#If I draw (for a crazy example) a character in certain clothes FOR FUn then pintrest people will be like “This is so out of character lol”

[emilyartstudio-s]

Everytime I saw your art (on twitter) it makes me wanna draw. It makes me want to go back to drawing because it made me happy. I just wish that I would have/find more time for myself to draw things that makes me happy again. College has been biting me in the ass and I'm slow af with my hw

Anyway I love your art a lot and I hope you never stop making them, but also please take care of yourself and don't push yourself too hard. Thank you for putting a smile on my face :) (and for making me squirm sometimes cus 💙💚)

Have a good day/night!!

OMG YOU ALL ARE SO LOVELY THANK YOU FOR THESE MESSAGES!! I reread these and others so much you guys literally fill my heart with so much love!! Thank you <333!! IM SAVIGN THESE FOREVER TO LOOK BACK AT :,))

[swordgayist]

cultural appropriation in ATLA (hinduism edition)

i’m sure there’s already a ton of posts about this, but whatever, i’m still making one idc. 

ATLA’s cultural appropriation, everyone knows about it, the white people don’t speak about it, and the asian and indigenous people get ignored. we know the cycle. but i wanted to come here and highlight some of the most prominent examples of ATLA abusing hinduism, as i am kinda sorta hindu (i was raised in a hindu household, i go to chinmaya mission, that kinda shit). i might forget some things so keep that in mind.

this is gonna be divided into 3 main sections, since there are different ways that they disrespect hinduism that i don’t wanna lump together.

and i’d say i know a lot about hinduism but that doesn’t make me an expert, obviously, so if other hindus have anything to add and/or correct then please do !! and if anyone else wants to share how their cultures were appropriated then please do that as well !!

so let’s get started shall we?

appropriating hinduism

1) the avatar

we’ll start with the most obvious example: the avatar itself

i know that there are parts of the avatar mythos that are taken from other cultures as well but the idea of the avatar itself is primarily from hinduism.

basically in hinduism, the term dashavatara refers to the 10 reincarnations of lord vishnu (the god of preservation), with avatar(a) meaning form or incarnation in sanskrit, and das(a) meaning ten. it was said that whenever the world was out of balance, lord vishnu would come down to earth in a certain form to restore balance. Each reincarnation is considered a different life with a different story. the avatars of lord vishnu are often considered the saviors of the world.

so basically, the central idea of the show and the actual name of the show is largely based on hinduism.

2) chakras

many different indian religions have a concept of chakras (chakra meaning wheel or circle in sanskrit), but hinduism is the one that primarily preaches the system of seven chakras, the version used in ATLA.

chakras connect the physical body to the ‘subtle’ body (referring more to the spirit and the psyche) by connecting parts of the body to aspects of the mind. the idea is that through different forms of steady meditation you can manipulate the different chakras and allow the pure flow of energy through the body.

the whole idea of chakras on ATLA is that aang has to unblock them all to let the cosmic energy flow through him so that he can go into the avatar state at will. so yeah, pretty much that whole idea was taken from hinduism.

3) terminologies

these are just a few terms that were taken from hinduism. i’m pretty sure there are more that i can’t think of right now but yeah.

“agni” kai 

i’ll be honest i don’t know where the ‘kai’ part is from, i don’t think it’s from hinduism but if it is well fuck me i guess.  ‘agni’ in hinduism is the god of fire, so the creators used it in ‘agni kai’, the name for a firebending duel.

“bumi”

this is in reference to the hindu word for ‘earth’, which is bhoomi. this is also in reference to our goddess of earth, bhoomi devi. also this doesn’t really bother me but i wonder if the creators knew that bhoomi is a name typically used for women (as are most hindi names ending in ‘i’/‘ee’).

in general, concepts like having multiple complex gods (the spirits) who are capable of good and evil and the reincarnation cycle are prominent in a lot of asian cultures, including (and arguably primarily) hinduism.

mocking hinduism

now we get into the mockery of hinduism in ATLA, because it is very much there.

1) whoever the fuck that baboon guy in the spirit world was

now what the fuck was this.

i mean i wouldn’t say this is the most egregious example of them making fun of brown people but lord why did this even need to be there? this random guy from the spirit world has an indian accent ? and is fervently chanting ‘om’ for some reason, and it’s clearly meant to be seen as comical. also portraying brown people as monkeys....... really.

2) combustion man/sparky sparky boom man

when rewatching ATLA in 2019 i actually had no idea that this was a thing, because the last time i had watched it was as a kid and i didn’t finish it.

so lord was i in for a surprise when i saw...

now... now what.

if you didn’t know, combustion man’s ‘third eye’ is designed to replicate the hindu god of destruction, lord shiva. right down to the vibhuti on his forehead (referring to the three line markings around the third eye).

in hinduism, lord shiva’s third eye is used to reduce people to ashes, though as far as i can recall, not very frequently. the primary significance of the third eye is that it represents the ability of higher spiritual thought and higher consciousness.

the ATLA writers take the ACTUAL significance of the third eye, throw it out the window, and then take its destructive abilities to make a super duper cool and dangerous new firebending technique.

and if that wasn’t bad enough, the actual person who uses this technique, and is meant to emulate a GOD who is PRAISED, is a scary, burly, half metal man who is a villain and an assassin. not to mention the design of his facial hair replicates that super duper scary “terrorist” depiction of brown people, particularly of muslims, that white people are so thoroughly terrified of for no reason. 

this is a parody of a god, and they portrayed him as this terrifying, maniacal fucking assassin who, along with p’li, the combustion bender from LOK, is constantly referred to as a “third-eyed freak”. i’ve made this analogy before and i’ll do it again, this is like making jesus into a hitman.

now onto my favorite example...

3) guru pathik

ah, this motherfucker.

i don’t really have any problems with him as a character, i mean hell, must’ve taken a fuck ton of patience to handle aang’s “why would choose cosmic energy over katara” bullshit.

but we all know it, we see it plain as day, don’t even try to deny it.

“guru” literally just means teacher or guide, so i don’t really know why pathik needed to be referred to as “guru” so distinctively from aang’s other teachers and guides, but that’s just extremely trivial compared to all the other issues with this character.

first of all what is this character design? what is he even wearing? if they’re trying to replicate the clothes of swamis and priests and stuff this is already wrong, realized people don’t dress like this. and why the fuck does he have an indian accent? and why was this indian accent done by a non indian (brian george)?

once again, the poor but extremely heavy indian accent is clearly meant to be mocking, if it wasn’t, they wouldn’t’ve gone out of their way to get a non indian person to DO an indian accent, and instead they would’ve just gotten an actual indian person to play the role. 

and oh yeah, the onion and banana juice. because hindus just eat weird shit right.

whether it’s actually weird or not, the show certainly portrays it as weird. and as far as i know no hindu actually fucking drinks onion and banana juice.

ironic because brown people can absolutely destroy white people in cooking. but i digress.

i know what you’re all waiting for. because the guru apparently didn’t have enough fun with guru pathik, so they just had to come back to him in book 3:

where do i begin.

so this is obviously john o’bryan’s super funny and hilarious depiction of pathik as a hindu god.

usually when a god has multiple arms it’s to carry an array of things, from flowers to weapons to instruments, and one hand is typically free to bless devotees (ie. goddess durga and lord vishnu respectively):

but of course white people see this as weird and so they make fun of it, hence guru pathik having multiple arms just flailing about aimlessly (save for the two that are being used to carry the aforementioned onion and banana juice).

then there’s the whole light behind pathik’s head which is usually depicted in drawings of hindu gods to show that they are celestial.

also what the fuck is he holding? is that supposed to be a veena? because this is what a veena looks like:

and i assume the reason this was added was to mock the design of goddess saraswathi, who carries a veena:

but that right there in the picture of pathik looks more like a tambura than a veena. 

and it also just kinda looks like a banjo?

but i guess the animators just searched up “long indian instrument” and slapped it on there. actually no, that’s giving them too much credit, they probably didn’t search it up at all. 

and then the actual scene is pathik singing crazily about chakras tasting good or something while playing the non-veena and it’s all supposed to be some funky crazy hallucination that aang is having due to sleep deprivation. just some crazy dream, just as crazy as talking appa and momo sparring with swords or tree-ozai coming to life.

our gurus and swamis and sadhus and generally realized people are very respected in hinduism, they’re people we look up to and honor very much. and our GODS are beings that we literally worship. and the writers just take both and make caricatures out of them for other white people to laugh at.

4) other shit

before we move to the next portion i just wanna mention there are also smaller backhanded jabs that i can’t really remember now, but one example was when zuko was all “we’ll be sure to remember that, guru goody goody”. or when a character would meditate and say “om” only when the meditation is supposed to be portrayed as comical or pointless. or in bitter work when sokka was rambling on about karma. small things like that. but moving on.

south asian representation, or lack thereof

now i finally get to the “losing” hinduism part. by this i mean the lack of actual representation there is of south asians (the region where hinduism is primarily practiced) despite the fact that hinduism plays such a big role in the show’s world design.

i think it’s safe to say that broadly the main cast consists of aang, katara, sokka, zuko, toph, azula, iroh, mai, ty lee, and suki. 

a grand total of none of these characters are south asian. the writers don’t even attempt to add any south asian main characters. 

there are characters with dark skin, like haru and jet, but a) they’re not confirmed to be south asian and don’t have any south asian features or south asian names, b) they’re side characters, so they don’t count as representation, and c) even if they were south asian and main characters, jet wouldn’t even count because he’s portrayed as a terrorist.

the ONLY truly south asian character we get is fucking guru pathik. so yeah. not representation.

i don’t get how the creators of this show rip off of hinduism (among many other south asian cultures they rip off of), mock indians, and then don’t even have the decency to HAVE a main character who is south asian.

i’ve never gotten a chance to compile all this, and this definitely isn’t all the creators have done, but i hope this was somewhat informative.

[unicornclutter]

Danny Phantom – Oops all Ghosts!AU notes

Hey so these are just some notes on a silly little au I’ve done some art for that I may do some mini fun comics for if I have the time. The main concept is that the containment for the ghost portal in this au was flimsy at best and when it turned on everybody in the lab became half ghost. This means Danny, Sam and Tucker are all halfas in this au.

 it’s all under the cut!!

Outfits:

I like to have the halfas all in outfits that are altered versions of what they died in, Danny was the only one in a hazmat suit so his design stays largely the same, Sam and Tucker in this have more varied clothing design than in the show so they’re wearing ghost versions of clothes I designed for them.

Sam has an orange aura, Tucker has a blue one

Powers:

Each ghost has a secondary theme, Danny’s is his ice powers, Sam has an electricity core in this due to the Camera she was holding at the time and Tucker’s theme is pretty strongly inspired by his King Tuck look because that’s a cool visual theme (core for him is pending but maybe fire could be cool)

They can all walk through walls, disappear and fly but will get unique powers as time goes on, Tucker will be able to summon themed minions for example (like the snake ghosts) and Sam will be able to take snapshots of people that freeze them in place

Their powers in this all come in much more gradually so it takes a few weeks for them to all piece together what happened and confirm they were affected

Names:

 I decided just how Danny doesn’t really call himself ‘Danny Phantom’ a ton in the show and often is just ‘Phantom’ I wasn’t going to try and do all their names as puns on their surnames so we’ve got Phantom(Danny), Wraith(Sam) and Shuyet(Tucker)

 Who knows:

Once all three of them know about eachother they have that support network but a much harder providing cover for eachother since they all want to be out there fighting, they end up taking shifts on fights and other shifts working to make sure nobody notices anyone missing, they probably draw straws on it a lot at first

When it comes to parents I can’t see Danny or Sam telling their own parents but I see Tucker wanting to tell his. Sam likely feels guilty about suggesting they all mess around in the lab and Danny blames himself for the accident that technically got them all killed so I can’t see either being thrilled at the idea of sitting down the Foleys to explain what happened. They probably go back and forth on it but once Jazz finds out it’s pretty impossible to not tell Tucker’s parents.

They probably end up finding allies in them as well as Sam’s grandma Ida since I doubt Sam could keep being a ghost from her very easily so they all have some adults on the team and weighing in on parents evenings where they have to. It also probably takes a big weight off Tucker when it comes to attendance issues.

 I’m not sure if I’d rewrite episodes or just do a whole story of my own with the same characters, certain interactions would be a little different but stuff like Vlad’s obsession with Danny would be mostly the same.

 Little things:

Tucker’s PDA becomes a ghost PDA because that’s really fun

Sam jokes that they’re all technically goths now and starts wearing crazier than usual eye looks because they help differentiate her from her Wraith look

Everybody gets a lot more sleep in this au

Even more aggressive and crazy Fenton parents because ‘Look at all these insanely powerful ghost entities!! They’re clearly planning the end of the world!!’

The ghost circus thing is even more of a hot mess than before and is also time for Jazz, Tucker’s parents and Ida to shine in saving the three of them

Paulina has a crush on Shuyet instead of Phantom in this

… Sam and Valarie might date

Dani will have to live with them all because I love Dani and new member of the ghost squad would be cute as hell

[twistedlymad]

Hello there I love your writing and read your headcannons for riddle with his child it was so sweet I wanted to ask if you could also do one for jade and floyd, only if you want to(:

Let me just say: Due to me experiencing Chapter 4, I have never ever been so happy to see the faces of Azul, Jade and Floyd. I’m just kidding, I already love them when their chapter debuted XD

Of course I’d write for Jade and Floyd!! Leech twins need all the love they can get! I do hope this headcanon is up to your expectations dear Anon! Thank you for requesting and have a lovely day!!

Also, once again, this features an aged up!Jade and Floyd. Side note, the baby is half human, half merfolk!

I hope I wrote their characters well, I may need more practice writing them OwO  (P.S IDK why I spent 5 hours on this.... I hope it was worth it QwQ)

Jade Leech

Jade would be the type of father that’s calm and collected at all times. So, when he finally caught wind of the news of his child, one can only see him having a closed-eye smile on his face. Do not fret though! In fact, internally, he was over the moon! 

