#It's also been a criticism of mine but I can see the appeal

[illdothehotvoice]

Oh now that it's 2024 and Dark Moon HD is coming out y'all better start being nice to Dark Moon I stg I do not want to see anyone talking about it being the worst Luigi's Mansion game. In this case worst does NOT equal bad dhjgkfdh.

[batrachised]

SO.

Dean Priest.

Watching the book trundle its way towards this chapter has been interesting, because as Emily steps into her own voice (although really, she's always had it) - Dean appears. This is going to be a weird analogy, but Dean is kind of like a rotten onion. There are so, so many layers to unpeel there - LM Montgomery seemed to have him as a pet character, he's rife with symbolism and allusion, he's disgusting, he's ominous, he haunts the narrative - but in the end, after all that peeling, you just have a rotten onion. This is my clumsy way of saying my personal opinion (personal! opinion!) is that while looking at Dean, saying "pedophile," and moving on is more than valid, (He is a rotten onion!), there's also key elements to his character that I think are incredibly essential to the book as a whole - specifically, the book's commentary on women writers.

Dean is like the evil version of a kindred spirit. There's some old saying about if you don't listen to your kids, they'll find someone who will, and I think this heavily applies here. It's not lost on me that we get Dean's perspective at length; it feels very significant in a book that, excluding throwaway lines, has Emily's voice front and center - until Dean appears. He's presented as enticing and disturbing all at once - @gogandmagog and @no-where-new-hero had an absolutely brilliant post the other day comparing him to the Big Bad Wolf. Emily seems drawn to and repulsed by him at the same time. He seems to fancy himself as a Rochester, which we can take or leave (I leave lol), and from the beginning, from the very first interaction, he makes clear that he wants to own Emily.

So, if Dean is so awful, why is he presented as appealing at all? I mull over this a lot. The easy explanation is that LMM had no problem with age gaps and grooming, as shown in other stories where she outright endorsed it (unfortunately, it seemed to be a popular trope of the time). But Dean is presented as ominous, and age gaps are criticized, and one minute he's denoted as having "strength, tenderness, and humor," and the next he's flinging "cobweb fetters" over Emily.

I would say (and thank you to @limestreet for the brilliant analysis a few months back, best take on Dean I have ever seen imo), that Dean represents the threat of the patriarchy to women's artistic voices. Of course Dean is appealing - he's a more viable threat to Emily's voice specifically because he's not an Aunt Elizabeth or Uncle Wallace. It's easy enough for her to dismiss them. But Dean quite deliberately enmeshes himself in Emily's life and explicitly (in later books) threatens her writing. Dean is the "it's your writing or me," and he's chillingly effective at making sure to make that a hard choice, when Emily at no other point hesitates to pick her writing, whether when burning her account book, writing on letter bills, risking the wrath of relatives, or any other of the endless hurdles she has to overcome.

Knowing that Dean represents that threat (how women writers often were forced to pick between, one might argue, the 'seduction' of marriage/family and writing), puts a curious light on this passage:

“That’s good. Because you see your life belongs to me henceforth. Since I saved it it’s mine. Never forget that.” Emily felt an odd sensation of rebellion. She didn’t fancy the idea of her life belonging to anybody but herself—not even to anybody she liked as much as she liked Dean Priest. Dean, watching her, saw it and smiled his whimsical smile that always seemed to have so much more in it than mere smiling. “That doesn’t quite suit you? Ah, you see one pays a penalty when one reaches out for something beyond the ordinary. One pays for it in bondage of some kind or other. Take your wonderful aster home and keep it as long as you can. It has cost you your freedom.”

According to Dean, Emily reaching for something out of the ordinary (such as a writing career) must cost her in bondage. And this is where I think of LM Montgomery, miserable in her marriage to a jealous, resentful, unstable husband, LMM for whom Emily was heavily autobiographical, LMM who despite her writing success, had to marry to secure her future. I have never agreed with Dean being Ewen's stand in, but I do think Dean as a character feels pointed.

I'm going to be reblogging past discussions on Dean later so hold onto your hats!

[ramiecutesy22]

I illustrated 100 ASoIaF Characters

" A Song of Ice and Fire" is a series that has become rather (in)famous for its depictions of violence, and abundance of s3x scenes .and while criticism can definitely be made for these, it's important that we dont end up overlooking the important life lessons, nor end up with wrong takeaways from the story.

you see, at its very heart , i believe ASOIAF is a story of the human experience, as well as a commentary about the twisted ways of this world ( set within a fantasy backdrop). being caught in the middle of loyalties, ambition, Reputation, vengeance, culture, faith, and familial acceptance . its themes like this along with complex and relatable characters that youll pity and root for in one scene, only for you to be appalled by and flinch at in the next scene, is what i find so appealing in this series.

Spectacle, Political Intrigue and Character Drama (all present in the story too btw) aside , its a story that really makes you think ,reflect , and learn upon. and i love it for that!

so today , i just wanna show my appreciation to arguably the best aspect of this series: The Characters . for over a year now, i have made fanart for 100 characters from the series. some are major pov characters. some iterally appear for only 1 chapter. but all help bring so much depth and color to this story!

special thanks to:

@nobodysuspectsthebutterfly . your blog has been such a HUGE in help giving me inspiration and references for design and clothing . i also appreciate you reblogging art from fellow asoiaf artist to help give them a boost

@amuelia , i really love your design for Areo, and it was actually the basis for art for him! its only fitting that i give you credit

@whoknowsnugget . i was having a haaaard time coming up a pose for Asha when i first designed her, it wasnt until i saw your own fanart for her ( the one with her arms crossed while holding axes) that i finally found a fitting pose for her. because it was such a huge help, i figured i should give you credit as well!

@buildoblivionthenwewilltalk for being with the journey since last year!

and @squidprinceofwinterfell too, who is my other fellow asoiaf pal from tumblr!

..............................................................................................................................

i really hope yall like this one! i know this may really come off as unexpected, but ive actually liked asoiaf since 2018! ( with a massive revival of interest starting late 2022). as for THAT show, i have yet to watch an actual full episode yet hehe.

as for my account, let this be considered my proper comeback after months of inactivity. this project of mine played a large chunk for my absence, because i frequently get artblock coming up with a new post for every new character i make.

#asongoficeandfire #asoiafart

[utilitycaster]

I just want to say, that I agree with almost all of your Critical Role takes and you have 1000% better and more nuanced takes than all of Twitter and I greatly appreciate it! The takes over there regarding Liliana and the gods are just wild and you bring some much needed sanity to the content I see

Thanks! I hope you don't mind because I've been thinking about this re: the Twitter takes but the thing about Twitter and Liliana specifically that I've seen is that there's this really bizarre fetishization of like, the fact that she is a (white) southerner (this also weirdly happened for Birdie though to a much lesser extent, and the person who spearheaded that wasn't even American so I have to assume this is a specific corner of Twitter Culture At Large). And like, here's the thing. It's true that fantasy tends to be very British in its accents, and it's also true that accents in a fantasy world are used to convey the same things we'd assume in our world - RP British for educated, southern American for rural, Cockney for rougher types, etc.

