#(i am there for THE DRAMA. for the SOAP OPERA. just tell me who died this time so i can update my chart of Dramatic Persons)

[nostalgia-tblr]

in fic news i realised that i've accidentally commited myself to several scenes of jotunn!sylvie porn rather than just the one that i'd initially added mainly for the weirdness factor

[suhmayzooka]

brooding batdad and his slightly more emotionally intelligent robins

"i don’t mind being a team with solo careers. in fact, i want it that way... maybe i’ll avoid what dick grayson went through—forced to leave just to find out who i am... so i don’t need to be at your side every time. just don’t freeze me out completely.”

“never.”

in this issue (batman #526) alfred comments that bruce has been working alone lately, and this is in the wake of knightfall so we’re all concerned with bruce overworking himself. bruce admits he’s still grieving jason 

and is concerned tim robin is a liability on the field (bruce: “maybe i’m still affected, being too cautious, but whether the problem is tim or me, robin can be a distraction”)  because crime’s getting more dangerous and he won’t lose another robin again dammit

turns out he knew tim was within earshot of this but since it’s so emotionally vulnerable he would rather discuss his deep feelings via facilitating tim’s eavesdropping instead of, like, talking to tim directly. of note this is like 10 issues after prodigal where the climax of that was dick and bruce's Moment

“i didn’t have the right to call you back” “...the right? i’d die for you, bruce.” (ಥ﹏ಥ) 

“but that’s the way it always is, isn’t it? between fathers and sons.” yeah okay this is like one of my favorite scenes ever and ive only been in this fandom for a few months and my heart’s skewered IS THIS WHAT YOU WANT DC

and then two of my other fav scenes of (1) dick yelling at bruce for making jason robin only for bruce to admit that he was lonely after dick left and (2) dick yelling at bruce after jason died only to get bruce’s fist in his face. 

(side note, yes obviously it is not good to hit your kids and i cringe whenever bruce lifts a hand to hit them but he’s very distressed and the grief the pain the angst the hurt it’s so RAW this is why people like soap operas, we want DRAMA. unless the comic’s written by one of the... less good writers... there’s narrative reason for bruce to hit his kids. i won’t get into where i stand on the “is bruce an abusive father” discourse)

back to batman 526, ofc a few pages later batman and robin defeat the bad guys and tim takes the initiative on the ride home to tell bruce his feelings

god i love this family the robins are so integral to bruce as a character and as a person, they force him into these uncomfortable Emotionally Vulnerable moments where he has to admit that he has feelings. honestly i think bruce wouldve died a few years into the job without robin but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

there’s the constant pattern of bruce acting out like this, pushing the robins away out of his own grief and fear and pain, and it’s especially explicit here with him quietly trying to keep tim away because he’s not over jason, and never will be. it’s just something i find interesting about bruce’s character—pushing people away not because he’s the cold brooding bat but because he’s scared to lose them. it's all trauma

i do appreciate tim flat out stating that he’s fine working more as a team with individual solo careers—that’s how i personally see and prefer the batfamily, rather than one group that has to be together for every case 24/7, but to each their own

anyway i have no thesis or anything, it’s like 10pm and i just finished class and wanted to vomit my bat feelings into the tumblr void

[absolutepokemontrash]

The Brothers and Side Characters Play the Sims

I don’t know what possessed me to make this but WHATEVER. I’ve been playing the Sims since I was a wee little girl, and I’ve seen my fair share of weird Sims stuff that I feel would fit these bozos perfectly.

My Sims have a Functional Family Life Because I Don’t (Lucifer)

God dammit Levi’s obsessed with another game... ugh.

Spends 5 minutes in Create-a-Sim and hops into a starter home.

Lucifer’s the type to start with all the average stuff and then build their stuff up as his sim gets promotions.

It’s just... so peaceful...

...he’s adopting a dog.

Look at his new little virtual family... his sim-kids are self sufficient and getting A’s in school, his Sim spouse MC or Diavolo take your pick loves his Sim-self, his sim-dog-

WAIT NO- THE DOG’S AN ELDER?!

AAAAAAAAAAAAA-

...

He’s fine. It was just a virtual dog. *sniffle*

He’s now spending his free time drinking Demonus and playing the Sims.

What’s a mod? Levi why does your sim have gun?

Behold, My Gorgeous Home... It’s a Box (Mammon)

Mammon, like the rest of the HOL, is mooching off of Levi’s Origin account.

“AW SHIT! This house looks awesome! I’m gonna build it for Sim-me to live in!”

Mammon proceeds to build a box with rooms. Yay...

He just picks the funnest sounding job if he picks any job at all for his Sim. That’s how he ended up making 9 dollars an hour in the criminal career.

Didn’t stop Mammon from buying that solid gold bathroom set from Get Famous... a box with solid gold bathrooms.

His Sim is broke send help-

“Leviiiiiii my sim needs money... the people my sim kidnapped and is forcing to paint aren’t making enough money...” “Ugh... press control shift C and type ‘motherlode’.”

...Levi made a mistake.

“FUCK YEAH! MOTHERLODE!”

His sim’s life is so chaotic, he has a piranha pool that his sim has almost died in twice, the sim is carrying on several torrid love affairs, his sim got struck by lightning, his sim has nearly died in a grilled cheese making accident twice... in the same day.

At least once Sim-Mammon and Sim-MC get married things calm down a little.

Mammon finds out what custom content is and proceeds to download EVERYTHING HE CAN FIND.

And now he’s asking Levi why his computer is running so slow.

Expansion Pack King (Leviathan)

He got into it back when the Sims 2 was new, he’s a veteran fan.

“Bro remember when Agnes Crumplebottom would show up and whack the shit out of your sims if they were flirting?”

“Remember when that witch would show up randomly on the lot you were on if you had Makin’ Magic?”

“Remember when Bella Goth was abducted by aliens and we just... didn’t question it?”

He whines about the Sims4 and how crappy it is but still buys every expansion pack, game pack, and stuff pack.

This boy watches like 40 hours of built tutorials and ends up sobbing over his weird roofs.

“WHY DOESN’T IT LOOK AS NICE AS THE ONE I’M LOOKING AT?! THIS ISN’T FAIR!”

The mod folder is so full istg-

Levi gets custom content for the sole purpose of making his favourite fictional characters.

This is why Henry and the Lord of Shadows are married and Ruri-chan and Sim-Levi are roommates.

Oh my god they were roommates-

Levi also added his brothers to the world and uh... Sim-Mammon died in a tragic pool accident F.

Levi then proceeded to befriend the Grim Reaper.

He’s anxiously awaiting the release of Paralives.

Wait Gameplay? In This Build Simulator? (Satan)

Satan’s here to build and leave. Gameplay who?

Our favourite bundle of rage is a master architect and the amount of followers on the Gallery he has shows it.

He takes up those build shell challenges and always ends up making them look positively perfect.

Asmo’s always using his houses, and Satan often takes requests when he gets bored.

No Mammon, he reserves the right to refuse to build a golden castle for you- YOUR SIM HAS 40 SIMOLEONS-

No mods, no CC, he’s building with what EA gave him.

...and EA gave him debug objects, and he’s not going to explain how to get them.

The one time he did actually play with a family... it was one sim and seven cats.

He tries to play without cheats... and ends up getting frustrated and turns on cheats.

All hail the Pets Expansion Pack.

Custom Content Soap Opera (Asmodeus)

Asmo spends 5 hours in Create a Sim then just... clicks out of the game.

That’s how it goes most of the time, buuuuuut when he gets super invested in a family he’s made, boy howdy is he INVESTED.

Sim A is carrying on an affair with Sim C who’s in love with Sim B who’s married to Sim A but Sim D wants to kill Sim A and C even though they’re the illegitimate child of Sim C-

When Asmo realizes that in the Sims 4 he needs to manufacture all the drama himself and he can’t just sit back with a glass of wine and watch the fireworks, he switches to the Sims 2 and 3.

“...why is this old lady beating up my Sim..?”

He immediately recoils in horror upon seeing how ugly the Sims are pre Sims4.

HE NEEDS TO FIX THIS-

Ah, there we go, perfect. Custom Content to the rescue!

He ends up remaking the entire world just so he doesn’t have to look at weird looking Sims.

Asmo is the only one to have finished a proper Legacy Challenge, but it gets crazy chaotic after gen 3.

“My sim just got abducted by aliens and now he’s pregnant- WHAT?!”

He has about 40 saves and only two he actually plays.

Just a Big Ol’ Happy Family (Beelzebub)

Beel found the game, proceeded to make everyone in create-a-sim to the best of his abilities, and made everyone get along.

That’s why Sim-Lucifer and Sim-Belphie are on a swing set together, they’re friends :D

“Hey Luke do you think you can make this?” “I-is that a cake shaped like a hamburger?” “Yes. Please make.”

He took one look at the cooking options and decided to max out his Sim’s cooking skill to unlock all the options.

Beel proceeded to drool all over his keyboard. Gross...

Boy howdy did he have some crazy dinner suggestions!

Overall, very wholesome Sim-life, except for the time Sim-Levi died because the toilet caught fire, don’t worry, Sim-Beel knows how to make ambrosia.

All is good in the Sim save...

...until Sim-Beel ate pufferfish nigiri and fuckin died-

Wait Did I Not Pause- (Belphie)

Huh, this game looks fine... I’ll play for a little- *SNORE*

Belphie makes some sims, plops them into a starter home, plays for an hour, then falls asleep.

He wakes up five hours later to absolute carnage.

Three sims have died because someone decided to make Mac and Cheese and the oven caught fire, the kids were taken away by social services, and the dog ran away.

“...heheh, holy shit everyone look.”

He doesn’t play often, but when he does, death occurs. He has found out every death method for every game from Sims 2 to 4.

And that INCLUDES the Sims Medieval! You guys remember that game?

Sometimes it’s not intentional, but Belphie got bored with the totally normal life his sims were living and decided to spice it up.

“Why are the ghosts breaking my showers..?”

Help There’s a Bug- (Diavolo)

The Crown Prince started playing when he noticed Lucifer was playing it.

He was immediately obsessed.

Dia mostly plays the Sims Medieval because he likes the feeling of achievement after completing a quest!

“Barbatos... why isn’t my Sim completing their task? The icon won’t show up.” “My lord it appears the game is bugged.” “:(“

No one thought to tell Diavolo that EA doesn’t plan on offering bug support to a game made in like... 2009

This doesn’t matter! Look at how great his kingdom is doing- oh no his hero has the plague-

He plays through the Pirates and Nobles expansion and manages to get the peaceful ending, he’s so proud of himself.

“MC! Look! My Monarch’s sword is permanently on fire and I’m fighting an evil wizard!”

When he does play the other Sims games he’s pretty basic, though, he does a great job at furnishing!

Dia gets crazy sad when his Sims die... he turns off aging.

Builder no. 2 (Barbatos)

Barbie doesn’t have time for this... but when he does, he builds.

No create a sim.

No playing the game as intended.

Just builds.

It’s relaxing, okay? A nice little suburban house he’s never going to play in, maybe a treehouse, maybe a big Hollywood Mansion...

The only time he actually plays the game outside of build mode is when someone needs his help to fix something in-game.

He does download custom content build items if he feels bored by the current selection.

Oh Crap What Am I Doing?! (Simeon)

Help him. Please.

He’s so confused.

“Luke, why is my sim upset?” “He’s hungry, Simeon.” “Oh, how do I fix that?” “...Simeon-”

There’s a toilet in the middle of the living room.

The fridge is facing the wall.

There’s no bathtub or shower.

The house is on fire- there is no god- AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-

Okay, once he gets the hang of it he’s sitting pretty. His sims have good jobs, the kids are getting good grades, everything’s fine.

...

But Simeon won’t forget the nightmares.

What Even is This Save? (Solomon)

Solomon’s save is the definition of chaos.

One sim’s a vampire, the other is a spellcaster that really wants to fight the Callientes for some reason, there’s one normal sim that’s always sick for some reason,

It gets weird, confusing, and horrible.

Just how Solomon likes it.

His house makes no sense, like, what even is architecture?

Money cheats are needed because Solomon‘a goal of chaos and confusion is proving to be kind of expensive.

Square up Mortimer Goth, Solomon’s sims are here to steal your weird knight statue that’s worth a shit ton of simoleons for NO REASON.

He joined the scientist career for the sole purpose of getting to the alien planet and kidnapping adding an alien to the household via cheats.

The vampire ended up dying on their wedding day because Solomon forgot that he gave them the sun weakness.

Oh well, the ghost got added to the household! VAMPIRE GHOST!

The Child (Luke)

Before you say Luke’s too young to play the Sims, you should know that I was nine when I first started playing, and I turned out fiiiiiiiiiine.

He’s just happy to be playing.

Look, his sims are gardening :D

Look, two of them are getting married :D

Look, they had a baby :D

Look, his sims are building a rocket ship :D

Look, his sims’s rocket just crashed-

The concept of death hit the little angel right in the face that day.

“*sniffle*... my sims...”

Don’t worry, with tears in his eyes, Luke quit without saving and everything was fine!

Speaking of My Sims, Luke played MySims Sky Heroes and that was when Luke had his first bout of gamer rage.

MC came over to hang out with Solomon and Simeon, and in the distance they could just hear:

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN MY TIME WASN’T FAST ENOUGH TO CONTINUE THE STORY!? I’LL SHOW YOU FAST ENOUGH TIME!”

Okay, maybe Simeon should take the game away... just for a bit... he should take heed not to be bitten by the incredibly angry chihuahua.

Bonus:

MC: Why are our Sims married?

*Insert Boy Here*: Uh... that’s weird... I have no clue why they’re doing that...

[percys-tits]

Of all the percy x dilf ships, do you have a favorite? And if that's the case, which one and why? Just curious!

omg this is so hard how could i possibly choo—its Fredercy. Frederick/Percy. basically my otp at this point and i think about them near daily ngl

okay so the way i approach shipping is i take my fav and go “congrats youre whore now. get ready to be fucked by literally every single male character” and that’s really it. can yall guess who that character is for me? 🌊🐬

in a ship i look for (aside from my fav obvi) 1) funny 2) hot and 3) drama. Fredercy is literally all four. it has potential i am telling yall

first of all the idea of percy being surrounded by literal gods and modern day heroes, looking at this middle aged man and going “yup thats the one 🥵” is endlessly funny. pure comedy. also you could get real light hearted with it and it basically becomes a sitcom

second they are like the classic sexual fantasy. older man/younger man, daddy/twink (ddlg if you wanna go there), secret relationship, cheating, etc. its everything

how you characterize offers so much btw. like just one scenario: they have a tension between them and Percy is down bad and fully ready bust it wide open for his girlfriends dad. like Percy is lowkey a slut and Frederick is an Older Man That Was Nice To Him™. so they inevitably end up fucking and Frederick is super guilty. he tells himself it wont ever happen again but get this: he’s hooked. he got a taste of that perussy and he wants more. all it takes is a look from across the table and suddenly he’s in the bathroom balls deep in his daughters boyfriend.

and thats just one scenario. you could have Frederick be a pervert actually and be the one seducing. its a sea of possibilities. percybilities.

as for #4…do i need to explain how fucking mess this shit can get? like this is some fucking soap opera shit and im living for it.

like omg imagine its a friends with benefits thing but then Frederick learns Percy sleeps around and he get jealous. and he like “wait wtf why am i jealous? i should absolutely not be jealous” BUT HE IS. suddenly its more than just sex BUT IT CANT BE MORE FOR SO MANY REASONS IT CANNOT BE MORE MCGWGAFSJDK

WORDS 👏 CANNOT 👏 DESCRIBE 👏 how much i love that dynamic. like im dead. i died.

anyway so yeah there you go anon. thats my fav percyxdilfs ship

[seerofmike]

The Writing In Apex Kinda Sucks And Also They Use Ship Bait As A Plot Device I Hate It Here

a stupid essay/rant encouraged by @zombiegloss that originally started as a youtube video script so if its like. weird at points. this was intended to be a verbal rant SNZISKSIA

basically i'm gonna talk abt the caustic-wattson-crypto relationship drama and how i think it was mishandled and how much the writers kind of Suck because i Can

you are free to disagree with me on any of my points and think that this aspect of the story was handled well, this is just my opinion, and i'd love to hear your thoughts and counterpoints !

