#and fanfic is its own thing and comparing it to pro fic like in the original post is...a different issue entirely

[bedlamsbard]

i will say—the whole "reaction shot roundup" thing that post is mentioning also just comes off as...relatively bad cinema. like, something you could make work if you were GOOD at it, but also something that a lot of people attempt to do without a lot of skill when they have too many cast members to effectively balance. YOU, on the other hand, do write in a cinematic fashion but you are so fucking good at it. the way you paint pictures in scenes and the way you build and release tension is just pitch perfect. it's tv/movie magic translated into a different medium at its finest

Aw, thank you. I mean, part of my reaction was definitely the bog-standard "this person is saying a thing that I COULD relate to so DOES it relate to me?" which I'm as susceptible to as the next "I am uncomfortable when we are not about me?" birb.

but also I genuinely think that this writer is talking about several different (though related) things and falling back on "it's television's fault!!!" instead of actually like. thinking about them. now I don't know what's going on in creative writing classrooms, I'm a history teacher (though I'm teaching 'how to write research papers' this semester and next semester), but I think these are just...normal "how to write fiction" problems. like the fact that OP isn't using any actual examples from published fiction makes it just sound like they have just noticed something so therefore it's A Problem And Those Darn Televisions And/Or Video Games Are At Fault.

there are very, very good pro writers who are very visual and very cinematic in multiple ways, which is not just about balancing reaction shots or pacing or stunning visuals. John Jackson Miller, who writes primarily tie-in novels, is really good at it. part of that is because he's also a comics writer, so he's used to thinking about things visually and how that translates to prose. (I know everyone thinks about Kenobi and A New Dawn with JJM, but the Knight Errant book and comics are interesting because he did both prose and comics for the same character. Also if you like JJM's stuff, go read his "behind the scenes," there's stuff he said about writing the KOTOR comics that I think about to this day.) Martha Wells is also great at it, so is S.M. Stirling; so are many others, those are just the first three that come to mind because I think they're three of the most visual writers I read regularly. And all three are tie-in writers and very good tie-in writers and good tie-in writers, like good fic writers, have to think about translating between media. (One sign of a bad tie-in writer -- who may otherwise be a very good writer -- is that they struggle with translating between media. Tie-ins are a very specific genre and even medium which I think many people don't realize until you read a terrible Star Wars novel written by an author who writes really great non-IP novels and then can't figure out why it feels Wrong.)

I do think writers (and readers and viewers) should think about how to translate something that's natural in one medium (film, video games, prose, comics, whatever) to another medium, because it's not as straightforward as "you just can't do it because they're different media." You can! You may have to think about it differently, but you can still do it! Some of the best writing advice I've ever read has not come from prose writing, it's come from comics writers about writing comics. Depending on your genre or your medium, advice for writing novels may not apply -- I don't structure my fanfic the way I would structure a novel, because I write serial fiction. My scene beats and chapter breaks are not necessarily translatable to a novel, because that's not what I'm writing and that's not how I expect people to read it. (I mean, for one, if I was writing novels, I would not be writing 10K chapters, because for a novel, that's insane.)

anyway, that was about like. six different vaguely related things, the tl;dr of which is something I don't usually say but which comes down to "perhaps OP, as a creative writing instructor, should think about what they're doing in THEIR classroom instead of blaming the television." (this is based on the whole article and not just that bit that's excerpted.)

[darklovetrash]

My unpleasant experiences in the a song of ice and fire fanfiction community

Hello, my friends. On archive of our own, my name is DancingSnowflakes23. Back in 2018 I started posting fanfiction. My first story was a Jonerys fic, but eventually I ended up writing stories in which the Rhaegar x Lyanna ship featured and had some of  the most unpleasant encounters I ever had in a fandom.  That said, I am not even a L x R stan or shipper per se, but since many of my stories feature Jon they appear as well. I have written two stories to be exact where Lyanna or Rhaegar were alive beyond canon. One was called the Loyal Knight and it had Lyanna surviving and marrying Arthur Dayne, though she cared a lot for Rhaegar whom she grieved deeply. Several anonymous people came and were bombarding my fic with comments about how I am wrong and should get my facts straight despite writing an AU story. I do not mind discussion, but I was called a dipshit numerous times and I was hurt by this behaviour, which even went to far as to question my writing. i am not perfect, but I am writing fanfic with a lot of effort and if readers disagree with the premise of a story I expect them to move on and not harrass me further.  The second fic I wrote was called Beneath the Weirwood which was an AU of Rhaegar x Lyanna surviving and there it got even worse. I was called numerous unpleasant things (Like me being racist). Sadly, I don’t have the story anymore since I rewrote it and cannot provide you with these highly-intellectual comments about the some bullshit regarding R X L over and over again. There are literal people who scoure the R  x L tag to seek out pro- R x L stories to annoy and harass authors. I am a grown up person and I was hurt about their comments and should have probably just moderated, but back then I was new to fanfiction and was stupid enough to waste my time over this stuff, but then there are maybe younger writers who are brave enough to post their stories and then they have to endure this bullshit? I could understand if they just left the fandom. Yet, I am not the only one who got this treatment. There are numerous cases of this and usually its by anonymous commeters, who all sound the same way and always repeat the same silly arguments. There are some I remember: Armansky Something, KingofKings? Not sure anymore, Dublin, UnbentGlass and what connects them is their weird obessession with all things Ashara Dayne and Elia Martell. I am not posting this to start a war and I do not think the majority of Elia fans are like these weirdos, but mabe they like to know what kind of hatred some people spread in the name of their favourite character. I am honest, I always felt Elia Martell was a character who got fucked over and deserved more characterization, but I like many other writers do not write her, because such stories draw this people to the comment sections like flies to a fire. No one wants to engage with people like that and it soured my liking for the character which I doubt is the wish for Elia Fans. On the contrary, I think most of them want Elia to be liked and admired and not be assoicated with toxcity. And with the current developements in this tag I decided to post this to show that the R X L people are not crazy people who just want to appear as victims. I am no R x L shipper and got targeted. So, I dont know what the real R x L shippers would feel for being called racists, pedos and other stuff for liking a fictional pairing. What I hope this post achives is to expose these creeps and maybe have the Elia fans purge them from their community so we can all go back to a more friendly atmosphre. Wouldn’t that we wonderful? And here to give you some examples: And this stuff is harmless compared to what some other writers got. 

[lilydalexf]

Old School X is a project interviewing X-Files fanfic authors who were posting fic during the original run of the show. New interviews are posted every Tuesday.

Interview with Syntax6

Syntax6 has 17 stories at Gossamer, but you should visit her website for the complete collection of her fics and to see the cover art that comes with many of the stories (and to find her pro writing!). She's written some of the most beloved casefiles in the fandom. I've recced literally all of them here before. Twice. Big thanks to Syntax6 for doing this interview.

Does it surprise you that people are still interested in reading your X-Files fanfics and others that were posted during the original run of the show (1993-2002)?

I’m delighted but not surprised because I’ve written and read fanfic for shows even older than XF. Also, I joined the XF fandom relatively late, at the end of 1999, so there were already hundreds of “classic” fics out there, stories that were theoretically superseded or dated by canon developments that came after them, but which nonetheless remained compelling in their own right. That is the beauty of fanfic: it is inspired by its original creators but not bound by them. It’s a world of “what if” and each story gets to run in a new direction, irrespective of the canon and all the other stories spinning off in their own universes. In this way, fanfic becomes almost timeless.

What do you think of when you think about your X-Files fandom experience? What did you take away from it? What did you take away from your experience with X-Files fic or with the fandom in general?

(I feel these are similar, at least for me, so I will combine them here.)

First and foremost, I found friends. There was a table full of XF fanfic writers at my wedding. Bugs was my maid of honor. I still talk to someone from XF fandom pretty much every day. Lysandra, Maybe Amanda, Michelle Kiefer, bugs…these are just some of the people who’ve been part of my life for half my existence now. Sometimes I get to have dinner with Audrey Roget or Anjou or MCA. Deb Wells and Sarah Ellen Parsons are part of my pro fic beta team. I have a similar list from the Hunter fandom, terrific people who have enriched my life in numerous ways and I am honored to count as friends.

Second, I learned a lot about writing during my years in XF fandom. I grew up there. Part of this growth experience was simply due to practice. I wrote about 1.2 million words of XF fanfic, which is the equivalent of 15 novels. I made mistakes and learned from them. But another essential part of learning is absorbing different kinds of well-told tales, and XF had these in spades. Some stories were funny. Others were lyrical. Some were short pieces with nary a word wasted while others were sprawling epics that took you on an adventure. The neat thing about XF is that it has space for many different kinds of stories, from hard-core sci-fi to historical romance. You can watch other authors executing these varied pieces and learn from them. You can form critique groups and ask for betas and get direct feedback on how to improve. It’s collaborative and fun, and this can’t be underestimated, generally supportive. The underlying shared love of the original product means that everyone comes into your work predisposed to enjoy it. I am grateful for all the encouragement and the critiques I received over my years in fandom.

Finally, I think a valuable lesson for writers that you can find in fandom, but not in your local author critique group, is how to handle yourself when your work goes public. Not everyone is going to like your work and they will make sure you know it. Some people will like it maybe too much, to the point where they cross boundaries. Learning to disengage yourself from public reaction to your work is a difficult but crucial aspect of being a writer. You control the story. You can’t control reaction to it. It’s frustrating at first, perhaps, but in the end, it’s freeing.

Social media didn't really exist during the show's original run. How were you most involved with the X-Files online (atxc, message board, email mailing list, etc.)?

I participated in ATXC, the Haven message boards, and the Scullyfic mailing list/news group. For a number of years, I also ran a fic discussion group with bugs called The Why Incision.

What got you involved with X-Files fanfic?

I started reading XF fanfic before I began watching the show. I had watched one season two episode (Soft Light) and then seen bits and pieces of a few others from season four. I’d seen Fight the Future. Basically, I’d seen enough to know which one was Mulder and which one was Scully, and which one believed in aliens. An acquaintance linked me to a rec site for XF fanfic (Gertie’s, maybe?) so that I could see how fic was formatted for the web. I clicked a fic, I think it was one by Lydia Bower dealing with Scully’s cancer arc, and basically did not stop reading. Soon I was printing off 300K of fic to take home with me each night. I could not believe the level of talent in the fandom, and that there were so many excellent writers just giving away their works for free. I wanted to play in this sandbox, too, so I started renting the VHS tapes to catch up on old episodes (see, I am An Old). After a few months, I began writing my own stuff.

What was it that got you hooked on the X-Files as a show?

I had to be dragged kicking and screaming to The X-Files. I’m not a sci-fi person by nature. I think my main objection is that, when done poorly, it feels lazy to me. Who did the thing? A ghost! Maybe an alien? I guess we’ll never know. You can always just shrug and play some spooky music and the “truth will always be out there…” somewhere beyond the story in front of you. You never have to commit to any kind of truth because you can invent some magical power or new kind of alien to change the story. I think, by the bitter end, the XF had devolved into this kind of storytelling. The mytharc made no kind of sense even in its own universe. But for years the XF achieved the best aspects of sci-fi storytelling—narrative flexibility and an apotheosis of our current fears dressed up as a super entertaining yarn.

What eventually sold me on the XF as a show is all of the smart storytelling and the sheer amount of ideas contained within its run. At its best, it’s a brilliant show. You have mediations on good versus evil, the role of government in a free society, is there a God, are we alone in the universe, and what are the elements that make us who we are? If Mulder and Morris Fletcher switch bodies, how do we know it’s really “them”? The tonal shifts from week to week were clever and engaging. For Vince Gilligan, truth was always found in fellow human beings. For Darin Morgan, humans were the biggest monster of all. The show was big enough to contain both these premises, and indeed, was stronger for it. The deep questions, the character quirks, the unsolved mysteries and all that went unsaid in the Mulder-Scully relationship left so much room for fanfic writers to do their own work. As such, the fandom attracted and continues to attract both dabbling writers and those who are serious craftspeople. People who like the mystery and those who like the sci-fi angle. Scientists and true believers. Like the show, it’s big enough for all.

What is your relationship like now to X-Files fandom?

I look at it like an old friend I catch up with once in a while. We’ve been close for so long that there’s no awkwardness—we just get each other! I love seeing people post screen shots and commentary, and I think it’s wonderful that so many writers are still inventing new adventures for Mulder and Scully. That is how the characters live on, and indeed how any of us lives on, through the stories that others tell about us.

Were you involved with any fandoms after the X-Files? If so, what was it like compared to X-Files?

I ran the Hunter fandom for about five years, mostly because when I poked my head back in, I found the person in change was a bully who’d shut down everything due to her own waning interest. A person would try to start a topic for discussion, and she’d say, “We’ve already covered that.” Well, yes, in a 30-year-old show, there’s not a lot of new ground…

Most other shows, Hunter included, have smaller fandoms and thus don’t attract the depth of fan talent. I don’t just mean fanfic writers. I mean those who do visual art, fan vids, critiques, etc. The XF fandom has all these in droves, which makes it a rare and special place. But all fandoms have the particular joy of geeking out over favorite scenes and reveling in the meeting of shared minds. It will always look odd to those not contained within it, which brings me to the part of modern fandom I find somewhat uncomfortable…the creators are often in fan-space.

In Hunter, the female lead joins fan groups and participates. This is more common now in the age of social media, where writers, producers, actors, etc., are on the same platforms as the rest of us. Fan and creator interaction used to be highly circumscribed: fans wrote letters and maybe received a signed headshot in return. There were cons where show runners gave panels and took questions from the audience. You could stand in line to meet your favorite star. Now, you can @ your favorite star on Twitter, message her on Facebook or follow him on Instagram. In some ways, this is so fun! In other ways, it blurs in the lines in ways that make me uncomfortable. I think it’s rude, for example, if a fan were to go on a star’s social media and post fanfic there or say, “I thought the episode you wrote was terrible.” But what if it’s fan space and the actor is sitting right there, watching you? Is it rude to post fanfic in front of her, especially if she says it makes her uncomfortable? Is it mean to tell a writer his episode sucked right to his face?

Do you ever still watch The X-Files or think about Mulder and Scully?

I own the first seven seasons on DVD and will pull them out from time to time to rewatch old faves. I’ve shown a few episodes over the spring and summer to my ten-year-old daughter, and it’s been fun to see the series through her eyes. We’ve mostly opted for the comedic episodes because there’s enough going on in the real world to give her nightmares. Her favorite so far is Je Souhaite.

Do you ever still read X-Files fic? Fic in another fandom?

I don’t have much bandwidth to read fanfic these days. My job as a mystery/thriller author means I have to keep up with the market so I do most of my reading there right now. I also beta read for some pro-fic friends and betaing a novel will keep you busy.

