#The untapped potential just has me so frustrated

[juniette13]

Genshin Rewrite Heads Up

Just a heads up I will be posting about what I’ve jotted down for the Mondstadt arc of the rewrite plus a ref of Venti! So be on the lookout!

[shysublimecoffee]

I prefer not to sound harsh, but Miraculous has become a fandom where I find more enjoyment in reading fanfics than watching the show. It feels like there's a lack of effort or an attempt to justify and rearrange elements, often ignoring past seasons and assuming the audience won't notice. The handling of Derision is a notable example, with more astute critics than me delving into their dissatisfaction and the evident retcons.

I didn't anticipate the show going to such lengths as portraying Gabriel as someone deserving of a statue, and it left a sour taste in my mouth to see the hero endorsing it. Adrien/ChatNoir's portrayal has become quite pitiful, with a peculiar shift where Ladybug takes on a significant role in the Agreste Saga despite her absence from that narrative. Ladybug, who isn't even part of the Agreste Saga, is the one delivering heartfelt moments. The decision to sideline Adrien and put him out of commission is disappointing. It's his story yet she the one who has to make it about her. She gets to shine along with a cool costume to boot.

There's a palpable bias from Astruc against Chloe, evident in the show's treatment of her character. Despite her being manipulated by Gabriel Agreste, the narrative blames her for becoming mayor, and the absurdity of the situation is magnified when everyone in the story goes along with it. The inclusion of a scene in Revolution where Chloe is crying is perplexing and frustrating, as it seems to perpetuate the negative and irredeemable image the show consistently paints of her. The added layer of her mother being horrid to her intensifies my annoyance, especially when sympathetic scenes are presented in a seemingly contradictory manner.

I mean you want her to be the worst but yet she has scenes like this? Why not go all the way wtf. Why give her depth only to take it away and then make her be so demonized in s5 and act like she was like this from the start. When she's been a joke

I hate to be critical, but seriously, it's hard to ignore how the Miraculous universe is just dripping with untapped potential. Five seasons in, and the movie outshines the show effortlessly. It makes you wonder about the writers' team and their approach—seems like they're just coasting on low effort for profit, and somehow, it's working, thanks to Miraculous inexplicable popularity.

The show's been beating the monster-of-the-week horse for five long seasons, lacking any creativity in crafting interesting villains. Gabriel, honestly, feels like a starter villain, and if they're going to make him the big bad, can we at least get some villains with a bit more pizzazz? You know craft creative interesting villains? KNDS, Original PPG, Totally Spies they got it so why not Miraculous. It's so damn tiring seeing the same old song and dance with Gabriel 24/7 monologuing to his wife and releasing the akuma I thought Mayura would be important but she's barely there.

It's not even an excuse kids do deserve better entertainment so why should Miraculous lower its standards. Marinette is very weird to me as the protagonist because her lovelife is more focused over everything I gauged her well enough to know about her that the rest of the secondary needs more of a spotlight to be cast on them. I like her but am I the only one who just skips when she starts the whining about Adrien and her plan to again get together it was cute at first now I fast forward to the more interesting part of the episode because it irks me i'm tired okay... what other facet of her character do the writers focus on besides her love life? I hope I don't appear to salt on her but Imma tag it just in case. I think she's in neutral treading to dislike because how can I come back from her gaslighting her boyfriends I'm sorry I can't.

You know what I'm afraid of that if Lila gonna be the next big bad they'll just recycle everything from Gabriel onto her. We'll have the same akumatizations same monster of the week formula only this time it's Lila.

I trust more in the fanfic community to come up with a better substantial plot than Miraculous could ever be. I know romance is a big part but the lore is so damn little it's season 5 are they ever going to expand more in the later seasons lol.

I'm tired from writing this long. Imma go to bed now.

[gilbirda]

for the ask game: Danny Arkham Security Guard?

I've been curious where you're at with that for a while (I assumed the muse has fled and/or you're too busy with other fics), so had to pick that one when I saw it on the list 👀

From this WIP ask game

Haha! I knew someone would ask about it!

Honestly I have struggled a lot with picking this bad boy up... When I finally did a few months ago, the last edit was July 2022 😭

Long story short, summer 2022 was the time I really went down the spiral with Hardcover ship and literally every idea I had was for those two. I think what happened was that I realized there was an untapped potential and market for romance and all the classic romance tropes in DP fandom (I understood why that was the case, but still I was frustrated because I hadn't seen a single fic that made me crazy about any ship in DP) and it left me wanting.

Then I wrote Arkham Guard Danny and I did the bit where Jazz almost shoots Jason, and then I liked the dynamics between him and the siblings and I literally said in the AN if I ended up shipping him, I was debating between Jazz and Danny. *laughs in irony*

So basically I went "what if I write every romance story trope but Jazz/Jason?" and the rest is history.

And every damn time I went back to Arkham Guard Danny, I re read it and realized.... Is just so bad. I saw flaws everywhere. I saw bad characterization. I saw "angry robin Jason" and a bunch of things I don't stand by anymore and I felt like there was no way I could continue that fic and the difference wouldn't be felt. Was I too harsh with myself? Absolutely, but we are our worst critic.

Also? I felt the project running away from me. I started developing worldbuilding and ideas and I got mad because Arkham Guard is supposed to be simple. It used to be the "simple fic" I did while I focused on my magnum opus for DP fandom (Eldritch Ghost King Danny AU - "You and me and our best friend makes three"). If it got complicated I didn't want to write it anymore. And then it did and I dropped it.

Recently I went through a really bad situation and it kind of killed any want to write for dpxdc. I thought - why not go back to the basics? Revisit what really made me start in the fandom, what made me get a bunch of comments like "i got into dpxdc because of this fic". Took me back to when I started, how simple it felt to just write a fic and drop it to the ether and not worry about the things that made me want to stop forever.

So I did. Feels good to pick this up again!

I could go on forever but I won't continue rambling about this project (✿◡‿◡)

If you read up to this point, here's a little bit of what I have so far!

---

“Children,” Alfred stood from his seat, positioning himself between the brothers and their guest. “Let her breathe.”

“It’s okay, Mr. — uh…” She blushed as she realized she never asked for his name.

“Alfred,” the butler smiled, “Alfred Pennyworth.”

“Mr. Pennyworth,” she nodded politely. “I’m fine. I am aware that after that… theatrical spectacle, explanations are needed.”

“Indeed.” Batman cut in the conversation. “Proper explanations are in order. After I deliver the Joker to Arkham.”

“You can’t be serious!” Did the old man go crazy? Back to that wretched place?

Jazz frowned, seemingly sharing his thoughts. She leaned closer to the microphone and spoke in a controlled voice. “Where are you delivering him? In the hospital.”

Bruce took way too long to answer, so Tim did it for him. “Through the front door?”

Jazz didn’t find it funny. “Wait for me.”

“What?”

“I said, wait for me.” Jazz reached for her discarded jacket, eyeing the door to the elevator back to the manor. “Joker is my patient and I need to be there.”

“What for?”

She turned to look at Jason. “He doesn’t deserve to be left at the mercy of some of the people in the Asylum. They could—”

“He can rot for all I care.”

The vigilante walked up to her, getting in her way and using his height and build to scare her into submission. Jazz held his gaze, defiant, muscles tense and ready to throw down if needed.

“You don’t know that place like I do.”

Jason huffed. “Whatever the inmates want to do to him, he deserves it.”

“I wasn’t talking about the inmates.” Her teal eyes steeled with fury. “Arkham has a history of staff abusing their authority.”