first, addressing some things:

i know this is a battle royale and not necessarily a story-based game, so i can’t expect it to have masterful witcher-style writing.

but with the direction the game seems to be going; putting quests, evolving interactions, and comics in the game, plus coming out with a lore book and hinting at something bigger in the future, i think it’s fair to criticize it for lackluster writing, especially since what i’m criticizing has been something present since Apex’s story technically began.

secondly, i am not a professional writer. i’m a high schooler who writes as a hobby. i don’t have the decades of experience that some of the apex writers do, and i can’t claim to be a better writer than they are--but i also don’t have to be a five-star chef to realize that something tastes bad. when i critique something and give suggestions, i am not saying i could’ve done it better. i’m just bringing up what i think could have worked.

third, before i upset anyone , when i say a relationship is badly written, i’m not telling you that you can’t ship it or that your ship sucks. i’ll briefly touch on the shipping aspect of this and how it’s a detriment to the story but Ye

okay, so with that out of the way, let us Begin

relationships are often the emotional core of a story, and how strong your reaction is to conflict in these relationships depends on how the story sets them up. if you want the audience to care about these characters and what they go through, you need to develop them and establish the type of relationship they have well. it’s why so many people cried in the last episode of telltale’s the walking dead. you’ve spent roughly 12 hours bonding with clementine and protecting her, and your relationship with her is part of several story beats as well as character beats for lee. 

when these two characters’ relationship reaches its peak at the end of the game, it’s powerful, and it’s emotional. you care. you feel something, and the fact that you have to choose what to do to lee only makes it more gut-wrenching. 

now, the walking dead is entirely story-based and especially character-driven, so it may be unfair to compare it to apex, but i just wanted to lay the groundwork down for what i think is a strong relationship that makes you feel something when conflict arrives, in this case the conflict being lee getting bit and clementine having to decide his fate.

the broken ghost in general is kind of not-good sometimes, tom casiello previously wrote for soap operas and you can really, REALLY tell sometimes.

this story feels like it should’ve taken place a little later, and that we should’ve had a season to actually set up the characters and their relationships, but that’s a story for another day.

to put it bluntly, the set-up for the crypto, wattson, and caustic conflict is done poorly. for caustic and wattson's relationship it’s a little better, but not by much. 

wattson and caustic having a relationship was hinted at in season 2, when her lore indicated that caustic was among one of the Legends who comforted her after her father died. In season four lore materials posted on Twitter, an email from Jacob Young states that Caustic is acting paternal towards Wattson. In season five, interactions get added to the Game, and this is the first time we actually see their relationship in action, as they have unique revive voice lines for each other. in the quests, when wattson is injured, caustic lashes out at loba and attacks her out of what seems to be anger at wattson’s current state.

Side Note this plot point was really stupid and done for cheap drama because she literally wakes up like two chapters later and they don’t even give her anything to say it’s just suddenly oh yeah crypto and wattson are working together. the same exact injury thing happens to octane later but nobody gIVES A SHIT because again, it’s just cheap soap opera drama.

their relationship might seem a little bit sudden for anyone who wasn’t on top of twitter lore drops, but like, it’s okay, i guess. i’ll give it the slightest credit for at least establishing something between the two in terms of voice lines and stuff, even if for some it might seem like it came out of nowhere.

what did come out of nowhere, though, was crypto and wattson’s friendship. in the quests, crypto and wattson are tasked with rebuilding the broken ghost because of their respective skills, and they’re seen talking in chapter six while they work on it. we’re not really given a clear timeline on how long the story in the broken ghost is, but i think it takes about a week, maybe.

unlike wattson and caustic, their relationship has been given absolutely zero material to work with before now, not even a passing glance in the trailers--which is a little weird considering crypto took down the repulsor tower and destroyed wattson’s home, but. Whatever.

tl dr of the chapter: crypto and wattson talk to each other while doing nerd shit, crypto laughs at wattson’s bad pun, and then suddenly they’re BESTIEEEES, until a couple dozen lines later in the same chapter. then they’re Not.

crypto’s drone gets hacked by revenant while everyone was kind of on edge after the reveal of a spy in their midst, he gets framed as the spy by caustic, anddddd wattson gets upset.

before i get into how dumb this storyline is, i’m gonna talk about the set-up to this conflict.

we have been given no reason to believe that these characters have ever talked to each other, and quite frankly, their friendship doesn’t really make sense.

ignoring the fact that crypto destroyed wattson’s home--which she probably doesn’t know about, so that’s forgiven for now--crypto is a paranoid guy. in the lore book he makes people stand on fucking footprints in his house so he can scan them for weapons and listening devices, and he apparently doesn’t stick around much after the games and nobody knows anything about him because he doesn’t talk to them.

a key part of crypto’s story is the fact that he is undercover and afraid of anyone finding out anything about him ever. him becoming friends with wattson kind of comes out of the blue, and we’re not even given a reason as to why they supposedly became close in the first place. i would kind of understand if like, maybe he draws parallels with her and mila in his mind and it makes him open up a little more, but that doesn’t happen. he just laughs at her joke and suddenly they’re friends.

maybe they’re trying to go for this ‘wattson can become friends with anybody’ angle, kind of hinted at with caustic but not really we’ll get into that, but that also? kind of doesn’t make sense since so many of her voice lines straight-up say she doesn’t understand people and electricity is more her thing, but honestly, she also does have those really friendly elements in her voice lines too, so its not as egregious as what they did with crypto.

their sudden out-of-the-blue friendship would’ve been fine if they spent a little more time fleshing it out, and giving us something to work with, but instead, the story immediately tries to rip it apart and frame it as this grand conflict where crypto is framed as the mole, crypto then accuses caustic, and wattson feels betrayed.

except it doesn’t really work, because we don’t give a shit. for several reasons. 

one: crypto and wattson became friends and then ended their friendship in the same exact chapter. they did not speak to each other onscreen until this chapter began, you can read the entire quest on the wiki and see for yourself that their interactions up until that point were nonexistent aside from mentions in the narration that they were building something together.

the reason wattson feels betrayed is kind of stupid too. why does she really care that much if one of them betrayed loba? nobody else really cared about the fact that one of them was a spy, in fact, nobody even seems to like loba that much, and they just found out that loba’s been lying to them this whole time, and wattson was conscious for that conversation and had a speaking line, so she’s fully aware of the situation. 

maybe it’s just like, the idea that one of them lied, but that’s still kind of a weak reason. 

this entire betrayal thing is just dumb, and it gets even worse when you realize that there could have been an actual legitimate reason for wattson to feel betrayed by crypto--even if it still would’ve come across as weak conflict because of their newly established friendship, it would’ve made more sense than this. 

Crypto destroyed Wattson’s home. He took down the tower and then all the flyers and stuff invaded Kings Canyon and made it their bitch. Not only that, but Wattson considers the Syndicate her family. The Syndicate are the very people who framed Crypto for murder and he’s trying to take them down. 

They could’ve set up actual conflict with these things, and it almost seemed like they would, because Caustic briefly brings up that Crypto could be working with Revenant because he has something against the Syndicate but then that doesn’t really go anywhere and we’re just back to Wattson feeling betrayed because either Crypto or Caustic was a spy and she doesn’t know who.

Weak conflict could’ve been made better by a strong relationship and a weak relationship could’ve still been interesting with strong conflict, but both the relationship between Crypto and Wattson and the conflict that drives them splitting up as friends were really weak and didn’t make much sense. 

It would’ve been ten times more interesting if Wattson found out Crypto ruined her home, the arena she grew up in, and was now participating in the Games to take out the people she regards as her family. That’s where her distrust could’ve manifested and conflict could’ve began, but instead it was the stupid betraying loba thing. why do you care. you just started talking to this guy like 2 hours ago.

also caustic’s whole reason for framing crypto feels stupid as fuck. he didn’t just frame crypto randomly, he framed him specifically because he doesn't want him to influence wattsob because he likes her Big Brain, but this is the FIRST time we have seen those two interact. 

what influence is he talking about? wraith and wattson have been shown to be friendly with each other in the trailers, according to tom’s tweets, and in the story too so why doesn’t he frame her? at this point the audience had slightly more build-up for those two’s relationship than crypto and wattson and a betrayal storyline would’ve felt a little more deserved if still weak.

this is the point where i briefly want to touch upon shipping, and the fact that part of this conflict feels driven by shipbait. 

aside from their relationship coming out of nowhere and the writers trying to make the stakes seem high and deeply emotional to the characters involved (despite this essentially being the first time they’ve ever interacted) tom casiello literally addresses shippers in a tweet regarding chapter seven, and as the story between these characters progresses, it becomes clear to me, at least that the crypto-wattson thing is just bait for shippers, and it’s lazy. 

it’s easy to get away with giving your characters little to no relationship development if you’re just counting on shippers to do the heavy mental lifting for you

why should i put any effort into making this relationship seem believable? people are going to see a young guy and a young girl having bare minimum interaction and assume there’s romantic interest! then i don’t have to do any work, see look, it’s a ready-made relationship wrapped in a bow for me! all that’s left for me to do is give them conflict so i can keep teasing shippers with lines like ‘you never deserved her’!

i think it’s reasonable for me to suspect shipbait, since tom casiello likes doing darksparks shipbait on twitter, and i’m like, eighty percent sure mirage and bloodhound suddenly being childhood friends in the book is shipbait too, because these characters were the number one ship in apex for a long time despite little to no interaction, and then all of a sudden in the lore book they’re childhood friends despite this literally never being mentioned before?

like bloodhound is set up to be mysterious and nobody knows what they look like, or where they’re from, or who their family is--except for mirage Apparently, who played with them when he was a kid on their home planet, and has seen them with their mask off, because bloodhound did not wear a mask when their parents were still alive.

its weird.

i’m pretty sure they’ve said somewhere they were working on this book before apex even came out, so i could just be completely wrong and they always planned for mirage and bloodhound to know each other, but if that’s the case, why did they never mention it like they did octane and lifeline?

i refuse to believe MIRAGE never brought it up either like ‘heeeeyy bloodhound remember when we used to throw eggs at our parents lab haha wanna go do to that to bangalore’s room’ 

[silence]

‘good talk buddy’

ANYWAYS I GOT OFF TOPIC. POINT IS, shipping is a detriment to the story because the writers don’t feel like they actually have to put any work into establishing or developing the relationship between characters when they know the community’s just going to do it for them anyways, and that they can put in shipbait and it’s fine and it makes sense when it really doesn’t.

imagine watching captain america civil war after not seeing a single other marvel movie.

why would you care about the avengers splitting up or tony and steve butting heads or steve’s commitment to bucky? you wouldn’t care, at least not as much as someone who’s seen all the movies and knows the relationship between the characters and why the sokovia accords exist in the first place. you don’t have context and you don’t have any reason to be emotionally invested in these characters’ relationship.

 this feels like that. the writers tried to squeeze this relationship and stuff into a single chapter and we don’t fucking care unless we were already invested in the idea of their relationship (shippers) because we barely spent any time with it.

so to summarize this little section, the set-up of this storyline Kinda Sucks! crypto and wattson barely seem to know each other, because we the audience barely saw them together and the writers are relying on shipbait in place of a relationship.

wattson and caustic are a little better but not great, but the conflict is stupid and it only gets stupider.

moving onto summarizing the rest of the broken ghost, gibraltar and caustic talk, caustic LITERALLY confesses to being the mole and says he framed crypto so he couldn’t corrupt wattson and to appear innocent because his identity was suspected, then that wraps up the season storyline.

season six begins with new voice lines, where wattson has had enough of crypto and caustic’s shit and is all passive-aggressive and going ‘this doesn’t change anything’. she has to decide who to trust, and how to figure out The Truth for herself because she’s not a little girl anymore. crypto and caustic are both trying to convince her they’re innocent and it creates some interesting conflict.

just kidding. it’s terrible conflict. you want to know why?

BECAUSE GIBRALTAR TRIED TO TELL HER THE TRUTH, RIGHT AFTER THE SEASON 5 QUEST HAPPENED, AND SHE LITERALLY REFUSED TO HEAR IT.

LIKE THERE’S A SEASON 6 LOADING SCREEN WHERE HE’S TELLING EVERYONE THE TRUTH ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED, AND WHEN HE GETS TO WATTSON AND IS LIKE HEY I KNOW WHO THE MOLE WAS AND WHY THEY DID IT, SHE JUST GOES i dont wanna hear it. i need to think

IF YOU WANT THE TRUTH WHY ARE YOU REFUSING TO HEAR IT

SHE SPENDS ALMOST TWO ENTIRE SEASONS MAD AT CRYPTO FOR SOMETHING HE DIDN’T DO BECAUSE SHE TOLD GIBRALTAR TO FUCK OFF WHEN HE TRIED TO TELL HER WHAT HAPPENED

ITS SO DUMB

i think it was towards the end of season 6 or the beginning of season 7 where apex posted this picture of wattson asleep at her desk where she has a letter from gibraltar on it that looks like it tells her the truth, so she knows now, she knows what happened, but NOW her issue is the fact that she doesn’t know anything about crypto.

WHAT THE FUCK. WHAT IS YOUR GODDAMN DAMAGE. YOU DON’T KNOW SHIT ABOUT BLOODHOUND EITHER ARE YOU THIS UPSET WITH BLOODHOUND TOO?? HAVE YOU EVER TALKED TO PATHFINDER. DO YOU HATE PATHFINDER TOO

oh but she was friends with crypto and now she’s mad that he lied to her EXCEPT THEIR RELATIONSHIP WASN’T BUILT UP WELL SO IT JUST FEELS STUPID. THEY SPENT LONGER BEING NOT-FRIENDS THAN THEY SPENT BEING FRIENDS. THEY BECAME FRIENDS IN ONE CHAPTER AND THEN IMMEDIATELY AT THE END OF THAT CHAPTER THEIR FRIENDSHIP ENDED AND THEN WATTSON SPENT LIKE 2 SEASONS MAD AT HIM FOR SOMETHING HE DIDN’T DO . 

AND THE WRITERS TRIED TO RECTIFY THIS BY SAYING OH SHE’S NOT MAD ABOUT THE TRAITOR THING SHE’S MAD BECAUSE SHE DOESN’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT HIM AND IT’S LIKE WHY THE FUCK DID YOU NOT MAKE THAT CLEAR WHY DOES SHE SAY ‘IT DOESN’T CHANGE WHAT YOU DID’ IN HER VOICE LINES WHY DOES SHE CALL HIM A TRAITOR IF HER CONFLICT WAS HER NOT KNOWING MUCH ABOUT HIM . WHAT DID HE DO. 

HE JUST STOOD THERE AND LAUGHED AT HER JOKE AND THEN HE GOT FRAMED AND THEN THAT WAS THE END OF THE CHAPTER AND NOW SHES SUDDENLY LIKE IM ACTUALLY MAD BECAUSE YOURE A LIAR AND I CANT TRUST YOU EVEN THOUGH I NOW KNOW YOU WERE FRAMED I STILL DO NOT LIKE YOU AND HES LIKE YEAH THATS MY FAULT

The Caustic voicelines are stupid too, again his reason for framing Crypto was stupid and a lot of his voicelines just seem to be that shipbait thing again but like from the angle of overprotective dad who doesn’t like the new boyfriend. it’s stupid but not as egeregious as this next part which is

crypto telling wattson his identity.

CRYPTO was framed for MURDER and is paranoid and can’t trust anyone and doesn’t talk to anyone and the last time he did talk to someone he got framed for Another thing and the person he was talking to turned her back on him and actively refused to know the truth for like 2 seasons and then he went This Is Fine I Can Tell Her My Identity

the stupidest update to this storyline was crypto telling wattson the truth

why did they do it on the dropship where there are presumably syndicate members and other legends around.

why didn’t he scan wattson for listening devices like he did for pathfinder in the book.

why is he telling her his identity when he knows she has very close ties to the people that FRAMED HIM for MURDER. Does he trust her that much? WHY? They spoke to each other in a chapter and then spent two seasons not talking to each other beyond passive-aggressive BS. why are you so fucking stupid taejoon

their relationship was so poorly set-up that even if the writers maybe intended for them to come across as close friends who had spent weeks bonding, it really feels like they became friends in a single conversation, had a falling out, and now crypto suddenly trusts her with his identity after an undetermined amount of time because he wants to be friends again. 

that does not make SENSE this conflict feels contrived AS FUCK and the resolution feels even worse and unearned UGGGHHHH

it honestly comes across as crypto feeling desperate for friendship, and maybe this would’ve worked better if that’s the angle they played it as.

he’s been alone for roughly two years, and just wants a friend, and he’s honestly so lonely he just breaks down to the first person who’s really talked to him. it could’ve been an interesting little part of his character, and they could've gone into depth about how much this situation has affected him, but that’s not what they’re doing. he’s still paranoid and anxious and doesn’t trust anyone, except for wattson, because the plot needs him to or else there won’t be any stupid soap opera drama.

and to rub salt in the wound, wattson’s new voice lines with caustic have him telling her that she forgave crypto.

