#and most importantly i go through the work of actually creating something

[crazysodomite]

the thing about "i could do that" is that what people mean is that they can copy the finished product because the work of coming up with something and making it has already been done for them. every little creative decision has already been made and put into creating something, so "doing the same thing" is only doing the work of physically making something. but art doesn't just appear out of thin air. every little decision someone makes is part of the creative process. if you "can just do that" you would be doing it instead of just saying it. because the most essential part of making a piece of art is actually making it. you have to come up with it, decide to make it, and make it, for it to even exist. you can look at someone's works and think that on a technical level you can Do The Same Thing but that's not really true. because the work of unique creative choices for a particular piece you're looking at has already been done. some pieces are hard to make because they're very complex on a technical level, but every single piece that's created requires the essential work of coming up with it, making choices that are unique to you as an artist, and actually making the piece

[justauthoring]

Late Night Trouble

Summary: Sylus has to leave your side during an auction because of some business. Surely nothing will go wrong, right?

Pairing: Qin Che / Sylus x F!Reader

Word Count: 1,127

A/N: A little fluff piece because I'm obsessed with this man. I will get to your guys' requests soon but I was inspire for some protective Sylus after I saw a severe lack of it in the tags.

Your feet were killing you.

Absolutely aching. They had been since about an hour into arriving at this auction, but there was no quick relief in sight. Sylus had assured you that this evenings auction would be a quick in and out and you'd accompanied him under the expectation that you would be spending the majority of your night in his arms at home.

Only, Sylus was no where to be found and unfortunately, you were not at home. Something or another had gone wrong during the auction and as usual, Sylus didn't want you to have to worry about business that you had no need to. You weren't worried because you were assured and confident in Sylus' strength and capabilities to handle the situation.

You didn't find offence to him keeping you in the dark - you knew it simply came from a place of believing you were too good to have to deal with these pathetic men who attempted to betray or overthrow Sylus. It never worked out and you knew it never would.

So, no, you weren't annoyed. Or really even frustrated. You were tired, your feet hurt and all you wanted was to be in the arms of the man you love.

Taking a sip of your glass of wine that you've been mulling over since Sylus had left your side to deal with business, you eye the protocore's up for auction that evening with little interest. You have everything you need and more and these auctions have long since become dull to you over the years.

"Nothing of interest?"

Turning your head at the new voice, you raise a brow at the man who has not-so-subtly sidled up to your side. He's wearing a fancy suit that is a touch to big for him and looks entirely too out of place on him, and you let your eyes drag across him for a moment before shrugging.

"Not really," you respond dryly, turning away from him to try and make it clear that you're not interested in a conversation.

It apparently isn't clear given the way he continues to speak to you; "too good, then?" He offers, tilting his head at you. "Or have you just not been shown everything?"

Halting at his words, you take a small step back, trying to create distance. "Meaning?"

"Just that I don't think you've been shown everything on offer tonight," he smirks, eyes twinkling. "And maybe I'm the one who can."

You let out a short huff. It's clear this man has no idea who you are.

"Very smooth," you roll your eyes, "but I'm not interested."

You think that makes it obvious and you turn away, expecting him to walk off before his pride is harmed anymore. There's lots of pretty faces in the crowd tonight for him to sink his teeth in; most importantly, ones who aren't already in relationship.

Except, you don't hear his footsteps disappear and instead, there's a hand wrapping around your arm.

"Come on," the man urges, tugging you towards him to the point your head has to tilt back to look at him. Your hand quickly comes to his chest, pushing back to create distance. "Not even a chance?"

He smiles in what you assume he thinks is alluring, but it only makes you sick.

"No," you say sharply. "I'm actually waiting for someone."

"Oh?" He laughs, "who?"

"Sylus," you answer dully. "I'm sure you've heard of him."

For the briefest of seconds, the man looks somewhat unsure, a flash of fear flickering through his gaze before his eyes flitter across your figure once more and he chuckles. "You're pretty, sweetie, but not that pretty."

Offended and annoyed, you try to tug your arm out of his grasp.

"You're a prick," you hiss, "and I'm over this conversation."

His grip tightens, pinching to the point that pulls a small yelp from your lips. Suddenly, his face darkens and the disgusting charm he'd been playing up disappears for the sake of spitting out; "listen, I was trying to be nice and give you the chance you normally wouldn't be given. So why don't you be less of a bitch-"

"I promise you you'll come to regret those words."

Any fear you'd felt disappears instantly at the sound of that familiar voice. Suddenly, there's a warm chest pressed against your back and the man's grip is being pried off of your arm as the man lets out a undistinguished cry at Sylus' grip.

Relieved, you turn back to meet Sylus' awaiting gaze.

"Hello there, sweetie," he smiles warmly, deep voice rumbling against your back as his free hand comes to wrap around your waist. "Sorry I'm late."

You sink into his touch, turning into his embrace, "'s okay," you mumble.

He squeezes you against him before turning back to the man still cowering and whimpering in his grasp. "Now, what was it you said? That my girl wasn't... pretty enough for me?" Something sinister flickers in Sylus' eyes and the man without hesitation falls to his knees.

"I'm sorry, sir! I'm so sorry!" He screeches pathetically. "I had no idea."

"Except you did," Sylus corrects. "Because she told you and you chose to insult her." There's a sickening crack that follows his words and a bellowed yell leaves the man's lips as echoes of gasps and disbelief flutter amongst the crowd. "I don't appreciate you trying to tell her her worth when everyone in here should be aware she's the most beautiful woman in this room."

Cheeks warming, you squeeze Sylus's arm. "Sylus..." You mumble, embarrassed.

Sylus glances down at you, taking one look, before throwing the man to the ground. "You're lucky for tonight," Sylus spits down at him. "But count your blessings."

He turns away at that, turning towards you and you move to step with him but before you can, there's an arm slipped underneath you as you're lifted up off your feet.

"Sylus!"

Clutching your arms around his neck, you turn to him shocked.

He just smirks, sending you a look before holding you with the arm underneath your back and using his free hand to slip off your heels.

"Your feet must be killing you, kitten," he whispers to you, ignoring the following gazes of the crowd as he makes his way out of the building. "I left you standing there all alone too long. I'm sorry."

Letting your head fall against his chest, you hum; "it's okay. You came when it matters."

"Not quick enough," he denies, swinging his heels next to his side as he effortlessly carries you to his motorcycle. "You deserve to be pampered all night, sweetie."

Smiling softly, you meet his eyes; "yeah?"

"Yeah," he nods, smirking. "I'll make sure of it."

[cupcakeslushie]

I’ve been debating on saying something because I have a lot of thoughts about this, but I just want to say a quick (maybe not so quick) thought…

“Comfort Character” is not a declaration of ownership. Just because you relate to a character deeply, and see yourself in them, does not mean you get to go around policing the stories that get told regarding them, or the how they’re depicted in said stories.

I wanna be clear. Im not saying you can’t pose genuine questions and have perfectly reasonable discussions about the intricacies of hard topics. In fact, fiction can even help make those discussions easier to digest by lowering the stakes, because there are not any actual stakes when none of it is real.

Unfortunately, I’ve been seeing the entire opposite. People taking stories that may make them “uncomfy”, and declaring that they’ve now decided they are taking it personally, to near obsessive levels. You are not the only one allowed to play with these characters. It is a huge sandbox, and these toys are mass produced enough for everyone to have their own doll to do with whatever they’d like.

I get you might see yourself in a character, but that doesn’t give you the right to go around sending death threats just because someone wrote, or drew your current blorbo in an unfavorable light. Prioritizing some cluster of lines and colors over the mental health and safety of actual real human beings, is worse than whatever fictional, moral “atrocity” that you think you’re championing against. You only end up sounding just like the people calling for book banning in schools.

You are not the character. You are not being hurt. The character is not even being hurt, because they do not in fact, exist to actually experience any of the pain creators are putting them through. And most importantly, you have no claim on how other people entertain themselves with said character. Because that is what these characters are. Entertainment. They can be used in good or bad stories. If you don’t like how a creator is using them. Move on. Don’t send death threats or attacks.

Block and filter your tags.

I have triggers, but that is my issue to control and maintain. It is appreciated when steps are taken by creators to help me avoid the things that trigger me, but I don’t wish death and pain on anyone who doesn’t view the world through the same lens as myself, and might not have considered my own personal feelings on the matter. My feelings of unease or anxiety from coming into contact with my own triggers, might be valid, but initiating an attack on a creator, because I took a personal offense to their story, is not. I do not outright assume that something was created with me and my tastes in mind.

Also, this is not aimed at any one person. This is a rampant issue that I have seen first hand, going back all the way to more than a year ago. I’ve seen it happen in multiple fandoms, but as I spend most of my time in the Rise fandom, that’s where I see the worst of it. I’ve received attacks, I know other creators have received attacks, and if this keeps up, creators will just stop wanting to share anything at all.

I also need to emphasize, I’m not mad. This is not a lashing out. This is just a frustrating and hurtful trend to constantly witness, when creators are putting their own heart, time, and energy into creating intriguing and complex works of all kinds in order to broaden the beauty of this fandom, and they’re getting anonymous messages to kill themselves.

Please think about the real life person behind the art and stories you are consuming, instead of prioritizing the fictional comfort of made up characters inside the story, that will in actuality, never have any opinions on what’s being done to them. Because they do not exist.

[anim-ttrpgs]

Go read check out Unchained Mysteries by Jesse Burneko

I recently was altered to and read a treatise called Unchained Mysteries, and it’s incredible that I had never heard of it before. It’s not a TTRPG, but it is a treatise about TTRPGs, particularly mystery investigation TTRPGs, and how bad they have been for the past 50 years at actually doing investigation gameplay.

For the roughly two years since we went public with Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, we have been fighting a war, an idealogical war on TTRPGs as an artform declared by monopolistic corporations, parasocial “”actual play”” shows, content mill YouTube channels and the loyal adherents of the above. The generals of this vast army, whether they consciously realize it or not, have a financial incentive to teach you that game design is not real and that it doesn’t matter. A consumerbase that understands game design or what a TTRPG is on even the narrowest, shallowest level is one where some people might sometimes choose to play something besides the most popular and heavily advertised game on the market when they are able to recognize that it does not suit their needs.

To this end they teach you “just ignore the rules when they get in the way of the story,” and “a good GM can make anything work.” They task the GM with putting on a one-man show so that people who do not like the kinds of experiences created by the rules of the most popular game do not ever have to engage with the experiences of playing the most popular game, but still buy all the most popular game’s products, and most importantly never buy anything else.

It’s been an uphill battle, but we have been able to carve out a little outpost for ourselves, convert others to the Game Design in Real faction, and occasionally make contact with like-minded individuals who fight for TTRPGs to be treated as a unique and meaningful artform and game, not just an annoying book that gets in the way of your improv session, as most self-identified fans of TTRPGs have been taught to treat them.

Unchained Mysteries is one of those times we discover a powerful ally, and it has been some real wind in my sails, lemme tell you.

As a TTRPG game designer, it really wears on the mind to get the same comments over and over and over from people who don’t even know enough about gleeblor to understand the position they’re taking, that all boil down to the same thing: Telling me that my work, and the work of others trying to design TTRPGs, is, at best, completely meaningless, because the rules we write shouldn’t be assumed to affect anything, that the right way to play TTRPGs is to just ignore the rules and make it up as you go. At worst, they get offended, and demand to know “why I’m trying to tell them how they should play the game” in the instruction manual for the game. And come at me with shonen hero monologues about how as an artist I have no right to even want people to engage with my art the way that I intentionally designed it to be engaged with, let alone have the audacity to express that desire. People’s right to not think about anything and put in the least possible effort for the quickest, shortest gratification is sacred, especially because game design isn’t real, so there’s no way that following the intent behind the design could lead to a more meaningful experience than just running off vibes.

