#the fantasy mashup project is IN PROGRESS
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clouseplayssims · 6 months ago
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The Nine Great Heroes of Skyrim. I've said before they won't be in the story proper, but will be in the prequel and maybe flashbacks.
Beth Red-Battle. Harbringer of the Companions. (Beth Peach from @lilleputtu)
Stach Shadehand. Headmaster at the Bard's College.
Qal Caerick. Imperial Leader. (Qaletaqa Brokejaw from @nervosims)
Hadvik Redbeak. Stormcloak Leader. (@esotheria-sims Ragnar.)
Kadja the Grey. Headmistress at the College of Winterhold. (Kadja from @ts2cambremon.)
Linias Torr. Dragonborn. (lipstick lady from @esotheria-sims.)
Andra gro-Burzag. Leader of the Dark Brotherhood. (Andra from @ts2cambremon.)
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thekimspoblog · 28 days ago
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I can't say this is a project I would ever feel passionately about enough to write an actual screenplay, but let's say for the sake of indulging a fantasy, someone from Blumhouse or A24 approached ME to write a "Jeff the Killer" movie...
My treatment would be a PG-13 dark romance, psychological thriller, and horror-comedy, with a decided leaning towards character development and comedy rather than horror. Mostly, I just have this image in my head of a very snappily-edited trailer utilizing a mashup of "What's the Matter with Kids These Days" and "Teenagers Scare the Living Shit Out of Me". The premise can be summarized as "When a charismatic older boy moves in, an affluent American suburb breaks out in a rash of teenagers attacking adults and each other." The film would heavily feature direct homages to "Blue Velvet" and especially "Edward Scissorhands", but the narrative would actually have the closest resemblance to something like "Village of the Damned" or "Children of the Corn". The point would be to really tap into the emotions of a parent with a troubled child they have no idea how to reach or even discipline, and what it feels like for that frustration to be compounded when the child seems to readily embrace the authority of an even worse influence. The alieness, inscrutability, and untamability of youth culture. The fear of getting old, losing your edge, forgetting what you once knew in your gut. That you barely got a taste of the world belonging to you before the next shiny new thing has already muscled you out, and being powerless to warn the next generation it's a repeating cycle. It's a nightmarish heightened reality where every moral panic the news has ever peddled feels vindicated.
Jeff would not be the main character. Instead we follow an unnamed fourteen year old girl, who at the start of the movie is still reeling from being diagnosed with signs of severe personality disorders (which only makes her feel more socially isolated), and is clearly holding onto a lot of resentment that her parents impeded her dreams of being a child star out of fear the industry was too seedy and would distract her from school. After being suspended for an altercation with a classmate, the girl begins to seek out movies which reinforce her perception of herself as a psychopathic killer. Her parents are clearly repressive, narcissistic, hypocritical, have their middle-class priorities backwards, and are arguably verbally and psychologically abusive, but there's still no question that the intrusive thoughts she begins indulging about killing them are NOT a solution. It's also clear that she wants to lash out at the drab conformity of adulthood that awaits her, that deep down she isn't special, but has no idea how. Jeff moving into the big creepy old house on the hill is framed like the start of a more conventional haunted house movie, but it becomes quickly apparent that the house ISN'T haunted; it's a regular dilapidated death trap and the threat is that nobody who's attracted to it or feels at home living there could be well. But after a brief period of the heroine being dismissive of Jeffery as a poser, the gothic romance of the creepy mansion enchants her and Jeff's general foul-mouthed speaking-truth-to-power vibes suck her into the little cult of personality forming at the house. From there, she is fully under Jeff's spell, and yet he still can't manipulate her into doing anything part of her wasn't already contemplating. As their edgy romance progresses, this is when parents start turning up dead. We know Jeff is behind it, even if the girl is too brainwashed to see it, but a mystery is still built up around the hierarchy of Jeff's followers and which disciple killed which adult.