[batsplat]

thoughts on challengers ? 👀

haha okay sure. I was overthinking this when I first saw this ask but since then I've sent half an hour worth of voice notes to my number one person I send half hour's worth of voice notes to (listen she keeps encouraging me to) and I've ironed some of my thoughts out. also I should probably watch it again. some of this might be me misremembering shit. also it's not that serious. quick warning, this ended up being just. too long. it's basically just a long rant. under the cut it goes

so first of all, I really enjoyed watching this film. I liked the central premise a lot, I liked the chemistry between the characters, tashi was very hot, the score was fantastic, the cinematography was at least interesting, and a lot of the non-tennis bits are interesting

having gotten that out of the way. there's an interview where guadagnino says he doesn't watch tennis matches because he finds them boring, which to be clear is completely fair enough - but I do think it does slightly come across in how the tennis is filmed. there's definitely fun, neat stuff in there: the shot where it follows around the ball, the shot from underneath the court, all of that stuff. and I think there's obviously a lot of challenges with filming tennis when you have to make sure you can't, like, see the actors actually play tennis, and I don't know anything about film-making so I don't want to judge it too harshly. but there are a few established angles from which tennis looks good, and this film doesn't really use them all that much. it was interesting to what extent they went for side shots (basically from the tashi pov in the final match) rather than... well, picking a side, and at different points of that match actually giving the viewer a clearer sense of the visceral nature of what they're doing here. like, if you're going court level from behind the player, that's how you capture the weight of the shot on screen. which felt was a little bit... missing

okay... ffs this next section ended up kind of being tennis tactics 101, and then the other bit ended up being about how matches work. my basic point here is that I think this film did some interesting stuff with the tennis but, and this is part of my more longstanding frustrations about the untapped narrative potential of sports, I think you could've done a lot more and communicated a lot more through the actual tennis. not just for annoying people who want to go 'oh look that's an extreme western grip and explains why her forehand has so much spin but can also be fragile when absorbing pressure!!' but for the general viewing audience. I want to be very clear here: I do not really care about realism except when I'm being annoying in voice notes, I care about storytelling. if you understandably do not give a shit about all this tactics and match construction stuff, skip to the bit marked 3 for more of my thoughts related to the actual film

1

now you might go 'okay but this film isn't about capturing tennis and doing it justice - it's not even about tennis'. yeah, but tennis is the central metaphor! tennis is a relationship, right, but it's also a conversation. it's a way of communicating something to the audience, yes, in a way non-tennis fans can also pick up on. and a lot of the tennis looked pretty same-y. the points were very similar - the intensity was ramped up mainly by the characters just... whacking the ball harder, running side by side, and then sometimes they both move forwards. this isn't a realism issue, it's a storytelling issue. you can tell a story with a tennis point, you can construct these points in different ways to tell you different things

just to give you an example (I promise this is relevant): okay, the most common rally pattern in tennis is hitting cross court. so either you hit on the deuce court (from your pov, this is from the right side of your court to the left side of the other player's court, aka the forehand side for right handed players) or the ad court (the opposite, and thus the backhand side for right handed players). this is for a bunch of tactical reasons. the net is at its lowest in the middle so, y'know, you're less likely to hit it. perhaps most importantly, it's a question of angles and... okay look I don't want to bore the two people reading this with the details but just to very quickly explain, here:

say player a is hitting the ball along the red line to player b, the orange zone depicts the theoretical area in which the ball trajectory of player b's answering shot can go. like, if you want to get the other player to move 'out of the court', you can only do so by going back cross court... which is obviously where, in a cross court exchange, the other player is already standing. this is why a lot of the times, players don't 'recover' after their shots to the exact centre of the court, but instead make a judgement of where the centre is of the theoretical zone the opponent can hit. to put it in plain english: I hit a forehand cross, I don't move back to the exact middle of the court because I know where you can hit the ball back and I need to be in the middle of that - which skews to the right of centre. also, I just know it's more likely you're going to go cross again, because that's just how this works

you want to move the other player around, right, first of all to get the ball past them - but also to make it harder for them to attack you. you're trying to construct a point so that eventually they are the one who can't reach the ball/makes an error, not you. a lot of the times, continuing to go cross court is the smart option. it's less risky than going down the line, and also if your down the line shot isn't perfect, where it isn't a winner or at least a shot they'll struggle to attack, then you're setting up a situation where they have all the angle in the world to work with, where the centre of their theoretical hitting zone is nowhere near where you're actually standing and they can easily whack the ball past you

now, why the fuck does this matter when we're talking about the tennis threesome film? obviously, I don't expect the director to interrupt the film to explain angles to the audience. in tennis terms, 'go cross court' is tactics for babies, but it's still not something most viewers will be instinctively familiar with. but think about what it actually does if players keep exchanging shots cross court because they can't risk going down the line: they're engaging in a direct contest! they are measuring one shot against the other, my forehand against your forehand, my backhand against your backhand, and they are trying to assert dominance. sometimes, you have no choice to escape that exchange even when it's risky because their raw cross court shot is better than yours. sometimes, you're trapped in that exchange. how you can extract metaphors from that should be fairly obvious, and I don't think this should be visually too tough to get across - it's a power struggle between two people contained within a simple shot pattern. it adds variation to what the viewer is being shown (and, yes, it does make the points feel more realistic), but it's also a way of gradually ramping up intensity. my shot against your shot - who wins? who is willing to risk deviating from the norm? who sets themselves up for a trap - does patrick sucker art into attacking him down the line? can he then manage to counterpunch (to use attack as defence) by making it to art's shot in time and placing his response into the open court? who blinks first etc etc

look, this is only one way you can visually use tennis to add to the story. another common tactic is (if you're a right handed player) hitting forehands from the ad court, to 'run around the backhand'. that's an expression of dominance, it's a power play - you're trying to bully your opponent with your most powerful shot (which is the forehand for 99% of players, some might have better backhands but they won't have stronger ones), and you're deliberately recovering less to the centre. you're camping out on the ad side, and going 'yeah I don't actually think your down the line shot is good enough to hurt me, I actually feel very comfortable standing right here so I can more easily move far enough to the left to continue hitting forehands'. it's a tactic that is implicitly passing judgement on the opponent, and again, I refuse to believe you can't show this in a way that the audience understands roughly what's going on. have patrick bully art with his forehand into the weaker backhand or vice versa - they can use their faces to show how comfortable they are with their respective positions. y'know, make the actors act. have one of them find the backhand down the line, fire it into the bit of the court the opponent has completely left open. your characters are using tennis to assert dominance over each other, to manipulate, to deceive each other - you can do that with the actual tennis they're playing

you can also express character through tennis. I'm not saying different play styles function as a personality quiz, but inherently the way you play is going to reflect what you feel comfortable with doing on the tennis court. is your preferred point three shots long or twenty shots long? are you looking to dominate your opponent with your big weapons, or are you looking to trick them with your variety of shots and smarts in using them? or are you looking to just grind them into submission with sheer relentless consistency?

take the drop shot: a shot that 'drops' right after it clears the net as a result of how the player has put a different kind of spin onto it. ideally, it's so close to the net the opponent can't sprint forward quickly enough to reach the ball. how effective your drop shot is depends on several things. obviously, it's how good the shot and the placement and the spin you've put on it is. it also depends on where you're standing and where your opponent is standing, which means that particularly effective dropshots usually come after big, heavy attacking shots that have forced the opponent to move back and have allowed you to move into the court. and it also depends how good your disguise is: for as long as possible, it should look like the shot you're playing is going to be a bog standard forehand or backhand - until you readjust your grip at the last moment and slash the racquet downwards (vs the upwards motion you'd make with the bog standard forehand or backhand). this is a shot that depends on the element of surprise. it's about trying to fuck with your opponent, it's about choosing your moment. it's about playing with them! and you can get pretty memorable reactions from your opponent. if you wrong foot them well enough, they'll literally stumble when they realise what's happening and never even start running. maybe they'll comically flail their arms

I feel like when the men's world number seven throws his arms up in shock every time somebody hits a short ball, you can probably convey this kind of dynamic in a film

and think about what it says if somebody's using a shot like that. again, you're trying to fuck with the other player, and you are relying on your knowledge of the opponent to figure out when they might be susceptible to it. now, obviously, this is tough to do when you're playing someone for the first time and (unlike top level professional players) don't have a vast amount of data to work with and how often xyz shot works against them in xyz situation. this is generally why early in a match, it's a good idea to just like, test some stuff out to give yourself a sense of how they'd react, if it's a good idea to use it in a pressure situation (you also do a version of this in the warm up if you're smart, just check how they react to that high ball to the backhand! all about being curious y'know). but if you know someone, if this is an established rivalry, if this is someone you've played with since you're kids... well. then it's a different ball game entirely

patrick has the psychological edge in that match-up, right, and the whole point of that final match is that it shouldn't be that close but it's that close due to the mental dynamics between the pair of them. patrick constantly wrong-footing art and frustrating him is the easiest way in the world to visually demonstrate that dynamic. you're constantly trying to guess what your opponent is going to do, you're constantly trying to anticipate, yeah? you know what I said above about how you're 'recovering' to the centre of the theoretical zone and all that? well, sometimes you don't do that - you guess where the opponent is going to go. most often, you've got to do that when you know the opponent has a relatively easy shot and they can hurt you with it, so you have to play the probabilities and hope you get it right... it's basically like a penalty kick in football. it's a quick judgement you're making on the basis of past data, of what you think your opponent is thinking, of how big a risk you want to make - of when to time it, because if you move too early they can still change the trajectory of their shot and go the other way. maybe you even feint one way before darting the other. and your opponent might shoot one way or the other... but, sometimes they'll drop shot you while you're moving in one direction as you frantically try to change course. or, which is even more humiliating, they'll go straight down the middle - since you're no longer standing there