He couldn’t believe it at first, he was having a BABY?! A SMALL CHILD?! A LITERAL LIVING CHILD?! So, shock could be found on his face as the realization slowly sunk it’s way into his head. Then, only came the closed-eye smile that I mentioned earlier.

He would go shopping for baby products as preparation for his young one. He would also do research on what would the baby normally eat, what signs would the baby normally show when they’re feeling a certain mood and so on, after all, he hasn’t seen a human/merfolk baby before, let alone take care of one! With the research he’s done, he could apply his newfound knowledge onto the products that he buys for his young one.

Literally, everything is perfect because he is perfect.

When his baby actually arrives, a tear slides down from his eye as he hears the crying sounds of a child, the crying sounds of HIS child. He has never heard anything so precious and cute in his entire life. Once he gets a good look at his young one, more tears start to come out as the nurse hands him his young one. He lets out a gentle smile and hugs his young one close to him, silently swearing to love his young one with all his heart only give the best of the best to his precious little gem.

All the baby products he bought beforehand actually came in handy. They definitely suited his young one well! From the type of food/nutrients his young one needs to eat to the size of their clothing, Jade would have calculated everything down to it’s very last detail. 

He would try to indulge his young one into his hobbies! He would set his young one in a high chair and make small little terrariums in front of them and his young one would just watch in awe. He would explain what he was doing, the type of plants used and his young one would respond either with a small little nod or just random words that they could say.

“And this mushroom is called the Agaricus bisporus. We’ll put some of these in here so your mother can cook something for us when it grows.” “Dada-A-Goo-Ga!!” “Yes, of course! We can’t forget to do that!” 

Jade would also tuck his little one in bed every night and plant a kiss on their head as he slowly exits the room.

Oh! Swimming lessons are a must as his child is also part-merfolk! He would want his child to be able to adapt to both water and land environments at an early age, that way, his young one is able to handle walking and swimming without any problems. He doesn’t want his precious little one to be like him when he first used his legs to walk.

Jade would also teach his young one proper manners and etiquette, or at least try to. He wouldn’t enforce the manners on his young one if they’re uncomfortable with it. But, he still would set a good example for his young one and hopefully his precious one will follow in his footsteps.

He would also take the young one mountain climbing every weekend! He would bring his precious one to go for a hike or just a little walk in a baby carrier. He wants his little one to love nature as much as he does and would look forward to many MANY outdoor activities with his precious one. He would also show his little one all the different types of fauna that could be found during the little trips they take.

As his precious little one continues to grow up, Jade decides to send them to human kindergarten instead of merfolk kindergarten. And since Jade doesn’t really know how human kindergarten worked, he would stick around the school for the first few days, just to observe his little one and what actually happens at the kindergarten.

He may or may not just went there to spy on his little one, making sure they aren’t bullied or whatsoever. Who knows am I right?

He’ll also be more cautious about their feelings. He wants to know that his child is safe and happy and that they aren’t bottling up their feelings whatsoever. At some point, Jade would’ve told his young one about his unique magic, so, lying is not an option at all. But, at the same time, Jade would usually initiate the conversation with his little one, just to let them be comfortable with telling him about either their day at school or just schoolwork in general.

If his young one is having a bad day, expect a lot of bonding time! And I mean A LOT of bonding time. Literally, Jade would either be seen having tea with his young one or just having a small nature walk with them. Anything to cheer his little one up. In the midst of ‘happy-cheeful-father-kid’ time, Jade would ask why they were down.

If the reason was because of schoolwork or just something else in general, he would do his best to help them and make them forget about their troubles by cheering them up.

However, if the reason was because of a person....

Huh? What? That child had to be transferred because they were exposed of their precious lies? Ugh, kids nowadays am I right?

Jade loves his little one with all his heart. Like I’ve said, he only wants the best for them and he would do anything and everything to make sure that his precious little one gets the ABSOLUTE best. He would ensure that his little one is happy and not stressed out at all. In fact, his child loves nature as much as he does and his little one always manages to surprise him with little terrariums of their own. Jade is glad that his precious one can find happiness in the things that he finds happiness in as well. He is very grateful to have this little precious child come into his life and he is very proud of his little one. 

His little one is absolutely glad to have such a perfect and understanding father and they love their father with all their heart as well. They know they could rely on him anytime and they do hope to be like him someday.

I’m sorry, this person is too perfect for me to actually write anything, so, just imagine the perfect father and BAM, you have Jade :’))

Floyd Leech

Okay, to put it in a simple way, everything that I had written for Jade, Floyd is the exact opposite.

I’m just kidding! I don’t wanna be squeezed by him :’)))

Or do I???

All jokes aside! Floyd would the type of father that is fun and carefree all the time! But! He’s also serious when needed. So, when he first heard news of his baby, he is sort of confused. And when someone explained the news to this wonderful goofball, his eyes literally lit up in excitement.

“Ahh? A little fish? I made a little fish?” .... I mean.... He’s not wrong.

In preparation for his little one’s arrival, he would rely on his brother for tips and resources. Don’t get me wrong, Floyd really tries his best to prepare for his little one as he wants to be able to welcome his little one without any problems, it’s just that he doesn’t know how. So, he usually brings Jade along with him as they go buy some baby products together.

Bless this lovely goofball for trying his best.

When the baby actually arrives, he feels a sense of pride as he knows that he managed to bring such a lovely and adorable little one to the world. A wide smile stuck itself on his face as he takes a good look and holds his little fish. He couldn’t BELIEVE that he was holding something so tiny and fragile. He was so shocked by the beauty of his little fish, he didn’t notice tears flowing out from his eyes. At that moment, he swore to love, cherish and protect his little fish and never let anything bad happen to them. 

However, he’s never really taken good care of kids before, so, he is actually kind of scared. He’s afraid that he’ll accidentally hurt his little one so he is EXTRA cautious with his actions whenever he’s handling his little fish. He literally does everything with extra care. For example, if he is feeding his young one, one can find him feeding his little one inside a pillow fort and on top of a big and fluffy pillow. 

Bless this goofball for trying his best x2.

But, as the weeks go by, he would get used to taking care of his little fish. Those fears he had slowly vanished and he’s more comfortable with his little one and he goes back to his carefree self. So, expect some crazy stuff happening when he has fun-time with his little fish. 

f-floYD, PUT THE CHILD DOWN!! DON’T FLING THE CHILD INTO THE AIR!!!

Floyd actually loves hearing his little fish laugh. He would do anything for that cute little giggle or squeal to bless his ears. Funny faces and tickling are his go-to actions to get his little one to smile and laugh in happiness. And when he hears that adorable giggle or laughter, he naturally smiles in response and continues his actions to make more giggles and laughter appear.

Hey, just because Floyd is carefree, that doesn’t mean he won’t discipline his little fish. Sure, his little one can have fun and be happy, but they have to be wary of actions which are okay and not okay. Floyd knows when and where to draw the line. 

If his little fish is tired for the day or absolutely worn out, Floyd would carry his little one to bed and tuck them in. He smiles at his little one’s sleeping form before exciting the room.

Swimming lessons are also a MUST for his little fish. They are half merfolk after all, if they know how to walk, they must know how to swim. Floyd would actually take it upon himself to teach his little fish on the basics of swimming. 

He.... At some point may or may not almost flung his little fish into the water whilst yelling: “Let the water guide you!”

Expect little dancing parties with Floyd and his little one. Whenever Floyd starts to dance, his little fish would end up trying to copy his moves. Floyd takes notice of this and starts to lead his little one to dance along with him. No matter the song and place, the father and child would always have the best time of their lives by dancing.

They also have another method of having absolute fun. Pranking. Literally. Floyd and his little fish would come up with all sorts of pranks to pull on either their families or Floyd’s friends at gatherings. Their pranks could go from just a small and harmless one to one that would flip the entire building upside down. Floyd and his little fish would be howling with laughter every time their pranks had succeeded. If they didn’t, then, good luck taking care of one moody Floyd and one moody child.

As his little fish grows up, Floyd would also send them to human kindergarten as well. Although Floyd would have wanted his little fish to go to merfolk kindergarten instead, he knows that his little fish would probably be uncomfortable there. So, he agrees to send them to human kindergarten. Well, as long as his little fish is happy, he is happy as well.

Floyd KNOWS when his little fish is having a bad day. Somehow, this goofball can sense whenever his little fish is feeling down. As soon as his little one comes home, Floyd is immediately hugging his little one and asking them what’s wrong.

If the problem was just because they were having a bad day in general. Remember all the fun activities I mentioned that Floyd would do to have fun? Yeah, everything happened. It was a day with fun filled to the brim.

However, if the problem was a person....

Looks like someone is getting squeezed soon.

For real, Floyd would have the face he has on his groovy SSR card as he accompanies his little fish to school the next day.

“So... Which one of you fishes made MY angelfish feel sad yesterday?”

May the lord have mercy on all the staff and other children of that kindergarten.

All in all, Floyd absolutely adores and loves his little angelfish for he has never seen anything as perfect as they are. He makes sure that his precious angelfish gets all the joy and fun in the world and knows that he loves them oh so much. His angelfish knows that they’re loved by their wonderful dad and loves him as much as he loves them. Floyd knows it and he is happy to know it.

Bless this goofball of a dad x3

~Little Bonus!~

With the benefit of being twins, both Jade and Floyd would trick their kids sometimes.

Usually, when they get together for play dates, their kids would be extra cautious on who was their father as Jade and Floyd would not even be separated.

“Oya? You thought I was your father? My dear one, your father is over there.” Jade said to Floyd’s child.

“Ehhhh? Me? Jade? No little angelfish, Jade’s over there~” Floyd said to Jade’s child.

Sometimes, they would deny being themselves! Like, Jade would deny being Jade and Floyd would deny being Floyd. 

They would literally say the exact same things that I’ve listed above to their own kids.

This confused the kids SO MUCH. 

I think both kids ended up crying one time.

Feel free to smack the duo for traumatizing their little ones though :)

[impulstor]

explanations behind my song choice for my 3lsmp playlist under the read more! keep in mind, some of these songs don't really have a reason beyond just... vibes. and that some ideas have changed over time. anyway!

playlist here

anti-hero — originally added as an etho song, and still applies. with him being prepared to fight & kill for ren + the rest of the red army. also, he tends to be a bit unpredictable and has a very different moral standing from someone like, say, martyn.

kill the sun — fits with the series as a whole, with shifting alliances and friendships, and with people killing and being killed by one another.

special — this ones for all the mfs who didn't pick a side until really late, or were bouncing between factions for a while 💪. especially for tango, as an example, making friends with someone who he can also consider his enemy, and being completely unsure where he stands in any group, though he wants to have their faith.

villain — this song is just really good for making a mental amv for lmao. it's good for demonstrating differing alliances n sides, n of course that applies here.

oh, death — not a lot of specific thoughts for this, just. yknow, death, vibes, dying for someone, watching your friend die, etc.

6up 5oh cop-out — first of all, I'm just a slut for will wood sometimes. second, a lot of the lyrics on their own could 100% be applied to events in the series (I mean I did use some from it for my etho n tango drawing for funsies) so. it's a strange song but the vibes fit well, in my opinion :]

kill of the night — a bit self explanatory, I think. in a series about trying to outlive, and to eventually kill your friends? no doubt you're going to end up hunting certain people down, hmmm? revenge, n all that. works well for multiple characters, really.

you're gonna go far, kid — impulse. just like. tango, or maybe etho, at impulse. "with a thousand lies and a good disguise, hit em right between the eyes" I meaaan 🤔 how is it NOT impulse lmao

kill the lights — once again, killing, death, murder, yknow. good vibes. also people lying and betraying one another, and watching as their friends and enemies die in front of them, people being changed by the events that transpire.. also technically they ARE actors sooo. kill the actor, yknow

mad IQs — mostly this song just slaps (thank you eexer 🙏) but also the lyrics fit well with the events! death, murder, killing your friends, burning. there is a lot of fire.

go get your gun — works very well for the whole war goin on. one side vs another, fighting and losing allies, fighting to win for their fallen allies, cheating fate if they DO win. also the line "when this is over, we'll raise a glass straight up to the sun" could be seen as like. everyone coming together to be friends once it's all over bc they are!

c'est la vie — it fits well. bad things happen, you lose people, you hurt, karma kicks your ass, but that's just life, and that's the game. c'est la vie.

i'm gonna win — fits for how they're all fighting to be the last one standing. and also with having to work through literally dying and to not give up, if you want to win.

mr capgras... — once again, I just like will wood. also fits well with people fighting each other, mostly with the chorus. "you'll never take me alive" / "you better pray that I die" likjkeeeee 👀 you could make art fitting those lyrics tbh

curses — red & green duos (at least. when they were intact :/) sticking together, taking care of one another when everything is going to hell, people are dying, and it's getting intense. they trust each other, at least.

under the pressure — don't really have something specific, it just fits well, with the lyrics. honestly this one fits well as a skizz song, now that I'm thinking about it. he went from trying to be friends with a lotta people to taking two out for good and went out in a blaze of glory. yea. that's what I got lol

everybody wants to rule the world — I dont think I really need an explanation for this one. it just fits well with everyone trying to win the whole game, and with everything slowly ramping up in intensity

rebels — for scar and grian being crime bros for the first while :] everything IS burning, good for them!

outrunning karma — impulse once again. playing everyone, playing to everyones good sides as much as he could, until the act didnt matter anymore. but karma might really kick him in the ass, if he ends up as one of the last survivors, and others turn on him for betraying everyone earlier on.

you're nobody til somebody wants you dead — shrug emoji. just fits well mostly. friends fighting eachother, betrayal, yadda yadda.

thanks i hate it — mmm,, tango? idk, im just a tango enjoyer, and he has spent quite a bit of effort trying to please certain groups to like. no avail. especially team crastle. like tbh he was solidly on board with em for a while, and mightve gone back to them on his own. but cleo blackmailed him anyway. rip tango.

the riddle — ALL OF IT. the whole series. it fits

crazy = genius — i dont rly like brendan urie like at all. so i might remove it from the playlist at some point. but it does fit with scar and grian being villains.

icarus — mmm fits well with grian. with the wing imagery, and with the fact that he made SO many enemies by working with scar. and he never reaallllyyyyy apologized, did he? he's walking a dangerous line, with few allies,

cradles — idk lmao. vibes only.

wolf in sheeps clothing — impulse again mostly lol. sung by skizz or etho probably. betrayal <3

how villains are made — again, for those neutral parties that had to choose a side. its about being torn between two sides & having to choose. honestly, I could see it fitting bigb, if he does some funky villain stuff next session. he deserves it I think <3

killing butterflies — trauma, ouchie, angst, murder your friends. everything hurts.

king — ren!! that's it.

little lion man — bruh if ren dies and leaves martyn alone.... ghost ren to martyn.... ouch.

gives you hell — red army @ sand people. specifically etho and ren get to be petty at scar i think

wine red — [gestures vaguely] all of it

i bet my life — red and green duos again. though it could be after some of them permadie.

miss missing you — (thanks again eexer this one also slaps <3) ouch impulse and tango angst. or impulse and etho angst. OR etho and tango angst. THEM. :(

youth — all of it but like. after it's over. just like going back and looking at how it all went down.

a gorey demise — i just think it would be fun to animate everyone's different deaths to this song tbh

another one bites the dust — they are once again Dying. but it's not angsty and dramatic this time.

god rest ye merry gentlemen — 😔 the whole thing again. pain

[opbackgrounds]

Hi there Sarc' ;) I am sorry if the question has already been asked but I thought it could be interesting to have your opinion about this. While I love most of the female characters in OP and think that most of them are well developed and can be truly good role models for girls I still feel that Oda sometimes has a sexist view on female characters (the jokes about the naked bath scenes for example or Kororo being considered ugly make me really uncomfortable). What do you think about it?

