#Fairy Contentious

[unovantype]

Every single semester. Every single time. My professors look at Daisy and then at me and ask what interests me about Dark or Ghost Typing. As if I can't have a Fairy type pokemon and be interested in Dark and Ghost 😭

It is kind of funny looking at all of the dark shades of gray, black, and brown of all of the other students' pokemon and then there's Daisy, bright pink lmao

[slimegirlknot]

a small vtuber i follow, Fairy Princess Ichika, had hololive ollie message in the stream. ollie truly is everywhere.

[prokopetz]

One of the reasons the walrus-versus-fairy thing was so contentious is that not only did the person who originally posed the question strongly believe the correct answer was obviously the fairy, their reasoning for why the fairy was obviously more surprising was that seeing a fairy would instantly refute the validity of human reason as a tool for understanding the universe and bring your entire worldview crashing down. The sensible response is, of course, to point out that people don't work like that, and realistically nobody is going to see something mildly inexplicable and fall to their knees wailing in existential despair unless we're living in an H P Lovecraft novel, but I'm not gonna lie, I'd probably pay money to read a story about a dude having a full on Lovecraft protagonist breakdown in response to seeing Tinkerbell.

[ckret2]

Ages ago I made a post about what Ford thinks about Bill (in a billford context), and I've had an infodump on what Bill thinks about Ford floating on discord for months, and an ask finally prompted me to post it, so here ya go:

If asked why he likes Ford, Bill himself claims that Ford overthinks everything, but in such fun, interesting ways, and Bill likes the way Ford thinks about things.

But really, Bill overthinks everything too; it's just he overthinks social things. He's always calculating how to persuade, control, manipulate people. He never has a conversation that isn't a chess game, it's exhausting and he won't even admit it's exhausting. When's the last time his top priorities weren't either "how do I convince some sucker to make a portal" or "ugggh I'm so SICK of the PORTAL I'm gonna THROW A PARTY and NOT THINK AT ALL"

Whereas Ford is guy who'd hear someone say something incorrect and bluntly go "no you're wrong" and accidentally offend the hell out of them because he's SO excited to share this fantastic information they don't know. The social world DOES NOT EXIST for him until he's reminded of it.

And so he's free to turn all his brainpower instead to. Like. The environmental impact of barf fairies on fern fertilizer or whatever.

Bill knows Everything™ but he's gotten tired of doing anything with that knowledge. They're all discrete points of information to him. He doesn't have time to muse over things, he's got an inventor to manipulate at 11pm and then a party to get to at midnight. He's never once in his life thought about the impact of barf fairies on the local flora. But he does happen to know the plants in that part of the woods are more acid-resistant and wow is that why???? He's never even thought to think about that before. Thousand year mystery that Bill didn't even notice has been solved.

(On the other hand "Ford doesn't think to think about the intricacies of social interaction" is also part of what makes him so easy to manipulate, he's so much more inclined to just accept at face value a friendly offer of assistance on a big academic project. Sure Bill's helping for the sake of scientific advancement in and of itself, why wouldn't he?)

Bill wants to just, fling random facts at Ford and see if he can think up connections between them. Go nerd boy go nerd boy go

"... So there you have it Ford, that's the problem you'll have to overcome with adapting alien machinery to human fuel sources, now I wanna hear YOUR thoughts on how to overcome that problem." "Well—" talks in an uninterrupted stream that by thirty minutes in has drifted over to the history of kerosene production, which he read an interesting book about between semesters in college— "... I've gotten off topic, haven't I?" "No no, I think you're on to something. This is how brainstorming works, free association of concepts. Keep going."

Ford in the morning: "... oh no I didn't let my muse get a word in edgewise for the rest of the dream, i didn't bore him did I?" Bill: "damn, I never noticed the patent process for hurricane lamps was so contentious. There's little dramas everywhere"

When things are going well, their relationship is,

Ford: "I just wanna hear Bill teach me things about the multiverse forever."

Bill: "I just wanna hear Ford think deeply on any topic that crosses his mind forever."

Both of them when they're in peak harmony: excitedly jabbering at each other at 200 words per minute about the stupidest topic you've ever heard, but you'd need a phd in at least two fields to comprehend it

That's love!!!

Ford, having historically been socially shamed: "... am I being weird?"

Bill: "💕❤️💓yeah❣️💖❤️‍🔥"

Sometimes I think about Bill watching Ford in his sleep and being in awe at this human-shaped genius: you with your beautiful electric mind, packed into this soft flawed uneven body. one would never know it from the outside—but you're in there. This genius with a mind like a galaxy. ... and he's like, growing hair and stuff. wild.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Heyo! Do you have a personal ranking of all TWST (JP) events?