And all this with the financial stress of being unable to keep a “normal” job due to disability, making my art my main source of income on top of the constant reaffirmation that large amounts of potential customers have been taught that the kind of art I’m best at and most passionate about, art that is really really trying to provide a particular experience through its design and intent, is the most undesirable kind of art, if they even know that kind art exists within the medium of TTRPGs at all.

Sorry about all that.

Anyway, it would have been cool to find such a well-written piece of writing that agrees with Eureka’s stance on investigative TTRPG gameplay on one point.

It would’ve been really cool to find such a well-written piece of writing that agrees on two points.

The points made, the problems highlighted, and the solutions proposed within Unchained Mysteries are about a 90% overlap with Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy’s, and presents them even more convincingly. (Which is to be expected, since it exists only to make these points rather than also being a whole game.)

If you’re interested in the arguments Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy makes and demonstrates about game design, give Unchained Mysteries a read.

[calware]

oo ooo i saw your posts on june and vriska in rapid succession so i wanted to ask: what makes vriska a trans character? if you can’t articulate it yourself, can you lead me to someone who can?

sorry it took me so long to respond to this; it's just that there's truly so much to say. WARNING this post is so so long

vriska being a trans woman has been incorporated in official homestuck works like pesterquest and homestuck 2, which i could start with, but i think it's better to start with how it was conceived of by fans. i've only been around the fandom since mid-2019, so i can't give a very detailed overview of anything before that year, but i can tell you that for years, fans have picked up on themes from her character that resemble and represent the experiences of trans women and transfemininity overall. because of this, i'm going to be linking quite a few posts from others, both because i would otherwise just be repeating something someone else has said but also because it's these readings that have influenced my own reading of the text. this is a topic that is, at times, very subjective, and because of that, i think it's important to recognize that everyone has a slightly different reading—even if it all adds up to the same conclusion—and i want to be able to show the ideas that my reading stems from

before i get into the transfem reading of her, we have to first be on the same page on what her character is telling us within the story. in general, vriska is an incredibly complex and nuanced character, so there is a lot to jump into right off the bat. the fairly surface-level understanding we can get from vriska is that from birth, she was intentionally and deliberately molded into a weapon by the people around her. this leads to a lot of problems, obviously, but focusing on how this affects her is the important part here. she faces daily expectations on how to behave and feel; she's supposed to kill for survival, and she's supposed to like it, to the point where she's desensitized to it. this leads to her not growing healthily; she desperately wants to be more mature than she really is, she struggles to maintain friendships, etc.

Everything about what's happening here is wildly overcompensatory, meant to repair damage she's done without really having to face what it is she actually did. Aradia's extremely passive nature as a ghost makes her an easy target for this kind of overbearing attention. Because what Vriska seems to want most is acknowledgement, and more importantly, to foster strong reactions. Good or bad, love or hatred, this seems to be what she demands from everyone. So for that reason, Aradia's impassivity seems to add fuel to Vriska's sycophantic need to make amends. Not caring much one way or another about what Vriska does is guaranteed to drive Vriska crazy. Neutrality is insufferable to her because it makes her feel irrelevant. Being irrelevant is her biggest fear and ultimate enemy. She struggles to keep herself in the spotlight, and when the narrative is finally done with her and tosses her into the gutter, she fights her way back into relevance. Fighting against the forces of narrative marginalization completely define her entire batshit arc, from her introduction here all the way to the end of Homestuck. – Author Commentary

more notably, on friendships, she lashes out (as she has only been taught to do), which drives others away from her. then, when she doesn't know how to cope with the loss, she lashes out further, creating a vicious cycle

she also looks at the hardships she (along with everyone else) endures and has accepted them as "normal life"

she enforces that on others (tavros, most blatantly) as 1) the only way she knows how to "help" and 2) out of anger for others finding peace when she is unable to. with all of this together, she is consistently regarded in bad faith by others (both in and out of the story), becoming more and more isolated

it's only when terezi (through john) gives her a second chance that she's able to break the initial cycle

now, if you've never thought about it before, you might be wondering, "what does this have to do with her gender" and to that i will remind you that most aspects of alternian society are heavily gendered. for example, lord english/doc scratch's oppressive influence on the planet is a pretty strong symbol for the patriarchy, and practically every instance of oppression on alternia goes hand-in-hand with misogyny in some way. another one of these aspects is the castes themselves; highbloods specifically are referred to as male-dominated castes, putting vriska in a masculine context, something she strongly pushes back against. she leans into femininity with desperation (i.e., asking kanaya to sew a dress for her mindfang/summoner roleplay). and, to that point, she idolizes her ancestor in both her ruthlessness AND femininity. going even further, she does this to the point where she forces herself into a specific conventional feminine ideal—not because it's what she wants to be, but because it's what she thinks a woman should be. she struggles hard with her role not just in the cerulean caste, but also as a woman. as she does with her caste, she consistently fails to live up to gender expectations, unable to be a woman "correctly" in the eyes of society. it's a bootstrap paradox. again, these things go hand-in-hand. now, that's a pretty broad overview of everything, but this post is already pretty long, so we're going to move on

now we can look at it through a transfeminine lens, asking "what would a transfem reading of the character add to what already exists?" there probably isn't anything i could say that hasn't already been said by victoria (doomsdaydicecascader) so i'll link her thoughts here

another analyst i feel is crucial to include is valerie (stabvariation), who has a collection of posts on their own transfem vriska reading. make sure to click through all of them and come back here (this is an older blog of theirs btw, their listed pronouns are outdated, they go by they/them). the reason i bring up valerie in particular is that during the 2019 toblerone hunt, someone found one of the toblerones and, in continuation of the june reveal, saw an opportunity to pitch transfem vriska to the current team (they mention an essay, but i'm not sure if it was ever completed as i was never able to find it). that last post by valerie is the pitch; we can assume that it worked because 7 days later, vriska's pesterquest route was released with some pretty direct indications to her being a trans woman. this is where we leave the Fandom zone and enter the Official zone. we are no longer being subjective and are now being objective

(which to me means that their posts hold some significant weight, in my mind. and, even if it was by coincidence, and this had been written into the story in advance, i think they make good points and that they're worth including)

outside of pesterquest, vriska's now-official transfemininity has been given some nods in HSBC with the hell-tier rungs:

now, nods are nice, but the meat/significance/message/etc of this implication is once again on the reader to extract from the text (back to the subjective zone). for example, ado (gendertrickster) posted a reading on how vriska's recent developments as a character intersect with her being trans, which to me makes me think about the demonization of transfemininity throughout our society and the stigma that surrounds trans women... especially in the context of caring for children due to stereotypes of being predatory, & the fact that she's done the work to improve herself and break the cycle adds another layer to her development as the new kids' pseudo-guardian. vriska being a trans woman changes the context of this development significantly, making it 100 times more meaningful to her arc overall. and i'm sure that there are other things to add to this as well, but hopefully by now you get the point

something i want to mention before i wrap this post up is that i place emphasis on subjectivity/objectivity and what originates from the fans vs. official content not because i see subjective/fan readings as necessarily lesser than what's officially stated or what's word of god. i'd argue that they both have their own unique strengths. i think that there's a lot of power in being able to form your own perception of a work of fiction, or where readers build off of each other's ideas. what does it mean to YOU? granted, most of the time, fandom takes just kind of suck. but i think that this is one of those special cases where people came together to make a really meaningful reading of an already significant and impactful character. the stength of something being official (or even "canon") is that it's an undeniable representation of a marginalized community, something else that holds power on its own. but i want to recognize that it doesn't mean much without you being able to look at the text, read between the lines, and decide what you think it MEANS (let alone deciding if those official works are actually "good"..... frankly i think vriska's pq route could have been better). anyway i just wanted to elaborate on my thought process with the way i wrote this post & view these sorts of discussions in general)

did anyone actually read this extremely long post? (and yes, the linked posts do count). if you made it all the way down here i'm giving you an award

[skaldish]

Alright folks. Here it is, my theory of what Ragnarok actually represents. It is very messy and I'm not sure I'm going to be able to actually convey my understanding clearly like I try with most things, because genuinely this is shit I would write a doctorate-level thesis on.

But we're going to try anyway.

So. After doing a lot to try to replicate animistic thinking, as well as taking a VERY deep read of the Norse myths, my theory is that Ragnarok is specifically allegory for societal collapse—the "end of the world" imagery and such is meant to convey what this feels like.

Recall what Odin says in Grimnismal. It goes something like this, since I can't be arsed to find the exact quote:

Huginn and Muninn fly over the world every day; while I fear Huginn ("thought") may not return, I fear Muninn's ("memory's") absence most.

When a society collapses, so does it's memory. It loses its technology, its methodologies, its paradigms, and everything it has learned about the world up to that point. Gone. Entire chapters of history erased.

What causes societal collapse is not always a conquering force, but is oftentimes the result of circumstances that a society orchestrates for itself. Think Rome.

People who have gone through societal collapse will probably develop an invested interest in figuring out how to prevent it entirely, so they don't have to start society all over again.

It's one thing to preserve the memory of "things collapsed and here's why" using a story. But it's another thing to do what apparently the Norse people did, which is cultivate a methodology for cognitively hardening their own society against collapse, using stories as a way to do it.

Like...I'm not kidding when I say they legitimately knew how the human mind works, and then built an entire system of stories and narratives that intentionally support the mind's freedom, cultivation, and agency. I can only convey a fraction of how this works in this post because the rest requires a deep-dive into behavioral psychology and neurological development.

All the tales leading to Ragnarok demonstrate various instances where the gods choose to follow their own agendas at the expense of the real people and forces in the world. All of these little things contribute to the magnitude of the event that is Ragnarok.

The tales represent these transgressions using allegories rather than literal events. This is because these stories were designed for children, who don't process information through a prefrontal cortex like we do as adults. They don't have them yet. But this gives kids an intuitive understanding for how circumstances of collapse feel, so they can recognize them in all their forms.

Loki is an allegory for the mischief we feel as children, and for the behaviors we demonstrate before we get to the age where we start valuing cooperation. In the myths, every time Loki causes mischief in ways that creates problems, the gods get mad at him and threaten Loki's life until he fixes his mess. Loki eventually becomes vindictive, kills Baldr in a jealous fit, and then is punished by being bound and buried beneath the ground, only to fight against the gods in Ragnarok.

The surface-level takeaway is a lesson in parenting: If we punish kids for their mischief, they're going to become vindictive adults, and these adults are going to have it out for the rest of society because they've been disenfranchised.

But it doesn't just end here. Consider how we punish ourselves for our own sense of mischief, beating ourselves up for having "problematic" thoughts and trying to bind and bury those thoughts in the depths of our mind.

These thoughts come from a place our mind known as the limbic system, which is focused on avoiding pain and seeking pleasure, and—most importantly—does not understand the world or make decisions using logic and reason, but in terms of what feels enjoyable and what doesn't.

We tend to call this system our inner child.

When we punish our inner child, that child starts doing exactly what Loki does and resorts to malicious and petty tricks. We can hold this behavior at bay until something causes us to "snap" (like Jörmungandr's tail does) and out comes the malice of the disenfranchised inner child, which creates a terrible cascade of social consequences for us.