The main mechanic of this story is the way the movie would repeatedly build up the audience's empathy for characters, then rip the rug out from under them. Everyone's a victim and no one is innocent. And Jeff himself defies explanation: When he first recounts his tragic backstory to Girl, we get a full unbroken nine minute retelling of the traditional Jeff the Killer lore: Relentless bullying, abusive perfectionist parents, brother falsely accused of murder, maiming and reconstructive surgery. But as the movie goes on, we get more flashbacks of Jeff's origins, and the details begin to contradict each other. At one point, Jeff tells a story about how he used to be a timid boy, but after a cult murdered his entire family, upon returning to school he embraced a kind of dead-inside "fake it til you make it" mindset that allowed him to succeed in all his endeavors and ultimately infiltrate the cult and turn it against itself. In another story near the end of the movie, Jeff's career as a serial killer began when he had an encounter with a cryptid akin to the Angel of Death itself, which personally cursed him with a mission he has no free will to resist carrying out, to be an emissary of its message. In another story he was chewed up and spit out by Hollywood and method acting broke his brain. The bulk of the runtime would be the slow burn of the girl peeling away the lies of Jeff's character and growing from enraptured to disillusioned with him. The man and woman Jeff moved in with aren't his parents; they're his hostages, which recontextualizes some of their "abuse". And this isn't even the first couple he's done this to since killing his actual parents over ten years ago. Oh that's right! By the way, Jeff isn't seventeen like he said; he's twenty-eight. And our protagonist isn't the only teenage girl he's promised to run away with once she "cut out the rot from her life". I'd like to think of something a little fresher, but the most obvious trajectory a story like this could go culminates in a Veronica Sawyer-esque showdown between the final girl and the ex-boyfriend who speaks for her dark passenger. I think by this point Jeff should basically split into two different figures: the frail and pedestrian appetites and vanities of a man who kills to feel special, and the eternal self-perpetuating disease Jeff tried to sew himself into the mythology of. His human body lays dead at the girl's feet, defeated, but vapors of television static form a ghost that flashes her one last knowing smile before walking off confidently into the fog. His laugh following her all the way home.
As far as the Blue Velvet homages, I would borrow dialogue said by both Jeffery Beaumont and Frank Booth, and let them both bleed together coming out of Jeff's mouth in a way that only gets more uncomfortable if you understand the reference. The version of himself Jeff wants his victims to see - sensitive, artsy, protective, angry at the cruelty of the world - masks a fragile brute hungry for control who has no problem punching down when it serves his ego. His demeanor in a scene can shift very suddenly, and it needs to be jarring every time. The original CreepyPasta was never high art, but the one thing it did well was serve as a time capsule of the Dark Suburbia setting. The symmetrical shot composition and pastel/candy color palette would clearly be going for a 1950's retro aesthetic, but great pains would have to be taken so that the actual interior set and costume design feels specific to the era the original story was written in. It would be a difficult balance to strike, but if the film's look succeeded in making 2006 feel like a fairytale - distant enough to be nostalgic and at the same time recent enough that we never escaped its shadow - I think we could have something really different and special here. For years, critics have mocked how every character in Jeff the Killer's universe is armed to the teeth and yet the adults are useless in the face of a couple cartoon bullies, and that's actually what started to inspire me. Because while it's very obviously just a plot hole in the original story, there's a real irony there which - if done correctly - could at minimum be mined for comedy. It's an absurdity but in a strange way it feels realistic.
In general, I would take a very "OOPS! ALL SOCIAL COMMENTARY!" approach to the screenplay. The movie throws out so many theories about where Jeff came from and why he's doing this; the police, teachers, and town hall talk in circles speculating on why the kids listen to Jeff and how to diffuse the situation, that it becomes white noise after a while. It lampshades the idea something as simple as an allegory in a horror movie can help us to better understand real world tragedies at all. The closest the story gives to a serious answer is what my criminology textbook calls "Social Control Theory" - basically that it's more constructive asking why people are ever good than why they are sometimes evil. A very specific set of conditions had to be true for the American Dream to ever give the illusion of viability, and by 2006 that dream was already succumbing to entropy at a rate nobody was ready to admit. Symbolized by the opening shot of the movie where the neighborhood is all watching a solar eclipse, and Jeff enters the mansion for the first time just as the eclipse is ending. The tone is very nihilistic, but the goal is to criticize all reductive narratives, including nihilism, and so at least with our main character's arc, the implied resolution is that mental illness and free will are not mutually exclusive, that oftentimes being an asshole is a path of least resistance we have to actively struggle against, even if that struggle looks different to each person. Sprinkle in some moments where the Girl stops herself and exercises some basic common decency, and have those moments not necessarily save the day but at least prevent things from getting worse. A lot of what supporting characters say about/to Jeff can easily be read as being about Trump if the audience wishes, but I'd be more overtly interested in characterizing Jeff this way as a means of calling Brian Warner a transparent loser and satirizing the way countercultures reflect the exploitation of the dominant culture. Our heroine's odyssey of looking for authenticity, in its place finding more bullshit, and having to form her own conclusions about what needs to change.