Though another random thing I want to say is about the events, do you think some events are more forgotten about than others??? I say this because I think the Sunset Savana Tamashina, Endless Halloween, Wish upon a star and Beans Day are usually not talked about as much as other events like the Ghost Marriage and Fairy Gala events.

Unless this is all just the TWST stuff I'm usually fed...

I haven't ranked all of the events myself since a lot of them fall into a "they're okay" middle ground category. (Besides, my rankings would be outdated and I’d have to come back and edit my list every month when new events come out.)

What I will say is that my favorite events right now are the following (in no particular order): Glorious Masquerade, Fairy Gala: If, Wish Upon a Star, Ghost Marriage, Beans Day (I + II), and White Rabbit Fest. I give more in-depth thoughts about my favorite events here!

I personally have not noticed a significant skew towards certain events over the others, though of course this could vary a lot depending on the smaller TWST circles you run in and/or what your social media algorithms feed you. The general trend tends to be a huge burst of discussion or related fan content during or around the time of the event's run or rerun, then the hype dies down once the event ends. Most of the event-specific content you'll see after the events (at least in my experience) are theories/analyses calling back to details mentioned in the events. TWST itself certainly doesn't discriminate against certain events; to this day, they still sometimes come out with merch for their earliest event, Beans Day. There's probably going to be another wave of event-themed merch to coincide with the later events.

To explain maybe why you may perceive certain events as more popular than others: not all events are created equal, and not all events drop interesting lore that people find worth discussing. The endings for Tamashina Mina and Endless Halloween Night were, as I recall, contentious or not well-received by pockets of the fandom. This could explain why they're not talked about much. Wish Upon a Star was notable for being the first time ever we saw the boys' individual rooms, but other than that... there wasn't anything that exciting to most. A lot of their wishes were self-explanatory or expected, and Idia's conflict is also one that is explored or otherwise mentioned many times over, which could result in a lack of fandom interest.

Beans Day has its age to consider. As the oldest event, it has maybe just eroded in memory due to the passage of time. Additionally, it's one of the few events (outside of Halloween ones) to prominently feature the entire cast, meaning everyone is fighting for the spotlight and thus makes it harder for specific events or interactions to stick out in people's minds.

And as to why Ghost Marriage and Fairy Gala are popular? I'll be 100% honest, I'm pretty sure it's because of the aesthetics. FG does not have a fantastic story, but man, do those outfits look good. GM is in a similar situation (who doesn't love a cute guy in a suit?), and it has the distinction of being the one and only TWST event with an overt "romance" theme (which appeals to the dense population of yumes and/or shippers in the fandom).

[preservationofnormalcy]

What exactly is the deal with the Fae and Iron?

I've talked about this before, but it's an interesting topic.

The short answer is "we don't know." There's theories, and it's contentious topic in fae circles - not really polite dinner conversation, if you get my meaning.

Some believe it's because of the fae connection to the natural world, and iron representing industry, change, exploitation, humans impressing their will upon the world. An idea, a vibe that has effects on the physical realm through repetition.

Others think that, way back in antiquity before written memory, an early encounter between a human and a fairy ended with the human slaying the fae using a chunk of iron - a monumental change that imprinted itself in reality. A sort of storybook tale that over time became real.

Some fair folk believe that it's no more than a more-impactful phobia, or something that can be "trained out" of individuals or that they could build up a resistance to it. I wouldn't bring those topics up to fae friends, however. It's very contentious and impolite in mixed company.

[yen-sids-tournament]

Animated 2: Return to Neverland v The Pirate Fairy v Tinker Bell and the Legend of the NeverBeast

Return to Never Land {originial-Peter Pan (1953)} *spoilers?*

It follows Wendy's canonical daughter Jane, in every version of the story where Peter returns to the Darling's window, he meets Jane, and this story gives her her own adventure. with Wendy as a turn of the century child, it isn't too much of a stretch to assume Jane would be growing up in the middle of a deeply contentious time in British History, that being the London bombings of World War 2, and Unlike Wendy, whom needed to understand that she didn't WANT to never grow up and embrace her coming maturity as it arrives, Jane had been thrown into a position in her family where she had needed to grow up too fast, and in her trip to Neverland understand the importance of that child-like wonder she had nearly lost. As such, she starts out deeply skeptical and frustrated by the nonsensical nature of Neverland, and being more trusting of adults than of children whose attempts of 'playing with her' were little more than bullying with the thin veneer of 'just a game', which ultimately allows her to be manipulated by Hook. But even then manages to grow attached to the lost boys and connect with Peter and due to her inability to fly for most of the movie had almost fully integrated into the world of Neverland and became the first Lost Girl by the time of the third act. While it's held back by the painfully early 00's music it's ultimately a very compelling story about a child in a deeply traumatizing situation finding temporary haven in a place untouched by the war that had so deeply distorted her worldview and ultimately reclaiming her right to have a childhood after constant danger of death and destruction had nearly wrenched it from her entirely. (also there's no racist Native American stereotypes that exist just for the sake of themselves and could have easily been some sort of fantasy species but nahhh it was the 50s so native americans were SUPER okay to be racist about/s)

