#how it could be improved and how one would fix plot holes

[phoenixkaptain]

Fascinating. If Tom Riddle had just stayed hot, Harry totally would have been swayed.

[nondelphic]

What's your editing process? I hate going back to read old work, but I know I have to in order to fix it up and make it better. I know that editing helps me improve. I find that generally speaking, I edit as I go. when I finish a chapter, I look back through it to find anything to improve on. But that means that since my author's voice has changed a lot in the past year, chapter 1 reads completely differently to my newer work. But then, when i go back to edit, my mind just blanks on how to make it better. any advice? I'm honestly considering deleting chapter 1 and writing the full thing all over again, but better. I like my plot points and beats in chapter 1, I just don't love the way I wrote it.

i used to edit as i was writing, but i quit because i realised, just like you're reflecting on, that it causes incohesive narration tone (i think that's a thing lol).

now, my editing process is rewrites. for the second draft, i do a full rewrite. i have the first draft open in one tab and the new document in another (using split screen). i find it's way easier to edit like this for the first few drafts because it's much easier to fix plot holes when you know the entire story and don't limit yourself to editing the already existing text. i treat the second draft as a completely new story, pretty much. just with more knowledge of the concept. i don't go into too many details on the linguistics in the second draft.

after i'm done with the second draft i create a third document and do a rewrite again, however, this time, i copy and paste a lot from the second draft (if it sounds good) and start working more on phrasing.

i've never gotten to a fourth draft yet, and idk if it's necessary, but i think once i'm done with my third draft (which i'm currently working on rn on one of my main projects), i'll go back and edit in the same document line-by-line, rather than creating an entirely new doc.

but i would advise against deleting what you wrote in your first two drafts !!! you might realise later you want to keep something or you like how something is phrased, and it's great as a tool for improvement for your future drafts and projects.

hope i could provide you with some helpful insights! good luck with editing !! <333 ⋆౨ৎ˚⟡˖ ࣪

[mabledonut]

I COME WITH QUESTIONS ABOUND🪴 What does your dream writing/creative studio look like?💪 What does your real daily creative routine look like? Morning, afternoon, or night?📝 What does your note-taking or sketching or brainstorming process look like? Are you more organized or chaotic about it?

thank you for asking! ^_^

🪴 south-facing windows, lots of house plants, piano in the corner, dead quiet. a candle or two.

or a cozy cafe with a good set of headphones and a decent vibe. I like working in public places.

*

💪 I generally have two different creative modes, which can and do activate at any time of day.

The first one, which I use about 2.5% of the time, is a one-step process where I'm (most likely) listening to a piece of music that suddenly hits hard, and I'm seeing a vision, and then I race off to open up a document and capture as much of the vision as possible.

The other 97.5% of the time is a multi-step process that goes something like this:

make tea/coffee

open computer.

check ao3 for new comments.

check Tumblr for notifications

think of like half a sentence that I could write if I could be bothered to open the doc and start adding to my wip.

open WIP.

feel lethargy/ambivalent about the half-sentence of improvement I was about to write.

browse reddit instead.

"...god I'm so bored!"

tell myself not to read the news.

think about getting up to clean or something

read news.

regret reading news.

regret other life choices.

"....god I'm so BORED!!"

play spider solitaire

"ugh I play this stupid game too much I'm so bored. I should go take a shower."

open YouTube, start watching video 2x speed in background

get sick of video

get sick of spider solitaire but continue playing anyway because the other option is writing and anything is better than writing.

".......God I am so fucking BOREDDD"

"fuck it maybe I will just write for 5 minutes or even 3 minutes or even just 2 minutes and try to fix a few bad sentences here and there, even though most/all of my tea/coffee is gone now and I have no brainpower whatsoever at the moment so I doubt i'll get very far"

5-120 minutes later: "Oh my goddd 😚😚 the pacing sucks and it's full of plot holes but surprisingly this fic is actually finally getting kinda good, it's like the author lives inside my mind and is tailor-making this fic to suite my own particular tastes, everything is just what I like, sure wish they would update faster tho 🥴"

bathroom break

start again from step 1.

*

📝 definitely more organized than I used to be. I have a Trello board I can access on my phone/laptop for each current project, and everytime i'm out living my life and I have a sudden idea for what I want to write, I pop a card onto that board. Sometimes due to autocorrect and haste, I wind up with a card on the wrong board, with very weird spellings, leading to some very cryptic notes-to-self.

here's a current and typical example:

i promise I do know how to spell words, but I don't always know what the word was supposed to be in the first place 🥲. but it helps a lot to have a trello card or two to copy+paste into my WIP doc, sometimes helps to shorten the 25-step process above.

[helila]

ao3 meme

tagged by @sparatus tysm <3

tagging @dispatchwithlove @varuna-writes @miceenscene @natsora

[my ao3] ✨

How many works do you have on AO3?

6 lol

What's your total word count?

122,161

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Friendly Fire with 153, First Contact War AU with Garrus and my Femshep. Enemies to friends with language barrier, because the situation intrigued me.

Starlight Lament with 70. The new and improved ME3 longfic in progress, where I wanted to fix plot holes and character arcs. Currently at 17 chapters and 92K words. Spooky, sad, slow. I'm sweating blood trying to write this to the best of my abilites.

Reprieve with 56, a 3 chapter story retelling of Garrus's loyalty mission with some angst and yearning.

Rules of Engagement with 42. A sweet little first date fic for shakarian that didn't get the reception I had hoped for. Oof.

Some lonely evening on Omega got 41 after I typed it out into a tumblr draft, then posted it to ao3 as my first ME work. Garrus angst.

yeah I got that shakarian brainrot, it's incurable.

Do you respond to comments? Why/Why not?

I get like max 4 comments a year, of course I respond. I cry tears of joy when that Ao3 email hits my inbox, I tell my mom, I tell the neighbors.