So yeah. That's my elevator pitch. As always, all creations by Annie Trinty are in the public domain. If you liked this post, don't forget to reblog.
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mariipproject1 · 10 months ago
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Ip Idea 1
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Nintendo, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, 2017
While the game The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild has been praised for its breakthroughs in the gaming industry. I myself am a huge fan of the game, but there are defiantly shortcomings of some aspects of the game. Zelda as a franchises has been around since the 90s, and like many games from the time, it came with its controversies. But as time progressed they worked to make many of the characters less controversial.
Many people however were still iffy about the character design choices for the gerudo people (shown above) this group of people are made of only women, and are primarily depicted with darker skin. People have criticized the clothing designs calling them over-sexualized and inaccurate. It almost looks like a distasteful mashup of a ton of different cultures.
One character in particular named Urbosa has been praised for her strength as a well written POC woman. She shows great power and resilience. But even if misrepresentations of cultures isnt intended to be harmful, it still has roos of racism.
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Nintendo, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, 2017
I myself am not of middle eastern decent so I cannot speak fully on this issue. I honestly had no idea of the distaste people had up until very recently. I will defiantly need to continue my research on this topic in the future.
But I think that these designs are extremely noteworthy to my project. It teaches me what not to do, and by doing some more research I think that I can become more proficient in creating ethical and respectful characters that represent a character's ethnic background while still fitting a fantasy setting.
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mari-ip-project · 11 months ago
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Ip Project 1
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Nintendo, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, 2017
While the game The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild has been praised for its breakthroughs in the gaming industry. I myself am a huge fan of the game, but there are defiantly shortcomings of some aspects of the game. Zelda as a franchises has been around since the 90s, and like many games from the time, it came with its controversies. But as time progressed they worked to make many of the characters less controversial.
Many people however were still iffy about the character design choices for the gerudo people (shown above) this group of people are made of only women, and are primarily depicted with darker skin. People have criticized the clothing designs calling them over-sexualized and inaccurate. It almost looks like a distasteful mashup of a ton of different cultures.
One character in particular named Urbosa has been praised for her strength as a well written POC woman. She shows great power and resilience. But even if misrepresentations of cultures isnt intended to be harmful, it still has roos of racism.
Tumblr media
Nintendo, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, 2017
I myself am not of middle eastern decent so I cannot speak fully on this issue. I honestly had no idea of the distaste people had up until very recently. I will defiantly need to continue my research on this topic in the future.
But I think that these designs are extremely noteworthy to my project. It teaches me what not to do, and by doing some more research I think that I can become more proficient in creating ethical and respectful characters that represent a character's ethnic background while still fitting a fantasy setting.
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lincolnchristie · 2 years ago
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Greetings, Mortals
Updated March 2025
I'm Lincoln, scifi/fantasy author. Professional blog of @letmetellyouaboutmyfeels. Follow to get official posts on my novels and find all the memes and random babblings I've made about them.
Feel free to send me asks for questions about my writing! I love talking about my evil little raccoons original characters.
DO NOT DM OR SEND ASKS ON HERE REGARDING FANFICTION. PLEASE GO TO MY MAIN BLOG. THANK YOU.
You can buy my work here at my website in both e-book and paperback. You can buy me a coffee if you're so inclined, or become a feral little jackal on Patreon. Sign up for $5 to get behind-the-scenes stuff, bonus content, and chapter updates. Sign up for $10 to get all that plus I post kitty*.
More detailed Patreon info here. FAQ post here.
As of right now, I do not have any other social media. If that changes, I'll be sure to link the accounts on this post.