WHAT ARE YOU FORGIVING HIM FOR. ARE YOU FORGIVING HIM FOR BEING FRAMED? WHY DID HE HAVE TO APOLOGIZE TO YOU WHEN YOU WERE THE ONE WHO REFUSED TO HEAR THE TRUTH?

 did the conversation just go hey my real name is taejoon park and something bad happened to me and she went aight i forgive you WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT

Caustic’s new voice lines to Crypto where he’s like ‘what did you tell her’--YOU TOLD GIBRALTAR STRAIGHT-UP YOUR EVIL MASTER PLAN LIKE A SUPERVILLAIN AND NOW YOU’RE SURPRISED WATTSON AND CRYPTO ARE ON GOOD TERMS NOW?!

THAT’S LIKE TELLING SOMEONE YOUR SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER AND THEN BEING SURPRISED WHEN YOU BECOME THE VICTIM OF IDENTITY FRAUD. YOU SET YOURSELF UP FOR THIS WHY ARE YOU ACTING LIKE CRYPTO DID SOMETHING SINISTER OR LIED OR WHATEVER. WHAT THE FUCK. WHY DO YOU HAVE LIKE 3 BRAINCELLS

this is at like ten pages already so i’m going to just try and wrap this up quickly. 

it’s frustrating seeing this storyline play out when there are actually good relationships and storylines written into apex. i’m kind of getting tired of the loba and revenant conflict, but we at least had set-up to it in the form of a few animated shorts and it doesn’t play out as stupidly as this story does. bangalore and loba’s friendship is actually developed well, even if the point between the end of season 5 and season 6 where they suddenly talk like each other feels like it could’ve used a little more. 

where crypto and wattson having an established friendship in the broken ghost failed, lifeline and octane’s established friendship works because we’ve been told since octane’s release they were childhood friends and given lore materials that indicate they’ve known each other for a very long time.

apex wants this storyline between crypto and wattson and caustic to feel dramatic and tense and ultimately rewarding when crypto and wattson did become friends for real and stuff, but instead it just comes across as hollow and empty. 

there’s nothing there. it’s a case of tell, don’t show, and it looks like this stupid conflict is gonna keep going for another couple of seasons at this rate. 

side note: this entire script was written before the new twitter comics

please tell me ur thoughts and feel free to respond with ur own lil essay

also believe it or not this is not the "shipping is a detriment to apex's story" essay i was gonna write this is a completely different essay that has some overlap SKXISOSOW

[trixcuomo]

Daily Writing Challenge, Day 3: Romance/Compromised

Another lovely talk show interview, this time with a slew of my Night Elf rogue OCs. And some fun re-caps of hilarious stuff I wrote.

Trixany: *after the Goblin pop theme music dies down* Helloooo and welcome back to DMD! Daily Mail Dalaran is an Azeroth celebrity gossip show where, if you survive the scandal, you're bound to have a good time. And I mean it. Our last episode was a little, uh fiery.

Recorded audience: *staticky laugh track*

Trixany: The stage set and all these red couches are brand new, since the uh *she itches her nose* incident. We haven't re-done the audience section yet. Some of the seats are still smoldering. *she taps her earpiece*

Oh yes, of course. I've just been asked by our producer to find a way to tastefully segue into a moment of silence for the audience members who were lost in the dragon attack from our last episode. *she stares at the camera, then goes 'oops' and bows her head.*

Man. That was so... moving. And um, silent. Now, on with the show! As an exciting change of pace, we are going to focus on something saucy today. Romance and getting so-called compromised is today's theme--haha! So, of course, I reached into my deepest bag of Horde B celebrity tricks yet and brought you... *drumroll sound effect* the entire cast of the acclaimed The Romancers fanfiction series on fanfiction.net! You guys know how I love to break the fourth wall. Alessandre, Wisthera, Opalbane, Faltheriel and the rest, get on out here!!

The Romancers: *a big group of well-dressed, waving Night Elves, two of whom look related with pale blue skin and similar white braided hairstyles, and one blonde Blood Elf in black warlock gear walk onto the stage. An intense, yet playful soap opera themesong plays involving saxaphones*

Recorded audience: *more fake applause and wolf whistles*

Trixany: Yes!! The Romancers! I'm so excited to get you all here at once. Your fic could have been called The Romancers and the Compromised, right? I mean, the mix of spy versus spy and love affairs in that story were the real deal. And I mean that's what daytime drama is all about, getting lost in another world, reading about your favorite video game when you're supposed to be working.

Alessandre: Haha, yes! *touches his black leather saber fang choker* We're all rogues, I guess. The Romancers and the Compromised... that would have been perfect.

Trixany: *fangirl squeal* You're actually here, that sexbomb Alessandre! And how does it feel, everybody? To finally get a cool interview about your years of hard work. And some crazy, steamy scenes, am I right?

The Romancers: *all clap and cheer, share hugs*

Trixany: Damn all the Night Elves here, and you too Faltheriel, are all so beautifully attractive. Hi Faltheriel! You and I actually go way back, you got me this interview.

Faltheriel: *says something sexy in demonic, in his very tempting voice* Vakka tu raxka, melin omderu prushika.

Trixany: Okay, that was hot, and creepy? How do you even do that??

Faltheriel: *the blonde Blood Elf man winks, with eyes done in heavy dark liner and eyeshadow* I won't go into certain details about my life with the Legion. All those stories were based on our real lives, you know.

Trixany: Oh? I suspected, but... really? Honestly, a lot of that was true? Wait, let's start from the beginning before I get carried away. What were your favorite, juiciest scenes from season one, the very first fic. Wisthera, Onyxbane and Priestess Feathershine, I think that was mainly you three, right?

Wisthera: Ho man, well Onyx here was the star. But I guess I'd better re-cap for those folks out there. Mind if I tell it? So, Onyx here was in love with me and a Human mage, Willypearl--she couldn't make it today.

Feathershine: She's moved on--

Onyxbane: Oh, she hates us.

Trixany: Oh? Drama already, it seems!

Wisthera: Yeah, that's the thing. Girlfriend lost her man to moi, a wiley rogue. But the twist was, ontop of all that... Onyxbane had some seriously confused feelings about his own adoptive foster mother.

Trixany: I remember that scene, when everything was kinda tip toeing around that, then he finally came out and said it. Oh my gods--

Onyxbane: Im an excellent uh, actor. So thankfully I was able to pull it off. Yeah, acting that out, that weird confession alone in the mirror was sorta gross but, like at the same time, I was lauging inside, hard. I was thinking like 'this guy is so fucked' haha! 'No matter what happens now, whoever he ends up with, Willy or Wisthera, he is so fucked.' Because it was so ridiculous, right? I mean who actually goes and does that? It was obviously just a setup, a way for me, Onyx, to get slapped in the face after all he put everyone through. His sister Opal was arrested in Stormwind, then they got dragged to Menethil Harbor and had to suffer through his sloppy not wanting to forgive Wisthera who already got arrested, kinda because of him and his family? Then they trek to Silithus and face death multiple times, and he is still flirting with all these women in their group and unable to choose any of them. That 'I'm in love with an older woman who kind of raised me too' mirror scene was just to have people laugh real good at Onyx's bad, bad mistakes.

Trixany: *waggles eyebrows* So, what happened?

Feathershine: What do you mean? I yelled at him and threw him out of my cabin on the ship after he made his pathetic love confession, of course! The writer was cheeky, but that was the point-- Onyx was obviously not going to have an affair with a priestess of Elune, a woman who saw herself as a mother figure to him. I mean matronly women are beautiful too, we deserve love. Priestesses of Elune other than glamorous Tyrande do fall in love and find love, to be sure. But in this case, it was a fantasy within Onyx's own silly himbo mind. Certainly not!

But it was so hard to keep a straight face all through Onyx trying to confess he actually saw me as a milf. And how did we go from the tragedy in Felwood to me being a priestess of Elune and a milf, I don't know.

The Romancers: *all blurt laughter*

Feathershine: It was so, soooo awful! Once an innocent teenage crush that went wrong, I guess. But that boy grew into a pervert, and I could have killed him. I guess that's why I finally snapped and threatened to in season three--or was it four? Something like that.

Trixany: Alright, so we got Feathershine and Onyx's favorite scenes I think. Wisthera, what was your favorite scene from the first fic? Give us something romantic and compromising, okay?

Wisthera: *holds Onyx's hand and leans back, laughing* Ho goddess! Um... I would say the cave scene, yes.

Alessandre: Oh, the cave scene! Yeah!! Haha--Wisthera stepped on this scorpid and then after... well, it was so good. I mean, I hated her and I couldn't have written a better scene for her. The vain, sexy Night Elf woman rogue who had it coming. But, then again, it's also how Wisthera and Onyx finally got together.

Recorded audience: Awww.

Trixany: I have an idea! And it is seriously the best idea. Clips up on the big screen there are one thing, but we have you all here, live! Let's act it out right here. Let's do a scene!

Onyxbane: *raises his white eyebrows* Oh?

Trixany: Yes!! Guys, get on the floor, right now. Let's see how the most romantic, hottest part of the uh, The Romancers series went down. No shame, no judgment. Just go for it, live!

Wisthera: *blushes, stands up from her seat, then thinks carefully and stands on one leg, balancing* Okay, so Onyx? Let's say the stinging scorpid was here and I just stepped on it. Maybe you come in from this side and carry me off in your arms to the cave?

The Romancers: *awkward silence*

Feathershine: *simmering rage as she looks down at Onyx who is kneeling nearby, and has placed his hand on her leg.*

Onyxbane: So... We're not doing this scene? You said we were doing the hottest scene. *turns red* Trixany, you said no judgment!

Feathershine: GET YOUR HAND OFF MY LEG RIGHT NOW YOUNG MAN!

Wisthera: Onyx! We're married now, or so I thought. What the fel is wrong with you?

Onyxbane: I got confused, or excited--excited to do the scene, I mean!!

Opalbane: *in her spooky, impassive shadowpriestess drawl* This just in, my brother Onyx is still a pervert. This time for real.

Feathershine: Onyx, I thought we got through this phase. I raised you, you freak! I'm your mother!

Onyxbane: No, I already had a mother. She died back in Felwood when I was a teenage boy and grown. But then this hot older priestess of Elune shows up, named Feathershine, and she tries to raise us--

Feathershine: Right! I adopted you, I'm your foster mother!!

Onyxbane: *hobbles over to Trixany while still on his knees, dodging blows from his female relatives* She's a milf. Why can't this woman accept she's a real-life milf? She's way too hot for her own good. That's how all this really got started--OW!

The Romancers: *all watch Onyx get smacked with couch pillows, then larger furniture, then get chased around the DMD studio.*

Wisthera: Pervert!!! You wanna get compromised? I got two poisoned daggers with your name on them, Onyx!

Trixany: Well, folks. *raises a red couch pillow as a shield* I can only apologize. This episode of DMD got waaay out of control...

Feathershine: Hooligan! I knew all along it wasn't acting because, you hack, you can't act ontop of everything else that's wrong with you!! *runs around and smites Onyx several times with her holy spells*

Trixany: What can I even say? *she laughs, watching the chaos unfold* Tune in next time for more of 'When keepin' your fanfic real goes wrong', here on DMD!

@daily-writing-challenge

[aloesarchives]

Gaolang Headcanons

(A/N):Sorry this took so long, I recently had a writer's block that made me really unmotivated to write. Another reason that it took so long was because I made the reader have a background that would’ve made it oc like, which I usually tend to stay away from. But after so pep talk with a friend and remembering this is my blog, I decided to say fuck it and write to self-indulge in my writing more and write this headcanon(what I mean is appearance is up to you but things like job occupation would be up to me. And also literally after eating ice cream, the thought of writing came back and here I am. Plus, who wouldn’t dream of being able to fight(doesn’t mean fighter) and kick ass in the Kengan series? If you said no, you lying.

(Edit July 1 2020 2:44am: Okay so Tumblr glitched again where my posts having been showing up on me blog and just disappeared from the search so I had to repost them again, I apologize for any inconveniences)

Word count:4257 words

But now, what many of you have been waiting for,

The Man, the myth, the legend himself,

Gaolang Fucking Daddy Wongsawat

I’ma write so much for this man you have no idea

Let’s gets two things out of the way first about this absolute unit of a man right here: Gaolang Wongsawat

First things first, Gaolang is literally a man of few words. He’s not mute, of course, it’s just he’s more of a man that speaks when spoken to. However, it doesn’t mean you start and carry every conversation the two of you have. Gaolang is always listening to you when you speak even though he’s not looking at you. He just gives you a short reply or answer when you ask him certain things, not a a tired or agitated response but more of them not pushing an agenda into the conversation unless needed so.

But when it’s just the two of you and a silent falls in between, it’s unsurprisingly serene and pleasant. Like the silence and energy that Gaolang gives off doesn’t make you uncomfortable or awkward, which is ideal when you both don’t want to talk because you’re either tired and lean on Gaolang, or when words aren’t needed in the moment and you silently enjoy each other company. He’s one of the few people to be able to not talk much and make the air not feel unbearable.

Second, Gaolang is a man of honor. With his status in Thailand and being the bodyguard of King Rama XII, Gaolang doesn’t use his status to prey on others/ those who are weaker than him. He deems that as cowardice and dishonorable so he doesn’t really want to cause trouble for King Rama and you.

Now with that out of the way, let’s got on it with this man, shall we?

TBH, you could’ve met Gaolang anywhere so it’s up in the air how you guys met.

The apartment is always clean and nice since Gaolang cleans up the place once or twice a week. You do you part around the house, of course, to keep it clean when Gaolang isn’t home, especially when he’s out for his boxing matches and championships for heavyweight. But Gaolang has a particular way of keeping the apartment clean and gets kinda of passive aggressive when something isn’t cleaned properly.

You two mostly split doing the chores in the house, like you vacuum and he does the dishes for the week and it would switch every other week. The only chore Gaolang just leaves solely up to you is the laundry. This is due to him not wanting to mess up any of your clothing when he’s washing them so you do both of your guys’s laundry. Plus, Gaolang doesn’t have that much of a diverse closet so washing his clothes isn’t much of a hassle.

Cooking wise, you mostly leave it up to Gaolang b/c face it, Gaolang is the better cook between the two of you, no offense mate. But Gaolang’s cooking smacks so hard you don’t eat out/get takeout anymore unless you’re craving some of that Thailand street food, which he doesn’t mind as long as it’s not frequent. But fam, why go out when Gaolang’s cooking is so good?

Domestic life with Gaolang is honestly lovely, holy shit. Like it’s pure bliss and wonderful. Usually it goes like this:

Every morning, Gaolang usually wakes up earlier than you which you don’t mind. He gets dress but doesn’t put on his dress shirt on until he has to leave for work. While you get ready for the day and freshen up, he already made coffee(if you drink it) and is cooking breakfast. When you’re done and walk out of the bed room, you already greet him good morning where you either hug him from behind or give him a good morning kiss( but the second one is always your go to). The tv is on in the background and you sip your drink as you watch what’s currently on. Gaolang calls out saying breakfast is ready and you two eat at the table. Once down, dishes are put into the sink and after a few minutes, Gaolang has to leave for work. He puts on his dress shirt, grabs his blazer, and while he’s tying his tie you’re at the door to bid him a good day at work. Once he’s finish and has put on his shoes on, you wish him a good day along with a kiss as you wave him off. Once you hear the door click, you knew it would be awhile until he comes back home. Your job allows you do work at home so you’re always in the apartment. Once done, you would clean the place, do the laundry, run a couple of errands, or relax. For lunch you have leftovers that Gaolang cooked the day before in the fridge. Afterwards, you do stuff to let the time pass whether it be productive or not. You know Gaolang is home by the clicking of the door and his voice saying “I’m home”. You give him a welcome back kiss and asked him about his day while holding onto his blazer to be later stemmed. He just said it was normal and nothing of the sort. However, there was one time he told you  fought someone who tried to claim he’s spot as his majesty’s bodyguard but by the look of things you can assume Gaolang won. While you put away his blazer, he ask you about your day which you reply with the usual that you say. Right away, you and Gaolang start making dinner for the evening. Gaolang is at the stove while you cut up the meat and vegetables and handing it to them when you’re done. Washing your hands, you set up the table and waited until he was done. Dinner mostly has minimal talking because it’s eating time but Gaolang will answer you if you ask him something. The aftermath of dinner is mostly compromise of cleaning the dishes, the table, counter tops, and putting away the left overs in the fridge. Then it’s off to the bedroom where the two of you get ready for bed. You always let Gaolang go first into the bathroom to do what need to do since he’s quick. Once done with both of your nightly routines, you two head off for bed. You always give him a good night kiss before sleeping and Gaolang has an arm around you as the two of you sleep.