The Pirate Fairy {original-Tinker Bell (2008)}

>none submitted<

Tinker Bell and the Legend of the NeverBeast {original Tinker Bell (2008)}

It centres around Fawn aka the best Disney Fairy, KT Tunstell did the soundtrack which absolutely slaps and is unironically on my main playlist to this day. It made me cry when i watched it for the first and subsequent times. Its just so sweet and wholesome. Also apparently spice girl Mel B voiced a minor character in the UK release??? The voice casting alone makes this one of the franchises and films of all time.

[cheshirecaine]

Grey from Fairy Tail? xD

//sorry for getting to this slow, friendo.//

How I feel about this character

shameless nudist; love him.

Love the depth to his backstory and his determination and insistence on growing through every loss and experience of adversity. Love his lil smirk when he knows he's being hot shit. Loved his swords and general array of techniques.

My fave Fairy Tail character – I never finished the series and yet he is my avatar on everything but AO3. (I saw him wear a cat ear hairband with Lucy on a chapter cover and went from shittily colouring it in Paint as a preteen or sth, to re-drawing them as real, because I'll never let this go). (Also: furry pipeline, who'd'a guessed lmao)

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Teen me would say myself xDD (I don't think I actively did much at that age and didn't super duper believe in the vibe Mashima was going for with Juvia). I think I was a lil convinced by Lucy or even Natsu or Leon. Recently spoke to a good friend about how I honestly would've been here more for some kinda love triangle or any ship between the three of Lucy, Gray and Natsu.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Him and Happiness. Possibly Gray and Natsu bro/rival/bestieship. Gray & the Fairy Tail guild p much.

My unpopular opinion about this character

I guess that'd be the disbelief in the Gruvia ship. And possibly just wishing Mashima had had the story kick down at him less.

Honestly, don't think I really have deeply contentious opinions here.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I stopped reading before it got very far with the Gray dad/evil weirdness idk. It didn't seem interesting to me.

I guess just more of not having him be as sidelined – I just liked when my boy was shown off.

(if you wanna ask me about more characters in this vein, please do!)

[us3rnam3-r3dact3d]

i assume you'll be coming for blood (that makes two of us)

Chapter 1

Ao3 | 1.9k words | Sweetheart's POV

You'd never even heard of shades when the file slid across your desk on Monday morning. - Fooliverse Sweetheart faces off with that first shade. They already know Milo, but things are a lot more complicated than they might have been, not least because of their own stubbornness and pride. Hopefully that pride won't get them killed. Hopefully.

TW: violence, mentions of sex, the Department

You’d never even heard of shades when the file slid across your desk on Monday morning. The Quinn Fox case had left you with a week’s worth of paperwork despite the nice little bow that Milo’s help had tied on it for you. The Department didn’t like the Vampire Council, and the concept of Sanguine Primero was contentious at best with Department officials. The stamped and sealed paperwork you’d been provided with was only good for telling you who was involved. You’d been forced to interview nearly every person involved, including the intimidating Talbot Pack Alpha.  

In the end, Asher, which he insisted you call him, was actually quite nice. Once you’d gotten past his intense demeanor, he had a quiet sense of humor that you appreciated. He’d given you the details, answered every question, and promised you statements from every pack member involved. He did sternly refuse to allow you access to them, especially the wayward wolf that had been the catalyst for all of this, Quinn’s true victim. He wouldn’t even give you their name, just an acknowledgement of how difficult he knew that would make your report. That famous wolf possessiveness on display.  

Just as Talbot- as Asher- promised, the statements were delivered to your work email by end of business that day, including an anonymous one from Fox’s victim. You’d filed them dutifully, along with Milo’s and a heavily edited one from his clan-mate Porter.  

All of that had taken the wind out of you surrounding the case. You’d almost been naive enough to believe that you’d get to take in a wanted criminal on your first case, adding a bit of clout behind your title.  

