#and thats why their 'romance' is horribly written

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

Phullo it is I again!

I am very glad that you actually responded and given me an actual advice since I was worried about the question I sent you.

Though besides that I have another question for you (hoorayyy)!

So, about the reading books earlier- I’m fortunately a bookworm too! It’s just that I notice I prefer reading the genre science fiction/psychological horror more than… anything else!

And while the books I am currently reading, ‘Flowers For Algernon’ and ‘I’m Thinking Of Ending Things’ (these books are seriously so wonderfully made they make want to tear my walls), DO have romantic aspects of it- it’s not really the main plot of the story..

‘Flowers For Algernon’ has amazing storytelling and is very unique- though I’m not sure if you’ve read it before but, it’s actually just the main character taking notes. Hence why there was a lot misspellings which honestly makes it a great touch if you know the context behind it.

On the other hand, ‘I’m Thinking Of Ending Things’ too shares the same uniqueness as the other, possibly even more unique if I must say so myself. Though I REALLY don’t want to make my story similar to them since I want to make it more heart warming than fucked up..

Which is why I feel like I have the need to borrow or buy at least one romantic book because, I lack of it. I mean I accidentally borrowed it one time but it was kind of disappointing.

I don’t know if its a good idea and if I should do it or not since does it really matter of the genre, or just the writing?

Still, if you have any good books that are in the romance genre. Feel free to recommend some to me!

-lots of love, from another bookworm

welcome back! happy to hear you're a bookworm as well <3 im writing those titles down since i read a criminal lack of sci-fi despite loving it

i actually don't have any straight up romance recs - i don't actively search it out (outside of fanfic), so any romance i read just comes with whatever book i've picked up. just straight up romance bores me, unless its a fic with a pairing i actively like. and even then, i need to take breaks from it unless the romance is interspersed with an actual plot. im not a romantically-geared person! i dont have single Main Plot Is Romance book on my shelves!

but imo its really just the quality of writing that helps. ive never been in a romance, im the child of two different divorces, and yet ive been told that i write romance fairly well. go fuckin figure lmao.

so actually my advice on romance is to just like. wow idk what i do is pick apart the romances i see on tv / in writing. what makes them good together, how do they act around each other, what are their love languages, what's their dynamic, what traditional romance things do they partake in, what dont they partake in, do they have anything nontraditional, do they work and why do / they dont they - does that make their relationship more interesting or is it flat. are they a good match.

you don't have to have every answer, but ive found that at least understanding their characters / dynamics, and having them interact in a way that suits them will help your romance feel natural. dont conform to tropes or tradition, that will just make the relationship flat and unrealistic. and you can always sprinkle in little things that you like / would like, which will help ground the romance and get you into the groove

tldr with romance, i think it's better to observe real life (whether that's paying attention to couples or reading reddit threads) & analyze in-love or in-a-relationship characters instead of just reading romance novels. bc honestly, and from what i can tell, they can tend to be over the top or cookie cutter

just realized you did not explicitly ask for romance advice! Oopsie! i got a little carried away here....

[basil-appreciation-comic]

IMPORTANT UPDATE!!

the comic is cancelled. you probably already assumed that since i havent posted anything about it in a while but yeah the things dead now lol. mainly because i dont care much about omori anymore, the comic sucked, and it was too much effort. i feel kinda bad about leaving you guys in the dark for this long tho, so i thought id go ahead and include all the scrapped stuff for the comic that never got finished

while i was writing the comic i started a google doc that laid out ideas i had for future pages. heres that if you wanna know how the story ends

it was written over several months and (most) things are in order of where they go on the timeline not when i wrote them so it might be a little hard to follow

also some art i never posted

(at least i dont think ive posted the last one)

i quoted not liking this comic as one of the reasons i stopped so let me explain that with a list of things id change about this if i were to remake it (which i wont)

remove the swearing that was so stupid

make omori mute (and probably use sign language)

omori does not express fear or stress in-game, thats sunnys job. quit it

he also does not cry and generally shows emotions (even the big ones) in more subtle ways (which i think i was trying to shift towards later in the doc) idk why he was so emotional all the time

literally everything about how i portrayed omori actually that was all just awful

the panic attack scene is fucking embarrassing i have no clue what i was thinking. im so sorry for writing it like that i did 0 research beforehand

make it shorter why did i think that would work out

id probably just make it a fic, comics take way too much outta me compared to just writing things

it does not need a big epic ending and probably shouldve ended not long after they escaped black space

the romance is horrible but thats the foundation of the comic so idek what id do about that

stop making everyone talk like therapists 24/7

and yeah it has a lot of problems but i still do care about this due to the ammount of effort and love ive put into it, i just cant and dont want to continue it

so yeah thats where this story ends ig. i had a lot of fun along the way, and thank you so much for all the support. bigger thanks to that one sunflower discord server (if you came from there you know which one) for being my main motivation and support throughout this journey. sucks this comic never got to see its full potential but im relieved to finally lay it to rest. the blog will stay up for archival purposes but i will not continue the comic any further obviously. the ask box will remain open if you wanna say anything or if you have a question about the story or whatever. thanks for reading.