It's also true that laying the exact socioeconomic parallels from our world onto, say, Liliana and Orym (who reads to me as non-regional but I, like Liam, am from the Northeast originally) is a recipe for disaster. Or rather, it's not, but it is going to reaffirm your own biases, some of which are dangerous to reaffirm.

There was a popular post on Tumblr a while back, probably not long after Trump was elected, of someone talking about how they were convincing a relative with the confederate flag towards socialism by appealing to the idea of "isn't in unfair how uneven wealth distribution is and how a small group has so much control" and a number of people were rightfully like "uh, maybe you should focus on the racism" or "hey OP ask your relative who they think that small group in control is because I'm getting a really bad feeling they're going to say it's The Jews." And I feel that a lot of the empathy for Liliana from those spaces feels like that OP. Or in other words: I get that you see your relatives in Liliana. Unfortunately, I cannot help but see me and mine in Orym.

You see someone trapped by circumstance and desperation in a dangerous ideology. I see the fact that I haven't gone to a synagogue in easily 6-7 years without there being a security guard present and usually, the doors locked with someone looking through the window to let you in, and then in the sanctuary there's been an installation so that you can quickly bar all the doors in case an alarm goes off or you hear shots in the lobby.

I think there's a great case for seeing yourself in Imogen, who is in a painful struggle with the fact that her mother does love her very much but is in dangerously deep and has done a number of incredibly terrible and harmful things. That latter point is important, incidentally; I get that cult members sometimes rise through the ranks but all but the leader are being manipulated. But the fact remains that a brainwashed person can still commit atrocities, and in this story, they have, many times over. It's especially true because like...sure, plenty of people are like "I lost my relative to a cult and I just want them back and I couldn't harm them," but also, as we've seen, this cult can and will harm Imogen! Plenty of people are also like "yeah I gotta cut them off, it hurts but unfortunately my horribly bigoted and violent relative, while a victim of brainwashing, is a threat to me too." It's not even the full picture of the Temult side of things, let alone the picture that includes the Vanguard's victims.

I also think the Southern gatekeeping is unhinged because it's like. guys there's QAnon members and other cults across the country; the Confederate flag example above was actually notable in that OP wasn't even Southern so you couldn't even write the flag off as deeply misguided heritage but rather was explicitly being used as a hate symbol. It's awfully presumptive to assume all southerners have the same experience (especially since the Temults are portrayed, physically and in accents, as white southerners, not that the experiences of white southerners aren't also incredibly varied). It's awfully presumptive to assume that people find Liliana threatening because they have no personal experience with people like her; often, it's because they have all too real experience with people like her, and it says something even worse about you if you can say "but you guys, I see me and my family in Liliana" when people are telling you that they see them and their families in Orym. I would not, personally, publicly admit that one's empathy extends to the people who remind you of your family but runs out before it reaches their victims. Nor would I publicly admit that I assume everyone who disagrees with me clearly has never had personal experience with this topic.

I should also note that, as I've noted a number of times before, that these are fictional characters and not real people. Twitter seems to be really fucking bad at grasping that. Like, yes, this is the other thing; I do not think that OP should kill their Confederate flag-toting relative, whereas if Imogen did so to Liliana I'd be like "hell yeah." The former is a real person who I do hope gets deprogrammed, just, you know, maybe adjust those priorities; the latter is a fictional character in a story.

[frankingsteinery]

(for the ask game from a few days ago) could you do Victor for 2, 12, 15 and 24

2. Favorite canon thing about this character?

i had to sit and think because this one was so hard to narrow down. on a surface level i find all sorts of things about him endearing from his mannerisms to his speech patterns, but i think the thing that got me hooked on victor as a character was how emotionally demonstrative he is, particularly for a male protagonist. this also extends generally to his love for nature, for his friends, and his siblings (disregarding the incestuous implications of his relationship with elizabeth...)

i think this was only intensified for me when i started delving into frankenstein academic essays and analysis and then, by extension, the frankenstein fandom, and found that en masse it was people criticizing victor for just what interested me to him in the first place: being emotional, and therefore somehow melodramatic, overreacting, self-centered, egotistical, etc. it was this kind of climate of victor-hate that pushed me to make a tumblr account in the first place. someone had to be the sole victor defender in this barren wasteland

12. What's a headcanon you have for this character?

this is silly and probably not the serious answer you were looking for but like 2 years ago a dear friend of mine and i were joking about how you could catch victor frankenstein in a mouse trap and ever since then his assigned fursona in my head has been a mouse:

15. What's your favorite ship for this character?

by far its waltonstein (robert x victor). im aware clervalstein is vastly more popular, and while im charmed by it in-canon i dont find most depictions of it to my taste. i don't see their relationship as wholly reciprocated–one-sided on walton's end–which is part of the reason why i like their dynamic so much: its established that walton romanticizes the unobtainable, chases the unknown, and that's why he hangs all his hopes on things he cannot feasibly reach. first becoming a famous poet and going down with the greats, then sailing to find the northern passage despite being an inexperienced captain, all the while hoping for this impossibly idealistic image of a companion who would be perfectly tailored to his interests and manners, and then, against all reason, he finds this in victor, wherein victor becomes an extension of this habit, who is dying and too hung up in the past and on martyring himself, because everyone who has grown close to him has been hurt for it, so he cannot love again, or at least in the way walton wants. yet victor still has a reciprocated interest and finds a friend in him, even shares the same sentiment of the importance of friendship, but like he says no man can "be to him as clerval was." its very much wrong place/time but the right person.

ive said this before but i think, too, that if victor had recovered and lived than walton may fall a little less in love with victor. their relationship was founded on their dynamic of sick/caretaker, and beyond that, victor would have already exhausted his story, so there's no air of mystery around him anymore–nothing for walton to glorify or romanticize. ultimately i think even if they had the best of intentions and loved each other, they could not have a healthy or fully mutual relationship, and part of the appeal to me is this tragedy!

24. What other character from another fandom of yours that reminds you of them?

im drawing a bit of a blank on this one because no other character encompasses just what victor Is to me, but theres a whole host of victor-esque characters i could name because he is the literal foundation for the mad scientist archetype. if i was pressed i think id say geoffrey tempest from sorrows of satan by marie corelli (beyond his blatant misogny), and i remember some parts of emil sinclairs early narration in demian by herman hesse reminded me of victor. lucifer/satan from paradise lost also, particuarly the bit where he says he cannot enjoy the beauty of earth for the suffering of his fall, but that almost feels like a cop-out answer.

lastly–and this one is completely unfounded–itd have to be double dee from EEnE.

[sejanusxcoriyo]

Pretty Lil Thang

Pairings: Josh Andreś Rivera x Fem!Actress!Reader / Rachel Zigler x Tom Blyth

A/N: I know Rachel and Josh are together, and Tom also has a girlfriend, but my page is related to Sejanus. For this, she's gonna be dating Tom, cus chemistry. I wanted to try something new, so I tried a social media post! Please, criticism is appreciated 🫶🏾. I will probably be making this into a mini series.

Face Claim: Coco Jones (The pictures with Rachel and Josh just imagine they are Josh, and you)

Type: Social Media Au

Summary: You auditioned for Mai White, Sejanus' love interest in the Ballad of the Songbirds and Snakes. Rachel notices that you and Josh have taken a liking to each other. Mini series!