You were the least impressive member of your class, at least by your instructor’s standards. Being a stealth was useful as an investigator, but not when apprehending suspects, not in a physical test, not when trying to show off to your new captain just how useful you could be. The Department was a good old-fashioned boys’ club. Sons of enforcers and investigators crowded your academy class, and their attitudes surrounding your size and power and physical ability clouded their judgment about you. It didn’t matter that you were the strongest stealth in your family in generations, that you could phase cloak for nearly an hour, that you could run mental circles around most of those assholes in a second. Your power wasn’t one they could see or be intimidated by, so it simply didn’t exist.  

So they gave you shit like Quinn Fox, shit that would either get you killed or leave you with nothing impressive to show for your work. All while your peers hauled in suspects and bagged cases left and right.  

If you weren’t so stubborn, you’d have left this stupid fucking job the night Milo talked you down from a goddam panic attack in the middle of an investigation. If you weren’t so determined to prove everyone around you wrong, you’d have taken him up on his sugar-baby adjacent offer and live off of vampire money while receiving the best fucks of your life. 

When you told your father that you were going to be an investigator, his face had twisted into something like pity. You couldn’t stop until you replaced that with sheepish guilt and impress.  

Of course, you weren’t going to do it with this case. Shades, as far as you could tell, were a fairy tale. The Department resources on them were nearly nonexistent. You’d found a few reported sightings of the ghost-like things, but the only real answers you’d gotten were from Cam.  

Camelopardalis was your favorite coworker. You rarely crossed paths in actual work, but your break rooms were adjacent to each other, and he was the only person who smiled at you unprompted on your first day. You drank coffee together in the morning, you complained quietly about the assholes in each of your departments, and you shared lunch on a bench in the large, green courtyard outside of your building every day.  

Cam didn’t strictly need to eat, but he liked what you cooked. You went from cooking for one to two, making sure there were enough leftovers to feed you both the next day. Over re-warmed shredded beef tacos, Cam recalled everything he knew about Shades.  

“They come from Death,” he had explained, the word taking on the sort of capitalization that important places got, “and they’re very dangerous to humans. We don’t know much about them, just what they do. There’s only been a few confirmed cases of them in human history.”  

“What do they do?”  

“They’re not living things.” He said. His star-dotted eyes looked up, considering the clouds like they had answers for him. “They’re incorporeal when they first slip into Elegy- Terra-” he corrected. Some humans didn’t like it when demons used their names for things. He must have learned to edit what he was saying as he spoke. “-and they need the life force of humans to gain a physical form. Usually that means draining it from unknowing victims. Most of them are drawn to heavily populated areas, feeding a bit from a lot of people. Once they’ve gotten enough life force, they gain physical form, they often become violent. They have claws that are particularly deadly.”  

“Are they... ghosts?”  

“We don’t know.” Cam shrugged, tucking a corkscrew curl behind his tall horns.  

“How do they get here?”  

“We think they slip through the cracks of demon’s rifts.” He sighed. “Of course, it’s impossible for us to rift directly to Death. It’s a sort of... cosmic glitch. Sometimes the rifts get crossed over the wrong dimension, and that’s how we assume they find their way here.”  

“It must be confusing for them.” You said. Cam cocked his head. “I just mean... if they are ghosts, and they’ve spent forever in Death, and then suddenly find their way here... I don’t know, it’s like when you back an animal into a corner. They must be pretty freaked out.”  

Cam smiled at you before waving a hand. With a flourish of his pretty, turquoise magic, the Tupperware you’d brought from home was gone. When you got home, it would all be washed and put away in your cabinet.  

“You have such an interesting perspective.” He grinned, standing and offering you a hand. “You always see the best in everything.”  

You certainly didn’t think so charitably about the shade when you faced it for the first time. It was a ghastly thing. Barely visible, it looked like a skeleton wrapped in thin, black smoke. It’s mouth opened into a horrible, gaping maw. You could smell the decay on it, even from your distance.  

You had backed it into an alley, a secluded corner just off Dahlia’s nightclub district. It had been feeding on college students, drunk kids who couldn’t see straight enough to know to run. You knew to run, but instead of away from it, you’d chased it. God, you were an idiot. When most people ran away, you ran to.  

Your magic was useless against it. It hadn’t taken physical form. Your fists passed right through it when you tried to fight it off. It framed your throat with two boney hands, drew your face towards its own, like it was going to kiss you. Instead, it sucked the life out of you.  

You came to cold, shivering on the damp ground of that alley. Nobody had seen you, or at least, nobody had stopped to help. The shade was gone.  

Making your way home was more difficult than you had thought it would be. Your phone was dead, so no Uber, no call to the Department, no call to Cam since you were truly desperate. The nausea was overwhelming, and your knees were weak. You remembered, giddily, Milo’s comment about not locking them in stressful situations. It only did you so much good, and you had to stop at every bench and a few curbs to not keel over.  