Now, if we were to listen to these stories as kids, we would naturally be very upset whenever Loki was threatened of punished, because we think out of the limbic system at that age and Loki is meant to represent us—specifically, the state of being a kid. We would see what comes to pass, with Loki being imprisoned and fighting the gods against Ragnarok, and it would become clear to us that there's consequences for punishing mischief AND also causing too much of it.

Now I don't know about you, but I was very motivated by a sense of justice as a kid. Hearing Loki's arc would have inspired me to learn how to be friends with my sense of mischief while also learning to use it in ways that were cooperative and social, because this would have been how I could right the wrong I felt was done to Loki. It would also mean my own limbic system will not fight against me in the future, but be a modality of thought I can always access. (This is the beauty of the way the Norse myths are crafted; they are designed to instill knowledge of the world using mechanisms that reinforce one's own sense of agency and competency, so rather than being told the moral of this tale, it sets me up to run right into the conclusion it wants me to draw, but in a way that makes me feel smart and therefore inspires me to value it.)

The binding of Fenrir serves a similar allegory. When we become explosively angry in the way that Fenrir represents, it consumes our wisemind the same way Fenrir consumes Odin during Ragnarok. But this only happens if we bind Fenrir/our anger. By demonizing this nature of ours simply for existing, it will not only refuse to listen to us, but also turn against us. Remember that Fenrir was willing to socialize and cooperate with the gods before his betrayal.

(Honestly, I believe this is why ulfheiðnar existed the way they did. Even though the animalistic rage of ulfheiðnar was too terrible for domestic society, it was not demonized, but instead given a social function. People would learn to understand and partner with their own sense of rage, and I'm guessing this is also how they were able to keep their sense of reason and priorities straight even while going berserk from psychoactives.)

These two examples serve to illustrate how societal collapse stems from binding or punishing our own natures. But also fearing our own nature as mortals factors into it.

For example, Naglfar. This is a ship constructed of dead people's fingernails, and its completion is part of what signals the beginning of Ragnarok. But as the story goes, we can delay Naglfar's construction by trimming the nails of the dead before we bury them.

Naglfar represents "neglect for the dead," and this is significant because the act of no longer viewing the dead as people is sort of like the canary in the coal mine for no longer view each other as people...and no longer seeing people as people is what defines Ragnarok.

A society is at peace when its people have no fear of death, and having no fear of death comes only by incorporating death as a normal and familiar part of life, just like we do with birth. Our relationship with death is a litmus test for our relationship with our own humanity—if we fear the dead and cannot see them as human beings, then we are always going to fear a part of our own humanity, and be at war with it. The simple act of keeping the nails of the dead well-groomed because it stalls Naglfar's construction was a way to remind people why such a simple act was profoundly important.

And these are just the things that I can think of off the top of my head that are the most obvious examples. There are—and I shit you not—multitudes of these things laced within the Norse myths.

(I haven't even gotten to the part about how the Norse creation myth uses what the womb feels like to characterize it. Telling this story to very little children helps them establish a sense of familiarity, belonging, and secure attachment with the entire world from the get-go. If they learn the world is everything they've already experienced, then their bodies will never be afraid of it, because nothing about it will feel unknown or unknowable. Like, how fucking dope can you get.)

So here's where we get to the really dense irony of all this: Why we don't pick up on all these nuances as Westerners and have so far missed this entirely.

It is for two reasons.

The first is because our society values the things that the Norse people identified as contributing to societal collapse—namely, the act of conquering/competing against other forces and conquering/competing against our own natures. The transgressions of the Aesir are not things we register as problematic because to us they're normal.

The second is that we don't think animistically. The way we are taught to convey, interpret, and transmit information is designed PURELY by and for the prefrontal cortex, with neglect to everything else (if you ever wonder why Americans look weird in how we behave, this is why). But because we only prioritize communicating this way, we're missing out on all the context added within the Norse myths. These myths function the same way Old Norse kennings did, in that they are designed to speak to ALL areas of the brain at once and in tandem, but if we only engage with it using one part of the brain, we're only going to get a small piece of the picture and the rest is going to look weird.

(Little experiment for you: Try to logic something out in your mind or think through a complex problem without using words or sentences to do it. Use any other kind of thought-process besides language. I promise you that not only is this possible, but it yields a completely different kind of experience and conclusion than you might otherwise reach.)

Honestly, I don't even think Snorri himself fully understood what he was looking at when he was recording the Norse myths. I think he was just writing them down according to how they were told, word-for-word. But his cluelessness is our good fortune now, because he not only preserved the cultural stories, but also what I consider an entire cognitive technology.

And every time I look at it, I can't help but think about the generations of people who sat around the fire in the dead of winter, weaving, crafting, and figuring out better ways to fortify their society, raise kids so they became fine and truly fearless people, and conserve information. This is, as far as I'm concerned, real magic.

They knew some shit.

[drdemonprince]

talk about leaving relationships that aren't working has me reminded of something i've been thinking about: leaving "relationships" with a social group that aren't working. the social is important here, like a sports team, or a group you hang out with, any and all gatherings of a social nature.

on one hand, the fact that there's no financial or housing entanglements make it easier to hit da bricks if it isn't working. on the other hand, groups are bigger than one person, so by leaving them you lose the connection vector, and more importantly, the social environment you engage with them in and the new people you meet through it. finding new social groupings that might be a fit also is also hard because there's always relatively fewer off those going around,

i don't have a good answer to this conundrum. i've certainly stuck with groups for too long because i didn't want to have nothing. and something, even though the vibes had gone rancid despite my efforts, mistakenly felt better than that.

A lot of the reason that people stick with bad social groups is because they have this organizational inertia that makes them easy to rely on. The group determines the outings, the traditions, the guestlist; the group decides how halloween and new year's and pride will be celebrated and with whom; the group shows up to your one-man show and sends you flowers when you're at the hospital.

People find it relieving to not have to do any of the work of figuring that stuff out themselves. But it results in a lot of frankly very immature social dynamics where people who do not even like one another hang out frequently because they share the same "group," outsiders are scorned, and people have very little agency over how they actually spend their time and whom they spend it with. An overreliance on one social "group" makes its members vulnerable to rejection as well, creating a silent pressure toward conformity and conflict avoidance.

It's Geek Social Fallacies (google it if you have not read the foundational early 2000's piece on this) and it's not a new problem. It is especially common among people who have either never had to set out and form a social group of their own, or who think they do not have the power to. Overcoming this stuff is an important part of every neurodivergent or queer outcast's life.

The solution is to mix and mingle among a variety of social groups, and not to overly identify with any one aspect of your life (be that a profession, identity, or hobby) that has connected you to a group. When you have multiple friend groups, you have places that you can float over to and find some peace and enjoyment in, even one everyone inside one group is beefing. You don't fear being disposed of so much. Because every group has its own dynamics, you can compare things and have a clearer view on interpersonal challenges. The absurd underlying beliefs and toxicity that a group have become more apparent and are no longer just what having friends means. It gives you multiple options of things to do on your calendar. Most importantly it gives you a choice.

The next level to diversifying one's social portfolio is actually exercising that power of choice to surround yourself with the specific people that you like, doing activities that you want to do, and building social connections that belong to you and not the group. Is your entire kickball team a bunch of backbiting, judgemental assholes, except for one or two people that you like? Well why the hell put up with the entire team when you can just invite those two cool people to hang out with you? Do you love conversations with the older divorce in your improv group, but hate the improv? Well fuck the improve and just invite Tracy over! Who do you actually want at your birthday? Only invite those people, and let some of your friends from other groups meet one another! If they dont get along well that is also fine!

People want socializing to be this one and done set in stone thing, but human relationships evolve as we grow and change, and we have to assert ourselves in making them what we want them to be. For anyone struggling with this stuff and really consumed by a social group's drama, let me just tell you the world is so much bigger than what one really up their own ass clique thinks, and you dont need to keep socializing like youre a 20 year old in a college acapella group forever. You can make decisions about your social life. Yes even if youre hell of awkward and Autistic. I still dont know how to initiate a conversation w a stranger and i manage to do this stuff! you really can do it and you must if you want things to improve and for your life to be yours. Read the hell out of Captain Awkward, she knows this stuff so well.

[yingdu-lover]

"I am not an accessory...I want freedom!" : Li Haolin's critique of the comphet media expectations, toxic entertainment industry and deconstruction of 'heroism' in To Be Bero X episode 2

Disclaimer : There are two more episodes left, and things will go haywire beyond our expectations; interpretations will change. However, I do believe that the core message should not change; the vision Li Haolin has, and I hope people who have watched his previous works recognize this. Li Haolin did say that the core theme remains the same in all To Be Hero works. May I have the pleasure of reminding you that Link Click was previously named 'To Be Hero: Photo'? Yeah. That being said, I should start my yapping.

Note : If you are a Link Clicker and have gone through all the stages of emotional peculiarities when Yingdu was airing, you may have noticed, with a critical lens, that Yingdu was very vocal about the nuances and politics of the entertainment industry. The recurring dialectic between (heteropatriarchal) capitalist consumerism and subversive counter-narratives really makes me happy; it affirms that Li Haolin is a political artist.

TBHX had a massive worldwide release; of course, it is aimed at an international audience, but I am sure that releasing TBHX a short period after Yingdu's completion was something Li Haolin did purposefully. Probably, it was a deliberate nod to avid Link Click fans to keep thinking intertextually. I took that as a sign.

Link Click and To Be Hero : Photo

(If you wish to skip this section, you can, but you won't be able to understand much when I actually start talking about To Be Hero X. I will draw ample comparisons with these discussions.)

Link Click, especially Yingdu, really deconstructs the concept and construction of 'Hero' and their identity. To quote Li Haolin: Tbhx is not your usual superhero story. It is fundamentally deconstructing the typical popular narratives.

To summarise, Link Click has/shows/raises questions about

1. explicit references to the concept of 'Hero'

2. how heteronormative masculinist capitalism forges the figure of 'Hero'

3. the question of agency : The dichotomy between public and private

4. narrative identity : hero, villain or is it a blur?

5. the 'soft' power of artistic hierarchy : genre and gender

6. the politics of ordinariness in popular culture (the communist propaganda :D)

[Of course, a lot of introductory yapping is about Link Click! It's important! So I am not stopping]

1. explicit references to the concept of 'Hero'

Starting with the 'Hero' (Hero with a capital H) theme, I think the first time we were introduced to Power Rangers-type heroes in Link Click was in the Doudou episode. Oh my God, this was the only episode that really stressed me out. Anyway, the Doudou story hits so hard because it is painfully realistic; it weaves simple yet endearing love with guilt, escapism, patience, helplessness, brutal honesty, and the acceptance of vulnerability, creating an alternative form of 'heroism' that is both funny and poignant at the same time. It is truly one of the most powerful episodes in the entire season 1.

Season 2's 'hero' discourse is more nuanced, so I'll discuss it while addressing the fifth point. It continues in Yingdu.

Ah, Yingdu. Cheng Xiaoshi's studio was called 'Hero Photo Studio' (ah) before Lu Guang moved in (actually- no, 'Hero' was replaced with 'Time' after they returned from Yingdu and Cheng Xiaoshi kept the promise he made with his maa)

Cheng Xiaoshi exclaiming : am I a hero in a freaking donghua-?! (ah.)