Do you have any favorite X-Files fanfic stories or authors?

I read so much back in the day that this answer could go on for pages. Alas, it also hasn’t changed much over the past fifteen years because I haven’t read much since then. But, as we’re talking Golden Oldies today, here are a bunch:

All the Mulders, by Alloway I find this short story both hilarious and haunting. Scully embraces her power in the upside down post-apocalyptic world.

Strangers and the Strange Dead, by Kipler Taut prose and an intriguing 3rd party POV make this story a winner, and that’s before the kicker of an ending, which presaged 1013’s.

Cellphone, by Marasmus Talk about your killer twists! Also one of the cleverest titles coming or going.

Arizona Highways, by Fialka I think this is one of the best-crafted stories to come out of the XF. It’s majestic in scope, full of complex literary structure and theme, and yet the plot moves like a runaway freight train. Both the Mulder and Scully characterizations are handled with tender care.

So, We Kissed, by Alelou What I love about this one is how it grounds Mulder and Scully in the ordinary. Mulder’s terrible secret doesn’t involve a UFO or some CSM-conspiracy. Scully goes to therapy that actually looks like therapy. I guess what I’m saying is that I utterly believe this version of M & S in addition to just enjoying reading about them.

Sore Luck at the Luxor, by Anubis Hot, funny, atmospheric. What’s not to love?

Black Hole Season, by Penumbra Nobody does wordsmithing like Penumbra. I use her in arguments with professional writers when they try to tell me that adverbs and adjectives MUST GO. Just gorgeous, sly, insightful prose.

The Dreaming Sea, by Revely This one reads like a fairytale in all the best ways. Revely creates such loving, beautiful worlds for M & S to live in, and I wish they could stay there always.

Malus Genius, by Plausible Deniability and MaybeAmanda Funny and fun, with great original characters, a sly casefile and some clear-eyed musings on the perils of getting older. This one resonates more and more the older I get. ;)

Riding the Whirlpool, by Pufferdeux I look this one up periodically to prove to people that it exists. Scully gets off on a washing machine while Mulder helps. Yet it’s in character? And kinda works? This one has to be read to be believed.

Bone of Contention (part 1, part 2), by Michelle Kiefer and Kel People used to tell me all the time that casefiles are super easy to write while the poetic vignette is hard. Well, I can’t say which is harder but there much fewer well-done casefiles in the fandom than there are poetic vignettes. This is one of the great ones.

Antidote, by Rachel Howard A fic that manages to be both hot and cold as it imagines Mulder and Scully trying to stay alive in the frosty wilderness while a deadly virus is on the loose. This is an ooooold fic that holds up impressively well given everything that followed it!

Falling Down in Four Acts, by Anubis Anubis was actually a bunch of different writers sharing a single author name. This particular one paints an angry, vivid world for Our Heroes and their compatriots. There is no happy ending here, but I read this once and it stayed with me forever.

The Opposite of Impulse, by Maria Nicole A sweet slice of life on a sunny day. When I imagine a gentler universe for Mulder and Scully, this is the kind of place I’d put them.

What is your favorite of your own fics, X-Files and/or otherwise?

Bait and Switch is probably the most sophisticated and tightly plotted. It was late in my fanfic “career” and so it shows the benefits to all that learning. My favorite varies a lot, but I’ll say Universal Invariants because that one was nothing but fun.

Do you think you'll ever write another X-Files story? Or dust off and post an oldie that for whatever reason never made it online?

I never say never! I don’t have any oldies sitting around, though. Everything I wrote, I posted.

Do you still write fic now? Or other creative work?

I write casefiles…er, I mean mysteries, under my own name now, Joanna Schaffhausen. My main series with Reed and Ellery consists of a male-female crime solving team, so I get a little bit of my XF kick that way. Their first book, The Vanishing Season, started its life as an XF fanfic back in the day. I had to rewrite it from the ground up to get it published, but if you know both stories, you can spot the similarities.

Where do you get ideas for stories?

The answer any writer will tell you is “everywhere.” Ideas are cheap and they’re all around us—on the news, on the subway, in conversations with friends, from Twitter memes, on a walk through the woods. My mysteries are often rooted in true crime, often more than one of them.

Each idea is like a strand of colored thread, and you have to braid them together into a coherent story. This is the tricky part, determining which threads belong in which story. If the ideas enhance one another or if they just create an ugly tangent.

Mostly, though, stories begin by asking “what if?” What if Scully’s boyfriend Ethan had never been cut from the pilot? What if Scully had moved to Utah after Fight the Future? What if the Lone Gunmen financed their toys by writing a successful comic book starring a thinly veiled Mulder and Scully?

Growing up, I had a sweet old lady for a neighbor. Her name was Doris and she gave me coffee ice cream while we watched Wheel of Fortune together. Every time there was a snow storm, the snow melted in her backyard in a such way that suggested she had numerous bodies buried out there. How’s that for a “what if?”

What's the story behind your pen name?

I’ve had a few of them and honestly can’t tell you where they came from, it’s been so long ago. The “6” part of syntax6 is because I joke that 6 is my lucky number. In eighth grade, my algebra teacher would go around the room in order, asking each student their answer to the previous night’s homework problems. I realized quickly that I didn’t have to do all the problems, just the fifteenth one because my desk was 15th on her list. This worked well until the day she decided to call on kids in random order. When she got to me and asked me the answer to the problem I had not done, I just invented something on the spot. “Uh…six?”

Her: “You mean 0.6, don’t you?”

Me, nodding vigorously: “YES, I DO.”

Her: “Very good. Moving on…”

Do your friends and family know about your fic and, if so, what have been their reactions?

My close friends and family have always known, and reactions have varied from mild befuddlement to enthusiastic support. My father voted in the Spookies one year, and you can believe he read the nominated stories before casting his vote. I think the most common reaction was: Why are you doing this for free? Why aren’t you trying to be a paid writer?

Well, having done both now, I can tell you that each kind of writing brings its own rewards. Fanfic is freeing because there is no pressure to make money from it. You can take risks and try new things and not have to worry if it fits into your business plan.

(Posted by Lilydale on September 15, 2020)

[bigskydreaming]

IGN’s recent Bat-focused article (Batman: What Does Red Hood Need to Do to Get A Good Story?) praises fanfic writers and also is an amazing critique of how stagnant Jason has become under recent DC management and I’m so surprised at how good it is and how well thought out the solutions were

Hmmm. I just looked it up and I mean, I’m not trying to start anything but I both agree and disagree? Like, it makes some points for sure, I mean, its not like its saying things that I haven’t said a thousand times about Dick, like.....these characters need to be allowed access to a full range of emotions, both good and bad, in order to be fully fleshed out, so I mean yes on that premise alone I absolutely agree this is as true for Jason as it is for Dick or anyone else.

Tbh my only real criticism of the piece is it thinks Jason exists in a particular predicament the other characters aren’t in as well. And that I just don’t agree with, like they kinda lost me a bit with their first paragraph:

His complexities and moral ambiguity make him a compelling and distinct character among his more strait-laced Robin-brothers. Sadly, the character has seen little growth since his rage-filled reintroduction into comics. The ‘former Robin becomes a villain’ idea was enough for DC to coast on for a while but since rejoining the heroes, Red Hood has done little else.

First off, this may just be me being pedantic but I’m ALWAYS going to go fetch a grain of salt before continuing reading anything that pits Jason against his brothers in a war of his moral ambiguity against their strait-lacedness. Because to me, that’s just a fundamentally shallow view of the Batfam that caters to the idea that they each must have their own distinct niche in order to be fully viable individual characters, when a) no, and b) they don’t fit neatly into the niches people keep trying to slot them into and it never ends well for anybody. 

Like Jason is morally ambiguous in a lot of ways too, yes, but umm, even if we assume that the writer is only speaking of Dick, Tim and Damian, we’re talking a guy who beat the Joker to death with his bare hands and has ten assassins and mercenaries on his speed dial and who co-led the Outsiders, a guy who was deeply immersed in weighing the pros and cons of getting revenge for his father by getting Captain Boomerang killed and is forever being DMed by Ra’s because he’s convinced he can get Tim to say He Has Some Points Actually, and the kid who was an assassin with a body count by age ten and who has struggled constantly ever since his debut to define his OWN personal view of morality that is not wholly predicated on what he was taught by any single individual.

And this is a big part of where I part ways with the article, because I think it falls into the same trap that a lot of people do by believing fanfic is inherently better by doing the same thing from just a different angle. Fanfic CAN be better than the canon, I absolutely believe that, I believe it is at times, but to do so, it has to like, BE BETTER. It has to do things differently, and not just paint a slightly different veneer over the same things. Like, pedantic though it might be, I outlined the above issue because its a mode of thinking the canon absolutely falls into again and again, and just like the writer of that article themselves, like....I think fandom as a whole is no different? 

Like, yes there are great stories about Jason out there, some writers have done great and interesting things with him, but that doesn’t mean there’s not a huge trend in fandom of doing the exact same thing I see here.....which is honestly a huge part of the exact same problem the article is decrying canon for......LIMITING Jason (and all the Batfam) by reducing them and their stories to finite niches as a way of spotlighting them as different from their siblings.....except they’re not that different! And that’s okay! They don’t have to be! Families can have lots in common, families DO have lots in common due to like.....shared variables during their formative years. 

I mean Jason was heavily influenced by environmental factors in how and where he grew up before he ever met Batman, but like the article goes into itself, he was no less influenced by Bruce himself as his father figure.....which is something he absolutely has in common with his siblings, thus its not hard at all to see how his siblings could have similar complexities and moral struggles that stem from trying to reconcile Bruce’s influence with the many other things and people that have influenced their childhoods.

And similarly, while the article is dead-on about Jason’s stagnancy....this is something that applies in equal measure to the rest of his family, because they’re all facing the same issues in terms of how DC views and utilizes them, and fandom as much as it likes to condemn DC for doing just that....frequently does the same thing. Like, Jason’s stuck in canon, absolutely......but Dick keeps being popped out into his own microcosm to experience a couple years of stories that essentially turn him into completely different characters isolated from every communal part of his character’s history, and then ERASE everything that’s happened at the end of each of these stories and reset him to square one.....and that’s just a different kind of stagnancy that again, still never allows for actual character progression or development. Tim has LITERALLY been regressed back to Robin, like a hard reset that’s its own kind of stagnancy and Damian has had years of character development upended just to kick him back to where he started, effectively strip away all the connections he’s developed at least in any meaningful way, etc.....and the same holds true for Babs and Cass and Steph and even Bruce himself IMO, in a lot of ways.

Its absolutely a problem, but its a problem that extends far beyond just Jason even if he is a great example of it. And its also a problem that extends into fic itself, and that’s why I don’t agree with a lot of the conclusions that article draws beyond just the fundamental “these characters need to be allowed access to a full range of emotions.”

Yes. That. That right there, THAT I think is crucial, but I think that writer needed to widen the scope a little to take in the full impact of what that actually MEANS for the characters....so as to not accidentally repeat the same problem they’re being critical of by essentially arguing for a full range of emotions for Jason....while still defining or viewing Jason through a finite lens of “the more morally ambiguous Bat character, at least as compared to his brothers.”

Because its that last part that’s so detrimental, because it seems like such a little thing at first, until you realize that essentially its just putting a ceiling, a cap on how far those full ranges of emotions can be expressed. Like the problem with Dick Grayson in canon and fanon is NOT that he can’t be written with a full range of emotions.....its that his character absolutely can encompass a wide range of opinions and viewpoints and emotional stances from “I don’t believe in killing as a first option” to “I absolutely can, will, and have beaten a damn clown to death for joking about murdering my brother”.....and he can still walk away as Dick Grayson after expressing both those things, because his character is big enough to include them both. HE’S not limited as a character, its canon writers and fandom writers that both heap artificial limitations of their OWN on him, say that his character is so defined in such a specific way that there’s no way for the latter expression of his character to actually be IN character.....and the fatal flaw here is fully fleshed out characters are never just one thing. They don’t fit in niches anymore than people do, and notice the problems we all run into when we try and pigeon hole people as being just one thing, like humans can’t be contradictory or act against their own self-interest or be hypocritical or evolve or even regress past prior viewpoints....basically, any time you try and sum up a human being in one line, no matter how accurate that description is, there’s still SOME things that are going to be left out of that picture. 

Now, these things don’t always have to matter that much, like if I look at a serial killer and say that’s a serial killer, like, I might be leaving out of the picture that once he helped an old lady across the street and didn’t kill her and he doesn’t even know why, and I for one, simply do not care that I leave that out of the picture. Its irrelevant to the big picture for me. I can acknowledge that it adds a smidgen of nuance to that particular picture and then go yeah but also I don’t care, nuance denied.

But in terms of fictional characters, these things that get left in the discard pile when we try and sum up characters as just one thing, like, they can be hugely significant, because characters unlike real people, are simply WHAT WE MAKE OF THEM. That stuff that’s been left out of the big picture look at that character because its stuff most people to DEFINE what that character looks like have deemed irrelevant....its still there, and still perfectly relevant for anyone who wants to pick that stuff up and make something of it, use it to change the overall picture or even just point to ways and places that picture can absolutely encompass and include these other elements and STILL fundamentally be that same picture, that same character.

And this isn’t to say that characters can never be written out of character, its to say that usually IMO what ACTUALLY makes the difference between something being out of character and something just being an unexpected but still valid character choice is just.....how these things are executed. The latter is when writers make the effort to JUSTIFY their character choice, to sell audiences on why and how this is absolutely something this character would do, to take them on a journey of what led the character to making this choice and let them see how those steps actually line up, that’s an actual journey that character might take. The former is when writers just don’t bother and are just like, well here’s a thing that character did, and you know it was in character because well that’s the character and that’s what I wrote them doing lol, what more do you want. No. Yawn. Next.

But the trick is if you’re going to try and make a character a SPECTRUM of emotions and choices rather than just a same datapoint recurring over and over again endlessly, a literal sticking point that never advances, never progresses, never changes......you have to actually give that character free range to utilize that spectrum of emotions and choices.....not just confine them to accessing all those possibilities but ONLY within a narrowly defined niche that is its own kind of limitation.

A character can START from a logline, absolutely. Can BEGIN in a narrative niche as a way to INTRODUCE them as seemingly different from their surroundings or their peers when they do not yet have the backstory, the evidence of past stories and character choices readers can use to interpret their actions or guess their choices.....but narrative niches, IMO, are meant to have a shelf life, an expiration date. They’re a seed for characters to grow FROM, to grow PAST, not return to over and over again.....because that’s when a niche just becomes another house that stagnancy built.