[yonpote]

I need to know why and how you were anti-phannie from 2014-2016

alright here we go i get to talk about THIS shit now.

i was generally anti-rpf at that point, and honestly? i think it was for fair enough reasons as some people were a bit too eager about showing (general) youtubers stories they wrote about them sucking and fucking their friends. i think i was also pretty high and mighty about being a somewhat oldhead phannie tbh, like ugh do these gaming-channel-only people even know about dan being super edgy and offensive 🙄 and lowkey it was a lot of subtly misogynistic "i'm not like other girls" type shit like i was sooo much better than yall cuz i hadn't watched that video (yet.)

i was generally not into these sorts of fandoms to begin with. i wasnt on the superwhopotterlock side, i was on the homestuck/dangan ronpa/anime of the month side of tumblr, if that gives you an idea of what i was like lol. around 2014-15 i was very much in a community that is kinda similar to what you might see on twitter now, where if you had any interests in media that portrayed anything problematic, that means you are in full support of that problematic thing. if dan howell said something racist in 2010, it doesn't matter that he wasn't being racist in 2015 he's still racist and liking him makes you a racist etc. and of course, rpf is included in problematic topics. if you ship real people, even if said people say they don't mind it, you are a sick pervert and you should be in the loony bin for being so depraved. and if you write or read any fiction that has immoral acts, it means you support those acts in real life too and you are trying to normalize abuse and SA (yknow as if whitecishetpatriarchy hasnt normalized that enough) and you're a danger to children and you deserve to rot in prison (yknow as if a queer person writing stories about queer people hasnt heard that one before)

now here's the real kicker. in 2015-2016 i ran a game grumps fan blog where i did talk about shipping the grumps. "wait how were you anti-rpf if-" well have you ever heard of this thing called Lying? or perhaps even, Cognitive Dissonance? i HAD to run a separate blog for this interest, because if my friends knew i consumed slashfic about arin and danny they would stop being friends with me and think im this evil horrible monster etc. genuinely that was where my brain was at, and is a little bit the reason i decided to this day, to make my phannie accounts completely separate from my main accounts.

nowadays, none of my non-phannie friends actually give a fuck and i do occasionally talk about dnp being silly gay white boys w them! at this point i dont post about em on main just out of respect like "hey im sure you dont actually want to hear about british yaoi constantly regardless of our level of friendship so i'll keep it over here okay?"

also, yeah i grew out of thinking consuming media with deplorable acts makes me deplorable. my favorite tv show is hannibal. i know its shocking, but i dont actually support serial killer cannibals. i will say, i dont fuck with "pro/anti" language with regards to what is considered "problematic" or having that be an identity marker. i think that people are free to write fiction as they please so long as its all properly tagged for people who dont enjoy that kind of content to avoid. but i also think there can be and often are problems in the way these stories are written, and yeah if all the romance stories you read growing up involve some sort of force or danger, that CAN normalize this sort of action as inherent to romance stories/real life romance. but i think thats an issue with like, society at large, and it's not on an individual fic writer to be educating teens who read their dead dove fic despite the explicit rating and tags.

TL;DR: BASICALLY. I WAS A DUMBASS KNOW-IT-ALL BUT DW I GOT BETTER.

[spiri-a]

Spiri’s A Tale Of Crowns Rant: Wait, Uh Oh, AITA??

Okay okay okay so for those who don’t know: yes sometimes I play dating sims (free indie ones I’m not that bad). They’re usually just one off stunts that make a weekend more interesting but I recently found one that has literally consumed my ENTIRE LIFE (LIKE, IT IS ALL I THINK ABOUT) and that sim is called A Tale of Crowns made by @ataleofcrowns

I LOVE A Tale of Crowns. The lore and writing is SO FREAKING AMAZING and the love interests are EVERYTHING and it is honestly SUCH a refreshing take on dating sims that I love with all my heart. I have been telling EVERYONE who can listen about AToC in hopes of being able to discuss it with someone. (AToC is a dating sim right?? I think so??)

But anyways, the reason I started writing this wasn’t JUST to gush. Admittedly this all started because of something weird happening to me and me needing to empty out all the complex feelings here. So um here it is:

So basically my very very first run of the game a couple weeks ago I decided that this run would be an honest, very personal run. That means no looking up the correct options, no going back and changing your mind (unless it was an honest mistake), and choosing what I personally think is the best option. No matter what kinds of catastrophic events occur, I just have to deal with it. I also made sure to avoid looking at any forums or posts indicating anything about how the game works.

In this run, I romanced Xelara, who I was honestly absolutely smitten with 😭 Anyways yall don’t need to know the details but basically I kissed the girl in Ch11 and was absolutely on cloud nine when afterwards I finally read all the forums and posts I had been avoiding before.

And then I learned that I actually got the low romance route ._.

For those that don’t know, this basically means I was umm…… actually not a very good person to Xelara. Like, everyone basically agrees the player is actually kind of terrible to her in this route.

And honestly the first thing I felt was really guilty. Like, heart crushing guilt. Horrible awful lingering guilt about how I treated a fictional character (though admittedly one I care about a lot). And then I found myself thinking: “Wait, am I a bad person??”

I moped around for the rest of the day trying to understand why I felt so icky and really just being half confused half guilty. Honestly I don’t really know what happened but my best guess is:

I invested several SEVERAL hours into this run (since it was my very first go), so I treasured it a lot

Not knowing the alternative route (or how the game worked), I assumed that my run seemed to be going really well (with bad stuff happening just being written in anyway) only to then discover it actually wasn’t

In this run, I was basically playing as me. I chose what I thought was the best options and what I genuinely thought was the best things to do or say to Xelara. Thats why when I found out that they were actually very much the wrong things to say, I felt like it was a reflection of me

Now keep in mind this has NEVER ONCE felt like an ATTACK OF ANY KIND. I don’t in any way feel like I am being called a bad person. I still love AToC with all my heart and this has not affected it in any way. This is just me ranting after catching complicated feelings, and I’m pretty sure this is just me taking the hurt feelings of a fictional character unreasonably seriously and spiraling downward into concerned self reflection with a hint of desire for self improvement.

To be honest, I don’t even remember a lot of the things I chose to say to Xelara, I just know that it all added up into being very wrong. What exactly happened, I’m not sure. Maybe I didn’t understand the difference between different options? Maybe I was just bad at figuring out the subtext behind Xelara’s scenes? Maybe I was just bad at reading Xelara in general? Maybe I genuinely need to think about some of the stuff I personally say and do? Regardless it’s something for me to think about.