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

Neither of them just yet. Starlight Lament will be brutal when I finally finish it.

What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?

Rules of Engagement ends with a first kiss, so that's the uncontested winner.

Do you write crossovers?

I would like to, eventually. I like AUs, I like crossovers, I had a whole Mass Effect/Battlestar Galactica art project happening a few years ago that I could possibly pick up again if my free time allowed so.

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

I'm not famous enough to hate.

Do you write smut?

I wrote some light smut in Honey and Sea Salt recently. I'm more into angst and existential horror.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Nay.

What's your all time favorite ship?

Well... guess.

What's a WIP that you want to finish don't think you ever will?

I wanted to write at least one more chapter for Rules of Engagement, but the lukewarm reception put me off so badly, every time I think about it I cringe myself into avoidance. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

What are your writing strengths?

Character voices and pacing. These come to me pretty naturally, and I can easily get carried away with dialogue tbh.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Action sequences make me sweat. Writing descriptions make me feel like I'm a toddler going "the sky was blue, and the grass was green, and the birds sang nicely."

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Well, english is not my first language so. There's that.

What's the first fandom you wrote for?

Dragon Age, and it never saw the light of god, thankfully.

What's a fandom/ship you haven't written for yet, but want to?

I have a Blair Witch Project fic cooking, and another one for Damsel (look... it's a fix-it).

What's your favorite fic you've ever written?

I genuinely don't know. Each of them have parts I really love for one reason or another. They each reflect something about my own life, stuff I was going through at the moment of writing. But I think I can say that Starlight Lament makes me the proudest, because it's such a huge ass effort to write, and sometimes it makes me want to chew rocks.

[hellparkri]

Good morning/afternoon/evening to everyone reading this!

As the title says, this is a re-imagining of HellPark. It aims to expand and, more importantly, improve the story and finish it once and for all. Additionally, the illustrations from the original AU will not be used, as the original creators have reiterated that they want nothing more to do with the fandom. Instead, I have opted to include small illustrations only when they are strictly necessary for the progression of the story.

There will be other chapters serving as prequels, which aim to expand and show more of certain characters before they became demons or simply to explore more of their stories. A good example could be a chapter of Estella and Gregory when they first met!

Of course, since this story is written by me, it will feature several alterations to the original work, and while they are not many, they are worth mentioning. Don’t worry, these changes will not significantly affect the story, and rest assured, the ships will not change.

For the purposes of the story, several characters will have different fates. As stated in the previous text, several characters will have a different story/ending compared to what was shown in HellPark. This was done to add more realism, plot hole fixing and drama to the story. However, changes will only be made when strictly necessary for the story.

The story will contain more demons and ONLY ONE angel. This was done to prevent plot holes where the angels could've done something, and also to make the demons more powerful, so they do not have an adversary capable of confronting them. But don’t worry, angels will still be in the story; however, they will either be simple humans or will not have much power or relevance in the story.

The story will change significantly towards the end. This is not because I wanted it to be that way, I simply do not know how HellPark would have ended. No one knows, there where multiple ending in mind, but nothing set in stone and besides, I do not want this to be seen only as a continuation of HellPark since the creators have repeatedly stated that this makes them uncomfortable. So, this is not a continuation; it is just a simple re-imagining of the story made by a group of fans of the AU. I will try to make the ending as incredible as the rest of the work. Trust me, you will all love it.

That’s all. I hope you enjoy this re-imagining of the story that captivated us all. Know that when I improve my drawing skills, I will create more illustrations to enhance the narrative. If you have any contributions/suggestions you want to send me, they are welcome. I know many would love to see this AU completed and would love to be part of it, so feel free to send me suggestions on how to improve the story. Enjoy...

[delawaredetroit]

Sorry for this ask but I read that the last bnha volume is going to add 60 additional pages, is this confirmed? Also do you think this could help something in the ending we had, one of the things that Horikoshi should fix would be the final confrontation between Tomura and Izuku, not so much in the plan of killing Tomura or not, but in that their confrontation was careless and rushed, but at the same time I don't see Horikoshi interested in them and he was already able to throw them in the trash, the only thing left is to expand the epilogue and the truth is that it doesn't seem interesting to me. Another plot that deserves to be expanded and taken seriously is Spinner and the discrimination but the whole plot was so sloppy and forgotten and it only ended with Shoji receiving an award, which is the easy way of saying "See something changed"

As far as I know, yes those extra pages are happening*, but I have no special knowledge other than what google searching could find you on that.

And I don't know. I don't think anything could "fix" the terrible execution of the final confrontation of Izuku and Shigaraki at this point. Further elaboration on what changes happened in the epilogue could improve the ending and tie loose ends or create even bigger plot holes depending on the direction taken.

In general, further detail on Uraraka's reformed quirk counseling program or what happened to overcome heteromorph discrimination could improve the themes, but in reality Horikoshi would fumble those because it doesn't seem like he thought them all the way through.

Lengthy Izuku and/or Hawks introspection on themselves and their roles in society would be ideal. Izuku thinking more about Shigaraki and what he represented and how Izuku approached villains after getting back into heroics would also be good choices.

*As an aside, anon be grateful I ventured into the cesspool that is reddit to confirm and find the link for this information. The functionally illiterate shounen bros are all still kvetching about the ending being the worst because Izuku didn't "get" Uraraka...

[afozine]

Addressing your Questions

Do you have to have a Discord account in order to participate?

No, you do don't have to have one in order to participate! While we prefer to communicate on Discord as it'll be easier to communicate with everyone at once, we will be willing to work with you in dms in order to give you the information you need in order to complete your part.

What do Beta Readers do exactly?

If you're applying as a Beta Reader you will be sent some drafts from our mods and look over them. Make sure they're grammatically correct and the story makes sense. Check for plot holes and give the author feedback on what they could possibly improve. Not too demanding of a job.