Anyway, thanks for the thoughts and the article mention.....it was an interesting exploration of thoughts for me even if I didn’t ultimately agree with a lot of what was already said....still a worthwhile read though I think and I mean hey, its cool if you still agree with it more even if I don’t, lol. This is just my take.

[aloera]

The ask prompt is too long to fit into an ask TT_TT but here's the doc for it docs(.)google(.)com/document/d/1yDI7iFRhOJ8ENv_IwZAo3rDSUqj80EiJROS10RzRbj4/edit

the lengths u are going for this,,, much appreciated you're very sweet!!!

prompts + answers under the cut!!

INTRODUCTION

Name: aloera

AO3 account: aloera

Fandoms you write for: bnha

How many stories have you written so far: 19

FANFICTION PROFILE

What's your favorite fandom to write for? hmm,,, used to do pjo and eah (ever after high) and eah was fun as fuck i will say!!! i think bnha is my fav mostly bc i made the most friends in this fandom :D

What's your favorite character/person to write for? bkg and kirishima!! cannot choose do not make me <3

Fic you'd want to improve? probably what we deserve? i rushed the beginning and the confession is a bit stilted imo

Hardest fic you've written? between lion and men -_- bc there is so much canon compliant stuff i've gotta write out before i get to the divergence and its HARD

Easiest fic you've written? come home to me!!! it happened so easily,,, no second guessing no writers block just vibes <33 was lovely i miss it

What would you say is the most "famous" fic you've ever written? also probably come home to me? its got the most interaction

first line of the first fic you've ever written and published. [not including my 2014 ffnet fics] "The bell rings, class starts, and Katsuki and Midoriya are inexplicably absent." from come home to me

Have you ever done a collab with another writer? yes!!!!! on two separate occasions and its so fucking fun i highly recommend trying it out its the best

Do you beta? if asked but honestly im a shit beta lmao

Do you like joining fic fests/exchanges? depends on what i have going on irl but in general yeah!!

FANFICTION PREFERENCES

Fluff or angst? definitely fluff

"OCs" or "Reader" inserts? reader inserts!! have been going ham on them recently

Blurbs or drabbles? blurbs!!

One thing you love about fanfiction i just. i really love slice of life romance?? and most media doesn't give you that bc its dedicated to plot and action and that's valid!! but fanfiction fills in the gap which is really nice

One thing you don't like about fanfiction most of the stuff i don't like is less about actual fanfiction and more about how people behave about it

What is/are your favorite fandom author/authors? IVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS ONE!!! TURN IT UP!!!

bnha: hiuythn, rae_tnub, Moniix, Ata_Lanta, wrunic, chezka, PurplePersnickety, surveycorpsejean, mahadevi, arxaris, deviance, Oceanbreeze7, MikeWritesThings, bonnia, wonhaebunny, dinosuns

voltron: hiuythn, Oceanbreeze7, DeerstalkerDeathFrisbee, arahir, dinosuns,

and honorable mention to loveclouds im not even in the haikyuu fandom i just love their fics So Much

these are just the ones off the top of my head i have so many favourites idc if i'm only supposed 2 have one!! die mad about it!!!

What is your favorite trope? secret relationship + relationship reveal til the day i die babie <3 <3

Least favorite trope? hm,,, probably just like. angst lmao i cannot stand 90% of it

A fanfiction cliché that you can't help but love? coffeeshop aus,,,, so good

Do you have a type when it comes to pairings? the otp where its like. piece of shit + himbo = love. ex. krbk, catradora, jade/beck

Favorite setting/au? hm,,, truly i cannot pick one KGKSJNHKj but i really like college aus!! and modern aus!! and roommate aus!!

Explain the meaning of your favorite line of dialogue you've written as if someone hasn't read it in context. “He doesn’t know,” Katsuki says, softly. “My timer stopped and nothing happened. He’s not mine.”

the line is from what we deserve!! it's a soulmate au where your timer counts down to the moment that you meet your soulmate!! bakugou's timer ends at USJ when he and kirishima attack kurogiri at the same time (impulsive kings <33) but kirishima's timer doesn't end until kamino because that's when he accepts himself as bakugous soulmate!! unfortunately, when bakugous timer has reached 0, he turned to see that kirishima's was still ticking and therefore believes that kirishima isn't his soulmate.

this line just,, idk. it's really sad. bakugou is such an action-driven character? if something doesn't go his way he Makes it go his way. he's got this insanely volatile quirk and he's got impeccable control of it!! but his love for kirishima isn't something that he can change and he's not going to ruin kirishima's chance of finding his own soulmate because he loves him and wants him to be happy. i really wanted to focus on how resigned he is? and how unusual that is for a character like him.

Favorite trope/genre to write? again, secret relationship with relationship reveals <33 fluff in general is my wheelhouse!!!

A trope/genre you haven't written but think would be a fun challenge? idk if this counts?? have been working on some dead dove concepts!! its super different from what i normally write so its a cool challenge

The one trope/concept you'll never touch and why probably cheating/infidelity?? it just looks,,, super difficult to write well and i don't have enough of an interest in it to try it out

Which do you prefer to write: longer or shorter fics? shorter!! low attention span gang <3

Ideal length to read? 5-10k?

Ideal length to write? 4-8k!!

How long was the longest fic you've ever written? control fraek is around 28k i think?

Have you ever written an AU? yeah!! i've done restaurant au's, soulmate au's, pro hero aus, and fantasy aus (general, not the bnha fantasy ending)

What's your favorite AU trope? hm,, probably when two people in authority are in a secret relationship? ceo's/uni professors/etc etc

Have you ever written smut? yeah!! was. difficult tho

What's your comfort genre? (the one you fall on most in writing/reading) fluff,,, hurt/comfort,,, fix-it fics with happy endings <3

If you were to start writing in other fandoms, which would they be? maybe jjk?? the characters are really cool!!!! fr i might go back to my ever after high roots i love the characters and setting so Much its so fun!!! idec if no ones into it anymore!!!!!

Is there a trope you think you could be easily recognized by in your writing? i've had people say they saw the mention of buff hagakure and recognized it was me so. probably that skdjhnksjd

WRITING STYLE

How would you describe your style? i tend to use shorter sentences and pretty simple words i think? and i gravitate towards lighthearted concepts that allow for ensemble casts and humour!!

Describe your style in three words romcom but fanfic

Favorite words to use when writing? the word reverent!! fuckin love including it!!

Dialogue tags or no dialogue tags? (she said, he said, they said, etc) dialogue tags!!!

Favorite dialogue tag (other than said, if you use them) again idk if this counts but "they said softly" is unmatched

Long sentences vs short vs a mix short <33

What colors would you use to describe your writing? hm,,, depends on the fic i would say?? control fraek is dark green to me?? kinda like a forest at night yk?? scary but there's still life there. sugar cookies is yellow like early morning sunlight, when it rains is yellowy-orange like a caution sign. not gonna list all of them cause theres a lot its just. do u get it? the colours change based on the vibe of the fic.

What song or music genre would you use to describe your writing? think. i am constantly trying to emulate that moment at the end of wasteland baby when hozier goes "im in love/im in love with you."

What kind of metaphors do you rely on? religious metaphors my beloved <33 they're just so pretty!!! i also love comparing stuff to water for some reason?? like that ocean vuong quote thats like "what are you now?/water." it goes hard!!!

What's something you'd say is experimental in your writing at this time? definitely action!! i have,,, no idea how to write it so anything i do is really just me playing around and seeing what works and what doesn't

Do you prefer to write by hand or to type? i've tried both!! personally i prefer typing because it goes way faster but i will say that writing by hand lets me get words down when i'm going through writer's block

What is your preferred place to write (notebook, laptop, cellphone, etc.)? laptop!!

What app/apps do you use to write (word, notepad, etc.)? google docs skjdnkjh its fine on desktop but mobile is,,,,, disgusting

Do you keep a notebook or file/notes page in your phone/device for notes on your writing? ngl i just have everything organized in my drive?? one folder per fandom and then sub folders for ideas+hcs, unfinished wips, and finished fics. multichaps get sub sub folders so i can organize outlines and drafts

Do you listen to music to help you write? yeah!! playlists organized by fic vibe :D

Where do you usually go to write (bedroom, living room, etc.)? mostly in my bedroom??? but moving around to different stops helps too i think!!

How long does it usually take for you to write? again this depends on what i have going on irl, how attached i am to the idea, my mindset at the time, etc!! i am,, the least consistent person skjnhdkjh.

What's your favorite font to use when writing? times new roman my beloved

Other writing habits? sometimes i'll write in the dark?? bad for my eyes but for some reason it gets the words flowing

CONCEPTUALIZATION

How do you conceptualize your ideas? (See specific moments like they're a movie, writing specific lines in your head, don't know until you put the words on paper, etc.) i tend to get inspiration from movies, books, poems, or other fics!!! sometimes one line just makes me go oh,, i want to write something like that,,, and then it helps me create an idea that makes me feel the same way?? i did this with control fraek!!!! i wanted a scenario where bakugou was cold and calculating and i was like hm. to do that he’d have to be focusing on something important. and from there i was able to flesh out the rest of the idea.

Which comes first: the pairing or the plot? with krbk its always always the pairing,, i'll be sitting there like wow <33 i love them <33 what if one of them had amnesia <33 (which, yes, wip!!) otherwise it's usually the plot!! and i slot in characters that i feel make sense

Have you ever used a prompt? yeah!! used a prompt for wlw week 2020 and it was fun as hell

Do you write around the story around a specific scene you want to get to or do you start from a plot idea definitely the first!!!! i almost always write like,,, a super messy scene thats 90% dialogue, keep it in my head, and then write the entire fic around that one moment

Do you find that you include a projection of some part of yourself in the way you write a character? a lot of the time when i write love confessions or love in general i'll have one of the characters think or say that the other person makes their head quiet? and it's because that's what i feel whenever i'm in love?? a quiet mind. i project on characters yeah but i think most of the projection actually goes to the way that i write love

Do you research some of the things you write deeply, partially and kind of wing the rest, or play entirely by ear (in this case, go with whatever base knowledge of the subject you have)? most of the time if i do research it'll be about the setting (ex. the izakaya in to have and to hold) or if i'm having the characters interact with an object that they like. need to know how to use (me, in control fraek: google. hey google. does someone die if they get shot in the foot??? no???? awesome thank u <3)

Have you ever had an idea for a story and forgot about it? lmaoo yeah all the time i'll find like 500-2k words of concepts in my gdocs like i do. not remember this at all

Is there a trope you think you could be easily recognized by in your writing? probably krbk secret relationship lmao

Are there concepts you've tried that turned out better than expected? yeah!! i fully thought the action in control fraek would be awful but it turned out not bad??? which im happy with

Are there concepts you've tried that turned out worse than you expected? again, what we deserve, i personally think it would have worked out better if i'd paced it slower and drawn out the pining but i. do not feel like going back to fix it so its staying the way that it is. pining is so fucking hard to do AHHHH i get so tired with it!!! im like just date already!!!!

PROCESS

How do you come up with titles? in rare occasions (literally. all my multichaps for some reason) the title comes after writing like .5 words of the first chapter im like YES this is it!!!!! sometimes i write the whole thing and pick out one line that fits (what i did with come home to me) a lot of the time i just. steal from songs or poems that i like

What's your favorite emotion to cause on your readers? i like making people happy!!!! love when people comment saying they're cheered up

What's your favorite emotion to write? lovelovelovelovelovelove

Have you ever cried or felt any emotion while reading something you've written? never cried?? but sometimes i'll rereading my hurt/comfort fics 4. yk. comfort

Do you write in order or whatever comes to you? in order!! unless i have a scene that i Need to write and i'll quickly jot it down so that i don't forget

Usual way you procrastinate while writing? ...doing asks like this, making playlists, discord, watching netflix. what don't i do smh

Do you outline or free write? i am. so shit at outlines. i mostly free write and write lil notes for stuff that i wanna add later

Do you set word goals or scene goals (scenes you want to include)? yes!! like i said i'll write loose notes for scenes that i want to add later!! it gives me something to write towards :D

What do you consider when writing your scenes? what goes into making the atmosphere and mood you want? to set a scene i do two things? the first is like,, the five senses bc that always sets the scene really well and makes it feel Real. i'll visualize stuff in my head like its a movie and write out what i would want to tell the set designer?? if the lights are low, if the space is busy, if it's supposed to exude comfort or not.

for putting forward the character's mood one thing i've found that makes a difference is sentence length!! long sentences are good for making a character seem flustered and nervous or not really in control of their emotions? good for love confessions. short sentences are good for when the character is focused on something or short on time. good for fights!!

What's something you never considered to include in your writing that you can't leave out now? def buff hagakure,,,, once i thought of it i was like. if i don't include this at least once in every single fic how could i look at myself in the mirror!!!!!! how could i face anyone!!!!

How do you start a story? establishing a fact about the character or describing the setting! option a is one single thread of gold, option b is between lion and men

How do you end a story? either by tying it back to the beginning or doing like a funny kind of closing??? option a is sugar cookies, option b is a godless society

How do you get out of writer's block? change something!! move something!! i go from typing to handwriting, moving from my bedroom to my living room, switching wips to work on something else!! i do sprints as well?? give myself like fifteen minutes to write something and sometimes 200 words opens up the way for another 2k. sometimes i'll just delete like 500 words and start fresh

Do you edit? or do you toss your writing out there? i edit!!! i'll go over it myself then send it to one or two betas (bee my beloved <33)

How do you edit? do you use spellcheck, grammar checkers, etc? bee is my grammar checker bc he is So Good with grammar. i use grammarly as well for spellcheck stuff mostly?? sometimes my edit process is just like "am i tired of looking at this!! yes <3" and then i post it

PROGRESS

Do you usually like what you write? yeah!!! i post stuff that makes me happy and that i'm fine with rereading!!! i write stuff for self-indulgence reasons first and foremost and i think my writing reflects that sjhnksj

Have you ever written something you didn't like but posted anyways? nope!! even what we deserve i LIKED even if i see a lot of room 4 improvement!! if i don't like smth it's not getting posted

Do you find yourself rereading your writing often? yeah!! the reason i wrote so much krbk secret relationship is because i loved it but i'd read all that there was so i just,, wrote more,, ngl its kinda nice being in a place where i actually like my writing bc i can write stuff that i want to see and really enjoy it!!

Can you tell us anything about your current WIP? sure!! i'm currently working on when it rains which is a fic where bakugou gets hit by a crying quirk!! i'm gonna be using it to explore So Much of all might's character and his relationships with bakugou and aizawa (and i think some people from his past!!)