Dividers by: @cafekitsune

Ynuser

Ynuser Welp, filming starts soon, and my co star is pretty cute😋

Tagged: joshandresrivera, Theballadofsongbirdsandanakes

Liked by: joshandresrivera, Rachel Zigler, tomblyth, and 30,000 others

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Joshandresrivera I mean, you're pretty cute 2😉

↪️ynfan1 My new mom and dad😫

↪️rachaelzigler New power couple alert???🤨🤨

↪️ynuser oh hush, just a little innocent flirting🫶🏾

↪️rachelzigler mhm👀

Tomblyth no love for coryo?

↪️ynuser I read the book, I don't like you😂

↪️tomblyth you mean coryo right??🤨

↪️ynuser I said what I said🤷🏾‍♀️

Ynhater1 How did she get the role of Mai? I could do much better🙄

↪️ynuser yet you didn't, try someone else, toodles😁

Ynfan2 Josh and Yn, my new ship😫

Joshlover @/joshandresrivera I've loved you since la la land🫶🏾

Ynfan3 she looks so sexy, I am feral😭

↪️ynfan4 right? I just want to take a bite🫦

↪️joshandresrivera back off, she's mine🤺

Ynfan5 look at him defending his girl🥹

↪️joshhutcherson she's single😉

↪️ynuser don't you have a gf? Get out my comments, peeta, I am not tryna come between you and Ms. Everdeen🙅🏾‍♀️

Text messages

Ynuser

Ynuser Three of my favorite people ever, love you guys🫶🏾

Tagged: joshandresrivera, rachaelzigler, tomblyth

Liked by: joshandresrivera, rachelzigler, tomblyth, and 42,000 others

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Ynfan1 she's holding on kinda tight to him👀

↪️ ynfan2 most of her photos of her and Josh😫

Joshandresrivera ❤️

↪️joshyn WHATS THIS^^^^

↪️ynuser miss you sm🫶🏾

Rachelzigler I'm supposed to be your bestie, IS MY SPOT BEING REPLACED??

↪️ynuser no, stop being dramatic

↪️tomblyth baby, leave them alone, let them dream of each other

(comment deleted)

↪️joshyn HUH???^^^

↪️ynuser @/tomblyth delete that now

Comments have been limited

Ynuser

Ynuser Maybe I can see your appeal for Coriolanus

Tagged: @/tomblyth @/rachelzigler

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Rachelzigler you stole those...🙄

↪️ynuser we are best friends what's yours is mine🤷🏾‍♀️

↪️rachelzigler be glad I love you

↪️ynuser love you more bestie

↪️ynfan2 mother is mothering😩

Tomblyth well I thought all the photos looked good except for the last one🥹

↪️rachelzigler you look as handsome as ever😘

↪️tomblyth thank you ml❤️

↪️ynuser ugh, if you look closely you will find me burning alive in their fire😩

↪️joshfan1 same Yn same

Joshandresrivera 🎶what about me🎶 🎶what about meeeee🎶

↪️ynuser you also look handsome as ever🫶🏾

↪️joshandresrivera thank you love❤️

↪️ynfan1 love???

↪️joshynfan it's giving power couple!!!

[jedi-enthusiast]

I have to say that your breakdown of themes and issues in the prequels is absolutely BEAUTIFUL.

I’m still always surprised that not everyone sees it this way because

1. That’s clearly how it’s intended to be viewed.

2. It always just seems so plainly spelled out for us.

I am not an Anakin fan, I have more of a love/hate dynamic with him, but it seems like it’s Anakin apologists above anyone else who like to demonise the Jedi and I just don’t get how people don’t realise you don’t have to choose one or the other. The downfall of Anakin and the Jedi go hand in hand because they were both manipulated by Palpatine. It really takes away from the emotional impact of the story if you don’t acknowledge that the Jedi were a genuinely good group of people who did support Anakin to the best of their ability, he was just convinced that that wasn’t actually the case.

Although I do feel empathy for the hardships Anakin endured, the Jedi had such a beautiful culture and way of life and people are missing out on so much by pretending they’re the “real villains”.

Also it was obviously genocide. How is there even a debate about that? I don’t know if there’s ever been an entirely successful genocide in history because it’s essentially impossible to completely eradicate a group of people but that doesn’t stop it from being classified as genocide. If you have to argue that it technically isn’t genocide, you probably don’t have the strong argument you think you do.

Thank you so much <3

I'm gonna be completely honest, I don't want this blog to be a platform for people to debate if the Jedi were "really good" or not with me (hence my blog description) and I don't really like getting into debates with people who are anti-Jedi or Anakin apologists.

Firstly because, in order to think the Jedi are the "bad guys" of Star Wars, it requires a certain level of bad faith assumptions, ignorance, and disregard of literally everything that canon shows us.

Secondly, because I have anger issues and it's kinda hard to work on controlling my anger and not letting it control me when I'm arguing with people who--at best are saying the Jedi caused their genocide, and at worst are saying they deserved it. Especially since Star Wars is my comfort franchise and the Jedi are my comfort characters--so it's just frustrating to see them so mischaracterized.

I'm glad my 2 am anger-induced, sleep deprived, aggressive rant resonated with you, though lol

I'm not a big fan of Anakin either and I'm largely of the opinion that Anakin caused most of the problems he had in general, but I'm not completely unsympathetic to him--my main issue lies with his apologists.

I don't really care if other people like him, I can see the appeal and I get that he's your blorbo. I also don't really care if other people don't like the Jedi, I have the "anti-Jedi" and "Jedi critical" tags blocked for a reason. I don't engage in debates with these people because I know it's pointless, and I leave them be--let them have their side of the internet and I have mine.

I do, however, have a problem with people coming onto my blog and posting their ignorant, bad-faith arguments. Like what you like, have your opinions, but keep them out of my space. Y'know?

I'm all for letting people like what they like and have different opinions on the media and leaving them be, but the moment you come onto my blog- (which literally says "this is a Pro-Jedi blog, fuck off with any Anti Jedi bullshit you have and keep it to your own page") -and start spouting that shit is the moment all of that flies out the window.

And yes, it's insane that the words "well, it wasn't actually a genocide" were actually present in that person's argument.

[dalishious]

The Pros and Cons of the Codex

Good roleplaying games tend to have a lot of lore packed into the world; it’s one of the most appealing aspects to players like myself, who enjoy spending countless hours studying these creations. But how do you fit all that lore into a game that is already very large? For many franchises, this is where collectible extra bits of reading come in. Assassin’s Creed has its database, The Elder Scrolls has its many books and letters, and Dragon Age has its codex. But there are both pros and cons to this function in a game.

Dragon Age codex entries are written in the perspective of people living in the world. For example, many take the form of excerpts from books written by the Chantry scholar, Brother Genitivi. Or they might be little notes left behind by a person, then found by the player. Or they might be letters written between two people who may never even actually, physically appear in the game, but leave their presence through the codex.