Anyways, it’s just something that I’ve been stewing about recently and wanted to share for transparency’s sake. Because once again I want to clarify that NONE of these bad vibes are aimed anywhere NEAR AToC. I played several more runs after this happened and had the time of my life. This is 100% me just ranting to get the bad icky energy out of my system, but I’m kinda glad I did. Ranting on tumblr is a good outlet.

I’m probably gonna keep going with that first run once Ch12 comes out, but this is probably still gonna be a bit of a tender spot, and I’ll probably end up walking on eggshells in that run now.

But that’s fine. I’m really genuinely not too bothered anymore, I just wanted to share something that I was feeling a lot of stuff about a while ago, and also partly just in case any elusive fellow AToC fans can relate to this.

If you read this whole thing, first of all that’s very flattering that you put in all that effort and, if you don’t think I’m crazy based on this post, let’s talk about AToC together!

(Of course though, I am expecting absolutely no response to this post. I am but a single post in the vast sea of Tumblr and that’s alright too. Okay now I’m gonna go back to drawing one of my fan crowns like a nerd bye.)

[bigbumder96]

my review on the original heartbreak high + the characters after watching like 2 nd a half seasons😈😈😈

spoilers below‼

the original is so much different to the reboot?😭 tbh the first season was very different to the rest of the show aswell as the reboot, but the only similarities i feel like they both have is that its took place in the same school and some (2💀) of the characters are in the reboot some way or another

overall, i do like the show. more than the reboot??? maybe, maybe not, idk😰😰😰 but its very well written in the sense that all the characters are insufferable, but you still feel pity for them and have a soft spot for them until next thing you know, theyre number 1 on your favourite list for the next 3 episodes until they do something crazy and slide all the way down to the bottom🙁

the storylines are actually really interesting, although i just know the writers are starting to run out of ideas. like theyre averaging around 40 episodes fkr 7 seasons there is NO way its gna be interesting all the way through💀 although i could be surprised, i was only bored in the first episode or two, because it has a bit of a slow beginning. infact i started this tv show ages ago but i never got past episode 1 until now😭

one problem i do have is the normalised large age gaps😨 like a 30 year old will date a 17 year old and nobody bats an eye... a bit scary tbh😞😞😞 they do still have storylines about how bad large age gaps are and how they're creepy but yk... hypocrisy is a real disease. im not too surprised though, as the tv show is based off a movie, called the heartbreak kid, about a romance between a teacher and her student. not so funfact: the teacher was called christina and the student was called nick. they were both played by the same actors as nick poulos and ms milano in the tv show. ☹

my opinion on the characters:

THANKFULLY they decided to keep this relationship out of the tv show. that doesnt stop the teacher x student relationships though😰😰😰 like the whole mr north - rose thing seemed pretty one sided on roses part thankfully, but he was still a nonce. like wdym u got a 17 year old pregnant and thats why you dont want to date rose? shouldnt the age gap or the fact shes your student be the reason??? then you had a 30 year old picking up con from a highschool, where she tells him he would look 'sexy' in a uniform, which just screams red flag, plus southgate and george (2 adults) knew and didnt gaf??😭 omg need i remind he was basically 🍇ed by lucys mother in the catering episode🙁 dont even get me started on sam and rivers. like he started harassing her which is horrible, but then she keot defending rivers and eventually started liking him back??? and when the students find out deloraine fired her they got mad at deloraine??? do they not care shes basically a nonce😥😥what even was the moral of this story because it was so icky... and then they run away together.😐 one storyline that highkey made me sob was lucy and her mums bf. im so happy they portrayed this in a negative light, cuz the scenes made me so uncomfortable. lucys actor is incredible tbh, this storyline was acc so sad☹

sorry for ranting, im just so mad about these😭

nick: he actually used to be my favourite, but at some point he became such a dick. like i still have a small soft spot for him because he was really nice at times, but him cheating on jodie was probably the final straw for me😭

i still absolutely ugly sobbed when he died🙁 tho

jodie: i didnt like her at first for some reason?? i dont know why???? shes actually really sweet, and probably the most open minded character in the whole show. nit at all relevant but she lowkey gives off gothic vibes😭 anyways someone find her a nice supportive boyfriend or i will date her instead. tbh tho, her and nick were cute while they lasted. also she is acc such a good singer and rapper omfg.

i also love the friendship she has w rivers and steve. like that is the perfect definition of platonuc boy and girl friendship where you can be close without catching feelings with eachother. like cuddling the homies. like kissing the homies goodnight. idk man my point is that some trios do work😋

con: probably my fav character !!! he was also my dads favourite too (my dad used to watch this when he was younger) 😭 he has a very likeable personality icl, although i feel like he lowkey has a lack of storylines. idk why, it just feels like they never give him any important storylines which is kinda sad😞 one storyline that he did have was the one with rose and jack and OH MY FUCKING GOD I GOT SO MUCH SECOND HAND EMBARASSMENT. like con, ily but asking rose to marry you was NOT a girlboss move🙁 anyways dare i say he has adhd. people might disagree, its just a headcanon (although he is adhd coded. quinni may not be the only nuerodivergent character in the hbh universe..😈)

steve: i used to hate him because i thought he was irrelevant and treated danielle horrible, but at some point in season 1 the episodes got very steve-centric and he grew on me sooo bad.😨 istg tho, there was a certain point where he could not catch a break and i felt so bad😭 like imagine ur parents divorcing and becoming homeless because none of them wanted you, and then finding out youre adopted??? crazy. imo, id say he had one of the best written storylines in the tv show, but i think thats just because i lowkey related to him.😣 like the depression arc was real (that aint even the part i related to💀) anyways hes also vv funny, and i know he dies and im already grieving him despite not actually getting to that part yet☹

danielle: i mean shes okay???? i liked her at first iykwim but then she became kinda annoyibg nd rude😭 shes fine now, but i still dislike her. however, im kinda curious to see how this drug storyline works out, as the writers seem to do pretty well with all of danis storylines. ive not gotten to this bit yet, im just kinda curious😞 however, i dont know if shes pro choice or pro life and ots scaring me...