in narrative terms, what does it tell you if a character guesses rightly or wrongly? what would it say if art or patrick had that kind of intimate knowledge of each other - I know you usually do this, but I know you know that so I'm going to go the other way - round and round in circles, a mental contest between people who are so familiar with each other that it can become actively confusing to try and preempt their moves. tennis is a relationship and it's a conversation and the way we construct a point tells us a story about the history between you and me. it tells us a story if art, the six time slam winner and more accomplished player by far, is being read so perfectly by patrick that he's tripping over himself and getting in his own way and flailing. one of the most common commentating cliches is about the ball, or indeed the player, being attached to the end of a string. the extension of that metaphor is that one player is the puppet master and the other player is a puppet. easy visual metaphor bingo

you can literally express how the characters feel about each other by... where they're standing. if you're scared of your opponent's shot, then you're going to try and give yourself more time to react. if you are on the attack, then you need to move in, to take the ball earlier, to take time away from the opponent. to me, if you're showing fictional tennis, you really should be playing with time and how you can use cinematic techniques to play with that sense of time. now, you can do this on the broader level of the match, because your subjective sense of time is dependent on how well you're doing in a match. time never moves faster than when you're losing a six love set. but it's also obviously integral to actual points, because you are usually trying to maximise your own time and minimise your opponent's, trying to make sure you will always have enough time to get to the ball and making sure they won't (obviously often u kinda have to pick one of those because of how time works)

where you stand on the court is an integral part of that, for obvious reasons related to 'basic physics'. and, again, it's also psychological. take the return position, right, aka where you're standing when the opponent is serving. most people have a built-in preference for both the first and second serve, and a kind of basic 'return strategy' of what kind of shot they'd like to use and where to move. generally, you'll stand further back for the first serve because it's more powerful... but hey, maybe you have a slightly unorthodox return strategy where you're just trying to 'block' the first serve and use the weight of the opponent's shot against them, and then you step back for the second serve and have a massive whack at them. just as an example

and, again, this is another way in which you try to fuck with your opponent. there is nothing more annoying than seeing the twat on the other side of the net move in to the court by an insulting amount because they don't respect your shitty second serve and think they can take a swing at it from in front of the baseline. some players just do this in general - prime offenders on the women's side are garcia and ostapenko (and with all love to them, they do this more than is perhaps tactically prudent)

(for the other end of the spectrum, see another place from which you can theoretically return a serve from if you're out of your fucking mind) (this particular player's return strategy has been like a top five discourse point over the last few years but we do not have time to get into all that)

but you can also vary it up in a match, and you probably should if you're being smart. so for instance (and there's a specific match in 2022 I'm thinking of here), if you know your opponent has an awful second serve and a lovely little habit of double faulting when under pressure, maybe as the returner you just... well, look, the ball from the first serve has rolled right to your feet, so obviously you need to politely pass it to the ballperson, and maybe it just takes a little bit longer so that you know the server is looking right at you when you meander in front of the baseline to wait for their second serve. and then they double fault and that's the break of serve right there. you're not always standing that close to return second serves, but you're standing there when you know it'll make them most nervous. again, I am not saying the tennis threesome film needs to explain the difference between jelena ostapenko's and daniil medvedev's return strategies, but these ARE the kinds of things you CAN organically integrate, and give you very blunt and easy to understand messages about the characters and their dynamic

and like... different people have different play styles, yeah? let them express a little character! tashi is relentless, maybe she's constantly attempting to take everything with her forehand to attack and attack, or maybe she trusts herself to attack from any place with any shot. maybe she's so lively and confident and uncompromising that she uses down the line shots more than anyone else, or maybe there's surprising subtlety there in how the intensity and rage fades away for a moment as she flutters a slice across the net. what is it about her game that so captivates the two boys, its aggression or its complexity? is her game already more complete and well-defined and self-aware than it has any right to be from a high school student? or is it raw and untamed and a little wild and so full of potential?

art has a one-handed backhand and uniqlo gear in a very obvious federer allusion, but does he share any more with federer than that? is he particularly prone to rushing the net, especially after the serve? does he want to end points quickly? does he have good hands, is he trying to wrong-foot his opponent - or is he the one constantly getting wrong-footed as the others dance around him? is he constantly trying to assert his dominance, to end points quickly, and initially you think it's a sign of his power and confidence... but then you realise that it's insecurity - he's worried what will happen if they go on too long, if he gives too many chances to other players to outsmart him, if he's uncomfortable playing defence because it makes him feel reactive and weak. maybe in the second set he has to knuckle down and accept the rallies will be long and gruelling - which is a central aspect of tennis, it's about patience and managing risk. maybe he's so tense and nervous that he's just an error machine in the first set, but then he decides to just slow the pace and live with patrick in those forehand to forehand exchanges, let his natural weight of shot do the talking for him and force patrick to change things up

and patrick, with the unorthodox technique and the sleeveless shirts and the money and how he never really grew up - what does that tell us about his tennis? is it rough and energetic, big swings at the ball, layering on more and more spin to propel it high over the net? does he throw a massive forehand at art's backhand, making him hit it at a high point that is naturally uncomfortable for the one handed backhand? wouldn't it be interesting if you had patrick have a strong point to his game that naturally matches up to art's weak point, the chink in the six time grand slam champion's armour? what about the physicality, does he lunge further and harder and throw himself into balls just that little bit more? is he stronger than art, or is he faster, or is he neither? is he driven by instinct and gets in his own way less than art does, or is he tactically more astute and gets the better of art that way?

obviously you can't do all of those things in a film and you shouldn't because it's distracting. but what I'm trying to demonstrate here is that there is a whole range of potential storytelling you can tap into here. now, nobody's actually doing this, and my thing with challengers is that in many ways it came closer to the kind of narratives I would like to see. but then it still falls short just a touch, which is where the frustration comes in

a rivalry has got a history that is woken up again every time you step on court to face your old foe - you remember how they play, you already know what you want to do to beat them this time. you are trying to unsettle them. you know how they want to play and you want to deny them that opportunity. inevitably, any defined play style tells us something about the player and their personality and their approach to the game. the film is quite scarce on details about its lead characters and using the tennis more deftly would've been a great way to give us a stronger sense of who they are in a very economical, concise way. what does it mean for tashi's game that she can no longer run? yes, obviously it means she can't compete any longer, but the injury does different things symbolically depending on how big a part movement was of her game. often, tennis injuries directly affect your strengths. take a player who puts a lot of heavy spin on the ball by snapping their wrist - they are putting more strain on said wrist and may end up injuring it (a particularly terrible part of the body to injure for a tennis player). there's something extra cruel about that because it also affects how they'll recover, if they'll ever be able to trust that body part again. these are career-threatening injuries not just for physical but for psychological reasons. same thing if you're a great server with a shoulder injury... or if you're a great mover with a leg injury

also, and okay this probably did come across as nitpicking and it's not really an issue if it worked for people who aren't familiar with tennis... but omg the last point was so confusing. did check and this wasn't just a me problem, though I'd be curious if it worked for people less familiar with the game. when they came closer and closer to the net and hit back and forth, I thought what was happening was that they'd like, given up competing and were just hitting back and forth as a symbol of defiance or something. that they'd basically decided to stop playing the match and just play with each other. because like, you just can't do that in a match, the point would immediately be over especially if they're just standing there - they're too close! you'd immediately get the ball past! so I only realised when the film was over that it was supposed to be a really intense point... but I think that's the kind of thing where most people watching will probably be fine with it, so again. y'know. whatever. I do think you could have staged that point a little more cleverly to get to the same conclusion in a more natural way, but also. whatever. it's fine

(obviously there are also some other broader suspension of disbelief issues that I'm far less bothered about. the technique was like, not great, but also probably about as good as you'll get from actors, though again I would've liked a little more thought put into what they're doing beyond 'art's got a one handed backhand and patrick's got a quirky serve!' I thought the patrick serve thing was really neat and fun and theoretically you could hit a serve like that, though quite frankly in the men's game you'd probably be fucked because you need more racquet acceleration than that - but that does fit in with his character and the stubbornness and all that so it's fine. the art serve quirk... well, most players deliberately construct serving rituals like bouncing the ball several times or ball placement or whatever because it's the one shot in tennis that's completely 'on your own racquet' but is also really tough, so you're trying to trick your brain into always doing the same thing. I find it a little tough to believe art wouldn't have been aware of what he was doing, but again, not a massive issue. beyond my concerns about the lack of variation in the points they were showing, it did also trip me up whenever they were obviously stranded in no-man's land - you need to be either on/behind the baseline or right at the net and there's certain areas of the court where if you spend too long in them you are very much fucked. the whole concept of 'recovering' after a shot is like, as important part of tennis movement as getting there in the first place, and there's whole footwork patterns you use while you're hitting the shot and immediately afterwards to get yourself in position again. at times they'd just be standing in place in the fuck end of where on earth are you standing until the next shot comes and. listen. it really Does Not Matter beyond how it's fun to be annoying about this stuff but it did make me a bit twitchy)