Ah, I wondered when I would get this question. 

When people talk about sexism in One Piece they typically are referring to two different things: How women are drawn, and how they’re treated within the narrative. While there’s some overlap here, there’s enough distinction that I want to address them as two separate points in two separate posts, because I guess I had Opinions, and by god there should be a limit to how much text one tumblr post can be expected to hold. Consider this an introduction.

Buckle up, kiddos. This is gonna be a long one. 

Nami Face Syndrome Isn’t the Problem...

An important thing to remember with Oda’s art and storytelling style is that almost everything is hyper exaggerated for effect. You don’t go into One Piece looking for realism. You don’t go into One Piece expecting the characters to act like normal people. Everything--from the art to the humor to the battles--is stretched and pulled to its absolute limit in hopes of garnering a particular reaction. When a character is sad they cry big bubbly tears with dribbles of snot coming from their nose. When they laugh their mouths take up half their face. 

And when a girl is hot, her tiddies are two great big watermelons stuck to the center of her chest.

What is often dubbed “Nami Face Syndrome” within the fandom is somewhat misleading. After all, why was Wanda, who is a literal dog that walks on two legs, decried as yet another Nami clone at her introduction? I would postulate it’s less to do with her face and more to do with the fact that from the neck down they are virtually identical, something that’s made more obvious because Wanda is literally wearing Nami’s clothes

What makes this frustrating for a lot of people, myself included, is that it’s not that Oda is incapable of drawing more diverse body types, but that he often chooses not to. Take for example the Kuja tribe

or the Charlotte family daughters (thanks to Arthur at Library of Ohara for the resource). It’s pretty clear Oda has the chops to make his women as weird as the men, and he often does! For important characters, even. And yes, as the Kokoro example given above sometimes the gonkness is brought attention to, but for others like Lola and Chiffon it’s...not. 

(more on mermaids later)

But Sarcasticles, one might protest, even Oda’s “ugly” characters have ginormous boobs! Where is my itty bitty titty committee representation >:(

To which I can only shrug. For Oda, boobs on a woman are like abs on men. It doesn’t matter if it makes sense, they’re gonna have ‘em

Seriously, Oda. What the fuck.

...So What Is?

I have a theory that’s impossible to prove, and that the problem isn’t so much Oda’s character design so much as the ratio of his male to female characters in general. It’s not that every female character is a Nami clone, but Oda has a template he uses for attractive female characters ages 16-25, the same way he uses Robin as a template for attractive women ages 26-35, which is how you get cases of mistaken identity like Viola for Robin or scenes during Reverie where one could be forgiven for thinking Nami’s supposed to be an identical triplet

 Oda does this for his men, too. It’s not as obvious because 1) Even men with similar facial features can have a wider variety body types due to Oda having a sliding scale of buffness he’s willing to attach to a pretty face and 2) There are more men. 

There are a lot more men.

In groups where the male to female ratio is more or less equal (Baroque Works, Big Mom’s kids) you get a wide variety of designs. But there’s only one female Supernova. There’s one female Warlord. CP9 only has one female agent. Only one of the Revolutionary Commanders is a woman. There are very few female background characters in crowd shots, especially among marines. Big Mom might be the only female Emperor, but she’s not young, In fact, when drawing her at age 28, Oda defaults to a much more generic “pretty girl” face before giving her much more striking, memorable features in her 40s

If you look at Oda’s male characters, the ones that are supposed to be hot are often given the same square jawline and the thin-bladed nose that at one point in time was reserved for Robin. Both Coby and Sabo had very distinctive noses before their glowups, while Ace must have had a laser treatment done on his eyebrows sometime between Alabasta and Marineford. 

But the biggest difference on the men has got to be muscle mass. The overgrown noodles of early One Piece are lost to the annals of time. Shanks alone must have gained 30 pounds of pure muscle from the time Luffy got his first bounty to his appearance at Marineford. 

Now, I will acknowledge that there is a difference between the increasing sexualization of female characters and the male power fantasy of giving Zoro bara tiddies post-timeskip. While I do think there are certain male characters specifically designed to be the Hot Dude, what I’m trying to emphasize here is that Oda works with templates for both men and women, and both of those templates have been exaggerated over time. Bigger boobs for women, more muscles for men. And when you’re only slotting for one girl in any given group, and that one girl has to be The Hot One then you’re going to have a lot of ladies that end up looking the same. 

My love for Otohime on this blog is well known, and I want to use her as an example of what Oda can do when he works beyond this template, because it’s really freaking good  

Otohime is neither conventionally attractive nor gonk. She’s dressed in very conservative, traditional clothing and has a narrow waist and small chest. 

There are no sharp edges on Otohime. Not her eyebrows, not her jaw, and most of the time not even her hands, emphasizing her gentle nature. You don’t see it as well in this panel, but Otohime’s head is often drawn wider than her shoulders, emphasizing her frailty. Oda gives her a longer neck to compensate, and the overall effect is a very soft, willowy figure. 

Her headpiece looks like a sunburst. The audience never sees her fins, so Oda gives her a scale patterned kimono-dress-thingy (my knowledge of Japanese clothing is, uh, not good) as a visual reminder that she’s not human. The sash that circles around her head harkens back to Japanese mythology as a symbol of divinity, similar to a halo in Western culture. And fun fact: Otohime is named after a god, just like Neptune, while her goals and ideals are pure enough to be heaven-sent. 

I’m not an artist, but this is a really damn good character design. A lot of Oda’s older female characters are. Dandan, Tsuru, O-Tsuru, Shakky, Kureha, Big Mom, and Nyon are all instantly recognizable and have strong designs, even if a few of them fall into the hourglass figure that Oda often defaults to. It’s just...there aren’t that many of them.

So the question becomes why aren’t there more women, and I think the answer is because, ultimately, One Piece is a series geared at boys. While I wish there were a few more important ladies, I can understand why there aren’t. 

Note, that doesn’t mean I think it’s right or that Oda is obligated to include more women. It’s just one of the facts of the shonen manga industry at this point in time. 

A more important question, I think, is why does every younger woman have to be attractive? And why do the attractive ladies have to wear outfits that are blatant fanservice? This is something I don’t have an answer for. Oda has said on more than one occasion that he writes One Piece with his twelve year old self in mind. It could be that it’s a calculated move to appeal to his audience, in which case it’s certainly worked because said Hot Ladies are constantly used in marketing and merchandising. It’s the Hot Ladies that top the popularity charts (although, to be fair, who’s there for competition?). In the most recent chapter a new Hot Lady was introduced, and the fandom went batshit crazy for her.

Even the fans who are very vocal about how Oda sucks at drawing women. It’s interesting how that works out sometimes.

Or maybe I’m giving Oda too much credit, and he’s just horny. Not having direct access to Oda’s mind, I don’t have an answer. If I had to guess I’d say it’s a little of Column A, a little of Column B, because that’s usually how life is. 

But in a vacuum big tiddies are just a design choice. An exaggerated aesthetic, in a series full of exaggerated aesthetics. It’s when that design choice is paired with in-story comments, actions, and decisions where things really start to get heated. But that’s a whole other ball of wax, and there should be a limit to how much one tumblr post can be expected to hold. I promise I’ll get to the meat of your question next time.

Thank you so much for your patience. I really do think it’s important to start here before diving into everything else, if only because it helps keep my thoughts organized. I hope you’ve found this helpful, and if not, I hope to do better next time. 

[skyeofloxlay]

Personality / Brief history / important things about MC / Reader for my fanfics or when I make requests.

Okay, I decided to do this more for myself when I make a request to someone, but this is also useful to let you know a little more about the MC / "reader" of my fanfics.

The MC is a cis-woman of almost 1.60cm in height, (age may vary) but generally the age will be between 20 and 23. She is heterosexual/straight (I don't know if there is a difference between the two things, but I don't understand why I would have two words for the same thing) and usually in fanfics she has never had a boyfriend before the character she will be together with (be it Jake (Duskwood), Jason (Todd), Spencer (Reid) or any other character). 

She was born in Brazil and lived a large part of her life there, and depending on what story she is in, she makes an interchange trip abroad because of college, and because of that she lives far from her family and lives alone, but she has her faithful companion, a male Schnauzer dog (his name in fanfics is undetermined.)

MC has always been a lonely person, because after several events in the past she does not trust people easily, and the only people she does trust are her family, but she still has trouble talking about her problems to them.

Furthermore, MC is a very shy, introverted, anti-social person and suffers from social phobia, which of course, is a perfect combo to be an alien in society and not be able to make friends, even if she wants to.

MC also doesn't know where it all started from, but she does know that she has probably suffered from anxiety for many, many years, even though she only discovered it a short time ago, and went to get help even less time ago.

Because of anxiety, she ends up being stuck in her own world, or I should call it, hell itself. Her mind is a mess, bad, unreal and meaningless thoughts invade her mind all the time, and because she has been this way for so long without help and not knowing what to do, her situation has worsened to the point where her anxiety starts to change into a depressive anxiety.

However, as much as she has been suffering with her own mind for years, she can always count on her family whenever she needs them, even if they are distant from each other, they are inseparable. 

Her father, as much as he doesn't understand most of the things she goes through, supports her and wants the best for MC, and so he does what he can to help MC pay for psychological treatment, and even though he doesn't understand, he always makes her smile and laugh, even when the situations are bad, even though he was always busy because of work, he always did what he could to be together, even in the simplest things, like family lunch, playing video games, watching movies, shopping together.

Her mother, on the other hand, has been through similar things like MC, and always try to help her the way she can, always speaking encouraging words, helping MC to do her things when she couldn't, sleeping next to the MC when she couldn't sleep because of anxiety, always being by her side, always supporting any decision, no matter the situation, MC's mom will always be there to hear her, either to hear about something that MC wants to do a lot or when she has some fear. 

And there is also her younger brother (3 years younger), as much as they ended up arguing for silly things, he is her best friend, maybe her only true friend, always having fun together doing what they like, protecting each other, always being one for another, even when it was not known which words were right to say.

MC is blessed to have such an amazing family, and as much as she couldn't say "I love you, you are everything to me" to them, she loved them with all her heart and soul, and she couldn't say what would happen to her if she lost them, but probably something really bad would happen.

As much as it seemed that MC doesn't care about other people, maybe looking selfish and boring to others, she cares a lot about others, but she knows that this is also one of the big reasons why she suffers from anxiety, caring for others more than for herself, and for her own mental health, she had to try not to think so much about the problems of the world that she cannot solve. 

Some people may think that she was wrong in doing this, but she wanted to have some sanity, even if little and trying to recover, than to go crazy with things that are impossible to fix, at least impossible for her to fix.

(Some other things about MC, but now simpler, because I'm out of time and too lazy, help me)

- Very distracted

- Very clumsy

- Nerd

- Dreamer / lost in her own world

- Impulsive

- Impatient

- Think too much about everything

- Studious

- Lonely

- Forgotten

- Problems with deadlines, do everything at the last minute.

- Avoid fights / arguments with people she doesn't know, but if it's someone close and it's a silly fight, she'll defend that she's right until the end, if she's wrong in the fight, she'll just be quiet for a while. If it is a serious fight, she will argue for some time until the tears stop her from continuing, and then she will be silent for a long time.

- Too stubborn

- Sarcastic with the closest people

- Always try to look for the good in people, but it is impossible for her to achieve kindness in certain people.

- Pessimistic

- Very sensitive / hurts / cries easily

- Perfectionist

- Very insecure

- She cannot express in words what she feels for other people

Likes:

Chocolate

Coffee

Rainy days

Winter

Music (Mainly, pop and  rock)

To drive

Flowers

Taking pictures (mainly of landscapes)

Animals

Old things, like things related to the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, or things from centuries ago

History

Books

Learn things

Horror stuff (games, books, movies)

Mystery

Horseback riding

Nature

Farms

See the city lights at night

Night

Games (both video games and board / cards)

Comics, Movies, Series etc about Superheroes

Mexican food

Travel

Psychology / Understanding the human mind

Buy drawing materials and books (even though she will never use / read them)

Big clothes

Wind

Ride a bike

Explore Abandoned Places

Dislikes:

Summer

Hot days

Insects

Spiders

Her mind

Who annoy her

People fighting

See things or people comment on things related to death or illness

Having to be patient

Who speak ill of her family

Working in a group

That people belittle her feelings

Parties

People

Delays

Alcoholic beverages

Buy clothes

Make up

High heels

Short dresses

Physics

Fears / Phobias / Things that bother her:

Spiders

Falling / High height

To drown

Die

Getting seriously ill

Dark / Night

To sleep

People

Speak in public

Losing her family

Stay alone

Crowds

Closed places

Tight clothes (Because she feels they are suffocating her)

Arrive late

Forget things

Having a car accident

Never be loved / Stop being loved

Future

May her fears come true

Skills:

- To draw

- Write

- Cook

- Game programming 

- Sing

- Play keyboard and guitar

- To compose

- To dance

Hobbies:

Basically, it's her skills + reading + playing video games + taking pictures of the landscape.