Do I have to write in perfect English in order to participate as a writer?

No, you do not! In fact that's why we have Beta Readers so they can read over your work and correct anything that needs fixing. We will be willing to accept anyone even if English is not their native language. There won't be any bias towards people who are native speakers. As long as you love AFO you will be allowed in. We're not going to be super strict about who we allow in, we're rather low on participants so we'll take as many people as we can. We may allow some people to write for multiple sections depending on how things go.

Can you be more specific about what you mean when you say NSFW is prohibited?

We won't allow any sexual works, but we'll be more lenient about gore/violence. After all My Hero Academia has a lot of violence in it. As long as it isn't too extreme,; for example, writing a long detailed paragraph of how someone's innards are being pulled out slowly from their stomach and shredded into pieces. If you aren't sure something you want to portray is appropriate you can send us an either small draft or sketch of what you have in mind and we'll look over it and give our approval.

Will swearing be allowed in the zine?

Yes, swearing will be allowed in the zine.

Another thing we would like to make clear is that ANYONE can participate as long as they follow the rules. It doesn't matter your age or where you're from. We're not going to be picky nor discriminate against anyone. Don't be shy, just apply!

Thank you for all your questions and concerns! We hope this was helpful. If not, please send us an ask or contact us through dms.

Have a nice day 🥰

[scruffyssketchbook]

I'm genuinely sorry if this sounds rude, but i consider that theme more like backing off. Like making comic for more than 10 years, it's plot, saying that all the plot and another questions will be answered later, keeping fans interested in that, and at the one moment harshly break all the story, leaving fans that really was interested in all these things with nothing. Why did you even made a ton of stuff, when you could just answer most frequent and important questions and move on to the next.

Hmm~ Honestly speaking, my life would be better if I was not writing and posting about SSEC because I am struggling a ton and would benefit greatly from focusing on things that’ll actually help me live. So I do appreciate people on my Patreon and Twitch that help me continue like- being able to do this.

But with that said. I can back out at any point really. I don’t really have an obligation to complete the story for anyone. I don’t have to do Box 31. And if I did leave entirely, It would improve my life much more than if I stayed. Like. Did I string people along? Prolly. But that’s kind of what you get when reading a webcomic. Some are abandoned and never continue due to life reasons or due to the person losing interest, And you know, it kind of took me a long time to come to terms with that and actually try to improve things. Not because of others, but because of me. Because I want to do these things.

I feel like ever since I started posting ssec, I kept it going for others and not for me. These story issues were always present, But I went on for the readers. I started SSEC not for others to read, but for myself. And when people started enjoying it, I was like “oh!!! People actually like my stuff?? I’ll keep going for them!!!” When I received Critisism, I broke down and tried fixing all the things people didn’t like so they can be happy, when I was at my lowest, I still updated weekly despite the world around me crumbling for the readers, when I found holes in the story, when I saw how bad the story will become if I kept going with the original plans, I tried saving the story for the readers, I tried fixing things and tried all I could to keep writing SSEC.

But, in the end, the issues in the stories foundation prevailed.

The reason I started drawing Eevolves was because I was depressed when writing SSEC. It made me sad. Every page was a struggle to get through, and I felt like I needed a change of pace because SSEC was just so depressing for me. And I was so happy planning Eevolves. The characters made me happy, the world made me happy, their relationships made me happy. I wanted SSEC to be more like it. And so I was planning and changing and trying to make SSeC like Eevolves. I actually love the past 2 chapters of SSEC. Paper’s please is my favorite chapter in the story and is what I want Box31 to be like, and this current chapter was so goofy and funny, it made me happy writing it. But then I realized. This happiness is only temporary. All of the things I did not want to address, all of the dark things in the story (like R word, extreme child abuse, suicide, As you saw with Felix: Blood and death, incest, Other types of abuse etc etc) and all of the broken nonsensical edgy lore I made as a kid influenced by even worse fanfics felt like a monster lurking in the shadows of my bright garden. It had to come up at some point. But I did not want to address it. I do not want to be associated with it. I do not want more people to have panic attacks because they saw things in my work that reminded them of experiences they went through.

I make SSEC to make people smile.

That was why I started posting and why I am still posting. I like making people happy. And I know that I am making a lot of people sad with these changes, but in the long run, I do believe that this is better than leaving it as is. Plus, ofc, I’m doing these changes for me. :3 and I really do need to take care of myself more ^^

I know this didn’t really answer the ask but like, Idk what else to say other than Sorry! Thinking of myself for once!!! 😄 thanks for reading!!! 😄😄😄

[helluvabossrewrite45]

Hey. I've seen some of your rewrite of Helluva Boss scenes and I really like them. I enjoy how you fixed the issues with the writing and how incredibly spectacular your writing of the improved dialogue within the scenes are.

Honestly, I feel inspired by your work. I have an idea for my own Helluva Boss rewrite where I not only fix issues the show has (ex. tonal shifts, inconsistencies & plot holes, worldbuilding issues, etc), but also integrate my HB OCs into my rewrite (ex. my main HB OC Alice Lola (Ally for short), who is an assassin at I.M.P. and an aspiring writer).

I was wondering if I could ask you this: do you have any advice & tips you could give for who have an idea for starting an HB rewrite, or a rewrite in general? I ask out of curiosity as an aspiring writer myself.