2

so. match constructions and narrative arcs. I think if a literal match of tennis is the framing device of your film, you should think about the natural narrative tension that exists within a literal match of tennis. again, a match is a conversation, it has its ebbs and flows and peaks and troughs and all that other stuff. you are more tense at *4-5 30:30 than you are at 1-1* 15:0. you are feeling better about your life choices at 6-4 *5-3 than you are at 7-6(8) 0-6 *1-3. you change over the course of a match, as you test yourself physically and mentally and acquire a situationally specific data bank about yourself and the other player, as you notice and learn certain things about what's going on in your own game and your opponent's game. maybe you have a moment where you go 'yup the backhand's a catastrophe today, time to slice everything and hope for the best' or you go 'lol that's the third consecutive djokosmash they've hit, maybe I'll throw the ball high up again next time they get to the net'

also obviously all these things vary over the course of a match - and they do so more than they have any right to! there's no logical reason why 6-1 1-6 6-1 scorelines should happen, but they do! because game breaks and changeovers and set breaks and all of it can represent massive shifts in momentum. you play a *5-0 game differently than a *0-1 game, and suddenly those beautiful forehands you were ripping for half an hour are all flying out of the stadium and, shit, time to change tactics to defend more except now you're really screwed because you're playing your opponent's game. the most important thing to remember about tennis is that it fucking sucks. matches are psychological torture. I want to feel that part when watching the tennis threesome film

the basic mechanism of narrative tension in a match is the serve vs return dynamic. if you serve, you need to protect your serve, because those are the games you are supposed to be winning. if you return, you need to attack the opponent's serve, because those games represent opportunity. you want your service games to be short and fast and you want your return games to be long and tough and miserable for your opponent. and after every game, it ticks back again - you are literally passing the ball to the other side of the court. your turn, have fun!

there are a million different ways you can construct tension on a micro level within a match. you have breakpoints/matchpoints, obviously, which to some extent the film did feature. you have games that just get stuck on deuce, with neither player able to win the requisite two points in a row to release them, so it's like... basically groundhog day in sports as you keep trotting from one side of the court to the other, both players frustrated, one unable to escape the danger and the other unable to seize the opportunity. battle of the wills. games can completely realistically last more than twenty points. obviously you've got tiebreaks, which again the film did feature (though icl I had no clue what the score was supposed to be, again it doesn't matter but). you have the old cliche of 'it's not a break of serve unless you've backed it up' (aka by holding your own serve) and how common it is to be broken straight back for various nasty psychological reasons

I wish they'd played with this a little more, just showed a little more of why the players were reacting emotionally in the way that they were at certain stages of the match - rather than just basically reacting to the flashback we've just seen. like, there's plenty of reasons why a player might get particularly angry at a certain point of a match in a way that just feels a bit more organic. if tennis is the medium through which to explore this three-way relationship, then showcase that push and pull factor, those changes in momentum. the film suggests patrick has always had the upper hand - I'd make more clear this is the classic 'pigeon' dynamic where basically the head to head between two players is more skewed than it has any right to be given how 'good' those two respective players actually are. usually that means there's something funky going on with the play styles or it's something mental or it's an interaction between the two. patrick really cares about art, right, and then he's always able to beat him because he gets him and knows how to mess with him. art has the more raw ability(?) but it takes a bit longer for him to actually realise how good he is, in part because he always lost to patrick

the way they should've done this imo have a place where art does actually choke a sizeable lead, a kind of unexpected switch of momentum. like have this be the first set where art comes in hot and is y'know the obviously better player and all that, but then patrick just increasingly manages to unsettle him. make it a proper bad one, say *5-2 to 5-7. throw in a long deuce game. and then art is confronted with all his old demons again, his inadequacy, all that stuff. and then you've got the momentum switch after the set break when art manages to pull himself together. the thing is, they do actually show a fair bit of the match, but it's not always that interesting because it lacks a little bit of specificity, a little bit of detail... just make a few adjustments that accentuate the central dynamic. you don't have to go with this exactly but go with SOMETHING, 6-2 2-6 is such a nothingburger score lol like what does that tell us... 7-5 1-6 is what it's all about

(dumb nitpick corner: unlikely a time violation would get called between first and second serves, and if you do so then you'd better hand out a time violation if the receiver starts faffing about between points right after, rather than quietly talking to them off-mic. but hey, the establishment is corrupt, they obviously wanted art to win. also, there's a mistake on the scoreboard at the *5-6 game where they accidentally make it look like art is serving for the match at that stage, which would completely change the dynamic of that game and the previous game and the implications if art had let it go to a tiebreak - aka he would have choked. just slightly confused me when the umpire called out 'thirty love' after patrick won the point lol)

3

so maybe this all does come across like I hate the film, which I really did not. I enjoyed it a lot, and honestly it's not like there's much to choose from in terms of 'sports media that seriously engages with the narrative potential of the actual sport'. there were plenty of storytelling details I really vibed with, especially the dynamic between the central three characters and the push and pull between them and how they work as a trio. all three sides of the triangle were good fun. the way the two blokes were so in sync at times, that kind of easy intimacy and familiarity - again, I think you could have expressed that more through actual tennis but that did absolutely work for me

the actual 'playing a challenger before uso' thing was also fun, though I was wondering what his ranking was like because it must have still been kinda in the pits. like, you can't show up to a challenger as a top ten player. not that it actually matters matters but just. whatever. I do think the premise is neat

(though, that challenger audience was not keyed in enough! like omg if you're showing up to some random challenger to watch a top player on the injury comeback try to rack up some wins and the final is against the guy he played doubles with to win a junior slam, everyone watching would be SO aware of it. those spectators aren't just randomly being drawn into the drama, they know what's up!! you just know the challengers tv stream is racking up crazy figures. idk this is obviously more of a subtle thing, but I feel like it was supposed to give off the vibe of the non-tashi viewers being surprised by why they were being such weirdos all of a sudden but nah they would be ON IT with their patrick zweig backstory. including the fact he used to date tashi lol, like yeah they'd Get It)

I loved a lot of tashi's characterisation, how fucking obsessed she was with tennis and how everything was About Tennis for her... like yeah very real!! of course it eats her up!! I had a bit of a debate about this but I personally really liked the college tennis thing because it felt like a complete curve ball given her characterisation. it's good though, this idea that she wants to fool herself into believing she's more than hitting a ball but she's actually not... because of course she isn't.... none of these people are.... I like that element of self-delusion, even though it still... hm, I'm not entirely sure the film COMPLETELY sold me on that level of self-delusion because it was so obvious she didn't care about anything except for tennis... like it never quite felt entirely clear what she thought she was getting from that experience. but yeah, the central premise of it all... like the fact she just can't say goodbye to that world, that she can't really escape it, that she has to pursue something related to it to feel alive, even by proxy, the suspicion that all she needs art for is to have that kind of second hand thrill... really good!!

I was talking about this with the unfortunate recipient of my voice notes, and she's more familiar than I am with american college tennis than I am for the fairly obvious reason that only one of us has attended an american college. she said she'd discussed this with some of her friends and that that kind of injury did feel a touch unrealistic in the context of college tennis, partly because you're less likely to be playing with the kind of schedule that professional tennis requires of you. now, this doesn't really bother me, but I almost wish they'd leaned into the tragedy of it more - that it was unlikely and she didn't even get it while playing professional tennis! she was engaging in this grand act of self-delusion that there was more to her than tennis, which, let's face it, just really isn't a thing when you're a very good junior player, and she got injured before she ever even got close to 'making it'. it's tragic because it should never have happened. whatever injury art picked up (can't remember if they mentioned) would be statistically more likely to actually fuck you over, given their respective ages and time on tour and all that. you don't typically randomly get career ending injuries when you're running for a ball, not if you've trained properly - both in the sense that you're moving 'correctly' on the court and you've developed the muscles to protect yourself (which admittedly she was looking a touch light on). perfectly fine as a narrative choice, lean into it more

the churro college conversation between patrick and art was good, but that's another thing I would've integrated more into the tennis. like, the thing about him actually going for what he wanted and all that? you can do that through tennis! I also kinda wanted more of a sense of what tashi brought to the coaching dynamic, just something very simple and straightforward even the non-tennis viewing audience can understand. again, you've got this fairly obvious federer expy set up going on with art, and the glimpses we got of his game ... I mean mainly the one handed backhand, it does lean towards him being a player that's naturally oriented towards aggression. I would've maybe gone for the whole.... y'know. him not really being able to embrace that, him always holding himself back a little bit, not willing to fully give himself over and throw himself into the game. that tashi kinda has to get him to go for it, to go after the ball, to step into the court and use that technically excellent flat forehand stroke and trust himself to find those angles and rush the net and play the game, rather than letting the game play him. linking that into his loss of motivation post injury, where he feels like he's achieved what he wants to, where maybe he kinda retreats into himself. which is partly a motivation issue but also about trusting yourself post injury... not really being able to go after it in the same way any more, struggling to commit to that kind of aggressive mindset when your heart just isn't it any more. or something! just a thought!!