rivers: idk, i mean sometimes hes tolerable, and other times hes just a knob. i do feel bad for him though, he went through some shit🙁 he was kinda creepy at times tho, ntm the racism and homophobia...😰 i can sense the character development though, like the difference between him in season 1 vs now is obvious ! i do dislike him quite a lot though still.

the whole thing with sam is so icky though😭

rose: icl, i loved her. she deserved to be in the show longer. i thought she was incredibky delusional though, like first that pedo mr north, and then jack? except the crazy part was that her delusions were right😥😥 i was extremely oblivious to the fact jack liked her back, but yk, never underestimate the power behind teen girl magazines😈 the whole thing with the baby felt realistic (i think?? idk ive never had a teen pregnancy before) amd i thiught it was all executed pretty well !!! plus tess was really cute😭 it would be cool if tess came in the reboot as a teacher or something!!

icba to talk about every single character, so if perchance anybody wants to know how i feel about a certain character/storyline please ask! my box thingy is open :))

[breadandblankets]

20 questions writer meme.

thank you @crimsonrainseekingflower for tagging me!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

26

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

101,970

3. What fandoms do you write for?

MXTX (SVSSS, TGCF), Fallout, Batfam, Bungou Stray Dogs, and i just started writing for S & D Tier

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

the window to the soul (and other such fallacies): scumplane fixit/romance told through weekly tea breaks i fell in (to a burning ring of fire): moshang fast burn strangers to married in under 5 hours a conversation i just can't have tonight: moshangliu chronic pain au pt 1 extreme hurt very little comfort and all this devotion I never knew at all: tgcf he xuan gets Hugged!!!! Agenda!!!! this has baby ghost kings and cuddles and v strong XL til the morning when it's time for us to go: msl chronic pain au pt 3 shangliu dates extreme fluff very little hurt, except for mbj he's suffering

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes! usually!! i just like to let people know that i am appreciating their appreciation.

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

thats fucking Hard cause i put some of them svsss boys thru some Shit, probably life is a current which cannot be fought which is less a fic and more of an archived twitter thread in which SQQ gets angsty drafts of PIDW and are trying desperately to stop it only for it all to go horribly wrong and everyone dies! it ends with cumplane! cause im evil! i should reformat that into something readable tbh

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

besides my hugging ghost kings agenda uhhh probably my dear atlas (let me hold the sky for you) which is a tianlang-jun/yue qingyuan crushing (like the cuddling method)

8. Do you get hate on fics?

yep! i delete it

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

yes i do! any kind really, ive got everything from trans lesbian threeways to getting dommed by an actual literal computer tower (and a soft spot for tianyue which features a penis haver using a strap on)

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

only one! its ongoing and a tgcf/dc fusion in which jason todd comes back as a ghost and gets trained by HC and HX (with secret guest appearance from BWX if anyone is paying attention ;) ): so i can find someone to rely on (and run to them)

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

no? i dont think so

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

nope but i have had someone make a podfic!

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

if you count twitter threads? or someone coming up with an idea and i expand on it? otherwise nope

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

impossible choice but uhhh idk maybe moshang? maybe?

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

in the morrows, good mourning a moshang serial killer/mortician au, unless i get some surge of inspiration its pretty much dead in the water (unless someone wants to finish it 🥺🙏)

16. What are your writing strengths?

dialogue/voices

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

whatever the fuck they're doing During the dialogue

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

i mean i do my best, i prefer to have it translated in line

19. First fandom you wrote for?

doctor who by hand in a notebook lmao

20. Favorite fic you've written?

recently ghost jason! other than that if someone would only want to be sweet and kind (nsfw)

Tagging: @livingmeatloaf @owldork1998 and anyone else who wants in!!!

[morphogenetic]

Mediaposting 2023, #35: Banana Fish (anime)

[said while vibrating very quickly and typing out like 20 different bullet points] i like this series a normal amount

okay so. non-spoiler thoughts:

step 1 YOU SHOULD READ/WATCH THIS. it does have content warnings for literally everything you can possibly think of as needing a common content warning (drug abuse, sexual assault, racism, and thats absolutely just the tip of the iceberg) but my fucking god. no wonder it's been such an influential piece of media on literally every jp anime/manga crime story (especially the BL ones) written since

for a series that is literally one of the early genesis points of BL as a genre i was ABSOLUTELY expecting more actual BL than was in this LOL. not that i'm really upset, bc honestly i really like the way that ash and eiji's relationship is written in a shoujo-y "they obviously care about each other a lot but it's not going to be outright romance" kind of way. bc like, honestly? that makes it way more emotionally satisfying (and devastating). i think it would actually make less sense if anything more happened In the story (though more happening in the epilogue wouldnt hurt LOL)

how the FUCK was this published in a shoujo magazine

the time period change to modern day from the mid-80's has both helped and hindered this series bc like. on one hand. much easier to do everything with a phone. also the update to shorter's character design was excellent,10/10 no notes. on the other hand. the Everything About It makes it so obvious that it was written to be a product of its time.

speaking of ^ ash turning from A Guy Who Knows How To Use A Computer into a hacking genius is so. why. i mean you can update it for sure but Why Like This

god i wish this had more room to breathe sometimes bc the exposition goes WILDLY fast sometimes. why did they try and do 19 volumes in 24 episodes. the 39 episodes that the director wanted would have been so nice to have

that said: the emotional moments that i actually give a shit about and that make up the core of the weight of the story are given what they deserve. at least up to volume 5 they are. gestures at ep 9? and 22 with a pained smile

i literally could write an essay about why it works so well as a spin on the american-style gangster story even while it definitely has flaws. and how its influenced so many fucking things. my god.