Currently available is my poetry collection Manifesto of a Blossoming Supervillain, as well as the first draft my murder mystery fantasy novel A Masque of Shadows, free to read on Ao3. I'll be professionally publishing it once my editor finishes tearing into it with a red pen.
Project Statuses
Actively in Progress:
Horsemen Quartet - post-apocalyptic sci-fi/horror/fantasy mashup - first book complete, writing the other three
A Masque of Shadows - fantasy murder mystery - with editor
Mortal Leviathans - "the dragonfucker series" - first novel outlined, overall character arcs roughly sketched out
In the Wings:
Pack - standalone adult fantasy - outlined
Leitmotif Trilogy - urban science fiction - outlined
Brand of a Witch - standalone high fantasy - underwent a complete overhaul, outlined, new draft halfway written
Dreamscape - standalone urban fantasy - rough outline
Netherworld - standalone fantasy - rough outline
This pinned post will be updated regularly as I progress in my projects.
It's a dream come true to get to share my original works with you all. I'm grateful to all of my supporters and readers, and excited to keep sharing my stories with you.
*pictures of my cats, you pervs, what did you think I meant?
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aion-rsa · 5 years ago
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Sega Reveals Free Streets of Rage/Yakuza Mashup
https://ift.tt/eA8V8J
As part of their 60th-anniversary celebration event, Sega has revealed a free Streets of Rage/Yakuza mashup called Streets Of Kamurocho.
“The death of the Tojo Clan’s Third Chairman has plunged the organization into chaos,” reads a description of the game on its Steam page. “The violence spreads to the streets, and only Kazuma Kiryu and Goro Majima can put an end to the bloodshed!”
While the game isn’t scheduled to be released until October 17, the early footage of the game looks surprisingly solid. Granted, it’s pretty much a Streets of Rage game that just incorporates some Yakuza characters and environments, but it turns out that those two series actually go together quite well. Whether you’re just looking for some old-school beat-em-up gameplay or you want to feast your eyes on an official pixel art rendition of the Yakuza universe, Streets Of Kamurocho looks like a surprisingly well-produced game for what essentially amounts to an Easter egg.
That’s not all that Sega is releasing as part of their anniversary celebrations. On October 15, you’ll be able to download a free copy of Armor of Heroes: a retro tank battling game featuring competitive multiplayer and couch co-op. On October 16, you’ll be able to try out Endless Zone: an action game “inspired by SEGA’s ‘Fantasy Zone‘ series.”
For long-time Sega enthusiasts, though, the most intriguing upcoming anniversary project has to be October 18th’s Golden Axed.
See, about 10 years ago, SEGA Studios Australia was working on 2.5D reboots of the Golden Axe, Altered Beast, and Streets of Rage series. Progress on all of those projects was stopped in 2013 when SEGA Studios Australia was closed, but Golden Axed represents a working version of what the team had built up until that point.
By Sega’s own admission, Golden Axed will be “janky” and “buggy,” but for Sega fans everywhere who long wondered whether these reboots could possibly recapture the magic of some beloved arcade franchises, this game (or, more accurately, demo) will offer a glimpse at what could have been. At the very least, the early footage of the project suggests that the team was walking an interesting path before the project was stopped in its tracks.
If you’d like to learn more about the history of Sega, be sure to check out the recently released (and pretty good) documentary about the early days of the Sega/Nintendo console wars that’s currently available on CBS All Access. As for the future of the company, we’ve heard rumors that they could be one of the studios on Microsoft’s shopping list, but we can tell you that they’re planning on bringing many more games to PC in the near future.
cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });
The post Sega Reveals Free Streets of Rage/Yakuza Mashup appeared first on Den of Geek.
from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/315UF0D
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njawaidofficial · 7 years ago
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Gigi And Zayn Were The Power Couple I Needed To See When I Was Growing Up
https://styleveryday.com/2018/03/15/gigi-and-zayn-were-the-power-couple-i-needed-to-see-when-i-was-growing-up/
Gigi And Zayn Were The Power Couple I Needed To See When I Was Growing Up
Zayn Malik and Gigi Hadid attend the Costume Institute Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 2, 2016, in New York City.