Feel free to respond back when you get the chance. Thank you and have a wonderful day/afternoon/night. Keep up the great work! 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻 🤗💕❤️🧡💛💚💙💜💖💕🤗

Thank you, im glad you enjoy my rewrites and of course, I can offer up some advice for rewrites;

I think one of the best things in writing a rewrite is that you can use these minor details the piece your rewriting has and use them to you advantage. For example, I noticed that Octavia listens to music whenever she hears her parents arguing or at the dinner table where her parents would be and probably would have at least some awkward tension so from rewriting seeing stars, I use that minor detail to highlight her character and her arc of using music or the moon festival to ignore her problems even though it clearly doesn't help. It also contrast with Loona in my rewrite ignoring her problems that she later acknowledges and the two would open up, closing the character arcs in a nice neat bow. Another would be that Millie is often depicted as either moxxie's wife or a murder machine and from the little time we see with her and her family, I rewrote millie growing up having to be in her sisters shadow and just wanting to be her own person instead as inferior or someone's tool. This would establish why she has a rivalry with her sister while also giving her more character for her to be explored (which we should've gotten from harvest moon tbh), Any details you find in helluva can be a tool for you to explore whether it be for the characters, world etc...

Something that even I learned is that when rewriting, you gotta plan what your gonna do with the characters, with the worldbuilding you establish, with all of these plots/ideas your rewriting. Most of the problems helluva has is because vivziepop didnt plan the show out until season 2 rolled around and if we wanna rewrite the show to be better, we ourselves cant make the same mistakes. If you already started the rewrite however, i suggest you look back on the rewrite your already doing for as much as you can to remember in order to not fall into the same mistake the show itself has

When planning an oc into rewrites, I think the main thing is to ask what are they doing here, what purpose do they serve to the plot and what is their character overall (their motive, personality, character arc, likes, dislikes, relationship with the characters, how they bounce off to the other characters etc...)

As another aspiring writer who has a lot of original stories in the works (there's even an original story inspired by helluva boss and some of my rewrite ideas for it), I think its important to approach criticism as a helpful tool rather than an insult. Especially when its rewrites. I always want whatever I'm writing to at least be of decent quality and is regularly curious of how people would react to my original stories still in the works so receiving it and even given criticism for it can help, you know? Since you have an established audience and them offering criticism can be your tool that you can use to improve. It should be noted though that their is a difference between criticism and personal bias/subjectivity. For example, if someone wanted to point out a plot hole or a mistake in your work, that's criticism you can use. But if someone just tells you to go touch grass for your rewrite or something like that, then its not criticism, that's personal bias/opinion they have of rewrites in general so it offers nothing you can use to improve it.

That's all I got so far, I hope this helps!

[grims-local-pkmn-irl-hub]

How did you come up with all of the plans for redux?

the way we came up with all the plans we currently have is a result of us retelling and improving upon the stories and arcs these characters went through in a discord rp we were all in!

a short description of what we did would be like:

what plot-holes existed in pre-redux? how can we fix them?

what parts of the old versions made us unhappy and how could we change them into something we enjoy?

what parts were unsalvageable and had to be tossed out? what did we add to replace those parts?

are their backstories the same? what has been changed? what has been added?

what characters were staying? when would they be introduced? what is their role to play and is it a different role than before?

what is the order of events? how do they intertwine? how do they lead into one another?

where should we allow the characters to have breaks from the big scale events? how do we make sure they dont just keep getting punched down?

what relationships are going to stay the same? and if not then how are they going to be different?

and we had to do all of this for a timeline that we have set up that goes ALL THE WAY TO EARLY 2026,,,,

and also an example of a character getting being introduced at a different time than they did in pre-redux would be miguel ( @/vulgrados-best ) cause in pre-redux he got introduced like a year after the rp started,, was not there from the beginning at all,,,

[teitpp]

I saw my first AI "fic" today.

The user who posted the AI creation added "goes to show we still need writers" I took that to mean they were uploading it to show how bad the AI creation was. Due to that, I felt more okay opening it for investigatory purposes (I made a post a while ago saying that AI would produce a facimile of creativity and I was curious how correct that would prove to be).

In a word, I was extremely correct. The fic had no-to minimal scene intros or transitions, banal dialogue, characters flat enough to feel ooc, silly to non existent conflicts, and it "tells" everything (no showing, no extended metaphors or insightful similes).

Scarily though, each snippet was coherent. Like sure, the characters were flat and the conflicts (when they exist) one dimensional and the turns of phrase often felt cliche (which is exactly what one would expect to get from an AI, which formulates sentences based off of how often words go next to eachother). But the scenes themselves make sense. If AI wasnt in the title I wouldnt have been able to tell the difference between this and a 15 yo's first fic.

The danger of course is that this is how AI starts out. The more people use them, and input content into them they will get better at producing this facimile of a creative work. AI could probably learn to produce some or all of the common components of storytelling that I've noticed this and other AI products lack.The scarier danger for me is when it becomes good enough to justify publishing houses and studios attempting to replace expensive human writers. (And to a degree clogging up AO3... although I hope enough people in fandom are here for the human connections that that wouldnt be a concern...).

Look, AI will never be keeping human writers out of fandom. Theres no finite number of spots on AO3. But AI could keep human writers out of screenwriting and book writing (which do have finite spots/finite funds for written works) and then... we lose something beautiful and precious.

The beauty of human writers is that they constantly have new things to say because every lived experience is so unique and precious. no two people will write a character's emotions the same way or capture the tension of a plot with the same words. I have read and will keep reading thousands of fanfics about the same canon characters because each person captures their pain and love and failures and triumphs in new and exciting ways. Humans always bring something new to the table. Humans always keep learning. Experimenting. Changing the conversation. An AI will never be able to say anything new. They are actively doing the opposite of human thinking and creating. Theyre not doing research or looking up new words or playing with new turns of phrase. Instead theyre cycling through a fixed set of applicable word choices and chosing the one with the highest percent match for what should come after the previous word.

So three bad things happen if you all start using AI as a fic production shortcut:

The AI improves its deepfakes of creativity. your requests, inputted content, and feedback all help it update the word selection math it is doing in the background. This makes it more likely that canon content stops being created by real people and instead starts being replwced by AI products.