it has flaws for SURE but the rest is so good that i don't care. which is rare for me (gestures at nirvanai/neo twewy being other examples)

spoiler thoughts under the cut (like full-very-ending-of-series spoilers) but YEAH UH I LIKE THIS THING CAN YOU TELL BY HOW MUCH I WROTE ABOUT IT.

it does kind of annoy me that literally all of the canon-MLM (probably gay but you know) guys are horrible people lol. like wow love how the gay predator stereotype is on full display here. feeeeels baaaaad. i know i know asheiji homoeroticism i am ON THAT TRAIN

however yut-lung being feminine out of a wish to carry on his dead mom's legacy is kind of a slay. ive seen people go "ugh it sucks that one of the villains is a feminine man' but while he is definitely not a good person hes one of the less terrible villains, just like. as a person. hes also a teenager in shitty circumstances just with way more power and sway

here's the part where I admit that I was spoiled on the ending so it didn't hit as hard for me OOPS. however. the anime DOES leave it open-ended and it fucking irritates me that anime-only people are like "boo i hate the ending bc ash dies!!!" when it is LITERALLY AMBIGUOUS. i have heard that the manga is less ambiguous about it but :') oh well. anime-onlys what are you doing

speaking of ^ i actually like the ending. like i think a lot of people who absolutely hate it must not have a lot of familiarity with gangster movies as a genre bc it is a genre convention that the Main Gangster dies in the end. granted this was a hayes code thing which the manga definitely did not have to do LOL but its definitely supposed to feel unfair bc ash's damn LIFE is unfair.

however i'm glad the anime makes the ending ambiguous bc that feels like a more fitting end. like ash's life was always in limbo, considering what he was doing, so making his life in limbo at the end too? Good. Yes. Do That

the fucking. everything with shorter and the sa-yo-na-ra bit. i die. that shit is so emotionally painful

i know this sounds weird but i kind of wish they dragged out the "what the hell does banana fish mean" thing a LIIIITTLE longer but by that i mean like, halfway point of the series. like they could have used a little more time to figure out what it is. also that would have let shorter live a little longer ay lmao that said this criticism also almost definitely applies to the manga soooo. you know

[my-makeshift-masquerade]

sry i love the idea of survivor bti rebecca so much cuz just imagine for a sec some drabble that starts off similar to a springtrap x reader fic like frighteningly intriguing or smthn but instead of romance its like “the fuck thats my dad” it would be so hilarious

Ohoho. Hoh. Y’all really just like my shit mashed together with other people’s universes huh? This definitely got me thinking though because @glitchysquidd’s notebook pages are quite compelling… After reading what I could of it to get an idea, this is going to be far from hilarious. It is going to be god awful, especially since poor Rebecca in this blurry fnaf timeline is still technically a minor. I hope the original creator of Frighteningly Intriguing does get a kick out of this though. Your stuff is a very fun read and I worked hard to make this even remotely comparable.

No read more because tumblr is glitching my text when I use it. Trigger warnings for autism meltdowns, flashbacks, trauma, and the obvious mentions of death. Let’s go…

It All Comes Back to Haunt You

“Ugh…”

A teenage girl groaned as she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket again. Micheal would not leave her the hell alone. She had spoken with Tim and Samantha already. They seemed more excited about her “past experience” with the animatronics than anything else. Her brother was supposed to take the job, but after a horrible amount of hallucinations he got just entering the building, she volunteered. He was not happy about it, but Henry wouldn’t let him go back until he recovered.

She had one night to actually be able to do something besides sit at home and hope the rest of her loved ones didn’t die horribly. This was her chance to prove herself in a sense. The Afton name followed her even after witness protection tried to erase it from her records. Her classmates knew who her father was. Of course they did. There was a whole fanbase of people who idolized him. Others stuck to throwing cafeteria food at her and telling her she should’ve died by her father’s hand and joined the rest of them.

She couldn’t say she disagreed…

Looking over the note left for her, she wandered around the empty horror attraction, searching for the other employee she was meeting up with. A couple of her peers wanted to trick her into coming to this place on halloween to cause her to have flashbacks. She heard their plans while eating lunch one day. What’s weird is she didn’t feel like she was reliving past trauma at all. The animatronics she just stumbled upon, the old models… Those were her friends… Hell, one of them was her own brother. They saved her life that night…

The teen didn’t flinch when Freddy’s head moved a bit, dead eyes sparking in recognition. Instead she just mumbled awkwardly, “H-hi, Gabe… I uh… hope everyone’s been doing alright… I’ll come see you later, o-okay…?”

“Let us sleep…” A ghostly child’s voice grumbled tiredly.

“S-sorry, guys…”

She didn’t argue, slowly shutting the door and continuing her search, soon overhearing faint conversation. Rebecca felt Micheal blowing up her phone again, and finally looked.

“Is his workshop still there? Henry wants to know if you could snap some pictures of blueprints.”

That was a good question, and she just stumbled upon the answer. Why was it wide open? Maybe her employers found it? Yeah, she’d go with that. The room was like a time capsule, mesmerizing her in an encompassing nostalgia. She remembered playing in this room so much as a little girl… Her father used to sit right here with her on his lap and she’d scribble on his scrap paper—

No. No no no. No diving into the past. Pulling out her phone, she snapped a few pics and tried to leave. The familiar head of a yellow rabbit lying against the wall froze her solid. Maybe she had underestimated the amount of trauma this task would bring back… Oh God… Was that her brother’s picture, and the address written after the bite? Her heart was starting to hurt more than her head…

“Who’s there?!”

A voice made her jump, putting down papers she was sifting through. A slightly beat up figure approached.

“Listen, don’t make me call the police, kid—“

Rebecca handed over the note, noticing the other person squint tiredly.

“You’re the one they hired to shadow me? You’re a little young.”

She nodded, “I-I’m Rebecca. My uh… my brother couldn’t make it…”

“Fine…” Her new coworker didn’t seem too thrilled for some reason, “Come on. I guess you gotta meet Dave.”