Can you give us a sneak peek on your current WIP? “You did something. What the hell did you do?” Kirishima sounds pissed off. It would amuse Katsuki if he wasn’t fighting just to stay standing.

“Nothing he didn’t ask for,” Shinsou replies.

“K’ri… shima,” Katsuki croaks out. “‘S fine. Not him.”

His chest collapses back into the familiar dry heaving after that but Kirishima shuts up. He doesn’t apologize to Shinsou.

Kirishima’s a good friend, stubborn and loyal. He stands by Katsuki’s side like an attack dog, blocking him from the view of anyone ogling at his tears.

The last line you've written Ochako knows more than she'd realized. She knows enough to keep her guard up.

It’s not enough.

Open a wip. what’s the first line?

Katsuki wakes up feeling like absolute fucking shit.

INSIGHT

What's your favorite thing about writing? touched on this before but it's mainly just being able to write the things that i want to see and actually enjoy them!!! actually reread them!!!! i thought "wouldn't it be cool if bkg and kirishima owned a restaurant together" and then i wrote it and i like it enough to reread it!!!! being able to create content for myself makes me. so happy

How do you keep yourself inspired? this is gonna sound narcissistic maybe but honestly i'm just really excited about my ideas and where i'm gonna take them and the idea of "i'm gonna get to That scene" keeps me going through the entire thing. also my friends!!!! i'll talk to them about fics and their reactions keep me hyped up enough to finish!!!!

What is your favorite thing to write? just,, slice of life romance,,, stuff thats silly and makes people laugh!!

What do you think your strengths are in writing? i'm good with dialogue!! i do lil voice acting sessions with myself to make sure everything sounds natural and like it's coming from that character skhjnskj

i'm comfortable with my portrayal of love as well??? i spend a lot of time thinking about what it is exactly that i'm trying to get across and i think it turns out well!!

What are things you wish you could practice more? on one hand i wanna get better at writing angst on the other hand i dislike writing angst. do you see my issue

One way you've improved your writing since you began? characterization!! i think i've gotten better at writing characters that are all Different and bring different things to the table!!! i used to project a lot more and it would compromise the characterization because the character was like 70% me and 30% them? not to say that projection is bad but if you do it too much it just,, doesn't read like the character and from a reader's standpoint the narrative can become less compelling

One aspect of writing you're still working on? writing action!!! i. literally hate writing it but i write for a fandom about superheroes so. Unfortunately i gotta learn.

A piece of writing advice you've learned while writing saw this on another tumblr post but they said sometimes if you're struggling with a scene, the problem is five lines back. i've found that to be true!!!! sometimes u gotta delete a chunk and start a little ways back!! i did this with too busy being yours because i was stuck for Weeks and i deleted like 25% of what i had but it helped me actually finish it :D

A bit of writing advice you can't stand when people shit on show don't tell for being overrated lmao bc when u read their writing you can Tell

Something you wish you knew when you first started writing? ,,,,honestly i kind of wish i could know some of the stuff that i used to when i first started writing?? technically i'm better now but creatively i was must better when i wasn't stressing about whether anyone would like what i was writing. so i guess i wish i knew that i should keep that confidence? i kinda wish that i wasn't as insecure about other people's writing styles because i never used to be!!

Something you've learned in life that you apply in writing there's no point in feeling inferior?? writing one genre isn't better than the other. being in one fandom isn't better than being in another. the kind of language you use or the length of your paragraphs- none of that stuff like. matters. what matters is that you're having fun and happy with what you're creating!!!! enjoy other peoples writing but don't let it make you feel worse about yours :D

[colour-outside-the-liness]

Oh Disneyland Paris sounds fun yeah! Were you and your roommate already close then? I went to Walt Disney's world with my aunt and cousin when I was like 11 but it would've been way more fun if I could've taken my best friend with me for sure. Maybe we can go to the one in Paris now that she lives just 3h away from me! Oh I see, sounds like LA was really fun for you yeah! your roommate didn't mind third wheeling tho? Hahaha

Yeah Canada is beautiful but what I liked about it the most was the massive improvement in quality of life I had compared to where I was living before and just being able to be who I am and people accepting me for it. Not being worried about violence 24/7 felt pretty fucking great too. So yeah I highly recommend living there if you ever get a chance. But I am loving Portugal so far, people are a bit more judgemental here tho but I like that it's easier to travel to a lot of countries I've always wanted to go to. Everywhere you go there are pros and cons tho so sorting out priorities is key. But Toronto is my favourite of all the places I've been, before living there for a year I had already been two times!

Jesus 50 states, sometimes I forget how big the US is. And you can totally do it if you plan it out! After watching Bly Manor tho I really want to go to Vermont especially during autumn season looks really pretty! There's this fic I love (only the sun by prestonarchives) where Dani and Jamie go on a road trip from Vermont to Maine and I did their entire journey on Google maps street view bc I was so obsessed with this one chapter fanfic I had to immerse myself entirety in it hahaha. So now I want to go there irl. Here's the link if you haven't read it before!

https://bit.ly/3BLy4WR

Omg I totally remember reading that on CBML and being a bit confused bc I was like why would she think you can't see the moon from the great wall of China HAHAHA but I thought it was really funny and endearing yeah it's even funnier now that I know you said it irl haha.

Oh so ENFP-T means extraverted, intuitive, feeling and prospecting personality with a bit of turbulence. Which just means you're curious, perceptive, enthusiastic, an excellent communicator, festive and good-natured. On the other hand you can be disorganized, unfucosed, a people pleaser, overcommitted, too optimistic and restless.

I wonder what Jamies and Danis mbti are as well as their zodiac signs 🤔 I think Jamie might be an ISTP-A bc she's definitely an introvert, very practical, stubborn, assertive, layed back and energetic at the same time. And Dani is either an ENFP-T like you or an ESFJ-T with the whole selfless thing going on.

AE already made it canon that Jamie's an aries (and it makes sense) but I can't figure Dani out. I've thought about her being a leo ♌ bc she's generous, passionate, warm-harted and dominant in her own way and THE HAIR haha. But she's got some pisces ♓ vibes going on too...idk. aaand I'm back at it again with the astrology signs haha.

To be fair your recent drunken exp it was dark and at least you didn't think the road sign was a bear or something (don't know what kind of wild animals you've got over there) that you wrestled with and ended up in a ditch and your best friend let you believe that happened for 3 years up until recently haha. 😂 but yeah some things happen for a reason, having life threatening health issues doesn't sound great tho, but I guess it's a good thing it stops you from drinking too much and making dumb decisions. And hey maybe I secretly want that to happen again idk maybe moving countries is not exciting enough, I have to go out and make a complete drunken fool out of myself in a completely foreign place hahaha. I guess that did kinda happen last month when my best friend came to visit me from Spain and we got drunk on wine, I got lost on the way back home and it was way past curfew. 🤔 shit I'm 29 will I ever learn...

Episode 9 is 😢😍🥰😰😭🤬☠️ just the worst roller-coaster I didn't even know I was on. Haha I was more pissed off than heartbroken the first time I watched it ngl.

Well then maybe the way you do accents is friendly and funny so people can't really get mad at you haha. Like Dani! Oh so that's called a Geordie accent! I see, it's really really cool. AE said Jamie is from Lancashire but that's a whole county isn't it? Idk if there's a specific accent to this region. Knowing you speak kinda like Jamie is something else tho, I think if anyone who spoke like her ever talked to me irl I wouldn't be able to pay attention to what they were saying 😂 just the accent haha.

Oh so you already have 4k something words for it nice. I'm kinda starting to feel an obsession with this medieval AU growing in me, I made a Pinterest board just for it ngl hahaha but I'm still resisting creating anything for it, I did a face study yesterday for Dani and Jamie to see if I finally pick up the idea and just do it but my brain was still like "I don't want to do this rn" and was just being a little bitch about it so I'll just let it cook for longer see if we can reach an agreement eventually (if ever) haha.

Glad to hear you had a good weekend! Even if it left you feeling exhausted in the end. And yeah it makes sense for you to say you don't have favourites haha! Have a great week Colour, take care! 👋✨

Yeah me and my roommate have been friends since we were like 14 so when we went to Disney Land we asked if we could be roomed together because we've been best friends for that long now... been best friends since school and now we live together. She's seen me at my best, my worst, has seen me in all my stages in life and has been there for a lot of the rough stuff I've been through and I've been there for all the stuff she's been through!! Nah she didn't mind at all we had some moments where me and my ex would just go and be a couple and have dates but my ex didn't want me travelling that far alone so invited my roommate too because she didn't like the thought of me flying 11hours alone or being in airports alone so my roommate came with me and we had a great time Awwh good I'm glad it was such a nice place and that you didn't worry about violence all the time but I'm so sorry you ever had to worry about that anyway that can't be easy. I would honestly love to live in Canada I really hope I get chance one day... I'm glad you're loving Portugal but sorry people are judgemental there but I am glad it's easy for you to travel around to other places... oh yeah every place has it's pros and cons I mean England has some pros but it sure has a lot of cons too so I know all about that Yeah America is SO big but I do want to get around all 50 states at some point and I am stubborn enough and determined enough to make it happen eventually even if I don't get around them all until I'm like 70 I'll make it happen haha!! No I haven't read that fic but it sounds amazing so I'll definitely check it out thank you for sending me the link Yeah... that really happened to me and it was just a dumb moment where I had this momentary lapse of knowledge in my brain and now I look back at that question and I'm just like... "you idiot" and this is why people are shocked when I get questions in quizzes right because I have said some really dumb stuff but I'm glad people found it funny and endearing... and I'm glad it makes it better to know I really said that haha Oooo I didn't know that, I like that and I think it's definitely fitting for me!! I think from what you've said about what ENFP-T means Dani could easily be that too and I don't know anything about the other one but I will take your word for it matching Dani because you know way more about this stuff than I do. I have no idea for Jamie though. And with zodiac signs I love that Amelia looked at Jamie and thought she was an Aries, as for Dani I have NO idea what her zodiac would be... in CBML she's a Leo but in MoU with what I have planned for her birthday she'd be a virgo but I don't know anything about zodiacs... all I know is all the pieces I've ever met have been the opposite of what Dani is so maybe that has something to do with their whole charts but I know a lot of other people always make her a Pieces and I trust what other people say about zodiacs more than what I know about them because I really know NOTHING about them haha Nah I knew it was a road sign because of how heavy and hard it was- nah we have no bears where I live... I don't think we have many dangerous animals where I live... got a couple of badgers that can be pretty aggressive but that's about it we don't have much that is scary here or at least not in the little part of England I live. Having life threatening health issues has been hard and since having my spleen removed in January (that was the surgery I needed to try and fix the issue I had) things are even harder now because I have to take antibiotics for the rest of my life to stop me getting any infections because if I ever get a chest infection now or a really bad cold it can be really dangerous but I take it all in my stride and not drinking is just a way to make sure the antibiotics actually work properly and to make sure nothing happens to me... and like you said, means I don't do anything dumb too... haha drunken stories are the best I have been lost a few times when I've been drunk... and I don't think you do learn, I have siblings that are

like 40 and still do dumb shit... I know at 27 I am still doing dumb shit too I don't think I'll ever learn haha 😂 Its such an emotional roller coaster and honestly I was just devastated the first time I watched it... no TV show or movie has ever made me cry the way Bly Manor did when I first saw it and it still makes me cry now. I can cry just thinking about that last episode. I definitely mean it in a friendly way so I hope it comes across like that. Yeah the accent in Billy Elliot is a Geordie accent and its my favourite accent there are other accents around the north that are called different things. Yeah Lancashire is a county and again in Lancashire there are loads of different accents I can't really pinpoint Jamie's down to a city I just know it's Northern. I'm from Yorkshire but don't have a strong Yorkshire accent I just have a Northern accent, like people never believe I'm from the place I'm from because I don't sound like I am but you can definitely tell I'm northern... honestly there are so many accents in England... you can drive for two hours in any direction in England and the accent will change like two times at least it's insane... see a lot of people say that but I am not a HUGE fan of the northern accent and I think it's because I grew up there. I much prefer Dani's accent to Jamie's but like I said to me, Jamie just talks normal there is no accent really haha Yeah 4k words for it but it's all jumbled up it's not like a chronological story yet it's just all over the place haha but I hope I can get it all structured properly soon!! Awwh good I'm glad you're already interested in this medieval AU!! That makes sense you're resisting creating for it but I think it's so cool you did a face study for Dani and Jamie even if you didn't wanna finish it I think letting things cook for a while is always a good idea if you're not in the right headspace right away I had such a good weekend but I am so tired and today I had a busy day too celebrating my roommate's boyfriend's birthday so I've had so many days that have been so busy and right now I am just really to sleep haha!! Yeah definitely don't have favourites but I have spent more time with one of my nieces than the others simply because I always look after her if her mum and dad are working and I'm not... like until I start this new job I am looking after her for an hour every day after school while she waits for her mum and dad to finish work but I don't have favourites haha!! Thank you so much I hope you had a great weekend and that you have a great week too!!

[ryqoshay]

For the fic ask: 4 and/or 18

4. Favorite story you’ve ever written?

That’s... honestly a harder question than I thought it would be when first skimming the list. I’ve loved many of my stories for very different reasons. Sometimes it is because how much fun I had writing it, while others it is because it was more difficult. Sometimes it is because I got a lot of reader interaction, while other times it was just one really good comment or tag. And many, many times, it was the amount of self-indulgence I put into something; spending way too much time naming someone or something, scouring thesaurus.com for the perfect word to complete some alliteration, or hiding some sort of Easter egg, even if I know most readers will never find it.

Also, the little lawyer in the back of my mind wants to discuss the definition of story. If we are talking about full entries over on AO3, HtHaN is a fairly clear winner, as one need look no further than its word count compared to my other works. I’ve spent a heck of a lot more time writing and even just thinking about HtHaN than any other work I’ve produced. I think it even surpassed my D&D stuff a while back.

However, I define HtHaN - and most of my other works on AO3 - as a collection of short stories/arcs. Thus, I should probably look to pick a single chapter.

And with a quick scan through the list of chapters, one very quickly stood out. I was thinking I may have to scan the chapter lists of my other fics or even review some of my D&D stuff, but no, it very much is that one chapter. Maybe it was easier to choose than I thought.

Jizenka

This will probably end up pretty long, so the rest is going under the cut.

First and foremost, Jizenka was among the first of my readers, and remains to this day in the top rankings for enthusiasm and encouragement. I can say with certainty that I would not be where I am as an author of LL fanfic were it not for Jizenka. HtHaN would have remained a small, questionably meme-like post among many other volleys in a meme war on a little Love Live fan site. It would have been forgotten in a few days and I would have moved on to other things.