Job:

Usually she either works as a waitress in a coffee shop or works in a supermarket (working at the checkout or replacing products on shelves)

As much as many find it strange, MC is very happy in her work, and does not mind working in "simple" jobs (basically jobs that earn little), and as much as she doesn't have much money, just enough to live reasonably well, she is happy with what she has and doesn't care about the money.

College: 

She studies digital game design

I think that's it, there are some other things that I only do when I'm writing specific situations, for example, MC's opinions on certain subjects, and honestly I don't have time at the moment to make the MC's different opinions, and just say that she tries to be as neutral as she can, because she knows that extremes are never good, and that when asked which side she is in a situation (depending on what it is, but usually she says), she says doesn't have a side because it doesn’t identify herself by either side, because both are extreme, and this usually leads people to think that it’s on the fence, but it’s not like that, it’s more or less. "You were teleported to a place, there are two paths, one on the right and the other on the left, at the beginning of each of these paths there is a person, each talking about their paths and talking about why their path is the best of than the other and why you should follow their path. And then you must make a choice of which path to follow " But MC does not agree with either side, and will not wait there to see which side gives her the best benefit as many would do, she goes there and moves on, where there is no path, where there is no one, because she doesn't want to be on anyone's side, she wants to make her own opinions, and not follow what a group is saying. 

Oh, and one of the philosophies she follows is of yin and yang, which says something like "There is good and there is evil, both need each other to exist, there is no good without evil, and no there is evil without good, and that nothing can be completely good or evil, since, however small, there is evil in good, and there is good in evil. "

Some phrases she would say:

"You can say anything about me, but don't come and talk about my family"

"I can't always do it, but I always try to be balanced, because I know that nothing comes out of extremism, no matter which side."

"I'm a Christian, I may not have proofs but I believe in God, but I don't believe everything in the Bible because it was made by humans, and I know that many of them used and still use people's faith to do very bad things . "

"Sorry, but I suck at remembering names, in fact, I suck at remembering."

"Shit, I knew I was forgetting something."

"I hate logic, most of these things don't make any sense!"

"At least I have you with me here DN" (DN = dog name)

"There is nothing that is not so bad that it cannot get worse"

"I think I celebrated too soon"

"I sleep! But no matter what I do, I will be forever sleepy!"

"No matter what I do, my thoughts disturb me from the moment I wake up until bedtime, and even while I'm asleep. And it happens every day."

"Sometimes ... I think ... people would be better off if I didn't exist. I just hinder and hurt people." 

"I don't know when or how it started, I just know that I have been scared forever"

"I don't do it because I want to! It's not my fault if I'm easily distracted"

"I think writing is the only way to say what I feel"

"Yes, I know, I'm crazy, you don't have to tell me that"

"I'm not a normal person. Maybe I'm not even a human? What if I'm an alien and I don't know? A synthetic human? A robot with high artificial intelligence that is identical to that of humans?"

"I don't like to be afraid, but I love to see and read horror stuff."

"I love old things, they are so fascinating"

"What day is it today?"

"I just wanted to have a little courage that other people have"

"I have no hope of anything, as always, every time I had hope, very bad things happened, close people and pets died when I had hope that they would survive. For me, hope has long since died."

"I think, in a way, I am a miracle, just like my brother. I mean, it was almost impossible for my mom to have a baby, and look, here I am."

"I'm not cute!"

"I'm not short, I'm average height, it's the rest of the people who are very tall"

(Maybe I wrote a lot? Did I overdo it?)

Sorry if there is something confusing or errors in English 

[franie-lam]

HW 1:App Ideas

This idea comes from a Korean drama I watched, but it would be really cool if there was an app where blind people can say something like “hey siri” or “hey alexa” what do you see and when they hold their phone up, the bot will tell you what it sees. for example, if a person was in front of you it will describe their features like “a young lady with long hair is in front of you”. The main goal is to help those who are becoming blind to have access to an outlet so that they can have another eye to see through sound from the phones or watches(like apple watch or something). 

Another idea is to create a new design for the CUNY system. I personally found it very confusing at first and felt like there was too many things slammed onto a page. Perhaps if there was a new design it would make it easier for new students to transition into college or their system. The main goal is to make cuny first, blackboard, degreeworks, much easier and simple for students and teachers to use. 

I was also thinking of an idea to help business owners find more sustainable options to purchase when they’re selling items at the store by linking them to sustainable wholesalers. For example, they can use paper bags instead of plastics. Selling metal straws? Using reusuable packages. (I’m not sure where I’m going with this, but it’s an idea) The main goal is to promote sustainable items and go green. 

I think it would be really cool to create an app where people can easily resell their items at home instead of throwing it out. Having easy access to print out a shipping label and sending it to the post office. Or perhaps have an additional area where if you don’t want these items anymore you can donate it. So perhaps there will be different donating organizations that can. be a part of this app and when they do pick ups, people can easily click buttons to get an organization to pick up old clothes, toys, or maybe good condition furniture that people want to throw out. In addition to this, I was thinking, there can be an area where people can find out about donation sites or food pantries so if they want to go in person or ask someone to come that can work. My inspiration comes from the app Mercari and ebay. The main goal for this is to not waste items that can be purchased by someone else or for it to be donated to an organization that can help those in need. 

This is another idea, and it’s to create a game design app to teach new languages. It would be cool if there are different themes to each language. So for example if we want to learn the Korean language, there would be a lot of drawings/animation/photos of the Korean culture as a background. And you level up by exploring a certain area in the Korea. For the beginning, it would be to teach the alphabet level. So perhaps theres an area to choose a character and enter the game at first. And then there’s “level 1 or world 1″ where you are given a bow and arrow (the character transitions to go back in time and wearing a traditional Korean outfit [hanbok]). the character could have a story line and trying to escape guards and in order to pass that round you have to use the bow and arrow and hit the correct Korean alphabet with the English sounds. The main goal for this is to teach people different cultures, language, and to have fun. 

I remember seeing this thing on youtube where a guy created a chat or something or was it in New York?... I don’t remember but in Japan or South Korea girls/anyone feel unsafe when they’re going home. And so in that chat a group of people walk together with that person so that they feel more safe. I was thinking it would be cool if there was an app like that but I do have some red flags/questions of how do we know he/she/they are not a psychopath or can we trust this person? So, i’m not sure how to incorporate that. Perhaps have people take a mini test that gives red flags about someone if they are suitable for the role and decide whether they are allowed to walk someone home?? Not sure how to go about this idea. 

Another idea is having drones send out packages? I’m not sure if it’s even possible yet but it would be so cool to build upon this idea. Some people may not feel safe delivering packages anymore so what if there were drones to help people send out packages. And I do think this may take away some jobs, but what if we had people working as backup in case something breaks down, emergency landings?? or maybe if someone stole the package. I’m not sure but it would be cool to create a design for this idea. 

Additionally, there’s my idea of creating a design for flying cars. Maybe I’m thinking too ahead for our time. But it would be so cool if we one day have the capabilities to ride a flying car?? spaceship? I don’t know. But it would be cool if the design had a system so that it can tell passengers when a flying bus service is coming? or where they are at? and a map of where they can go. It would be nice if they can order online for a flying ticket?

I was also thinking about electric vehicles. And what if we had an app that indicates where all the electric chargers are? and have people pinpoint certain areas that they believe should have a charger to promote more uses or electric vehicles? Not sure, but just a random idea. 

Perhaps an app that gives you daily doses of (pills?) happy thoughts? I was thinking of the issue of mental health and how important it is. Maybe have happy thoughts and have an area to listen to peaceful music? I was also thinking about incorporating horoscopes, but not sure if it will fit. Or maybe have an app that’s informative about mental health?? Make it an interaction app? Where people can find more about it ? Or maybe turn it into a game where you defeat monsters that are mental health issues? 

Maybe have an app to inform about the injustices going on in their community and how to combat that as a whole community?? This relates to the BLM movements and I also feel like a lot of Asians have become targets and should be taken note by the community. Perhaps have a donation box to communities that need help?

What if there’s an app that allows you to easily rent out a space for your event? My idea is similar to airbnb but it’s targeted more for people who are looking to rent out a place for a party?? or maybe have people who coordinate parties find places easier. I’m not sure if they have anything like this, but I was thinking about it... Or perhaps rent our your car?? Maybe for those who bought a car or have several but don’t use it, they can let others rent their car??? I don’t know haha, I guess that would be similar to Uber but instead of having someone drive the car, you’re driving it. 

Or maybe an app where you can specifically donate or sell your old books?? I know I have a lot of books that I don’t read and want to get rid of. So maybe if there’s something like that it can be used for a better purpose. 

Maybe a travel app? A place for people to talk about the best places to visit or even have a tour guide so you don’t get lost. I was thinking a bit of an airbnb style mixed with bookings.com and yelp. 

Perhaps have an app to help small businesses in the community? An app to search up what to order for food near you or locally. And for the businesses to deliver locally themselves so they get all the profit for the food/tips. I was thinking they can promote themselves for free and only if they want to be promoted more or be on the top list they can be charged a bit? I don’t know, just a thought. I guess this is basically an Ubereats idea, but rather than charging the businesses on the delivery fee, they don’t get that? And have the ability to do that for free??? Or maybe have something similar to Postmates but when it comes to employing people as a driver for delivery, they have to pass certain requirements and not be subcontractors? I think that’s the right term, but basically so that you make sure the driver isn’t a crazy person and so that they are paid equally? I’m not really sure how much drivers get paid but I think it’s not that much??? If we consider gas and everything and the fact that anyone can become your driver, I think there should be requirements. 

Anyways, thank you for reading my random app ideas. All these are literally random thoughts and ideas I’m having. Let me know if you have any ideas or suggestions. 

[tehrevving]

In your opinion, how graphic can a fic get before the porn becomes too much?

Hey there Anon.

Honestly for me, the answer to that is never 😂. However I do agree that a huge block of porn can sometimes be quite exhausting to read. It’s important to find a balance between describing something in crazy detail, but also making sure there are enough narrative breaks in between so it doesn’t get too overwhelming. 

Because I’ve had people ask me for writing advice lately, I’ll explain a little bit about what I mean under the cut.

You can spend as many words as you want describing a single specific act, or multiple acts, what’s more important is balancing out the whole scene so readers don’t get fatigued. This can include doing things like slowly building to a climax, adding in breaks between scenes, appealing to kinks, or changing up the description to make it interesting. 

For example, a big kink for me is clothed erections, clothed bulges etc. So I will spend far too long sometimes describing a male getting their pants off, but then get a woman undressed in half a sentence. I try to make the long description as sexy as possible so it’s not boring, but I can imagine some of my readers that maybe aren’t quite as into that kink as I am thinking, “god damn that took ages, is it gonna take that long for the other party too? I just wanna get to the good stuff.” I’m aware of that, so if I ever write a long winded and descriptive paragraph like that I try to make the next one not quite so descriptive, to reduce some of that fatigue.

Mainly, what gets fatiguing is reading something that just keeps building and building up to a climax without any breaks in the flow, for ages and ages. It can just be exhausting if it goes on too long. Sometimes this is what you want to get across in your writing, but if you’re worried about your readers thinking something is going to be too intense or long, then break up the intense sections with some parts that are a little bit calmer. 

There are 2 main ways that I do this. The first is to plan for short breaks in between sex acts, sex positions, or certain parts of the scene. During this short break, the characters can catch their breath, maybe have a little bit of a discussion or a laugh. Sex doesn’t always have to be this serious sexy thing, mistakes happen, funny noises get made and that’s the best part of it irl for me, so I try to include that in my writing. I think smutty scenes are great for character development, because you have your characters now feeling very raw emotionally, and they can have some really genuine interactions. Don’t ignore describing position changes, dirty talk or any other back and forth interactions your characters have. It’s a good way to draw someone into the story, and also helps it be more fun.

The other thing I do actually affects the way I write a scene. If you really slowly and non-exhaustively want to build up to a climax, you can try and introduce some ebbs and flows in your writing. The easiest way I find to do this is to start each sentence leading on with what happened in the last sentence, so you end up building the mood quite slowly.  Every now and then add in a sentence that doesn’t follow that flow that beat, to keep your readers interested and make sure they don’t fall into a trance with your writing. Having those different bits almost makes those stand out, and can make them more exciting/arousing.

Hopefully this was helpful, if not feel free to send me another ask, or just tell me shut up. That’s cool too. Feel free to ask me any questions about writing and I’ll try do my best to answer :D.

[murderslugs]

Could you please give me tips on how to make a proxy OC?

Some of these rules apply to CreepyPasta Ocs In General!!!

Try to make your character look like they could possibly exist in real life. I really think that's what makes a character scary, or relatable, or whatever you want it to be, the fact that it could be a real person. For example, maybe don't make their character design too crazy or too eccentric. You never want your character to be too much to look at. Like, don't add fairy wings and devil horns and a rainbow dress and hooker boots and a mohawk and a unicorn horn, etc, etc. Try to have a reason for even the simplest things from their hair color to the reason they wear the sweater they wear to why they are missing an eye.

It is important not to overpower or underpower a character, or make them flawless or useless. What I like to do is make an equal set of bad and good personality traits. Also make an equal set of strengths and weaknesses.

Their clothing should make sense to where they are located. For example, if your character lives in Arizona, they most likely won't wear a sweater and blue jeans around. Or, another example, of they live in Alaska, they won't wear a tank top and shorts around.