“Dave?” Rebecca echoed in bewilderment, “I thought they said we were the only two employees he—“

“Dave’s not an employee. He’s kinda scary. Smells awful. Walking biohazard. Still, he’s pretty cool.”

What the fuck were they talking about? If this “Dave” wasn’t a staff member then— Did they mean an animatronic they named Dave for comedic effect?

Then she saw it. The head peeking from around the distant corner down the hall… The head of the other Spring Bonnie suit. The same one she watched springlock her father when she was six, while she was on the ground with a knife in her body. She froze, feeling her heart drop to her feet.

“W-what the hell is that?!”

“That’s Dave...” Her mysterious coworker shrugged, “No need to actually be scared of him. He’s…relatively harmless…”

Rebecca knew for a fact his name wasn’t Dave. Her dad was just as bad at coming up with fake names to hide his identity as Micheal was. God, if she ever made it home, Henry and Mikey would not be happy to hear William Afton was back. This poor innocent person had no idea who they were dealing with! What should she say? Could she say something?!

Nope… She was in full meltdown mode now, totally mute. The teen felt her mind leave the current moment and rewind back years in the past. Her mother had convinced her she made up her family outside of herself and Micheal… She didn’t even recognize William as her father until he forced her to look at the suit that jogged her memory. He held her and told her he loved her, before a sharp pain pierced her back. She recalled seeing the ghosts of the children and the puppet standing between them… Then the springlocks went off. His screams haunted her as she passed out.

After that… It was a long stay at the hospital, which made her remember the siblings she was told she made up all the more… Loads of therapy later, she was staying with Micheal and Henry trying to repair her life to some form of normalcy without her mother… The best thing her father did was set her free from her mother, but that was besides the point. All the while the traumatic experience became the talk of the world, it seemed. True crime podcasts, news reports, so many fans of the franchise trying to find her and ask her about her experiences…

This was all some spooky story to the rest of the world, and this hooky horror attraction all but proved it. It was all fun and games until your siblings died and your father comforted you as he stabbed you in the back both figuratively and literally. Of course…

When she finally grounded herself, she nearly lost all the air in her lungs as she realized he was now a foot away from her.

“Dave! Personal space! Can’t you see she’s freaked out?!” Her coworker was starting to get concerned.

The animatronic rabbit rolled his eyes, all but confirming to Rebecca this was definitely still her dad. He was the type to scoff at anyone giving him advice in such a situation. His dead eyes almost seemed concerned when he shifted his gaze to her. That terrified her further. The last time he looked concerned for her was when she got stabbed.

“Hey hey…” The other employee spoke slightly softer, “Dude all the color is gone from your face… Here, sit down… Try to breathe… I’m gonna grab you some water…”

WAIT.

NO.

DON’T LEAVE HER ALONE WITH—

Her phone was buzzing like crazy. She didn’t dare take it out. She couldn’t. Trying to breathe, she gasped and choked on air as “Dave” sat down next to her, far too casually. This was painful. Was he trying to give her cardiac arrest?!

He was totally silent, besides the sounds of his joints ticking and popping unnaturally with his movements. It occurred to her with the stench that his body was still in there, making her gag. Her attempts to catch her breath were the loudest sounds for a few moments. It was almost calm… until she felt a hand on her back.

She would have screamed if she had any voice to scream with. Instead, the teen stiffened at the feeling of his hand feeling over her shirt, clearly noticing the slight bump of the scar she had down her back from his own actions. His eyes almost lit up at that, whether in a positive or negative way she had no idea. It seemed he was surprised she didn’t pull away. It was because she couldn’t due to paralyzing terror.

“S-stop pretending already…” She stammered, “I-if you want to finish it… J-just—“

His ears drooped slightly, and he almost sighed…?

What was up with him?! He wouldn’t even say a single word to her after all of what he put her through?! Wait… Could he even talk?

Footsteps made Rebecca relax a bit as her coworker had returned with water. She grabbed their arm to be helped up, and eagerly created space between herself and the figure sitting next to her. She pulled out her phone and with trembling hands found herself not texting her brother or Henry for help. She just left them on read. As much as she wanted to believe her own father was safe, it could seal her doom like it did before. She knew not to underestimate him, but she didn’t want to be a coward…

She was also worried about this other person who had no idea what they were up against. This was no time to fear the results of her actions. This was potentially another life on the line. She typed on the notes app on her phone and showed it to her coworker.

“I can’t talk right now, but please listen to me. Dave isn’t his name. He’s lying.”

“What? How would you know his name? You just got here.” They scoffed, almost playfully, obviously not taking her seriously, “I think you’re still in shock, dude…”

She could feel her father’s eyes on her even without looking up from the screen. As much therapy as she went through and as much as she knew her father did terrible things, she couldn’t help but feel guilty for doing anything to harm him. It was still her father, after all… Is it bad she missed him? After remembering all the things her mother told her were her imagination filling in loneliness from her autism… Was it bad she wanted her whole family back?

She was jolted out of her feelings when Henry tried calling her, but she pressed decline. This happened about three more times with Micheal’s number within the next two minutes.

“Yeesh…” Her new acquaintance commented jokingly, “Family won’t get off your back, huh? I don’t miss being your age, that’s for sure. Nobody thinks you’re capable of anything.”

Finally, a text from Mikey sealed her fate for the night and any future nights.

“That’s it. I’m coming to get you.”

She spat out the water she sipped, confused at why she was upset Micheal was coming to save her… Well… Rebecca still felt like she didn’t deserve to be saved the first time, so… Maybe it was that with her dad still here, she was finally hoping for this nightmare to end how it should have back then? She should’ve died. That was all she ever heard from doctors and police and kids at school… Yet she continued on living… She couldn’t count how many times people who knew who she was related to expected her to “snap” just like her parents.