And those lines from The Eye full version :

No matter how hard we looked in the lost and found We never could shine the moonlight underground To the point where we got sick of pretending like we are saviors Till we learn to carry on

Heroes and their savior complex: What is a hero if he does not save people? Useless, right? Heroes are built on narratives. There needs to be a villain to blame, victims to be saved, and most importantly, people to identify the hero as a hero and give the final verdict. What happens when even one parameter is missing?

It's quite amazing how Lu Guang is highlighting his fragility. He does pretend, and he has to be adamant and quite delulu in order to continue his task, or he will collapse.

The interesting thing is that there is an utterance of 'we' rather than 'I.' So, is Cheng Xiaoshi cognizant of this? Something is amiss. It beautifully haunts. It's not just a recollection of the past or their shared suffering and understanding of the world, but rather a sense of final submission on Lu Guang's part.

2. how heteronormative masculinist capitalism forges the figure of 'Hero'

'Heroism' is a fundamentally masculinist construction. Even the term 'virtue,' which has taken on a moral connotation in modern vocabulary, is actually associated with virility/vir (the Latin word for 'man'). Historically, justice, reason, and virtue—the three most basic tenets of heroism—were reserved for (and believed to be possessed only by) exclusively able-bodied men. Women are bestial, devoid of reason, driven by excessive passion, and therefore can never be eligible for the role of a 'Hero.' Even in recent years, the trend is that a female character has to renounce some (or all) parts of her femininity to access aggressive masculinity. Moreover, she can almost never exist without being a shadow to her male counterpart(s). In short, humanist 'Heroism' is predominantly masculine. Female characters must follow a norm to be considered a 'Hero'; they can't topple a system. The fixed binary positions of hero/heroine are heteronormative constructs. Ever wondered why, when a 'heroine' saves a 'Hero' (let's assume both are able-bodied, of equal caliber), it's considered very 'subversive'? It should just be another story of saving people, right? But...It is the normative story that sells. It sells, and that's what matters to capitalism. An alternative story of heroism will remain alternative and special (you know those companies that hire disabled people, queer people, and Black people as a form of tokenism? Then they sack them first without any legible reason or notice). A cluster of 'heroes' will never be able to compete with the 'Hero' (hero with a capital H).

Now, what kind of 'hero' is Qiao Ling?

Honestly speaking, she has been saving Shiguang's ass since the beginning of season 1. Whether it is financial help, legal help, paying hospital bills, paying their bail, or confronting difficult opponents, Qiao Ling hardly backs down. She takes risks; she is overprotective of Shiguang, but since her 'heroism' is so subtle and there is a lack of an audience to identify her as a hero, her 'heroism' goes unnoticed for the most part.

3. the question of agency : The dichotomy between public and private

I discussed a hell lot about it in my analysis of Xia Fei's character before. A few excerpts-

He (Xia Fei) is smart enough to know he is being exploited (and tbh the theme of surveillance and making him the 'morbid' object of gaze, I say morbid because in the last scene of his pv, it's a dead shot, his eyes look so dead, the camera's battery is dead. But yk what remains? his face card. The like button continually popping with likes made me very uncomfortable.

and

Also Xia Fei's story talks about another important theme of the donghua; photo! How photos taken in private spheres are meant to preserve memories of the loved ones, loved encounters. How you capture someone you love in that still image, alive with the emotion you associate with them, giving it an afterlife. The photo becomes the literal and metaphorical medium through which Lu Guang can rewrite history. Forget-me-not, remembrance. It empowers him.

-

On the contrary, for Xia Fei, it is the panopticon seizing his life and rendering it absurd. The emotive power and affect for lu guang changes into viscous institutionalised power politics for Xia Fei. Brilliant! 😭

Xia Fei is surrounded by cameras and it's the play of fate that it continues even to his private life (while befriending Shiguang)

The most perfect focus Wandering between gazes

-

Wherever there's a good position, I'll offer a smile To the lights, I lend this beautiful body To stand in the center

-

No need to guess, this complete disguise The crowd will eventually forget this mask It doesn't matter if the great fire extinguishes the truth Who will it be, perfectly concealed The stolen gaze Yeah, I know I gotta run Yeah, fake a smile in calm

It's a public performance and an elaborate enterprise of concealing the truth; the more you can hide yourself and present what the viewers want, the more success comes to your plate. But very dangerously, when the mask starts to replace your real face, you don't even process it in the beginning, but when it's realized, it's actually too late.

4. narrative identity : hero, villain or is it a blur?

Let alone heroes, villains, or contradictions, all of us are a cluster of fragmented or gap narratives trying to make sense of each other's existence. The reason we resonate with others is that some of our own narratives click with theirs. Our narratives have gaps, and we fill those gaps with what we want to believe. The way we perceive others, forge relationships with others, or even ourselves fills in the gaps in the storytelling. That's how we become complex human beings. Objectively, we are on a perpetual stage of liminality, but to make it easier for our subjectivity, we appropriate narratives according to our ease and taste.

A few months ago, I would easily lose my calm over the 'Is Lu Guang evil?' debate. Now, I feel that it is actually important. Lu Guang himself doesn't identify as a 'Hero.' The problematization of Lu Guang's stance as a 'Hero' is important. Remember the fable-esque story of the forest fire that began featuring in S2 and continued in Yingdu? Who was the culprit? Who was the hero? We may NEVER know. When you are searching for the absolute truth, after a point in time, you realize that absolute truth has no practical value. If you have watched Akira Kurosawa's Rashomon (I strongly recommend this movie; please watch it), you know how people choose a narrative for their own convenience and continue their lives with it, however contradictory they might be from each other. This is what really happens in our daily lives. The problem arises when one narrative is weaponized by a certain group and preached as the grand narrative, and the people who believe in alternative narratives become victims of persecution.

The similar story follows in creating the figures of a 'Hero' or a 'villain.' Until now, Xia Fei and Lu Guang's characters have subverted those horizons of expectations the most in the Link Click universe.

5. the 'soft' power of artistic hierarchy : genre and gender

First, I would like to mention a few lines from Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own

Speaking crudely, football and sport are 'important'; the worship of fashion, the buying of clothes 'trivial'. And these values are inevitably transferred from life to fiction. This is an important book, the critic assumes, because it deals with war. This is an insignificant book because it deals with the feelings of women in a drawing room.

Sadly, there will be even a tiny residual of internalized misogyny even when we grow up. It's hard to deal with and that's why it's very important to point out. Romance and shipping is for feminine minds, therefore 'trivial' as a genre. War narratives and heroic battles talk about 'serious' topics, therefore it has an actual 'plot.'

Firstly,

the notion of heroism is inextricably linked with patriotism. In modern-day popular narratives, we may not see the blatant nationalism, but there always remains an echo of 'sacrificing for our own people.' Who are these people? Heroism can't exist if there is no distinction between 'us' and the 'other.' Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. (Very rough translation: It is one's sweet duty to die for his fatherland/country.)

Heroic narratives are war narratives. If you change the perspective, your hero becomes a villain. We always like to see ourselves at the end of suffering as people who have been wronged; injustice has been thwarted against us, and it's our hero's duty to save us.

I know this is more relevant to tbhx, but if you look closely, Link Click implicitly builds upon this: the hierarchy of gendered genres.

Also, Lu Guang's commentary on art, fiction, and philosophy was much more than just shits and giggles. He equates Shakespeare with donghua and manhua; all of these are forms of popular art with different modes of presenting philosophy. Donning a mask and playing a character from Shakespeare's play and cosplaying as a donghua or manhua character are not that different. Lu Guang questions the hierarchy of high culture and low culture. He writes his diary in Latin and Mandarin; he is undoubtedly a fierce scholar. He respects alternative belief systems such as Tarot cards, traditional Chinese medicine; indigenous or pagan forms of knowledge that are often looked down upon by modern Western scientific disciplines (I will write a separate post on this). The crux of my discussion is that Lu Guang continuously identifies the various forms of hierarchy in social beliefs and art and questions their validity. It's a form of soft power that no one bats an eye at, but many do not realize that it shapes how they process information. It is very much linked to the gendered hierarchy, as misogyny and the exclusion of women are very pervasive. And this brings to our last point : the question of power.

6. the politics of ordinariness in popular culture (the communist propaganda :D)

Lmao. Did I say communist propaganda? wth sure.

I will start my combined discussion from here.

Heroes are these big, big people with big, big superpowers-very flashy, very cute, and very demure. Can ordinary people afford to be a hero? It's not a new question, but I can't remember anyone who has dealt with this topic the way Li Haolin has.

I have talked about this before. This genre reflects Li Haolin's vision in his various works. Take, for example, an episode from To Be Hero: Leaf, where little children are playing on the midnight streets, where all the adults have gone for a factory strike. There is a HUGE focus on ordinary people. The reason I remember Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin's Odessa Steps sequence is not because it was a government-funded Russian film to preach communism, but because it showed how to decentralize your focus from grand narratives in artistic representation (for example: navy mutiny and soldiers fighting) and strike the audience with alternative, lesser important narratives (normal people suffering from the war). Digressing from the crime-suspense plot and delving deep into Emma's experience, weaving the Shiguang story with hers in 'Keep in Mind' was not truly a necessity plot-wise, but Haolin felt compelled to do so. To the person who mentioned in their post: 'link click' centers around two young boys who are struggling to pay their debt. I will forever be indebted to you. It's all there, but we need to identify it.

Now that I have discussed all of that, let's dive back into To Be Hero X. Just a list so that I don't forget things,

1. Moon and her plight : Idol culture and how relationship rumours affect female idols' public reputation

2. how corporate dehumanizes people

3. Private queer lives and politics in entertainment industry: Wreck and Nice's relationship as a twofold critique on the audience.

So, Moon.

Can you imagine how disturbing it is to be romantically associated with a person just because you signed a contract with a company? For three years, her main identity was someone's girlfriend, whom she didn't even love. She used to be a travel vlogger, a woman who constantly travels and archives different experiences. If you are into the earliest feminist discourses, women traveling is a frequent topic. From Mary Wollstonecraft to Virginia Woolf - everybody acknowledges that. From THAT, she became someone's girlfriend. The sheer humiliation. The most heartbreaking part is that it is the people's expectations which curbed her teleportation powers; it can only open to Nice's side. Moon can't leave Nice. But is Nice bound to her? I don't think there were any suggestions like that.

If you have already guessed it, then congratulations! You are right; Moon's experience as a female idol is actually a microcosmic representation of how women are treated in a heteropatriarchal society.

When they were hatching the plan to 'free' Moon, Lin Ling said :

'Since Nice is a perfect husband, you can't say no to his proposal.'

Of course! If a man is handsome, virtuous, a respectable 'Hero', and the people love to see the heroine as the Hero's partner, how dare the heroine refuse this proposal? The Moon's consent does not matter. It would be a narrative so audacious and absurd that it would not sell. Champagne problems, ha?

And that woman who constantly speaks corporate said: "We have locked them in the same room for a whole month without any other engagement. Of course, they will grow feelings for each other." Ah, fuck-ass logic. Before you jump on me saying, 'But oh, what about the propinquity effect?' and shit, it is a very heteronormative notion to assume that a man and a woman will always develop romantic feelings for each other. Many people (me, I am the many people) headcanon that Moon is queer, aro-ace, and a strong independent woman—I second all of these, but my point is Moon doesn't need a thesis paper on her sexual preference or romantic orientation to reject Nice or Nice's substitute. Again, Lin Ling is Nice's substitute! Imagine the horror: you are shipped with a man you don't love, and people want you to marry him. Then the fucking company doesn't even have the basic courtesy to inform you that that man died, and now you are playing the same game with a substitute! It's a double violation of Moon's dignity. So, Moon is just a mindless idk animal? You throw a man assigned to be her husband or his decoy WITHOUT her consent and EXPECT her to fall in love with him? I mean, Moon would eventually know about Lin Ling's identity...wha-what was the point of excluding her from the discussion and keeping her in the dark? If it was just work, then why wasn't she consulted before the step was taken? She is the central figure, and she has no say in any of the mayhem unfolding.