Mike Coppola / Getty Images
I was a little too excited when Zayn Malik and Gigi Hadid first began dating, way, way back in 2015. That was the year Gigi’s modeling career exploded, as she showed up in the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show and Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood” music video. Zayn was in the process of launching his solo career after a dramatic break with One Direction. A romance between two beautiful, successful celebrities isn’t exactly earth-shaking news, and Zayn and Gigi didn’t do anything especially interesting together: They posed in fashion shoots, walked the red carpet together, wore a couples costume for Halloween, and, of course, documented all of it on Instagram.
But what did matter to me is what also fascinated me about them separately: They both have Muslim heritage and are outspoken about how their backgrounds have shaped them. And seeing this desi-Arab-Muslim power couple together, in the pages of the same magazines I had flipped through as a celebrity-obsessed, boy band–loving, Palestinian, Muslim, American teen — looking for Muslim and Arab faces, and finding none — felt like something I had been waiting a long time for.
This week, the couple announced their split after more than two years together, and the breakup was as relatively drama-free as their relationship appeared to be. Zayn described Gigi as an “incredible soul”; in her own statement, Gigi said she was “forever grateful for the love, time, and life lessons.” There was some minor drama over Zayn unfollowing Gigi and her mother, Yolanda Hadid, on Instagram — and the matter of a months-old tattoo of Gigi’s eyes across Zayn’s chest — but as far as celebrity breakups go, this seemed, at least publicly, to be pretty unremarkable.
I wasn’t really heartbroken over the breakup of Gigi and Zayn, the actual people, as much as I was at the end of the idea of their relationship.
I had been so wrapped up in Tuesday morning news that I was genuinely stunned when another editor at work asked if we’d be covering the story, which I’d heard nothing about. And then I was suddenly sad, and then I was mostly embarrassed about being a 31-year-old woman who was this sad about the end of a relationship I wasn’t even in. But I wasn’t really heartbroken over the breakup of Gigi and Zayn, the actual people, as much as I was at the end of the idea of their relationship, and what it had represented to me. They had been so unusual as a fantasy canvas to project the real Muslim romances I’d grown up watching onto: Zayn and Gigi were the couple that sat too close at Muslim Student Association meetings; they were the desi and Arab pair kept apart by cultural differences; the teenagers ducking into cars together when they’ve told their parents they’ve gone to the mosque. Their celebrity realities were miles away from any of ours, but they had backgrounds that made them blank slates for our versions of sweet, unremarkable, all-American stories.
Coverage of Gigi and Zayn, together or separately, meant seeing things like Eid al-Adha — a major Muslim holiday — casually mentioned in publications like People and E! Online after they marked it by taking a selfie with their mothers. Eid al-Adha was a regular part of the United States I grew up in, a day when my family spent time together, exchanged presents, bought new clothes, and ate way too much, and now, it’s also when we post smiling selfies to social media. To see these celebrities doing the same, and to see a note about the holiday in the media coverage of them — free of any offensive, hand-wringing debate over whether or not there are too many Muslims in the US — still feels remarkable.
Instagram: @yolanda
As a child and throughout my teens, I struggled to find myself reflected in the pop culture around me. Even though I was in elementary school, my dad would turn off my cartoons and watch coverage of the Gulf War with me, and the news seemed to be the only place where I would see Arabs and Muslims. Most of my favorite TV shows, like Full House, Rugrats, and later Dawson’s Creek and Friends, featured mainly white characters — which helped form the idea that uncomplicated lives were not written for people like me. I was so hungry for representation that when Aladdin came out in 1992, the movie — even as a racist mashup of generally Eastern cultures — was revolutionary for me. It was my first time seeing fun, popular characters even remotely representative of my family’s culture; I became so obsessed that I tried to convince my parents to rename me Yasmine.