The great thing about this is, the flavour added is extra spicy when it feels like it is coming from an actual person. Someone took the time to write something down, that your character then comes across, without breaking immersion. It gives you the player more information about the world, while at the same time gives the character you’re roleplaying as more information about the world. It feels much more real than if you, the player had knowledge that your character wouldn’t realistically ever be able to know.

But there is trouble with in-universe written codex entries as well: The biggest being, this perspective can be biased. If you’re reading something about the Qunari written by a Chantry scholar, chances are it will refer to them in a very poor light, compared to how the Qunari would refer to themselves. Why? Because within universe, the Chantry is full of racist zealots. So when your character comes across something like this in Dragon Age Inquisition:

Scrawled Note You've heard how the Dalish would hang trespassers. Hung them from trees, is what they say! Would you believe you can still see them? I swear on the Maker's beard, when I saw that face in the tree, I just about pissed myself. The screaming face of a murdered bastard, right in front of me. I was afraid if I stayed long, I would hear it howling. I hadn't even been drinking. Don't believe me? Go see for yourself! Brien.

There is nothing to dispute what this person has written. A naïve player may take it at face value, without accounting for in-universe biases against the Dalish. Now, if you’re thinking that’s too far-fetched to believe anyone would do so, then I must say I am very jealous of your fandom experience being so different from mine. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who lack critical thinking skills, whether it be for real life or engaging with media. Hell, I will fully admit to falling for real life propaganda myself, so I certainly would not say I’m above it either.

Dragon Age Origins had a great way of getting around this: Depending on your character’s origin, you unlocked different versions of the same codex entry. For example, the codex entry on city elves has three different variations: One written by a human Chantry sister that any non-elf character unlocks, one written by a city elf that a city elf character unlocks, and one written by a Dalish elf that a Dalish character unlocks. Each version paints the city elves and history in a different light. Not only does this cover different bases and makes it crystal clear that the writing is founded on an in-universe bias, but it also adds to replay value, because you are collecting something different each time you play. Unfortunately, Dragon Age II and Dragon Age Inquisition did away with this.

Another struggle with codex entries is the fact that they are collectibles, and therefore only unlocked if the player happens to come across them. While this can add a secondary goal for the player to find all the codex entries possible when playing, it also leads to any missed codex entries meaning missed information about the world. In some cases, that’s not that big a deal; in the grand scheme of things, who cares if we know the story behind the wyvern head mounted on the wall of a café in Val Royeaux? But in some cases, rather informative writing on a hot in-universe topic is tucked in a note found behind a locked door somewhere. Such is the case with the following codex entry in Dragon Age Inquisition, for example:

The Annulment at Dairsmuid When we heard of the injustices against our fellow mages at the White Spire, the Circle of Magi in Val Royeaux, I feared what was to come. Our Circle at Dairsmuid is small and isolated; it exists largely as a façade to appease the Chantry. When the other Circles rose up, the Chantry sent Seekers across the bay from Ayesleigh to investigate. They found us mixing freely with our families, training female mages in the traditions of the seers, and denounced us as apostates. Perhaps they thought we were spineless robes who could be intimidated with a little bloodshed. Before I was first enchanter, I was the daughter of Captain Revaud, of the Felicisima Armada. I know how to plan a battle. They brought with them a small army of templars. We fought. And we might have won. But they invoked the Right of Annulment, with all the unrelenting brutality that allowed. It is their right to put screaming apprentices to the sword, burn our "tainted" libraries, crush irreplaceable artifacts under their heels, tear down the very walls of our home. No mage has the right to disagree. We of the Dairsmuid Circle wait now, behind barricades. I have sent word to our brother and sister mages of this outrage. When they break through, we will not die alone. —Final journal entry of First Enchanter Rivella, slain in Dairsmuid, 9:40 Dragon

This codex entry is the last words of a dead woman, murdered in what is, in my opinion, a hate crime based on her being a Rivaini mage practising culturally traditional magic. Veteran players of the world of Dragon Age are already familiar with the viciousness and cruelty of the Chantry, but new players are not. And with Dragon Age Inquisition already so Chantry-focused, it is exceptionally rare in this game to hear of any disputes from sources not painted as an antagonist. So if you, the player, never unlock this codex entry, you, the player, may never read one of the few examples of the Chantry’s corruption.

Fortunately, thanks to fandom archiving efforts, all codex entries can easily be found online. But that is only because of fans who lovingly record all the content of the game, not because of anything from the actual game developers.

I believe that codex entries have a proper place in the world of Dragon Age. At this point they are a staple feature of the franchise, and I enjoy reading them. But I do not enjoy having to collect them in order to do so, and I do wish that there was a function that perhaps after you beat the game, you automatically unlock all codex entries, or if BioWare themselves were to publish all the codex entries online instead of fans having to do the work ourselves.

—–

Like these kinds of meta pieces? Please consider supporting me on Patreon, where you could have viewed it a few weeks earlier!

[ronearoundblindly]

sending this w love but it's really hard to read ur comments if they're purple *and* tiny

First and foremost, thank you. That is good to know, that is a great example of constructive criticism, and I appreciate you helping me make what I write more user-friendly for readers.

Second, this has stirred something in me that I cannot tamp down, and so here goes a well-meaning rant. Sorry in advance (especially if this is one of my moots on anon).

There are several reasons I do the tiny, purple text; among them are personal esthetics, good conditioning, and bad conditioning.

I don't know why I've sorta chosen purple/lavender/etc as a theme for a while, but meh, I like it, and to have purple text show up works with the theme. Speaking of themes, Tumblr has various ways you can see your dash, called 'palettes' I think, and mine is set to idk 'goth rave' or something which has purple text on black as the default. It's easier on my eyes and makes the tiny, purple text stand out nicely in my draft posts. Because that's how I see them when formatting, I didn't notice it might be much harder on a white background or any of the other palettes. Thank you for pointing it out! I hadn't thought of that.

This might also be me as a distracted person, but the visual of a divider such as this:

...doesn't seem like enough of an end-cap to the actual story portion of the post, so I change the way the A/N looks afterward to really separate the two. (Special shoutout to the fact that the divider's message seems utterly useless in encouraging/reminding readers to leave comments or reblog. You've all heard that tirade. Let's just say I know the reminder is ignored, so I gotta try something else as a transition.)

Writing/posting on this platform, as you may have heard, is a bit of a crapshoot mixed bag. Readers feel limited both in number and in time, so we creators tend to try various things to make our posts stand out, to make them appealing. Color or text variation is one of those ways. Now, I have no flippin' idea how to get rainbow or gradient text; I barely figured out how to put hyperlinks into my bio, bless my heart, so there's little chance of my blog looking super unique or fancy. Instead I vary the look between actual prose and my notes/warnings/summaries, which leads me to the sad bit.

I am conditioned by this site and others to understand that you are here to consume content. That content is the writing that I have curated and edited into a story which doesn't involve me, just the character of 'you' and other OCs or canon IP, so my thoughts and opinions are not and never have been the reason anyone follows me. Those are quite literally small compared to the actual work I generate.

I still think of comment reblogs as flooding your dash with stuff most of you have already seen. I think I'm being annoying--even though I know it's the only way to have my writing go farther on this site--and because I will do so very, very much IRL to *not* annoy anyone, I put opinion and random side comments and little thoughts in small text that is color-coded so you can ignore it as "not-story bits."

