the people who actually join to serve their country and the people in it, despite how few in their countries actually deserve their respect.

And yeah, I can already hear the “blah blah fiction is poorly portraying law enforcement/the military because ect ect”. I disagree. Think of it this way: Neon J is a fun example of what a leader in a military unit is. Not only that, he’s extremely loyal and willing to do what it takes to get the job done - including having a program inside 1010 that makes them explode when they fail to generate the requisite fan praise that’s likely required to keep 1010 merchandise flying off of the shelves and thus prove to the other NSR artists that even robot boybands can be used to help Vinyl City; AND use said robot boyband as weapons to fight off any threats - internal or external.

Also think about what he had to go through to become a cyborg. That means he likely had to replace everything that’s on the surface - imagine what he needed to replace underneath all of that metal. How much of his original body is left? How badly did the war he was involved in hurt him? How many comrades did he lose to try to recreate that feel in a boyband? Aren’t the implications of that so much more grand than the surface level “radar head man is bad representation of military people because he’s silly and ineffective at his job”. Furthermore, tell me of a person in the real world who lost so much of their body they literally had to become a cyborg that has a literal radar for a head.

On top of all of that he’s the second half of my second favorite pairing. Not that is has any major bearing on how great Neon J already is. Is it silly that Neon J tries to give a huge speech at the end when we know Bunkbed Junction is just trying to get to Tatiana? Yes. But it’s fun.

I salute the No Straight Roads team for creating such an amazing character . ________________________________________________________________8. Blue 1010 Robot | Purl-Hew Ah yes, now we start getting to what’s taking up most of the top 10 slots. Kind of funny that not all of the 1010 members are going into the top 5 slots with how much I ranted and raved about Neon J. But I have characters I like way more than most of the 1010 band members.

And yes, I’ll bring this up now since we’re actually talking about 1010, that will apply to all the members of 1010 so I don’t have to repeat myself: I already know that they’re meant to parody boy bands, pop bands, and how similar all of them are and ect ect ect. That doesn’t stop me from going “hee hoo pretty boys” at fictional characters. And, yes, I know they don’t canonically have names, but I’m going with what’s been accepted across the fandom. Also all of their body types are the same: I like them alot. They’re tall, in monochrome (hah, chrome), and the way they bob to the beat in their battle is fantastic and shows they are powered by music as much as any machine is in the universe of No Straight Roads.

Starting off with my least favorite of them, Purl-Hew just reminds me of Garnet from “Steven Universe”, which is not a bad thing. It’s just that outside of what we learn of Garnet, she’s a character I often forget exists. I think it’s honestly the shades and the blue, more square-like hair that makes me draw the comparison. Purl-Hew strikes me as the “cool” one. The one that recites his poetry in coffee shops and is the sensitive boy with a cold exterior. You know the kind of person I’m talking about.

Other than that, I like the 1010 branding on the side of his head. I normally don’t like hairstyles like that, but somehow with how it flows and how non-obnoxious it is, I actually find myself liking the hairstyle. Also coupled with the fact that I see him as the second eldest of all five of them, who likely cemented an identity for himself before the others, makes me like his entirety even more.

A cool dude deserves a cool transition, but since this isn’t a video, a line break will have to do. ________________________________________________________________7. Red 1010 Robot | Zimelu Zimelu is one of the ones that strikes me as the one that’s borderline trying to break free from the rest of the band and become his own artist. The mowhawk, the color red, even to what he’s likely supposed to represent in-universe. Many see him as having anger issues, and considering what 1010 is about coupled with, again the hair style and his color, yeah I can see why.

But I also see him having a somewhat tsundere side. Not overtly fully tusndere as “I-It’s not like I like you or anything!” but more of a “Hey, I got you [insert favorite food] to eat. Don’t read too much into it.” while looking off to the side to avoid seeing your reaction just because he’s not sure if he can handle the thought of him possibly being wrong and then seeing you be disappointed kind of tsundere.

I don’t see a lot of peices of work exploring this concept, and I’d love to see more of it - or heck, even other personality traits that could be lying under the rebellious design of him.

I see him as the middle child of the group, which could also add to the rebellious personality and anger issues. Not sure if anyone agrees with me on this though. ________________________________________________________________6. Yellow 1010 Robot | Haym Okay, so this is a bit weird. Haym is my second least favorite in terms of design, but third favorite because he’s supposed to be the sunny, shy, and sweet one. I see him as the second youngest of all of the 1010 members. Old enough to have experience and understand his purpose, but young enough to retain that childhood-like innocence and sweetness.