!!!"CRAZY" IS NOT A PERSONALITY TRAIT!!! Never, ever, do you ever put down "crazy" as one of a character's personality traits. Crazy can mean a million different things. Why does your character get called crazy? Do they have visual and audio hallucinations? Are they wild, eccentric, or adventurous? Do they make illogical decisions impulsively? And do not just write down that they are "crazy" because of Schizophrenia or any other mental illness. This is not acceptable.

Try to make their name make sense to their time period and heritiage/nationality. If you have to, look up names from a certain time period or form a certain language to use.

Though it is tempting, please try to make your story completely unrelated to the stories of the other pastas and proxies. The only pasta that should exist in your character's world is Slenderman. The other proxies may exist, but your character should not meet them in the story.

I can not stress this enough, do research before you add any physical or mental illness. Do NOT just add a mental or physical illness to a character without doing extensive research on it. An illness can be completely different than they show on TV. And an illness can give a person certain personality traits as a result. I can not tell you how many times I've seen someone add Bipolar Disorder for some edgy points, or Depression for some sympathy point, or Anxiety for relatable points, or Schizophrenia for Scary points. That is not at all what these illnesses are about. Also, maybe think about why a character has the illness they have if they have one. Does it run in the family? Have they gone through a physical injury that cause it? Do they have trauma which brought it on?

Obviously, the Slenderman wouldn't just pick any person as a proxy. What makes your character qualified for the job? What were they chosen? Are they good at combat? Are they easy to brainwash? Create a logical reason that the Slenderman would choose your character of all people to be his proxy. Show how they proved themselves fit for the postion.

A lot of people headcanon (though I am not sure if it is canon,) that all the proxies have a proxy symbol somewhere on their body. So, if you want to, incorporate that into your character design!

Though the fandom tends to make out Slenderman to be some amazing child saver, in reality, he is designed to be a kidnapper who brainwashed people into doing his deeds. So, your character should not have a great relationship with him the Slenderman. Make your character hate him, angry with him, or confused by him, or even hopeless because of him.

Make sure that their story isn't too much, and could possibly maybe happen. Try to make their be a few positive events in their story, not just negative, negative, negative over and over. Again, try to have a logical reason for everything that is going on in the story. For example, why did they go to the mental ward? Oh, because they had autism and it was the early 1960s, and that's how they dealt with autism back then. Or, why did their sister die? Because she had been fighting cancer for 4 years.

Show how certain illnesses a character had and certain things a character has experienced effects them. So they have Social Anxiety. How does it affect them? Well, they have a hard time in public situations, and trouble building bonds with people. They were in a car crash a year ago. How does it affect them? Well, now they are afraid of being in a moving vehicle, and can't even get their driver's license because they are afraid to drive.

Like I've said, have a reason for everything. From every event in their backstory to their name to their appearance. Never ask yourself 'why'? And have the answer be 'I don't know'.

Though all the rules on this list are important, THIS rule stands above the rest: Just have fun with it! If you don't like your character it's not yours. If you don't have fun writing for you character, roleplaying as your character, or drawing your character, then there's no use in having it. You want your character to be something that YOU are happy with. If you like your character, then, politely, fuck what everyone else thinks.

If anyone would like to add anything in the comments my inbox, or by reblogging, I welcome you!!!

If you guys want anymore tips on ocs or anything else, just send an ask!!!

[darksaphire2002]

👅: top 5 kinks/turn ons 🍀: do you have good luck, bad luck, no luck at all, or do you make your own 🛍: favorite store(s) [online//physical] 🧸: your main/favorite toy growing up, why 🚬: bad habit you want to break 🎮: the greatest time you had playing a video game 👹: 6 things someone would put in a pentagram to summon you 😱: biggest fears

Oh my... okay, here we go lol!

1) My kinks lol. This is both a fun one, and a scary one to admit because y'all are gonna get a glimpse of just how freaky ya girl Saph really is, so here we go:

• Blindfolds

Blindfolds are probably my #1 kink. There's more excitement in the mystery of what comes next than there is in the anticipation of expecting something you're familiar with.

Please, only do this with people you TRUST.

• Fire play

I enjoy being set on fire. Lol I know it sounds crazy for people who have never heard of the idea, so lemme break it down for you. You coat the area you wish to set fire to in 100% alcohol and ignite it. The fire will only burn the alcohol and not your skin.

This of course can go very wrong very quickly, so DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES try this at home by yourself. If you're curious, go to your local dungeon (trust me, they're around) and set up a tasting session with someone who is familiar and practiced with this particular kink. It doesn't hurt and it feels amazing!

• Monster kink

I mean...this one is self explanatory. Ninja turtles, sentient slime monsters, lizard men, vampires I love all monsters, but I draw the monster fucking line at zombies and mindless killing machines.

• Violet wands (electro stimulation)

Violet wands are a lot a fun and a great starter kink to satisfy even the freakiest of sensual adventurers. They have interchangeable glass heads of various shapes that send out controlled jolts of electricity across your skin. Some heads use more electricity than others, so it can go from a soft tingle, to a jolt of pain very quickly. So it's important to start slow. But it's fun.

• Pumps

This was a hard one to pick, and let me tell you, it's not for the feint of heart. Pumps can be used on male and female genitalia and can be taken to both extreme and soft measures.

The purpose of a pump is to draw the blood to the area of choice, making it much MUCH more sensitive than usual. The area will swell up and, in prolonged use (not recomended,) will engorge.

I don't usually take it quite that far, but you get the point lol.

2) Do I have good luck, bad luck, no luck at all, or do I make my own...

I suppose it has to do with the scenario really. For example,

• Say I'm playing a game of blackjack at the casino: That can be either good, or bad luck.

• Say I wanna date Tom Hiddleston: Absolutely no luck whatsoever.

• Say I'm being attacked by a man in an alley and there happens to be a baseball bat in my hand: I'll make my own damn luck and start swingin.

It's all about perspective. >;)

3) Favorite stores!

Okay, I love shopping. I have tons of favorite stores, but I'll try to narrow it down for you:

• ebay!

This is more for fun, but if you're looking for a laugh, check out their miscellaneous section.

• Amazon.

Amazon is my go-to for the majority of my shopping. If I can't find it in person, I'll find it for a quarter of the price here.

• Ross

I'm a fluffy girl, so my fashion stores are limited, but if you're looking for a good deal, Ross is the place to go. Nearly all of my streetwear clothes come from Ross.

• Rosegal

Rosegal is an almost identical site to Rose wholesale, the site I was originally gonna post, but they are closing down. Lots of good bargains here for women and curvy girls.

• Ranch 99 Market

Okay, so this is actually a grocerie store, BUT I LOVE IT. It's an Asian food market that carries everything from rice cake to fresh fish to durian fruit (gross!) They have everything you could ever want by way of exotic nummies. If you can find one in your area, check it out!

4) Favorite toy growing up?

Hmm....that's a hard one to remember because I grew out of toys at a very early age, but if i had to pick one....I'd have to say it was this round stuffed goose that my mom got me when I was very young.

It was eggplant shaped, white, fuzzy, and had no wings. Only two flat stuffed feet and a big orange bill. The backside of the animal was stuffed with fluff and plastic beans so it made that beanie baby sound when you hugged it. When I was a baby (4-5ish) I would chew on its bill for comfort until there was a bald patch on the fabric lol.

Her name was Jemima.

5) Bad habit I want to break

Okay so I'm not sure this is so much a bad habit as it is a part of my autism, but I have a tendency to talk a lot about certain subjects that I'm momentarily interested in and it can be off-putting for people.

I like to learn about everything in my spare time, so if a topic I'm knowledgeable about comes up in conversation, I tend to get a bit chatty. Not everybody minds this, but I sometimes make people uncomfortable and I hate that about myself.

6) The greatest time I had playing a video game?

Alright, so I'm not really much of a gamer. I have a PS4 and a SN emulator on my computer, but I don't really play a lot of games. I'm more of an "outdoor with a book" kind of person.

But I absolutely LOVE Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy, and Yoshi's island. I got into those when I was younger, that probably why lol. A lot of the newer games don't really pique my interest as I have a difficult time sitting I front of a screen for so long.

But I will tell you a story about the time my friend made me play Until Dawn (fuckin scary ass game holy shit.) It was a scene where you (the player character) had to break into the family cabin and let the other members of your party in from the outside.

Okay, so no scary shit is happening yeah? We're exploring the cabin, trying to find a way to let the other characters in, and for some god awful reason, I decide to look under the sink in the downstairs bathroom.

A fucking wolverine jumps out from under the sink and scares the shit out of all of us.

IT WASN'T EVEN A SCARY PART! I screamed so hard and chucked the remote at my friends head for making me play. She laughed at me.

7) Six things someone would put in a pentagram to summon me?

Hahahaha okay this is a fun one:

• 2 litre bottle of Pepsi

• 1 green Bad dragon dildo

• A copy of Out of the Shadows

• A booklet of memes

• Lobster w/garlic butter sauce

• A box of daifuku mochi (peach mochi can be used as a substitute)

8) My biggest fear.

I have three. Spiders, heights, and losing my mom. I won't elaborate on them as they're pretty self explanatory. But yeah. Heights make me pee.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-

That was a fun one!! LOL I hope I answered all your questions well enough ^_^

Thanks for the ask!

Btw, @ravn-87 you're next lol

[evilisk]

Reading Len’En Profiles Part 4

This took a while didn’t it? This is being split up into two parts since Fumikado’s profile is way bigger (with more info about other characters, including future characters in BPoHC) than initially expected. Teams, Sese, Tsugumi, Shion and Tenkai are covered in this part.

= = =

As always, here’s a quick look on the profiles for the returning characters. 

Team Profiles

Shrine Team:

I like how Yabusame’s profile mentions that they wear lighter clothes in Winter than in Summer yet the only discernible difference I can tell from their sprite is “Yabu choosing not to wear shoes”

I can't believe Tsuba’s profile casually reveals that they remodeled their body structure so they can't feel the cold. What the heck Tsuba?

Slaver Team

Kuroji’s profile is such a swerve. We went from “gotta put food on the table for my siblings” to Kuroji going full “Ameyama Telegraph style Reimu” who shakes down people [youkai] for money

Kuroji having ambitions to open a school in Mugenri is unexpected

Wait, so Kuroji, who is described as being a scholar of pre-history, wants to open a school (and presumably wants to teach at it). And Keine, from Touhou, is a were-hakutaku who can manipulate history, that teaches at a school. HMMMMMMM.....

“This is kinda dangerous” lmao at that being in Saragimaru’s profile. I appreciate how this is referenced in Yaorochi’s profile (their profile mentions that they feel like they’re being watched)

It’s revealed that Saragimaru doesn’t actually know if they are related by blood which is kinda weird? I got the impression that the one who was in the dark about everything was Yaorochi, not Saragimaru. Maybe I should take another look at their EMS profile...

Bottle Opener Team

I mentioned previously that one of the EMS profiles confirmed that Orochi was a youkai. Well Yaorochi’s profile 200% confirms that Orochi was a youkai with the line “[Yaorochi’s] a youkai very much like Yamato no Orochi” which is good to know

It’s been a while so I forgot, and ended up chuckling at, the bottle opener stuff. Especially the “Yaorochi has been training so good they’re good at the bottle opener now too!” angle

"For the sake of creativity, [Sukune doesn’t] speak like a normal person.” So that’s the reason for their accent? Lol okay

I like how Sukune’s wings are given a small explanation here. I wouldn’t have guessed that they could fly without them (I would have assumed they can’t normally fly, and that they fought on-foot in EMS)

= = =

Boss Profiles

Stage 1 / Stage Extra+ Boss - Sese Kitsugai

Original Opinion: While I find their in-game spellcards (as a Stage 1 boss) to be rather zany, I love this Bony Baby. Seriously, I cannot look at their sprite, with their cute smiling baby fangs, and see Sese as an adult (I think they’re referred to as “a kid” by some of the teams too). I am not so hot on EX-Sese as a design, but in concept? I LOVE IT. I think their BPoHC design (which I love, love LOVE, but more on that in the next post) is a better middle ground between  “base” Sese and EX-Sese, but I digress. Sese is 'Sese-rious’ fun!

Comments on Profile:

Interesting, interesting. So apparently Sese Kitsugai (or just “Sese”, according to their Wiki entry) isn’t their real name. They just thought it was a pleasant nickname.

It seems that without their skull, they don’t remember much (like their original name). It’s weird since they draw attention to Sese’s current skull helmet in Yaorochi’s route (Sukune can’t remove it, Yaorochi seems to think it’s special) but I suppose that Sese’s original skull should be WAY bigger than their current one.

Sese has a second profile which adds a lot more details. Apparently, they were scavenging bones near Harujion while that big epic fight was happening in Stage 6.

So EX Sese’s appearance is their canon true/”original” appearance. Boo. I honestly think their BPoHC design is way better. It also seems that without the original skull, Sese cannot maintain their original appearance.

Sese’s EX Profile has an extra ability: “something like conquering the above-ground”. That’s not ominous at all.

I cannot help but wonder if Sese originally fought Tsurubami and just got whooped really hard... okay, now I have the mental image of Tsurubami booting Sese’s skull so hard that they became dumb.

Oh and Sese is mentioned as excavating becoming a hobby for them. Good for Sese.

New Opinion: Y’know, it just hit me that Sese is *basically* Rumia / EX-Rumia but canon and with 200% more bones...

Regardless, Sese is so good. Just like the two other Stage 1 bosses so far. It’s crazy how good JynX is at doing Stage 1 bosses, I dislike most Touhou Stage 1 bosses (the only good ones are Eika and Nazrin).

= = =

Stage 2 Boss - Tsugumi Umatachi

Original Opinion: Tsugumi is the one character I say has aged like fine wine (to me). I thought that Tsugumi being a grumpy goon, despite being a steampunk-looking, bat wing-wearing, eggplant-riding jockey, was such a strange design choice. Then I realized that “grumpy person who dresses colorfully” is basically my real life aesthetic and I totally got it. Though I outright like Fumikado more, I appreciate their personality and their fun musical theme.