that's the thing right - sure, tennis might be a relationship, but the tennis will always be a character in its own right in whatever twisted threesome thing they've got going on. at the end of the day, the real toxic relationship is with the tennis! it's sad tashi can't leave it behind, it's tragic she's organising her whole life around something that'll always be lost to her. but it won't ever let her go, even though it hurt her, even though it caused her physical pain as well as emotional. it's the truest love in the whole film, tashi and the game itself, and all other love is subservient to that. it's also the most interesting relationship that needed to be... well, a little more foregrounded. she's always chasing that high, that moment of perfect communication and understanding and all that - and it's an entire lifetime of work, chasing the briefest of moments and now even that is gone. something she won't ever be able to recapture. she can't live her dream and she can't move on, so she is forever trapped, in stasis, frustrated and tormented by desires she can't act upon, the worst kind of repression imaginable. and it's not just about playing tennis in general - it's about playing matches. the height of competition, the moment in the point and in the match in which losing or winning feels like an equal possibility, where anything could happen but only one player will eventually emerge victorious... she's chasing the high of uncertainty, of suspense - the equivalent to showing up to the bedroom of two blokes and knowing anything could happen, not knowing yet what choice she will make, who will win, who will lose. if you really want to get abstract about this, she's essentially functioning as, y'know, the tennis gods with these two boys, where she is the one to make the choice of who wins and who loses. she is the one creating the uncertainty, the suspense. and she's doing it all for the love of the game, because that's all she ever truly loved

or that's what I think they should've gone for idk. I also have a few kinda dumb thoughts like 'ugh I needed more of a sense of what patrick's career looked like, are we talking never made it to the main draw of a 250 or slam quarterfinalist because both are plausible'. but anyway I think narratives in sports are neat and I wish more people did stuff like challengers did, even if I think I was just looking for something a little different from what that film was doing. you do kinda need somebody who's really into sports to do some of this stuff I feel, but. well. sports rivalries really is a bit of a tragically under-explored storytelling set up. they're good narratives. somebody write them

[themagicbrew]

what was the thought process behind your kraang oc's?

My thought process was filling in the gaps in rises already pre-existing lore. (this is my general thought process for most of my Rise!OC'S) I feel as though there are a lot of concepts untapped by the community as a whole- The kraang being one of them. Never before I have seen characters be used so much yet so underutilized. A lot of times, The kraang are even straight-up mischaracterised which frustrates me deeply. This iteration has such heavy ties with the series' world-building and history, that one can't simply overlook. Furthermore, The Kraang siblings are such fun characters with lots of story potential.

When developing Utrom alot of factors came to mind. Rise is known for taking things and spinning on its head,it is by far the most unique take of TMNT. (old art)

For those who aren't familiar with the previous iterations of The Kraang. In most versions, Their species name is "Utrom" and "kraang" or "the kraang" is an evil faction/individual that broke off before doing dubious shit. Some Version doesn't have "kraang" and just Utrom (I.e: Tmnt 2003) I simply took that and did a reversal of said thing. I made The Rise!Kraang an inherently evil warmongering race and Utrom is a krang that broke off and started a rebellion.

From there, I can tie his character further into other aspects of the show while having legroom to create lore/world-building of my own.

Creating both "Utrom" and the "Kraang Rebellion" allowed me to create more Kraang characters on Earth without having to come up with an explanation for each and every one. (outside of doing it for a twist) Them stemming from an "evil" species was another intentional narrative decision. Aside from Utrom, they are not an innate force of "good" and many who joined the rebellion did so to escape the authoritative environment they lived in... Thus, The remaining rebels who remained after the conflict are morally grey or straight-up evil

This is where Cameo came In (old art)

He came a long way from his first concept. Originally Cameo was going to take on a less villainous role, have more ties with The E.P.F and be married to a Catgirl.

But this all changed as I developed him further i scrapped some of his writing in favour of a more sinister yet fruity character

Cameo is meant to fill in some of the holes in Utrom's plot-line, further the world-building of TMNT and create scenarios for other characters. He was a fun character to write but- even MORE fun to design. I really pushed the boundaries and created a femboy kraang basically. ANYWAY! yeah, hope that gives some insight for my thought process when writing my kraang oc's.

[monochromatictoad]

So.... This is an Isaastle piece, written in the POV of the Castle. @beevean.

It heard yelling before it saw the source. It had been a long time since anything has come up this far within its walls. It remained frozen, unmoving, just waiting for the source to leave. When the source only got louder, it let out a snarl. The doors to the throne room open, revealing a rather petite man. A man of elegance, yet so small in figure. It could see the bones under his skin. Black marks cover his body in familiar patterns.

It continued to stand like a statue as the man paces around angrily. He was yelling about something, but it wasn't focused on that. It was focused on the energy he put out. A familiar dark power emanated from the man. It looks at him, his hair was a different shade than the Wolf's Son. Darker. Duller. It felt drawn to him. It saw his pain, his frustrations, his desire to serve. It knew it needed to claim this bizarre man before he found his way out.

It made its move, a puddle of blood following the man outside the throne room. It could hear him cursing someone named Hector. It did not know a Hector, but perhaps it was one of the many that sought the Prince's power. One of the many that served as a Dishonored Vampire. But then, he cursed at a Trevor Belmont. It knew that name. The White Wolf's human name. Oh, it knew that rage. This would be fun.

As it followed, careful not to alert the agitated man, it also subconsciously moved any danger to this potential new Lord. It listens carefully to the bizarre man.

"First I couldn't kill Hector! Then that cursed Belmont! I couldn't avenge my Lord, Dracula! Now I can't even kill myself?!" He screams into the echoing chambers of the castle. It could work with this.

"It is not often we have visitors." It spoke, the blood bubbling up audibly behind the man. It saw the look of confusion and frustration as he whipped around to see who was talking. It bubbles up into a semi-solid state. It knew what he saw, it knew he was disgusted by it. It has been so long since it had a host, it no longer knew how to look like its Prince. It looked vaguely humanoid. Without arms, or legs, or a lower torso. It felt like its head was human enough, though the globs of blood falling off of it states otherwise.

"We are like you." The multitude of voices spoke.

"You are nothing like me!" The man snapped back. Oh, this was going to be more difficult than it originally thought.

"We are like you." It repeats, "we have dedicated ourselves to a lord, only to be abandoned for another." It saw his eyes twitch, before he got aggressive again.

He started yelling more, but it tuned the noise out. Yes, this emotional response was what it needed out of him.

"The one you served. This Dracula. He still abandoned you. He did not see what we see in you." Tell him what he wants to hear, that was what it was best at. "We can feel your untapped power. We see your potential. He could not could he? Distracted by that Hector, he ignored such a beautiful specimen."

This causes the man to stop mid-word. He looks at the Entity staring back at him. His mouth opened and closed like a merman tadpole. The Castle took this chance to continue, sliding its tendrils along Isaac's hands.

"We only speak the truth. Such power and beauty like yours would be a waste to throw away. Especially on one who cannot see it." It speaks so softly. So hypnotically. It can see the man thinking about what it's saying. "You are intelligent. Powerful. Beautiful. We would thrive under a lord like you."

It can see how the man hesitated, before trying to resist it. It needed to draw the man in more. Lower his guard more. This will not be as easy as its Prince, but it would be worth the chase. It released the man from its grip easily.

"We can offer you so much. Loyalty. Companionship. Power. Love. We can offer so much more than the one you served your life to." It pauses, a name popping up in its memories. "All we need is you. Your blood. Your energy. Your power. Your presence. Without it, we are nothing. We can subsist for only so long on the monsters and humans within these walls, but you... You could provide so much. We will never take you for granted. You will be an object of worship. A ruler. A Lord."

That does it. It can see his mind turning. It had to be methodical. It could not claim him all at once. It had to be slow. Nurture a bond, and seal it with blood when the time is ready. It bows its head respectfully.