It is taking everything in me to NOT make this small text or purple. Honestly, my palms are sweating so badly, I've wiped my computer keyboard four times.

No, I don't want anything to be hard for you to see or read. Yes, I am really grateful you pointed this out. *Do* please remember that we are all doing the best we can to get the experience we want from Tumblr by customizing what we can.

*

The comment I posted in tiny, purple text immediately before this was sent to me has been changed to regular, default color. Hopefully that helps, and I will try to keep in mind how things will look in the future.

**

I did purposefully choose to not put a readmore in this post fwiw.

[cursedhaglette]

tagged by the incomparable @aevallare who is soooo hot and talented how does she do it!! anyways i am new to fandom and ao3 so my numbers have nothing on hers but here we go.

1) How many works do you have on AO3?

six

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

190,051

3) What fandoms do you write for?

bg3. i also once wrote a paragraph of DAI fanfic but that didn't go anywhere. it was in my heart though.

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1- The Broken Chosen

2- Hold Me Like a Knife

3- Thrice Before Dawn

4- Apples to Apples

5- Colleagues

5) Do you respond to comments?

usually! i try to at least.

6) What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

ummmm none currently. tbd.

7) What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

the broken chosen

8) Do you get hate on fics?

luckily no but i am still a baby fic-writer all things considered so i'm lucky

9) Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

yes. i need to write some gay smut probably, or at least a little gay. alas, all of mine have been what i know (straight)

10) Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

no and i'm not really into that anyway? that and modern girl gets dropped in video game world. i don't see the appeal tbh.

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

naur thank god

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

nope!

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

no but i absolutely would. who wants to write one. let's smut together.

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

garrus/shepherd probably. astarion/durge closest second.

15) What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

don't do this to me it's pressure i don't know!!!!!!!!

16) What are your writing strengths?

ummm ending on cliffhangers that make people yell at me in the comments

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

grammar followed by smut probably. but also this is asking a writer to criticize their work which i would guess most writers find fairly easy. you could tell me any aspect of my writing is the weakness and i'd be like "oh yeah you're so right"

18) Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

ummm i haven't done it but i would. i love how @aevallare used greek as elvish in kindred and if i were writing elvish, i might do the same because it's brilliant. but i'd use cyrillic because i took russian in college.

or i'd write in polish since that's my second language, it just doesn't use a different alphabet which feels like half the fun.

19) First fandom you wrote for?

bg3 oop

20) Favorite fic you’ve written?

HMLAK for sure. i just. i can feel the way my writing's improved since i started TBC the most when i'm writing that fic.

i'm tagggggginnnnnnng @kittenintheden @brain-rot-central @fangswbenefits @wetcatspellcaster and @bloodinwine <3

[kwaggysshardmindemporium]

Behold, WotC making a move so braindead you'd think Hasbro made them fire a ton of people for no reason or something. Long post, so I'm putting a page break for those of you who don't care about MtG drama.

For reference so you know where I'm coming at this from, I'm an idiot whale buyer of these things. Secret Lair is deeply flawed, but I do love the shit out of the alt treatments and they do on rare occasion take an expensive card and torpedo the price.

So, first, the article says that a consistent bit of feedback about Secret Lairs is people want them to ship faster. Not personally a significant grievance of mine, but I get that at least. I wish the average buyer had some patience, but i just kind of have to accept they don't because this isn't something I can change. Okay, so how are they gonna fix this? Well, they're gonna use their market research from 4 years of this program to pre-print based on anticipated demand. And then that's gonna be the whole product run. No more print-to-demand. Or more specifically, the default is now limited print runs on everything and if it's print-to-demand you'll know. (A quick definition of terms here since most of my mutuals aren't into MtG: "print-to-demand/PTD" should here be interpreted as they collect an unbounded number of orders for these products ahead of time then print the total amount sold plus a little extra for replacing defectives and shit, so supply is effectively unlimited since it's going to be definitionally equal to the number of people who want and can afford it. "Limited print run" is there's a fixed amount they already made ahead of time and they aren't making any more after that, so supply CAN run out.)

So, who benefits from this change? Not you, that's for fucking sure.

The obvious MAIN benefactor is scalpers. People who have a bot that refreshes the page 10 times per second until the drop goes live then auto-buys a max cart full of everything. This wasn't a problem with most Secret Lairs before now, because it was print-to-demand. But now, supply is limited, meaning scalpers are going to become a huge problem immediately. WotC's existing market research on Secret Lair would be predominantly for products that DIDN'T have a maximum amount for sale and thus wouldn't attract many scalpers. They've had a few hundred Secret Lairs go out since they started. There's been I believe three that were limited print run previously, one of which was a total disaster due at least in parts to scalpers.

Also, a huge foundational appeal of Secret Lair IS that they're print-to-demand. You want one and have the money at the time? You get one. Period. I have a LOT of criticisms about that "and have the money" part, but those go WAY beyond the scope of a rambly complaint about Wizards of the Coast's distribution decisions. Short version is that if you were interested in getting these products, you could simply do that. No longer!

Now, I do have some faith in WotC. A tiny bit. They said their intent is to print about the sams amount ler drop as demand would've been so that the average buyer won't see a difference. I do absolutely believe their marketing people have enough competence to have factored in that scalpers will increase. I do think that most Secret Lairs will reach the end of their sale period with a little left over. However, I think that any Secret Lair with anything notably GOOD in it gets obliterated by scalpers from here on. That box that had a First Sliver and a Food Chain for $30 regular/$40 foil from a few months ago? Yeah, you're never getting your hands on a box that good ever again.

So I'm gonna ask a serious question: is this change good for WotC? I do think the answer is unfortunately yes, but it's worth noting that any flops from now on flop *even harder* because if a PTD Secret Lair flops then at least they only had to make 3,000 units or whatever and it definitionally still makes money. If a limited run Secret Lair flops... well now they have unsold inventory.

Now, I've complained at length about this. So do I have any suggestions? Yeah, actually. I do. And it's so close to their existing plan that there's no way it didn't come up as an option. I have a decent guess as to why they didn't, but here's my proposal:

The stated problem is that many buyers of Secret Lairs complain their product takes too long to arrive and WotC wants to change this. Their current solution is to switch to limited print runs based off market research projections of how desirable any given box is gonna be. Why not, instead of that, print something like 80% of the projection ahead of time, then if and only if sales go above that pre-sale print run you do print-to-demand for any excess? The vast majority of buyers receive their product lightning fast, the rest will still get theirs faster than before because late buyers aren't gonna be waiting for theirs to print behind everyone else. AND you can make some marketing hay out of it by making a big deal of "buy early, and it'll ship sooner than if you waited." It also insulates against flops a little bit because if something underperforms way below market projection, hey at least you only made 80% of the projected amount instead of all of it?

And I suspect the reason this idea isn't the one they're going with is because some asshole in a board room countered this idea with a sentence containing the word "streamlined," and I will grudgingly admit this idea isn't streamlined. The logistics of making my suggestion work are, indeed, a fair bit harder than the alternative since my idea is two print runs and their idea is one bigger one. Economy of scale is also an issue. They would probably get a slightly better bulk price per card printed if they ordered everything at once. I do, in fact, understand that my alternative is by no means flawless and there's obvious appeal on the corporate side of things to doing it the way they chose to do it. I also sincerely think that, unless that bulk rate is so massively different for doing an 80-"20" split printing that it's just plain not an option, my solution is better.