You learn and feel nothing. I mean it. Writing is a joy because every creation is a new research rabbit hole. a new word looked up in the thesaurus. a new way to make your readers sob from the feels. AI robs you of that process. So you think less. You explore characters less. You are deprived the joy of marinating in your blorbos angst and pain and love and joy while you decide exactly how to put that into words. Youre deprived the satisfaction of your own work. (And by being deprived of the process above you also dont learn how to write. because the AI is not writing.)

Your readers lose out. Sure the AI has produced something perfectly spelled and grammared... but nothing new has been said. The grand conversation we are constantly having by writing and reading fic and exclaiming about characters stagnates and then festers. No new stories get told. AI is only producing things that look like what came before. your readers dont get any joy from new thoughts. new ideas. changed minds. changed perspectives... none of that happens. (Again I want to go back to point one. Im not worried about AO3 drowning in AI fics as much as I am worried that canon content will become overrun with it).

[appleboxdog]

I would like to show some process or writing my comic story thingy that I’ve been working on for almost four years now!

So my main story, not Out of Bounds, is called SELINA, that’s about it.. it’s about a multiversal being going on a rampage and destroying a bunch of worlds/universes. Now a group of fools gotta stop her, basically it.

I made a first version of a comic in early April 2021 (plus some paper outlines the year before). There were a lot of things wrong with this but I’m going to focus on one aspect, the main character.

The main character was a man named Edd, who had a deep, deep past with the villain Selina. He was basically her best friend in every reality and world, almost like her sidekick. My first comic version already had a problem right from the beginning. I started it with “I don’t know how long it’s been, possibly two or three years… the day all the worlds were doomed..”

BOOOORING!!

Where’s the interest in that!!! Where’s the flavor!!! World info dumps at the beginning of a story? Worst move you can make!! And I did it.

See, the problem is that Edd has SO MUCH background with Selina and literally just in general that it’s hard for someone to connect! He goes on all like “we moved on… here’s a reference no one is gonna get….. I’m gonna kill her!”

So after 3 long boring chapters of a poor fast paced comic, I made half of a chapter with some improvement. This time Edd had no inner dialogue in the beginning and there was a HOOK!!

No story infodump, plus points for Apple. Anyways I ran into other problems with this version too. Although I fixed plot holes with the villain, there was no motive still. Edd still knew too much and the other characters kept talking about him which was more difficult, he’s such a fleshed out character with so much lore, how is it possible for someone to connect with that with zero knowledge? This is a multiverse story, Edd has lived thousands of lives, there would be too much for even flashbacks to show as a main character.

Now as a side character or second main character? I could work with that. Instead of the reader struggling to understand what this dude was on and what his deal was, he was just the mysterious character who he lore. It’s like if you started a show with the antagonists point of view. If my hero academia started with Todoroki or whatever his name is. Instead it’s Izuku, pretty much a blank slate!! Name one thing cool about him before he got his power. Nothing! That’s the point!!

For me, I needed a main character who was aware of Selina but didn’t have a deep past with her, someone who would be asking questions the reader might have, someone who is easy to see yourself as while still having a complex character backstory and design!

Behold.

Venus is a space traveler who travels the galaxy with her best friend Apollo in a space plane during a space zombie apocalypse. She’s immune and is going around the universe AND the multiverse/realities to help heal people with a cure made from her blood. She barely knows about Selina, she has questions, and the reader will still have questions about her!!!

When I talk about needing a “blank slate main character” I don’t mean just an insert, or that your main character should ALWAYS have questions. This is all only how I do it, and maybe it will change! I won’t know, but currently it’s easier for me to figure out a story with a character who has no clue what’s happening!

This story is a BIG work in progress, characters are still being made, storyline, plot, backgrounds, all of it. But I will be posting here about it, including Out of Bounds stuff!! If you see an OC of mine and are confused on which story they’re in, look for tags! You may ask anything (I’ll try to not spoil too much). I hope to see you there once I’ve made progress on this creation.

[realcleverissues]

If you’re into UBI, you need to support Housing

I love the idea of a UBI. However, until we have enough housing, any additional money everyone starts getting will just go to increased housing costs. I.e. property values will go up, as will rent, moving that UBI income from the lower class to homeowners and landlords, while not improving the housing situation or life for most people. This is clearly not what we want to accomplish with a UBI.

We need to first build housing and then implement a UBI. (I imagine housing that is owned and run by local gov’ts or non-profit organizations, like housing authorities.) And considering the cost of a UBI, this is very feasible.

Let’s imagine a very modest UBI of $100/mo = $1,200/yr. There are around 260 million americans over 18. If everyone got a UBI, that’d be over $260B/yr. If we estimate housing construction costs of $260k/unit (just for convenience; the actual costs average only $200k), we can afford to build 1 Million apartments each year. 

Estimates vary of how many homes are needed to satisfy housing demand in the US, with estimates varying between 3 to 8 million homes. Let’s round up to 10 million.

It would take just 10 years of our UBI setup to completely transform the housing crisis. That’s not a long time. And this was using very conservative figures. If we imagine a UBI of $1,000/mo (which many do), we could pay for all the housing from a single year’s budget!

And what do we get in return? Primarily, two major results:

a. People are housed: People have adequate housing; slow the progression of people into homelessness (caused by housing prices); improve rate of getting people out of homelessness. (And, ideally, guarantee housing for everyone.) Additionally, the price of housing will go down for everyone, benefiting the lower class tremendously. (Some economists have estimated that the price of housing in some places could come down as much as 10% with adequate housing supply. Imagine saving 10% on your rent!) (It could potentially reduce the value of homes to some extent, which current property owners will not like, but I don’t think people are entitled to push for housing scarcity so that they can profit off it. Additionally, some studies show that things like changing exclusionary zoning can *increase* property values due to the fact that the same plot of land can now house more people.)

b. Money then put into a UBI is not swallowed by the upper class. The value of the money is more evenly enjoyed by all. Not to mention the savings from reduced housing costs (which could easily be $100/mo in savings). In other words, people will have more money, and the UBI becomes more effective. 