"We will let you think on our offer. We will not force you to join us. But note, as long as you do not harm us, nothing in here will harm you. We will bring you back to us, when your final decision is made." At that, it disappears into a puddle of blood, leaving the scene. It watches the man from the shadows. It would take time. It needed to show him that it was better than his lord.

It summoned two dishonored vampires to the room, and had them bow before the man. Give him a taste of the power he'll have with it, before it vanishes back to the throne room, eager for its new Lord.

[narwhalandchill]

(HEAVILY suspect genshin 4.2 AQ weekly boss leaks, massive spoiler if its legit etc etc but take with a Colossal grain of salt, also general 4.0 & 4.1 spoilers jic, i am going moderately insane)

i would like to formally apologize in advance for the person im about to become if childes whale (or 'it' more likely than not) is genuinely going to be the 4.2 AQ weekly boss what the fuck. What the fuck

Listen. Listen. Listen.

ive been saying for YEARS that this fucker is a bigger deal than just he hee minor miniboss turned neutrally aligned friendly rival on the fatui harbinger gauntlet. ive been coping ive been starving seeing him get literally no relevance or new abyss lore for years as fanon butchered his character beyond recognition. but i knew. i knew they werent putting those lore breadcrumbs in there for nothing and like. im trying not to lose my mind just yet its still highly suspect claims but. itd make so much sense. itd explain everything.

the oratrice was not wrong. if the primordial anti-french bathwater is connected to the whale all along its no wonder it deemed childe guilty as the one with 'its' traces remaining on him all this time especially as the latent yet-untapped power resulting from that past encounter has clearly begun to surface. theyre registering as one and the same to the oratrice. and for the whale to end up as a weekly boss its Very clear theres an explicit link there.

and like? if the whales been behind fontaines rising sea levels and tied to the primordial water all this time lurking somewhere just underneath the nation of hydro im just. was childes instinct to come to fontaine specifically due to his worsening mood rly much coincidence at all or was 'it' beginning to call for him due to sensing that hed soon be ready to awaken his potential? his stories suggest quite clearly that this was what happened when ajax was 14 as well - the abyss called to him as did he to it, frustrated as he was with his ordinary life, seeking the potential he had within. ready to nurture his trouble-mongering nature into a true force of chaos and a nexus of strife. isnt this just the same thing all over again?

and the celestial star-cruising whale is his constellation. that kind of link isnt giving me a "chance encounter you happen to get latent powers from". and for skirk to explicitly state that awakening 'it' was a feat unheard of before ajax. that no one had ever done it before. theyre deeply intertwined if not outright the same entity on some cosmic level - just different incarnations somehow. shits getting Real and i fucking knew there was something up YEARS ago

anyway hooooly shit i am going to fucking lose it i really really hope its real. and like sure sure knowing its coming is technically a spoiler but also not really? bc now its just the how and why and when. is skirk going to finally show up? is childe going to summon 'it' either on accident or on purpose? would he utilize the imminent threat the whales presence poses to force both furina and neuvillette into emergency mode given how abyssal creatures are literally kryptonite for dragons and celestia-approved divine beings alike? is that why traveler ends up having to face it instead? bc those 2 would literally get irreversibly corroded by the abyss from one hit?

alternatively, will childe want to fight it? bc ppl dont talk about this for some reason but hes always had a voiceline about what we now know 100% was 'it' and bro genuinely wants to go back to the abyss full send just to throw hands with the whale to prove hes surpassed the past terror that gripped him upon their first encounter and that hes overtaken it with his own power. which with the new lore drops of their deep connection definitely isnt giving childe replacing and becoming the new incarnation of the abyssal star-whale at all nuh-uh. surely. (i want it so bad)

anyway. holy shit. heres hoping this doesnt just age like shit DUFYDUGHFGDJSHDK i really want an AQ final fight thats not just harbinger of the week for the 4th time in a row. theyre fun and all and like yeah arguably childes ties to it kinda make it a harbinger fight but also not? bc this is about his abyssal links nothing to do with being in the fatui. and its the whale anyway not him per say

anyway heres hoping we get that 3rd final boss fight to the death with him in the celestia arc for once and for all when hes finally reached his peak. first we fight him at his incomplete level in liyue. then his abyssal whale. then 3rd time him in his final form thank youuu

but like. still emphasizing. this is NOT reliable leaks or confirmed yet so hold your horses. very sussy whisperings from some ppl who do have somewhat of a truthful track record but nothing concrete. i just went insane enough with the very idea that my brain made me type this madness out regardless

[whumpitisthen]

I like one very specific thing, which is Whumper locking the door after they enter the room Whumpee is kept in and wanted to expand upon i just a slight bit so:

Here's some fun ways to signal that pain is coming Whumpee's way (a ramble):

So in spot no.1 we got what inspired this post, which is the mental image of a Whumpee watching Whumper come in, then promptly lock the door behind them. It signals danger, it makes them feel even more stuck, so helpless. And the best part is that it signals that Whumper won't be leaving any time soon. When that door is locked, it means that it is time to hurt and I really can't explain any more why I have such an obsessive love for a locked door so utterly cutting Whumpee off from any hope of getting out of that room. Please consider the implications of something so simple and ponder on it for me

Another good signal is an alarm, or a specific time. Say Whumpee gets to endure horrific torture every day, but they are free to do whatever until that dreaded 7 pm comes when Whumper comes for them. They might have an alarm set up, which, if they ever manage to get away will haunt them for the rest of their life; or they might not, and they might not even know that it's already time before Whumper shows up out of nowhere and Whumpee gets this incredible expression of horror on their face and goes "Is it already time?" Chef's kiss, give me ten

We love our non-human characters and I specifically love non-human whumpers, so perhaps the signal for a whumpee who has the misfortune of being this terrifying Whumper's favourite is a quiver in the air when a supernatural all-powerful whumper enters Whumpee's home. A pressure on their body, a chill down their spine that comes right back up, a noise in their ears they can't get rid of, whispering in their mind. Hallucinations, inexplicable panic, a very specific smell, a distortion of their vision, the feeling of being watched, the feeling of another in the room though they are supposed to be alone, a feather/scale/puddle/literally whatever part of Whymper in the middle of their living room floor, the list goes on and on! I think we as a community should have more eldritch horror whumpers, it's got so much untapped potential and I for one could finally relate fully to the whumper as I am also a creature unbeknownst and inconceivable to mortals with a fondness for pretty little pathetic men crying on my floor :)

Oh here's a good one: Whumpee receives the signal from another person. "Whumper seems pretty frustrated." "Have you seen how angry Whumper got this afternoon? They looked about ready to kill." "Whumper wanted me to tell you they are waiting for you in their office." "Whumper keeps nagging me about you all the time. Why are they so obsessed with you today?" "I'm kind of worried about how long Whumper has been in their room for. I think you should check on them." Now doesn't all that sound just wonderful for out dear Whumpee, anxiously debating on whether they are going to survive today or not.

Of course, who's better to give the signal than Whumper themself? They could have a word they have taught Whumpee means nothing good. They could act a certain way, perhaps much too friendly or intimate, touching them, keeping them close. Maybe they don't even mean to send a signal, but Whumpee catches it anyway. That telltale glint in their eyes. The way they keep staring at them. Whenever they seem bored, frustrated, excited. When they call Whumpee's name in a specific tone that has an underlying want in it. Biting their lips a lot. Anything you can think of.

Rewards! When Whumpee recieves a reward, they know they are in for a bad time. I mean, they have to earn their luxuries, right? If they think they can just have that blanket or water without earning it it's really their fault for thinking that in the first place. Extra points if the reward isn't actually a good thing. Maybe Whumper got their Whumpee a new collar, or a new toy to try out on them, or they graciously helped them stay awake like Whumper told them to by electrocuting the hell out of them all night, and Whumpee dares to not even thank them?

And that is about as much as my brain can think of right now its late. If you wanna use any of these you are free to ofc though this isn't even a prompt list, more of just me rambling about tropes

Also the numbered list thing fucks with the readmore so i hereby apologize to anyone who will have to scroll past this seventy times on phone i legit cannot put one in there unless i wanna cut off the entire list and leave the first paragraph only. If it makes you feel any better I will also have to scroll past this

[justatalkingface]

Idk I feel Himiko and Izuku have great potential as parallels; both people shunned by society due to quirks, but one took the light path while the other took the dark, but it seems MHA forgot there was any kind of link between the two to begin with

I mean, sure. But how do I put this... Toga is the Potential Character.

Just... every part of her, honestly, is filled with this untapped potential to work with:

How do people react to a 'villain's Quirk' like hers? Does the average person even think much of it? Were her parents just crazy?

Potential.

What was it like, with this kid being basiclly blood starved her whole life, when she first transformed? What did it do to her head? Was her first transformation that kid she killed, that she liked? How did that fuck with her head?