But after Aladdin, it was a long, empty road for Muslim representation in the mainstream, especially after 9/11. And I just accepted that I would never fully relate to the white heroines in my favorite books ��� Little Women, the Sweet Valley High series, the Baby-Sitters Club series, The Princess Diaries. A few years ago, I spoke to one of my high school’s librarians and asked him why we never had many books by Arab or Muslim authors. He told me that we never asked for them. It was strange to think that the weight would have been placed on me — a child — to ask for stories that would speak to me. After all, how many white, Christian teenagers have to actually ask librarians for books written about characters who look like them? But everything around me taught me that stories about girls like me simply did not exist. An awkward, opinionated Muslim girl would not roam Bayside High’s halls, nor would she ever serve as Dawson Leary’s out-of-reach love interest.
Me dressed up for Eid, with my Jasmine doll on the table.
courtesy of Sara Yasin
That applied to the heartthrobs I fantasized about, too: I was obsessed with boy bands as a teen. While I was mostly loyal to NSYNC, I was easily wooed by any group of young men with coordinated outfits and dance moves. These young men I dreamed about were carefully constructed to cater to my desires as a teenage girl — and most of them were white. I fantasized about the Justin Timberlakes and Brian Littrells of the world, and would always attempt to stamp out the tiny voice that wondered how they might feel about a fan who was Muslim.
By the time One Direction had become the biggest boy band in the world, I felt too old to be obsessed with them in the same way. But I still found joy in listening to their songs, and it had a lot to do with Zayn. He wasn’t necessarily vocal about his Muslim and Pakistani roots while he was in One Direction, but I didn’t love the real Zayn so much as I loved what he could have been to me, back when I was a teenager: the halal crush that I could dream of introducing to my parents, that would have made me feel like my heritage and my world were as commonplace as anyone else’s. There was something incredible about seeing a Muslim man not only become famous but become a sex symbol — seeing a Muslim name like “Zayn Malik” on a thirsty, hot-pink poster sold to teenage girls, rather than on a terror alert.
While Gigi also has a Muslim father, what drew me to her is the fact that she’s Palestinian — and vocal about how proud she is of her background. I first came across her in 2014, when I noticed a photo shoot she did paying tribute to Anna Wintour’s first Vogue cover as editor-in-chief, in 1988, which featured Israeli model Michaela Bercu. Some wondered if Vogue was making a (quiet) political statement about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by featuring Gigi years later, especially since the photos came soon after the last deadly war in Gaza.
Vogue breezily referenced Gigi’s heritage, and in many ways, that’s Gigi’s approach too: She doesn’t explain or justify the fact that she’s Palestinian; it’s just a part of who she is. When she won Glamour’s “Woman of the Year” award last year, she referred to her father as a “refugee from Palestine” in her acceptance speech. Mohamed Hadid is vocal about the conflict, as well as his heritage. Both Gigi and her sister, Bella, also a model, have spoken about how their father’s background has shaped them, and last year, the sisters joined a protest against Trump’s controversial travel ban.
Gigi Hadid wears a keffiyeh-patterned jacket at a 2014 Chanel event in New York City.
Stefanie Keenan / Getty Images
You could argue that Gigi’s outspokenness is made much easier by the fact that, for the most part, she gets to decide when she wants to remind you that she’s a Palestinian — a luxury that her ex does not have. Zayn faced racism even in the days when he wasn’t as vocal about being Muslim or Pakistani, whether that was from anti-Muslim pundits like Debbie Schlussel warning that he was “pimping” Islam to young girls, or Bill Maher making a joke comparing him to one of the Boston marathon bombers.
Hadid has slammed anti-Muslim bigotry, but she has also made some big stumbles herself, like a video from 2017 showing her mocking Asians on her sister’s Instagram story. But even that is part of what’s so familiar about her to me; missteps like this were commonplace in my own Muslim community, where people had blinders on when it came to addressing inequalities that weren’t their own.
Of course, Gigi and Zayn’s ability to move with an ease that isn’t afforded to others with similar heritage is mostly a testament to the privilege that comes with fame, beauty, and wealth, rather than any huge symbol of progress. Desi-Arab-Muslim power couples aren’t going to unravel the prejudices that these groups have faced in the US — that will probably have a lot more to do with accepting that what it means to be an American is a diverse, ever-changing thing. Not long ago, I was waxing poetic about the Hadids while visiting a relative, and the significance of their visibility as Palestinian-Americans, and she sighed and asked when she would be accepted as an American as she is: a devout, hijab-wearing Muslim immigrant.