Somehow, you managed the three mile walk and the two flights of stairs up to your apartment. You barely made it to your bathroom before you emptied your stomach of the day’s contents, your vision swimming and body finally giving out on you. By the time you’d dry heaved your throat to shreds and your stomach finally settled, you were shaking all over, broken out into a cold sweat. This felt like a particularly brutal flu, the memory of stomach bugs lingering in the back of your head.  

“I want my mom,” you whispered to no one, your head pressed into the cool white tile floor. That childish instinct reared its head like it did every time you were ill. You wanted someone to brush their fingers through your hair, press a cold cloth to the back of your neck, make you soup and nag you about getting plenty of fluids.  

Eventually, you dragged yourself off of the bathroom floor. You stripped out of your sweat-soaked clothes and crawled under the covers of your bed. You fumbled with your phone charger, your hands shaking, and waited with drooping eyelids as it came back to life.  

You didn’t know why you called him of all people. You had plenty of others who you should have called first. Your supervisor, for one, who would need a report of your injury. Your father was twenty minutes away and would have been there in a heartbeat, with his sorry glances and muttered admonishments about this job being a bad fit. Your older brother and younger sister both lived a handful of blocks away, but there wasn’t a caring bone shared between them.  

“Is this the kind of three A.M. call I’ve been waiting for, Sweets, or-”  

He must have heard your ragged breathing, because he stopped mid-flirt, his tone faltering. Milo’s flirty facade was always sort of amusing to you. It was so clearly an act, a cover for the insecurity or angst or whatever he was trying to keep down. Sometimes, especially when you required some sort of care, it fell away without him even noticing, and you were left to stare at the naked truth of him.  

“What’s wrong?” he demanded, his voice jumping a few pitches in concern. You smiled absently at that.  

“I-” your voice was wrecked, ruined by strain. You cleared it a few times, trying to sound a bit more presentable. “Nothing.” You lied. Milo would know, but you didn’t have the energy to explain. “The flu.”  

“Uh-huh.” Milo replied. He went silent.  

He wasn’t your fucking boyfriend. You weren’t in a relationship. He was a fuck buddy at best. You wouldn’t even go so far as to call him a friend with benefits. He wasn’t your friend.  

“I just-“ you repressed the urge to cough. “I won’t be there. Tomorrow night. Because of the flu.”  

“Are you-“ Milo seemed on the verge of asking you something dangerous like ‘are you okay,’ which would take this fun, casual thing you had going on and add feelings to it, something neither of you wanted. “Right.” He finally settled; his voice still suspicious. “I guess um… just let me know. When you’re better. Or if you need… soup. Or anything.”  

“Soup.” You repeated.  

“Fuck off.” Milo growled. “I haven’t been human in years, remember? I don’t know what sick people need.”  

“I don’t need anything.” You said quickly, defensively. “I’ll… text you next time. I don’t know why I called.”  

“It’s okay,” Milo said, “I don’t mind a call.”  

“Right.” You said. “I‘ll call you in a few days. When I’m better.”  

“Okay.” You could hear him deflate, his tone settling back in that façade. “I’ll see you soon, Sweetness.”  

“Yeah.” You replied. You didn’t know if you managed to hang up before you passed out. 

[scotianostra]

9th December 1770 saw the birth of the poet and novelist James Hogg.

Hogg is primarily known today not only as the author of a series of pastoral poems, but also as the writer of the novel, Confessions of a Justified Sinner, widely regarded as the first piece of modern Scottish fiction.

A contrary figure in real life, Hogg almost bankrupted himself in attempts to be a successful shepherd - leading to his literary friends dubbing him "the Ettrick Shepherd".

There were two main strands to Hogg’s early cultural experience: folk traditions and religion. The family were church-goers and his father was an elder, while his mother was steeped in the oral tradition, relating to her children folk tales and songs of kings, knights and supernatural beings.

With no media ,as we know it back then Hogg would have listened reel off tales of Scottish history and legends as he was growing up. As a young man Hogg worked as a shepherd in Selkirkshire and Dumfriesshire, becoming interested in literature in his early twenties, when he attempted writing songs and poems, some of which were published in The Scots Magazine. He moved to Edinburgh in 1810 to pursue a career as a full-time man of letters, after having published poetry and non-fiction while maintaining his day-job as a shepherd. However, in 1813 he returned to Selkirkshire, where he lived and worked in the Duke of Buccleuch's Altrive Farm in Yarrow.

