#and it would add another interesting layer to the story because then the death of lestat's mortal family

[vorbarrsultana]

i’m so intrigued by the idea of nickistat during the french revolution and the way they may tackle it in the show

[year2000electronics]

Bill & Ford & A Book, Oh My!

DISCLAIMER: The Book of Bill has Bill Cipher serving as an unreliable narrator. If we go out trying to say something is "definitively a truth" or "definitively a lie", we're going to keep arguing about it until the heat death of the universe. This is just my own personal interpretation of the source material. If you don't agree, that's fine! Also TBOB spoilers abound.

So it's no secret that interest in the dynamic Bill & Ford have (enemies, platonic, romantic, formerly romantic, whichever way) has really skyrocketed since TBOB's release. Of course, there are the 'easy' culprits to point towards, with Mabel referring to Bill as 'being like a needy ex', and the whole O'Sadley's fiasco (Him literally crying over losing Ford and going "one Sixer, please"? Messy. Messy behavior. Still, I think it goes so much deeper than that.

Bill, being the unpredictable chaos entity that he is, also serves as the main antagonist for a show about family and having close bonds with each other. We don't really need to look into his inner psyche that much, because that's just not what he needed to be doing at that point in the cartoon. He's meant to be a way to divide the Pines, really. And a silly little guy. A silly little obstacle. So, naturally, when it came to Bill's arguably "closest" relationship to someone in the show (Ford), it was very easy to interpret it as Ford being tricked by a completely apathetic Bill, who was just using him as a rung on the ladder. And I do want to stress that Ford and Bill's physical actions remain fairly consistent throughout interpretations, and focusing on the fact that Bill badly hurt Ford is important, so if that's how you still see it, then fine by me! No harm no foul!

But I think the relationship, their story, their tragedy just becomes so much more interesting with the lens The Book of Bill has presented. We’re finally able to see Bill’s perspective as a “protagonist” of sorts in a medium where he’s not just something to defeat- and that’s something we’ve never gotten before, so it’s shedding light on an area we didn’t know about for sure! Again, Bill is lying to the character of "the reader", so we can't trust it as a completely unbiased source. But we can speculate on where the "truth" is between these lies.

First of all, Bill's backstory was that he destroyed his home dimension- we knew that already. But now, with the extra content we have about it, we see something interesting- that Bill's backstory mirrors Ford's to an uncanny degree.

Both of them champion their intelligence, although they highlight how it set them apart from others, as well as highlighting their own 'rare mutation/birth defect'.

Again, with this self-isolation already spurred on from their "weirdness", but also as a little aside, I would also like to highlight that Bill being 'ready to be one', looking up at the stars, striving to 'reach' them, is a shared motif he has with Ford, who is also associated with space, the stars, and reaching them.

Bill's 'trying-really-quick-to-convince-Ford' fantasy sequence even has him in a field of stars as a sort of "ultimate wish fulfilment". Remember, this is Bill showing Ford something he thinks would win Ford over, at least a little.

(And I'll take a quick time out for this train of thought to point out- hey! Bill admits he sought out most of his other victims, but Ford summoned him, and it took him by surprise! That adds a fun little layer of complexity to everything, don't you think? Another little layer of humanity for this whole mess- Bill didn't expertly seek out the 'perfect victim' or anything, it was just... luck. Some twist of fate.)

Anyways.

Obviously, the intro page to the 'Sixer' section has a ton of red flags galore (I mean, poor guy's literally depicted as a hapless puppet. C'mon, Bill. Not to mention the "OH BOY HE'S ALREADY SO ISOLATED, IT'S PERFECT" thing.). This guy is kind of a terrible companion no matter how you slice it. He's terrible to everyone close to him, because he's a deeply traumatized character who refuses to heal. BUT, the wording here is kinda deliciously intriguing to me. All of humanity is Bill's puppets, his future victims, but to me, it's clear that he holds a fondness for Ford. From "This is what a partner looks like", to "Me and Sixer could be the perfect team", to "He had what I always wanted- fingers" (drawn to his strangeness, maybe?), "He was destined for so much more", "I looked at his futures and giggled", and most stand-out to me, "Society calls these people freaks, I call them Henchmaniacs!"

Going back to the pre-Book of Bill era I was talking about, Bill's offers for Ford to join him were always in a sort of murky territory for interpretation. The first offer could definitely be read as mocking, with the line "WITH THAT SIX-FINGERED HAND, YOU'D FIT RIGHT IN WITH MY FREAKS!" in particular making it seem like Bill was only saying that to rub Ford's strangeness in his face, and the second offer to join Bill being under a new circumstance- that now Bill is desperate and believes Ford is the only one who can help him. But the Book of Bill mentions the idea of Ford becoming a Henchmaniac more than once, and also has Bill upset at losing Ford and claiming "he'll be back", as well as Bill seeming to use "freak" more like a badge of honour, and having previously complimented Ford's six fingers (In the Sixer intro page, he highlights Ford's fingers as a quality he likes, and in the pages about bodies, he states that "humans should have more fingers". To me, that first offer reads more now like Bill being genuine about finding Ford a place among his misfits. ...Although, the moment Ford says no, he does zap him into a statue. So. Y'know. He's still got issues.

(Yeah, again, red flag city. "Just hazing"? Bill, none of what you were doing over there was okay! You might have suppressed everything traumatic that happened to you, but that doesn't mean you can go around traumatizing everyone! Good lord.)

Bill has already been imply to like other characters because they remind him of himself. Pointing towards a connection with a character Bill DOESN'T have a weird undefinable ex-partner thing with... Mabel! Alex has says in multiple official media and interviews that Bill sees a lot of himself in Mabel, and essentially, that he thought Mabeland was the perfect prison because if HE liked all that awesome, uncontrolled chaos over any family or friends, why wouldn't SHE? And we see that again in TBOB. So basically, what I'm saying is that we have two characters to back up the fact that Bill seems gravitated towards humans or other living beings that he views as being 'like him'- beings he can relate to! So, y'know, what does that say about Bill and Ford?

There's also Bill's plans for the reader and "Weirdmageddon 2.0", where he portrays the reader as getting to, like, perch on his arm like a little bird and get their own little crown? And specifically calls out Ford for not going through with things?? Okay, Bill??

AND Ford not only being the only human mentioned on the list of people he "definitely doesn't miss so stop asking", but also having his own category? Alright, man.

Of course, another point to the 'Hey, maybe Bill can actually feel emotions towards humans besides complete and total apathy' club is this page here, which has ALSO been hotly debated! Certainly, we know he's telling the truth about his home dimension being destroyed, and we know that he's lying about the 'monster', but some interpret this scene as Bill not being remorseful at all and playing his reaction up to earn Ford's sympathy. And me, personally, I dunno if I agree. I feel like the specific inclusion of Bill "looking distant, more distant than I'd ever seen him" (Mirroring the fact that he keeps blacking out when thinking about all his large-scale massacres) and him "laughing joylessly", I think this sequence is meant to tell us that Bill actually is being vulnerable with Ford here, it's just hidden under layers and layers of deceit, whether towards himself or Ford or both.

And finally for my Book of Bill collection stuff, there's the stuff that could be read as more romantic in nature. In the 'love' section, Bill claims he doesn't love anyone, but, like-

Come on. You can disagree with me that it's Ford, but he does have exes. And he's clearly not over them. Shrimpy little liar. And then there's the fact that a lot of his hokey 'advice' is stuff he ends up directly doing to Ford.

These rats.

The Love Cage.

The Book of Bill really outlined all that in bold, but in my opinion, it was never an entirely new revelation! Bill seems to hold a preference for Ford over other humans in the show. He shows up in Ford's dreams just to say hi, tease him, and gloat (Mabelcorn) unlike the other two dream appearances he's made (Dreamscaperers, Sock Opera) which were exclusively for business purposes. Unlike every other character that gets exclusively one nickname for their zodiac sign, Ford gets multiple (Fordsy, IQ, Sixer, smart guy, brainiac, the list goes on). Bill asks Ford to join him TWICE, whereas anyone else who tries gets their face rearranged, put in a cage and made to dance, frozen in stone, etc etc. And finally, I think, the most emblematic of Bill's weird, specific relationship with Ford, is that whereas everybody else gets turned into stone, Ford got turned into gold.