As much as she loved Micheal and Henry for supporting her, she felt like she dragged them down by not being able to hate her father’s guts like they did. She was so young when it happened. Her mind was so cloudy on whether he actually cared in those moments or not. It was so confusing… Her mother’s gaslighting made it difficult enough without finding out her father was real and a serial killer. Then there was the matter of how just before she was born this whole mess started…

What did she do wrong to make her happy family fall apart before her very eyes…? Should she have been born at all…? Was she the one to blame for all of this? Of course. Who else would it be…? All those kids who died… Her mother being killed while baking her birthday cake because she just had to go see the animatronics she was banned from seeing that day with Mr. Emily… This all wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t been what he was after… It was all her fault. She knew it deep down, too…

“Shit… A-Are you crying…?” The voice of the adult beside her sounded worried, “Was it something I said— DAVE! YOU ARE NOT FUCKING HELPING!”

The rabbit stiffened at being screamed at, but still stood up and approached. Before anyone could stop him, he hugged this seemingly random teenager in a manner uncharacteristic to his entire personality.

“What the hell’s gotten into y—“

Rebecca’s eyes shot open wide, as she began shivering and losing strength in her feet. She was prepared for the pain of the knife…a springlock mechanism… something to impale her and leave her bleeding out on the grimy floors, like just another prop in this haunted house built around her trauma.

…Yet nothing came. No stabbing, no blood coughed out of her mouth... This wasn’t like before. This was…just a hug? A…real one? From him?! She finally looked up at the masked face, silently demanding some sort of answer behind the whirlwind of emotion she was trapped in. He didn’t say a word, looking down at her and daintily moving some hair out of her eyes. His hold on her was careful, but also possessive. He wanted to keep her close to him for as long as he could…

Eventually the third figure pried her out of the rabbit’s steel grip, much to his upset as he stomped his foot to make a loud thud echo down the hallway. Her phone vibrated. Rebecca knew her brother was waiting outside, and would rather not have him break in to see this. She slowly turned to the door, shaken and shocked by what had unfolded. She almost wanted to go back to hug him one last time. No way she would be allowed back once Micheal and Henry found out…

“My rides here… They want me to come home. My brother is gonna come instead. He just needed someone else to cover for one night…”

She showed the phone mainly to the other person, but her father did see what it said and nodded solemnly, much to her surprise.

Springtrap followed them to the doorway as much as he could without being seen, and watched as his more recently met friend sent off the teen, who ended up running straight to a hooded figure. Micheal was taking care of her at least… He could overhear the conversation.

“She had a panic attack or something when she saw one of the animatronics in the attraction.” The employee’s voice sounded confused, but also slightly dismissive, “Probably just a little spook.”

“Thanks for looking out for her.” Micheal replied, “Can I ask which one of them it was?”

“J-just Bonnie.” Rebecca piped up suddenly.

Wait. Did his daughter just cover for him… or was she scared of Micheal’s reaction to finding out he was still here…?

William felt like it was both, but that included the former, and that nearly melted his dead metal heart. God, of course she still cared about him. She was too young to actually have the capacity to hate him for what he’d done to her back then. She was the youngest child he ever attempted killing. This wasn’t supposed to end like this for her… It stung seeing her still impacted by it after all these years. This wasn’t supposed to be her fate.

He wished he had gotten the job done on the night of her sixth birthday, if only to spare her from this haunting her for the rest of her life.

After the pair of siblings left, the only words that came next were:

“Dave, what the flying fuck was that?”

[redrum-sketches]

the thing i hate about mapleshade discourse these days is that despite people being aware that warriors is very sexist in its writing, no one applies that to mapleshade's entire novella which is dripping with warriors sexism from the very premise alone. it is entirely about a she-cat who had a forbidden romance much like every she-cat in the main series, and yet shes punished WAY harsher than any of those she-cats who did the exact same thing so the author can have mapleshade "go crazy" and show the readers that this is the tragic yet wrong way to react to sexist injustice. how dare you lash out at the people who unfairly screwed you over instead of suffering in silence like the noble leafpool or yellowfang. sure maple is kind of a brat but being a bit of a brat doesnt mean shes gotta be punished for wanting a happy family. its strange because warriors actively pushes she-cats to have forbidden romances, but only as long as they feel guilty for it i guess? because from the way its written, maple is brutally punished by the author for the crime of hoping and expecting that her life will be good despite her supposed crime that shouldnt even be a crime. but a lot of people who dont like maple kind of seem to accept the fact that she fucked up on the basis having a forbidden mate, despite these people also saying that the rule about forbidden mates is stupid. or they dont like her because she killed people for the wrong reasons or something, when in reality its the author who is making maple commit murder to push this awful trope of a woman being hurt in some horrible unfair way and then becoming a villain and hurting everyone because the writers are misogynists who think traumatic experience = mass murder. especially considering maple hallucinates her kits telling her to kill other cats, which is a pretty disgusting portrayal of mental illness even if they likely didn’t intend it to be read as mental illness. its also telling given how warriors writes male villains, who are never really given any sort of tragic backstory for why they have to murder everyone and if they are given a backstory, it is usually incredibly flimsy and obviously meant for the reader to roll their eyes at, like ashfur for example. also unlike a lot of the male villains, maple showed basically zero signs of murderous intent before her punishment, the only thing she did was be somewhat rude and lie to people about her kits BECAUSE OF COURSE SHE WOULD THATS WHAT EVERY SHE-CAT DOES. im not saying maple is a good character because shes not, but she wasnt written to be a good character. her entire premise is a sexist trope. if maple was written by authors who didnt have so much internalized misogyny, she wouldnt be a murderer, she'd be a victim

[mydemonsdrivealimo]

Please, hit me up with a hot-take HC for Bryce, please! ❤️ Sending so much love your way, dearest!