Moon could be a sorted woman totally comfortable with her heterosexuality and still say no to Nice, even if he is the last surviving man on Earth. She just doesn't like him; it's that simple. That should be the end of the debate. However, people are not ready to accept that. The audience of the 'To Be Hero X' world and the real audience of 'To Be Hero X' donghua both should question themselves: is it okay to still enforce a relationship between them when the woman clearly expresses her sheer irritation at this fake relationship?

And that staged marriage plot! A perfect woman can either be a wife or a dead wife. Part of the reason Lin Ling cries while holding Moon during Moon's 'death' scene is that Moon has to metaphorically and literally die and withdraw herself from the narrative in order to chase the freedom she deserves. She can't exist with her individuality and agency in this world; capitalism and heteronormativity will not allow that.

Also, Moon's mock attempt at suicide is not funny. If I remember correctly, Li Haolin said in the Link Click art book interview that Liu Siwen and his girlfriend's story was something he actually took from a real-life story from a newspaper. Contrary to the happy ending in episode 5.5, the girl actually ended her life.

Another thing I want to mention is Moon from Lin Ling's perspective. In that interview, Lin Ling said

: Moon is not my girlfriend, she is my goddess.

It is not a typical 'romantic' declaration. Lin Ling acknowledges his position and accepts the fact that he will never be able to reach an equal position with Xiao Yueqing. That's why Yueqing is an inspiration to be admired from afar. And do you know why he accepts this? Because he respects Xiao Yueqing. During their one month together, Lin Ling realized that she never loved Nice to begin with. Lin Ling was the person she learned to be a bit softer. "Lin Ling is a much better name," she said. There is no possibility of assuming a relationship (which, honestly, most men don't even pay heed to. If I love you, I will be eligible to be with you, I will make you fall for me, and then how will you be able to say no to me? This is the general logic. Annoy, cross boundaries, violate personal space, and then coerce the woman into falling in love with you because YOUR love is so pure, omg) when the other party doesn't reciprocate. Lin Ling can still love her, but the love will not be actualized. I think Lin Ling was really upset when he learned that Yuqqing was forced to be in a fake relationship with Nice. He didn't want to hurt her more. The idol-fan relationship was fine, but in my opinion, Lin Ling did see her as more than an idol. His simple efforts to make things better for Xiao Yueqing without the illogical hope that 'if I do this, she will fall in love with me' make their relationship very humane. There might be a desire to be with her, but it never becomes the determining motive. I think Lin Ling would say this to Xiao Yueqing: Ti voglio bene. The literal translation of this Italian phrase is 'I want good for you,' which feels more impactful to me than its allegedly more intense romantic cousin.

Whatever the nature of the feelings Lin Ling had for Xiao Yueqing, if more people had this kind of feeling for others in our world, the world would be a much better place than it is today.

I love Li Haolin for how he tries to liberate heterosexual relationships from heteronormative constraints. In a sense, he introduces a splash of queerness into those relationships. Haolin's hetero couples are couples not merely because they share the same room as a boy and a girl. He portrays heterosocial relationships in a beautiful way. There is room to explore and form different kinds of human bonding. If things were normal, maybe Moon would form a really good friendship with Lin Ling. I feel that Lin Ling is the best interpreter of Moon as a human in tbhx.

2. how corporate dehumanizes people

Moon clearly has a more marginalized space in the dynamic, but how does one process power and position thrown towards them without their full control? Nice's character makes us ponder over this. Power and privilege come with a price. For Moon, she still had room to be subversive because things were clearly not working in her favor. What excuse does Nice have in this regard? It's much more complex. His death was so comical and absurd that until a new character is introduced in the second episode, we don't even feel that a real person has died. THAT is the power of perspective and storytelling. Lin Ling didn't quite process what he saw and perhaps didn't feel the need to bother. And Moon... yes, Moon had her reasons and irritation towards Nice, but it was really appalling to see that she did not even feel a little sad about Nice's death. How bitter must her workplace be? How much does capitalism isolate people to the point where fellow sufferers do not even bat an eye at each other? I am not blaming Moon, but I am asking you to consider the horrifying simplicity in this admission: so what if he died? You arranged for another one? Well, I felt chills. Imagine, one day you die, and then, very unfortunately, you didn't actually die and return to see a clone of yourself performing better than you probably could have done. Corporate not only dehumanizes people but makes people dehumanize each other and that's how it thrives.

Next, I would ask you to remember or re-read the third discussion; the question of agency : The dichotomy between public and private. Just replace Xia Fei with Nice. Heck, listen to Xia Fei's character song and if that doesn't make you remember Nice-

fake a smile in calm

3. Private queer lives and politics in the entertainment industry: Wreck and Nice's relationship as a twofold critique on the audience.

*sighs*.

I thought Haolin would just tease us with a iykyk rivals-enemies to lovers trope between a hero and a villain. Like, people who want to ship, ship. I really didn't expect him to pick shiguang, reverse the colour scheme and maintain the trauma and go : did you like my doomed yaoi?! 😃 man-

Haolin's obsession with widows needs to be studied. He pulled the similar string thrice in Yingdu and it's just the second episode in tbhx. Chill, man.

Back to analysis...what should I say? Let's assume you are Wreck.

you look at him like this. You wanted to be a hero with Nice together. So, for Wreck, to be a hero really meant to be with Nice.

Then one day, a script shattered everything. He became a hero, you became his villain, a literal stepping stone for him, so that his trust value increases.

The flashback suggests that Nice would frequently visit Wreck's house, probably the only place he could call 'home.' Nice would let his imperfect but real, unguarded self liberate in front of him.

And then suddenly, one day, he calls Moon his 'goddess.' You text him, call him, and send letters, but he doesn't reply. You shared a private life beyond the gaze of the camera and the prompt of scripts with him, and the company doesn't feel the need to inform you of his death. You reached there for the much-awaited encounter because nothing makes sense to you. The moment he speaks, a world shatters in your heart; he doesn't seem like your Nice. Still, you urge him to speak, almost pleadingly, because nothing makes sense and you hold onto that one tiny belief that things are still okay; maybe it's just a play. Then the illusion breaks. You can't tolerate it anymore and implore the imposter to speak the truth. He says that Nice committed suicide. He died.

People will remember Moon as an individual and someone who had an emotional dynamic with Lin Ling. But Wreck makes us mourn for the original Nice who died.

I don't know if Wreck knew that Nice was capable of doing something like that. He had already begun to cry, and when he heard the truth, he didn't even say things like, 'It can't be possible,' or 'How can it be possible?' Probably, it was more than possible, and that's why he was so tortured and disturbed. Wreck fell to his death with a smile, thinking that perhaps he might finally be able to be together with Nice peacefully.

Now, after everything, people will come and say: 'Ah, they were best friends.' Sure, they were. And that doesn't sit mutually exclusive to being lovers. What I feel is that it is a very conscious narrative within the narrative that Haolin deliberately put forth to unfold the compulsory heterosexuality and queer erasure in the viewership. Fans in the tbhx world forgot Wreck and didn't bother to understand what made him a villain. If tbhx donghua fans do the same after knowing the other perspectives, it's really... just, um, disappointing. You are proving Haolin's point, and you are the type of fans being criticized in the show. If Wreck were a female villain, my god.

I mean, yeah, I am kind of tired of 'proving' that they were lovers. It's the basic lack of media literacy.

I HAVE YAPPED TOO MUCH HELLO

did moon really survive? we don't know. did nice really die? we don't know. did wreck really die? i don't know. did LIN LING REALLY survive? I DON'T KNOW.

But I don't think those will totally topple these reflections.

Special note :

hello, today is this head emptu's birthday. please give him blessings and pray that he does not bite through the longevity noodles. He has a wife at home. and a sister. please. He has a family.

[2000sangel]

RAHHHH tenna x autistic reader who likes video games RAHHHHHHHH

Thanks for requesting !!! I'm not autistic, so I hope I was more or less accurate with what I went over.

Warning for mention/slight description of meltdowns, right after "★ !!" ; feel free to skip that part if you're uncomfortable!

*★*★*★*

Tenna x Autistic Reader who's into video games !! - Headcanons

★ Tenna knows very well about your unmatched love towards video games: you're always the first one who wants to try out the ones he creates! He feels appreciated when you do, like his work is worth something, especially considering how passionate you are when it comes to them.

★ You've got your favorites of course, be it because of their characters, plot, or simply for the sense of comfort that they grant you from replaying them over and over…Tenna knows each one of them by now, and makes sure to add little references to them in his own sometimes, just to see your face light up as you realize!

★ He has super good memory so when you info dump about your favorite games he retains every single information; should you have to stop talking for a while, he'll remind you where you left off, making you grin at how attentive he is.

★ Sometimes it happens that you need some more time spent on your special interest -video games, of course- to self regulate or just because for one reason or the other your interest in them is heightened; at first, Tenna might get nervous because of this, thinking that he's done something wrong to make you want to spend more time on games than doing anything else, but all you need to do is sit him down and explain that it's got nothing to do with him, actually!

★ He manages to calm down over time, and either lets you be and have fun or gets comfortable on the couch next to you if you invite him to watch or play along. He's not the best at games that are modern even though you've explained each concept to him…he holds the joystick weird sometimes, or gets confused on how to save if there's a lot of things going on on the screen already plus many controls, he might even be afraid of slowing you down but you reassure him it's all in good fun, and he's good again!

★!! With you being autistic, sometimes things get a little too much; so much so that even the soft music playing from whatever console you're using might send you over the edge, if combined with other things. Each sound is too loud, each feeling is amplified, and suddenly Tenna is by your side turning off whatever device managed to irritate you and removing anything that could be upsetting for you from your proximity. He's a natural entertainer, and through your relationship he has learned to ‘entertain’ you during meltdowns just the same, just a little differently than he's used to on stage; he's quieter if you're quiet, more reassuring, and brings up topics that he knows you'll enjoy hearing about, and adding to if you're up to it. He validates your emotions by having genuine reactions to what you're saying, the dramatic side of him never really leaving.

★ Tenna, despite not being autistic himself (at least in my headcanons), emphasizes with you if you dislike disruption of routine. He's got quite the busy schedule often, but he likes recordings happening at the same time every time, and having that short hour after lunch to slightly nod off -don’t judge him, okay?-. Most importantly, he likes spending the end of the day with you, finally switching off from his TV Time persona. So rest assured that he'll always be around for an evening watch of your skilled gameplay. <3

[avelera]

Ok, I feel like there's three writing concepts that Tumblr needs to get reacquainted with when it comes to understanding fiction:

Catharsis - Sometimes, fiction engages with horrifying, disgusting, painful, or scary concepts in order to bring about a positive experience for the reader. This can be through the hero defeating a disgusting evil, like defeating an abuser for example. One might also get catharsis not out of the defeat of something bad or uncomfortable, but simply from the experience of living it vicariously, such as joy at successfully hiding the body of a murder victim. There are literally countless examples of catharsis in fiction, but most importantly it must be understood, it is completely harmless to real people whether you're experiencing catharsis at something good happening or something bad happening that you get to live vicariously because it is literally fiction. Indeed, there's a lot of evidence that getting to experience catharsis through fiction at evil things, say, living vicariously through a fictional character committing adultery, even if you would never want to cheat on your own partner, actually helps purge the desire to do evil things oneself.