Comments on Profile:

...After reading this profile, I’m not sure what to take at face value. 

Okay so first off, they were hired by a certain someone. It’s unclear if this someone is Fumikado (the obvious choice) or Iyozane (who is technically the person who put out the bounty that Tsugumi and Kuroji are following up on in the game).

There’s some reference to boke and tsukkomi that I honestly do not understand. Like I recognize the terms from Gintama, but I’m not sure what JynX is trying to say about Tsugumi as a character when they say “Ninjas!” or that Tsugumi wasn’t born in Japan.

Also, their species is “Eggplant Jockey”. I have no frame of reference for what this is supposed to mena.

New Opinion: I... have no new opinion because I have no idea what I just read. I was going to say “oh so Tsugumi isn’t Japanese” but I just skimmed their page on the Shout Wiki and there is no reference to this fact (which makes it seem like that was just an example of this boke and tsukkomi thing mentioned before)

I got nothing :/ Tsugumi is still cool tho

= = =

Stage 6 Boss - Shion

Original Opinion: Just as Sese continues the unbroken tradition of Len’En games having incredibly good Stage 1 bosses, Shion continues the tradition of Len’En games having incredibly underwhelming final bosses 

Yaorochi and Clause both had something keeping them from being great final bosses; for Clause, its their joke character personality that lets them down, while with Yaorochi, it’s their theme. In Shion’s case, it’s the fact that they come completely out of nowhere, hijacking Fumikado’s rightful place as Final Boss that gets me all hot and bothered. (I think that Shion giving off strong “low rent Yuyuko vibes doesn’t help their case either)

It’s an absolute shame, since Shion seems to have clearly learned from Clause and Yaorochi, since they’ve got the creepy (cool) personality and the kickass boss theme. If only they had actual relevance to RMI’s plot...

Comments on Profile:

So apparently Shion is from a magical plant that can resurrect or grant immortality, it always pops up in a random place and the Senri Priests are usually supposed to cut it down when that does happen... oh dear.

Oh I see now, Shion is like Ermac from Mortal Kombat i.e. they’re a mass of souls and experiences that collectively form a new being. That’s a pretty cool backstory, actually! ...Wait, so the final spellcard that Shion has... are those like the names of the souls they absorbed?? That seems interesting.

So it goes that the souls in Shion were split at some point: the good souls formed the body while the evil souls formed the spirit. This intended equilibrium, however, was distorted by Mugenri’s barrier and instead of a split of good and evil it was just evil and more evil. Well that basically explains why Shion went from no chill to being very chill after Stage 6. Shion is mentioned as literally getting killed in all the endings (because everyone apparently went too ham). So we basically have “Evil and Eviler Shion” dying and then Harujion bringing them back as “Equilibrium of Good and Evil Shion”. Interesting, interesting.

This last part of the profile is such a mood. “[...] a good number of those voices were playing the same melody in unison, that “the world is full of malice.” “...Shion had no doubt about that claim. If their body is a miniature copy of the world itself, then they are evil itself.”

New Opinion: While I still hate that Shion hijacked Fumikado’s role as final villain, they are a way more interesting character than I initially thought. I do know that Shion is apparently a playable character in BPoHC, but have no idea how JynX intends to use them, so I’m interested to see what JynX’s plans are for them

= = =

Stage Extra Boss - Tenkai Zuifeng

Original Opinion: I think my first thoughts went exactly like “oh god that outfit is horrible” to “oh god this fight is insane” to “oh so they’re just Tsurubami’s really, really tired friend, I dig it”. I think the aspect I appreciate most is that they’re basically the straight man character the series has been missing. Yabusame and Tsubakura are weirdos, Kuroji is a scoundrel, the Adagumos operate on weird youkai logic and Sukune lacks common, human sense.

Tenkai is your only option if you’re looking for a sensible recurring character. And this sensibility only makes the interpretation of a Tenkai who is “endlessly tired of everyone’s shit” stronger in my mind.  Beyond the personality, they have a great theme, a cool backstory and, most importantly, a really damn good shot type in BPoHC. Now if only their outfits weren’t absolutely, consistently garish. It’s like JynX heard me say “the Len’En games need more colour” and decided to concentrate it in Tenkai’s outfit which has like, EVERY SINGLE COLOUR. 

I still love my Tired Barrier Carpenter but please stop picking your own outfits

Comments on Profile: 

Okay so Tenkai is from a renowned family of barrier builders that has worked with the Senri Shrine. Note the focus on the word *builders*; apparently these builders aren’t so good at repairing barriers. Cue Tenkai getting a job to repair the Mugenri Barrier as part of her ‘training’ (at least, that’s what it seems like on the surface. It’s mentioned that this training is also an attack on Tenkai’s prestige). 

The profile mentions Tenkai pulling some prank as a way to get back at her bosses. Tenkai hating her bosses just makes tired Tenkai more and more real in my head.

From my knowledge of the routes in-game, this prank was not repairing the barrier immediately, letting the souls outside the Barrier into Mugenri and basically letting the events of the game happen (Fumikado and co. start gathering souls, Harujion sprouts near Fumikado, Shion is born, Sese transforms in the Extra etc.). I guess it’s also meant to be an excuse to test Tsubakura and Yabusame. In short, we can all thank Tenkai for the events of this game.

IIRC, I think Tenkai is referenced as being from the Outside World? Maybe? I know it’s brought up in the Kuroji / Saragimaru route. 

It’s also not mentioned in the profile I believe Lumen is responsible for punching a hole in the barrier in the first place which is HILARIOUS

Their title is of the “Old Dictators”. So basically, Tenkai is the Marisa to Tsurubami’s Reimu.

New Opinion: I already liked Tenkai, this is just cementing my headcanon of Tenkai being a very, very tired person. There’s not a whole lot to say about Tenaki since this is all just plot and worldbuilding details 

= = =

I will finally get into Iyozane (who has a small profile, but has a large role in Fumikado’s profile) and Fumikado (who has a huge, huge profile) in the next part.

[ghoultyrant]

I've tried a few times to write Samus' pov before and I've had a lot of trouble. I feel like she is fairly inscrutable as characters go, being largely voiceless, and taciturn even when she does speak (not counting Other M). A lot of her dialogue is also removed from social interactions, being internal memos in scan logs. Idk. Maybe this is just me.

Samus as a character isn’t so much a cipher as an archaeological mystery.

The point of that comparison being that the Metroid series actually tends to tell a large fraction of its story through its environments, and does so quite well. Metroid II makes it clear that the endgame area is some manner of laboratory where the Metroids were apparently created, probably by the Chozo, but at some point control was lost. The laboratory is their nest because that’s where their existence as a species started, rather than the Metroid Queen selecting it as a good brooding ground for some other reason. Notably, the laboratory is unusually isolated and difficult to reach, even by Metroid II’s standards of travel distance, suggesting that the lab was deliberately cut off from the rest of the planet, and also probably explaining why the Metroid Queen didn’t wander off elsewhere to nest; she very possibly couldn’t.

In turn, this grounds a detail many players probably never questioned, but which is slightly odd on its own: that Metroids can apparently only grow into their Alpha and so on forms on SR388. As a consequence of natural evolution, this is certainly possible, but seems odd. But given that they’re clearly artificial, it’s easy to guess that the Chozo put that in as an artificial constraint; most likely the Chozo had plans for shipping them out to other worlds, and for some reason or another didn’t want them to change form once they were off the planet. (There’s a lot of plausible reasons for why they’d want this, but that’s a bit of a tangent)

Furthermore, this also grounds the Metroid Queen itself. Most players probably never question the fact that there’s literally only one Metroid Queen on an entire planet, because after all she’s the final boss. There’s obvious video game design reasons involved. But actually, it makes perfect sense in-universe: while fandom frequently assumes that any Metroid could potentially molt all the way to being a Metroid Queen, and that’s not an unreasonable assumption, it’s also entirely possible the Metroid Queen was one-of-a-kind because the Chozo carefully designed things so she’d be unique; that the Metroid Queen was built to be a Queen from the ground up, and is not supposed to be capable of producing more Queen-capable Metroids. That would be a logical thing to do to limit the damage in the event of a containment failure, and neatly explains why the planet has only one Metroid Queen even though Metroids themselves are running rampant across the planet.

Speaking of the Chozo and environmental storytelling, the fact that we saw their statues on two different planets back in the original trilogy was already a strong indication that the Chozo were a spacefaring species. Metroid Prime using scan logs to spell it out was a confirmation of an already-likely-true thing, not a state of canon invented by that particular entry. Again, I imagine a lot of players never questioned it because there’s game design reasons that are obviously applicable (eg that Chozo statues are frequently used to mark Important Power-Ups), but it’s extremely good environmental storytelling.

Anyway, that’s just some bits from Metroid II. Aside Other M and let me be brutally honest Samus Returns (I enjoyed it, but it mostly doesn’t try to do environmental storytelling, and probably-accidentally heavily retcons things, with the Metroid Queen’s nest no longer being set deep inside a laboratory being the most blatant example), the Metroid series does this heavily and constantly. The player is expected, if they care about the story and the world it takes place in, to look at the details they can see and make inferences.

And if they don’t care about any of that, it’s not intruding on their experience: they can just play a fun little game with blasting aliens and whatever.

Looping this back to Samus, though: yeah, we mostly don’t get Samus’ voice, both in a literal sense and in the writing sense. What we get is a ton of secondary information hinting at the kind of person she is, supplemented with concrete facts (eg that she was substantially raised by the Chozo), and then are expected to draw inferences.

As one of the more obvious examples: the first two games implicitly establish that Samus has to have a high degree of confidence in her abilities, or if she doesn’t she’s got a literally suicidal streak. She twice accepts missions to travel alone, deep into hostile territory, with the interstellar bounty hunter equivalent of nothing but the clothes on her back. Metroid II’s manual tells us that some elite corps of soldiers was sent to SR388 and never heard from again, and this didn’t dissuade Samus from going in completely alone.

This strongly implies she earnestly believes she can do the job when a literal small army couldn’t even survive: it’s not just that the Egenoid Star Marines failed at the mission, it’s that they were so completely out of their depth that none of them were able to escape the planet to report their failure!

Important and related is that starting from Metroid Ii it’s very normal for Samus to unambiguously have the option of just turning around and leaving. Her ship is on-planet, she uses it to leave at the end of a given game, and nonetheless she sticks each given mission out. She doesn’t encounter Omega Metroids and go ‘no, this is too dangerous, I’m out’. She doesn’t rampage across half of Zebes in Super Metroid and give up in disgust when she fails to find the stolen Metroid reasonably quickly. She doesn’t report the Space Pirates on Tallon IV to the Federation and leave them to clean up that particular mess while she goes to get a drink. Echoes and Fusion are the only games that actually trap Samus on-site temporarily to justify her ongoing presence, and even then if you bother to visit and scan her ship regularly in Echoes you’ll discover it’s ready for liftoff well before it’s time for the endgame, while in Fusion it actually doesn’t take that long to get back access to the Main Deck and thus her ship.

A lot of games that place a player character alone and far from civilization are very careful to explain that the player character was stranded in this strange place, and implicitly or explicitly sets the player character’s goal as escape back to civilization. The implication is generally that these are people who would never willingly inflict such a situation on themselves, and if they ever accidentally found themselves in such a situation with the ability to back out, they’d take it in a heartbeat.

Samus, meanwhile, keeps ending up in these situations and sticking them out. She doesn’t mind being alone with her thoughts for long periods of time.

It’s worth mentioning that the Japanese version of the original Metroid tracked how long you’d played, only your hours of play were presented as how many days Samus had been on Zebes. If you treat this ratio as canonical to all future games, which are generally designed so a first-time player will beat them in 4-20 hours... yeah. Samus has repeatedly spent several days or weeks in a row far away from civilization, and is just fine with sticking those situations out, and even inflicting them fairly spontaneously on herself if she has a specific reason for doing so. (eg she goes to Tallon IV in pursuit of Ridley)

Now, since this is inference there’s a fundamental ambiguity here. I personally tend to interpret Samus as being someone who finds socializing with her fellow sentients to be a stressful experience, such that going out into the wild for a week is a form of decompression and relaxation, but this isn’t the only plausible interpretation, and honestly I probably go to that interpretation because I don’t cope well with that kind of social interaction, rather than it actually being a better interpretation. One could plausibly interpret Samus as someone who, say, is actually fairly intensely social and just rates (Insert mission objective here) as more important than her own personal comfort. (In this interpretation, it would be assumed she instead decompresses from her missions by partying with her must-exist-in-this-interpretation large circle of friends) That’s certainly an excellent justification for her chasing Ridley in Metroid Prime, for example, and if we ignore Other M entirely I can’t think of a Metroid game that could be said to contradict that particular interpretation. (And Other M doesn’t count because it contradicts literally every other game on so many levels; if one game doesn’t fit while the rest are consistent with each other, you toss that one game as an inconsistency)

(Well, actually, another reason I take my interpretation of Samus is that she was raised by Ascetic Space Bird Monks, but then again plenty of people rebel against their upbringing. It’s perfectly possible to say Intensely Social Samus was driven crazy by the Chozo expecting her to be an Ascetic Space Bird Monk But As A Tiny Human, and even suggest that she takes being Intensely Social even farther than she would’ve otherwise as pushback against that whole thing)

BUT

While there’s room for interpretation and murkiness on details, Samus across the games has a fairly clear sketch of a certain range of plausible personalities. This range is also further reduced if we actually, for example, acknowledge Samus’ monologues from Fusion, which make it clear Samus concerns herself with the big picture (Suggesting that she sticks out her missions at least in part because often The Fate Of The Galaxy hinges on them kind of thing), and also seems to indicate (Consistent with her observed behavior), that Samus isn’t someone inclined toward negotiation as a problem-solving mechanism -that is, she doesn’t even countenance the possibility of trying to talk the incoming Federation goons into not trying to weaponize the X, going straight to ‘I need to make sure it’s not possible for them to try’- and that she’s got a bit of a philosophical streak to her, of exactly the sort one might expect of someone raised by Ascetic Space Bird Monks.