Happy Life, HtHaM, Happy Life (AU) and Tri-Arame probably would have never even crossed my mind. Heck, in some parallel universe, there might be a version of me who left the LL fandom after the primary µ’s content had concluded - SIFAS or A Song for You! You? You!! may have brought me back - and never bothered figuring out a shipping fleet for Aqours or Niji.

Instead, something was sparked back in July of 2016 - jebas, it’s been a while - and I started my journey with LL fanfic. Whether Jizenka was the flint or the kindling or both may be up for debate, but she certainly contributed something.

And whatever that something was, it was what I wished to honor and commemorate with my HtHaN chapter, Jizenka.

I jammed a lot into that chapter. I wanted to include things I knew Jizenka had liked about NicoMaki as well as references to ongoing themes and trends that I had established in other chapters. I didn’t want it to just be a memory of Jizenka, but also something she would have enjoyed reading in its own right.

I’m pretty sure that chapter was the genesis of Egao’s Pro Bono Idoli project, even if I hadn’t named it at that point. Free concerts in a hospital and an outreach program to fledgling idol groups in the HtHaN universe came into being with that idea. And by the gods do I have notes for future stuff to write along those lines.

And finally, all authors include a bit of themselves in the works. We almost kind of have to; we can only write what we know, after all. But I think there is more of “me” in that chapter than in anything else I have ever written. I have recently claimed HtHaN 10 and Tri-Arame: RPG Night as being among my most self-indulgent works, but Jizenka may top them, though in a very different way.

So yeah, though it was quite the bittersweet experience both writing and posting that chapter, and it still stirs my emotions when I skim it or reread it in earnest, I can confidently claim it as my favorite story from among those I’ve written.

18. Favorite character to write?

Well, to refer back to HtHaN having the highest word count of any fic I’ve written, and knowing how much time and thought I’ve dedicated to its primary pairing, and continue to happily dedicate to this day, I can definitively say it’s a tie between Maki and Nico.

Yuu, Setsuna and Ayumu are currently giving Riko and Yohane some stiff competition for their place in second. YohaRiko definitely has the advantage of time, so after the “newness” of YuuAyuSetsu wears off, we’ll see where they all stand. But I’m fairly confident that NicoMaki will retain their position in first.

I’d love to claim that Ryqoshay and Yozakura are my favorites, but they’re OCs in a story that I’ve never made public and haven’t actively worked on in far too many years. Perhaps as I write another chapter or two of translating it through a game being played in Tri-Arame, I’ll rekindle something and start back up with those characters and their stories.

[kuvvydraws]

I'm not sure if you've answered this question already, but I'm honestly very curious- why do you write fanfiction? I certainly enjoy it as much as you and have written a few things of my own, but I know it can be quite a personal topic for many writers. If it's too personal for you, don't feel any pressure to answer, but it's always interesting to see the writer's perspective outside of the story they've written :). I hope you understand what I'm trying to say-

Hey!

I actually enjoy the words and the rush your brain gets when they join without effort to create a reality.

Now, let me break that down XD

I've always had a book in my hands as far as my memory goes. My dad used to read to me when I was very little and from the second I could do it on my own, that was the best thing ever (yes, that means when I was punished for doing some shit, my books were taken away and I had to sneak them into my schoolbag and read in class like a heathen).

Not only I enjoyed books but I always found myself wanting to partake in the stories, and my brain was always running with the words and the scenes. (I discovered during my teenage years that brains have different ways to process thoughts and mine did it in words, so writing just sort of came naturally to me at that point in my life).

I discovered ffnet when I was 12, I think, but I had tried my hand at original works (that is, about five or six starts of different novels that never saw the light) and some "fanfiction" (about Nightmare Before Christmas because I had a big ass crush on Jack and I unassumingly created my first xReader ever) without knowing what the hell I was doing.

I just knew I wanted to write stuff and I did as much.

The thing is, I introduced one of my friends, who also loved to read and write, to ffnet, and we started writing together. The first thing we wrote was a Sesshomaru x OC fic, the second one was a Sasori x OC fic, and we dipped out toes into some Kuroshitsuji x OC...... all of them handwritten stories we promised we would type in a computer eventually (we didn't, they were horrible [I still have the notebooks we used for each of them and they are cringey as fuck]).

But we wrote for ourselves and we were happy like that.

So we were rampant and wild and having the best time. Back then I still wrote in Spanish (because I hardly knew any English and I didn't care for it), and I remember mixing Spain's Spanish with the ones from South America because obviously the percentage of writers in ffnet who used a different "dialect" Spanish was huge if you compare a single, tiny country with a whole continent.

At the same time I wrote with my friend, I wrote for myself. Naruto, Kuroshitsuji, Bleach, Hetalia.... And I met so many people, nice people, who loved my works (they were random fics, all of them x OC because I didn't know x Reader ones were a thing -they weren't at that time, and x Reader are harder to write in Spanish because all the words and pronouns are gendered one way or another-) and I got so much enjoyment from sharing them.

The thing about books I love the most is the fact that you can convey so many emotions with a few symbols, and you can create worlds out of ink and you can change views and inspire others. So, if none of my dumbass teenage novels were to roam the word, I still could share, in a free, open and fast way, my words with others.

Again, I was going to write them with or without posting them because I found -and still find- great pleasure when a scene creates itself in your brain and all you have to do to make it real is to write it down. (Sometimes my brain still does this and even when I'm daydreaming, my imagination is "written, described and dialogued" as if someone was reading a novel out loud. It makes writing so much easier).

And then I got hate.

I somehow had managed to miss all of the fandom drama that's so toxic in the internet because I didn't bother to interact with anyone in the fandoms beyond the reviews they left in my fics, and ffnet has a -sort of- specific search engine to help you find whatever you want, so I could never willingly find the "problematic stuff" because I was literally not trying to find it.

The hate comment I got was anonymous and very specific about everything that was wrong in a particular fic I had just updated -from plot and characterization to grammar and continuity-, and later on I discovered it came from a couple of authors who shared an account and who I admired greatly for their works. Turns out they were out for blood and hating on every fic that had updated that week and that had any members of their OTP shipped with some other character. (It was a Hetalia fanfic, I was writing SpUK and they were pro FrUk, if anyone is interested).

I was contacted by some other authors asking about this because they had gone through the very same thing -same specific hate, same hate comment- and I remember not giving a fuck.

I was 16 when I got the hate, writing for fun and trying to find a way to go through my shitty highschool days without falling into the black out of depression that haunted me. I remember not wanting to write anything anymore, leaving a fic I was very invested in writing to gather dust and rot in the forgotten folders of my computer because every time I tried to get on with it and progress, it felt wrong.

That thing I said about words just happening? It stopped. My brain was silent as a grave and trying to get my words out became painful. I remember struggling to even write regular project for my school.

I kept reading, of course -it was my only comfort and I really, really didn't want to give up on it-, but I abandoned the fandoms I enjoyed so much before. My new focus became the sci-fi, and I remember being hooked on Predator. Imagine my joy when I discovered there were thousands of works from that fandom! I was extasic.

Problem? They were written in English.

I didn't know shit about English besides being a language I was supposed to handle in school, memorize the unreasonably spelt words that were pronounced illogically regarding the fucking spelling and the stupid ass irregular verbs.

But I learnt English because I wanted a hot piece of alien ass XD

Back to the topic of fanfics, I still roamed ffnet, keeping 15 tabs open and reading until 5 am... But now there was a world of possiblities in front of me because of course everyone on this goddamn Earth writes in English.

So, for the next years I did that, and my words didn't come. It was fine, tho, because I had so many new things to read.

It wasn't until fall of 2018 that I dabbed into the idea of maybe considering to perhaps give writing a try again????? I was neck deep into Undertale -still am, I'm a shameless skeleton fucker and there's no cure for that shit- and its many AU's and somehow I had managed to avoid fandom wars again, so my brain started toying with words... The same way it worked with novels: I got myself into the fics other people wrote (this is so much easier to do with x Reader fics, and I'm so happy about that and the massive boom they had just when Undertale came out, you can't even understand it).

So I kept doing my shit and daydreaming about skeletons and ribs and ecto-stuff for a very long time. It was kinda reassuring and nice to see other writers projecting on their x Readers so much because that's what I had done before.

And then Good Omens happened.

As I've said before, I actually discovered Gomens back in 2012 and it is, to the date, the worst translation to Spanish I've seen in my entire life to this date. And, despite it, I fell in love with it.

Now, barely in 2019, my dad gets Amazon Prime and the first thing he fucking sees is the font of Gomens on the screen. I had fangirled hard about Gomens in book version, so much and so annoyingly that I wouldn't leave my dad alone until he gave it a chance. It's the only book my father hasn't finished because the translation is that bad. He hates it.

Yet.

The particular font they use for the show is the same from the book's title. My dad of course recognized it immediately and knew I would want in on the news.

I confess I watched Gomens the show at least seven times before giving it a break because I liked it so much and the novel was so fucking good and it's honest to God the best adaptation I've ever seen to the screen. It's so good I'm fucking sure I was crying actual tears after watching it for the first time because my dreams and all the feelings that book had given me over the years and the many re-reads were "true" and so well done and it reached deep into my heart.

And then, for the first time in six years, my words came back.

Another thing Good Omens has given me, I have to say.

I don't know if I can stress this enough, but just imagine spending six years of radio silence, sending longing stares to the void and hoping to see something yours returning back, something you've lost and you're not sure you're getting back, something you think you don't need or want but that would be nice to have again. If only. You can live without that something, and no one but you cares about it, and it's not that big of a deal and-

Then you see a spark in the dark.

My words came back.

They weren't in Spanish, and it was hard to manage them at first, only being able to listen to them in short bursts over long periods of time.

But they were my words and they were back.

Writing is still hard, and I have a lot of work to do to improve my skills, to get them not only back but to refine them because I'm not writing in my native language and all I know is what I've learnt from other authors and their knowledge. I project a lot on my projects -I don't intend to stop because it's such a relief, the biggest scape from reality I get by doing so; it helps me deal with my problems, it gives me a break and a way to take a breath when I can't keep going...

Fanfics are where I can say what I want to say to the world in the most honest way, and that allows me to be me, and to express myself and indulge in the fantasies I dream about without having to force myself to think of them over and over and over. I can just sit back and enjoy content I know I like without being judged for it.

I can fucking make that content, too.

Writing feels like home, even if sometimes I still struggle, if I can't find my words or the expression is not quite like that in English, or if I can't find the words or if I'm suffering a block... because there's nothing scarier and more free than a blank page ready to be written.

[yourultraarchive]

Reply to @prurientpuddlejumper​ on this ask:

I’m sorry you’re frustrated or if I offended you somehow, but to be frank I don’t appreciate the tone you’re using here. However, to answer you anyway:

> they def meant the links to these alleged "online generators," because I am in the same boat as anon

First of all, unless you ARE that anon, I don’t think you can say they “def” meant anything, since they never came back to clarify, and I did try my best to answer them the first time, and I seemed to have helped since they didn’t come back to report any problems with my answer.

Second of all, “alleged”? That’s very rude. Just because you cannot see them on tumblr mobile, does not mean they do not exist. Plenty of other people have used them just fine, as evidenced by the many posts submitted to this blog. And as the last two people who’ve asked about mobile access before never came back with problems, I can only assume they simply went on the desktop site to use the generators instead of accusing me that it’s not accessible at all.

>  post after post about how you updated the UI or whatnot with no link to the thing you updated

It was only two posts (so far anyway), and if you read them closely, you may have noticed I said I was only working on new updates, that they weren’t done, and that they aren’t out yet. And also that “the current generators are still up” so that people have a fully functional version of the generator to use, even if it’s not as pretty as the update is going to be. So no, there is no “link to the thing I updated”, because it’s not done yet. And as the point of the post was about the updates-to-come, I saw no need to promote a link to the generators that are currently available. Seeing as you want that though, I shall go correct those posts and link it, for your and future readers’ convenience.

I apologize for the misunderstanding, if I wasn’t clear enough about the updates being a work-in-progress. I was just trying to update my actual followers (of which I noticed that you are not one) that I was working on stuff, since this blog is usually pretty quiet.

> I REALLY wanna see it, and am growing increasingly frustrated about how much work you're pouring into this *thing* without giving mobile users any way to *access it*.

Again, I’m sorry this is frustrating to you, and you do bring up some legitimate feedback about the mobile accessibility. As I mentioned, I’ve answered at least two asks about this issue before, but since it’s been a few years and phones have definitely gotten more powerful I can look into developing a proper mobile version. But a lot of issues come up with making a mobile version, namely UI and responsive design (because I’d have to account for both vertical and horizontal orientation, and again I reiterate that UI design is hard), dynamic coding/image generation/data input/font importing and styling/etc., and how to save the actual generated image or at the very least the export/import save data for later use on a desktop browser. It takes a lot of work (more than most people realize, I imagine), so if you would like to help with that, let me know, otherwise you have no right to shame me for not making a mobile version, taking my time, or doing any of this.

As it is, you can actually still access the generator on mobile, just not tumblr mobile. You just have to go to a browser on your phone (there’s a reason my URL is so simple). However, as mentioned above, the template was not designed with mobile in mind, so all the fonts and effects and arrangement on the template itself just looks... not like it’s supposed to. Which, again, is part of the issue with the design, but at least you can access it on mobile, against your claims that you cannot.

Also, I mainly made this a desktop site because of how large the dimensions of the template are, in order to make sure the text is visible/legible even in the downsized preview image. Even when I view the template on my phone, I have to zoom in a lot, and with the current live version of the online generators, it would have made scrolling around to input data annoying. The PSDs, as well, would be inaccessible on mobile as far as I know (if Photoshop Mobile has improved enough to handle all the layers, masks, and effects, I’m unaware) so it was a conscious decision to make this whole thing desktop-only when I first started this blog several years ago.

> Even the "downloads" link you just shared just redirects back to this same page. Which is probably because you've hidden all the links away in "pages" which are completely invisible and inaccessible on the mobile app

It’s very much tumblr’s fault, and I really should have thought of that at first, but again, it was a conscious decision to make this a desktop site. Even if I made rebloggable/viewable posts with the links in them (which I plan to do soon, if only to satisfy mobile users like you), only the PSD download links would work (but again, not sure how well downloading PSDs work on mobile devices), as the tumblr app will still loop back to the blog, since the online generator is still one of those blog “pages”. And that is not changing for as long as I don’t have the time or money to host it on its own domain.

I can’t change the fact that tumblr mobile doesn’t automatically open blog pages in an external browser, so the only solution I can offer you is to take the extra step to copy the url and go into your mobile device’s actual internet browser, or just go to your browser and type in my URL manually.