Gigi Hadid (center) with, from left, her sister Bella, mother Yolanda, father Mohamed, and his fiancé, Shiva Safai, at a party in Paris in 2016.
Dimitrios Kambouris / Getty Images
I always say that I grew up in Disneyland Palestine: a suburban, North Carolina street dotted with relatives and other Palestinian immigrant families who came together to re-create a version of their homeland for their American children. Being Palestinian was about having way too many cousins, an infuriating surveillance network of nosy aunties, dancing to corny music videos that came on our Arabic satellite television stations, and, of course, eating typically Palestinian meals like musakhan — huge, soft wheels of bread doused in olive oil, topped with sumac, roasted pine nuts, fried onions, and chicken. For me, particularly as a child, my parents’ Palestinian heritage was about all of these things, just as much as it was about knowing our histories and, of course, understanding the conflict with Israel.
But in the US, being Palestinian is rarely viewed outside of the lense of that conflict. And while it is deeply intertwined with being a Palestinian, particularly in a situation that is ongoing and ever-deteriorating, viewing us through that alone has helped dehumanize us entirely. We can never just live, and that’s what the Hadids do: They’re public, Palestinian figures who lead splashy, “ordinary” Hollywood lives. And seeing a family with roots similar to my own become the fodder for ordinary, superficial celebrity gossip coverage — seeing their daughter, who just happens to be a supermodel, date a British and Pakistani boy, who just happens to be a pop star — was remarkable in its own completely unremarkable way. In a country where it’s a reasonable thing for a politician to suggest that Palestinians don’t even exist, that visibility matters.
While Gigi and Zayn’s split doesn’t make them less meaningful, in terms of what they represent, it does mean an end to a Hollywood romance that seemed to be written just for me. More than two years is a long time for celebrities, and of course, Just Like Us: They Grow Apart! I am still a little sad, but I’m realizing that there was a kind of joy in watching a romance — that just happened to involve two Muslim celebrities — blossom, and then fade out, like any other. ●
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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Making (mostly) dudes for the fantasy story which has NOT been abandoned! I've actually gotten a few chapters written, but I honestly want a little more cushion before I start posting it for real!
This will be the second group of ASIAF-based sims, all Northerners who find their own way into the new world. I haven't quite decided how Jae, the lone woman, ends up with them yet. I'm torn between her being a widow and her being the lover of one of the men. Either way she will be preggers.
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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Do you want to contribute to my upcoming sims story?
Great!
A scene requires several skyrim-inspired characters that will only be featured in that chapter - these are friends/family members to characters within the story so might feature in flashbacks. I could make them myself, but I thought it would be fun to have sims created by the community instead.
These characters can be any race within the game (as long as it's appropriate and not already indicated) though please include any CC you use!
Nord Stormcloak (male)
Imperial (male)
Dragonborn (female)
Member of the Companions (either)
Winterhold Wizard (either)
Leader of the Thieves Guild (either)
Leader of the Dark Brotherhood (female)
Bard (female)
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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More characters in the upcoming Nothing story. These six are Aes Sedai, from the world of The Wheel of Time.
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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This didn't really have a place in the story, but I thought it was sweet. Consider this an outtake from my upcoming sims story :)
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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Two more skyrim sims! I did my best on the Dunmer - I don't have the right ear sliders to get super elf-y but I think they're okay? The second sim is another Nord, meant to be a wizard which is why she has funky hair that I never get to use.
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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Some more characters for the story, these ones from Skyrim.
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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Last few members of the WOT group - the largest of the starter groups!
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clouseplayssims · 7 months ago
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A bunch of warders to the Aes Sedai I shared before, as well as a random Two Rivers girly and an Ogier.
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clouseplayssims · 11 months ago
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Emphyria Cassel, 15 years old.
I didn't change Emphyria's face at all because I love it. I gave her some moles and some curls because curly hair is pretty much the only real descriptive term for the known Cassel family members in the series.
It's probably odd to have a Northern girl serving as a lady-in-waiting, but is Sansa can end up in King's Landing so can Phyria!
Other than thinking she might be a little bit impish and proud., I don't have much of an idea about Phyria yet. She is on the younger end of her group, but definitely not the youngest.
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