Potential.

When Toga went on the run, in that span of time between 'normal-ish girl who just broke and killed someone' to 'memetic Toga, serial killer', what was that like? What made her like that? How long did it take?

Potential.

The thing is Toga, as presented to us, is this almost one dimensional character: she likes to kill. She's crazy, to the point of literal delusion, when it comes to how things work. She likes blood and her friends. That's it.

And there's just... so much to work with, with her story. She has, more than any League member, a tale of just plain corruption from a normal person into the monster she is now, and there is just... so much concept with that story Hori is just flat out ignoring, skipping over, or replacing with something simpler and less interesting. Her story, properly implemented and worked with, there could be an entire ass manga just about her slow descent into villainy.

And yet, she has all this screen time, but it's just so shallow that it's honestly frustrating to think about.

She has potential with Izuku as outcasts, like you said, comparing their low origins, the way Izuku was helped and she was hurt, and how they both started from Average People into people of great power and influence. She has potential with Stain as blood drinkers and blade wielders who rebelling against society, for vastly different reasons. She has potential, technically, with Ochako as people who like Izuku* (and just... let me get back to this, I'm sorry but I'll make it make more sense). She has potential with Shoto, Dabi, etc, with her history of parental abuse.

(*Ok, the way the manga presents this dynamic? Shit. Absolute shit, I hate it. But if it put any thought, or work, into it at all... there's actually some interesting elements to work with. Izuku has no self respect. He thinks he's universally loathed. And this girl likes him. Loudly. This is made clear to anyone in the general area because she's really not subtle about this. And Izuku just has... no context for a girl liking him, at all; canonly, he has no context for a girl even talking to him before UA. How does he react to this? What does he think?

And, in a more realistic setting, that's something that wouldn't just be ignored whenever Toga wasn't on screen, if only because he'd probably have one or two existential crises over having a female villain (because of both of those words!) like him (and also, Responsible Authority Figures would probably realize that makes him a potential target and, you know, do something about that. Maybe implement a code word system or something, because Toga actively hunting you is nightmarish in an Among Us kind of way). Like, hell, it could be a launching point for a character arc on him redefining himself from Quirkless Era Lack of Self-Respect to something more realistic for who he is, and you know, make him reassess his past in general.

And the thing is Ochako does like him. Or did at least. But, since this starts when her crush is still relevant.... What does she think about this? How does this make her react? Does that make her push her affections? Give her perspective and give up on feelings as a childish crush? And how does she bring that reaction back to Toga?

Because the thing is, as much as this chick fight-y format gives me some real bad vibes, there is a potential to it fundamentally, but it's something that would take work and development and some actual respect, which Hori just refused to give to... literally everyone involved in this situation.)

All of that is there, but we're never going to get it, because as much potential is there as a character, Hori clearly prefers her as the Yandere Blood Waifu and we're never going to be able to past that into anything deeper, anything more.

[maranull]

Hi, you're the first Elden Ring headcanon blog I've seen on here and I wanted to say how much I appreciate you and your blog! The soulsborne series has a lot more untapped potential and I'm happy to see you digging into it! Really, discovering it for the first time was very refreshing, thank you. May I get some romance/relationship headcanons for Malenia, please and thank you. If not that's fine, have an amazing day!

Oh, hi! Thank you so much! I started them as a fully self-indulgent stuff cause I was/am crushing hard at Melina. :P Didn't expect people would like them.

Oh, btw, I tent to find it easier to make the xReader headcanons in a generic modern AU, but if you want the setting to be the Lands Between, sent me another ask and I'll alter them. It'd be no trouble at all. :)

Right, headcanons go!

Malenia doesn't allow herself to get close to anyone, due to her fear of infecting them with the Rot

Despite that, after you originally meet, she doesn't go out of her way to avoid you, which, for her, is already allowing herself to relax too much

Letting you get close feels almost as an accident to her

One that she quite likes, but her usual mindset doesn't allow her to accept your affections

Cause why would anyone love her, her being mutilated by and carrying the Rot in her

Confessing to her made her literally get up and run, and she didn't talk to you for a week

After which she "accidentally" passed by your usual route to work, and gave you a shy wave from across the street

Obviously you skipped work that day and you spent your time talking

Awkward at first, and she was still very closed off, but you could hear in her tone that she was giddily and nervous

Starting to date was quite similar to your usual time together

But she let herself laugh more, allowed you to actually sit next to her and not a seat away, and her whole body began looking less tense when around you

Slowly, very slowly, I mean weeks to months slowly, she physically came closer and started taking your hand, leaning to you and after a month+, sometimes asking you to hug her

All that time she was panicking and repeating that it's not that she doesn't like you or doesn't want to touch you, it's just that she is scared of the Rot afflicting you