If you actually couldn’t access the templates at all (which should not be an issue if you “REALLY wanna see it” given that not only did I offer you explanations and solutions for the tumblr app problem, but also that it IS accessible on desktop and you reasonably could have just gone on a computer) or had any other problem with them, I have made no stranger of myself and have always been open to help people. They have been polite or nice when they do talk to me, and I’ve always tried to be cordial in return. Your feedback is legitimate, and I appreciate it, but you really could have worded your implied suggestion a little better. And to be quite honest, I was offended by the rudeness of your reply, especially when you called my hard work a “*thing*”. Those asterisks imply a very negative tone, in case you weren’t aware.

I get the impression that you think that your demand will be fulfilled right away if you make enough fuss about it, but I’m not going to be manipulated or guilt-tripped because you feel bad. Maybe you don’t mean it that way, but you can “grow increasingly frustrated” all you want, because not only am I working on this for free, on my free time, and by myself, but I am also not doing this for you. You’re right that I am pouring a lot of work into this, as much work as any fan artist or fanfiction writer will put into their own works, and I’m very proud of it (both as it is now and what it will be in the future) and I have fun working on it, but this is not my job. And you’re not paying for a service.

I’m not working for anyone, and I have no reason to have made more than I originally did--originally I only made the student template PSDs for some friends, and the generator (which seems to be my most popular template, even though my original focus was on the PSDs) only came about because one of my friends didn’t have Photoshop. And I wasn’t even going to release either of them to the public, but I did, and the villain ones came over a year later because of this blog and the people who follow it. No one asked for a user interface update (in fact, more people have asked for a pro hero template), but I’m doing it anyway because I can and I want to. That’s all this boils down to. Also my free time (if you hadn’t noticed, everything on my blog runs on a queue, and when I do queue stuff it’s usually like 3am or so--including right now... it’s currently 5am actually) and motivation (I’m well aware of how few people actually use the templates compared to how many people follow and reblog the posts, and honestly it’s a little discouraging). So if I do make a mobile version, be aware that it won’t be coming out for a very long time. (Also, I think you’re the only one in several years who has complained about it, and you are literally 1 in... what, 3000+ people? Judging by the number of notes on the original post I made when I started the blog and my current number of followers. And again, you’re not even one of them. So to be honest, I’m really not motivated to work on this quickly.)

If you want it faster? Being nice when you show your interest helps, it’s how I got encouraged to make the villain templates. Though I never asked for much other than patience. Or at the very least, the respect any fandom content creator deserves--I may not be cranking out fanart daily or new chapters of a fanfiction weekly or anything, but I am still providing the fandom with something they can enjoy at no cost. And like reviews on fics or comments on art, many people have expressed that they’re grateful the templates and generators exist at all, unlike you, which is really the reason this blog continues to exist and the generators/templates to be updated with new and improved features. I could have just left my original template generator up there and abandoned it, but I know how it feels to find out a fanart you loved years ago was deleted or a really good fanfic was discontinued. So I’ll continue to work on it, and yes I’ll put mobile compatibility for the generators on my to-do list, but I’ll do it at my own pace.

Also I’m not making money off of this, but hey, if you wanna give me incentive that way, hop into my DMs or something and we’ll talk, but I’ve never asked for donations or anything and I don’t plan to. The generators and templates are free for use, and most of that is because of tumblr, which gave it a platform and a home. If I hosted it on its own domain, I’d need a means to pay for that, and I’m personally not invested enough to do that when tumblr is free and works well enough.

If you or anyone else wants to help change that, come talk to me, the ask box is always open.

Otherwise, please visit this blog page on a desktop browser or at the very least something that isn’t just the tumblr mobile app, because nothing can be done about mobile compatibility right now, and I’d hate for you to miss out on seeing the templates. Hopefully I can look forward to whatever you will create with it.

-archivist

[bunslakes-artblog]

Small collection of bnha stuff I’ve written

Ok so I am not a story writer, I can’t write a full story that is enjoyable to read. However, I do like to write specific scenes, try to convey a mood, or just write down scenarios that have been floating around in my head. This is probably not the the most convenient-to-read format, but I don’t have an accound for any fanfic sites or anything so..  Here I have put together some stuff I have written down, I think you could class all of them as angst lol. It’s kiribaku, but could be read as platonic in most cases too. 

These are all written like little extractions from fics (that don’t excist other than said extraction), so don’t expect a full story coming or anyhting. I’ll try to explain some context to each one if I feel it’s needed though. Warning: super long text under the cut

This first one is so over  the top angsty it’s almost funny, but here goes (context plus some extra in cursive at the end): The last piece of concrete was lifted by a light tap from Uraraka’s fingertips and the rescue group could finally see into the small space they had been working for hours to find and uncover after the building had collapsed during the battle with the villain. All Might was standing by the opening, blocking most of the view, but Midoriya could still catch a glimpse of what had been trapped in there. He almost recoiled when he was pierced with a crimson gaze, colder and sharper than an iron rod to the heart. Kacchan. He'd been in the center of the action when the building had collapsed, fighting side by side with- "Young Bakugo! Worry not for I-" All Might stopped himself from finishing his sentence, and Midoriya could see why. Bakugo was sitting, leaning against a broken piece of wall and rubble, the furthest into the small space. He was covered in small scrapes and cuts, hero costume torn, his body tense, face exhausted. Dried teartracks that had drawn visible lines over his dusty cheeks. And in his arms, leaning back to his chest, Kirishima. Bakugos arms were tightly wrapped around his upper body in an embrace, his head nuzzled in the dip between the redheads shoulder and neck. It would've been a tender view, if it wasn't for the redhead's unmoving chest. His pale skin. His almost closed, blank eyes. 

It had been hours since the building collapsed, since the rest of the class and teachers were able to start digging for survivors.. Midoriya felt the dread sink its cold claws into his gut. All Might looked like he was about to say something, but stopped when Bakugo's arms hugged the lifeless body they were cradling a little tighter, his eyes suddenly burning white hot, most of his face still buried in the crook of his friends neck. "How dare you- How fucking DARE you show up now, when it's too late. When it's been too late for HOURS." Bakugos voice was low, cracked and rough like gravel from the emotional strain it'd been through. But it cut through the silence like a blade. The class had gotten involved with another villain attack and Bakugo and Kirishima had been fighting together inside the building while it collapsed. They got trapped in the small space under a fallen supporting beam that kept the rest of the rubble from crushing them. Or well, most of them. Bakugo had got off lightly compared to his friend who he found gasping for air in his arms once the dust had settled. They had been in there for a long time and both were noticing how difficult it was becoming for the redhead to breathe. How soft his voice had become. And there were still vague sounds from the battle outside, so rescue was still far away. Bakugo had already overused his quirk and could not let out any explosions without risking hurting Kirishima even more, so the only thing left to do was to sit still, wait, and hope.

  Bakugo would try to keep Kirishima talking, terrified of the silence. Kirishima would be terrified too, not wanting to leave Bakugo alone in this small space with his dead body, knowing he’d be trapped in there for a long time before getting rescued. In an attempt to comfort them both, Kirishima had been gently massaging Bakugos strained palms, and Bakugo had had to sit there and feel Kirishima's grip getting softer and softer until the hands laid limp in his own. After the last breath had left his friends body, hed cried, yelled, cursed, cried some more and then some. But eventually tears run out and he was still trapped in there, now completely alone. The only thing he could think of to do was hugging the body in his arms, trying to keep the warmth from slipping out. And he had to stay in there like that for hours before rescue finally came.

This next one is kind of strangely written. Sometimes I like writing super vague and avoiding to talk too much about the characters, and more about what they feel and experience. Trying to show who’s perspective we are reading from just based on context clues. But to be clear, the first chunk is from Kirishima’s perspective and the second is Bakugo.  The main thing here was just that I wanted to write about being trapped and abandoned for a very long time with no contact with hte outside world. Kind of tuning in to pure survival instinct and so on. There’s no context to this, I don’t know who or why he was captured or how, it jsut is how it is haha.  Every gap in the text is a timeskip. How long a timeskip is is not really the point, but it could be anyhting from hours to like a week. 

He had lost count of the days he’d been held there. Not that it was hard to, the complete lack of access to the real world made it more or less impossible to keep track of the passage of time. It was just him, alone in a windowless cube, a wooden rectangle sticking out from the wall to sleep on, a door with a tiny slot to push food through, and a bucket in a corner. It was just him, his only company being the rare sound of the slot opening and the scraping of the tray as it got pushed into his cell. No talking. He'd stopped talking to himself. Run out of things to say. He'd stopped hallucinating the sound of distant explosions getting closer and closer, stopped imagining the heavy door getting blasted open, blessing him with fresh air from the outside, and the sun. God he had almost forgotten what the sun felt like. What natural light looked like. What the voices of his friends sounded like. Their faces. Only a name with a vague blurry face shape to accompany it. He'd lost count of the weeks. No one was coming. The silence was unbearable. It was like pressure on his ears. The isolation was driving him insane. He'd laid by the door-slot, waiting for it to open, just to perhaps at least catch a glimpse of a hand, a sign of another human being. He'd lay on the floor in front of the door, watching the slot open, over and over. Nothing. No one. He can't stand it. Anything is better than this. No one is coming. He has to get himself out. Warmth and the taste of iron and salt fills his mouth. For a moment his hunger takes over and he bites down harder. The pain quickly takes over though and he lets out a whimper. Everything slowly fades. It hurt. The pulsating hot pain under the sloppy wrapping around his wrist, and the cold, piercing pain in his mouth. His tongue wouldn't stop running over the empty spaces and broken, filed down points that had once been his teeth. Failure. Weakling. They were not letting him go. No one was coming. It's so dark. There had been a distant rumble. The ground shook. Something deep inside him tugged at his heart, tried to revive a distant memory. A connection his brain wanted to make. An association. The smell of burnt sugar. Hope?  The feeling didn't last long though since soon after the rumbling had begun, the artificial lights went out and his world became absolute darkness. In the beginning panic was the only thing he felt. He couldn't see. He didn't understand. What had happened? The air felt dusty, still and old. And it was so quiet. He didn't get used to the darkness. This wall of black right in front of his eyes at all times. He didn't understand. The meals had stopped coming. Not that they came very often before, but now they were nowhere to be seen at all. Abandoned. Forgotten. Left to rot. No one was coming. The air is so thick. Old. Same. He can almost taste himself with every breath. Disgusting. He doesn't know when he's sleeping and when he's not. It all looks the same. Black. Moving is hard. He doesn't know what his limbs are doing. He can't see. He accidentally tipped over the bucket when weakly fumbling for it in the dark, spilling the contents over the floor. Disgusting. Putrid. Unspeakable. Sobbing, he crawled back up on his bunk. He didn't go on the floor anymore. Liquid. His dry lips are pressed against the wall, trying to soak up every last drop of what's slowly trickling down the uneven surface. There had been a crack, the first sound since the horrible wet clash of the bucket, and he'd breathed in a mouthful of dust. Then he'd felt it. Cool against his fingers. Slowly trickling. Wet. That tug in his heart is there again. Fainter than ever, making a last attempt. He can't do anything else than keep pressing his lips against the wall, absorbing every last drop of hope. It was becoming almost unbearable to force himself to breathe. He was so tired. Felt so heavy. Nothing to breathe but dust and stench. No one was coming. He was just going to sleep for a little while. Finally. Finally they found it. The place they'd been tirelessly searching for for months. His body was out of shape, exhausted from endless sleepless nights dedicated to searching, because dammit, they had taken HIM. Those fuckers. Those absolute evil monsters. They were his. He felt his body preparing to give it its all now when they'd finally found their target. The attack had been successful, executed with the element of surprise in their favour, along with pretty much the whole class, all the teachers plus some other pros. And he'd been in the lead, blasting anything that moved, sometimes even if it didn't. Like a machine he'd plowed through corridors upon corridors, searching for the only thing that mattered to him. Nothing yet. "Th-the basement. You ha-have to.. it collapsed" "WHAT? WHAT DO YOU MEAN COLLAPSED? IS THERE ANYTHING DOWN THERE??" he was getting impatient. Impatient and scared. He hadn't found him yet. And all the captives had been rescued. Where the fuck had they hid him? He refused to even consider the unthinkable. He WAS here. Somewhere. "Don't shake the victim, are you crazy?!" The annoying voice of some adult shouted. He let out an irritated “tch” but let go of the shaking, thin human. The adult took over listening to what the rescued had been trying to say. "The basement.. it's where they kept.. where they kept the struggling one. The one who wouldn't stop fighting.." A wall of rubble. Impossible to get through. There must've been an earthquake or something with equal force that caused this massive disaster. They couldn't get down. And it looked like no one had been able to for a very long time. He could feel hope run out. Quickly. His chest tightening, making it hard to breathe. But he dug. God it's so dark. The air almost impossible to breathe, having been still and filled with dust for so long. His heart was racing with horrification. Was he here, in this complete, silent darkness? This hell of isolation? "When did this happen?" "I-i don't.. days.. weeks ago?" That's what the rescued person had said. Fuck. His explosions was barely enough to light the floor in front of him. He walked quickly, every step echoing in the earnumbing silence. There was a door at the end of the hallway. The glimpse he'd gotten of the horrifyingly small cube of a room before getting pulled away had been enough. His head was screaming. Stomach tying itself into a hard, cold knot. Throat tighter than it'd ever been. It had been complete darkness when he'd swung open the heavy door, followed by the stench, hitting him like a wall. Old, musty and way too over-recycled air, rot and something else he didn't want to think about. Then the lightbeam from the rescue torches had lit the scene for a moment. A small bare room, no windows, nothing on the walls or ceiling but some built-in fluorescent lights that had since long gone out. A mess in a corner. A crack in the wall with a small trail of water from some broken pipe trickling down, leading down to a wooden rectangle sticking out from said wall. And on it- "Oh no" That was all he had heard from the pro that had been right behind him before quickly being tugged away from the scene. His heart was still and cold in his chest. He couldn't comprehend what he'd seen in that room. The thin, boney figure on the bunk, lying, folded in on itself, looking so small, so fragile. The head pressed against the crack in the wall, the head covered in greasy, tangled, matted hair. Fading crimson red hair. He was throwing up, couldn't help himself, couldn't stop. Dry heaving on all fours, he felt a warm hand on his back, large, bony, familiar. Unwelcome. They had been too late. They had let this happen. They weren't worthy of calling themselves heroes. People. FRIENDS. He'd seen it when they were carrying him out, up to the surface. The filthy bandages that had almost slipped off the thin wrist that had once been strong and muscular. The badly stitched together bite marks. The glimpse of the demolished, once sharp teeth. Those fuckers had even denied him his last option to get himself out of there. Those fucking monsters.