There are very few times where you wake up first: when he gets the day off, just got back to Thailand from weeks abroad for championships and matches, or from a hefty training session. However, this is mostly uncommon to happen as Gaolang is a early bird.

Sleepwise, Gaolang doesn’t really snore. He’s a quiet sleeper, however, he leans in more of moderate- lighter sleeper where heavy stirring and noise can bring him out of sleep. But it does take some minimal effort to wake him up. Gaolang is the type of person to face away you the two of you would fall asleep but when you wake up his body is facing you and his arms are caging you in. I can see him also being the type of spouse to carry you into your bed if you fell asleep on the couch or while working, Gaolang is more than welcome to carry off to bed, hell he’ll tuck you in and give you a forehead kiss.

This man will HOLD you in your sleep, fucking on cloud 9, sis. And you never felt more safe and comfortable in your life.

Gaolang doesn’t talk a lot when eating, but again he won’t shy away when you’re talking/asking him something.

Straight up, Gaolang loves to watch those soap operas/Asian dramas, it’s sort of his guilty pleasure. When you found out about it, you didn’t really judge him for it because you actually liked the series he was watching. He was a little bit anxious when you didn’t say anything but relaxed when the only words you said to him was “Gao, scoot over this is getting interesting.” Like he’s motionless and his face barely contorts when the plot begins to thicken but you can tell he is enjoying the show.

It would be untrue if you didn’t at least have some encounter with Saw Paing. God, I can imagine as soon Gaolang leaves for work and you have the apartment to yourself, then the next thing you know there’s a Burmese man in his 30′s outside of your window and he’s screaming at the top of his lungs what seem to be your beloved names. Two thoughts are running through your head as you’re just staring on at this man: #1- Who the hell is this man and how does he know Gaolang? and #2- How in the hell was he able to climb up to you and Gaolang’s high rise apartment? After you let him in through one of your windows, the man was quite surprise because he hasn’t seen you before, or more rather in the apartment. He asked you who were you, when you said you’re Gaolang’s wife, he was shock and kind of ecstatic to know that Gaolang has gotten himself a spouse. The first thing you took note was his loud and constant yelling; however, when you’re talking to him in the apartment, he dies down his voice and doesn’t yell. He somehow manages to leave the apartment and miss Gaolang arrival from work. And when Gaolang comes home and asked about your day, he’s slightly intrigued when you said you made a new friend. As soon as you mention Saw Paing, you see Gaolang’s face slightly grimace as he let out an annoyed sigh. He apologizes for his behavior and for you not to say sorry for causing it. After he explains his history with Saw Paing, you now understand his reaction. Gaolang is kind of happy for you to be friends with Saw Paing because at least Saw Paing gets to hang out with you and not bother him whiles he’s trying to live his life with you. Surprisingly, when you became friends with Saw Paing, he won’t barge into your guys’s apartment or yell anymore, most of the time that is. But it’s all good with Saw Paing being and Gaolang doesn’t mind as long as he is minimal involvement in it.

Saw Paing is your buddy, fam. It’s bound to happen.

You do fight but it’s more on the side and a hobby you do. Unlike Gaolang, who does this as a profession, you do this as more for fitness and self defense. You’re not as powerful as Gaolang, but you can handle yourself enough where Gaolang doesn’t have to worry about you going out without him. The two of you spar and train together when given the time but during the small sparring Gaolang goes easy on you because he doesn’t want to hurt you.

King Rama every now and then would ask Gaolang about you. Rama is pretty much Gucci with Gaolang so it doesn’t really bug him. King Rama is one of the few people that knew about you being with Gaolang, so yeah. He was intrigued by the fact that Gaolang subtle mentions you the first time he asked him. Over time, Rama listen to his royal subject and bodyguard as Gaolang talks about you, he just wants Gaolang to spill the tea. Although it’s very hard for many people notice, King Rama notice a slight soften in Gaolang during those moments. The fact that you were able to make a dent in the stoic Thai God of War was more than enough for Rama to have a reason to meet you. He was curious on who you were to able to do that to Gaolang. Then queue the day you were invited by the King of Thailand himself to have a simple small meeting. You had no idea why the King wanted audience with you, but you knew you had to go b/c it would be rude if you didn’t.  You told Gaolang that you had to leave early to go somewhere and he thought nothing of it. You also didn’t tell Gaolang about it cause you assumed he knew about it. For some reason, King Rama keep things simple and asked you to walk around the palace’s garden, contrasting his extravagant behavior. Being the charismatic person he is, you’re not intimidated by him and answer his questions truthfully. After listening to your replies and responses, especially ones about Gaolang, he now understands why Gaolang took interest to you, you’re unique in the sense that you’re a blue diamond. Matchless, rare, and unlike any other, not in the way you shiny above everyone since you blended into the crowd, but once they have stumble upon and get to know you there’s no turning back from there. Just the imagine the shock on Gaolang’s face when he gets to work and sees you talking to his majesty. He was curious and a bit scared that you were talking to Rama but after a short exchange of laughter it disappeared. After you spotted Gaolang and the two of you walked towards him, Rama stated the two of you had a little chat and that you were heading on your way. Once Gaolang responded with a head nod, you bow to the King and wave bye to Gaolang as you go for the rest of the day. Soon as you’re out of sight, King Rama comments to Gaolang that you’re a hidden gem and told him to take good care of you. And Gaolang being Gaolang, smiles and fulfills his duties given by his king.

King Rama, low key, wants Gaolang to settle down because, I’m gonna be honest, he deserves it. Like Rama is vigile and gives Gaolang days off so he can spend time with you, this includes when Gaolang has boxing matches and championships too. He just wants Gaolang to slow down in life and spends his life with you without stress or worry.

King Rama implicitly ships you and Gaolang but you didn't hear it from me.

You definitely have run into King Rama during Gaolang’s boxing matches. Speaking of which, you always watch his matches. Whether it be at home or in the actually stadium. you make sure you were watching every single one of his fights. It’s enthralling to watch him fight, like his infamous Flash of 13 jabs is something that never cease to amaze you. Having won 4 heavyweight championship, you’ve never really doubted him and his abilities one bit. During one of his championship, King Rama was actually present and invited you to join him in the VIP lounge to watch Gaolang. The fight was intense but Gaolang came out victorious and won with a knock out. It was one of the most amazing things you have every seen as the crowd roared at the win and King Rama allowed Gaolang to take a 5 day rest as his fruitful victory.

There are times where you’re either at the entrance of the ring or inside the locker room to wish him luck. The most he’ll accept is a hug and a kiss on the cheek, that’s it. But he does flash you a smile before going out there.

Without a doubt, Gaolang is a very private person, except to you of course. Like Gaolang doesn’t reveal much of his home life to the public to keep the paparazzi away. He likes to keep the his work life and home life extremely separate. Your relationship with him and even your own existence is unknown to the public, THAT’S how private Gaolang is. And a little bit of help from King Rama as well.

Gaolang is not much of a confrontation man, but will confront and be straightforward with you when something is wrong with/bothering you.

He’s also is an observant person, you could tell by the way he analyzes opponents so he at least can read you and situations at home.

Due to this, he is very good a giving compliments. Not the super cheesy one, it’s usually the simple ones, and those are the one that get you all the time.

He has a chill personality, calm and collected, he’s not the type to jump the gun on assumptions. The man trusts you, fam.

It’s really hard to make Gaolang mad. He gets annoyed and aggravated, yeah, but it’ll never escalates to him being furious. Gaolang knows how to manage his emotions and has never really been irrational or lashed out before. The only time you ever saw Gaolang lose his composure was when he yelled at Saw Paing. And that moment, right there, was terrifying to you because you never seen Gaolang lash out before. So you do your best to not push his buttons too much.

Gaolang lets you do your own thing because he understands that you have your own life and do things on your own accord. Not much of a controlling person, far from you. But Gaolang doesn’t understand why you have a job when he makes a reasonable salary for the both of you to live off on. When you told him that you wanted to contribute to society and not rely on him for everything, and you also said you like to have save pocket money. Gaolang respects your answer and kinda likes that you take accountability for yourself.

Jealousy is something that Gaolang knows about and doesn’t really feel, but more rather avoid. Gaolang is comfortable in his own skin and abilities to know that you will not betray him and leave him for someone else. And it’s obvious when you’re not interested in anyone other than Gaolang and tell people off when they hit on you. But what really aggravates him is when the person can’t take a goddamn hint when you tell them off or deny any of their advances on you. Especially if it’s a scumbag of a guy. But Gaolang can’t be irrational due to him having a public image to uphold so he has to logical and clear minded. So Gaolang rational annoyance is rising in level, like his stare goes hard, his aura becomes daunting, anyone who’s near him fear like they would shit in their pants if they ever had to face Gaolang in such a state. You kept telling the guy that your husband/boyfriend wouldn’t be happy if he keep up his behavior with you. Then the man mocks about your lover and asks who is the lucky guy. Then queue my man Gaolang standing behind him and saying it was him and Gaolang was with you. After commenting that Gaolang was your boyfriend/lover, you were humored by the guy’s reaction. The man went pale, apologized to the Thai God of War and was out of sight from then. I don’t know who said it, but I think it was @bokutosbiceps​ (follow them, they have really good Kengan writing pieces.) that Gaolang goes into a state of grumpiness, which I can totally see. He be like this for what, like a week at max, and this is where everyone just stands clear of Gaolang and try to not get on his bad side. Like even Saw Paing doesn’t come over when he encountered Gaolang’s grumpiness, it’s that bad. Again, he knows that you won’t really leave him because he trust you won’t be that disloyal to him. But the only way to pull him out of that slump is excessive amount of words of affirmation from you and a simple promise that you’ll never leave him. But even after pulling him out of his grumpy pants state, Gaolang acts more of a bodyguard just in case a similar case happens again. If the person/people/guy tries their luck with you then it’s over for them and they will really die, literally Gaolang goes into Thai God of War mode and it ain’t pretty. But overtime, when incidents happen like that, his reaction is less elevated every time due to your unwavering loyalty to him. Jealousy is not foreign feeling to Gaolang but he tends to stay away from it as much as possible.

Seriously, imagine leaving Gaolang for someone else. Sis/fam not only are you a damn circus act, that’s a literal downgrade on so many levels. Like why? I’ll personally find you, smack your forehead, and lecture you why that was a bad move.

I mean, everyone does stay clear on bothering you in general. But after that incident where Gaolang reveal your relationship with him, then people really know to actually stay on your good side. You don’t use Gaolang’s status to abuse power, of course, to get your way with things. But you do make it clear that you’re with/married to him.

However, it’s safe to say that no one messes with you when your boyfriend/husband is literally the best Muay Thai fighter, undisputed heavyweight boxing champion, and bodyguard of the King of Thailand. They’re about of clowns that really want to be humiliated. I’ll also beat them up for you fam, i gotchu

One flaw Gaolang probably has is him having basic logic/common sense but he can be easily swayed and convinced on things he doesn’t have prior knowledge on. The man’s open up to new things, it’s more of him acting like a dumbass for a bit.

God, the horror of seeing Gaolang with wrong Japanese etiquette hurts your eyes and soul. You had to reteach him a lot on these types of things. He’s a little bit embarrassed but grateful that you’re have enough patience to teach him the proper etiquette.

POWER COUPLE OF THAILAND, I’LL FIGHT ANYONE THAT DISAGREES WITH ME. YOU DESERVE TO BE WITH THIS MAN, THAT’S FINAL.

I’ma tell you something sis so you better open them ears: Gaolang isn’t the type to have multiple flings or be in many relationship. He has better things to do with his time than waste on short term infatuation. So if he chooses you, that’s speaking VOLUMES.

In other words, if you’re the one, YOU ARE THE ONE! Like Gaolang could’ve been a playboy and have anyone in the world but the man chose you. YOU’RE THE FUCKING CHOSEN ONE!!!!

Gaolang is not one to push things but he does have conversations with you that marriage and kids can be apart of the equation if you want.

Besides, who wouldn’t marry a man like Gaolang? You be missing out on so much.

Time with Gaolang is always productive no matter what since he knows how to use his time efficiently. You two go to the grocery store together and sometimes you divide and conquer in the store to save time. Being with Gaolang helps you manage your time effectively which helps you a lot.

Bruh, Gaolang’s hair is SOFT. You play with it when the two of you are laying down together and you can tell that he takes good care of his hair. Gaolang lets you do his hair, combing through it and add the bead at the end of his hair. He likes it when you do it.

I like to headcanon that the jewel on his forehead was a gift you gave him and every since you gave it to him he’s been wearing all day everyday.

Gaolang’s kisses are like angel feathers. They’re light and pure. He doesn’t really have any ulterior motive other than missing you on some work days. These are *chef kiss some of the most bless things you’ll ever have.

His hugs, fucking god send. Firm where you’re flush against him but not too tight. Gaolang’s hugs were just right. Those things make you feel safe, and all warm on the inside. There are some days where work is slow, where Gaolang just comes home and holds you in his arms while swaying back and forth. It helps him wine down and relax, transitioning into his home life with you. But hey, free hugs from Gaolang.

Another thing we need to talk about is his smile. I...god... seeing Gaolang smile is when you’ve achieved paradise. You do note that Gaolang doesn’t really smile that often. But if you ask him the right things, have a way with words and play your cards correctly, you can get him to smile and hell even a small chuckle out of him. And there’s no denying that you get butterflies in your stomach and feel warm, fuzzy, and so many positive emotions that you got to witness Gaolang smile.

His smile kills you, heart squeezes

Y’ALL can’t tell me that Gaolang’s smile right here gave you goose bumps or a shiver up your back. If you deny it, you’re lying to yourself, fam.

The man is CANONICALLY husband material, which mean the high possibility of him being a family man.

Literally best Husband, CHANGE MY MIND, I DARE YOU.

Gaolang is super soft to you, he is soft spoken to you, smiles more often around you, became more emotionally open, etc. He really does love and care about you, like a lot.

He is stoic teddy bear for you.

Thai Jesus, Done with everyone’s shit except yours and King Rama.

The most cursed images you have ever seen is that signature shocked express he has, it’s something you never really want ever.

Just living a good, satisfying, and tranquil life with Gaolang. A wholesome man of honor and loyalty, being with Gaolang is a goddamn dream you never want to wake up on.

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God this took way too long. Sorry for being gone for some time, I hit a writer’s block but it’s gone now. I finished on June 30th but stayed up until 12am to edit it. I’ma switch up the order and do Cosmo’s headcanon next. I’ll put the Gaolang oneshot on hold and actually finish my Chapter 2 for my series. This is my longest headcanon yet, and I’m tired.

Stay safe and beautiful, fam!

[silver-lily-louise]

Herondale

ao3 link

Rating: General Audiences  Warnings: None  Ship: TWI!Clace  Tags: Family Drama, Revelations 

Written for @shadowhunterbingo. Square filled: Java Jace 

Summary: In every universe, the truth will out. 

~oOo~

‘Michael lied to me.’

It’s the first thing Jace says when Clary gets home that evening, and it stops her in her tracks. ‘What?’ ‘He lied to me. My whole life.’ Jace’s voice is low, quiet – dangerous, her mind supplies, though she’s never had reason to think of her boyfriend like that before. She sets her satchel down on the nearest chair, and cautiously, warily steps closer. ‘You mean your dad, right? What did he do?’ she asks as gently as she can. Jace barks out a short, sharp laugh that’s even more frightening than his strange tone of voice. ‘That’s just it. He’s not my dad.’