After you spent the months making it abundantly clear that the Rot is a non-issue for your affection towards her, she slowly starts initiating touch, instead of asking you to hold her

~~~

After getting fully comfortable with you, she seems a bit changed

She talks more

Laughs more and at little things

She isn't scared of you seeing parts of her body that are rotten, and even asks you to apply a soothing cream Miquella has helped create

She can be a slob and single minded

Her only worries are Miquella, you, her swordsmanship and the Rot

She enjoys you brushing her hair, and with how rough and long they are, the whole process takes hours

She's not the most playful person, but when she gets in a mood, you are crying from laughter

She almost never gets angry and you never hear her swear

The only time you've seen her cry was a day where all three of her prosthetics decided to malfunction and after tossing them at the wall with enough force to break them, she broke down in crying from frustration

She enjoys honey and flowers

So when you moved together you found out that being with Malenia comes with also having a small bee colony at your place

She also enjoys you reading to her, and you often combine brushing her hair and reading when you sense she's feeling down

She enjoys walking, working out and training and talking to her brother, so while she has no need for a job (due to her status) she's made a habit to leave during your work hours for her own things

You do walk together to the station, and often she'll arrange her cardio to bring her by your work, around the time you clock off

That's all I got for now. I hope my depiction of her disabilities was respectful. Please let me know if they weren't. I'm able-bodied so mistakes are inevitable, but I would prefer to be called out on them, so I know not to repeat them in the future.

So, thank you for the ask! Hope it was what you were looking for! Have a lovely day!

[mirchloe]

and just going off that last post of mine, but that cutscene really shows a stark change in writing between the first and second game. to save his friends and mentors, raz bounces into each inmate's brain without much thought. he initially isn't doing it to help them get better - he needs something from them. though, raz does end up directly helping edgar and fred as they take on a more active role in their minds, and raz, after talking to them and learning about them, is compelled to help! he wants to! he's an earnest kid and seeing people in trouble? he wants to do what he can to see them at their best, but when he fails with a character like boyd, and raz is ejected after letting the milkman loose, the consequences are pretty...explosive. however, raz doesn't see this outcome; he just knows the asylum is suddenly burning down, and then, he's off to face oleander.

hollis is a direct result of his actions, and he is forced to face them because of raz messing around with her mental connections, she becomes a compulsive gambler. she feels like she lost her mind when it's cleared up, and when she learns what raz did, she's *pissed*. what raz did was dangerous and wrong. he jeopardized not only her, but everyone on the mission. raz sees this now very clearly and learns that he can't mess around like he did. most of what he was doing was based on what seemed best in the moment. now, he learned to be more considerate and careful or what he can do in someone's mind, accepting their boundaries, learning "maybe i shouldn't toss my psi portal willy nilly."

but this brings me back to sasha. sasha's morals were seen as a more than a little dubious in the first game. while he wants to help kids, he also wants to vastly explore the human mind and enhance his understanding. the untapped potential of children, especially those he believes can withstand advanced training, are incredibly valuable. he can't, however, do it directly. it's all under the table. even though oleander and milla are aware, neither step in, and the kids are allowed to run free with the rumor mill. bobby is a result of sasha's training, of how dubious ethics regarding the mind of a child, can lead to harm. and as for raz, he, too, is a result of it. raz emulates sasha, so sasha expressing his frustration with raz comes as the expense of me knowing...that this is something raz did because of his experiences with sasha. it's never acknowledged, and i do feel that's a bit of a shame, especially with much they parallel each other. raz feels he let sasha down, and while it is still primarily his fault, their conversation on ethics would've been so much greater if sasha had expounded on how he influenced raz to act carelessly.

and as for the writing, those cutscenes just wouldn't have happened in pn1! it shows a true growth for raz as a character, in how he realizes he needs to let his empathy be more genuine, in how he needs to respect the boundaries of the people he wants to help. he can help them, but it has to be at their pace, and they need to accept his assistance instead of it being forced upon them.

[wonderful101gecs]

Have you played fear and hunger? If so what did you think of it?

I put two hours into it and... honestly kinda hated it tbh??? I need to go back and give it another go cause, as a massive fan of Games That Hate You and someone who thinks turn-based RPGs like that have a lot of untapped potential, I should in theory be THE biggest fan of it. But maybe it's for that exact reason I felt like I was only seeing all the flaws and shortcomings, the ways in which it was frustrating by accident instead of on purpose, all the ways in which is was failing to be what I felt it could/should be. That said, it has been the most requested non-Patho video topic I have ever had by WIDE margin and I freely admit that it could have just been a bad first impression, easy to have with games like that. Patho took me a couple tries before I stuck to it too, as did Disco Elysium. Have no doubt that at some point in the next couple months, I'll pour an entire weekend to dissecting every piece of it, if only to learn from it.

[meistoshi]

houou is the reason satoshi cannot die.     it looked upon this ridiculous boy with untapped potential & untapped powers, ready to risk life & limb for a mouse that wouldn’t do what it’s told, saw that same mouse be inspired enough by that ridiculousness to leap in front of the boy & channel actual lightning to save them both …     & it decided “yeah, i’ve got a good feeling about this one”.     & it just kept following him in the background.     kept an eye on him.     ensured satoshi’s resurrection after getting caught in the crossfire of mew & mewtwo.     flashed its tail feathers when satoshi returned from johto, practically said with a nudge-nudge “hey, how about you check out hoenn next??”, flying it its direction.

upon satoshi deciding to start from zero, caught him on the same path that he first saw it, this time giving him a feather, an invitation, told him “c’mon, let me see what you’re made of, let me see how you’ve grown”, sent him on a search for it, waiting to battle him, & when satoshi died protecting pikachu, houou made sure he came back, like it always has.     it’s decided that satoshi is interesting, has seen the amount of love he has for the world, has seen how many times he’s succeeded in protecting said world, in protecting other gods, has concluded that he’s worth sticking around  ;     there’s too much he’s yet to do, there’s too much he’s able to protect like few others, & he always manages to be at the right place at the right time, even if satoshi himself might disagree with the last point in some cases.     so houou’s not letting satoshi die.     not for a long while yet.

because of this blessing, satoshi’s relationship with mortality is different to that of most people’s.     the concept of his own death has lost meaning to him outside of worry for what will happen to the people / pokémon he wants to protect when he’s no longer around.     he’s died too many times for it to really matter.     death is just a bump in the road, an inconvenience.     the gods want him around, so he’s still around.     he’s aware that he’s gonna die for real for the last time sometime in the future, but he’s sure that day’s still very far off, so he treats his mortality like a runner far behind him who keeps being tripped up  ;     it’ll catch up with him eventually, but for now he’s gonna keep moving it like it’s barely there.

it’s part of why he’s so reckless with his methods of rescue, going so far as to jump off buildings & cliffs to catch his pokémon mid-fall  ;     it doesn’t matter if there’s no guarantee of surviving the fall, if he can protect the pokémon from the brunt of the landing it’s fine, he’ll be fine.     eventually. if he can take someone else’s place in taking the brunt of something, it feels like a no-brainer that he should, because he’s always been fine in the end, while majority others don’t have that luxury of carelessness. he's come back from being ripped apart & burnt to cinders — what can take him down?? ( his lack of regular ol’ human mortality doesn’t make the nightmares ease off, though, it doesn’t make swimming any less of a mental chore, it doesn’t make him any less tense when the topic of any crisis in the past decade gets brought up.     he kind of wishes it did.     he’d be lying if he said he didn’t think it frustrating that dealing with trauma doesn’t get any easier with a lack of fear of death & the knowledge that, for him, death is but a temporary inconvenience. )

[yandere-romanticaa]

You jest, but out of all GI chibis, Qiqi is my fave (platonic ofc!) and I loved the yandere concept. I find Qiqi to be sort of an inspiration to me. Her desire to live was so strong it gave her a vision. It probably isn't the life she wanted (immortal, cannot age, has difficulty with memories) but I love how she tries her best every single day. Come to think of it, I would love an interaction between her and Shenhe since they both had problems handling the adepti energy at first.

Qiqi is such an underated little sweetheart and I'm so sad that people hate her purely because they lost the 50/50 to her, my friend is a prime example. On Scaramouche banner she lost the 50/50 to her and nearly cried out of frustration, she hated her so much omg. She would have stayed at level 1 had there not have been an easy wish given with her ascension, but she did manage to get Scaramouche in the end though.

Qiqi also has some of the best and saddest lore ever, I just want to hug her. And she is also untapped potential for us writers as well. I'm not opposed to writing more for her in the future!

[transexuality]

rhe thing about kairi is that she is so underdeveloped to an utmost degree beyond any other kingdom hearts character even though she is the POINT of kh1. yes, sora and riku's relationship is in the forefront of kh1, but sora is searching for KAIRI hes mad at riku for what hes done to KAIRI. but she has 0 agency. she is asleep 90% of the game and for the last 10% she does nothing. naminé and larxene are the next original female characters introduced in chain of memories and immediately we see them have more interesting development and storylines and personalities than kairi. naminé suffers a bit from being a female character written by men who dont know how to write women, but she has struggles and she has her own motivations, she is complex. she feels jealous and wants sora to forget everything and stay with her, but she sacrifices those wants because she knows its for the greater good. larxene is an active antagonist and she is a ruthless villain, with agency and power in the narrative. jump to kh2, naminé has become basically a ghost, larxene is dead, and kairi has been captured again. we get moments in kh2 of some personality from kairi, certainly more from what weve seen, but ultimately she still lacks agency and doesnt do much. riku just sort of gives her a keyblade at the end and then shes there to reunite sora and riku, since finding riku is the point of kh2. they had the chance to make her do more in kh3 and while i appreciate that she at least is given a fighting chance it ultimately falls flat because her character revolves around sora. her existence is to support sora and riku's friendship. shes the case that is replace her with a rock and nothing changes. and im saying this as someone who loves kairi! shes fun! shes cute! shes sweet! shes snarky sometimes! but ultimately her personality is Nice Girl Who's Nice :) and there is an untapped well of potential for her to get some depth and it ultimately isnt there as the writers have made her character shallow that pales in comparison to her counterparts. but somehow people hate her EXISTENCE for this and thats what drives me crazy. even with all of these criticisms i have with the writing i still really like her and think that she needs to exist. and yeah sure sora and riku have much more chemistry and are written with such a beautiful bond that its hard to see it as anything other than accidental gay romance but sora and kairi is still there and its still sweet. soriku shippers hate kairi for whatever reason cause it gets in the way of their gay ship and thats whats frustrating. sora and kairi are clearly intended to have romantic undertones and while yes its a shame that kairis character is reduced to this, people shit on it for the wrong reasons. theres nothing wrong wirh sora and kairi's relationship, and its been there from the very start and its not going away. they both care a lot about each other and its sweet! kairi is hated on for merely existing but people dont take the time to step back and critique the way that she is developed and written, they just go for the jugular and perpetuate the misogyny that is already written into the franchise. you can have a problem with the way things are handled, but just shitting on a female character for existing in a male dominated cast written by men is just not cute. Can anybody hear me

[sanguine-salvation]

I see

[ Send me “I see” and I’ll tell you how my character perceives yours - ACCEPTING ]

Viktor's eye twitches a bit and they huff a breath through what's almost a grin but just enough grimace that it's hard to tell what emotion it's feeling. "Tess, my dear, she's... complicated. She could be so much more if she just... opened her eyes! She's so close, I can feel it! That beast of hers is too much for her to hold off forever, but..." They pout. "She's so stubborn, you know. Too stubborn! Every step closer taunts her with truth, and she simply walks by it! How? Why choose that blindness? I haven't seen it yet, and she won't share. It's starting to get on. my. nerves."

But, upon realizing that they are now leaned forward and looking tense as a live wire, they pause and flop back, taking in a deep breath and exhaling in an almost meditative fashion. "... Apologies. Untapped potential can... rile me up." They stare for a bit before an icy smile forms on their face. "Anyway, I like her enough." They laugh. "Ahh, maybe I'm a masochist, but something about her teasing keeps me on my toes. It's hard to tell if she's doing it on purpose or is truly ignorant. She's... exciting! Vicious! Almost like my dear Captor! I'm not sure how to feel about that, honestly, but she's... Tess."

And Tess was complicated. Because as much as they dug and tore at her, she never seemed to budge. She was a wall in a storm, battered, bruised, but defiant, even as the wind pocked her surface and scarred her edges. It was equal parts insulting, impressive, pointless, and... in a deeply frustrating way, admirable. They'd find her cracks yet.

"... And she has excellent taste in food."