[midnightstargazer]

Why I Like Regulus Black

Regulus Black is one of my favorite Harry Potter characters, and I want to talk about why. I feel like there's a frequent misconception that people only like him for superficial reasons or in ways that are contradictory to canon, so here's my take on what I find interesting about him and why I think he appeals to me as a character.

Just to be clear upfront, this is not:

An argument that Regulus was a totally good person and did nothing wrong.

A criticism of other morally gray characters or their fans. I am not interested in playing the "only my problematic fave is valid" game.

An attempt to speak for Regulus fans in general. This is my opinion only.

All that being said ...

I like morally gray characters.

Regulus is not the first character I've liked who's done things I would absolutely not condone in real life. I don't tend to like straightforward "pure evil" villains (e.g., Voldemort) except in a "love to hate them" sort of way, but I often end up liking anti-heroes and more nuanced villains.

I also tend to have a very positive view of redemption arcs. That doesn't mean I think every villain can or should get one, or that they're all to my liking. But the potential for one is usually going to make a character more appealing to me, not less. I like the idea that people are capable of growth and change. Of becoming better than they were. And I tend to be pretty flexible on what sort of characters I'll consider redeemable. There are limits, but "teenager who joined the wrong side, quickly changed his mind, and then died trying to back out" is very much on the "not too far gone" side of the line for me.

I'm a fan of the Black family in general.

I don't love all of them, but the family dynamics and backstory are really interesting. Regulus is not even the most obscure name on the family tree who I have headcanons for. Not even close. *gestures vaguely to not-yet-posted WIP about these ladies*:

Sirius and Andromeda are other favorites of mine. I love their narratives of breaking away and taking control of their own lives. Regulus's story is a bit different. He stays behind. He tries to be exactly what his family wants. I imagine both he and Narcissa would be strongly affected by having an older sibling disowned, and all the more careful in their own choices as a result. I almost certainly find Regulus (and quite a few others in the family) more interesting as part of these family dynamics than I would without them.

Getting a bit personal for a moment ...

I grew up in an ultra-conservative area of the United States* and bought into some crappy ideas as a teenager. Not in an intentionally hateful or ignorant way, just in a "most people I know agree on this, so I guess it's true" kind of way. When I grew up, moved away, and went to college, I ended up rethinking a lot of things and forming my own opinions. So the idea of realizing you've been wrong, breaking away, and having to figure everything out all over again as a young adult? I find that super relatable. That's probably a part of why I like Andromeda and Sirius so much.

Regulus, in canon, doesn't do that, or only does it on a very limited basis just before his death. But there's the potential to explore that angle in canon divergence stories. It was very cathartic for me, in my first "Regulus lives" fic, to stick him in a situation where he's separated from the negative influences and slowly starting to question stuff he's taken for granted all his life.

*although my family was actually way more chill than a lot of my friends, teachers, neighbors, etc. For instance, they were fine with letting me read Harry Potter.

How I see Regulus

Now we're getting more into headcanon territory. Regulus is only described second-hand; he never actually appears on the page. So, naturally, fans have interpreted him a million different ways. If I'm going to talk about why I like Regulus, I should probably also mention what my take on him actually is.

I see him as being driven by a strong sense of duty. He wasn't forced to join the Death Eaters, but he knew or believed his parents would be proud of him for doing so and that played a part in his decision. When he chose to turn against Voldemort, he kept it a secret from them in an attempt to protect them (that part is strongly implied in canon).

Despite those loyalist tendencies, I also imagine him being stubbornly independent, trying to take things on alone rather than ask for help. The horcrux is a perfect example of this. He didn't tell his family, any friends he might have had, or anybody on the opposite side of the war. He went after it himself, alone, with just a house-elf for help and without letting anyone know what he was doing. There's probably an element of pride in this, but I'd say also a level of distrust, a feeling that there's no one he can rely on and that he doesn't want to show weakness.

I think it's reasonable to assume he shared the Death Eaters' prejudices and committed crimes for them. But I do imagine him as a lesser evil, so to speak, compared to people like the Lestranges. The way Sirius describes him - an "idiot" who was "soft enough to believe" their parents - is not flattering, but very mild compared to what he says about other family members. There's nothing to imply Regulus was a really cruel, bloodthirsty sort of person, and I find it hard to believe Sirius would be so quick to shift the blame for his choices to their parents if he had been. And there are other signs as well. Kreacher said Regulus believed that Voldemort would "bring the wizards out of hiding to rule the Muggles and the Muggle-borns," which is awful but stops short of what actually happens when Voldemort takes power in Deathly Hallows. And, of course, there's his relationship with Kreacher.

House-elves are a whole other can of worms I don't want to get into right now, but I do think Regulus probably treated Kreacher better than their society would have expected. I'm not saying he was Hermione-level enlightened. He probably didn't see him as an equal or spend his free time campaigning for elf rights. But when the full story of Regulus's death is revealed, it's made clear that he was fond of Kreacher and upset by what Voldemort did to him. He literally drank a potion that caused him extreme agony rather than ordering Kreacher to do it in his place. That doesn't make him a totally good person, but it does hint at a softer side to him and a sort of nuance that isn't typical of the Death Eaters.

He clearly knew what a horcrux was and strongly objected to finding out about the locket, either on the basis of "that's crossing a line" or "actually, the Dark Lord probably shouldn't live forever." Or both. I've seen people question why a Death Eater would have a problem with horcruxes, and I suspect some of them wouldn't. Bellatrix, for instance, would probably be overjoyed to know she was entrusted with a piece of Voldemort's soul. But the idea of horcruxes being repulsive even to many Dark Wizards is actually foreshadowed a bit in Half-Blood Prince, where the author of Magick Moste Evile warns his readers against them. So I do think Regulus was probably not thrilled to find out he was working for someone who had one.

There can be multiple factors in why he did what he did: anger about Voldemort's treatment of Kreacher AND objection to horcruxes AND possibly doubts and second thoughts that had been building up already, since Sirius knew nothing about the specifics but was sure he died trying to back out.

Now, going after the locket on his own, without telling anybody who might have an interest in stopping Voldemort, was not the smartest decision. And I don't see his death as something that should be glorified. I've seen people claim that his redemption arc is more valid because he gave his life, and I disagree with that take and actually find it to be very troubling. Redemption Equals Death can work if it's a meaningful self-sacrifice, but Regulus's death didn't really accomplish much other than getting him killed, and if he had lived longer he might have been able to do more to atone. Like actually destroying a horcrux, for instance, or providing info to the Order.

But still, the fact that he did anything at all is a big deal. The fact that something - or multiple somethings - seemed wrong to him, and given the choice between "a lifetime of service or death," he decided he still couldn't keep serving Voldemort? That's huge. That says something important about who he was as a person. A weird combination of a damaged but not completely absent moral compass paired with an unexpected sense of integrity and courage.