Which kinda sums up their whole thing up pretty well? Bill gave him special treatment by turning him into a golden statue (similar to yellow ha ha), always holding him close, but, like... Dude. You still kidnapped a man and turned him into a statue and then threatened to kill his niece and nephew. I don't think it will change his opinion on you if he's the Most Pampered Hostage, Actually. I just don't think that we need to explore the relationships between characters as simply "Well, this character hurt the other one, so we shouldn't really think about why or what they feel personally, because what they did was bad, so there".

Bill & Ford interest me because they're a tragedy in motion. We can see that Bill and Ford mirror each other in a multitude of ways, and we can see that they both do have positive feelings towards each other at the time they meet, and we see that Bill very desperately wants Ford to be just like him in the unhealthy ways; the ways that make Bill destroy entire universes and compartmentalize it all, because maybe then, he can finally have the companionship he so deeply aches for. Bill and Ford both had tough, lonely upbringings, but Ford moved on from that "I don't need you" mentality. That's what saved him. Bill didn't, and that's what got him where he was in the end. I feel like that's just so much more interesting than Bill just being a flat entity that makes abuse Happen to Ford, just as another Event in his life. I mean, isn't it just SO much more interesting that Ford humanizes Bill, in a way? That Ford makes him- in Bill's own words- "sentimental"? That a chaotic dream demon has regrets and loves and favourites and connections? It's the same thing with Fiddleford & Ford, although, obviously, to a MUCH lesser extent than Bill & Ford. But you get what I mean, right? You know that Fiddleford and Ford are going to undo each other in the end, and the path to that downfall is... it's telling a story! I like the story of it all! I think that's what I've been invested in and intrigued by all these years- the story, the tragedy of Bill and Ford. No matter what form it takes.

(Plus, as tumblr user fordtato pointed out in their own essay (not tagging because this post is messy enough as is oh god), hey, Ford now has two incredibly queer-coded narratives, with one of them being about how he recovered and was able to heal from an abusive relationship. And, well, I think that's just neat.)

Anyways, that's the end of the post. Thanks for reading this long!

[isagrimorie]

Star Trek Voyager 6x02 - Survival Instinct | Star Trek Picard 1x08 - Broken PIeces

Seven: When I was first assimilated into the Collective, I was a child. They were assimilated as adults. When our individual memories began to resurface-- Chakotay: Yours were of being a little girl. A scared little girl. Seven: I let that fear control me. After I saw the drone die in the swamp, I panicked. I began to envision my own death. Alone, without even the sound of another drone to comfort me. So I forced them to return. I infiltrated their left cerebral hemispheres with nanoprobes and created a new interlink network. One that they couldn't resist. And then I eliminated the evidence of what I had done. Chakotay: You were overwhelmed by feelings you couldn't begin to understand. You're not responsible for that. Seven: Because of what I did, they'll be forced to live the rest of their lives in the Collective. For that, I am responsible.

Rewatching Star Trek Voyager after Picard is so good because it makes the Seven-centric stories even richer. They were already good but it adds another layer to everything.

It also makes this moment in Broken Pieces even more resonant for Seven because she's not only assimilated people before but she's assimilated people who were trying to escape. I love how interesting this makes Seven's character. It's a situation TV Tropes call Ignored Epiphany.

It's the moment when someone who is on a path of redemption or enlightenment willfully ignores the epiphany to continue on the current path they were. But narratively, the ignored epiphany moment wasn't futile.

Eventually what happens is the ignored epiphany becomes a building block for when the real epiphany hits. Because sometimes epiphany and the choice to turn around is not just one moment, it's composed of several moments, and sometimes, people need the help of other people to pull or push them out of the current path they were on.

This is what happened to Seven of Nine.

Drone Borg Seven of Nine was happy to continue being a Borg and was proud of being a Borg. It wasn't until Janeway chose to cut Seven from the Borg and started Seven on the path of her own individuality that Seven finally understood the real damage the Borg has down to other people and herself.

And now that she possesses individuality and knowledge when she's asked a year later if she would want to return to the Collective given the choice and Seven's answer is a resounding No.

And then going back to this moment in Survival Instinct to the moment in Broken Pieces knowing the context for Seven now it's so much more poignant because she's done this before and regretted it.

I think this is one moment out of many moments in what she's done and made to do as a Borg that Seven will never forgive herself for because the moment with her three Unimatrix Drones was something Seven did herself.

(I do wish they let the moment in Picard 1x08 breathe more but time and production probably didn't give them enough time to do more).

Seven: The damage I did can never be repaired, and my guilt is irrelevant. I simply want them to experience individuality, as I have. As you have. At one time, you were confined to this Sickbay. Your program was limited to emergency medical protocols. In some ways, you were not unlike a drone. But you were granted the opportunity to explore your individuality. You were allowed to expand your program. Your mobile emitter gives you freedom of movement. Your thoughts are your own. If you were told you had to become a drone again, I believe you would resist. EMH: Yes. I suppose I would. Seven: They would resist as well. They would choose freedom, no matter how fleeting. Only you and I can truly understand that. EMH: Survival is insufficient.

[garchu-garchu]

Guys, I love Ace as a character. He's cool, he has an interesting story and growth, I love that he has a (quite literally) fatal flaw, and his parallels with Luffy are very nice...

BUT.

I'll always die on the hill that his death doesn't hit as hard as it could have. When Impel Down/Marineford comes by, we barely know anything about Ace himself. He has had such minimal screentime. We know and care for Luffy of course, so his unwavering determination to save his brother compels us to care too because we want Luffy to succeed, and Ace was a nice guy back in Alabasta so we have a shallow bond with him. We also know that he got caught in the first place because he wanted to defend Luffy, so it adds to that brother bond. That alone is part of why we care for his death - because it hurts seeing Luffy lose his brother after EVERYTHING he has done to save him. After he was already technically saved. It's a very touching scene to follow from Luffy's perspective, and Ace's last words are heartbreaking and bittersweet. It's very hard not to feel emotional because the scene is very well written.

But just IMAGINE if we had gotten the ASL backstory before. Of course, I'd tone down the "I'm not going to die!!!" Ace constantly says to still keep the shock of his death, but it would've been MILES more impactful. The backstory is there to add more context to Luffy's grief (and does an amazing job setting up the "I still have my crew" line), and it still hurts when you look back and realize how tragic Ace's death was in retrospect - but we've already felt the bigger feelings!!! The "climax" has already happened and only now we're building up on it? Don't get me wrong, this retrospective storytelling format CAN totally work. But this time, I think Oda should've gone with the standard "backstory to build the climax" format he usually does in his writing. Retrospective storytelling often works best with smaller bits of info, mysteries, and plot twists - not something so big and special like a character death. It also works for Brook! I think it's very clever to have his backstory only be told in the latter part of the arc as closure. Because we already know what happened to his crew and we've learned to care for Brook through the arc, so the scene hits hard like a truck. It works because his backstory isn't very relevant to the arc's climax anyway, only for his own character growth.

The ASL backstory gives us so much more insight on both why this is important to Luffy and helps us understand Ace's character. To me, the most heartbreaking fact we don't know in a first watch and that I think we should is the fact that Luffy (assumedly) has already lost a brother. This completely changes the framework here. It adds a very huge layer on why Luffy is so set to save Ace at all costs. He's lost a brother before, and he's not about to lose another. He has a chance this time. Back with Sabo, they felt hopeless - but now he's strong enough to at least try. And yet, he loses. He's all alone now. He's lost both of his brothers. And that's such an important tidbit we only learn after the fact!!!

We also completely miss the fact that Ace felt alone and rejected by the world ever since he was a kid. Yet he had a whole fleet he saw as a family and his little brother show up in the main Marine base to fight against all the Admirals just to save his life. This adds a LOT of impact to his last sentences and to Whitebeard's sacrifice. Yet... we don't feel that at the moment, either. We only learn of this later (if I recall correctly, I could be wrong about this one).