It’s also worth noting that the investment into housing construction will actually pay for itself, as renters pay for use of the homes. Unlike a UBI, this investment produces dividends. Those funds can be reinvested in housing, other community needs, or used to help fund the UBI.

There is a lot of exploitation that happens in our capitalist system, but housing is by far the worst since it effects everyone (i.e. everyone needs a home) and is likely the most expensive part of everyone’s expenses, with many people seeing a third or more of their income going to this one expense, every month, till they’re dead.) We must fix housing first. We must plug the hole in the ship before we can expect to move it forward with any efficiency. If you believe in a UBI, and understand the costs of it are worthwhile, then you need to also be advocating for a massive program to address the housing crisis.

[thebadwolves]

Lore drop!

This is the basic lore needed to understand my Doctor Who AU (which I don't have a name for yet 😔)

Quick FYI, I have only seen DW from 2005 onwards, no classic who I'm afraid :(

also there will be so many spoilers on this account so don't read if you don't want any :)

another quick FYI, I know everyone has their opinions but I didn't like 13's run like at all. I tried so hard to watch it trust, I was hoping it would be one of those times people were exaggerating how much they didn't like something (and that definitely still applies in some situations) but I just wasn't vibing. I have, therefore, not included the whole plot of the Timeless Child, it just didn't make sense to me at all and it creates a bunch of plot holes that have yet to be fixed.

Anyway, onto the actual AU 😎

I got this whole idea from Rose Tyler saying she heard "singing" when she woke up after being the bad wolf.

Basically, instead of the Doctor, we have the Bad Wolf. She is (mostly) a Time Lady and she has the faces of some of the Doctor's companions (and vice versa).

The faces I have swapped are as follows:

9th Doctor > Rose Tyler

10th Doctor > Donna Noble

11th Doctor > River Song

12th Doctor > Clara Oswald

13th Doctor > Yasmin Khan

14th Doctor > Donna Noble again lol, for obvious reasons

15th Doctor > Rogue

all companions who have not been switcherooed behave and look exactly as they do in the show :) (except that one plot line with Amy being really into the doctor, it was weird at the time and remains that way now)

due to gender swaps, some of the companions names have changed too

Rose Tyler is now Florian Tyler

Donna Noble is now Dominic (Dom) Noble

Clara Oswald is now Oswin Oswald

I've also changed Yasmin Khan to Jasmine Kelly since it felt wrong to keep a name that has very Persian and Arabic origins for a character without the same background as Yaz.

River and Rogue get to keep their names ✨️

back to our Time Lady

similarly to the Doctor, the Bad Wolf fought in the time war. before the war, she was only called "the Wolf" but she was so wracked with guilt after fighting that she changed it to "the Bad Wolf" because she thought it would make people (children especially) more scared of her. she figured that due to all the suffering she caused, she deserved to have people fear her from the start, before she could "fool them" into liking her

she also has a deep connection to music and songs. she can hear all non-diegetic music that one would hear in the show, including people's individual themes. she will often judge people and situations based on what she can here at the time, which can sometimes be misleading. she also hears the flow of time as a huge flowing "rivers of song", which is one of the reasons River Song intrigues her so much when they meet

lots of my AU follows similar plots to Doctor Who but there are key differences! the main one is that the Bad Wolf does not remember that she destroyed gallifrey (I'll expand on this in another post) another one is that the Bad Wolf is even more of a hopeless romantic lol

she lives and loves so easily, and it improves many of her relationships and tears them apart even more brutally.

unlike the doctor, she enjoys visiting Florian's family - making it even more heartbreaking when she is torn away from all of them in the end - she also isn't blind to Martha's love, instead she reciprocates it tenfold all the while still grieving for her lost Florian. this eventually destroys her relationship with Martha, who can't stand to see her in pain every time they're together. her love for River is so deep and special, but because her love is given out in such abundance, he often doesn't feel as treasured or unique in her eyes as he is. she tells Jasmine she loves her so often it almost feel insincere, and it hurts them both more when she is eventually so devastated by the truth of the destruction of gallifrey that she can no longer express herself, and it seems like all her love has disappeared

anyway, that's all for now, I'm gonna make so many more explanation posts and art about these guys in the future

please feel free to ask anything at all about the AU in comments and asks

hope you all enjoy :)

[kiingocreative]

Ready to edit, format, or publish your book? We offer editing and coaching services! Send a DM or go to https://kiingo.co/services

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The more immersed I’ve become in the world of writing and the writers community, the more I’ve learnt. And that learning has been as much in terms of grammar, style and genre as it has been about the many logistics of being a writer.

I get a sense that there are a lot of misconceptions around what being a writer is like. I sure keep coming across them when I talk to non-writers and see the surprise on their faces when I talk about what my experience has been like.

In truth, I love the writer’s life, with all of its joys and infuriating moments. But I do also think that there’s a lot people don’t tend to realise about it…

It can take a long time.

When I tell people it took me three years to write No Pain, No Game, they’re often surprised. If I’m honest, I used to think that it mainly took me that long because I wasn’t very disciplined back in the day. But, as it turns out, even when I’ve been working at it diligently, my second book will likely have taken me a good couple of years by the time it’s published.

In fact, when I published No Pain, No Game, I had this grand idea that I’d release The Dhawan Brothersexactly a year later. I’m not entirely sure where that arbitrary deadline came from. I suppose I liked the symmetry of releasing a book a year on or around the same date. That timeframe, rather than invigorate me, ended up discouraging me, because I just couldn’t fit everything I needed and wanted to do with the book within a year. I’d set myself up for disappointment before I’d even started.

I see other writers release a book a year and I’m in awe of them, because that just doesn’t seem to be me. I need time and space to be able to create.