His heart almost couldn’t take it anymore when he heard the medic’s voice gasping.

“There’s a pulse!”

You really are stupidly strong, aren’t you.

This one is not much of a story, but more a little “headcanon” I have for Unbreakable. I like to imagine Kirishima being able to reach deeper and deeper states of unbreakable, getting bigger and more rock like. This text is pretty much just a description of the very specific sound that a deep-state unbreakable could make.

At first it was just a feeling. A vague sensation of pressure, almost like airplane ear. The sensation grew and he could feel a low vibration in his ribcage, rumbling like an earthquake throughout his entire body and, or so it seemed, the ground as well. What the hell? Then it hit him. It's a noise. He can hear it now. It's so loud and in such a low pitch that it's more something to be felt than heard, but it's definitely there. A deep rumble, like rough boulders grinding against each other (not in a stupid metaphorical way, no, it was literally the sound of rock grinding against rock), coming from what felt like the ground itself. The strong arms holding him down loosened their grip for a brief moment, probably due to the surprising sound, and he took the opportunity to break himself free enough to look around. "Oh." That was all he could say. Where his friend had stood as he had gotten himself stupidly overpowered by the villain now tightening their grip once again, was now something he would never had believed was the same person unless he'd seen it before. Or at least a similar version of whatever this was. Skin no longer even remotely resembling its true soft self, the rough texture made him look like he'd been bluntly carved out directly from a cliffside. Every soft curve was replaced with hard, angular edges and sharp points. His friend, or he was almost sure it still was his friend in there, looked more like a living mountain than a person. And he was still emitting that sound, even though the stalactite filled cave that was once a mouth wasn't even open. No, this rumble came from his core, vibrating out from the chest, through the bones and into the ground. "A growl" he realized.

This is not a perfect representation of the sound I’m imaginiang but it’s sort of a combo of this and the first half-second of this. Or maybe a bit like this, but more rock-y sort of. These growls would be close mouth vocalisation, emmitting from deep withing the gut/chest. 

This last one is also about unbreakable, and has a bit more of my headcanon for it. I’m sort of thinking that the deeper Kirishima goes into unbreakable, the more one-tracked his mind gets, eventually running almost like a machine, carrying out each task (thought) the quickest, most convenient way before forming the new task. More on this at the end. 

The class is in the middle of a particularly heated sparring session, everyone having been divided into the hero- and villain half.

The arm reached out for Bakugo, ready to grab him. If it reached, it would all be over, and Bakugo doesn't have time to dodge. Being too caught up in the heat of the moment, reality slips for a moment and weeks worth of nightmares of villain hands grabbing for his friend, taking him away, killing him, floods his mind. No no no no no! Kirishima feels his unbreakable form deepen, and suddenly his mind can only keep in one track. "NO. DENY." A loud bang echoes through the training hall as rock-hard jaws slam together, stalagmite teeth snapping shut, leaving no gaps in-between. The world goes silent as an object goes flying, spinning, in a wide arc across the battleground with liquid drizzling behind it like a firework, faint traces of green lightning still sparking around it. The object collides with the wall with a thud and a small choked gasp can be heard from the projectiles source. Then the tense silence is further broken by a scream. "MIDORIYA!" Uraraka rushes to the green-haired boy who's now sitting slumped down on the ground, pale as a sheet, clearly in shock. More screams are heard around the hall as the other students start realizing what had happened. Blood is pouring from the stump ending right below the boys shoulder, the same blood that's dripping from the still closed, still harneded jaw, frozen in place. Kirishima's min is blank inside Unbreakable. His heart is racing and out of his control, he goes deeper and deeper into his hardening, choking himself, crushing- And suddenly it stops and he goes limp and falls to the ground. Aizawa had taken hold of the situation, canceled the red-head's quirk to stop him from panic-crushing himself, and then headed straight to pick up the mutilated boy who had started muttering incoherently, looking like he might pass out any second. Pretty much the whole class kept as much distance as they could from Kirishima as they followed their teacher carrying their classmate to recovery girl, fear, shock and confusion clearly visible on their faces. The whole class. Almost. Kirishima didn't know he was hyperventilating until he felt a grounding hand on his shoulder. Bakugo's hand. His head was spinning. What happened? His eyes dart around the area and they land on the object on the ground across the room. The arm. The taste of blood suddenly made itself very present and he brought both his hands up, tightly holding them over his mouth as he breathed shallow and hard from his nose. "Kirish- oh fuck." Bakugo placed his hand on the red-head's back and did his best to keep the red hair out of the way as Kirishima vomited on the floor. He kept going until he was just coughing up saliva and dry-heaving, tears flowing down his face, the warm hand still on his back rubbing soothing cirkles. "Sit down, put your head between your legs or you'll faint" Bakugo's voice said softly. When he had enough control over his breathing to speak, he managed to croak out; "I-.. Ididn't mean to- I thought- I didn't know-" the sobs were taking over again and Bakugo gently pulled him into a hug. "I know. I saw what happened. And-" he stroked Kirishima's hair "I know he saw it too. In your eyes. He won't hate you."

Ok so back to how I imagine unbreakable’s mind would work in this deep state. Kirishima’s last thought before hardening was to stop the hand from reaching Bakugo, which carried over into a more compressed, literal state once in unbreakable mode. Like a computer sort of his mind would now work like: stop hand - closest? mouth. - bite - task complete.  For visual reference, I imagine the movement when he turns to bite is similar to how Saitama bites the sword. Not this exact motion, but the same suddenness and power of it.  The way the arm flies away is similar to how Eren’s arm gets flung away when the titan eats him.

Poor Kirishima, imagine how bad he feels about hurting a friend so badly. Dw, they will probably be able to put Midoriya’s arm back again, it was bitten off cleanly and with this world’s technology, anything is possible. 

Okay, so if you’ve made it all the way to the end, thank you so much for taking the time to read my strange, “let’s see in how many ways we can hurt kirishima” angst texts! This is actually the first time I’ve written anyhting similar to fanfics. I don’t know if there will be more in the future, I guess I’ll see what people think of this first.. 

[alexanderstarhero]

I would like to explain why for me, the best option it's AO3 (Archive of Our Own), and why authors should really crosspost in there, for the sake of more audience.

I'm saying this as a reader, rather than as an author, as there might be more nuance with that, so an author's point of view would be perfect.

But why I'm shaming the other sites boils down to the filter system.

As far as I have seen, there was not a better filter system in either wattpad or fanfiction, which was close, but the tags help more than just the genre or the characters in there.

Tumblr it's like it's own category, there are fanfics around I have seen them, @apomaro-mellow makes some fanfics here, but he also puts them in AO3, main reason why I'm following him in the first place, the Kirito (SAO)/Takashi Komuro(HOTD) ship that I didn't know I needed in my life lives rent-free in my head. Right now he is mostly unto Steddie, not my thing, but I do read them and I like them.

However my main problem here it's that as far as I know, you can only look for one tag, and that's not enough. Sure, now there's a system that allows you to exclude certain tags permanently from your search or even your dashboard, and you can decide if you watch those post or not if you come across them, but Tumblr it's a varied place, and you might not find much fanfics compared to the other three options.

Though, I do like the perma block on certain tags, would like that on AO3 to not see Major Character Dead, Gore or Vampire AU tags instead of putting them back in whenever I look into something.

Wattpad and Fanfiction are not that bad honestly, they have their pros and cons over one another.

Fanfiction, as the name implies, it's not a place where I would be finding myself reading original stories, so that's ac on over Wattpad, which might be more into OC stories in comparison.

When searching for something and you want to narrow the search through length, fanfiction has the advantage in my opinion. Wattpad narrows through parts, but how much is one part? how many words or chapters does that entail? Meanwhile, Fanfiction narrows the length through words, it does not allow you to personalize how many words. <1k it's the least then comes 5k+ which is 5000 words or more, then you have <5k which in itself also includes the <1k words.

I personally like over 1000 words fics, as I read a lot of one-shots, but I can't avoid <1k fics in the filter with <5k, nor can I get shorter fics with 5k+. It's the worst feeling.

Wattpad has a better tag system over Fanfiction, which doesn't even have a proper tag system. You narrow your search through which characters are there, and sometimes, if they're in a relationship, while also choosing a genre. But I think when choosing a tag, you also add the genre you're looking for. I think the horror tag it's self-explanatory. Or the AU tag with whatever you want, like D&D AU.

However, both lack a form to exclude tags or ratings (you can only pick one rating in fanfic and exclude mature in wattpad), or even characters. And that's where AO3 beats both as well as the length search.

In fact, AO3 even has in its filter "include words". This filter allows you to search for works that have certain words, but are not in their tags for whatever reason. Maybe I'm looking for a college AU, but the fanfic might not have the tag, so I just put "College" in there. But I don't want to look into a murder mystery or I don't enjoy blood or I don't like vampires in that setting, so I exclude the tags which I don't feel like. You can also exclude certain ships, like I'm a big Shance shipper, but I don't want to read about Klance when looking at Voltron fanfics, so I exclude it.

I think this is the main reason I read exclusively in AO3, but fanfiction will hold a special place in my bookmarks...because the authors have not moved anything into AO3, and there are still some stories I like to binge read form time to time.

I only read Wattpad a few times, but that was mostly because Hiro/Miguel was prominent there. And Tumblr it's my do-whatever place, my goblin paradise, my garbage pile that makes me smile... and where I can read Canon Characters or Real Life actors x Male reader because I'm thirsty.

rank the fanfic websites (part 1)

PLEASE REBLOG THIS, I WANT A LARGER AUDIENCE

[i-want-my-iwtv]

Hello! I'm hoping you are well. I just want to say I love your blunt/possitive posts about fiction not being reality, personal responsibility, authors' responsibility if it even applies...just all of it. Really, major kudos to you for being so blunt!

Aw thank you! Yes, I am doing well. Hope you’re doing well, too. I took a decent break from tumblr, and now I’m getting back into the swing of things, there are fanworks to reblog here <3 and I have my own fic ideas percolating.

(I’m sorry that this response got kind of long, there are things in here I’ve expressed before, and some I may not have, or haven’t mentioned in awhile, and I kind of want to have these things out there for ppl to see where I’m coming from.)

Your message really means a lot, bc I feel like, if I have any responsibility to the fandom as a somewhat popular blog, that I have to stand up for shippers and creators of fanworks. Fanworks are the lifeblood of the fandom, both for the creators and the consumers. Fanworks are made for free (or on commission) by smaller creators who need the encouragement more. Being smaller and more accessible, they’re also easy & more responsive targets for harassment than the published creators :-P

And so when you see it from that perspective, you can understand that when I reblog those fiction =/= reality, pro-shipping, and anti anti posts, it’s coming from a place of good intention. I identify with those easy targets who are criticized for their creation/consumption of published works and fanworks. I was bullied for pretty superficial reasons in my formative years, not an unusual amount/degree of bullying, but it hurt. “Oh, but words can’t hurt you!” <– this is pretty insensitive, and I shouldn’t have to convince anyone that bullying is painful, but there are those who would compare injuries and say that being bullied was less suffering compared to other things (like abuse, PTSD, mental illness, etc.), and therefore invalid. Should we be comparing injuries to validate ownership to fiction? I don’t know, but the bullying was real to me and it hurt. 

And this part of the story is my own attachment to canon (and, later, fandom), before I was even aware of others. Do we sever our attachment to something bc smne else says that their connection to it is more valid? I feel like fandom is limitless, it’s big enough for all of us.

Media/Fiction was an escape from reality for me. It was a place I could find inspiration, could see characters beaten down (by antagonists and/or their own faults) and rise up again and again, in so many variations! Even the same plot points can yield different emotions when told in different ways, and/or involving different characters. Characters refusing to lay down and submit to their obstacles/antagonists was inspiring and helped me rebuild the self-confidence the bullies had crushed. 

So that was my story, as valid as any. I love stories of how ppl got into VC (or any fandoms/media really!), and there are so many. I don’t think that any reason is more valid than any other. 

There are those who saw themselves reflected in the fact that there are queer/LGBT+ characters, that they existed and had depth and could love and be loved in return. 

Someone told me that they shared a love of history with their father, especially of Rome. The father passed away when the person was young, and so they loved the historical explorations in canon, it seemed to bring them closer to that lost parent. In fact, the act of pointing out historical inaccuracies in canon was enjoyable to this person.

There are those who passionately adore Armand, for all his beauty, strength, and sass, the fact that he is a survivor of so much tragedy. “We must be beautiful, powerful, and without regret.”

There are those who love the quiet and dignified manner of Louis and how he burns everything down handles situations. 

There are those who live for the ~purple prose~ and ~wealth porn~, in the loving descriptions of luxury, the declarations of love and 3 pages of describing how pretty a character is.

… etc. etc.

^And fanworks based on the media consumed may relate to the fans’ reasons for getting into that fandom in the first place. I like to think my memes and fanfic show the same refusal to quit that I valued so much in the characters when I read canon. I would think that other writers/artists/etc. would say smtg similar, that their fanworks are their way of engaging with canon, whether it’s to have more of what they enjoy about it, fix and/or explore a character/ship/situation, or take the characters into different situations (like AU) and see how they might fare within changed parameters. Ppl analyze canon and critique it, comparing it to other fiction/non-fiction to lay out their ideas. Ppl might want to dress like the characters and act like them in cosplay! So many ways to engage with canon. And then you have comments on works and works inspired by fanworks and that’s p. much the definition of fandom, to my mind.

HOWEVER.

In my zeal for reblogging posts (and writing my own) about defending shippers and creators/consumers of published media and fanworks, I can be too blunt, and unintentionally injure others. I trust ppl to inform me privately if a post goes over the line in that regard, and I have responded by editing/deleting posts. This blog isn’t sacred, editing/deleting a post is not a sign of weakness, but of curating it to better serve my needs and those who come to it for whatever reason. 

Bc my blog really is at its core about entertainment and encouragement/sharing of fanworks.

It’s hard for me to sit in silence about attacks on shippers and creators/consumers of published media and fanworkswhen I feel like if I don’t speak up, silence is tacit agreement when ppl state, “Don’t draw/write/talk about X bc it is harmful to Y” I understand that some ppl do have real triggers and some fictional characters/ships are painful to them, but on the other hand, is it fair to restrict everyone else who wants to explore those characters/ships? 

We have to find ways to coexist, and that may mean everyone taking on some responsibility for their fandom experience and extending respect towards others. Someone asked me to tag a certain ship, and now I do, so that they can block it. I can’t tag every possible thing, but within reason, I will add tags on request.