Clary’s mind short-circuits a little, wrapping itself around that. ‘What?’ Jace pushes up to his feet, starting to pace the same way he does whenever he gets agitated – though if this is what it sounds like (and she doesn’t know what else it could be, just – how could it be this?), Clary doesn’t think a night out with her and Simon is going to soothe it better this time. Oblivious to her thoughts, Jace continues his tirade. ‘Yeah. Turns out I’m adopted, which would be just fine except one, it was illegal, and two, he didn’t bother mentioning it until I was twenty-fucking-five.’ He laughs again, though it’s a lot more strained this time. ‘My original surname was Herondale, by the way. Which I now know, because about five seconds before he told me all of the other stuff, he introduced this lady called Imogen. My grandmother. Who, until now, apparently thought I’d died along with my mom in childbirth – god, it’s like a fucking soap opera, how the fuck am I supposed to –’

‘Jace.’ She interrupts him, then, because this is quickly spiraling out from a vent into a panic attack, and that’s the last thing he needs right now. She stands in front of him, reaching up to his shoulders, tracing up to his neck and cradling him there. ‘Breathe, okay? It’s a lot, I hear that. But you’re okay. I’m here, we’re safe at home, everything’s gonna be okay. Just – just take a breath, and tell me the rest when you’re ready, and we’ll deal with it together, okay?’

His hands come up to latch onto hers, and he closes his eyes, taking slow, deliberate breaths.

A minute or so later, he looks back up at her. ‘I don’t know what’s gonna happen, Clar,’ he murmurs, and his eyes are shiny, his jaw tight. ‘I mean, I’m an adult, you know? It’s not like she can sue for custody. But she’s – she’s so pissed, and she has every right to be, she was my next of kin and he took me from her. And I’m pissed too, but –’ he takes a deep, shuddering breath – ‘but he’s my dad,’ he whispers, his voice breaking over the word. ‘I don’t want him to – to go to prison, or anything. I just… don’t know what to do.’

But Clary knows what to do, and so she does. She guides him over to the couch, gently presses him into taking a seat. She grabs the water bottle from her bag and holds it out to him. She sits back against the couch herself, until she can topple him back into her arms and hold on tight. Only then does she speak – and it’s not the maybe you could do x, maybe your dad has y, maybe your grandmother is z that springs to mind – it’s something short, simple. ‘When are you seeing them next? Either of them?’ she amends.

Jace sighs, leaning heavily against her. ‘I’m supposed to be meeting Imogen again tomorrow morning. Apparently, she wants to get to know me.’ Clary nods. ‘Alright. Why don’t you ask y- Michael to come too? And I’ll come along, if you want, or Simon could – or my dad, even, I’m sure he’d help you out. Sit them down, make sure there’s someone there in your corner, and have everyone talk it out like grown-ups. Then, whatever happens, you’ll at least know your next move, right?’

He seems to consider it for a moment, and then he nods. ‘You’re right,’ he murmurs. He looks back up at her, and the softness in his eyes makes her heart ache. ‘I have no idea how I got so lucky, you know that? I don’t know what I’d do without you, babe.’

Clary smiles at him, and presses a kiss to the top of his head. ‘You’ll never have to find out,’ she promises.

~oOo~

[jebazzled]

SOOO the Drama: Making it Work with Tragic Backstories

Hi everyone, how are we doing? It’s been a while since my last unsolicited tutorial. Is everyone eating well? Is everyone drinking water? Dressing warmly if it’s cold wherever you live? 

Today we’ll be talking about tragic backstories, and how to use them rather than abuse them. 

This tutorial will mention a number of triggers, though not with great detail - more in the interest of providing context. 

Specific triggers mentioned: abandonment, verbal abuse, child neglect, car accident, transphobia, animal death, cheating, bullying, parental death

In the rp community we often joke about loving to put our characters through hell - about really running them ragged - making ourselves weepy. For a lot of us, writing Heavy Emotional Content is a lot more fun than fluff, or characters who are happy, fulfilled, and well-adjusted. I’m literally planning to kill off one of my characters in the next couple of weeks. I get it. 

But there’s also a fair amount of discourse in the rp community about what is pejoratively called “trauma porn.” It’s discourse that is warranted! Because while we love fictional drama, the truth is that sometimes...

well, sometimes it can be too much, can’t it? 

Here’s the thing about trauma: a tragic backstory does not a well-developed character make. Too often, too many of us lean on these traumatic histories as a crutch towards building a character, without meaningfully exploring that trauma with any depth. The truth is, in fiction, tragedy only builds character when when you do. And tragedy is far from the only way to create a nuanced character. 

In this tutorial, we will examine common approaches to character backstories, alternatives to tragedy-as-a-default, and figure out how to have your cake (the feels) and eat it too (with purpose.)

BUILD-A-BACKSTORY

In my experience, the most common approach to writing a freestyle application is writing a chronological history (you can read my app guides, including thots on alternative styles of freestyle, here). Ain’t nothing wrong with that! If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! 

It’s an approach that makes sense, as it forces you to fill in the blanks to answer the question: why is my character Like That? And often, as writers, our first instinct is to provide the saddest answer possible.

“Why is Susie so clingy?” 

Her parents abandoned her at a fire station when she was an infant, and rather than being raised in foster care, she grew up at the fire station. But the entire company that raised her died while fighting a wildfire, and she is certain that any time anyone walks away from her, they will never come back. 

“Why is Brent such a misogynist?” 

His mother never wanted him and told him so every day of his youth. When he hit puberty, she stopped speaking to him entirely, and the day he turned eighteen, she changed the locks while he was at school. 

“Why is Lichen such a high-achieving go-getter?” 

Lichen was born with glass bones and paper skin. Every morning they break their legs, and every afternoon they break their arms. At night, they lie awake in agony until their heart attacks put them to sleep.

Feels like a lot, doesn’t it? I may have done a little exaggeration, but - not a lot, frankly. 

Especially if other characters on a site are loaded with tragic histories, it can be hard not to equate a certificate from the school of hard knocks with a Pulitzer. You want something juicy to write about, yes? And this is all so juicy! 

But here’s the rub: often, these histories will never come up again outside of an application, or will not be practically dev’d out beyond shock value. Susie will never be reminded of Frank, the fireman who taught her to ride a bike. Brent will focus his sexist comments on objectifying women’s bodies rather than degrading their personalities and motives, which were the issues with his mother. Someone who didn’t read Lichen’s app would have no clue that they have had a total horror show of a life. 

If you are writing a tragic backstory that doesn’t have a continual impact on your character, you are writing trauma porn, and it is doing nothing for your character. 

This doesn’t mean that your characters should be fully and constantly occupied with memories of their trauma - in fact, constant introspection is an easy way to stall threads (per my “why aren’t people writing with me?” guide here) - but it does mean that if your answer to the question, “why is my character Like That” is a compelling one, it is one that a reader should be able to answer even if they haven’t read your app, if they’ve read a few of your threads or other writing. 

This is a careful balance, of course, but think of your characters the way you think of yourself! For example: probably the most Potentially Dramatic thing about my personal life is that my older sister is developmentally disabled, and I am one of her legal guardians. When my parents die, I will inherit my older sister, and will uproot my life from wherever I am living at the time to move back to my hometown and make sure she is taken care of and happy. This is not something that I constantly think about, but it is difficult to know me for any meaningful length of time and not be aware that I have a developmentally disabled sister, as I mention her in passing, think about her when her favorite music comes up on Spotify, and tell people to donate to her favorite charity, Special Olympics. 

If I were writing an app of myself as a character and spent a good portion of the app untangling my relationship with my sister, and then never mentioned her in any of my thread posts, then is she really important to my character? Or was I flexing her for depth?

Do you see what I am getting at here? If it matters, it will come up more than once. If it only comes up once, and it’s in your app, you should think of something to explain your character’s personality and motivations that is perhas a little less loaded. 

BUT WITHOUT THE SADS, HOW DO?

The good news is: you absolutely do not need a tragic backstory to write a nuanced character! Again - think of your characters the way you think of yourself, or of other real people. While everyone has gone through heavy things in their lives from time to time, chances are that your life does not resemble that of a soap opera protagonist. And aren’t you a multifaceted person, full of depth and life? Aren’t you someone whose story is worth telling, even if it feels like your life is pretty ordinary? 

After all, it’s not the past that makes a character - it’s the present, their current voice, actions, and missteps. That is where you want the real juice to be, because that is the shit you’re writing! 

Some potential “everyday histories” for our above cast of characters:

“Why is Susie so clingy?”

In elementary and middle school, Susie was bullied on and off - a few weeks spent hanging out with the in-crowd, followed by a month as a social pariah. She could never understand why. When she moved to a different state for high school, she attached herself like a barnacle to the clique the Tulips, and has made it her goal not to let herself get shaken back to the outskirts this time. 

This isn’t as dramatic as Susie’s earlier backstory - in fact, it could apply to any number of people, being passed between friend groups for years on end. But again: your character doesn’t need a one-of-a-kind daytime talk show-worthy backstory to have a unique and compelling history and voice! 

“Why is Brent such a misogynist?”

Brent’s mother never wanted children, and made it pretty clear to him throughout his youth. His father, though, as always there for him - including when his mother walked out and never came back, after cheating on Mr. Brent’s Dad for years. From then on, Brent and his dad only had each other - and their bitterness towards the woman who wronged them.

This still gives you some family drama - unloving mother, and some adultery - but having Brent be raised by someone who has their own beef with women eliminates the shock value of locking your son out merely for being a boy. Also, this take acknowledges misogyny as a learned behavior.

“Why is Lichen such a high-achieving go-getter?”

When their parents divorced, Lichen only came out to their mother as nonbinary, and presents a fully different persona when they are with their father. Being in the top 5% of their high school class and being a national champion Lincoln-Douglas debater is the only thing Lichen and (deadname) have in common. 

I acknowledge that Lichen’s previous story was a meme. The above story could be made much more intense (for example, if Lichen’s father were a member of the Westboro Baptist Church and then Lichen’s supportive mother dies in a freak accident and Lichen, unable to hide their true identity, is imprisoned in their father’s basement until they pretend to have seen the error of their ways and identify as cis again) but the above gives plenty to chew on! 

While drama and trauma can be satisfying to write, there is plenty of drama to be found in the everyday. Building a well-rounded character is much less about what happened to them and much more about what they are doing, thinking, and feeling now. 

That said, 

TIPS & TRICKS FOR WRITING TRAGIQUE CHARACTERS

Don’t go overboard. If it is not going to come up ever again after the app: leave it out. 

Impact is about the character, not the reader. If it was important enough to leave in the app, it should have an identifiable impact on your character. The main purpose cannot have been to shock the reader. 

It’s not meaningful JUST because it happened. If someone can follow your character’s story for any extended amount of time and not realize that, say, your character’s mother died in a boating accident, then it isn’t actually important that your character’s mother died in a boating accident, and you should let her live. 

If ALL of your characters have a heavily dramatic backstory, ALL of your heavily dramatic backstories lose their meaning. Dramatic backstories are fun but they should not be a constant: they will begin to feel cheap and lazy. 

Your character does not need to dwell on their tragic backstory! While a character should acknowledge their history, a character does not need to realize that their backstory is meant to be tragic. For example, Sally might have been raised by her Aunt Agatha after her parents disappeared in a hot air balloon when she was a baby. Rather than being sad about her missing parents, Sally might think of them as total strangers and of Agatha as her sole parental figure - and her sadness might be for Agatha, who does miss Mr. and Ms. Pumpernickel. 

And that’s literally all she wrote! I hope you find this helpful when you’re writing your characters - tragic or otherwise - and developing their plotlines. The world is not made of trauma and fluff alone, friends. Go forth and contain multitudes!

[fencesandfrogs]

an abridged history/explanation of warrior cats if you didn’t read them as a kid and have questions (a primer)

welcome. i’m going to keep things to the point, this is not a plot summary, just, well, its a pandemic and people are seeking items of childhood comfort and its come to my attention that a lot of people didn’t read these books as kids and then they come up in conversation and they act shocked so! i felt compelled to write this.

[2.5k words, 10min read. section headers, no pictures. not a ton of helpful formatting. i don’t want to say don’t read this because obviously i wrote it and think it’s worth reading, but i’ll be honest, this is a lot.]

section one: about me

i was an avid reader as a child, most of which fits solidly into “stories for another time,” and some of which would necessitate me adding tags onto this post that are, well, not necessary. so i will skip over that backstory but for those aware of lexile scores, i had one that was too high for literally any book that was appropriate to give me. so reading in school was torture and reading for fun was excellent.

now because i was a first-ish grader and my mom was trying to keep the fifth harry potter out of my hands, she looked desperately for something else to pass to me. her friend, who had a daughter a year or two older than me, was into these cat books, and my mom was like “here honey you like cats” without thinking too much about it.

which is good, because as i’ll get into, it was a really good fit for me. but like a dozen books later she asked me about the plot and well. i think at that moment she realized that it might have been better to just let me read harry potter.

but yeah i continued to read them long past the recommended reading ages and still as a Young Adult will return to them for nostalgia, and also as i will get into, some really good books. (see a list of books for “morbidly curious but i don’t want to spend 56 to 168 hours reading this”)

i’m not fully caught up on the series but this is not a plot summary so that should not impact my ability to discuss this

section two: content warnings

these books (not this post) includes the following:

discussion of castration (1.1 series 1, book 1, i’m not including this on every item/discussion because this is a complicated series but i want to demo how up front some of this is)

teenage romance/sex/pregnancy (1.1ish-1.3 or 4, continues throughout the series quite a lot, comes up again in 3.4/5, 4.4-5, and a bit in 5)

death from childbirth (1.can’t remember which book, many others)

unwanted pregnancy (se super edition, or a longer one off novel, discussed in 4&5)

sex/implied, discussed, and very very very heavily hinted but never directly said/shown (1.1-3ish, se, other)

murder (constantly, 1.1, 1.4, literally every book, 3.5, i’m just listing the ones i remember off the top of my head that were particularly graphic)

disability/illness, esp. the debilitating and/or deadly nature of it (1.3-5ish, 3.1, but all of 3, 3.4ish)

dementia (1.3-5, i’ve heard in some of the later series?)

abuse (7/8 this is reported i haven’t read these books but based on what i know it’s def there)

child abandonment (1.4-5, 3.4/5, it’s also all over the place but i think those are the only major character incidents of it)

treason (1.3-5, all over the place)

the horror/tragedy of war (background, but pretty constant)

disagreeing with an integral religion/tradition (3, based on the series title, 8, and generally scattered)

the corrupting influence of power (1.4/5, possibly 7/8, others)

racism (1, 3-5, possibly others)

sexism (se, background)

patriarchal societies (se, seems to be somewhat softened based on what i’ve heard but i’m not entirely sure about this)

and more! but it starts to get stranger and this is enough to prove my point

basically everything that could go wrong does

oh yeah! child abuse also child abuse that’s a very major theme in the first series as well as during other points. and elder abuse in the first series.

okay i’ve made my point.

section three: the appeal

look. so. i think we’re kind of pastel-ify children’s literature based on movies. see, parents have to watch children’s movies with their kids, so they can’t be gritty and intense because a lot of parents will say “not for my nine year old! they can’t deal with treason!” and that seems to be bleeding into children’s literature.

but warriors is not that. it’s intense, it borders on “too gruesome for children,” and it’s from a time where kids books got to be serious and heavy and dark because they were about animals. which was great because i couldn’t find books at my reading level that weren’t too thematically difficult, so i got to read something below my reading level, but thematically too hard, so it kind of balanced out.

and then well. so. the series grows with the audience, but the books don’t grow in terms of like difficulty so new readers start deep into it and it’s a complicated thing, the fandom history is complex, but.

the appeal is that parents don’t usually read the books their kids read and so they see a book about cats and assume it’s fluff, and kids who are starved of complex content get to read hamlet-for-kids.

section four: worldbuilding/lore

oh yeah also there’s some really deep lore to explore. so there’s two bits of appeal.

i’m not doing a full world/plot summary, but i’ll explain some common elements here.