And that’s just it. Writing (for me at least, and for others too, I’m sure) simply takes time. Some pieces will take you less time than others, but ultimately, you can’t really escape it. It’ll take howsoever long it takes you to write the right story.

…and that might be longer than you or anyone else might imagine. And that’s ok.

It can feel lonely.

It doesn’t have to be, but it can feel that way at times. I imagine that a lot of writers love their craft partly because it gives them that sense of independence and all that me-time—my guess is a lot of us tend to enjoy being alone with their writing, without it necessary feeling lonely.

But, as with everything one does by themselves and that relies only on their own abilities, there are moments where it can vacillate from being contentedly alone to feeling a little lonely.

Anything can trigger it. A scene that’s not coming out quite right. A character that’s got us stuck. A plot hole that’s leaking so badly it’s making us question the whole story. It can be something that’s writing-related, something that has nothing to do with it, and anything in between.

Before I found the writing community on Instagram—before I knew that I wasn’t the only one to go through such phases—I used to try and ride those waves as best I could, mostly aiming not to drown in them.

Now, when I feel a little isolated, I pick up the phone and ping a fellow writer, and I share what’s going on. They may not have the right fix for my plot hole, but knowing they can relate to my struggle makes a whole world of difference.

It can be discouraging.

I used to get to the end of a draft and all I could see would be how much still needed to be done. In my work as a beta reader and editor,I’m always mindful that, by pointing out areas for growth and improvement in someone’s manuscript, the writer on the other end risks only hearing one thing: that they’re so much further away than they might have thought from the finish line.

What I always tell writers is what I’ve trained myself to focus on in these moments: that the work left to be done on a story should be exciting.

That the distance left to cover before a book is ready is where the story gets polished and gets a chance to shine.

That all these things we didn’t get quite right in the previous drafts are as many opportunities for us to learn and grow as writers. To improve. To fine tune our tale until it’s the best it can be.

We can look at a mountain in front of us and wonder how we’ll ever get to the other side, or we can rub our hands together and smile, because we know the view from the top will be more than worth the climb.

It can feel vulnerable.

Writing is such a personal endeavour. It’s the act of pouring your soul out on paper and channelling your inner most desires, fears and insecurities. At its core, writing is very much like therapy: you get unlimited sessions during which you give everything you’ve got on the page. It can be healing in so many ways, but the fact that it’s so vulnerable is also what makes it scary. Sharing our writing is sharing layers of ourselves that we may not often show others.

It’s no wonder letting someone else read your work can be daunting. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in saying that showing your writing to anyone feels like handing over a piece of your heart and praying no one crushes it.

The reality of it is, whatever you write, and no matter how good you are at it, there are people out there who are bound not to like it. The most cliché of all examples is that of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter: as successful as it was (and still is, over a decade later!) there are people who hate it so much they go around burning copies of it on the street. True story.

So let us be vulnerable. Let us pour our hearts out into our work and let us accept that, just like with everything in life, we won’t everyone’s cup of tea. And that’s ok. These people were never meant to be our tribe anyways.

It can be a lot about NOTwriting.

My biggest misconception about writing? The one that definitely caught me unaware? The fact that writing can actually be, well, a lot about NOT writing.

It’s one thing to write, and it’s quite another to let the world know that you have something to say. If you don’t let people know your work is out there, it’s unlikely they’ll ever find out about it.

In comes social media, marketing, networking… All these things that are not actual writing but still very much all about your writing. A large portion of my time leading the ‘writer’s life’ has been focused on building a social media presence, nurturing a network, and putting my book out there in front of the right readers.

And that, my friends, takes a lot more time, effort and energy than one might think.

It is a pain sometimes? Yes. A hundred times, yes.

Can it be avoided? Afraid not! Not if you want people to find out about you and your work (or unless you can afford the luxury of hiring someone to do it all for you—hashtag: life goals).

…Why bother, then?

And here comes the Catch 22 question. If there are so many sides to writing that are painful, vulnerable, scary and cumbersome… why even bother with this whole writing thing?

Great question! I’m glad you asked.

And I’ll tell you why:

We bother because we love it. We do it all because we can’t not do it. Because there’s no way in hell we can go too long without writing. And I’m not talking about the word count you clock in every day or every week. I’m talking about the writing you do even when you’re not physically writing—when you’re washing the dishes whilst fixing plot holes, when you’re in the shower designing your next main character or when you’re about to go to sleep and the perfect idea for a great scene occurs to you.

We take it all in our stride, the good, the bad and the ugly, because there’s no way in hell we can picture our life without it. We put up with the annoying bits, the terrifying bits, the downright eye-roll-worthy bits because writing isn’t something we merely do: it’s who we are.

[mdhwrites]

Do you think toh needs a reboot? There's lots of things that I don't like how were handled in the show but it's also painful to give up on them when you think of the better ways they could've worked out, characters, backstory, plot, everything in general.

I wouldn't mind a reboot tbh, but then again you mentioned that the show isn't quite concious of it's own identity. So I guess unless they work with better writers, it won't make a big difference even with the time needed.

The short version of this is that TOH's inherent flaws mean that… No. A reboot won't help it, it'd be a nightmare to try and adapt or reboot in general and it's never going to see one in animation that could improve much on the version we got except for cleaning up mistakes made because the writers weren't thinking about the consequences of their character's actions.

And this mostly has to do with its crises of identity being a very core part of its image at this point. If you try to refine it into an adventure series, into a school drama, into a more traditional fantasy story or one of the half dozen identities you could place on TOH, it becomes effectively a different show. It's going to feel different, it's going to be different, etc. like that.