He continued to publish regularly while maintaining a contentious relationship with the Edinburgh literati, including his friend and some-time mentor, Walter Scott.

Many of Hogg's stories and poems appeared in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, or Maga as it was affectionately known.

Hogg continued to write, publish and farm until his death in 1835. He was buried in Ettrick Churchyard, appropriately next to his grandfather, Will o’ Phaup, who is reputed to have been the last man to converse with the fairies!

Among Hogg's most famous works was Jacobite Relics - originally commissioned by the Highland Society of London in 1817, it included Lament of Flora McDonald, sung here by Kenneth McKellar

Far over yon hills of the heather sae green An' doun by the corrie that sings to the sea, The bonnie young Flora sat sighin' her lane, The dew on her plaid an' the tear in her e'e. She look'd at a boat wi' the breezes that swung, Away on the wave like a bird on the main, An' aye as it lessen'd she sigh'd an' she sung, "Fareweel to the lad I shall ne'er see again; Fareweel to my hero, the gallant and young, Fareweel to the lad I shall ne'er see again."

The moorcock that crows on the brows o' Ben Connal, He kens o' his bed in a sweet mossy hame; The eagle that soars o'er the cliffs o' Clan Ranald, Unaw'd and unhunted his eyrie can claim; The solan can sleep on the shelves of the shore, The cormorant roost on his rock of the sea; But ah! there is one whose fate I deplore, Nor house, ha' nor hame in this country has he; The conflict is past, and our name is no more, There's nought left but sorrow for Scotland and me.

The target is torn from the arm of the just, The helmet is cleft on the brow of the brave; The claymore forever in darkness must rust, But red is the sword of the stranger and slave; The hoof of the horse, and the foot of the proud, Have trod o'er the plumes on the bonnet of blue; Why slept the red bolt in the breast of the cloud, When tyranny revell'd in blood of the true? Fareweel my young hero, the gallant and good, The crown of thy father's is torn from thy brow.

[ask-sebastian]

Dear Sebastian,

You will probably read the letter when the spell wears off. I'm sorry for the intrusion, but in my defence, we never specified WHEN I would cast the spell on you....

I still apologise. Now to your gift. While I was knitting, Pascal helped me with a few spells. Wrap yourself in the blanket and it will envelop you like a sleeping bag, giving you the feeling of being in the softest and most comfortable bed in the world. You can take a nap anywhere when you feel tired.

For Nosy there is a small pocket warmer for the cold days. And you should handle the little bottle with care. Don't ask how and where I got the golden fairy dust that gives you the power of flight. A little whiff is enough and Nosy will be able to fly through the air just like an owl.

I also wish you a Merry Christmas,

PS: be prepared for me to sneak back into the dorm :P

[Accompanying the sealed letter is a small parcel containing a cat-sized Hufflepuff-themed collar, complete with a tinkling brass bell.] Gwen,

A most generous gift. I shall make use of it whenever I am in need of proper rest (read: always).

Thank you for making a little niffler's dream of flying come true. I just hope he manages to find his way home. Not sure he'd appreciate flying like an owl though. He seems to have a rather contentious relationship with them recently. Rather odd, I must say. Usually he is so good-natured with other creatures.

Have yourself a very merry Christmas, Sebastian

P.S.

Do not make me put that bell on you.

I will.

[aranarumei]

your fairy tail posts got me into it, so I gotta ask: favorite ships?

um. my condolences? well i'm joking—despite my critiques of it i still love the thing dearly and am extremely fond of a lot of the characters. I hope you’ve had fun with it too! as for ships... my tastes have changed over the years while also not? i've become really into like. friendships lately, yknow, or things where the dynamic between the two is more important than it being strictly platonic of romantic. so I would say i'm open to a lot of them. as for the ones i tend to go for, they tend to be like. super conventional. whatever i was into years ago, but now i just have a lot of extra headcanons about it. the thing for me is that a lot of the "big" fairy tail ships have like. really good setup, and shoddy execution. also this got long bc I rambled. sorry

i like natsu & lucy because i want them to be best friends and sometimes being best friends is a romance as well... and that starts out really strong in canon until it gets dragged on into just. bad fanservice. like i dont need natsu to see lucy when she's naked. i want them to have an emotional conversation or just work together as a team.