But even without the Fusion monologues, it’s not actually that hard to dig up a coherent personality for Samus, consistent with what we see across most of the games and compelling in its own right. It just takes a mentality that, while unusual for most writing/reading, is completely consistent with how the Metroid series prefers to convey its stories.

[cookiedoughmeagain]

Haven Syfy DVD Commentary for 4.05 - The New Girl

In which Brian Millikin (writer for the episode) talks with great enthusiasm and at a million miles an hour throughout almost the whole thing, with the exception only of interludes from Nick Parker, another of the writers. Seriously; I think every other commentary I’ve listened to has a least one moment where the talk dries up either because they struggle to think of interesting information to impart or because they simply get distracted by actually watching the episode. But these guys have so much stuff to say, it’s totally awesome. IIRC both acted as script co-ordinators before becoming writers, which leads me to think that script co-ordinators should do episode commentaries more often. I have tried to summarise/paraphrase but keep the spirit of what they’re saying :)

It was decided from pretty early on that this would be the episode that Audrey would come back to Haven, except she wouldn’t be Audrey, and that at the end of the episode Duke (and only Duke) would know that in fact she really is Audrey. And that in the next episode Nathan would find out it’s her too.

As a writer you always hope that you’ll get to work on certain episodes but you never really know because the order is decided independently of the content of the episodes, so Brian was glad/lucky to get assigned episode 5 as this was one he wanted to work on. Because he was excited about this idea of everything in the whole episode acting to convince the other characters and the audience that Audrey is not Audrey - until the last few minutes. And so it acts almost like another pilot episode with a new character in Lexie, and as another introduction for the viewers to the Haven mythology. And so it was fun to subvert that expectation at the end. They were very clear that the episode be done so that it could work without that revelation at the end; that everything up to that point is 100% as if it could be Lexie’s first episode in Haven.

Wanting Lexie to be as un-Audrey-like as possible but still have the same ‘underlying decency’ that all of her incarnations have always had.

This scene [Lexie and Nathan in the Herald at the beginning] was designed as a way to kick off the story of these two characters and Nathan’s story for the episode which in a way is all about him; Nathan as the emotional heart of the episode and the audience surrogate. Nathan wanted Audrey back on both a personal/emotional level and because it gives him a way to make up for shooting Howard and stopping the Troubles from ending. The idea for the episode being that he doesn’t want Lexie there but at some point during it he sees something in her and warms to her a bit.

The restaurant they shoot at is actually “The Rope Loft” - they didn’t change the sign for filming. Brian; “It’s a great place, we go there all the time.”

We needed this episode in some way to put Nathan and Lexie in some uncomfortable situation together. The actor playing Josh did a great job; he was actually locked in to the kitchen, with no air conditioning and no ventilation. Brian; “He goes so all-out here and we did this take after take after take. We all thought he was acting when he collapses on the floor - but he didn’t get back up again. He’d actually passed out.” The paramedics checked him out and he was fine, but he had actually fainted. He really committed to it even though it was only one scene so it was great.

The Trouble was picked for this episode very specifically. You always want the Trouble for the episode to help you tell the story about the characters, or for it to have some kind of thematic parallel. For this one, it’s an episode where the characters are dealing with someone else in Audrey’s body, so a Trouble where someone can jump into someone else’s body was a good fit. We all knew immediately that Emily Rose would enjoy being able to play someone other than Audrey and this seemed like a great opportunity to throw the same thing at Eric Balfour. And he did a great job with that too. And that allowed us to set up a scene towards the end of the episode where it’s just Lexie and Duke there so that he alone gets the chance to figure out that she’s really Audrey.

So this was a Trouble they had talked about before. Nick; “It’s been in the Trouble Bank for quite a while.” And the brought it out here because it made the most sense for this episode. Nick; “This is a good example of figuring out what would be thematically resonant and going through our Trouble Bank and finding something that fits. We have about 40 pages of Trouble ideas; some quite good, some not so good.”

Brian appreciating the skills of the director for the episode, who was a director of photography previously and how everything for this whole episode looks great and he got terrific performances out of the cast, and really understood where Brian was going with the episode. The idea that there are three episodes for every one you make; the one you write, the one you shoot, and the one you edit. And they are usually all a bit different from each other, they can be very different from each other, but for this one, there was not much shift from one to the other. The final version was pretty close to the original concept; it felt like everyone involved bought into the idea behind it and so it worked out really well.

[As we see Lexie at the second crime scene with the police radio] At this point we needed Lexie to activate herself a little bit. Up to this point she’s been going along with things, but now she’s a little bit more invested (because she met Charlotte before she died) and interested in finding out what’s going on. So it’s that underlying decency again that even though she’s a bartender with no training in this stuff, she still cares, and here she is taking ownership of it and showing that she wants to be involved.

[As Jennifer brings Lexie some of Audrey’s clothes] This was a different scene originally; there was a scene with Wade and Jennifer and Duke where Jennifer was getting Audrey’s clothes, but that got cut due to production challenges so they had to have Jennifer bring the clothes to a crime scene instead. Brian; “And we hoped no one would ask why Jennifer just showed up at this crime scene. But that kind of thing works because the actors are great at selling it. And Emma Lahana was terrific. She joined the cast this year and I think really elevated the level of the show.” Nick: “It’s some of the best and luckiest casting we’ve ever done.”

Brian; “I was really lucky with this episode that I got to push the Duke/Jennifer storyline along in a really big way.” Audrey coming back being a big deal for Jennifer because the reason she’s been in Haven up to this point (looking for Audrey) is suddenly gone. What’s Jennifer supposed to do now that she’s suddenly “the fourth wheel”. In a sense she has served her purpose and she’s afraid that Duke is going to see it that way.

Nick; “What I like about this episode is that even though Duke isn’t in control of his body for most of it, it still gets Jennifer to a point where she decides to stay in Haven.” Brian: “That’s really what sold me on the idea of the episode” that thing you often see of having the characters affected by a love potion that allows their story to be pushed forward in a way those characters might not have done otherwise, and in this situation possessed Duke was able to push some of the character story lines forward in an interesting way.

Lexie struggling to pronounce Nathan’s surname as one of Brian’s favourite lines in the episode and how they had to cut Lucas Bryant’s ad lib there where he tells her that Wuornos is Polish. They liked it but they had to cut it for time. Brian; “This was a great opportunity to have a character in here who would react to the others like a normal person would: Your name is ridiculous; this town is crazy.”

[As they find the orderly dead in Tyler’s bed] Nick: “This is the spookiest thing ever because he looks exactly like you.” Brian; “A bunch of people I know who watched this episode when it aired emailed me like; That was a crazy cameo! I’m not in the episode, but they all thought this was me. We only stuck glasses on him to make sure he definitely looked different from Tyler. But he also needed to look like Tyler from behind so that they could walk up to the body.”

Discussion of the specific things they had to work into the story to make the plot work; the get well cards that are not only there but that Lexie draws our attention to by noticing; the business card that Nathan handed to Tyler and the drinks ticket that Duke handed him. Those things were in the episode not so much because Nathan is being professional and Duke is being a nice guy but because they needed to have them both give Tyler something which could then act as this kind of talisman giving Tyler the option of possessing both of them. Brian; “These are the kind of things that you just have to squeeze in and hope that no one notices that you’re squeezing them in.” Nick; “I think they worked well. Duke did end up looking like a nice guy.” Brian; “I think it worked pretty well. And luckily the case of the week isn’t really the big story in this episode. The big story here is Nathan and Lexie.”

[As Lexie and Nathan look at the security footage in Tyler’s room] Nick; “What I like about this scene is that this is Audrey pretending to be Lexie, so she’s doing her detective work but she has to also cover up the fact that she’s actually Audrey. So she’s posing her theories as questions to Nathan and trying to lead him down the path that he’s going down. It works well.”

[As Nathan and Lexie find Duke upstairs] All of this set was built of the sound stage as they needed there to be a place in the hospital where no one else would be to hear Nathan and Lexie banging on the door once puppet Duke has locked them in. So they “invented this abandoned morgue wing” as an extra space in the hospital that no one goes to. The corridor stretching away behind Duke when we first see him there on the phone to Nathan is not really there; it’s a backdrop - a painting effectively, hung in the doorway.

[As puppet Duke locks Nathan and Lexie in the storage room] Brian comments this is where the episode really took off for him, everything up until here is set up. There were times when he was writing the script when he almost moved this scene to the end of act 2 (rather than the end of act 3 where it actually is).

Both of them agreeing that Eric Balfour’s performance as Tyler is fantastic; “it feels like a completely different person.” Brian; “Eric got applause from the crew” on finishing this scene [where he’s locking them in the storage room] and after Tyler’s death scene “and I’ve been on set for six or seven episodes now and I don’t think that’s happened before.”

Talk of how the cast [Eric, Emily and Lucas] really made the script work so well, and it being a great decision by the director to cut back to Tyler’s body having seizure’s in the basement while Tyler is using Duke’s body to point a gun at Nathan and Lexie; working really well as a really spooky indicator of the fact that it’s this guy who is in control of Duke’s body. They had scripted in to cut back to Tyler’s body once or twice but the director had the great idea to film Tyler saying the whole thing so they could cut back to him as they wanted.

[As Dwight is showing Jordan all the research in the bunker] How they were so pleased with this set and had planned to and wanted to use it much more than they ended up doing. It was tough to shoot in because it’s a small space and so they ended up having characters referring to it rather than actually being in there. But it looked great and they needed to give Dwight and Vince and Dave a place where they had been researching options for how to end the Troubles once the cycle got disrupted. And they didn’t find anything, showing that “this hairbrained scheme” of getting Lexie to fall for Nathan is still the best bad idea they’ve got.

Jordan’s idea of having Duke kill Lexie so that the Crocker Curse ends the Troubles as a good idea of hers but Dwight also being completely right that Duke would never ever do that. And so they knew that this would be the episode where Jordan would find herself a different Crocker.

Liking the actor who played Wade and wishing they could have used him more. There was only one bad thing about him and that was that “we didn’t have enough of him.” Brian; “And it wasn’t our fault, it wasn’t his fault but it just worked out scheduling wise that we were going to lose him but the end of episode seven all of a sudden and we thought we’d have him for at least one more episode so we had to accelerate his story a little bit.

Duke has been keeping the Troubles secret from Wade to protect him but “like all good secrets, especially on TV shows, while Duke had the best of intentions, it’s going to work out for the worst. Because what Wade doesn’t know is going to get him into a lot of Trouble.”

Nathan and Lexie locked in the storage room as another of Brian’s favourite scenes for the episode. Lucas actually broke the set door as Nathan is trying to bust them out of the room. Acknowledging it’s a bit of a trope to have two people stuck in some place like this but they had to do it with Nathan and Lexie so that Nathan “is forced to deal with her.” Brian’s enthusiasm for the scene and the direction and the actors making it work so well, and Nathan testing one more time to see if Audrey’s in there by asking her about pancakes. And loving Lexie’s reaction to the pancakes. How when Brian wrote that he didn’t think it would make it to the final cut (same for her inability to pronounce Wuronos) and so being glad they both made it; “Emily really liked it, and she sold it.”

[As Jennifer comes to tell Duke she’s leaving] How this is the point where Tyler starts to get an idea and to realise that maybe being Duke Crocker isn’t so bad. He came to the Gull to take some money but now he realises maybe he can take something else. Nick; “Yeah because Duke’s got a great life; he’s good looking, he’s got money, he’s got a hot girlfriend.” Nick; “The tragedy of that moment I really enjoy.  The first time they kiss, after growing closer for all this time, Duke isn’t even in control of his body.” Brian agrees that only in a supernatural TV show can your first kiss not be your first kiss at all.

[As Lexie is trying to pick the lock] Brian; “We cut a line here and it kills me. That Nathan can’t pick locks not because he doesn’t know how to (because it seems like everyone on every TV show does) but because he can’t feel it. And it’s the sort of thing that you have to feel in order to do it.” But they had to cut it (and other lines from this scene) for time. And saying again what a great job the actors do here.

Talking about the moment when Nathan admits to Lexie that he wants her to be someone else. And how that would be difficult for Lexie to hear, “but from Audrey’s perspective, she’s actually quite touched to hear that.” And how Audrey in this episode is probably “learning more about Nathan’s devotion to her” that she has until now.

[Duke and Jennifer in the landrover as she realises it’s not really him] How they needed Jennifer to give something to Duke so that Tyler can take it inside to his actual body and thereby have the option to possess Jennifer too. This as another thing that Brian wrote not thinking it would stay, so being glad that it worked out.

[As Jennifer meets up with Nathan and Lexie outside the hospital] Brian; “This scene was an important one and it was there from the get-go before we even had an outline. Because what we needed was to manufacture this situation for the climax of the episode where only Lexie can go inside.” This moment where Lexie suggests it and surprises Nathan with that and kind of proves herself to him with that. And this being another turning point in the Nathan-Lexie story. And how this is Audrey trying to convince Nathan to let her go inside whilst also having to still pretend be Lexie. And how their thinking was that for Audrey, if Nathan had refused to accept the idea of Lexie going inside, then Audrey would have to have revealed herself to him as Audrey here. But luckily Nathan has come around to Lexie enough that he gives her his gun and lets her go inside.

Brian saying that he wrote this neglected basement storage room and being really pleased with how the set was put together. The ‘Free Drinks, Duke’ note was the director’s and Brian’s handwriting.

In this basement scene there was originally a moment where silver-eyed Duke picks up Lexie by the neck and holds her up against the wall. Brian; “We spent a lot of time shooting this sequence and then it got cut out for time, but I actually think it works better without it.” Nick; “Yeah, I think it’s stronger for not having it.”

[As Tyler slams the axe into his chest] Brian; “This moment I was concerned it wouldn’t come across clear enough, but I think it did. I mean look, how scary, how great that looks. This was all the actors freaking out here as Duke and Tyler die, which turned out to be exhausting … Eric did a bunch of takes of him convulsing on the wall and floor and he was exhausted.