I think he’s content about his place in 1010. It’s not that he would slack off or anything, but he’d be the most comfortable with his identity out of all five of them, even years down the line. Where Purl-Hew has to upkeep his identity, Haym is fine just being who he is and happy that the crowd accepts him for who he is.

Also him saying “even your lips, which form that raaaaadiant smile~” made me smile like an idiot and my heart flutter when I first saw him - and don’t even get me started on his pose when he was saying that. So that probably has at least some bearing on his placement in this list. ________________________________________________________________5. Green 1010 Robot | Eloni Haym was weird for me to admit I still don’t fully like his design, but Eloni’s design is actually worse for me. I still don’t like the fact he looks like you could hang him on a Christmas tree or a keychain and not be out of place there. But as I learned more - especially the part where in-universe he’s the least-liked because he’s the prankster type, my heart melted for the guy.

While I myself am not a prankster or a fan of prankster types, sympathetic characters that are generally unliked in-universe for something minor or not their fault is something that will always get me to love a character. There’s also a lot of great fanfiction out there for Eloni, playing with the idea of jealousy, feelings of inadequacy, and the resulting love and support that inevitably follows from a strong supporting family.

Also, I see him as the youngest, and likely the one who thought it’d be a good idea to give everyone reindeer heads for the Christmas event instead of whatever was originally planned. The fans probably loved it anyways, even better than what was originally planned, but never knew it was Eloni’s messing around that gave them the toy-soldier-with-reindeer-heads 1010.

Second best 1010 boy deserves to be in the top 5 for all of this and more. ________________________________________________________________4. Tila Tila? You mean the one girl who only goes “pyun” a few times? The only one of Team Sayu that has any voice lines that are more than sobs, grunts, tremoring fear, and sounds of triumph?

Yes. That character. You want to know why?

First, lets start with her design. She wears an oversized hoodie and glasses - already two things I can relate to. The color contrast is just perfect between her hair, skin, and hoodie. Her design alone to me screams “high-functioning introvert”.

Her one line? Going “pyun” a few times? Absolutely adorable. I wanted to hear her say more lines, and the delivery of them being so uncertain filtered through a microphone to not come out that way as Sayu? She is definitely the shy one of the four of them. Also let’s not forget she’s Sayu’s voice actress in universe. Meaning that VS Sayu is something that Tila is singing.

Also, in the background material for Sayu, she’s the one that apologizes for using Remi’s art for one of her songs, and starts the collaboration with all four members of Team Sayu. It’s her story we follow. Not any of the other four members, though Remi does actually say something.

Though we don’t get much else of her, which prevents her from taking a spot in my top 3 picks, if we got just a little bit more from her, I’d definitely bump her to 3rd, maybe even let her take 1st. As it stands, compared to the rest of Team Sayu and Sayu herself, top 5 is nothing to sneeze at. ________________________________________________________________3. Kliff “No one like’s Kliff! He’s evil and bad!”

I mostly disagree with that statement, politely of course. Does no one like him? Seems that way in the fandom, but I like him. Is he evil? Yes, most certainly. Is he “bad”? Well, what’s the context of bad in this case? A bad plot-twist? A bad character? A bad guide? Not really. Well, except for the last part, possibly, but even then he’s still serviceable.

I mean take into context that Tatiana is Kul Fyra. On a first viewing, after having fought so many people after first meeting Kliff, most people would have forgotten that he, like Mayday, also likes Kul Fyra and was even there for her concerts. People who have insane memory would remember it, but for the rest of us, it probably came as a shock that Kliff would send a satellite into the NSR tower.

But he’s a fan that put Kul Fyra on a pillar, just like Mayday. He’d hoped that rock artists would get her back into rock music, to reignite the fire in her, so that he could enjoy her music again. He even says that he’s still her fan. He questions Tatiana “did my loyalty mean nothing to you?”.

And while yes, she didn’t technically owe him anything, the way that Tatiana shoots Kliff down so coldly after all of his attempts and his waiting - after she shut herself away from any potential future differing opinions and banning rock so she couldn’t remember the heartache - he snaps.

I’m not saying that Kliff was right, or that his reaction was fully justified. But imagine him saying he’ll be the strategic planner of NSR - after all, it was thanks to him that Mayday and Zuke got as far as they did. They knew what was coming ahead of time due to his advice. Mayday and Zuke would just be figureheads. It would be entirely realistic, and not make Kliff entirely evil.