i like gray & juvia a lot, which i know is contentious, but i think they have a genuinely great setup (juvia's someone who's got wild ideas about love, and immediately falls for this guy, who's not into her at all but is also just a better person than any romantic attachments she's had before, and then she's figuring out herself and her place in fairy tail over time. the first two big juvia moments the show has after her fight is when she does a unison raid with lucy and when she refuses to fight cana. her initial feelings towards gray are also... quite shy? like she definitely does follow him around a bit but i think half of that is bc she wants to join fairy tail) and then it just doesn’t resolve well (over time she gets more pushy in a way that reads as jokey but is also uncomfortable, and her character kind of stops being about anything but gray) I’d love to see a version of gray & juvia where gray’s non-interest in her is actually beneficial for her, because she’s not rushing into something with high, perhaps fragile emotions, and she gets to grow as someone outside of gray, and juvia’s protectiveness of gray is done in a way where she’s not pushing him to like her, but rather protecting him just because that’s what someone who loves him would do. this is great for juvia, and also great for gray, who probably could use having someone to check in on him every once in a while. bring them into being seriously friends without pushing romance, and then we could maybe try a romance. it would be slow burn as hell. it would be delightful and entirely to my taste. I have so many wips abt this.

related to that, I like juvia a lot so gajeel & juvia’s relationship as well as lucy & juvia’s relationship is really fun to me. gajeel and juvia especially I would loveeee to dive into their friendship. I think they have a shared experience in phantom lord but also weren’t friends at the time and had a lot of different things going on, so it’s neat that they are still like. looking out for each other because of that past.

jellal & erza have great setup, it’s amazing drama and I think it just. works. completely. after the 7-year timeskip I think it loses some steam, and then it never really recovers in terms of having a sense of weight and depth. I am nonetheless fond of it.

what else… I am really into sting/rogue, I’ve got a fic for that one, and I like freed/laxus a lot, too. I’ll be the first to admit that in canon, freed & laxus don’t have that many meaningful interactions (freed is obsessed with him in a sort of like. comical unrequited crush way bc haha, gay people) and laxus cares for everyone in the raijinshuu pretty equally it feels. However. the initial arc? the fantasia arc? I think the raijinshuu are at their best there, and I wish they had gotten developed into smthing more interesting. once again I have a lot of headcanons.

i think gajeel & levy probably has the smoothest execution of any relationship, but kind of wish levy's character had a bit... More to her? like she's very smart but lucy also tends to do a lot of the smart stuff, and she knows runes but freed is clearly the runes guy, and i just wish we could've gotten more than that? I’ve been messing around with headcanons relating to her recently…

that’s the thing with a lot of fairy tail ships. I think a lot of the character relationships have really interesting ways of looking at them bc there’s just so many characters I like. like I think gray & erza’s relationship is really neat. I wish we’d gotten to see more of gray & cana as friends… it’s so cool that gray & loke are friends to the point that he’s the guy he picks for S-class trials… I like lucy & loke’s relationship a lot (like, the fact he joins gray for those trials is a display of how free he is even while she has his key, and also the loke mini-arc is one of my all time favs). I love the deal with the whole strauss siblings and would’ve been interested in seeing freed & mira interact some more. I don’t really care about it in canon but I think elfman & evergreen is actually a really interesting setup, since they’ve both got this sense of… vanity about them? (evergreen wants to be titania, queen of the fairies, and elfman valorizes manliness. there’s interesting places to take that!). raijinshuu friendship, I’m really into that, like, laxus feels like such a Solo guy and yet he willingly carts around a team with him, and also everyone in that team have kind of freaky eye powers, as far as I can tell. what’s that about. did u upturn your nose at fairy tail’s misfit guild while hanging with a misfit crew? it's a team that characterizes laxus well… I know he’s technically not Part of the raijinshuu team but Cmon he literally is.

all that to say. you could probably sell me on a lot of ships. but natsu/lucy, gray/juvia, sting/rogue, and freed/laxus are probablyyyy the ones I think about most and actively write for (and don’t publish LOL. I need to actually finish one of these things, but the issue is I’ve built so many headcanons I feel weird abt it sometimes. I would loveeee to talk abt them sometime tho)

but even saying that, a lot of the stuff I write reads very ambiguously platonic, so like. if I got sold on something, I’d probably get into it.

anyways anon ty for the question! i love chatting

[danitza-drtc]

Straight on (Strange Magic version)

I admit that the first time I heard it shocked me a bit but after listening to it again and completely, I mean, listening to the full version from the beginning of the song to the end, I loved it and it made me appreciate it a lot and of course it gave it a plus to my liking for the scene where Marianne and Bog King face each other in the Dark Forest castle.

In the first place I loved how it starts, since it doesn't start exactly here in the fight scene,

but since Marianne gathers her courage to enter the dark forest

and the song with the chorus is resumed right after she arrived at Bog King's castle and start the fight against him (one of the best fights I've seen 💪👍).