Final thoughts

Most of what I described in the section above is personal interpretation, and there are other valid takes on what might have been going on. But I tried to keep it to just what I think can be reasonably extrapolated from canon, not random headcanons that I'm happy to admit I pulled out of thin air or adopted from fanon.

I see a lot of interesting contradictions in Regulus, and specifically, a lot of positive traits turned bad. Loyalty and dedication towards a family and a cause that don't deserve it. Capacity for kindness that remains so undeveloped it never actually leads him to question his prejudices. The willingness to admit he was on the wrong side and the courage do something about it, but it ends up being a pointless self-sacrifice.

I see him as someone who isn't inherently evil, who could have been a good person if he'd been brought up differently. Someone who might very well have changed for the better and made a positive impact if he'd survived. And yet whose life ultimately amounted to very little. I don't know about you, but that strikes me as a tragedy.

It also screams "opportunity" to the fanfic writer in me. I love "what if?" storylines. I love fleshing out characters who were not well-developed in canon. Regulus has hints of a personality and storyline that I find really interesting, but isn't a main character or developed enough that I feel like the story has already been told in a satisfying way in canon. That's exactly the sort of character I'm likely to end up reading and writing fic for, etc.

[byneddiedingo]

Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (William Wyler, 1949)

Cast: Olivia de Havilland, Montgomery Clift, Ralph Richardson, Miriam Hopkins, Vanessa Brown, Betty Linley, Ray Collins, Mona Freeman, Selena Royle, Paul Lees, Harry Antrim, Russ Conway, David Thursby. Screenplay: Ruth Goetz, Augustus Goetz, based on their play suggested by a novella by Henry James. Cinematography: Leo Tover. Production design: Harry Horner. Film editing: William Hornbeck. Music: Aaron Copland.

With 12 Oscar nominations and three wins for directing, William Wyler holds a firm place in the history of American movies. But not without some grumbling on the part of auteur critics like Andrew Sarris, who observed, "Wyler's career is a cipher as far as personal direction is concerned." His movies were invariably polished and professionally made, but if what you're looking for is some hint of personality behind the camera, the kind that Alfred Hitchcock or Howard Hawks or John Ford displayed no matter what the subject matter of the film, then Wyler is an enigma. His most personal film, The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), grew out of his wartime experiences, but they are subsumed in the stories he has to tell and not revealed with any assertively personal point of view on them. And anyone who can trace a Wylerian personality latent in movies as varied as Mrs. Miniver (1942), Roman Holiday (1953), Ben-Hur (1959), and Funny Girl (1968) has a subtler analytical mind than mine. What they have in common is that they are well made, the work of a fine craftsman if not an artist. The other thing they have in common is that they won Oscars for their stars: Greer Garson, Audrey Hepburn, Charlton Heston, and Barbra Streisand, respectively. The Heiress, too, won an Oscar for its star, Olivia de Havilland, suggesting that in Wyler we have a director whose virtue lay not in his personal vision but in his skill at packaging, at arranging a showcase not just for performers -- he also directed Oscar-winning performances by Bette Davis in Jezebel (1938) and by Fredric March and Harold Russell in The Best Years of Our Lives -- but also for production designers, costume designers, composers, and cinematographers: Oscars for The Heiress went to John Meehan, Harry Horner, and Emile Kuri for art direction and set decoration, to Edith Head and Gile Steele for costumes, and to Aaron Copland for the score, and Leo Tover was nominated for his cinematography. Wyler lost the directing Oscar to Joseph L. Mankiewicz for A Letter to Three Wives, but is there any doubt that The Heiress would have been a lesser film than it is without Wyler's guidance? All of this is a long-winded way to say that although I honor, and in many ways prefer, the personal vision that shines through in the works of directors like Hitchcock, Hawks, Ford, et al., there is room in my pantheon for the skilled if impersonal professional. As for The Heiress itself, it's a satisfying film with two great performances (de Havilland's Catherine and Ralph Richardson's Dr. Sloper), one hugely entertaining one (Miriam Hopkins's Lavinia Penniman), and one sad miscasting: Montgomery Clift's Morris Townsend. It's a hard role to put across: Morris has to be plausible enough to persuade not only Catherine but also the somewhat more worldly Lavinia that he is genuinely in love with Catherine and not just her money, but he also needs to give the audience a whiff of the cad. Clift's Morris is too callow, too grinningly eager. There is no ambiguity in the performance. If we like Morris too much, we risk seeing Dr. Sloper more as an over-stern paterfamilias and less as the cruelly self-absorbed man he is. Richardson's fine performance goes a long way to righting this imbalance, but he's fighting Clift's sex appeal all the way. 

[gamelandia]

Starfield (30 hours in)

Like many others, I disappeared head long into Starfield on Friday.

That game sure is a Bethesda game. And I mean that with all the implied positives and negatives depending on your own thoughts and feelings about Oblivion, Fallout, Skyrim etc.

It's a pretty slow burn to start with, but that was okay with me. I don't often pre-order games. But the timing was right for me wanting to get lost deep within a game world, particularly a scifi one.

The fast travel system is both a huge time saver, but also diminishes the feeling of the size of the galaxy. Want to travel back to your home base but many jumps away from home. Blip! No problem, you're there in an instant. It's fortunate that load times, on PC at least where I'm playing, are short enough that flitting between locations is relatively quick. Like.. quick enough that I don't feel the lure of picking my phone up to check something.

I spent a good chunk of the early game in Jemison. I can see that in terms of design they went for a city that is grand in scale and perhaps utopian. Unfortunately, in terms of the game it's all very large expanses and bland enough that it's really easy to get lost. The surface map which should help with these sort of things is basic to the point of actually not being very useful. I eventually found some visual markers to help me remember where various shops and points of interest were, but MAAAAN, the game does not help with this.

I've been sticking to mostly the main quest line and it's been moving me along at a decent pace. I won't include any spoilers here, but it was interesting enough to keep me moving through the quest log. There's some tasks that involve collecting powers (think dragonborn in Skyrim) and there's enough of those that it's starting to get a bit repetitive. That is perhaps my fault because I'm trying to cross them all off to get them off my list and continue with the game proper. Perhaps I should just intersperse it between other things instead?

On the main quest line, I started bumping into enemies that were killing me with ease. To the point that I actually got stuck deep within a map with very low health and no med kits. I managed to drag myself back to the ship and heal up. But it's making me wonder if I need to go off to do some side quests in order to get more skills and better equipment.

During my last session I started playing around with ship customisation, mostly due to running out of storage space. It's a bit confusing but I presisted and eventually figured out how it works through trial and error. I think this might be the thing that gets me playing with base building and resource mining, since I'm assuming you'll need that stuff to build things from scratch.. but I could be wrong!

Following that train of thought I also built a basic base, initially mining iron. I've spotted that it's possible to automate the collection and delivery of resource to other places, creating a supply chain of sorts. That appeals although I'm not sure if I want to put the effort in yet.

So, overall impressions so far.... I like it, but I don't love it. And maybe that's okay? As my time with the game has increased, and I've found other places to explore, I've started enjoying it a little more. And perhaps that's a bit of a criticism of the opening hours of the game.

I'll write another one of these once I've made a bit more headway.