So the first problem with even conceptualizing a reboot is you have all these disparate, clashing elements that barely interact and never were enabled to properly interact in the show so… What do you emphasize, what do you de-emphasize? Because no matter what, you're pissing SOMEONE off. If you lean into the childish nature of S1 then you annoy people who prefer the darker, more serious tone to S2. If you lean into the school stuff, Eda's plotline with her sister becomes more neglected and S1 doesn't feel as coherent while Belos feels like even less of a figure than he already does. If you lean more into the Owl Family, you lose as much time with Amity so her character arc is going to suffer, Lumity takes longer to happen naturally and you probably get called racist because people already call the show racist for how little it cares about Gus and Willow.

Quick note for another blog: I don't think race had literally anything to do with Gus and Willow's treatment. They simply stop having a place in the narrative post S1, even arguably after Luz becomes friends with Amity. They look the way they do for design variance and demographic numbers and that's probably it.

Anyways: No matter what, you cannot fix the conceptual problem of TOH being everything that Dana wanted to say and do alongside throwing in the kitchen sink. The only way to smooth out The Owl House is to literally smooth it out. Just flatten it into five or more seasons so it has the time to breathe and actually explore EVERY concept and even then… Yeah, that definitely gets into needing better writers than TOH has who can follow through on the ideas they have. After all, just because they would have more time doesn't mean they have the skill.

And you would need that promise from go so the writers could plan that out properly and… That's never going to happen. Especially not for serialized content like The Owl House, not in the current media landscape that we have. This isn't even because the show is bad. Quality has VERY little to do with whether something gets renewed nowadays. And if you want to get renewed consistently beyond three seasons (and iffy on even that) you need to hit one of two different options.

The first is for broadcast television where ease of programming, cheapness, and advertising is king. This is where you get why Teen Titans Go has two movies and a billions episodes. That show is entirely episodic and thus very easy to break up, throw into a hole in your broadcast schedule, easy to make marathons because you can just slap a bunch together without care, etc. like that. The animation is also incredibly simply and the show in general is probably very cheap to produce. Its writing style of literally anything goes adds to this fact. Cartoon Network can probably make five episodes of Teen Titans Go with the budget Disney gives for ONE Owl House episode and it works better for the company's goals monetarily.

And yes, Teen Titans Go is bad. It's WAY worse than The Owl House. But quality doesn't matter here. What matters is that it's easy, it's cheap, it has brand identity and is easy to merchandise. It is profitable, safe and people see it as easy to sit their child in front of for when they need the television to babysit.

The other option is streaming services and you're not going to get a 100 episode contract for a streaming service. Yes, they want cliffhangers and serialization to make sure you binge and continue subscribing even between seasons but that's also why streaming services are all or nothing. You either are so big that you will continue to pull people for months after your release or they don't care about your small squad of dedicated fans.

And TOH… Didn't become a cultural phenomenon. It was genuinely nothing special to most people, if they'd even heard of it, until Grom. Outside of that, it was just known that it had above average animation when it launched and… That's literally all I ever heard about TOH until I joined the fandom inbetween S1 and 2. And by then Netflix would have cancelled the show most likely.

Because TOH didn't break any records. It didn't light the world on fire. It didn't even cause some giant discourse that rattled through the internet on all fronts. And that means streaming services would probably rather invest in another attempt at a new Walking Dead or Game of Throne rather than continue the show. It's those record breaking numbers that got Velma and Wednesday renewed after all, not their quality or anything like that. (This isn't me condoning these practices btw. I think it's a real problem like everyone else and that it has to do with a lot of focus on short term gain rather than long term retention but I'm rambling enough as is)

And The Owl House never had that clout. Ever. I mean, how many people always had to add caveats to what made The Owl House special like "On Disney" or "in a prime time kid's show" rather than the show actually being special on its own merits? Especially now? There is one last option and that's of course a reboot that doesn't happen in the next five years but instead is closer to 20 when enough time has passed that radical changes might be allowed. That's the Voltron and She-Ra method effectively. Except... That's where we get the fact that Voltron and She-Ra were big properties at their time, never truly forgotten and have strong nostalgia attached to them. They pushed toys, they pushed consumers and those IPs had a real value to them, even to the current day but to revive them took a delicate touch because cartoons are different now. And TOH just doesn't have that power. That impact and care. And there is a LOT to be said about how it's much harder for shows to have that sort of impact nowadays but that's beyond the scope of this blog. The main point is that in 20 years, why would a studio choose to give TOH that much love and attention versus any of the other cancelled animation projects around this time? Especially something that did get to do its full run like Amphibia?

So… Is there a way The Owl House could get the time it needs to explore its whole identity and possibly become better? Yes? In a webcomic, manga or book. Animation is simply too expensive a medium and not regarded well enough that it's going to get the time but things like webcomics, manga and books are known for being more drawn out, able to do more with that space and more independent because the overheads are a LOT less than other mediums. After all, you only have to pay one writer and maybe a couple editors for a book.

But… I don't think Dana has the skill or attention span for any of those mediums. Not if she's working solo. If you look at her solo episodes in TOH, they have some really powerful moments and statements in them… And also some of the most meh B plots, some of the larger narrative cheats, show blatant disregard for her own world building and even at times had to have major plot points in them retconned by future writers because Dana wrote the show into a corner while trying to be clever. It shows someone who would be much better on an anthology series or an episodic series than ANYTHING serialized.

Remember, Dana wrote Reaching Out, where everyone just forgets that being a Wild Witch is met with the death penalty and is not just equivalent to college, which is how Amity and Alador treat it, let alone the twins celebrating becoming outlaws like they just joined a special club.

So in general, I don't think The Owl House is going to see a revival or the like. I think the best thing that could happen to The Owl House's legacy is that people figure out which parts they like the best and go on to make media inspired by those parts of TOH. Because I feel bad for anyone who tries to adopt TOH as a whole.

Because I just don't think it's possible to capture TOH's essence without also bringing along its crises of identity. The two are too intertwined and that was always going to hold the show back.