I am not an expert in music and I admit it is the first time I heard this song but I admit that enjoying "Straight On" as a song too (in the version of Strange Magic, the interpretation of Evan Rachel Wood and Alan Cumming), has made me love it much.

And well, returning to the idea that I exposed a moment ago, I love the beginning since it gives a good entrance with the guitar, that tune something like that of "The Legend of Zorro", and together with the animation it gives us a mysterious atmosphere and hostile that little by little tells us that a great adventure is going to start where Marianne will test herself leaving her comfort zone and overcoming her fears that limit her, and will lead her to face a great contest with her apparently enemy.

From there comes the development of the fight and the characters are between bickering and wrangling while in the background the musical interlude unfolds, with a fascinating trumpet sound that takes command as a representation of the visual contest that we are seeing and when it ended intervention gives rise to the second musical voice in this act, that is to say the opponent, Bog King, who makes an excellent accompaniment and ends up singing a duet, making the song no longer talk about the fairy's adventure but also about the Goblin's adventure who can't help but be impressed that he has finally found a good contender.

I would like to know more about music to continue explaining more properly but well at least I feel happy to be able to share these thoughts about one of my favorite songs from this movie and some of my favorite scenes from Marianne and Bog King, which ok I admit there are a lot adrenaline in their fight as well as contentious dialogue but with a certain filtering😍. Well, that's all👍💯.

[redpensandplaywriting]

Our Grammar Talk post this week is about a writing technique that many people have some beef with: symbolism. To some, writing symbolicly feels a bit airy-fairy and pointless, and to others it feels heavy-handed and awkward. Still other writers see it as a subtle and inevitable part of fiction that they rely on a lot in their work.

Readers are also strongly divided on whether we search too hard for symbols in texts and read too much into them, or if we overlook them too easily.

Indeed, even nailing down what is and isn't a symbol can be confusing or contentious! Does it have to be intentional? Does it have to be clear? In this post, I discuss different types of symbolism that we may use in our writing and how that symbolism works. Maybe you'll spot some uses that mirror what you've written yourself!

[barbie-movies-tournament]

Preliminaries: Results

Our first set of polls has officially ended, and here are the results:

Barbie: Starlight Adventure VS Barbie: Spy Squad

Started out pretty close, but Starlight Adventure started pulling ahead and could not be stopped.

WINNER: Barbie: Starlight Adventure (72%, 100 votes)

Barbie: Mariposa and the Fairy Princess VS Barbie: Mermaid Power

Fairy Princess had a commanding lead from the start and never faltered.

WINNER: Barbie: Mariposa and the Fairy Princess (94.1%, 85 votes)

Barbie in Princess Power VS Barbie Dolphin Magic

Princess Power may be about a superhero, but it wasn't powerful enough to triumph over the titan that is Dolphin Magic.

WINNER: Barbie Dolphin Magic (75.9%, 54 votes)

Barbie and the Secret Door VS Barbie Princess Adventure

I don't think that there's a passionate fanbase for Secret Door, but it still managed an overwhelming victory over Princess Adventure, proving once and for all that Princess Adventure is the worst of the Barbie princess/commoner swap movies.

WINNER: Barbie and the Secret Door (80%, 70 votes)

Barbie and Her Sisters in The Great Puppy Adventure VS Barbie and Her Sisters in a Puppy Chase

The tags and the votes both agreed, and I quote, "Puppy Chase sucked ass".

WINNER: Barbie and Her Sisters in The Great Puppy Adventure (87.3%, 55 votes)

Barbie and Her Sisters in a Pony Tale VS Barbie: Big City Big Dreams

This proved to be our most contentious matchup thus far, and from start to finish it was anyone's game. Ultimately, however, Big City, Big Dreams just edged out its competitor. Sorry Pony Tale, you put up a good fight.

WINNER: Barbie: Big City Big Dreams (51.7%, 58 votes)

Barbie in Rock 'N Royals VS Barbie Video Game Hero

Video Game Hero has a reputation as one of the worst Barbie movies, and this poll did nothing to help change that.

WINNER: Barbie in Rock 'N Royals (79.4%, 68 votes)

Barbie: The Pearl Princess VS Barbie & Chelsea: The Lost Birthday

My apologies to the approximately 4 people who voted for the Lost Birthday, but you lost. Pearl Princess truly proved to be the Pearl of this matchup.

WINNER: Barbie: The Pearl Princess (94.4%, 72 votes)

Thanks to everyone who voted! The bracket should hopefully be out later today, and the first official round of the tournament starts on Monday!

[thegreatclowncat]

Your contribution to the walrus v fairy stuff is incredible. I hope the next time you make food you season it perfectly first try.

i have such a contentious relationship with food that this is actually great, thank you