[todayisafridaynight]

The topic of the dub is a complex one for me. Because while I do love the cast as well, it's also like, I genuinely think it's a problem with the industry that they can all be traced to like 1 or 2 other Smash Hit properties with few exceptions.

Like of course the Japanese actors are also household names, but I would be comparatively really hard-pressed to find that big of an overlap in casting. I totally understand it's exciting for people who enjoyed those properties to be able to say "Hey, that's X!" and I'm exactly the same way, but I just find it hard to believe that the same couple of US voice actors who've dubbed nearly everything for ages are always the best choice.

But way way more than that, it's the knowledge that the actors were essentially told to "direct" their own performances that has left me with kind of a bad taste in my mouth. I don't see the point of having an experienced cast of "actors everyone likes" and not harnessing their talents. It's pure insanity to me in comparison to how much care Yokoyama and the other directors put into each and every line.

Of course it's a huge credit to the actors that they understood The Assignment well enough that it turned out as good as it did, and I would still say it's the best dub in RGGS history (not that this is saying much), but at times it was painfully obvious that they didn't have enough to work off of.

So, you know, it was still pretty good, but I feel like that was in spite of how it was handled, and that I only used to say it was "great" to fit in with all my friends who were saying the same thing. I don't fault anyone who does think so at all, of course, but in my case I don't wanna do that anymore. (Though I'm sorry to be so overly critical in your inbox haha, it's no problem at all if you don't wanna talk about that)

Anyway! The Mole Song! My Blood and Bones in a Title I'll Never Remember! Great movies IMO and both fortunately very very easy to find. I hope you enjoy them, and thanks so much as always for taking the time to indulge my recommendations!

SPEAKING OF...... I SAW YOU READ SOLILOQUY AND CONFESSION............. I love how the exact same things stood out to us like yes, I've been wanting to draw That Exact Scene for ages too, How Did You Know. LITERALLY IMMACULATE RIGHT... Love the character interactions and themes discussed soooo so much.

But it's also really funny you mention it on that particular post because I had a dream we were discussing an AraSawa fic (that you may or may not have written in the dream?) the same day I recommended them. You know, now that you mention it, I've had a metric ton of Mine dreams, a few Jo and/or Arakawa dreams, even a few with Mine and one of The Joes, but as far as I can tell I've only ever talked about one dream with Daigo in it.

Apparently, in the dream, MineDai were confirmed a couple in the 10th anniversary book. Because they were participants in an experiment that was trying to gauge whether there was some kind of psychic link between partners, and while that whole thing turned out bogus, MineDai were the only gay couple and the only ones to stay together after the experiment was over. Like what in the SUBSTORY--

I don’t mind the criticism: everything warrants it and nothing can appeal to everyone, so it’s totally welcomed! Again, I’m purely biased, so it’s as you said my adoration can be influenced from someplace personal (which is a habit I try not to fall into: I’d like to appreciate the work for what’s presented, not from what I know or ‘nostalgia’ I suppose, you know). I know other people still have their grievances about the English dub, so I wouldn’t say you’re alone in that and I think you should make your honest feelings known! We criticise the media we enjoy because we know it can be better (or we’d like to see better), so again I totally have no issue with you sharing your thoughts (especially since voice acting is a special interest of mine, so I’m always happy to hear people’s word on it)! :]

BUT YEAH ONTO THE FICS THE TONE AND EVERYTHING WAS SO GREAT for sure to have special spots in my fic list (though tbh it’s a small list- but I guess it’s still an honor in that right, right lmao). And the rain scene is SO good I don’t blame you for wanting to draw it too- the fic in general was everything I was hoping, and that scene was just especially so good and something I’ve always wanted to see between Jo and Masato :’] With Arakawa’s perspective, I loved the drama theme- like it makes sense and is obvious, and I loved how the author executed the concept and ‘outline’ of Arakawa’s life.

I still stand that I have no idea how dreams work (the thought of writing a AraSawa fic, while surely temptig, I doubt I have the ability for), but that MineDai one does sound right goofy. Genuinely some kind of silly substory moment, dubious experiments and fake surveys and all ☠️☠️

[greatwyrmgold]

Scavengers of Hygiea

There's a setting I've been slowly simmering for years. Sometimes diving into details, but none have really stuck. So I figured I'd post an outline here, put the most important details into words, and see what people thought.

The year is...sometime in the mid/late third millennium. Humanity has spread across the solar system, turning the untapped mineral stockpiles of the asteroid belt into new worlds for humanity. (Well, O'Neill cylinders, so more like new islands, but "new worlds" is more poetic.)

But these new worlds do not last forever. Efforts are made to maintain them, of course, but after centuries of operation, the time comes to decommission them. Maybe an accident or collision crippled critical systems, maybe it was depopulated by disease or hostile action or mass emmigration, maybe it was simply bought by someone who wants to use its hull in some radically different type of construct.

When it's time to salvage or reconstruct an old station, most of them get brought to Hygiea.

As the Golden Space Age's end neared, the inhabitants of the greatest belt asteroids searched for ways to remain relevant when asteroid mining was no longer the industrial engine driving humanity forward. Ceres became a hub of trade and tourism, Vesta focused on heavy industry and spacecraft construction, Psyche is the financial heart of the outer system.

Hygieans focused on salvage. In the void of space, it takes relatively little fuel to push even large constructs around, if you can accept long transit times. Hence, having a centralized location where specialists in taking apart or rebuilding space stations makes a certain amount of sense. Hygiea became that location; salvage yards of immense scale orbit the asteroid.

(You might wonder whether there would be enough derelict space stations for a whole economy to be built around them. Well, this setting doesn't have a few thousand space stations—it has tens of millions of O'Neill cylinders. Even if they could be refurbished in a single year and lasted 250 years between refurbishments, there would still be hundreds of thousands of space stations being refurbished at any given time. That's roughly an Earth-landmass-area of derelict space habitats.) (Space is big. Really, really big. Hygiea could have a derelict-refurbishing economy built off of a fraction of that vastness.)

The titular scavengers can be divided into a few groups. The primary work crews are the most numerous, but also the most boring; they handle the ordinary work that. Then we have the inspectors, who check the ship to make sure it's safe for the work crews. They have to worry about a wide variety of potential dangers, from rogue automated systems to stubborn hermits to the third group of scavengers—the poachers.

The space poachers slip into salvage yards and enter the derelicts, either trying to make off with valuable components or squat in a station without many people living there. Either way, the companies running the salvage/refurbishment operations see them as a liability, threatening their profits.

There are other places in the Solar System, of course. There's Earth, sharply divided between vast estates of the uber-rich and densely-packed arcologies full of those too poor to move anywhere else. There's Mars, mired in political debates over whether and how to terraform the planet. There's Titan and its AI overlord. There's a cult of mining AI whose patron corporation was dissolved centuries ago.

But I originally wrote up this setting as a sci-fi D&D setting, so focusing on a part of the solar system full of sci-fi dungeons was obviously appealing. It's probably the most "world-of-adventure"-like part of the setting as a consequence—especially in drafts where I decide to keep some kind of magic.

I'll probably write more about this setting in the future. If you have any specific questions or something, feel free to drop an ask or something.