Pleasures of the genre - some genres have expectations that go with them. If you, as a writer, don't include those pleasures, you might turn off the audience. For example, the Western genre has a certain expectation of being set in the 19th c American West. There's usually cowboys and horses involved. If you write a story that's advertised as a "Western" that takes place entirely in a New York City apartment, it might be novel for the genre, but it might also piss off a bunch of readers who were expecting horses. You can do it, obviously, but don't be surprised if readers are confused and perhaps disinterested in the work. More salient to Tumblr perhaps - Marvel believes it is creating action/adventure superhero stories. If a Marvel movie suddenly became a psychological exploration of the internality of a character's relationships, without a single laser beam or fight scene in sight, Marvel expects its audience to be confused and unhappy. We, as fanfic writers and readers might be dying for that story, but that is not the pleasure of the genre that Marvel thinks its audience wants when it walks specifically into a superhero film.

Power Fantasy - this might be one of the most misunderstood or perhaps narrowly applied terms. Yes, sometimes a power fantasy is a 16 year old boy watching a superhero dude with 8 pack abs destroy the bad guy, get the girl, and save the day. Living vicariously through that character is definitely a power fantasy. BUT, a power fantasy can also be fantastical things that the audience wishes would happen in a way that would empower an audience member or make them happy. For example, a billionaire industrialist merchant of death like Tony Stark getting hit by his own weapons and deciding to become a crusader for justice in a way that actually helps normal people is, in fact, an audience power fantasy. We want to believe that if the right bad guy like a billionaire got the right comeuppance like a near-death experience at the hands of their own evils, they'd learn their lesson and become a better person. This is a power fantasy. This is not a thing that actually happens. It's honestly not that different from the power fantasy many gun owners have that if they own a gun, they're more likely to stop a crime in progress with their perfect marksmanship, rather than that they're more likely to kill or be killed by a member of their own family. Understanding the application of power fantasies in terms of good things you hope would happen happening in fiction is not only important for dissecting fiction as an intelligent viewer, it's also important in terms of recognizing when you're being influenced by certain stories and choosing what lesson you take away from it and what lesson (if any) you want to take away from it.

I just feel like these 3 terms are what I see most lacking in a lot of "discourse". Fiction is trying to engender emotion in the audience. Great fiction engenders a wide range of emotions in the viewer, not simply good emotions. Thoughtful fiction might (but not always!) try to impart a lesson. But great fiction can also just want to give you great emotions and make you think outside the usual box of your usual experiences. It's also completely fine for great fiction to just want to give you a great emotion experience like catharsis, or the thrill of a power fantasy. And I really wish these three separate but interrelated concepts were discussed more when it comes to dissecting fiction here on this site.

[eamour]

feeling the wish fulfilled.

if you have read and consumed some of neville goddard's works, you will already be familiar with the word "feeling". when speaking of "feeling it real" or "feeling your desires to be yours", it is not an emotion that we are referring to. "feeling", here, means to know something for a fact.

feeling it real.

when you "feel" something to be real, you don’t try to "get" it, you don’t think that there is still "work" that needs to be done, you don’t "try" or "attempt" to manifest something, you don’t "pray“, "hope", "worry" or "wonder" if it’s going to occur in your reality, you don’t feel "unsure", "trapped", or "confused". the reason why you won’t feel any of these things is because you have managed to feel your desire to be yours. you cannot be convinced of the opposite. you have created an unshakable experience within that cannot be taken from you — a new belief of yours has been established!

perception with senses.

to "feel" usually implies your perception with the senses. you will use all of your senses — but within your mind — and recreate the same experience you would have if you were to experience it physically. to make your desire as vivid, as touchable, as perceivable as possible will help you make it feel real. the moment you free yourself and allow yourself to feel the way you would want to feel, you will lose yourself in it. eventually, you will start to feel relieved, empowered and secure. why? because you have accepted this imaginal act to be reality. your reality.

its transformative power.

you may question the power and effect of this way of "feeling" but it will and has to change you. the moment you bask in the feeling, the acceptance and the liberation that come along, you will begin to shift. your mind will begin to change and therefore your very environment. at the end of the day, your feeling portrays a shift of a state. every state is a feeling that you can move in and out of. it’s a coat you can choose to wear or take off.

to feel means to let go.

in order to feel it real, to feel the wish fulfilled, you will have to let go of something: the world around you. you will have to let go of reminding yourself of the looks of your current reality and leave it as it is. don’t even try to fix it, but let go of your worries, your obstacles in life, the limitations and restrictions in it, and allow yourself to perceive, experience and accept whatever it is that you want to have to be yours. only through the art of removing yourself from the outside and feeling like a part of it, you will begin to understand that the outside is actually just a part of you, a part that you've got in your hands.

the challenging part.

now, the difficulty in this is disregarding your logical mind, your rational and realistic (whatever the hell that means) way of thinking. you will have to accept your imaginative acts, your inner conversations to be reality — not for your outer world to determine your inner world. the more you do this, it does not only get easier, you will also ease your anxiety and let go of your fear... but you must be willing to grant yourself greater feelings.

dare to feel it.

dare to imagine and feel the things you would want to feel. expand your former limits or give them up entirely. get rid of rules and forget about how the outer-world has once appeared. and most importantly, don’t be afraid to do so. don’t be afraid to use your mind’s power. if you find it hard to do so, then you are still attached to your senses who can only give you a limited outlook on a limited reality.

practice the feeling.

start simple. think of a scenario you would like to experience. visualise or just think of it. and now, ask yourself "how would i feel if i was to experience this?". you may feel resistant at first, maybe even ridiculous or delusional, but just permit yourself to feel it for some time. go back to that scenario and go deeper. "how do i look like? who am i with? what is it that i own? what am i doing? what's happening to me?". and then, the most important question: "what if this was my reality now?". i want you to rephrase this question and form a sentence. your "what if" becomes a "this is", the same way your "this would feel" becomes a "this feels". i want you to declare that this — the scenario you have felt — is factual. it’s true. it’s a reflection of your reality, RIGHT NOW. after all, this is what distinguishes creation from daydreaming.

with love and lots of feeling, ella.

[genericpuff]

Dyou ever feel disappointed (?) that there aren't more eyes on LR? I know you keep it on the DL to avoid Rachel's wrath but I 100% know the only reason it's not more popular is that not enough people know about it. You put in a lot of work that we all really love but I know the notes count could be higher. Is this something you care about? We can try to spread it more if so, but going back to the Rachel/not intruding on LO spaces point...

Ouu so that's a good question, but honestly... nah, not really. And I'm not even saying that to be "humble" or whatever, it's literally just... what y'all are seeing in Rekindled is, to me, a step away from my usual patterns and habits that I've been dealing with for years now. It's forced me out of my comfort zones, but most importantly, it's got me creating purely for the fun of it, for the self-indulgence, without any of the usual pressures I've forced upon myself in the past for the work I do to "mean something" or for it to "be successful". It's not just the tip of a massive iceberg, it's practically a whole ass detour. Rekindled is like one of those road trip movies where the reluctant stickler gets strung along by the aloof weirdos, driven off the beaten path, and winds up realizing by the end of the crazy journey that it was worth taking the long way home.

That's not to say making Rekindled doesn't come with its own unique pressures or that I don't take it seriously, but they're different from the pressures I've dealt with in the past and the nature of Rekindled being what it is means... I don't have to take it as seriously as the car crash that was my original work prior to it? 💀😆 (which I already took way more seriously than what was healthy for me, in hindsight). Like I can take it seriously as a creative project that I wanna see through, especially where it's meant to "fix" stuff that felt misguided / done poorly in LO, but because it's effectively fanfiction, I can separate it from the expectations that came from my original work. It can never pay my bills, so I don't have to worry about it doing so. It shouldn't be the only thing I'm ever known for, so I don't need it to amount to my legacy.

A good example of what I mean are what you brought up - the notes count. Thing is, compared to social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook and even Youtube, posting exclusively to Tumblr over the past couple years has been great for my mental health. Unlike those other platforms, my follower count isn't on full display to both myself and others. There's no real bearing on notes beyond clout, and that clout only exists within Tumblr - going "viral" on this hellsite doesn't amount to the same things as going viral on a platform like Twitter, for the most part my work still stays within its respective audience where it's meant to be and even if I do have an episode "take off" in notes... it doesn't really matter? Like to me there's virtually no difference between a post that has 300 notes and a post that has 30,000 notes. And I actually do have a couple posts that have "taken off" like that. It's neat but it's also like... okay, life goes on. Except now I'm gonna keep getting notifications about that one post forever LMAO

Granted, it would be different if the posts were actually intended to get as many eyes on it as possible - like if they were posts meant to generate income in some way through advertising Patreon, Ko-Fi, merch shops, etc. - but it's rare that I ever do that because obviously with Rekindled being what it is, I can't really profit off it anyways.

And that's okay! I've spent enough years worrying over the online "gains" and bearing the weight of my work's responsibility to my livelihood on my shoulders.

Rekindled is fun. Even when it's stressful, when an episode goes up late or when I'm still finding myself procrastinating, it's fun. It's neat that it now has a TV Tropes page and that there are some Youtubers who talk about it every now and then, but... the novelty of those things comes paired with the pressure and fear of knowing my work is being perceived outside of my own scope. Sure, that's just what happens when you share your work online, but even I , in all of the hubris I had to have to create Rekindled in the first place, can't pretend like I'm infallible to that sort of thing. Every time a Youtuber talks about it, every time there's a thread in /r/webtoons about it, every time someone besides myself uses the #lore rekindled tags, I have to live with the small but real consequences of doing what I do - the anons taking it upon themselves to judge me in my own inbox, the Youtube commenters forming their own opinions based on what they assume are my intentions (even when those assumptions are often false), the redditors arguing back and forth over the virtue of transformative rewrites.

It's a small price to pay, for everything that I do here. I can't very well sit here on my pedestal talking shit about something like LO without taking some of that shit in return regarding my own work. It's only natural people will have misinformed opinions about what I do, or will take it upon themselves to dissect and debate and discuss my work regardless of whether they even like the work or not. I try to take it as proactively as I can, that it's a metric of success in and of itself - what I'm making has made people feel something, for some joy, and for others, frustration. The art has done everything it could ever do, for better and for worse - it's made people feel and think and talk. Most of all, it's made me feel and think and talk, and create, and experiment, and fail, and succeed in ways I never thought myself capable before. It's more than I ever expected - and all I really needed to come out of all this.

----------

All that aside, it's not like Rekindled isn't already doing a lot in the way of "expanding my reach", so to speak. Though it is just Tumblr, I've gotten to meet so many amazing readers and writers and artists through this project, and that's at the heart of why I make comics at all. I'm not joking or exaggerating when I say that Rekindled literally couldn't be what it is without the community that surrounds it. And that's a community that I'm hoping will still be interested in hanging with lil' old me even after Rekindled is over.

Rekindled isn't my first rodeo and it certainly won't be my last. In fact, I'm currently (finally) overcoming some of the burnout that's been persisting over the past couple years with my original project, and I'm breaking down walls I literally couldn't have broken down before. I hadn't realized I had been suffocating, and Rekindled wound up being that breath of fresh air that I needed to live again.