thunder/shadow/wind/riverclan: harry potter houses for cats (gryffindor, slytherin, hufflepuff, ravenclaw, except this doesn’t work for the last two but that’s fine because no one cares about them despite riverclan being pretty important in most of the books)

-kit/-paw/-star: naming conventions. everyone has a two part name. (we’ll use cinder as an example because i like the two cinders we know, even tho neither of them get to be cinderstar.) babies are -kit (cinderkit), then when they’re apprentices, which is like being a student, you know, elementary through high school, you’re paw, so cinderpaw. then you get an Official Name from ur clan leader (cinderheart). if you become clan leader, you get to be -star (cinderstar). i know i haven’t explained clan leaders bear with me. this is kind of important because i have the names burned into my memory so i cannot simply always call firestar firestar if he was firepaw at the time of the events i’m describing. it won’t be ambiguous, cinderheart/cinderpelt are a special case. if this is tricky for you it’s fine just only read the first part of the name.

clan (leader, deputy, medicine cat, elder): roles with in the clan. leaders literally have nine lives. deputies are next in line and chosen by the leader. leaders usually go through several deputies, because deputies don’t have nine lives. medicine cats are doctors. they also have an apprentice. those are all one per clan. elders are just retired cats. they’re not a special category per say, but i wanted to mention them.

warrior: adult.

warrior code: laws.

star clan: dead cats. this ties into the religion which is pretty important to the books but for the most part if you understand that dead cats get to give guidance and send their approval, you have the gist of it.

section five: so um, what the fuck

so we start with a cat named rusty who runs into the woods to join thunderclan and then his name is firepaw and we all forget that he’s named rusty except for like that one time it comes up again. bluestar is a great leader with some corrupt deputies but fireheart eventually takes care of it and becomes clan leader which is a big deal.

then a bunch of other shit happens and suddenly ashfur is possessing brackenstar and being (more) abusive to squirrelflight (who is on the outs with brackenstar anyway for lying about their kits jayfeather, hollyleaf, and lionheart because they’re actually the children of firestar’s other daughter leafpool who had them with crowfeather after she fell in love with him but he’s from windclan and she’s a medicine cat so that’s double illegal and apparently hollyleaf is alive even though she yeeted herself into a pit and died because she killed ashfur when he threatened to reveal this but couldn’t live with being the product of an illegal meeting and then it was all pointless because leafpool stopped being a medicine cat out of guilt anyway and jayfeather is just an ornery bitch about everything but especially all of this)

i’m not explaining any of that.

section six: i repeat: so um, what the fuck

so the thing about these books is they’re soap operas and dramas about cats and that means they get just as strange and chaotic as anything else in the genre. i think a lot of people like me, who read them as children, regard the series we knew as a child (usually either the first three or the first five, plus super editions) as something good and warm and comforting (despite being dark and gruesome) because they made us feel good.

they were also a breeding ground for young fandom because of all the the drama that exists and the nature of the books providing that.

section seven: super editions

the simple answer to what a super edition is has already been given (it’s a novel length one-off about a single character, and its usually either a side character - bluestar, crowfeather - or a event/perspective we don’t get to see - firestar, skyclan, greystripe - and they’re generally more mature)

my favorite super edition is bluestar’s prophecy. i read it at like 16, slinking into the children’s library with a stack of other ya fiction and a “children’s book” which dealt with unwanted pregnancy, grief, forbidden love, and more. still not sure why that’s in the children’s section.

section eight: about the drama

so there’s been a lot of fandom drama about these books. i can’t tell you about the nuances, because i am an old fan, so i watched but didn’t partake. the highlights reel that i can recall goes as follows (please note i will refer to characters by name without explanation. it’s fine. the point of this section is to convey the pettiness of this drama):

tigerstar: did he do anything wrong? (the answer is holy shit yes, this isn’t discourse, it’s okay to like a villain)

scourge: did he do anything wrong, also what color is his collar? (also yes, doesn’t matter)

was the new prophecy (2)/omen of the stars (3)/etc good? (yes, eh, no, yes, no comment, no comment)

should jaypaw or hollypaw be medicine cat apprentice (neither of them, but jaypaw’s employment opportunities are limited because he’s blind, so its gotta b him)

uhh a massive tangle around this parentage drama between squirrelflight, leafpool, brackenfur, and crowfeather, which i used as the crux of humor for how batshit the plots can get, so i’m not even going to pretend i can make it funny, but just know that it’s batshit and the correct opinion is as follows: no one is right, but squirrelflight has done the least wrong, brackenfur is an asshole to her where it’s unwarrented, and hollyleaf is an idiot

and the current drama centers around brackenstar and ashfur and is tied directly to the point above, which is why i’ve kind of given up trying to make jokes about this because this is the culmination of like 35 novels.

section nine: i feel like i need to have some conclusive point to justify writing all of this

but i don’t have one, because this was really an excuse to ramble about an old passion for like half an hour. i mean i guess i can say, like, i think younger fans are sort of embroiled in this drama they don’t really have context for, because i’m not kidding, the current drama centers around the grandchildren of our original cast.

it’s kind of hard to know why, say, mistystar matters if you don’t know that she’s the child of bluefur and oakheart and if you don’t remember the drama that surrounded that when bluestar was dying and tigerstar and leopardstar were ruling a combined shadow/riverclan.

(i really hope that’s intelligible i tried to lay the groundwork for it. basically, there’s a biracial kid in a very segregated society who becomes the leader of one of the clans. which is obviously drama, especially considering that that clan was part of a weird supremacy movement a while back.)

& you know? i really hope one of the new series gets to be like, a soft reboot. just. end the current drama and pick up again with the latest generation. a) we’re starting to run out of names, and b) i think that it’s kind of tipped over the edge of sane.

the series also used to be very low fantasy. the cat societies are reasonably close to feral cat colonies (the biggest detail is that toms don’t all have their own territory, but there’s honestly in-universe discussion of this and it’s basically a culture thing), and while star clan/religion is a real and legitimate thing, there’s also a discussion of its abuse and most of the early books don’t really use star clan/related ideas as a physical force so much as a plot device, barring, like, when a new leader gets their nine lives.

honestly, i’ll always adore these books for serving the role they did, and a lot of the series is fantastically well written. but the fandom surrounding it can be, uh, not great because 9-14 year olds don’t really have good brains to understand this.

also, i’m very sad that i can’t find the flash game that was for the great prophecy. it was not very fun, but i enjoyed playing it, so if anyone knows the url so i can search the internet archive for it, please let me know.

section ten: i’m morbidly curious but there are 56 hours of books to read, assuming a very fast reading pace, so is there something i can start with to experience this without dedicating 4 days to it?

yes, there is.

it’s called bluestar’s prophecy. it’s standalone, and i should have given you enough of a background on the lore that you don’t need to know anything else. i’ve already given away the twist in series 1 that it would spoil, so you’re all good on that front.

if you want more, or want the original experience, the first series is self contained and quite good. i’ve given the broad outlines of the plot, but trust me, there’s a lot of surprises and all sorts of things i skipped over because while i like it, it’s not exactly fandom primer material

i also enjoy firestar’s quest and skyclan’s destiny for super editions, but you’ll need to read the first series to understand FQ and FQ to understand SD, so it’s not exactly a starting point. also, SD especially deals with a very different set of themes as the other books.

also, if you were to, say, search “readwarriorcats” (no spaces) on duckduckgo, and then click on one of the first links, you know, not the official site, the one hosted on one of those free website things, you know, not wix, not wordpress, the other one, you would only find lists of the books with hyperlinks.

;3

[wefewwehappyfew]

Hello! I was scrolling through your posts and I saw your comments on rtve’s Reinas. I have seen it but I couldn’t actually understand what was going on since I can’t speak Spanish.Can you tell me if it is written like Verdi’s Don Carlo?(I mean are Carlos and Elisabetta having an affair?) and your opinions on Philip’s side of the scenerio in general?

Hi!!!!

Sorry for the late reply, I am currently more out of tumblr than in and I just saw this.

I watched Reinas a long time ago and... I frankly do not recommend it.

(Disclaimer: Basing this on the Philip plotline since it is the one I actually watched because I skimmed over the Elizabeth and Mary ones, but I imagine they’ll be equally as terrible)

But yes, it felt like a soap-opera-y messier version of Don Carlo. Only way worse written, and whereas Don Carlos is actually quite likeable in the Verdi opera, here is like they remembered what the actual Don Carlos was like (a very mentally unstable young man, to put it kindly) and shoved it there.

As far as I remember (anyone who has it more fresh in their minds can correct me here), the affair between Elisabeth and Carlos is only hinted at (in a scene where she kisses him when she tries to help him escape from prison, and in something she says to Philip about loving them both, in which I cringed enough to turn the tv off).

Also!!! For some reason that I still do not get, we get Felipe still having an affair with his mistress Isabel de Osorio (and having fathered two sons from her, so Elisabeth can have some drama about only having given him daughters- when the daughters she gave him where his favourite children ffs, one of the only instances of him crying in public is when his youngest daughter by Elisabeth, Catherine Michelle, died. Btw the only other instance I can remember of him crying in public was after Elisabeth’s death.), when, as far as I remember, he did not have any mistress during his marriage to Elisabeth.

But no Princess of Eboli. And for some reason Antonio Pérez is older than Ruy Gomes. (Which wtf)

They have Felipe visiting Elizabeth of England in some diplomatic visit where he’s like he still has a crush on her or something. When the real Felipe didn’t even move to meet Catherine of Medici and sent Elisabeth to negotiate with her mother instead.

Aaand of course, they heavily imply Felipe poisoned Elisabeth.

Full disclosure: I am a Felipe II fan, if this wasn’t obvious. I know the dude made some more-than-questionable choices (Hello poisoning of Bona Sforza, execution of Egmont, and wtf was that mess of appointing a seasick person as the Head of the Armada????), but hey pretty much all historical faves are problematic, aaaaaaaaand he did love Elisabeth. Like, a lot.

Because seriously, pointing again at the crying incidents. Felipe was a huge stickler for protocol, and the protocol of the Spanish Habsburg Court was the absolute worst. It is the same protocol Franz Josef I would adopt later in Vienna and would prompt the then-Prince of Wales to say, after a visit “My G*d, this court is stiff.”

So, for Felipe to start crying, in front of the French Ambassador nonetheless (who was on  a diplomatic mission to ensure a potential marriage to Margot, aka Elisabeth’s youngest sister), speaks buckets of how he felt regarding her when put in context.

Aaand, returning to Reinas, makes the idea of even implying Felipe poisoned Elisabeth absolute bullshit.

Like pretty much all the Felipe storyline there.

The only salvageable stuff? The actors. I specially liked Adrián Castiñeiras as Felipe, and I wish he would have gotten an actual good script.

(Still, idk what I was hoping when the man behind the series is mostly known for the most outdated comedy, and for cabaret shows. (When not for getting into financial messes and not paying his workers) And now he’s creating a series about Francis of Assisi and I think I’m gonna have a stroke how does this guy keep getting work)

But yeah, Reinas is not worth your time.  I was hyped because I am starved for content with Felipe and Elisabeth, but what you are offered here... is not worth it.

(And don’t even get me started on the costumes. Just... why.)

Also, apologies for the long post!!! I just have, like a ton of feelings regarding Felipe II (and apparently a lot of opinions regarding this show)

[softjeon]

We always talk about jealous!namjoon...what about jealous Jimin??

— GENRE; fluff | — PAIRING; Namjoon x Jimin | — DISCLAIMER; mentioning of jealousy, insecurities | — Wordcount; 1,8k | — written with @cassiavioletblue

Being subtle wasn’t his thing, not really. Jimin was standing there, looking over to Namjoon and the girl he had been talking to for the last ten minutes. She - whatever her name was, he totally refused to remember it - was looking up at his boyfriend with so much adoration and awe that it made his toes curl. 

He laughed, leaning forward as his hand brushed along her arm. Namjoon was smiling brightly, seemingly enjoying the company he was in. He had his arms crossed in front of his chest as he leaned against the wall with one foot stemmed against it, only emphasizing how his shirt was straining against his muscular chest. 

Jimin would have loved to just walk over and in his sweetest fantasy he would pull Namjoon towards him, right in front of that girl’s face and kiss his boyfriend square on the mouth. Maybe make out for a little while until he had driven the point home. Jimin smiled for a second but it died on his face when he noticed how Namjoon touched her arm and how she shyly smiled and blushed as if he was watching some goddamn high school soap opera drama stuff.

“Well, I’m glad you are doing better, and the exam went well.” Namjoon smiled proudly at the younger student, when his eyes flickered over to a figure that stood a little further away, staring holes into his body – his boyfriend. He didn’t listen to whatever the girl said, when he noticed Jimin’s stiff posture. 

Namjoon knew him too well to know what it meant. He was jealous.

“I’m sorry Naeun,” Namjoon patted her shoulder sweetly, “I am really proud of you, but we’ll see each other tomorrow after class okay? Make sure to learn your english vocabulary until then. We need to prepare you for friday’s test.” With a small wave, he turned towards his boyfriend, putting on the softest smile for him. 

Finally, finally Namjoon finished their (way too flirty!) conversation and walked over towards him. Jimin knew perfectly well that he was supposed to not be angry at Namjoon for talking to the young students he tutored but it was a little difficult when his last encounter with the girl was still fresh in his mind. He had wanted to pick Namjoon up from a tutoring lesson when two girls had almost run into him, both giggling like mad. They were gushing about how ‘handsome he was’ and how ‘great with words’ and that he was ‘so smart and caring’ and basically all their romantic dreams personified. He hadn’t thought much about it, greeting Namjoon just like always when the other noticed a book on the table. “Oh, Naeun must have forgotten it there, wait a second”. With that he ran out and to Jimin’s horror gave the book back to one of the giggling schoolgirls who promptly turned red.

“You’re still thinking about it, huh?” Namjoon shook Jimin out of his thoughts as he came to a halt in front of him. “Babe,” He whispered, pulling Jimin by his arms as he held him close. “What did bother you this time, hm?” Namjoon asked, softly brushing his thumb over Jimin’s cheek.

Jimin huffed indignantly. “Nothing.” The thing was, Namjoon didn’t do anything. Not really. He was a generally affectionate person and to someone who didn’t know him it might look like as if he liked that girl a lot. Which maybe he did, but not in that way. Jimin knew that. Or should know it. If there wasn’t this teeny tiny little voice in the back of his head that whispered ‘what if..’ and ‘doesn’t it look like..’

“Your face tells me otherwise,” Namjoon cocked his head aside, keeping Jimin close to him. “Should I do something differently? I can adapt if it bothers you.” He leaned down to place a kiss on his cheek, whispering, “You know I love you, right? She just told me about her exam. That’s all.”

Jimin tried really hard not to pout which somehow always ended up making it more obvious to Namjoon that he was pouting. “Yes. Please don’t be so perfectly loveable! I mean I get why she has a crush on you and thinks you’re handsome and great and magical because actually I agree with her on all these points but can she please not try to flirt with you? You’re taken! By me!” He shook his head, “I bet you’ll have valentines chocolate in your locker in a few weeks.”

Namjoon cupped Jimin’s cheeks, squishing them a little to emphasize on his beautiful luscious lips that he loved kissing so much. “And what about it? You know we both going to make chocolate fondue out of it anyways. I don’t care, I say thank you and that I feel honored but that I am taken. By you.” He placed a kiss on his lips, before releasing his boyfriend again. “I can try and be less loveable, I guess.” Namjoon shrugged off his jacket, not really thinking about how it stood completely in contrast of what he just said as he placed it around Jimin’s shoulders who he had noticed shivered from the cold wind. 

Jimin bit his lip. Namjoon was right, there was nothing he could do to make it easier for him because Namjoon wasn’t at fault here. It wasn’t even the girls fault that she had fallen for Jimin (or else he must feel guilty as well because he had done the same) it was his for getting jealous so easily.

“C’mon, baby, let’s get some coffee and pretend as if you don’t get dozens of roses each valentine’s day yourself.” Namjoon reached for Jimin’s hand, wanting to pull him and his pouty lips along, maybe treating him to a coffee and lots of kisses, but he didn’t make it very far. 

“Oh Namjoon,” A young woman stood in front of them, smiling at Jimin shortly before giving her full attention to the taller man. “I just heard about the news. Will you take the dean up on his offer? I’d love to show you around if you’d join. You’d make a great assistant professor. We truly need people like you in our department.”