I don’t believe in censorship when it comes to fiction, for many reasons, there are blogs out there who are much more eloquent than I am in their defense of it. I don’t have their rhetoric. But I feel like I need to defend those who are easy targets for bullying (as I had been).

^^^With all that said, I think it would be best for me to refrain from too much of this type of posting so as not to trample others. Instead, I want to focus on encouraging fanworks, reblogging posts about writing/art and advice about that.  

(If you are looking for more blogs that defend fanfiction, I can recommend more to you privately, or in a separate post.) 

[spideyxchelle]

Hey I don't know if you've ever done something like this or have been asked this or even if you really write fanfic but you should definitely write a spideychelle headcannon or fic based on wet dreamz by j Cole

a lot of you wanted some first time stuff. so here. also, I didn’t know this song, fam. so I looked it up and its WILD. the lyrics are insane. and, forewarning, this is a sensitive content headcanon. SO, you know, be prepared. 

by the end of junior year Peter is pretty sure he’s got a totally healthy crush on MJ (see: obsession) 

its not a stalkery obsession, okay? its more like since she found out that he’s Spider-man and become friends with him and Ned he notices everything about her and always wants her around and he starts looking forward to going to school because he knows she’ll be there and he even declines some upstate training weekends because MJ wants to go to BLM marches and he just wants to brush against her shoulder in a bustling crowd

its not weird. okay. its a little weird. but she’s woah. she’s probably the most brilliant, fascinating, wholly unique girl he’s ever met and she doesn’t need him but he really wants her to want him, you know? 

not want him biblically more like want him as in want to be with him but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t always want her to want him in the sex kind of way. he’s seventeen. sue him. 

the only time they ever talk about sex is when Ned excitedly tells MJ and Peter that he and Betty finally had sex. they’re all over watching movies on their weekly Sunday night movie night. and while Ned and Peter both freak out because AHH THAT IS GREAT NEWS…MJ remains quiet. they both ask her why she isn’t freaking out with them and she casually informs them that virginity is a social construct and you can’t lose anything. genitals are genitals before and after sex. 

and so, five weeks later, Peter is a little taken back when he gets a note from MJ in the middle of chemistry. its more like she chucks a crumpled up ball of paper against his head in lieu of passing him a note. 

after shooting her a confused look, he unfolds the note and nearly chokes. he shakes his head to make sure he read the note right and F U C K it says the same thing he thought it did. “you wanna have sex this weekend?”

he doesn’t know how to play it cool, how to play it chill because Peter, by design, is not cool. and MJ is. like probably the coolest person he’s ever met. 

he glances back at her and she’s jotting down her notes like she didn’t just proposition him in the middle of chemistry (the irony is not lost on him).  

he quickly scribbles down an answer (”have you ever had sex before”) and waits.

it comes five minutes later (”of course. you?”) and he tries not to be irritated by her answer because its her body and her choice but he’s suddenly jealous of this phantom guy he’s never met. and intimidated by her proposition because while he does wanna have sex with her (again, he’s a seventeen year old boy) he doesn’t want to be an inexperienced disappointment…

so instead of being upfront and honest with her…he lies (”yep. so this weekend?”)

and suddenly he’s making plans with MJ to have sex at her house this weekend and he has NO IDEA HOW THIS IS HIS LIFE ALL OF THE SUDDEN. he needs to talk to Aunt May!!!

NO WAIT HE CAN’T TALK TO AUNT MAY. scratch that. that is way too…weird? yea, weird. 

so he comes up with a plan that involves watching a lot of porn to learn what he’s supposed to do and he buys some condoms at a nearby convenience store. and tries to learn how to put one on himself like he’s a  pro. spoiler alert: he’s not. the rubber snaps against his dick twice and he cries both times. because that HURTS. ouch. by the third time he manages to not maim his penis.  and he feels pretty good, more like a superhero than he ever does as Spider-man. 

on Friday night he goes upstate to meet with Tony about his suit and while he’s hanging upside-down from the ceiling trying out some new tech a condom falls out of jean pocket. 

there is a profoundly awkwardly silence…..

Tony hands back the package as Peter’s feet hit the floor. his face is bright red and Tony asks slowly, almost like he hates himself for acknowledging it at all, “you’re being safe, I see. so that’s good” “Tony-” “I don’t really want to talk about it, kid. just safety is important, okay?” “yes sir”

more awkward silence. 

“who is it?” “Mr. Stark…” “that’s none of my business.” “thank you” “is it that MJ, girl?” “OKAY! I’m going to go.” “HAVE FUN AND BE SAFE PARKER!” 

and Peter wants to roll under a rock and never come out again. god. he hates his life. 

except his life is amazing because MJ wants to have sex with him….unless he’s terrible. O H GOD WHAT IF HE IS TERRIBLE AND SHE NEVER WANTS TO TALK TO HIM AGAIN?!? he could live his whole life without having sex with MJ (it would suck but he could do it) but he couldn’t spend his whole life not being friends with her. he needs her in a way he suspects she doesn’t need him. 

he goes to her house the day they planned to talk to her about how he doesn’t want to ruin their friendship….but he doesn’t really get to talk. he opens the door and MJ throws herself at him. and he does try (kind of, again he’s a seventeen year old boy) but each time he tries to talk MJ is kissing him and he basically short circuits. 

like he’s imagined kissing her before (too many times to count) and its nothing compared to the real thing. the real thing is so hot and makes him lightheaded and her skin is…wow. 

like its so soft. SO SOFT. he wants to know what moisturizer she uses. and he also wants to eat her out. its a weird thing happening in his brain right now. 

they fumble backwards into some wall and MJ is taller than him, that’s just the facts of life, but he’s strong and so he hoists her up around his waist to really take full advantage of making out. 

he’s pretty sure he’s making some very enthusiastic noises because fifteen minutes into making out MJ is smiling against his lips….and he KNOWS its because he’s amusing her. but he can’t bring himself to care because she’s grinding up against him and the only thought he can actually manage is her name - MJ MJ MJ MJ

it takes them another half hour to make it to her room because every time he tries to back them away from the wall MJ yanks him back against her. but once they are in her room MJ tears his shirt off and curses. he’s momentarily self conscious until she explains, “you’re crazy ripped, spider-boy.” “man,” he corrects her. “we’ll see,” she smirks. and then she’s kissing him again.

and he’s coherent enough to know that he’s in love with her. and probably has been for months. but y i k e s. she’s got him so fucked up. 

the rest of their clothes go relatively fast after that and he starts to think a little prayer that he won’t cum too quickly and that he won’t disappoint and that he won’t lose her friendship because he’s an inexperienced loser that is crazy in love with her.

he tears open the condom wrapper like he practiced and positions himself to enter her when she presses her hands against his chest and tells him to stop. HIS EYES GO BIG BECAUSE DID HE ALREADY MESS IT UP?! he didn’t even put it IN yet. 

and when his brain catches up to the moment he notices how nervous she looks. it doesn’t make any sense to him. and she whispers, “I know you’ve done this before…but….I haven’t, okay? so, you know, I can’t do anything fancy.” 

it throws his whole head off kilter because he hadn’t anticipated this. he’d spent the better part of a week hating a guy he’d never met that she’d had sex with before. but now….now….well this changes everything. 

he blinks, “you wanna lose your virginity to me?” its a dumb question because she rolls her eyes and says, “not losing anything. virginity is a social construct. but i want to have sex for the first time with you. yes.” 

“why?”

“i thought that part was obvious…?” and its not because MJ keeps talking slow like he’s a moron, “I like you, doofus.” 

she kisses him for good measure like she’s reassuring him that she does, in fact, like him. and everything that was frantic and desperate before is now slower. between kisses he admits he’s never had sex before either and she looks delighted. which is a weird reaction to his inexperience but he supposes he’s a little glad that she’s never had sex with anyone before him, too. 

when he finally does join their bodies together, MJ hisses like its a bit of a new and unusual stretch. he watches her face carefully and TRIES HIS HARDEST (again, its hard at seventeen) to not move. she brushes her mouth against his for what feels like her own benefit. he indulges all of the kisses she seems to want. 

and when she’s ready he moves inside her slow. its effortful, the slow pace he’s going, but he manages the best he can. it helps that they’re kissing. because he can focus on that and not how much he wants to just thrust into her body because it all feels so good. 

he doesn’t last long, he supposes that was inevitable, but MJ doesn’t seem to mind. she’s grips his back and tells him its okay. and he cums. 

when he done, he collapses on her and she makes an oof noise. but when he tries to climb off of her she pulls him back down and fits his face in her neck. she strokes his hair and he relaxes. this feeling is better than anything they just did. this, the two of them just breathing together. this is what he wanted more than the sex (tho, he wants more of the sex, too). 

they stay like that for five minutes and then Peter hoists himself up on his elbows and kisses her nose. she rolls her eyes at him but is smiling. “i’m sorry i hurt you,” he whispers. “it was a weird stretch but you didn’t hurt me, Parker. get off your high horse.” 

he laughs and spends the rest of the afternoon trying to make her feel as good as she made him feel. by, you know, going down on her. and he’s not GOOD at it per say but what he lacks in experience he makes up for with enthusiasm. and with MJ’s guidance they work it out together. 

the next day at school Peter and MJ keep shooting each other looks. and Ned notices. and he almost doesn’t want to ask but……….he gives in, “what?” “nothing” they both say. and he nearly drops it but at lunch MJ gets some foam from her coffee on her upper lip and Peter leans over to kiss it away. 

AND ALL HELL BREAKS LOSE BECAUSE WTF YOU GUYS??!??! WHEN THE- WHAT THE- EXPLAIN!!! 

[22degreehalo]

Like on that, I’ve been thinking lately about romance in fiction, and how I’ve found it very hard to find an original fiction version of slow burn? Like romance in long-form pro fiction tends to have two kinds, in my experience:

Romance exists, but the relationships between the characters are not the main focus of the story. Instead the plot comes first, and then the characters’ non-romantic plots and backstories, with any romance either only being implied, or receiving no development until possibly a sudden Get Together scene at the end.

Romance is the sole focus of the story, and it is constantly changing. The characters are continually becoming closer and approaching closure, only to each time face some obstacle or understanding that resets at least one character’s feelings or actions. The ending comes when they finally overcome the last obstacle.

For me, slow burn isn’t really either of these two, but somewhere in between: a story is primarily about the relationship, with other factors in large part existing to set it up... but the other factors are interesting in their own right, as well. And there is continual progress towards the goal, rather than either stagnancy or constant back-and-forth - as the chapters go on, the characters noticeably become closer, in a fairly straightforward line towards the end. Instead of a series of obstacles, there’s usually one or two big things which the characters need to overcome to get together, and those obstacles generally relate to broader issues of the characters or setting, in a way that possibly connects to the non-romance subplots.

So I’ve been wondering why it is that pro fiction so rarely seems to write this way. And I guess there are some things relevant:

When you already know the pairing and characters, you’re willing to be a lot more patient with progress. Perhaps pro authors don’t trust a general audience to read through 70k words of build up without some false starts along the way

When you’re dealing with pre-made characters, you’re giving a fully immersive and interesting world on its own that possibly couldn’t be achieved (or at least not without great difficulty) in an original slow burn.

Just a different culture -fanfic readers like fic because it gives them the romances they like, and pro work readers like the romances they get, too. This doesn’t explain it all to me - there are obviously a lot of book readers out there who don’t know about fic who might enjoy slow burns - but it’s probably part of it

I dunno. I really do get a sense of different approaches, comparing original romance with ship fic - original romance tends to promote Excitement and Opposites Attract and Enemies to Lovers, or quite mundane and smooth friends-to-lovers relationships where we don’t get to see much because it just kind of happens and is good. Whereas fic also promotes difficulties and obstructions, but less from any conflict between the characters’ personalities and more because of individual thoughts/experiences or external obstructions. Original romance tends to be either ‘love doesn’t need to make sense, it’s just a spark that you can’t explain!’ or ‘love just kind of happens as long as you’re out there with other people’, whereas fic romance tends to be more ‘relationships take work’ or ‘people coming together in a world trying to tear them apart’. The fact that most fic writers are queer, and many also are disabled in some way as well, definitely impacts on that different messaging. ...and huh, maybe that’s part of it, as well? It’s just less obvious to straight white cis people that two people could take a while to get together unless there was a personality conflict? Hmmmm.

Dunno, it’s interesting.

[savvyliterate]

Hi ! So, I have a little question for you ;) Well, I know you've written both fanfictions and real books (btw congrats on Namesake!) and I wanted to know what were the pros and cons of writing fanfictions in comparison with real books ? (if it's no bother :)) Thank you !!!

It’s not a bother at all! Here’s how it’s been for me:

Pros: Fanfic really helped me learn the ins and out of developing a story arc and character development in a comfortable environment. You know the characters already, you have established backgrounds, quirks, and the like. So you can focus on things such as plot, dialogue, and telling a cohesive story over worrying about having to come up with intricate backgrounds because those already exist. It’s fun, because you get to take an existing puzzle and poke at it until it becomes something new. You learn to develop your own style. If you go look at my fanfic from 2001 and compare it with the stuff I posted this week, you can see the growth.

I’m not sure if you’ve read any of my fic, but one of my favorite storylines is the “what if.” What if River had been in Mercy with the Ponds or had been involved with the cube invasion? What if it had been the Ponds and River to have the showdown on Christmas against the Daleks instead of Clara? What if River had shown up to assist Ten and the Children of Time in series 4? Right now, I’m writing a Gilmore Girls fic where instead of going on the cruise with Nicole at the end of season 3, Luke decides to follow Lorelai and Rory to Europe, which changes everything that follows. Ripple effect stories are a lot of fun!

How that translates to real books: For me, it makes it easier to develop original characters because you’ve practiced with established ones. You know how plot and dialogue work, and you’ve figured out your writing style. I saw a post a few days ago on Tumblr if you write original stories like you write fanfic, it takes a lot of the pressure off, and it’s so true.

Cons: Your time is limited, so you have a choice: a wholly original story or fanfic? That’s the only one for me.

A surprisingly amount of original stories have their roots in an older piece of work, so essentially, they are actually fanfic! Even Namesake at its core is a fanfic of Oz, Wonderland, etc.

I still write fanfic because I find it super relaxing. It’s my way of working out my quibbles with a series because the plot went in a certain direction that I felt didn’t make sense, such as the lack of any River mention in “Power of Three” in series 7 or the fact that Clara is the one at the final resolution of the Silence plot and not Amy, Rory, and River. Or you want to see things you wouldn’t normally see in canon, such as intimacy between two characters, slice of life moments, or everyday adventures. Or you really want fic of a certain pairing, but there’s not a lot of it, so damn it, you’re going to write it yourself.

I hope this helps!