I genuinely truly feel like showing the backstory before would've made Ace's death more emotional. To me, as it's written, it feels like punching Arlong without knowing why Nami was hurting. It feels like seeing the Nine Scabbards' annihilation without seeing Oden's backstory. Or seeing the Going Merry burn without watching the rest of Water Seven. These would all still be emotional and impactful scenes on their own, but the context makes us understand their stakes and the emotional weight behind them. Because as it stands, Going Merry's death made me cry a river... while Ace's death made me emotional, maybe got my eyes a little watery. And it's a shame because I'm sure I would've cried a river too if I knew the whole context.

[chriscrosswallflower-blog]

Alright, I have finally finished watching a Good Girl's Guide to Murder and I collected my thoughts as I went. Overall I really enjoyed it, though some of the plot changes weren't my favorite.

Spoilers below for the TV show!

Things I Loved

How awkward Pip is - I don't think we get a good look at this in the book since it is mostly through Pip's eyes, but I love how goofy and awkward she is!

Pip's friendship group! I love how much closer they seem in the show and how they accept Pip as the weirdo she is without a single thought, especially since she is different from them in so many ways. I also love seeing more of Connor and his funny personality

I love that we get to see more of Cara and Pip's relationship - they are precious and you can tell how ride or die they are for each other

Lauren - she adds so much to their friend group and I just love her so much. Ant, stay tf away from this baby!

The PipRavi sleepover - my heart couldn't take it!

I like the introduction of the da Silva siblings backstory. In the books they seemed pretty estranged so it's not as obvious why Nat is upset about Pip accusing her brother. Obviously that would bother anyone to an extent but with the introduction of how close they are/were it will make a lot more sense moving forward

Max (and Dan honestly) seem creepy from the start. I swear anytime either of them came on screen I got a terrible feeling - though Dan did begin to seem more good intentioned after talking to Pip in the police car (still creepy though)

Name drops of characters that will be important later - non-readers won't think anything of it but it's funny to hear Stella and Jamie name dropped so casually

It's interesting to see Mr. Ward acting so normal and casual - he does the same thing in the books but seeing it is so unnerving. I think the plot line of him forcing Pip to change her EPQ really adds another layer to his character too

BARNEY'S FUNERAL AND THE TENNIS BALLS!!! 😭 the "why didn't anyone help him" almost broke me.

Ravi being the one to suggest that they call off the investigation hits so damn hard. He feels so hopeless and trapped but the only thing he cares about is protecting and reassuring Pip

Since we have a more objective POV, I love seeing the little signs of how smitten Pip is with Ravi from the beginning - much more than she ever acknowledges in the book

Pip going in the junk yard scared the hell out of me - she got wayyy too close to DTK there.

Becca and Andie being close makes her death so much more tragic

Cara has a TRACKER on Pip?! "Maybe she's not as smart as she thinks she is," man I cackled!

OMG Sal and Andie talking about running away together hurt so bad - seeing how much they loved each other makes the whole story so much more heart breaking

Regardless of if it's in the book or in the show - Mr. Ward talking about how he talked to Sal about Cambridge so he would die thinking about something good will always turn my stomach. That man is such a disgusting mfer

Pip threatening Max at the very end is so amazing. That little pat on the shoulder? 🤌🤌

Things I disliked

Pip seems a lot less informed in the show - like seriously, book Pip would be horrified. You broke into the Bell's house without GLOVES?

I think this is partially because we don't see Pip's POV and much about her suspects - the only two people she really seems to suspect are Dan and Jason and that really only comes into play at the end. I wonder if people who just watch the show will even guess that she suspected Naomi, Nat, and even Howie throughout most of the book

I think we all mourn for "real men wear floral when trespassing" 😢

Honestly, the storyline with Pip's dad might be my least favorite thing. I loved their cute, playful relationship in the book and how she ardently defends her blended family, but in the show, even before the cheating thing, it seems like she didn't really like him? That made me so sad! (Also, does he call her chicken in the UK edition of the books? I really liked Pickle as a nickname!)

Nat's storyline is strange, like I understand to an extent why they did it but book Nat would have a fit if she figured out she was supposedly friends with Andie 😂 I think she loses quite a bit of her character building when we leave out how much her nudes getting leaked affected her (it seems like almost a minor thing in the show) and her act of violence while trying to go to college that put her on probation. Especially since it's a large reason why Pip suspected her in the first place (her reasoning seems pretty weak in the show)

Where the heck is Stanley?! He's pretty important for season 2; of all the characters to cut you wouldn't think it would be him!

I really miss the scene where Ravi and Pip recreated the timeline to prove Sal's innocence - it was such a potent moment!

I miss hearing Naomi's backstory - we get a bit of it implicitly by the way she acts and her confession, but I think it adds a lot to her character to know more about her anxiety and depression and how it caused her to drop out of college

We miss some of Pip's bad ass moments! Again, this is possibly because we are seeing things from an objective POV and we can't see inside of her head, but I loved reading about how knowledgeable she is about true crime, how much research she did, and how much that informed her actions. I also missed seeing how much she defended the Singh family and Ravi specifically. That scene in the grocery store where she told off the cashier for being so rude to Ravi is one that I dearly miss

Pip accusing Max of raping Becca doesn't hit as hard when she did it over the phone and I hate that he didn't truly confess like he did in the book. And they didn't bring up Nat's rape at all (or Nat in general very much). Her confronting Max and Naomi was such a badass moment for Pip and I'm sad that we missed it

Becca's wig in that flashback. Yikes.

Becca taking Pip to the well (or whatever it is - I feel like it was called something else but it's not coming to mind) made her seem less sympathetic to me than when she just drugged her without much of a plan. "Now I'm going to have to put you in there with her," was so freaking sinister

Things I'm not sure about

In some ways I like the addition of Pip seeing Andie and Sal after they obviously argued - the guilt she felt after that and how that would motivate her to look into the case makes a lot of sense. However, I think I prefer her only looking into the case because she trusted and believed in Sal because of how kind he was to her. I think that the fact that she rarely doubted Sal in the books was really compelling and we lose a lot of that when Pip is concerned that she might have played a part in Sal finding Andie after their fight, therefore possibly contributing to her death

I don't think the video to lure the killer out was necessary but I think they did it to move the story along quicker. I wish we could have seen more of Pip's notes since that is what they wanted in the books when they kidnapped (dognapped?) Barney

I think I prefer them finding Andie's planner over the note in her bunny - it seems to make more sense than just a random note and I like how it gives us a small look into her life (her struggling to read the Revengers was a cute little detail and showed us that she is still a teenager). That being said, the note does the job and it feels a bit nit picky, so I'm not super upset by it

Having Isla tell Pip about Sal's murder was interesting - I'm not super mad about it but it definitely changed a lot, especially since neither of them think she's Andie and he keeps her captive to further hide Sal's murder. Somehow it makes Mr. Ward even more sinister

Having the plot line of Ravi leaving, coming back, and then him and Cara track her down was definitely different. I can decide which way I prefer it. Ravi leaving seemed really random and rushed but I did like that Cara had a part in her rescue (see the hilarity of the tracker above)

Though I enjoyed seeing PipRavi get together by the end of the season, I will miss their awkward tip toeing around each other as Ravi tries to ask her out!

All in all I really enjoyed it - I think it's one of those that I'll also get a lot out of after rewatching it. If you got this far, first off, I'm impressed! And second, let me know your thoughts!!

[blabberoo]

You know, it makes sense why so many people love your art.

Just speaking from my own experience, I’m only really familiar with Hyper Light Drifter, and tangentially familiar with Dead Cells. I scrolled through your work because I really like how you handle line weight and color. I stuck around because I enjoy your writing style and the story concepts you come up with for these characters. You put genuine thought into the interactions you’re creating and that’s what makes it interesting.

Hell the first time I said “Goddamn” aloud when looking at you art was that line from V1 asking the Drifter if there was an afterlife, correcting itself, and specifically asking if the Drifter has an afterlife waiting for him.

That’s a raw ass line! The concept of a murder robot that knows for a fact the afterlife is real but not if you personally get one? Terrifying concept! Love it!

This was also literally the first time I’d ever heard of Ultrakill. Neat game, I dig the premise.

My point being, you come up with some really damn interesting concepts and then have the skills to execute those ideas.

I have almost no idea what’s going on otherwise, but I’m a fan of the silly bits regardless.