It's gonna take time, and there's still a lot of healing happening on my end, but I'm making plans again for what I really wanna do esp for when Rekindled is over, and it's exciting, and scary, and most of all, hopeful.

So all that's to say, if you (anon) or you (everyone else) are really interested in "boosting" my work and getting more eyes on it... well, I suppose I better start sharing more of it outside of just Rekindled, shouldn't I? I hope that when I do, it's welcomed as eagerly as you all welcomed Rekindled. It'll be quite different, and likely won't be everyone's cup of tea, but I hope all the work I've done on Rekindled so far - and what we still have left to accomplish in the future - proves what I'm capable of and allows for the opportunity to really connect with my work, wholly me. Y'all took a chance on me when I first started posting those lil' glow edits and the first scrappy sketches of Rekindled back in the day, so I hope when the time comes, y'all can take that chance on me again <3

And hey, here's a fun fact for you to close out this long response - though it might not be a major platform, judging by the metrics I can see on the surface from other comics alongside it, I'm pretty sure Rekindled is carrying like 90% of the current traffic numbers on Dillyhub LMAO Like seriously, the next highest liked / subbed comic I could find on there didn't even amount to a third of the amount of likes and subs I have on there just through Rekindled. It's actually hilarious, but also kinda sad, because damn... the devs really have abandoned that place. So it's not exactly all that impressive. But that's pretty much exactly why I chose it as a mirror in the first place - I sure as shit wasn't gonna test my luck posting it to Webtoons or Tapas, and the only reason I even wanted a mirror site in the first place was to give non-Tumblr users a place to read it (without being badgered to make an account and without having to sift through all my rants and essays LMAO) so Dillyhub just kinda made sense as a place that was functional enough to host it but not big enough to draw any unwanted attention. Sooo I guess what I'm saying is, you're welcome Dillyhub?? 😆

[amalgamationillustration]

Alright Ghost Fan Artists, this is for you. Seeing as we have a papa with a real human face and not a silicone one I have to talk about this, if you're trying to capture his likeness and finding something isn't looking right like I was, here's a psychotically detailed tour of his face and the parts I think are worth noting when it comes to drawing his beautiful visage.

Tobias Forge has a really interesting nose, he has what's known as a bifid nasal tip, or a cleft nose tip, it's a rare thing that occurs early in fetal development where the tip of the nose segments into two, it's similar to a cleft chin, but for the nose. A butt nose, if you will, and I mean that affectionately.

Here's some examples of a few different noses with a bifid nasal tip

You'll notice them by the distinctive line or cleft down the center.

Sometimes they'll be more of a pronounced ala (the edges of the nose where it meets the cheek).

In some pictures of Tobias it's more subtle

But in others it's more obvious, it seems to change depending on the lighting and probably some other unknown factors

But importantly for all you fan artists out there, the Papa V paint seems to really highlight this center line

This kind of nose is really interesting and kind of rare so I wanna see that shit represented! Draw me that little cleft line, show me that little cute butt nose!!

So, connecting from the bifid nasal tip to the mouth is his philtrum, which is noteworthy because it's fairly broad, giving him a wide Cupid's bow

But his makeup is painted in a way that exaggerates the points upward and inward, this isn't vital when drawing him as Perpetua but can help if you draw the face and then the paint!

Now he has a specific set of things going on with his teeth, and I'm going to address the 'imperfections' with them, but please don't mistake that for me saying they're bad or need fixing. As long as they aren't causing him any trouble, there's nothing wrong with them. However as someone who's had orthodontic work done as an adult, I am really interested in the myriad of ways our teeth can come through and the causes for that. I'm not suggesting he needs to change them and in fact I think they have a lot of character and are also very fun to draw, and though no one is under any requirement to, I urge you to practice imperfect teeth, they're very common and add a lot to a portrait and character design and generally are fun and pleasant and full of personality.

So onto the teeth, the most notable ones right away are his bottom incisors, as he has some notable crowding

You'll notice his central indoors are mostly central/straight but his lateral incisors either side are sat further back, this creates what I've decided to call a bunny teeth look. As at a glance it can appear as though only the front incisors are there like a rabbit. This happens when theres not enough space for the teeth coming through, this can happen when either the jawbone is not wide or long enough or the teeth themselves are too wide to sit side by side, or a combo of all three. I also had some crowding on the bottom row as this is where it's most common, the teeth don't have the room required and they either crowd like this where they move to accommodate (sometimes it's symmetrical like in tf case where the same teeth on each side move the same way) or they can flare outward (more common with the top, I had this pretty badly, called an overjet, which is different to an overbite) or they sometimes teeth need to be extracted or occasionally theres orthodontic or surgical intervention to widen or lengthen the jaw or sometimes the sides of the teeth are sanded down to allow them to fit more flush with each other (it sounds shit, I've had it done, it's actually fine, just feels weird).

Another thing to note is that because the lateral incisors have moved behind the central ones, the canines on the bottom have slightly rotated outward and his bottom left incisor (out right in this case) is tilting inward. This is most obvious in the Lachryma music video where he seems to have some sort of wash over them to make them stand out.

You can basically only see his central incisors and his tilted canines here.

Now his top teeth are less distinctive but do have something everyone has noticed: vampire fangs

He does have a similar crowding with his incisors as on the bottom but much more subtle, very similar to what I had actually.

However, his canines are what steal the show here. They've got a two fold thing happening, so one is that they're slightly rotated, so they're sticking out more rather than laying flush with the others, and it's making the point seem more curved and pronounced as it's creating a visible gap between its inner edge and the lateral incisors. Here's an example of something similar pre and post orthadontic work, to show you how they move

Additional, his canines also appear to have erupted a little higher than the rest, so they'd normally share the same gumline as the rest of the teeth, but in some of us they erupt a bit higher up, which can often also push them out. So we have rotated, high and projected canines which gives him a really distinctive fang that means he's never gonna beat the V in Papa V stands for Vampire allegations and I love that for him.

This kind of formation also happens due to crowding, where his lateral incisors on the bottom sunk in behind his central incisors, his upper canines protruded out. This is again due to a slightly narrow palate, which is also seen in the fact that he has a very slightly recessed jaw, though he also has a prominent chin so it balances out and makes it hard to notice unless you're a little tooth freak like me. I also have a narrow palate and a more recessed jaw and chin than he does so I'm primed to see one of my own. You'll notice when he smiles with teeth but without opening his mouth, you'll rarely if ever see much of his bottom teeth, and it is normal for the bottom teeth to not be perfectly in line with the top, as they always sit behind the top unless you have an underbite, the layout of his teeth make it so that you only really see his bottom teeth when he's opening his mouth more fully, which is why they're seen more often in Copia due to the extent of motion required to open the latex mask mouth.

Now, I'm not gonna gate keep art, you can draw TF or Perpetua however you'd like in whatever style you'd like, but if like me, you're interested in likenesses and capturing them and like me, have found it really hard to capture his likeness and weren't sure what was missing, maybe this unnecessarily detailed guided tour of his face will help you, and even if it doesn't, you might have just learnt some fun facts about noses and mouths and orthodontics!

[wikiangela]

Hi, a bit late but joining in on the @alliwantforchristmasislou project 🫶

I decided to donate to a polish organisation called the stonewall group (which is why the pic is in polish lol)

chose this one just because im the most familiar with this one, and they do amazing work in support of lgbt+ people and fighting for our rights in this... not so queer-friendly country 🫶

now, ive been in the 911 fandom for almost 4 years now (gonna be 4 in i think February), and i only started after the episode Buck actually bc it was allll over my dash. i binged the whole show in a week, before the next episode is even aired, I loved it SO much.

as most of y'all know, I initially shipped buddie - it was the big ship, ofc i did, i wrote so much fic for them and i had so much fun and met so many moots i still love seeing on my dash 🫶❤️ but it might've been obvious (or not, idk) i was kinda getting bored and losing enjoyment, more and more of my fics and snippets were focusing on other characters with buck or eddie, i wasnt really as into it anymore - but i still loved it and wanted to enjoy it (which ironically was killed dead later on by the buddie fandom itself lmao)

and then came bucktommy and everything changed. initially i tried not to give in but within a few days i had two fics and more ideas lol they completely took over my thoughts. ive never been this inspired to write, to create, I even learned how to make gifs for them (with lots of help from amazing talented friends 🫶🤣) during fall and winter I always get so depressed and sad and having very dark and depressing thoughts (last year my buck driving fic was a result of that lol), and its so hard to find motivation to do anything, even write. but this year, even tho I had a lil crisis moment, i wrote through it and im as inspired as always - i havent stopped writing since april. they're literally the most inspiring ship ever - and fun fact, usually i prefer writing about fanon ships, so this was a huge change and surprise

I always related to buck a lot, and especially once we got his bisexuality canon - checking out and appreciating hot people of the same sex and not realizing what it means is too real lol - and Tommy is so compelling and theres so much potential for so many stories there, I wish the show would do something interesting with him 😭 despite being so confident and cool, he feels like he's holding back some sad, maybe (probably) traumatic backstory that could be so good and interesting - and lou is such a good actor and itd be amazing to see more from him in this role

they wrote tommy as the perfect love interest for buck, and it was amazing to see it on screen, it was such a breath of fresh air to see this kind of queer representation on a network show, it was so gentle and adorable, and they initially handled it with so much care, and id love to see where they'd go from there 😭 the break up broke my heart not only because it happened, but because it felt ooc and abrupt and not at all like that's where the story was going. wish they'd fix it and give us tommy back 😭🙏

and lastly but most importantly - thanks to bucktommy, i met so many amazing friends ❤️😭 even when I was writing fics and interacting with mutuals on here, i was never really talking to a lot of mutuals, not for longer than a few messages, and now i got this wonderful community that i feel so comfortable in, everyone is so nice and friendly, and I love y'all so much, this is the best fandom experience ive ever had ❤️

thank you all, ive been having so much fun since april, i love y'all. here's to more bucktommy in 2025 ❤️

[rea-grimm]

Android Luffy

You worked in a science lab where they focused on making robots and improving artificial intelligence. They wanted to perfect everything and create the perfect android that would be unrecognisable from a human, at people's fingertips and, most importantly, able to get power for its system in times of power outages and so on. Now you were also working alongside nanobots and special metals that were to be incorporated into another new model.

This created the first android model that did all that. This prototype was supposed to draw energy from human food, was supposed to feel human emotions, and could stretch its body as if it were made of rubber without any damage.

You weren't there for the programming process or the actual manufacturing. Your task was simple, at least according to everyone. The prototype of this robot, named JOY-BOT01, but with the work name Luffy, was to live with you, and you were to test its reactions in a real environment.

Everything was to take place in your house. They moved a giant box that contained a charger and an android. You opened it and felt the button that the android had hidden behind its ear, which served as a switch.

Just as you turned him on and his eyes opened, a giant smile appeared on his face. You had no idea how energetic and cheerful this android would be. You've never seen such a personality in an android before.

Luffy, even though he couldn't read or write and had limited knowledge, was cheerful and full of life. You'd expect him to have a processor full of knowledge or access to the internet to look it up, but no. Instead, he had a head full of dreams and asked questions about everything. You got the impression that at one point, you were working with a child rather than a real android.

Every day was an adventure with Luffy, and not a single day was boring. You wrote down all your progress and observations in a notebook and reported back to the scientists every week.

However, from their answers, you found that they didn't like Luffy's daydreaming and his general character. Or that he would use nanobots to reach out for food, or that he would reach out and hug you like an octopus. You, however, tried to reassure them that everything was perfectly fine and that Luffy would eventually calm down. Even though you didn't believe it yourself.