Namjoon chuckled a little awkwardly, feeling put on the spot right now. The young professor must have noticed and reached out to him, squeezing his arm lovingly, “Don’t worry. I just was delighted to hear about the news that they asked you.” While taking her hand back, a book slipped out of her grip and Namjoon instantly bend down to get it for her, letting go off Jimin’s hand in the process.

It was like a slap in the face. 

For a moment Jimin felt like he must be dreaming or as if he had stumbled into some alternative reality. Namjoon hadn’t said a word about an offer. And he hadn’t told him about that obviously interested woman either. His chest tightened painfully as he tried to make a happy, relaxed face - not like that of a boyfriend who felt betrayed and left out.

Namjoon noticed how Jimin was getting smaller and it had nothing to do with his bigger jacket around his shoulders swallowing him up. So, he bowed his head respectfully and answered, “I have not decided upon the offer, yet as there a few things I need to discuss first. The dean will make sure to tell you about my decision then.” The young professor smiled, giving him an offer for a coffee some time if he had any questions about working for the university before she turned around. Namjoon reached for Jimin’s hand, but the other slipped right out of his grip. “Jimin,” His voice was a whisper, when he looked at his boyfriend, “Believe me, I would have told you.”

“Of course you would have.” Jimin’s answer was court and true because he knew that Namjoon wasn’t lying. The other would have hold him eventually. Which couldn’t make up for the fact that he had kept it to himself so far. Jimin knew that he would have acted different, he would have called Namjoon the second he had stepped out of the dean’s office or had otherwise gotten notice of it and had discussed it with his boyfriend right away. Because Namjoon was so tightly woven into his life, in his mind, that not telling him right away wasn’t even an option he considered possible. 

But apparently Namjoon felt different.

Namjoon knew he should have told Jimin right away, but actually it didn’t seem too important to him. He didn’t want the job anyways. He had other offers, better ones, somewhere else, where he could be with Jimin.

“Baby, come on, please.” Namjoon rubbed his hands over his face tiredly. “Don’t look at me like this. I don’t even want the job. He only asked me two days ago and you were busy with dance last night and… I wanted to tell you tonight. How could I’ve known that she would be so happy about it to run and tell.”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it.” He smiled back at the other who looked stressed out. Namjoon didn’t deserve this treatment. He had never actually done anything that justified Jimin’s jealousy and if he wouldn’t be so insecure then he wouldn’t mind prepubescent school girls dreaming about his boyfriend either.

“I love you, baby.” Namjoon cupped the younger’s cheeks and leaned in, “I want to be with you, only you.” He saw the insecurity written all over Jimin’s expression, as the younger nodded, humming a quick answer. “It was too much today, right?” Namjoon sighed, giving Jimin a peck on his lips. It was the best idea, if he just got Jimin out of here and somewhere, where he could shower him with love and kisses and as many compliments he can think of.

But Jimin seemed like he was rather frozen, eyes averted, when Namjoon took a step away taking his jacket back from Jimin (who silently let him do so – which was no good sign to Namjoon’s tingling boyfriend senses). 

There wasn’t much he could think of and he knew it was a pretty dumb idea, but he saw Jungkook doing this once when Yoongi was grumpy, so it might work now too. With a quick motion, Namjoon bend down and lifted Jimin up and over his shoulder, giving his bottom a soft smack before walking ahead and towards the parking lots with a proud smile.

“Excuse me, me and my boyfriend need to squeeze through,” Namjoon announced, smiling when they passed the group of young students that had gushed over him before. 

“Namjoon!” Jimin exclaimed in protest, trying to struggle his way out of the older’s hold. “What are you doing?! There are people around..what if the students…” He broke off when he saw one of the younger pupils take a picture with his phone. Jimin felt like dying from embarrassment - and he also didn’t like that he was upside down with his head a little too close to the concrete for his liking. One misstep and he would fall off of Namjoon’s shoulders. Deep down he knew that Namjoon would never let him fall. 

And as strange as it sounded being reminded of how much he could trust Namjoon actually helped to tone down his jealousy.

[letterstothemidnightsociety]

It’s 2020 and my anxiety level is so high, I grind my teeth while I’m asleep and awake!  But let’s ignore all that and instead focus on critically analyzing America’s premiere soap opera for monster hunting! It’s Supernatural! 

As you may have already guessed, I watch a lot of TV. And in the Year of Our Troubles, 2020, when I’m encouraged to stay home and indulge in my favorite pastime for the health of the nation, I watch a hell of a lot of TV. When you watch that much TV, you start to notice the rhythm and the flow of how seasons of television progress. You probably notice it too, even if you don’t think about it as much as I do. 

Like, you know that episode that happens right near the end of the season where all the characters are happy? They’ve overcome a whole bunch of obstacles and they’re finally winning and they can see that light at the end of the long tunnel? You know the one I’m talking about. That’s the moment that you, as an audience member, know things are about to go downhill very quickly

Like when Poldark smiles over something and you’re just like, ah yes, I’ll prepare for the funeral. 

Season 1 of Supernatural is like a case study of the rhythm that makes a network show work. There’s this wave effect throughout the season, building the tension up for a few episodes and then sliding through the next handful. Look at the first five episodes: they’re all about holding our breath, we’re gasping at every new turn - death and ghosts and monsters and Family Drama and Bloody Mary and PREMONITIONS AND THEN we let it out over the next three. 

Aaaaaaand exhale!

This first season especially, but I’d argue the first three definitely, you can see this pattern repeated over and over again - building the tension, ramping the horror, bringing it to a major Mythos or Series Arc Moment and then releasing all that tension with a cool-down filler/self-contained episode. 

And that’s where I am in the show now. We just had a major series arc episode with “Shadow” - John finally reunites with his sons, the villain is revealed (Meg and also the demon that killed their mom), and the endgame (for this season at least) is in sight. BUT! We’re a network show with 22 episodes to fill, and we can’t just head straight into the Finale Fight now, we’re only on episode 17! I mentioned in my last post that getting the team together again for all of 6 minutes and 44 seconds (yes, I did go back and count) felt like a slap in the face. I assumed it would have something to do with Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s shooting schedule, but looking at it again, it probably had more to do with the fact that it was too soon to bring John Winchester back as a major player.

So our next episode, our breather episode after all this High Drama, should feel a little disappointing to anyone caught up in the arc of the season. But. BUT. But. The next episode is “Hell House."

Yes, this is a filler, but this is filler done RIGHT. I mean maybe it’s just cuz it’s 2020 and I’m very tired and sad and scared all the time, but I was SO HAPPY to see Ed and Harry again, guys you don’t even know. Guys, the GHOSTFACERS ARE HERE!

And man, I am SO glad that this is a recurring side team that shows up throughout the series. Pease no one tell me that they die in a later season, I’ll find out eventually, I just can’t handle it now. 

They are the anti-Sam and Dean. They have no idea what they’re getting into, they have no idea how to hunt anything, but they’re here to get famous and that’s just...it’s beautiful guys. Just beautiful. 

Plus, you have this soft b-story line where Sam and Dean get to be Real Brothers for a hot second and prank the shit out of each other the whole episode. It’s like even Sam and Dean are saying, yeah, we need a break from all the feelings, let’s put itching powder in each other’s boxer briefs. I want to say that I was really annoyed the first time I watched this and did not care for these shenanigans, but this time around, it was a REAL JOY. 

I’m also not mad about this.

And this breather feeling sort of carries over into the next few episodes. Sort of.  

“Something Wicked” is another feelings-heavy episode. Backstory! Child-eating Monster! Tiny!Dean! I think Dean maybe cries again? Or just does that thing where he stares into the middle distance, all pain and torment and chiseled jaw line and I’m doing it again, I’msorrynotsorry. 

You know. THIS face.

All of these things lead to an episode that has a lot of character development and strengthens the bond between Sam and Dean. Sam literally validates Dean’s whole existence by apologizing for fighting him on this job and then saying “I know I’ve given you a lotta crap for following Dad’s orders, but I know why you do it.” It’s a lot. It’s a big moment from Sam, who hasn’t really reconciled with John yet and who’s still hoping for a future that isn’t all about killing every evil sonuvabitch they can find. It’s a big moment for Dean, too, since his main motivation is protecting his family and (from his limited point of view) that family keeps trying to leave him. And while we do get some insight into the f-ed up childhood that was forced upon our eponymous heroes, there’s nothing really driving the season’s plot forward in this episode. 

Same goes for “Provenance”. This episode is another good horror episode. I mean, even if that painting wasn’t possessed by a murder orphan, it is deeply haunted and I hope props burned it when the production wrapped. And what is it about ghost children particularly that’s upsetting? Is it the size? Is it the fact that their eyes are too big for their heads at that age? I mean, it probably has something to do with perverted innocence and goodness blah blah blah, but also their hands are tiny and so all the knives look bigger.

Same, Sam.

Aside from that, Sam gets another nice growth moment where he gets to imagine a world after Jessica. He’s been so fixated on finding Jessica’s killer - I’d argue more so than his mother’s killer albeit they are the same entity. That’s not a judgement against him, mind. He knew and loved Jessica, he did not know his mother, so I’m not mad about that character decision. But the show is really wrapping up the Jessica plot line because that won’t have legs in a season 2. And that’s harsh, so I’ll temper it with the fact that Sam, as a human being, is getting to the final stages of processing his grief and starting to move on with his life. Plus, I think that Dean wingmanning his brother is adorable and I love it. Good Brothering, Show! 

But nothing in this episode has anything to do with the killer Sam’s been fixating on, so there’s no progression for the season’s main arc. 

Last but certainly not least on this disc of my season 1 box set is “Dead Man’s Blood.” My notes on this episode include the key phrases “I’m pretty sure this episode is...dumb?”, “ I...do not care for vampires,” and then like, two lines later, “Nope. Still don’t care for these vampires.” They’re just making up some random-ass lore and their fashion sense is SO 2006 and I just...I just hate them. 

I hate them SO MUCH.

BUT! That’s not the point of this episode. The point of this episode is to point us towards the season finale. FIRST, we start to see a little bit more of the world that the Winchesters inhabit. We actually meet another hunter, Daniel Elkins. He dies immediately, but that’s a cold open for ya. And when Sam and Dean go to investigate Elkin’s death, John comes back, this time for good (haha, lol). We get a real taste of the family dynamics in this episode - John and Sam fight and come together and fight and come together and Dean’s standing there kinda like, SPONGEBOB! 

You know, Plankton! Krabs! Dean Winchester! Right? Anybody?

All sides have good arguments, and I appreciate that none of the conflict between the the three of them feels forced, or at least, it doesn’t feel forced this watch. The fights all come from deep character places that have been established through the whole season. They’re natural progressions of what we’ve come to expect of these characters. 

And finally, most importantly, John knows how to defeat the demon that killed their mother. Enter Deus Ex Colt Revolver. 

Colt Revolver Ex Machina?

CAN I just take a break for a second to say that BOTH Elkin AND John were ready to WASTE PRECIOUS COLT BULLETS on VAMPIRES, who can be killed IN OTHER WAYS?? Listen, you make a magic gun that only works with these  like, 5 BULLETS, and then you just THROW AWAY A BUNCH OF SHOTS, GUYS??? ALSO, what the HELL does Haley’s Comet and The Alamo have to do with this STUPID GUN??? I JUST- you know what, we don’t have time for all that. 

Attaining the Colt is the brick they drop on the gas pedal to drive us into the season finale of season 1. 

Wasting a some PRECIOUS F*CKIN’ BULLETS, GUYS.

When you look at the season’s pacing at the outset, it seems like it shouldn’t work. I was that person who felt disappointed in each episode where it became clear we were definitely on a side quest, not the main quest.  Watching it now, though, I think that pacing is important. Yeah, the Monster-of-the-Week episodes are a little hit and miss, but sometimes you have to think of a TV season like a marathon and not a sprint. There will be times when you pick up the pace, yes, but it’s a long race and you’re gonna need some periods of recovery if you’re gonna make it to the finish line. And frankly, a lot of those side quest episodes ended up being my favorite episodes of the entire series. 

NOW. I doubt you would see this sort of structuring in a show today, specifically in shows that don’t get a 22 - 24 episode order. You MAY get, MAY, a Ghostfacers-type episode thrown in after a major emotional climax for that breather effect. MAY. But if Supernatural was made today - probably for an online streaming site, probably with only 10 - 13 season order - I don’t think you’d see episodes like “Something Wicked” or “Provenance” or “Faith”. The nice thing about short seasons is that you can keep the storytelling focused and tight, but I also think that can be a weakness as much as it is a strength. What do those three episodes all have in common? They’re strong on character and relationship development. We, the audience, get a deeper understanding and appreciation of the Winchesters and how they work and grow as a unit in these episodes. So if we’ve watched this far, through bugs and ghost trucks, through all their little victories and major setbacks, we’re well and truly invested in how the season is going to end. 

I’m not saying you can’t have big character moments in a shorter season. And I’m not saying that a show more focused on plot, on the What Happens rather than the Who It Happens To, is a bad thing. But watching this season over again in comparison to present day television seasons, it’s highlighted what Supernatural did right. On this side of the series, it’s easy to see why the show went on for another 14 years.

[omnomtonystark]

Charmed 2x11

What a weird disjointed episode. All the plot threads started off promising but ended up either a bit odd in execution or making no damn sense at all. There were some good character moments, but the lack of dialogue tie-in between the two main plots made it feel as if I were watching two completely separate episodes. At no point did it seem as if Maggie knew what was happening back home and Macy seemed oddly carefree of the dangerous missions taking place while she was in Aspen. Were some lines accidentally cut out or something? Might be my least favorite episode of the season.  

Say no to drugs, kids: Baiting the dealers in New Orleans was a great hook, but the way it played out in the club was underwhelming. Who cares if they resurrected the most accountant-looking guy I’ve ever seen? There hasn’t been enough narrative build-up in that plotline for the story to have any sort of suspense or tension. It didn’t help that all the club scenes were shot terribly, cheap-looking and like the camera guys hated the shaman so much they collectively decided to shoot him from the least imposing angles possible. Shouldn’t have cut in line at the craft table, Ed.

Sergeant Vera and her sidekick: The best part of the New Orleans plot was Jordan fully committing to the insanity he’s been thrown into. He’s proving to be a really admirable guy. And Maggie’s blossoming here in the second half of the season, kicking ass and taking names like a slightly shorter incarnation of Buffy. They’ve got a warm chemistry. I like the idea of them just being good friends but if they end up being romantic, Jordan’s an infinitely better choice than Parker. 

Whump whump whump: In a continuing theme of this episode, what started off strong ended up lacking. There was never any doubt that Harry would be alright—either by being cured or dying and then resurrecting again—but that’s fine because stories like this are usually about the characters reacting to the situation. Mel was great but Abigael was confusing and Macy's good moments were marred by the Plot of Contrivance. This thread would be better served if it didn’t hang all tension on what either Abigael or Macy were going to do. Throw some lore in, some intrigue. Whitelighters can’t heal their own wounds? Why? Why does a malignant demon’s poison turn the victim feral? Was the attack more than it seemed? There was so much potential for this storyline.

Butch and Sundance return: Harry and Mel’s friendship in season one was the best and I’m so happy we got a little bit of that in this episode. I wish we’d gotten to see them on their rescue mission, but Mel’s concern and protectiveness over Harry was probably the strongest thread in this plot. More Harry and Mel, please!

Something wicked this way comes: The mistake the writers made with Abigael is making her too ambiguous. I appreciate that they made some effort to develop her character more--bonding with Mel over their mothers was a pretty good moment and her reactions to Harry throughout the episode actually made her seem like a real person--but I always have to stop and think, "Is this real? Is she just acting? Can I believe any word she says? Did she set this all up so she could come to Harry’s rescue?" The uncertainty makes it hard to invest in her character, either as a true villain or someone redeemable. We need to peel this onion, see what makes her tick, get a glimpse of the core to see if it’s rotten or not. She’s as confusing as every mixed metaphor I can throw at her and while that adds mystery, that also detracts from whatever point the writers are trying to make. Her witch side seems to be the key to her motivations so I hope we get more of that.  