I am also super curious what your digital art process looks like

OHHH???? 🥺🥺🥺🥺

Man. I am. Speechless. This is insane. This truly means a lot. Im really happy that you liked all of that and the character interactions. I've always thought of headcanons for these characters with their personalities and how their respective environment shaped them, and ive always loved it when I see their personalities interact and clash with one another.

The three of them having to deal with death in such a different way is such an interesting concept to me and i inhale that dynamic.

What I also aimed to achieve when I make these comics is that even people outside of it would enjoy these characters and their dynamic :D because I really just do love writing a story about them.

Thank you so much!! You made me ramble about these guys hahhaaha

Also, not much really happens during art process because my attention span is sometimes too short to make a much proper art Lmaoo. I mostly use 2 layers, for the very sketchy lineart and flat colors. And i sometimes add airbrush for lighting or mood. 👍

[longing-for-rain]

So I know you said you ship Zuko/Zhao sooo any headcanons about them?

I don’t know whether to call it “shipping” because in my mind it’s very one-sided and has to do more with my headcanons about Zhao than anything. Basically I ship it in the sense that it makes an interesting story and allows me to deal with dark themes, but I don’t think it would be a remotely healthy relationship. But a realistic situation, which is why it’s interesting to me.

Basically, my headcanon for Zhao is that he’s gay, but as a result of growing up and living in a deeply homophobic society, he hates himself for it and tries to deny it. He’s even married to a woman, but deep down, he knows it’s fake and his lack of ability to feel attraction towards his wife makes him feel inadequate and angry.

In canon, Zhao is a character who is constantly trying to claw his way to the top. He’s desperate to prove himself as strong and competent. He’s also fairly sadistic. He also seems to derive a weird kind of joy from deriding Zuko. I think this is largely a combination of jealousy and manipulation of Zuko’s royal status. Zhao desperately wishes he could be royalty, but can’t because he wasn’t born into it. He views Zuko as pathetic and weak, and resents the fact that he was born a prince and squandered it. Also, because Zuko is disgraced and banished, it makes him an acceptable target for Zhao. While he’s technically royal, Zuko lacks the protections he normally would have. Zhao clearly has no fear surrounding putting Zuko down and trying to impede him at every opportunity. I think Zhao enjoys this because being able to do such a thing to the Prince without consequences makes him feel more powerful.

Given this is the canon dynamic, I think adding the element of Zhao being a repressed, self-hating gay man makes it even more interesting. His combination of admiration and jealousy towards royalty gives him this weird obsession with Zuko, especially as he matures. Feeling such a way towards Zuko makes Zhao angry. Zhao is so far in denial that he spins this twisted narrative in his head where Zuko is actually seducing him on purpose in order to humiliate him. Zuko, of course, is completely oblivious to this and doesn’t feel anything for Zhao. This just pisses Zhao off more.

And this eventually reaches a boiling point, especially after Zhao begins to suspect that Zuko is the traitor who freed the Avatar. The combination of Zhao’s obsession with Zuko and his sadistic nature results in him taking out this anger on Zuko. Not going into details but you probably know what I’m talking about.

Then this would add another layer on top of their hatred towards each other, and Zuko’s decision to try and save Zhao’s life despite Zhao treating him this way and/or trying to have him killed. Even after Zhao’s death, Zuko would be left with such a complex situation to work through.

I know it’s fucked up but yeah, that’s basically my Zhao backstory.

[venusin-aries]

Who cares if SJM said the lightsinger theories were “onto something”? I don’t give a shit if Gwyn is a lightsinger, I don’t think she’s going to be evil. There is literally nothing to support that fact besides shippers who are crying about Gwynriel being a possibility. 

That doesn’t even necessarily mean lightsinger. It could mean she’s something adjacent. SJM literally comes up with new powers all the damn time. That’s her job. She’s dropping a hint of how powerful and important Gwyn is, if anything.

And her acknowledging the lightsinger theory just tells me she’s going to be a major role in an upcoming book lmao so that’s not the win anti’s think it is. Like that totally discredits the anti’s who think she’s never going to show up in the series again. 

And even if she is a lightsinger, wouldn’t it just make her extra unique and special if she was a good one? 🫣 wouldn’t that just piss people off that such an evil power is being wielded by such a good character making her even more powerful than we all thought and an equal to a certain shadowsinger 😵

Even if she IS slightly problematic, like a lot of people on here have stated I don’t see Nesta and Emerie in particular giving up on her.

And I think the only person Gwyn would be angry at, if she does have some deadly powers, is herself. Because if it had manifested sooner, she could have saved her sister. I don’t get why people think she has a vendetta against Azriel.

If Gwynriel are mates, which a lot of us Gwynriel shippers think they are, she doesn’t have to lure him anywhere lmao. He’s naturally going to be drawn to her.

I’ve talked about it before, but siren!Gwyn (which I find comparable to lightsinger) and Azriel is a total vibe. Gwyn using her voice to “lure” people someplace and Azriel catching them unaware from the shadows. Both of them working from the shadows and Gwyn’s power and beautiful face leading their enemies to Azriel (death).

I’m VERY into that idea.

I do think a story about her guilt and anger at herself for not being more powerful at the time of the attack would be interesting and add another layer to an already layered character though.

Really, all of these theories just make Gwynriel more and more likely to happen in my opinion. 

[sketching-shark]

🔥 with Tang Sanzang or his Buddha of Glorious Sandalwood self, your pick

He would be SO much more interesting if he was written to be more like the historical Xuanzang than as a parody of Confucian scholars!!!

Feel like I'm preaching to the choir in some ways, but yea it's been remarked on by many another poster that of all the pilgrims Tang Sanzang does usually come across as the most static (with perhaps the exception of Bai Longma, but he spends most of his time as a horse so cut him some slack) and sometimes the most annoying. Which does make sense in a lot of ways, especially since you could reasonable argue that everyone's favorite weepy monk presents an early version of the "damsel in distress trope" given how often his role in the story is to get kidnapped and saved.

That said, it has been nice to see an uptick of people arguing that given the circumstances of having to wrangle three extremely dangerous yaoguai on a journey where he's routinely threatened with death by devouring and multiple instances of sexual assault, a lot of Tang Sanzang's even more frustrating actions do make quite a bit of sense, from using the headband against Sun Wukong to the favoritism towards Zhu Bajie (i.e. the one pilgrim who hadn't tried to kill/eat him). The monk doesn't change much over the course of the journey, but I'm in the camp that there's some pretty interesting implications about how he thinks & approaches the world! So three cheers to the og for making it crystal clear on just how messed up each of the pilgrims are lmao.

Even so, I do think it would be really cool if JTTW itself or retellings spent more time making the implicit explicit, as it were, and let Tang Sanzang grow and change as a character outside of his usual mandated tropes. I do think a lot of this could be accomplished by including more traits from Xuanzang himself, who if I'm remembering this right he was both a master translator, a savvy diplomat (having reportedly gotten along well with everyone from local rulers to bandits), and possessed a pretty amazing tenacity and set of travel skills. Not to mention I think it would be amazing if Tang Sanzang's story followed Xuanzang in that the historical monk was NOT permitted by the Tang emperor to travel west, but did so in direct defiance to that rule because he was that dedicated to reviewing the Buddhist scripture in India and bring its lessons back to China. Said as much before, but that situation could add a really interesting layer to the general image of the world JTTW presents!

[avelera]

The Power Fantasy vs. The Mary Sue

I think one phrase we need to work back into discussions around stories and story crafting in general is, "power fantasy."

And I think in the course of discussing power fantasies, we can reexamine the term, "Mary Sue" which traditionally only referred to original characters put into an established universe who was unrealistically capable at saving the day and winning love. Because clearly the definition has expanded beyond that in how it's used, and I would argue, the new definition of a "Mary Sue" is: "A power fantasy that the viewer does not find exciting or personally relatable."

I think fear of creating a "Mary Sue" has stifled some creators (particularly female-identifying ones) when it comes to including power fantasies in their stories. Because it's ok and even the point for fiction to contain a power fantasy! A power fantasy is something cool or desirable that does not happen in the real world, or doesn't happen regularly, happening to the protagonist in a way that allows the audience to enjoy that experience vicariously.