Brian, commenting on the way the Trouble ended; “Tyler actually had a really great plan. He just picked the one wrong body to possess.” It might have seemed like a good idea because “Duke is a good-looking guy, he gets all the women, he owns a boat, he owns a restaurant/bar, he’s a pirate …” Nick; “He’s a wanted criminal in eight different countries.” Brian; “... what more could you want? Except for the fact that you should not use him to kill your own Troubled body because he’s going to eradicate your Trouble” and the whole thing will backfire.

[As Lexie is stood by Audrey’s desk looking at her stuff and Nathan comes in to talk to her]; This was a quirk of production that this was the last thing they shot on the first day of filming and they were running out of time. So they didn’t have time to set up for the two different angles they would otherwise have done, so they had to do the whole thing with both actors facing the same way. Both Brian and Nick agree it worked out really well for the scene, because they get to stand close together “which is really important for their characters” but also Nathan doesn’t really look at her, which is also important because he’s struggling with the idea that on some level he’s beginning to warm to her and to see a future for Lexie in Haven. Whether it involves anything romantic for him or not, he’s starting to think that maybe he can do this. Nick; “Emily Rose did such a great job of playing Lexie, particularly in this scene. She really sells the idea that she is a different person.” Brian; “Oh absolutely. And what you also get is the idea that Audrey is there too looking out at Nathan, hating the fact that she’s doing this to Nathan but this is what she has to do.” Because she doesn’t want to be forced to kill him, she’s pretending to be Lexie to protect him. “There’s very few moments where Emily could show that on Lexie’s face, and that was one of them.”

[As Duke talks to Wade] Brian; “We knew all along that we wanted Duke to remember what happened with his body while he was possessed. It made for the best drama because we wanted Duke to sort of feel bad, but not feel bad” about what he did to Wade and Jennifer. “And it ended up being a useful concept that will come back as we progress into season five.” As Duke is apologising to Jennifer, Nick says this is an interesting scene because Duke is apologising for something that happened while he wasn’t in control of his body but that he himself did want to do. And how the whole thing works well because it gets them to this place where they both now have an idea how the other feels. Brian talks about how this scene was initially written with a joke where Duke is being a bit sarcastic telling Jennifer she has to move out of the apartment before asking her to move into the boat, but on the day the actors played it more heart-felt and that was the way it worked for those characters and that scene and describing it as another example of where the actors made the scene better.

Nick comments how bad ass Jordan looks in her sleeveless with her arms on show because of her Trouble; “She’s just putting it out there that she’s dangerous.” Brian; “It might have been weird on anyone else, but Kate Kelton really sells it.” Nick: “Yeah. She’s just so scary.” Brian; “Yeah. And she’s not afraid. When you can see her skin like that it tells you something about her head space.”

Nick; “I love that we’ve shot so many episode codas on the Grey Gull deck because it’s really beautiful there and it just seems like the kind of place I would go to say something important to someone I cared about.”

Brian; “So this final scene is the one where we could have ended the episode 30 seconds ago and no one would have been any the wiser” about Lexie really being Audrey. “But we wanted to pull the rug out from everybody.” Brian also talks about how it was the director’s idea to focus on Lexie/Audrey’s face as she realisesDuke know who she is and how Brian thinks that worked out really well because we can see both her and Duke at the same time for this key moment. “And we’re on her face the whole time and it’s so much better because of it.” Nick comments that you can see the moment Audrey drops the facade of being Lexie. Brian; “An example of how things can get better in editing is we cut the last line of this episode. In the script, after Audrey admits it’s her, she pulls out of the hug to look at Duke and tell him ‘But you can’t tell anyone’. But we cut that final line and it was better because of it.” Brian says he’s pretty happy with it as an episode and full credit to the cast and crew and director for making it work out so well.

[annalavder]

task 001: CHARACTER INTRODUCTION

( admin laurie, 21, est )  — annabelle lauder just moved in the SUMMER HOUSE, and she looks a lot like elizabeth gillies ! rumor has it, this 25 years-old cisfemale is (organized & thoughtful), but also (skeptical & anxious), but that doesn’t stop her from being in the summertime spirit! outside of the house, she who works as a commercial interior designer. oh, and she reminds me a lot of (busy new york subways & a white blouse tucked in shorts). i wonder what she will bring to the house!

hi everybody! admin laurie here, just trying to control my own enthusiasm about opening my first ever rp! underneath the read more, you will discover an AWFULLY long description of anna. as requested by the task, i’ll stick to her biography and answer more about her relationships in following task drops (spoiler alert!). i hope this example will inspire you or make the task clear to you! if not, please, message the main and i’ll do my best.

enjoy reading! 

childhood:

growing up with two real estate agents as parents was SOMETHING. they always acted like their own house were the ones on the market, keeping it crazy neat. no toys should be left on the ground, no drawings hung on the walls and no food was allowed on the white suede couches. little anna did not complain that much and instead started to develop similar habits as her parents.

during elementary school (she was babysit by a nanny so therefore she was lacking in the social area i apologize in advance for that), she was that clean freak who hated doing a mess at the playground or during art classes (not for long!). she came off as pretty weird to other kids because she acted like anything BUT a kid. she didn’t wear crazy ugly clothes, only white, her hair was straight, never in pigtails, and her lunch never looked like a tornado built it at the last second. 

teachers LOVED annabelle. she was very independant and resourceful. she showcased incredible organization skills when it came to handing her projects. she was the quiet type of student, sitting in the back of the class and not making a fool of herself. they did not pay much attention to the fact she was alone most of the time, too busy being blinded by how mature she was.

when she was not at school, she was at home, playing alone while her babysitter tried her hardest to take her out and make her discover the world. anna wasn’t the social type, clinging on her mother’s leg or pulling on her father’s sleeve to be carried whenever something made her nervous. she never saw it as a problem, mostly because her babysitter always came up with fun ideas. anna’s favorite activities was arts and crafts. she was, as one could say, gifted. she knew how to bring her ideas into life, whether they were crazy imaginary friends or cute furnitures for her dolls. she just loved going crazy once in a while and allowing herself to be a kid.

teenage years & high school

unlike the majority of teenagers, annabelle never went through a rebellious phase per say. she remained that picture-perfect archetype of students in high school and gained admiration from all of her professors. the only problem they had with her was that she seemed impossible to pair with in team projects. anna was never able to overcome the anxiety of meeting new people, let alone accepting their ideas. at least she had a friend or two to keep her away from straight loneliness and shame, but still, anna was not comfortable in social situations.

this issue was slowly evaporating as she found in art classes the best form of expression there was. she loved going crazily creative and started to help other students, without even knowing them. she had a gift and she wanted to share it with those who showed more difficulties. she won several art contests around schools and other facilities to the point both her parents and teachers thought she would continue into art school, maybe even art history. she surprised all of them by choosing something more pragmatic.

early 20s:

she attended the new york school of interior design and accumulated the appropriate requirements to be a true certified interior designer. she started small, by working for her parents in renovating and decorating the houses they were paid to sell. as soon as she touched something, it lit up a room. if she could not find certain pieces in stores, she would design them and build them. 

she drowned herself in work and it comforted her constant fear of becoming shallow people like her parents. don’t get her wrong, she was grateful for them and for the future they served her on a silver platter, but she just wished they were more colorful. as for relationships and friendships, she had a few fling here and there, some good friends for the 5 à 7, but no one could be put before work.

she moved out of her parents’ place as soon as she graduated and swore to herself to never live in an hospital-looking home. she started buying all kinds of stuff from mall stores to thrift stores to the point her apartment almost looks like a museum. she loves it that way. it was eclectif and full of life. it was, in fact, what she aspired to be as a person. one day.

now:

it is quite impressive for a 25 yo to be THAT successful in a field where trends died faster than snowmen in summer. she appeared in home & design magazines, she styled several boutiques and penthouses around the big apple and she has quite the reputation of being versatile. her style leans towards the antithesis of modern vintage, but she can do anything from industrial to western chic to a touch of rococo. she will never have her own television show and decoration line at target, but still, the name anna lauder is on everybody’s lips when it comes to unique renovations.

anna specializes in revamping vintage objects and giving them a modern and current style touch. she does that casually on the small balcony of her apartment, right above the noisy and busy streets of new york city. she’s almost never seen without paint stains or art supplies in her shopping cart.  in fact, this passion of hers is what made her famous in the hamptons. big houses were nice and all, but they needed something else to spice up their style. the demand was high in the hamptons, which brought her to travel there by train frequently.

bonus infos!

she WILL open a store to sell her creations. this store will be a pop-up for summer and fall time, maybe a bit of winter stuff as well. if any characters around here are good with businesses, hmu!

she decorated the summer house, indoors and outdoors! the house was supposed to be a villa for a rich client to be rented as an airbnb.

i will be requesting 2 connections, a friendship one and a relaitonship one. i suggest you to think of connections too! keep them as open as possible for a chance to have them filled by our lovely members.

she is full on bisexual, but never actually “came out” to her parents or anybody. too anxious to be judged, ya know. 

i speak of anxiety often, but i will rarely portray anxiety attacks and such. she will have her moments of high stress and social anxiety, but i don’t want to turn the summer house into a festival of anxiety for anna. she comes here this summer to try and search for her inner eclectic self and she wants to do that through meeting new people and befriending them. she might come off as awkward at first, but she’s much more at ease now than she was as a child. 

the general idea of anna is a) a kid at heart who had to grow up quite fast and learn to be her own friend b) SOMEONE WHO NEEDS FRIENDS FOR REAL b) someone who turns into mom friend real quick because she is very thoughtful when it comes to her loved ones d) she’s crafty & creative, so speak of craft channels on youtube and she’ll turn into a chatterbox.

[unpickingthetangles]

Wardrobe and Interiors for those oc asks? Your choice of OC(s)!

Ooooh! I like this one! It is tactile!! Clothing and interiors, hell yeah!

wardrobe: what’s your OC(s) style like?

I got to do Hadrian for this one because his style is a whole crazy concept. My boy has a vain streak in him that I try to keep more nuanced than overt in the book, but it is absolutely there. 

I’ll focus on 35-year-old Hadrian, since youthful Hadrian didn’t have enough money to buy anything to flatter himself. Older Hadrian is much fussier now that he has the luxury.

I’ve based his colors off poisonous plants that are advertising their danger, yet are nonetheless engaging to the eye to look at. He is dangerous in his own right, but harmless unless you interact with him. He is dresses in such a way to bring people in, and to then by no motives of his own, he ruins them. Hadrian wears a lot of creams and whites (like The Lily of the Valley flowers) when he is living in the city, basically screaming ‘I can afford to get this suit dirty’ to everyone on the street. Also, white is more often than not connected to funerals in Gillidainen culture, worn almost exclusively at times of high honor or mourning. Dressing Hadrian in cream suits is a purposeful move on my part, to show that he always seems to be in a state of half-life. It is as literal as it is metaphorical. He fakes his own death really early on, spending ten years allowing people to believe him dead. But with that he has killed his sense of self-being. It dies along with his past life, leaving behind this half-alive version of himself, though that isn’t really addressed until the emotional climax at the very end so lets forget I said that. 

Hadrian begins the story wearing a cream-colored suit to a funeral, an example of how his respect for the dead man is only half-there, then proceeds to wear similar colors over the course of the story. But he goes through some shit while he is out there traveling, moving from light colors to darker ones, until he is finally in black. A color to show a completion of being in Hadrian-- that he has departed from his charlatan ways, that he is no longer stagnated at the age of 25, that he has the capacity of thinking beyond his own wants and needs. 

I also made him travel with Gretchen a great deal, who wears exclusively black 99% of the time in the story. She moves towards lighter colors herself, untangling herself from a life where she was bound to an ideal, a purpose. The colors revert in the opposite direction from Hadrian, from dark to light, until finally she is dressed in a vivid violet color. For her, this coloring means freedom. I coupled the two as a set so they could be in contrast to each other. Also, they just get on really well, they deserve to be friends. 

Outside of all that bullshit, Hadrian accents with fob watch chains and pocket squares. Anything to compliment the color of his hair. He also has a wooden leg and cane made out of MAHOGANY, the finest of all wood (yes, i did that for the reason you’re thinking). So there you go, Hadrian in a nutshell. 

interiors: describe your OC(s) bedroom/home/or a place they consider "theirs". what's in it? do certain items have a special significance to your OC?

This one is really hard!! I cover 20 years of personal history and most of it spent traveling. But if I had to pick a single space where two of my character were blissfully happy, it would be the brownstone house in the Monument District of Alburndia where Douglas and Hadrian live for 5+ years. For Hadrian, it is the first and the last place he ever considers ‘his’. For reference, Alburndia is based (looooosely) off New York City, so the brownstone looks just like the iconic buildings found in Brooklyn. 

For Douglas, it is a cozy little corner very much unlike the manor house in which he grew up. For Hadrian it might as well be a palace. Douglas buys it for them to live together in, far away from a world the echoing halls and bustling servants of the Blue Manor and Hadrian’s own claustrophobic apartment over the Oar Daily Newspaper building. Three stories, that Douglas exclusively fills with furniture that he picks out with his mother. So it isn’t at all to Hadrian’s tastes, but he gets use to it. They fill it with books, not only for their own tastes, but for a cultural standard. They come from a culture that classifies illiteracy as an actual disease. Books are a status symbol, and you are expected to have read them all. Thankfully both boys do so with a genuine hunger. (Though I feel it is worth mentioning that Douglas reads nothing but trash and Hadrian is the one off learning languages and history.) 

The interior was chosen (in what Hadrian thinks) looks like a middle class family’s go at trying to look richer than they are. The wallpaper is classy, mostly in absinthe greens, but floral in the drawing rooms and deeply patterned creams in the bedrooms. 

To Douglas it is all very plainly furnished, very modern. To Hadrian is as posh as a man like him can possibly hope for. It is very much a home to both of them and my lunch is done I am going to wrap this up.

Thank you so much!! This one was FUN!