Days of Our Plot Contrived Lives: Julian and Macy in Aspen started off fine and then quickly devolved into a soap opera. They’ve literally been on two dates (sort of) and suddenly we’ve got Julian’s aunt trying to break it off between them like this is some telenovela/k-drama star-crossed romance? What am I watching? I feel like we skipped several chapters ahead in this story and the writers are ignoring how nothing about this plotline makes sense. Macy getting with Julian while she and Harry are figuring things out away from each other is absolutely fine. It makes sense. Manufacturing the Aunt of Contrivance to push them together doesn’t. This weird melodramatic left turn to insert weight into a relationship that’s literally only existed for one episode really detracted from the main plot. Either the writers are just terrible at their jobs or it’s another indication that Julian is, indeed, evil and manipulating the whole thing.

I think he’s evil: The backstory makes me even more suspicious of Julian. Never trust flashbacks from an Unreliable Narrator. Too many shows have revealed them as outright lies or largely misleading. And I was recently reminded of 2x04 where they encounter the facility with captured supernatural creatures. That was very lab-like, wasn’t it? Very technological. Scientific. Just like the lab where they were experimenting on black amber. Just like the magical devices we’ve been seeing. Just like what Julian’s company is about. I’m leaning more and more towards Julian being Jimmy’s master. Who else but a billionaire would collect supernatural queens? 

Favorite shot: Mel throwing the portal between Abigael and her family, literally putting a barrier between them and her. I really liked how Harry walked away from Abigael to stand with the sisters and how Abigael didn’t take her eyes off him until the portal literally obscured her vision. The look on Abigael’s face as she was watching him go almost made me pity her but again, I can’t be sure if she’s just putting it on. And I have absolutely no idea how to read her expression once they leave. Poppy Drayton is too good at being ambiguous.

Favorite moment: A toss-up between Macy telling Harry she’ll kill him if he dies and Mel/Macy combining their powers to revive Jordan. 

Funniest part of the episode: Harry shouting “Bollocks!” was hilarious. Rupert Evans’ delivery was perfect. And Julian’s aunt telling Macy to break it off with Julian literally had me rolling. It’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever seen in this show.

[buttdawg]

All Out 2020 Predictions

Just gonna run down the card here, because I keep forgetting what’s on this show, and it is stacked.    

Side note: Looking this up on Wikipedia made me sad, because the article points out that the show was originally planned for a whole other venue before the pandemic started.  I had gotten so used to every AEW show being held in Jacksonville, that I had forgotten the good old days, when they could run every show in Chicago.

Casino Battle Royale, winner gets a shot at the AEW title

I thought they gave up on this stip when they did the Casino Ladder Match at Double-or-Nothing.   Here’s a dumb thought: Ditch the casino nonsense.   The last two casino battle royals were kind of dumb, because they sent out five guys at a time, and then the 21st guy got to come out last by himself.   The problem I had was that I had no idea who half the participants were, and sending them out in fives made it that much harder to keep track.  

Anyway, this time around it’s easier to just list them by faction.    We have

Eddie Kingston’s group (Eddie, Butcher, Blade, Pentagon Jr., and Rey Fenix)

Team Taz (Absolute Ricky Starks and DA MACHEEN Brian Cage, who is also the FTW World’s Heavyweight Champion of the World, Excalibur)

Gunn Club (Billy Gunn and Austin Gunn)

The Inner Circle (Jake Hager, Santana and Ortiz)

Best Friends (Chuck Taylor and Trent)

Lance Archer

Darby Allin

Wait that’s only 16 guys.   You know, it’s been a long time since I learned the rules to Blackjack, but I think that’s about where you want to stand pat.    If you take another card, you’re much more likely to go over 21.    Anyway, I hope Warhorse ends up in this match somehow.   I guess I’ll pick Eddie Kingson to win, since he’s got the most guys helping him.  

No, wait, fuck all of that shit.   Lance Archer wins everything.    Call this Casino Battle Royale a George R. R. Martin novel, because Everybody Fucking Dies.

The Dark Order (Brodie Lee, Evil Uno, Stu Grayson, Colt Cabana) vs. Scorpio Sky, Matt Cardona, Dustin Rhodes, & QT Marshall.  

This is like the Dark Order vs. the Dark Order Revenge Squad, trying to make Brodie pay for beating the shit out of Cody.   I saw a video package for this on Dynamite yesterday, and it was fucking stupid, because they wanted me to believe that the good guy team are “four badasses”, even though one of them is QT Marshall for crying out loud.   They do this horseshit all the time, where a group of babyfaces try to gang up on the Dark Order, but it never works because the faces never bring enough guys.   There’s like eight or nine dudes in the Dark Order, so unless your team has ten or eleven, you’re gonna get your asses kicked.    Brodie killed Cody like he was nothing, so why am I supposed to believe Dustin has a chance in hell?  

The last time Scorpio Sky was on one of these anti-DO posse teams, it was with Colt Cabana and his partners in SCU.    Well, Colt ended up switching sides, and apparently Chris Daniels and Kazarian aren’t even booked, so that tells me what I need to know.     Dark Order wins.  

Britt Baker vs. Swole in a Tooth and Nail Match.

I don’t know if “Tooth and Nail” is an actual stipulation, or if they’re just calling it that for promotional purposes.  I wish they’d spell out the rules to these things instead of just calling out the names of matches like catchphrases.   Swole would look pretty dumb if she loses this, so I’m picking her to win.  

Matt Hardy vs. Sammy Guevara  in a “Broken Rules” Match.

Wikipedia says this is a Last Man Standing match, so maybe they should have just called it that?  I mean, less than a month ago Matt claimed that he was ditching all his characters for the duration of the pandemic, and now he’s right back to chanting “Delete!” like nothing changed.   I heard a lot about Matt’s cinematic universe run in Impact, but so far I’m not overly impressed with his run in AEW.   He just makes a bunch of callbacks to stuff he did in WWE, Impact, and ROH like I’m supposed to know or give a shit about that time he was a douchebag.     If Matt loses, he’s supposed to leave AEW, but I’m pretty sure this is a trick, and he’ll just come back as “Leviticus” and pretend to be a robot from outer space.   I don’t think I care who wins.

Jurassic Express vs. The Young Bucks.

Why are these guys fighting?    I feel like they already did on TV?    I’m gonna pull for JE to win this one.    I think the Bucks might be my favorite act in AEW, but I mostly enjoy seeing them get the shit beat out of them.    Yeah, kill the Young Bucks.   

Chris Jericho vs. Orange Cassidy in a Mimosa Mayhem Match.

You can win Mimosa Mayhem by pinfall, submission, or dumping your opponent into a big tank of mimosa.    I guess this is a way for OC to win their feud without actually pinning Jericho twice?    Alternately, the loser can get pinned, only to dump the winner in the tank to get a moral victory.    I’ll go with Orange to win.  

AEW Tag Team Championship: Kenny Omega/Hangman vs. FTR

Now that they finally kicked Hangman out of the Elite, and FTR has finally stopped pretending not to be heels, and now that Kenny Omega finally seems to give a shit about his tag team, I think this program could finally lead to something cool.    I sort of want FTR to win, just to move the Hangman/Omega angle onto the next stage.     If the tag titles are the only thing keeping that team together than we need to see what happens without them.  

Also, I want FTR to defend the titles against Santana and Ortiz.    Yeah, no offense to Omega and Hangman, but fuck this Elite Drama Bullshit, gimme FTR vs. PnP.

AEW Women’s Championship: Hikaru Shida vs. Thunder Rosa.

Fuck yeah, this is the real main event right here.    Thunder Rosa kicks ass, and now she can show her stuff without the nonsensical soap opera booking found in the NWA women’s division.   The last time I saw Thunder Rosa in NWA, Melina had inexplicably declared that she had a title match against Rosa, but when the match actually happened, Melina just rolled out of the ring and took a countout.    Seeing Eddie Kingston, Ricky Starks, and Thunder Rosa has opened my eyes to a lot of problems in NWA.

Anyway, here’s the AEW storyline for Thunder Rosa: Shida wanted competition, and Thunder Rosa showed up to kick her ass and take her belt.   I suspect Shida’s going to win, because Rosa’s NWA title isn’t on the line, but I’m rooting for Thunder Rosa to become the double champ.  

AEW Men’s Championship: Jon Moxley vs. MJF.

I want Moxley to win, although I’m not 100% sure this isn’t MJF’s time.   It feels too soon, but I didn’t think Moxley would win the title from Jericho back in February either.   Also, if Moxley loses the title, it might make it easier for AEW and NJPW to open the Forbidden Door long enough for him to defend the IWGP U.S. title against KENTA.    Is that worth putting the world title on MJF?   Probably not, but it’s fun to think about.  

I don’t understand this feud at all, because MJF has been “campaigning” for a world title shot, even though he’s the #1 contender and he’s undefeated, so I’m pretty sure he could just request the match and he’s all set.    MJF has also successfully lobbied to have Moxley’s finisher banned from their match, but what if Mox uses it anyway?   They’d just disqualify him and he’d retain the title, right?    Or maybe the ref would just stand there and let him do it anyway, because that seems to be how AEW referees do things.   

I really don’t get why MJF wanted the Paradigm Shift banned.   He got hit with one like two weeks ago, and he acted like it half-crippled him, but then he revealed it didn’t hurt him that badly, so why does he care if he takes another one?  MJF also seems to have this thing going on where he pretends to be this high-road-taking “pure wrestler”, who can out-finesse Moxley’s brawling style, but we’ve seen MJF just go apeshit and use hardcore tactics himself.  

This is kind of an aside, but I find it funny when Jim Cornette acts surprised when people accuse him of playing a character on his podcasts.   He’ll be like “No, no, you don’t understand, I really hate Vince Russo and Kenny Omega and I want them both dead for not respecting kayfabe!”    The thing is, wrestlers like MJF and FTR are out here repeating a lot of Cornette’s talking points on TV, specifically to get heel heat.   They praise themselves for being workhorses who stick to the fundamentals, but they’re hypocrites who use gamesmanship and trickery to get ahead.    So people hear Cornette blowing a gasket about Joey Janela and they just assume he’s being some sort of cartoonish supervillain character to sell his merch, because the alternative is too absurd to contemplate.    It’d be like MJF assuring people that he really does bloody people up with his diamond ring in real life, just like he does on TV.   

Anyway, I’ll stick with Moxley, but if MJF wins, I’ll be more intrigued than disappointed...

[shouldiwritetoday]

Nanowrimo Week 1

Days 1-8

Words: 6668/50000 | 6668/13336

So, I’m like four days behind. Whatever. I’ll get over it. The point is that I’ve written at least like a hundred words each day. Which is a win. For me. I wrote the most today (2656). I’m just finding it really hard to find the motivation to write.

Anyway, I’m writing a story about a soap opera actress whose character is going to be killed off, but before that can happen, she suddenly wakes up in the world of the show and everyone is calling her by her character’s name, so now she has to figure out a way to not die.

Snippet:

The studio was like a second home. When Bee had first been cast, on her first day at work, she couldn’t imagine ever feeling comfortable in such a formidable building with hundreds of people coming in and out, doing heaven knows what at all odd hours of the day. Hell, she couldn’t have even imagined that she would have ever made it this far in her career.

Lyla Blake was her breakout role into stardom. Lyla was a friend Bee could never shake off by now. More soft spoken, less abrasive than she really was. She had unintentionally adopted some of Lyla’s mannerisms after practicing them for hours on end. For example, Bee had never twirled her hair before it became Lyla’s signature way of thinking. Lyla was always more simple minded, a little too eager to please, a little too willing to forgive. She had a near perfect life — a nice home with a nice husband with a nice family supporting her. Well, except for her brother-in-law, but that was another dramatic story all together. The only thing Lyla was missing was children and Bee desperately hoped that this new story arc Lowry was announcing included them.

She greeted those she knew, politely acknowledged those she didn’t but who had welcomed her in. As she made her way over to the offices, she wondered about the fates of other characters in the show. While she liked to believe Lyla was the one and only really important character, soap operas were ensembles and even just one scene could throw off an entire character arc with developmental issues that needed seasons to fix.

Jackson Blake was Lyla’s husband. He was played by, of course, Will Fairfax. He had been struggling with the fall out of his brother Elijah (Ryan Kelsey) abandoning him and the rest of the family upon marrying Lyla. The relationship never recovered and they had yet to figure out the reason why Elijah despised Lyla so. 

Meanwhile, Emma Caroll (played by the amazing and Emmy-award winning actress Scarlett Agapov) was recovering from a particularly bad case of pneumonia after she had been locked out of her house in the middle of a storm with a dead phone and her husband, Ian (Phillip Nicolaides), hadn’t realized she was missing as he had fallen asleep watching movies on the couch with their two children Hannah and Travis. Ian was currently in therapy for almost inadvertently causing her wife’s death. If Brandon Tran (Daniel Ho) hadn’t been coming home from his late night affair with the older and married Mrs. Theresa Martines (Vera de la Cruz), then Emma very well could have died. 

And there was that business to consider. Brandon and Elijah were best friends. Both of them schemed behind Jackson and Lyla’s back. Mrs. Martines was, after all, the wife of Jackson’s boss. However, to further complicate things, Mr. Ricardo Martines (Julio Montoya) had had a past relationship with Lyla’s father in their school days which was coming back to haunt him after the reintroduction of the Michaels family after the wedding. Mr. Martines was right back at it again with questioning his sexuality, thereby leading his wife to have an affair as they were childless. That is to say, whatever plots Brandon and Elijah cook up to pass onto Theresa to then enact on Jackson and inevitably foiled by Ricardo who wishes to do right by the husband of the daughter of his first love. Because there was a missed opportunity or something.

Not to mention, Bee also knew that with this new story arc a new character would be added. Arabella Jones. Bee didn’t know who the actress for her was yet. Some unknown, to be sure. She was also eager to learn her purpose. Most importantly, she hoped that they would get along because nothing was worse than having a coworker she couldn’t stand. The only real friends she had on set were Will and Cassidy Carmichael, who played Olivia O'Malley, the physical therapist who had an on again/off again relationship with Elijah.

Cassidy greeted Bee over by the coffee maker. Skylar went off to talk to a producer, remarking that they would chat again later.

Cassidy Carmichael was a tall woman of thirty. Her straight blonde hair came to her cleft chin in a sweet bob, extenuating the faint roundness of her cheeks. Hazel eyes sparkled at Bee like the day had grown infinitely more interesting. “So,” she said, “d’you think I’ll break up with Eli over five times, or less?”

“Hmm…” Bee pretended to think. “You’re going to break up with him twice, he’s going to call it off three times, and for extra shit, giggles, and drama, when getting back together the last time, he’s going to skip straight to proposing and you two will elope.”

“No way,” Cassidy said. “I’m going to propose.”

Bee laughed. “Right. Because Olivia loves to walk straight into fires unprotected.”

“Nah. It’s ‘cause she’s a right bitch who tries so hard to make her own life difficult.”

They shared a smile. It was one of their favorite pastimes to think up possible plot lines that the writers were thinking of and why they deemed them suitable. Guessing relationship statuses were almost too easy. Cassidy had called the exact season, episode, and page of the script where Jackson proposed to Lyla like she was some sort of soap opera prophet. Those participating in that particular bet had been thoroughly impressed.

Later, Cassidy had told Bee that she had slept with Andrew and dug through his files while he was asleep. Bee laughed for days afterwards.

“So,” Cassidy continued, a sly smirk on her face. Bee prepared herself for whatever provocation was about to be unleashed. “It’s been three months since you-know-who broke up with his girlfriend.”

Clearing her throat, Bee maintained a neutral expression. “So?”

Cassidy nudged her, grinning. “Make your move, Bee. Before some other young filly snatches him up or Catherine comes back to stake her claim.”

Bee rolled her eyes and shrugged, her gaze shifting to her shoes. “I don’t know, Cass,” she sighed. “They were together for three years. You don’t exactly get over a three year relationship in three months.”

“You might, if the next girl to come along has been one of your best friends for the past five years and is super hot.” Cassidy paused to consider her next words. “And, you know, if you’ve already had steamy make out sessions with her.”

“Those were for work!” Bee cried, which only gained her a shrug in reply. “I don’t exactly have a way of knowing if he’s interested in me, nor do I know how to make it clear to him that I am.” This earned her a short laugh, to which she glared at. “Seriously, Cass. I can’t just walk up to Will and say—”

“Ooh,” a low, baritone voice that rang like a heavenly choir cut in. “What kind of gossip can you not just walk up and tell Will?”