Let's get into some examples of what I mean:

A good example of a power fantasy might be the elemental bending of the series "Avatar: The Last Airbender". It is objectively cool to be able to cast magical elemental spells by doing martial arts, which are also cool.

A romantic power fantasy that we see very often is, "This love interest is very powerful and dangerous towards everyone else in the world, but they are sweet and loving with the protagonist and would never ever hurt them." Someone like a mob boss or an assassin or even a literal demon who finds love with the protagonist and turns those qualities to their defense. "Beauty and the Beast" is an example of this trope but it can take many forms.

Another power fantasy might be to take a complex political or military situation and saying it can be solved by an individual with a single heroic act.

For example, destroying the Death Star in Star Wars, something that's accomplished by young protagonist Luke Skywalker who is fresh off the farm, being enough to defeat the Empire (in the first film, before the trilogy was fully planned), or killing Emperor Palpatine at the end of the trilogy. (Yes the expanded universe adds nuance to this, but within the films themselves, these single events are defined as decisive victories.)

Another example might be how throwing the One Ring into Mount Doom is enough to end the threat of Sauron's evil in Middle Earth forever.

A power fantasy might be the ability to magically gain a lifetime of skills, such as downloading Kung Fu in "The Matrix" or a magical serum making Steve Rogers into a super soldier in "Captain America", or any number of "chosen one" stories where an otherwise unremarkable but relatable individual is suddenly thrust into a world of adventure and magically granted the abilities needed to navigate it.

And in more personal stories, the idea that that a single gesture or speech or demonstration could be enough to change the attitude of an authority figure, or a loved one, or a group, is a power fantasy. Not that this can't ever happen in the real world, but it is a power fantasy to say that a single impassioned speech can bring an end to widespread bigotry, or that winning the big game will earn the protagonist the love and respect of a distant parent or a potential romantic partner.

There's nothing wrong with power fantasies. Power fantasies are enjoyable, they are often the meat of the "so what?" of a story. Adding a cool power fantasy to your world like can be the hook of the story, or the spice, or the whole story could be nothing but layered power fantasies, in fact a great many really good stories are!

Where power fantasies fail or are leveled with the accusation of being "Mary Sues" is when the audience does not find the power fantasy relatable or exciting.

In fanfiction, Mary Sues/self insert characters are often created deliberately in stories that extremely personal to the writer, who is often a beginner. These characters and their stories are not intended for a wide audience, they're merely a written expression of a daydream the writer has. That means that they're not meant to be widely relatable. The author just wants to imagine being the 10th member of the Fellowship of the Ring and having Legolas fall in love with them. Others might find it "cringe" but the fiction is serving its purpose in bringing joy to the author. It might just not be widely popular.

However, this reputation of Mary Sues being these intensely personal stories that aren't trying to balance relatability in pursuit of a wider audience have somewhat muddled the discussion around what the accusations of something being a Mary Sue are actually saying. Because what they're saying is: I don't find this story relatable.

Rey in "The Force Awakens" trilogy was roundly criticized as being a Mary Sue. I like to use her as an example because it's one of the most public discussions of late that used the word, and because I understood both sides of the accusation.

To be sure, an element of the accusation was sexism. Because Rey's story wasn't all that different from many male protagonists and yet many male viewers found her power fantasy unrelatable because she's a woman.

That said, her story was also somewhat sloppily constructed when compared to, say, Luke Skywalker. Luke Skywalker was a well-constructed power fantasy because he did things that the viewers wished they could do: like be plucked up from their boring job on the farm to because a cool fighter pilot trained by a space wizard with a laser sword that once you mastered it you'd magically know how to use perfectly because of the Force, and in the process, Luke got to hang out with cool people like Han Solo and Princess Leia and literally save the universe. These are cool, fun things that you average kid would love to do!

Rey's story was muddled. She was given all the same magical powers and many of the same story beats as Luke Skywalker, but it wasn't in pursuit of a coherent power fantasy, not for women who might relate to her, nor that men in the audience might not personally relate to but could at least understand wasn't for them. No one bothered to ask a female fan of Star Wars what they wished they could do if they were in the Star Wars universe. Because I imagine being the secret descendent of Palpatine (???) wasn't one of them.

But this shouldn't mean we can't have women in Star Wars who get a bunch of magical powers and save the day! And that was where the discussion broke down. Power fantasies are good. Sometimes, power fantasies aren't relatable to the person calling a character a Mary Sue. Sometimes, it's because it's not meant for them.

For example, I think that Maverick in Top Gun is an unbearable Mary Sue, because I don't find the desire to become a fighter pilot who saves the day all that compelling. But I at least understand the power fantasy isn't for me.

The key is to make the power fantasy fun and relatable to the intended audience. The key is to understand the power fantasy being created. When trying to expand to a broader audience and tell a good story, the power fantasy usually also needs to be roadblocked by some obstacles or rules, or there need to be tradeoffs, but they are usually things that the audience also finds exciting.

Like: you get to be a super cool fighter pilot, but first you have to go to fighter pilot school, where you'll meet tons of other beautiful and cool people, which is also a power fantasy, and then you get to be a magically gifted and skilled fighter pilot who saves the day!

Or: You get to be a crime-fighting badass who saves the day while dressed up like a bat (for some reason) but first you have to travel the world and learn martial arts and go on a bunch of adventures before you're skilled enough to do it.

That said, sometimes an element of the power fantasy is that the character just naturally achieves it! There just usually has to be other tradeoffs. Like Neo can learn Kung Fu with the touch of a button in The Matrix, but now he has to use these skills to fight some serious bad guys before he gets the praise of everyone around him, just like Captain America and the serum, he now has to go save the day before he can get his parade. You don't get easy powers and widespread adulation at once, that feels cheap. That's why the Mary Sue showing up and impressing the Fellowship with her magical skills before she's done anything to actually help them feels cheap.

Mostly, the point of this essay is to help those, like me, who grew up around accusations of all original female characters being Mary Sues to help overcome this knee-jerk fear and understand when the criticism was valid and when it was just sexism. There should be more female power fantasies in mainstream fiction! There should be just as many as there are male power fantasies! But, sometimes male and female characters can be Mary Sues, which is expressions of power fantasies that feel unearned, or unrealistic, or just not fun for the audience.

Sometimes it's not fun for the audience because they don't relate to the fantasy being explored, and that's ok! The power fantasy is still allowed to exist! Because my god, if I have to sit through yet another magical white guy chosen one who is super cool and saves the world and gets the girl, viewed totally uncritically as the Mary Sue it is, we can at least create the versions that speak to a wider range of personal experiences than that.

[arianjpeg]

I wrote down the things Martyn said about his lore during the stream (mostly about the poems), here's what I could put together in short time:

Episode 04:

Every grain that passes come to rest - Time passing

A pilar built another test - Beginning of the watchers influence on betraying Scott. Also another layer of the Watchers putting Martyn above the other players because they have interest on him, he's fun to torment and while being very loyal, he's happy to switch on people if need be. During "another test" we hear the tone of the tune when the boogeyman is picked, but pitched down.

These fickle fields, unguided hand - Recognition that Ren wasn't on this season, so a switch on Martyn's comfort and familiarity.

Forever molding in the sands - The idea that all would wash up on the shore

The thrill to kill, the fleeting gill - Excitement of betraying someone and how fragile the alliance was.

All washed ashore to settle still - Same of "forever molding in the sands"

A single day and then it's gone - About their timers.

Episode 07:

Pause, unpause. We paralyze - Recognition of the AFK episode and Grian's role within the story, bringing a more joyous yet chaotic side, which is bad for the Watchers since they feed in negative emotions. Text is in upper case cause the Watchers are pissed at Grian.

A vacant stare. For wandering eyes - Watchers being able to paralyze Grian and make him a bystander on the game, trying their best to get rid of him. Forcing him to only watch.