One day, you decided to take Luffy to the amusement park to test his interaction skills. As soon as you entered the park, Luffy's eyes lit up. He had no idea which ride to go on first, or if he would go around to all the treat stands first. Eventually, however, something else caught his attention.

"Y/N! Look at that ship! That's a pirate ship! We're going treasure hunting!" He exclaimed excitedly, grabbing your hand and pulling you towards the attraction.

In front of the pirate ship, you were given a map that led to the hidden treasure. The game consisted of searching for clues around the park, and whoever found the treasure won a teddy bear. Luffy looked at the map carefully and started pulling you for the first clue.

Luffy ran from one station to the next, his long mechanical arms reaching out to collect all the clues he needed. Every once in a while, he stopped to ask you a question.

"Y/N, why do people like to find treasures? What's so exciting about it?" while he was scouring the map for where to go next.

"Because treasure isn't just about value, Luffy. It's about the journey you go through before you find it. And of course, the excitement of finding your reward after a difficult journey," you replied with a smile. Luffy thought for a moment, but his enjoyment of the game didn't wane. Instead, you had to show him the way.

When you finally found the treasure, you were given a teddy bear with a map in its hand, plus a straw hat. Luffy picked up the teddy bear, looked at it, and then gave it to a little boy standing nearby.

"To me, treasure is something else," he said as he put on the straw hat, and his eyes briefly met yours. "Maybe it's something I'll find later."

Before you walked out of the park, you came across a snack stand. Luffy immediately headed over to the vendor and asked for a huge portion of fries with a wide smile. When you sat down at a table to eat your share, he began to enthusiastically talk about how amazing the treasure hunt was.

"It was like a real adventure! But I think my real treasure is still out there," he said with a mouthful of chips and a dreamy, hopeful expression.

On the way back home, Luffy told you about his dream. What he wanted to achieve. You've never heard an android talk so determinedly and enthusiastically about his dreams. You've only heard him talk about dreams. Androids didn't usually have dreams of their own. Only pre-programmed ones.

"I want to find my own treasure. Something that's mine alone. Maybe not gold, maybe not food. Something... that I can feel here," he said, placing his hand on his chest where his processor was hidden. Your heart fluttered strangely at his words. Luffy had something special inside him - something that went beyond programming.

"What would your treasure look like?" You asked curiously as you watched Luffy gaze up at the star-studded sky.

"I'm not sure," he replied after a moment. "But I think it'll be something that fills me with the same happiness I feel when I'm with you," he said, looking at you like it was nothing, his smile warm and innocent. His words surprised you and warmed your heart at the same time.

As your work continued and you sent in your regular reports, some scientists began to have doubts about the safety of the program. Luffy's behaviour was an aberration that had to be stopped.

"A robot can't have dreams," said the project leader. "If it keeps going like this, we'll have to terminate the program."

"But Luffy is unique! His ability to think and feel is what makes this project revolutionary," you protested, but your words were ignored. Luffy overheard your conversation, and his eyes darkened.

In the lab, Luffy was subjected to more tests. He was originally supposed to answer questions about his functions, but instead, the scientists focused on his behaviour. One:

"JOY-BOT01, what is your main objective?" one of the scientists asked him. Luffy paused for a moment and thought.

"I want to find treasure," he replied confidently without any hesitation.

"That's not an adequate answer," the scientist remarked sharply. "Robots cannot be programmed to search for abstract concepts. That is unacceptable." At that moment, you realised the end was near, as you saw him write the word DEACTIVATE heavily in his notes.

The day Luffy was to be deactivated came too soon, and you failed to prepare for it. You wanted them to cancel it, you made up reasons why the project should continue, but the scientists were deaf to you. They said you were too emotionally invested for a proper review.

As the scientists prepared to shut it down, Luffy saw your face and knew that would be the end of it. What upset him more than his demise was your sad face. How dare the scientists do that? Luffy got angry and broke through the lab's security systems.

"Y/N, come on! We gotta get out of here!" He grabbed your hand before changing his mind and taking you in his arms like a bride and running with you to the dock.

At the pier, you headed straight for the boat you bought because you wanted to take him on a sea trip. Luffy hopped on it with you, still trying to use his outstretched arms to push away the scientists and security guards who were following you. You, meanwhile, ran to the wheel and started it up before taking off full speed away from there.

"We're free now!" Luffy rejoiced. "And you know what? Together we'll find the greatest treasure. Maybe it's a treasure I can't find alone - maybe it's you."

On the high seas, you started a new life. No scientists, no controls, just you and Luffy. And even though Luffy was an android, he could show you every day that his heart was full of life, dreams and love. As you sailed over the horizon, you felt that you had both found the true treasure in each other.

Luffy Masterlist

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Hi! Sorry to disturb. I'm a quite inexperienced writer, I'm trying to write my first long work and I don't want to just get it out and be done with it, I want to put care in it, so your blog has been super helpful for both small tips and for big deals. So I have a doubt and I thought I'd ask you, if you can't or don't want to answer that's fine!

One of my main characters is a singer but most importantly a song writer so the songs she writes really have a meaning with the story and are meant to get a reaction from her counterpart. I tried a few ways but I can't seem to incorporate her singing very well in my pages, how would you go about it? Do you have any tips?

Thank you and have a good days and holidays if you celebrate xx

Hi! Here are some references and tips from various sources I found for you. Use which ones would work best with your specific story, and alter as needed:

Writing Template: Singing Scene

Part 1

What perspective will this be from? The singer or the audience? Maybe both.

There is more to singing than using the voice.

Will the audiences’ emotions be front and center for this scene or will it be the character’s? It doesn’t matter if you are writing first person or second person. The character can show the reader what the audience is thinking based on body language. 

If the character is singing alone, the audience can be more than just themselves. It could be a deity they believe in, or a loved one that passed away and is present either in physical spirit or thought. Could be a pet or even nature itself (trees, grass, etc) as the character’s audience. They all would respond in their own ways. Maybe the trees dance in the wind while the character sings a melody. Or the birds and bees join in on the tune.

Part 2

Connect a deep feeling and understanding back to the reader.

Remember, overall experience is more important than mechanics.

What is the song about? What genre? How does it sound? Is it slow or fast? Lighthearted or formal? Does the singer have a high voice or a low one, or a mix? 

How does the song make people who hear it feel? Is the singer doing anything else while they sing?

Let’s say the main character has a song stuck in their head. One way to show the reader (if it’s important to the overall plot) is when every time the song gets stuck in the character’s head, the paragraph would stop and a new one would start with the lyrics.

Part 3

Create an emotion profile for why the character is singing

Is there a message you want to convey? This can be shown by how the character sings.

Tone/breathy, maybe the sound of an exasperated sigh would be heard in parts of the singing.

How the character holds tension in the body can really influence the emotion. Are they rigid, loose? Perhaps seemingly overthinking it.

Diction can be shown through how you write the lyrics the character is singing. For example, hard/soft on the consonants using bold letters or capitalization. The character can have pauses and slurring in the singing, shown through the way you write the lyrics.

Breath. Every emotional state has a breathing pattern associated with it. Ways to write breathing for singing would be through body language and onomatopoeia. For example if the character is scared and is hyperventilating: He placed a hand over his heart, barely able to stare into the crowd of onlookers. Wheeze, gasp!  Was all the lyrics we heard from him that night”.

Think about the type of song and the genre. For example, if you’re writing about rock music, the instruments will be guitar, drums, piano. So ‘Her voice rose higher, while trying to follow the raspy, intense notes of the musician’s bass.  

Is this a new song?

If you’re using well-known songs, include action, internal monologue, and scenery description to avoid a reader skipping over to the actual story.

If a song is new or a unique take, you can paraphrase the lyrics in a way that tells you something relevant to the character or moment.

Example: The goofy man staggered down the street in his drunken stupor singing: “You ma-a . . . blue-eyed girl!” He took another swig from the bottle in his hand. “Do you remember when . . . we used to sing: Oh la la, la la, la la, la la, la te da! Just like that!”  He took another swig. “All alone on my own. I thought I saw you the other day. But it was my dreams—” He was silenced by sirens coming from behind him down the alley. He bolted!

Part 4

Create emotion profiles for the song.

Purpose of the song. Is the message in the content of the song or the characters reaction to them?

Songs in fiction have multiple purposes such as giving background details, foreshadow, used as a metaphor, portray emotion or conflict, reflect or mirror events of the story, used for character development, etc. The message you are trying to convey will determine how you write them.

One method is good for when the content of the song is unimportant or secondary to the characters reaction. Simply include a description of the song. Using broad terms, describe the topic and style of the song but keep focus on how it affects the characters.

Part 5

How does it end? Good note or bad? Audience wanting more? Character feeling happier?

Don’t be afraid to end the scene or chapter here.

When it ends, is there thunderous applause?

How are they feeling? What are they thinking? Their posture. Are there any subtle movements in their hands, eyes, and breathing patterns?

After singing the character could simply move on to later that night or the next day. You don’t necessarily have to show what happens right after. It may even make the reader curious. You can show the results of singing throughout the story, for example, if other characters start treating the singing character nicer, or they get a contract deal, or if their depression has subsided. Example:

Intense, was the crescendo as it built to a slow roll that crashed like a great wave into the souls of those that listened. A calming silence fell over the eager audience; they were captivated by the intoxicating tune coming from this slender throat. From the depths of his soul, the lyrics rose and swelled around everyone in that room as if all could feel his misery. In this moment, his pain was their pain and the audience and singer were as one. 

Some Personality Traits of Singers

3,088 singers were surveyed to learn what personality traits and interests make them unique.

Singers are artistic and enterprising. They tend to be predominantly artistic individuals, meaning that singers are creative and original and work well in a setting that allows for self-expression. They also tend to be enterprising, which means that they are usually quite natural leaders who thrive at influencing and persuading others. [Using the Holland codes]

The top personality traits of singers are openness and social responsibility. Singers score highly on openness, which means they are usually curious, imaginative, and value variety. They also tend to be high on the measure of social responsibility, indicating that they desire fair outcomes and have a general concern for others. [Using the Big Five]

Character Development through Music

One device that is highly effective in understanding character is music. Music is nearly universal in its influence.

It’s a bit too easy to just answer the question, “What kind of music does my character like?”

More difficult might be, “What kind of music would my character turn off?”

You might think of an entire type of music or, more likely, a specific song. Maybe a song that would break your character’s heart in two at just the first beat.

Think about instances of revealing character traits using music as a way to show your reader more about how your character interacts with the world.

Music can be explored in literature showing us just how responsive this device can be to character.

Our knowledge of character may be deepened by their interaction with music.

How might this work in your own writing?

Try this exercise, using the first few words from Prince’s iconic “Kiss”:

“YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE BEAUTIFUL…”

Copy this line, including the quotation marks. Unless your character is Prince, write says, or sings, or said, and your character’s name.

Imagine your character speaking these 6 words.

To whom did they say them? Where are they talking? Are they singing at a bar? Or is your scene NOT connected to the reality of this song at all?

You can imagine that your character is the first person to ever say these words to another. Take time to free-write this scene, and see what happens next.

More references:

On Sensory Language ⚜ Word Alternatives: Auditory

Words to Describe Someone's Voice ⚜ Key Musical Terms

Sources: 1 2 3 ⚜ More: Notes & References ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

Hope this helps. No need to apologise, this was such an interesting request for me to look into. So thanks so much for that & happy holidays to you! <3