Still, with all the hypotheticals out of the way, having an entirely selfish twist villain like Kliff was amazing. When you go through the entire story knowing how it will end on a second playthrough, suddenly his motives and what he says makes so much more sense.

I want to see (or maybe someday I’ll write) a redemption arc for Kliff. He’s not so fargone that I’d write him off as another villain for the sake of evil, but it would take actual work and effort. It’s something I look forwards to seeing in the far future.

Though he is also fun to see as an antagonist in all of these stories I read about him. ________________________________________________________________2. Zuke On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d rank Zuke an 11. From his design, to his animations, to his background, his voice, his lines - everything is an 11/10 for me.

Starting with design again, normally I’d dislike the major contrast such a saturated green against a saturated blue. But there’s other bits in Zuke’s design - his red eyes, the fact that his clothing is a good neutral base to draw away from the chaos of colors of his head - only to lead back into what looks like ultra-comfortable blue-and-green flannel with dark blue flats? It all screams the perfect chill dude to hang out with.

His personality matches too. He’s laid-back, wise, rational, humble, and kind. Almost the perfect man in every way. Though he has his limits, especially when it comes to DK West, and he’s not always the most intelligent at times. Sometimes he takes a minute to put two-and-two together, especially when he’s under pressure and nervous.

And his drumsticks being used as a walking cane when he’s not battling, admitting that it’s NSR property - recognizing that NSR itself is not bad, it just needs change. He doesn’t generally talk smack unless, again, it’s DK West. He probably says less than Mayday does out of the two, but I wasn’t counting. I was just thankful that he was talking at all, attempting to be the voice of reason in situations, telling Eve he was wrong for leaving so suddenly (even though he’s not at fault for his hair being set on fire), reconciling with DK West after Mayday gets them to talk about their feelings to each other - he experiences the most growth over the longest period of time.

In fact, it feels like we’re witnessing Zuke’s entire story through the eyes of Mayday. Sure, Mayday has a stake in the conflict, and a small bit of growth, but none nearly so much as the jolly green giant between them. Heck, he’s so good that he made DJ Subatomic Supernova’s music actually sound good.

If this wasn’t enough, he’s also one half of my favorite pairing. Where’s the other half? Where he belongs of course. ________________________________________________________________1. White 1010 Robot |  Rin Look guys, my favorite character of No Straight Roads is finally here. Let me be the ideal fan and give him my utmost attention.

ATTENTION!

Hoo boy have I been waiting to talk about Rin! His design is the one that I love the most despite how simple and obviously pandering it is. I mean come on, he’s got the kind of hairstyle that just screams “typical emo/scene/goth/pop leader” without the sweeping bit of hair in front of the eye like Haym’s or other emo/scene/goth hair styles. He has no unique colors to himself (white and black are technically not colors). Heck, as a robot meant to parody pop/boybands, he technically should be the most bland and uninteresting part of 1010.

But that’s where you’d be wrong. Rin is the one who leads the flirting attempt against Mayday. Rin is the one who is focused on the most of all the 1010 members when the cutscenes play. Rin is the one who’s talking the most in the promotional video for 1010 and No Straight Roads. Even though Zimelu takes up most of the spot in the in-game photo op, Rin is the second most noticable. In the “wefies” the 1010 members make in the promotional video, Rin is front and center.

Rin is the poster child. Meaning he has the most mounting on him of all the members of 1010. And this can manifest in any number of interesting character traits. I’ve already written an (as of posting this review) three chapter fanfic on Rin and his dynamic with not only the other half of my favorite pairing, but also his dynamic with Neon J, and how both Zuke and Neon J view Rin - through what I perceive how Rin actually feels and acts when he’s not on stage.

I could probably do an entire 20 minute review on why Rin is the single-best character of No Straight Roads, both in and out of canon, but I don’t have the tools for it. And as a side note, the guitar solo that Mayday can play over the song is the single-best of all the guitar solos, the second being the one against Yinu - and that deep passion for 1010 is reflected well in the guitar solo.

Zuke may be an 11/10, but Rin is a perfect 10/10 - and I wouldn’t have it any other way . ________________________________________________________________Afterwords Finally, after an entire 4 hours of writing, I’d like to hear your thoughts on all of this, if you’ve made it this far.

What did you agree and disagree with? Feel free to comment if you want.

As for me, I think I’ll continue to browse the work of the fandom, keep an ear out for any future updates or sequels, and rock on with the amazing soundtrack of No Straight Roads jamming loudly in my ears.

Rock on fellow No Straight Roads fans! Or whatever genre you prefer to listen to.