Canary call, the first to fall - Jimmy's death (reference to the canary in coal mine story)

Forever caged in different walls - The nature of the loop of the games and how it's happening again and again, with him dying first

Echoes bring for brief exchange - The listeners are a temporary wrinkle

Disruptions by the ones estranged - The listeners managed to interrupt the games briefly to replace Pearl and Cleo. Lizzie was tapped in cause Pearl hasn't quite recovered from the events of Double Life and was really traumatized. Cleo had never made it so far before Double Life so it took a toll on her, she never witnessed this much destruction before. Cleo and Pearl don't know they got swapped.

Martyn said this about Joel recognizing Lizzie and I had to quote cause it broke me:

"It makes sense that Joel was the only one to recognize Lizzie for being soulmates and married in another life. Joel will always recognize Lizzie no matter what, no matter when"

Our gaze would bring untimely deaf - For a listener to not hear anymore it would be close to death, symbolically.

"None of the Evo players are Listeners. Only Grian has become a Watcher, but everyone else is a player"

Episode 08:

The vignette at the end of Martyn's episode is the Watchers getting more and more frustrated (they hate Scott for refusing to play along, Impulse being willing to die and ruining the negative emotions, annoyed at the Listeners for swapping bodies before). The ending was too civil and nice for their taste.

It's not the Watchers fully possessing Martyn, they're feeding negative emotions into him and making him angrier than he should be. The Watchers wanted a show.

A reminder that it can't always end civil, a reminder of why they're there.

Martyn wanted to add clips of voice lines of important moments of c!Martyn during the count down but there wasn't enough time for that

The main voice on each number of the count down:

10 - Jimmy

9 - Pearl

8- Grian

7- Impulse

6- Scott

5- Etho

(After that it doesn't really has a main one).

Poem

There are some who watch, we are those who listen - The Listeners speaking. c!Martyn isn't really responsive or aware of what's happening

Not yet free - The cycle will continue

Still you flee from a weighted decision - Recognition that they were trying to run away from the Watchers on Evo. Also about the betrayal on Scott.

Woven the fragments that make up a soul:

A fragment isn't a shard of the Vtuber lore. The fragments were losses on the life series, a large fragment is lost from his soul/body after experiencing a great amount of distress.

The one in his chest represents Double Life, the one on his hand is Limited Life and the one on his face is Third Life (on his cheek, representing a tear after Ren fell, Ren's death broke him and made c!Martyn more selfish). The one for Last Life is beneath his clothing, between his shoulder blades.

Because of his win, one of the Listeners "cures" the fragment on his hand. They're trying to free/liberate him, while the Watchers are trying to feed on him.

His character is in a constant state of falling at the end because it's the only fear humans are born with, so the Watchers can feed of something while waiting for the next game.

Evo is part of the timeline, while other SMP's (hermitcraft, empires) are almost like other planes. While they're on the subconscious state they can go to these other planes.

c!Martyn doesn't know about anything going on. He gets a glimpse of the truth on Last Life but he didn't comprehend it. c!Grian is aware

Watchers thoughts on some members:

The watchers have a slight grip with all the Evo members

They're slightly fond towards Skizz and Joel because they tend to be chaotic.

They hate Scott. So much.

They took Lizzie and Mumbo out of rotation because the Watchers thought they couldn't take another season on a row, they would be too broken.

That's what I could note down while watching the stream, hopefully it makes enough sense!

[wildissylupus]

heyhey!! i love your page so much and your analyses of characters.... when you posted cassidy and mysteriousness and how he would only share the most with mina, it could be interesting to expand on that with echo being the closest person and personality to her as a result. it could be a grief amplifier but also it could close up cassidy even more and make him so much more reluctant to share anything real at all,, i've been thinking about this all day!! this is why i love your thoughts!!

Oh trust me I think about this a lot.

The way Declassified described Mina and Cassidy's realationship reminded me so much of something that was mentioned in Deadlock Rebels. That being that Cassidy had walls up, a line that not even Ashe could cross. Those walls being his mask, his persona, something that not a lot of people could see past, let alone break though, but Mina is described as seeing through it instantly, and even breaking through it. She did something that no one else, not even Ashe could do, she saw who Cassidy was without the persona, without the mask. She's the one person we see that Cassidy probably fully opened up to, and the way she died probably altered Cassidy permanently. He was just outside the building when the explosion happened, he raced to where Mina was and was the only person with her in her final moments. That would change anyone, and we see that it changed Cassidy, making him more hostile in the beginning but then he just began building those walls again, stronger this time. Hiding behind the mask even more so he wouldn't be hurt like that again.

One of my biggest HC's is that Cassidy and Echo have a father-daughter relationship, as some of Echo's personality wouldn't have come from Mina, but would have definitely come from Cole. Such as her outwardly sassing people like Ramattra, that and the way she teases people along with how she empathises with people and comforts them. We also know from her short story that the first people Echo could copy were Mina, Cassidy and Jack, Mina and Cassidy being the people she was around the most. That doesn't detract from the fact that Echo is still very similar to Mina, having similar behaviours and mannerisms.

Considering how we see Cassidy interact with Echo, it's very obvious that he isn't as open to her as he was with Mina. To me, Cassidy isn't the type of person to treat Echo as just a copy of Liao, she's her own person. However considering his history with her and Liao, it would be hard for him to not see the similarities. Also I would like to point out that the way that Echo and Cassidy talk about Liao feels like child asking an alive parent what their deceased parent would have thought of them.

Something else I would like to add is that Cassidy was so focused on revenge he wasn't able to attend Mina's funeral. Which probably adds another layer of grief on an already steaming sess pool of shit, because on top of all of that, Gerard gets injured and Reyes shoots a guy out of a window, basically signing Overwatch's death warrant. Then right after that the Zurich explosion happens and Cassidy looses his arm, his family, his home, and what fragile stability he had from being an Overwatch agent. During this time, Echo is also put in quarantine.

He probably feels like he failed Echo, that he failed Mina. It probably being part of the reason why he sounds so hostile about Jack "chasing ghosts", he knows what revenge can do to a person, how it can affect the people around them.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, Cassidy's story is so much more complex and tragic if you stop and really think about it.

(btw, writing this reminded me that shortly after this, he would have had to watch as Genji and Lena were critically injured while fighting Doomfist.)

[assignmentimprobable]

I haven’t subjected anybody to my posting in the last month so it’s time to break my streak with a dose of word salad.

To Start… It really gets my goat that it’s sort of integrated into Wolverine lore on a fandom level now that Stryker was the Weapon X culprit. Not necessarily because ‘oh that’s not how it was in the comics!’, even though that’s part of it. More because I think there is something genuinely interesting in the kind of evil that Stryker presented in God Loves, Man Kills (1982), the story that made up half of the movie’s plot elements and themes.

More below the cut. Warning for discussions of eugenics, racism, mentions of lynching.

Yes. This comic.

There’s a lot to be said about the prevailing relevance of televangelists using religious hypocrisy and white supremacist ideology in mass media to spead bigotry and incite lynchings within their following.

I do actually recognize the value of compositing Stryker’s character with Dr. Thornton from the Weapon X (1991) story. You only get 2 hours to hash out what’s happening, the writers wanted to pick up the threads from the last movie. For the purpose of a movie, a military contractor and scientist is an easy evil to swallow, because duh, and an easier one to clean up. That said, I think it was only ever good for that one outing.

Seeing him again in Origins can be explained as taking us back full circle— But even then, it falls apart because there’s such a Nothingness to his inclusion. He’s a generic CO without anything to add to the overarching dialogue on mutants, or the underpinnings of the original Weapon X story (Which is a problem for another post because I’ve got some fucking WORDS to say about the entirety of… all that. And how the movie undertook it). I KNOW that you’re probably thinking ‘why would you expect intelligence from origins’, and it’s like, I don’t. I watched that shit when it hit bootleg fresh off the DVD guy’s trunk collection. But if you’re gonna make such a big change with these kinds of ramifications on a movie timeline and stand on it, then well. I’m gonna write about it. Especially when he’s in fuckin DOFP and I’ve gotta see his foreshadowed impact getting waved around.

The point of Stryker in GLMK was that he couldn’t be easily handled by sending the X-Men in, he’s a political figure using the cover of free speech, fundamentalist Christian “values” and gathering enough clout to perpetrate some heinous shit.

Stryker didn’t need to experiment on anybody or invade the X-Mansion to make their lives palpably worse. He was gathering up the already large following of people gung ho as fuck to legislate on mutant rights. I used the word “lynching” earlier with intent, because that’s exactly what he did: the comic starts with two black mutant children being lynched and having a sign with the mutant slur hung on the bodies. Which. Alright. The use of black pain and black death in a story like this inevitably serves the allegory and makes the conclusion inescapable for even the most braindead readers of 1982. Dare I say, inescapable for the braindead readers of 2024. That said, the margin of leeway you can give it (if you even want to) gets smaller when you consider Kitty Pryde dropping the n word to ‘prove a point’ in the same story. How the mutant metaphor constantly assumes the volatility and natural genetic power of the underclass. Or how the team never seemed to have more than one face of color at a time having something vital to do, if even that. Hm.

Anyways, in invoking the imagery for this murder: The story illustrates that Stryker’s ultimate conclusion is 1-to-1 with his real life counterparts. It’s the last stop on the train to annihilation, and it never stops at just one group of arbitrarily picked undesirables. Bigotry never has one layer . You peel it back and you get another. You get down to the root of eugenics, the exclusion it’s all white supremacy. The same fire and brimstone preacher tactics, the same righteous indignation about problems that aren’t even Real. Designations of ‘natural’ that are presupposed by European defaults. The front runners of it have just gotten enough fucking simpletons thinking that they won’t be next, or not even *caring* that they’ll be next, as long as the object of their hate gets to suffer. It all comes down to the fuckin race science with these people. It does stink something fierce that FOX/Marvel were so afraid of pissing off evangelists that they bit the bullet and changed things up. It’s really a disservice to the story it’s adapting, and I LIKE X2! It’s probably my favorite of the movies?

TLDR: Corporations are cowards when it comes to standing on business. The Strykers of the world were real 42 years ago and they’re real now. Oh, and if I never see William Stryker again in an X-Men film, it’ll be too soon.

[morningstargirl666]

Hey! I absolutely love your stories, and right now I'm super excited to see how TBBW will continue ☺️. I'm really curious how you came up/what inspired you to write everything about the werewolf lore and Klaus' dad being alive and quite amazing if I say so myself 🥰.

Thanks so much! And oh boy, is this a question. So, what did inspire me to write the werewolf lore and Klaus' father into the story?

Well.

That comes down to the very fundamental reason why anyone chooses to write fanfiction. I watched TVD up to s5, then I watched TO up to s3 and you know what I said to myself?

That's fucking stupid.

And then I re-wrote canon my own way out of a mix of rage and spite. Here's how:

First off - the werewolves in the tvd universe are so under-developed and shallow characterisations it wants to make me SCREAM. Like, at least for vampires, we have sire bonds and the intimacy of blood sharing, the implications that powerful vampires controlling big cities, little coffee shops with UV protected windows, the differences between daywalkers and nightwalkers - an idea of an actual SOCIETY out there. For werewolves? There's none of that. The ability to turn into a wolf on a full moon is perceived as a 'curse' by vampires and witches alike, their bite kills vampires and they've been hunted to almost extinction, and that's it. That's all we're given. There's some development in TO to do with packs and how they work, but again, very shallow writing. And again, TO, so it was centred around Hayley's werewolf journey not fucking, oh, I don't know maybe KLAUS MIKAELSON WHO IS PART WEREWOLF, THE ORIGINAL HYBRID???? So yeah. Not sure it even counts at this point.

[deeply inhales]

Sorry, it all makes me very angry thinking about it, as you can certainly tell. See, all that I can probably forgive because it is called The Vampire Diaries and not The Werewolf Diaries - makes sense they didn't spend as much time fleshing out werewolf culture and customs, the details of the species. But then. THEN they had to go bringing Klaus' biological father back from the dead - a man he never knew but probably longed to have known after his death, that little boy inside who always wanted a real father not an abusive shitbag - and then. They. Fucking. Killed him off.

Not only that but KLAUS killed him off.

Add the fact Klaroline was meant to be endgame, ENDGAME I SAY, thus, I was fuelled by such fury and spite I had to rewrite the entirety of tvd's s3-s4 because that, my friends, was the last straw and I could not live in a world where something SO stupid was left unchallenged.

So. It all began with Lycaon, really.

In TO, Ansel is the name of Klaus' father. However, I always thought it would be more interesting if his father looked more like Klaus (Ansel's actor, Lloyd Owen, doesn't look much different from Mikael, brown hair, chiselled chin, etc), for various reasons, mainly being it would be amazing to explore Klaus growing up thinking he looked like the sister that died before he was born, not knowing what his true father looked like and having no other reference since he didn't share Mikael's features. It's like, another layer of detail to him coming to terms with being a bastard. So, if I did bring in Klaus' father in with the name Ansel, readers would be forever associating the character with that physical appearance, which I didn't want. Knowing that, I decided to completely rewrite the entire character from scratch.

'Lycaon' is actually of greek origin - I did look at norse names, but none of them spoke to me, not like this one did. Lycaon just rolls of the tongue so beautifully, and it means 'king of wolves', which was rather fitting I thought. Makes Klaus a little lost prince almost, a reference to a favourite klaroline fic of mine, which expands beautifully on the werewolf lore: The Lost Prince and The Eternal Queen. The people of Scandinavia were travellers and conquerers too, famous for their navy, and with the Greek's influence in Europe, I didn't think it was too outlandish for a greek name to pop up. Like it's improbable, but lets suspend our disbelief a little on that front.

I can't quite remember what inspired Lycaon as a whole (it's been like, 3 years lol). I know I wrote that first chapter of The Little Wolf more as a way to get an idea out of my head. It wasn't about the klaroline then or any of tbbw's plot - even the rest of the little wolf's plot - which I came up with much later. It was just that scene, little Niklaus running through the woods and finding a wolf within them that felt oddly like home.

(And somehow, that one scene bloomed into what's probably going to become a 800k megafic, but isn't that how it always is, with writing?)

Going onto the deeper details of the werewolf lore... that's a mash up of everything I love about werewolves, honestly. There's inspiration drawn from other shows, of course, like Teen Wolf for example and even Twilight much to my shame (those books/movies are questionable okay but the werewolves looked BADASS) as well as just general myth and legend. There was some things I knew I didn't want to do, like make the wolf mates fated by destiny, something i've seen a lot in kc fics. That removes the romance for me, so in tbbw a wolf mate isn't a soulmate by supernatural force... they're a soulmate of choice. A mate is the wolf's first love, and the man's last - both sides have to fall in love, as one (which I think is much more poetic, no?). Which is why you have examples of Lycaon falling in love with Esther, while his wolf didn't - she wasn't his mate. I've also decided I'm going to take out the beta/omega werewolf dynamics in the edit I'm doing at the minute - originally I tried combining the fantasy werewolf pack dynamics (alpha, beta, omega) with real life wolf dynamics (wolf packs are actually families, an alpha pair being the parents of the other wolves). This is because the found family trope has me at the throat and the idea of werewolf packs being more like families? It's just such a romantic idea and I love it. So I'm changing that.

I'm always changing the lore, really. Always adding new things in. Currently, I'm rewriting the little wolf and adding some new scenes in, expanding on an idea I've had for a while and implimented elsewhere - that lycanthropy isn't a curse. It's like a....defence mechanism. It's not triggered because you killed someone - that's just a coincidence that can happen, vampire propaganda (cough, cough - Milkael's propaganda) that has spiralled out of proportion. Werewolves believe it too, because most packs and bloodlines have been decimated so catastrophically, many traditions and inherent knowledge has been lost. It's more like a trauma response? So if someone with the werewolf gene goes through something that ignites the fight or flight instinct, the wolf wakes and choosing fight. Because of course - this is werewolves we're talking about. It's more born of the idea that werewolves evolved (which I think is 100% more badass, like imagine prehistoric dire wolf werewolves people COME ON) rather than were a result of spell from some witch forgotten long ago.

But back centuries ago, before Mikael's blood feud, before the purge of werewolves, werewolf packs had this ritual? A rite of passage almost, a coming of age, that does the same thing - wakes the wolf. It's just been lost through the generations of death, destruction and fear. Or that's my headcanon of it, and you'll get a glimpse of the ritual in the little wolf, something that's happening in the background of a scene to expand on the lore.

There's so MUCH more to say about the werewolf lore. Maybe I'll reblog this and share more at a later time but this is long as it is. The werewolf lore is definitely a lot. Ah, the sacrifices I make for world building.

[greenerteacups]

How do you feel about the fact that Bellatrix was Voldemort’s concubine/lover?

This ask prompted a real coleslaw of emotions.

Top level, I can't take the Cursed Child seriously as canon. I'm a purist about text to begin with — no word of God or adaptation can change what you put in the original books, and if the author wanted the text to be different, they had their shot — but, even if not, the Cursed Child is bad. Like, it's My Immortal type bad. It's the kind of bad that makes you glad it didn't come out closer to the original books + movies, or it could have had a Game of Thrones-type cratering effect on discussion and fandom. The Albus/Scorpius dynamic is cute — everything else about it sucks. It is a no-fly zone for good ideas. The Golden Trio are all twisted into funhouse mirrors, Voldemort has a daughter, and most perversely, the absolutely horrific mutilation of Cedric Diggory's character (in no world did that boy become a Death Eater! he was KIND AND DECENT! and he DIED ANYWAY! that was THE FUCKING POINT!!!!!!!).

Second layer: let's say that Bellatrix/Voldemort is canon and explored beyond the writers going "whoops gotta find a working womb for Voldemort's kid." That's a really interesting dynamic. It's a horrible dynamic! It's a motherfucker of an age gap to begin with, and it would have started when she was in her late teens to early twenties! Plus, she was married. To another man. So that would have to be explained? Because she obviously wasn't always so mindlessly devoted to Voldemort that she couldn't entertain connections with others? But that's not to say that I'm against it as a narrative decision. Tom Riddle is (captain obvious moment incoming) a Bad, Bad Man, and the idea of him seducing a younger woman is actually an understandable extension of his connection with his followers that's not explored in the books. Because, like: the Death Eaters are a cult! Riddle runs a death cult. Cults use sex to manipulate members. One of the oldest tricks in the book.

Third layer: this could be a kind of interesting move for Riddle, who as a villain is never developed all that much, and doesn't have much in the way of humanizing qualities. Because Riddle is anti-love as such. He doesn't believe in it, and if you believe Dumbledore, he's not capable of it. (I don't really love this take on the character, but I think that Riddle thinks this is the case, and Dumbledore is so grizzled and jaded by the years that he believes him. Dumbledore's great failure with Tom was never seeing past the person Tom wanted him to see — or, rather, looking at Tom and seeing Grindlewald when he should have seen Harry.) So for him to harbor enough affection for Bellatrix to take her as his (only?) lover, when he doesn't seem to need it to convince her to join him (and he doesn't really need her support, anyway) creates a wrinkle in the Story of Voldemort as we're told. It suggests that either Tom or Dumbledore (or both) is lying about his capacity for love— or at least his capacity for human attachment. And that Tom isn't so unique as either of them would like to believe.

Also, it adds a wrinkle to Bellatrix's character, too: even if they met when she was an adult, there's manipulation happening there that's clearly one-sided and unequal. or at least, there probably is. and if it's consensual, or if she aggressively pursued him— that's interesting, too. my point being: this isn't a bad idea, necessarily. it's a bad idea because i don't think the writers of the Cursed Child thought about any of that when they were trying to find a womb for the Voldebaby.

[lryghe]

META; the life and death of transmigration

Word count: 1075

Reading time: 4 mins

I’ve put the word count and reading time at the top of today's post so readers can click off when they realise the length (transparency is key), since this post isn’t MXTX related. I just wanted to air out some thoughts I had regarding how transmigration stories incorporate the previous lives of the people whose body they are occupying. Because it’s always so interesting to see how authors work around the ethical issues surrounding actually possessing someone's body. There’s the classic ‘they died in a fever so it’s morally okay to act however I want because they're dead, I’ll just keep them in my thoughts every now and again’ move, which is boring. There’s also the ‘they were a horrible person so it doesn’t matter what I do because I’m not abusing people like they were’ but that’s even more boring!

Of course, lording over other people’s morals is rarely excusable, but it's frustrating to see in transmigration stories because it’s such a lazy way to explain things. When the possession is done well, it’s really refreshing to see. Take Penelope Eckhart from ‘Death is the Only Ending for the Villainess’ (I read this novel around when it first came out in 2019, so my knowledge is a little rusty on some things), who notes very early on that she will never forgive the people around the original Penelope, because she knows she doesn’t have the right. Since she’s not Penelope, she can’t forgive them for how they treated Penelope. And this is so important because it highlights an issue with the transmigration community and its stories. If you aren’t the original, who are you to forgive and move past the inexcusable actions of others? You yourself cannot absolve another person of their sins, and this was explored so beautifully through Penelope, because she sympathises with the villainous girl who’s body she inhabits, which means that while she’s ensuring her own survival, the author can add depth to the new Penelope’s character, and can develop the plot in a way that allows for other characters to be explored too. Adding guilt, or remorse, or even sympathy towards the original adds meaning to the character, in the way that many transmigration authors are sorely missing these days.

In reference to the clear morality issues surrounding this genre, it often results in a less than interesting plot and characters. With the family of the original, the transmigrator rarely holds weight in the other person's family, a distance is drawn, and characters surrounding the original are placed to the side in favour of the newer, more interesting characters that the author can barely develop. But this itself presents a new dilemma, because exploring the family of the original and their relationships would add a new layer of depth to the story as a whole and allows for an exploration of the main characters moral grounds, but allowing the transmigrator to get close could result in something as painful as the family noticing the original is gone, or even worse, noticing but not caring. In a novel I recently read, the main character's brother is the one who is possessed by a transmigrator, and everyone notices this change, but they end up ignoring the fact they know it isn't actually him, simply because they themselves judge it to be a change they like more so than the original.

But it’s an objectively painful thing to consider, because what if people did care about the original? What about their family, their loved ones, their close friends? This type of complacency authors and audiences, even characters in the novel itself, hold towards the surroundings of the transmigrator is something that had ruined the complexity of characters in transmigrations. Not even the main characters are spared from the one-dimensional fates they are thrown into by lazy authors, and oftentimes, characters feel hollow because they don't have remorse or even feelings beyond the need to ensure their own happiness and safety. This in turn ruins the immersion the reader has in the story, because how can you enjoy a novel where the surrounding characters are so painfully empty, the main character has no depth to them at all, and the plot itself would have to be based entirely on action, which is torture to read on a good day.

I feel like I should explain more on the bashing of the ‘lazy author’ since it’s obviously a rude thing to say, and writing is an incredibly difficult thing to do on a good day. But after seeing the influx of one dimensional transmigration stories, it’s so difficult to appreciate them. The inclusion of morals and ethics surrounding the cast of the novel results in a deeply gratifying storyline and whole character arcs, which draws in fans who appreciate deeper levels of writing. It adds complexity! Spice! Layers and hidden meaning! Authors who lack any type of internal character monologue beyond a moment every hundred chapters about the originals pitifulness, or beyond their brilliant schemes they plot in their mind that turn out perfectly and give the main character a million billion dollars and women and a lot of prestige, are what I’m referring to with ‘lazy authors’. The lazy author is complacent and singular with their writing, which draws in a large audience, but the audience are like sheep, drawn to effortless and boring stories which they can consume without thinking too hard about it.

However the blame isn’t totally placed in authors, as authors usually write for audiences. The media landscape surrounding transmigration stories is run by audiences who want to see instant gratification, the new main character appearing and beating people up or flaunting their beauty/wealth/fame and so on and so forth. But this instant gratification that the masses seek ruins complexity and whole narratives. It rather reminds me of SVSSS, how Airplane, despite having a deeply thought out and complex world, for lack of better word, sanitises it to appeal to a wider audience of dude-bros who just want shitty porn.

I feel like I’ve rambled on a lot today, I actually apologise. I don’t mean to rag on people, as transmigration is a really good genre regardless. This particular line of thought comes after me reading ‘The Third Wheel Strikes Back’, which, while frustrating at times, is a really, really good transmigration, that ticks all the boxes I explored before (as in the things a transmigration SHOULD be doing).