aw ty lin <3

for bryce, i really wanna talk about how he is in relationships. after reading so many bryce x mc fics before even joining the fandom, i am so not interested in "lovey dovey sentimental bryce who would die for mc the second theyre together." of course these are hcs, and to each their own, but in my hc he is anything but that

bryce has never been shown to be an overly affectionate person, or someone who would throw all of his own ambitions and time away for another person. he is canonically self-absorbed, and talks himself up a lot. yes, throughout canon he developed and became a little more reserved, but his personality was never reduced to just "loving and adoring mc"

again, this is my problem with heavily re-written ethan because they are still a character with their own things, not just an add-on to mc

bryce is a really, really interesting character, and thats why people romance him. but, for some damn reason, all of his personality (besides an innuendo here and an obonoxious comment there) tends to be thrown out the damn window. he is supposed one of the best and most promising surgeons in the entire country; do you think that comes without fundamental ambitions and dedication? no fucking way!!! one of his main relationship stutters was feeling like he was being held down and losing his freedom because he had to be thinking/worrying about his partners all the time, and then people do exactly that in fics and hcs

i genuinely believe that bryce would break it off if suddenly his only hobby and personality trait was talking about mc and being in love with them

yes, to a certain point he does that willingly, but if it starts interfering with his career and hobbies then he needs to call it for his own wellbeing. it is so annoying when couples can only talk about each other, and bryce lahela has never and will never be that person. romance and sex and relationships are such an integrated part of society, especially for young people (20s and early 30s), to the point that its the only way people perceive them as successful. it influences media horribly, and you see so many fictional couples that have each other an nothing else remarkable about them, but thats what sells so its seen as okay

bryce's character was never set out to be that, and if you loved and respected that so much, then he should at least be a whole character and not the second half of mc

[darkcrowprincess]

My thoughts: fair warning to people who are following me. I'm a lunter shipper, I don't like Amity's character at all. Lunter just makes more sense to me. I'm not a fan of miraculous lady bug anymore do to bad writing and because I just don't like Marinette's character anymore(she's so annoying). I love sailor moon, especially 90s English dub because thats what I grew up with, usagis new English voice actor's voice is annoying, so I don't listen to the new English dub. Don't like sailor moon crystal because the animation sucks and they took out everything I loved about the 90s one. Don't understand why my little pony is so popular or ever will. I love catradora, and don't understand the hate on catra' character. I think catra had a perfect story arc. I love Shera and the princess of power as is. It's a great show. Plus it has Entrapta and she is my spirit animal. So don't get the hate for shera. I don't get new cartoons or new kid shows/teen show of today. They're all so bad, so sanitized, or just plain bad writing. I'm a zutara shipper(or just zuko finding happiness with anyone's besides mai. Don't like her character very much). I don't like legend of Korra, the writing was just really bad. Especially after season one. So never watched it after season one. I hate the cartoon movie Disney beauty and the beast and love the live action one so much. It's my favorite of the live action disney movies. Emma Watson was the perfect Belle and made her more relatable. The little mermaid is my Disney movie and don't get all the hate on Ariel. She's the best. Love all versions of the little mermaid. Even the original fairy tale and any movies based on the original fairy tale. I hate the frozen movies with the burning intensity of a thousand suns. The movies are just not good. Titanic is a good movie. I love that movie. I also love James Cameron's avatar movie(can't wait for the sequel) and never understood why it isn't more popular. I love 80s movies and 80s fashion( would not want to live during that era) especially 80s romance movies, or any 80s movies were the main character is female and relatable. Though I don't get the breakfast club or why it's so popular. I love criminal minds and true crime documentaries(especially ones with female criminals). I don't like the Percy Jackson/Heroes of Olympus book series. Mostly cause theres not enough Artemis in it, Hades would never cheat on his wife Persephone ever! I loved Rachels character and never really liked Annabeth. I thought she was a know it all. I honestly would have picked lukes side. Because the gods as parents suck! The whole concept of demi god children sucks and its abusive. That's mainly why I stopped reading. I love movies on classic novels, but will never read them. Mostly because they just seem so boring. I will never read jane austen because her books are just so boring to read. The language is so difficult to understand. Sam Manson is a horrible character and I don't like her with Danny. Danny's parents are abusive, and he deserves a better ending. The ghost king deserves a better ending. The only Classic novels I've ever read are written by Agatha Christie. I love her writing! Clary from mortal instruments is a mary sue and just Cassandra Clare's writing just seem really bad. Especially her world. The shadows hunters world is very black and white thinking. So I'll never read her books. The show looks really good though. And I like it so far. I love Harry Potter but understand why it's problematic now. And that just makes me really said. I hate when creators turn out to be jerks. Why I strongly believe never meet your heroes. They always disappoint you. My favorite movie this year is "Don't worry darling". I thought it was brilliant and had a good twist. I love ghibli movies and my favorites are spirited away, whispers of the heart, the wind rises, and howls moving castle. If I don't like a part in a book I don't finish it. And if the first paragraph in a book doesn't catch my attention I don't finish it. I love the original dark fairy tales. I love happy endings.

[dukevincent]

I think romance might be one of the hardest genres to do effectively in film, but also in fandom.

Like, a lot goes into a good love story

-good chemistry (if they don’t have chemistry no matter how good anything else is no one will ship it)

-both characters have to be written well (if one is written horribly, it feels like wish fulfillment)

-necessary. Forced romantic subplots are usually pretty hated.

And, a lot of films just don’t do all of this. Like how many films have you seen that just have a sexy male/female character that the MC ends up dating/kissing/whatever because the directors just wanted it to happen? Despite there being no real developed tension or reason for them to love eachother, and it just feels like the directors/writers wanted

A) a sex scene to make the film/book more mature

B) wish fulfilment

And I feel like it’s things like this that are the reason non canon ships get more writing then canon. Because simply canon messes up romance a lot. But, in fanon you can create tension, you can create a reason for characters to love eachother. Plus, in fanon it doesn’t matter if it was wish fulfillment because I feel to a degree thats why a lot of people read/write. They want to see the romance, they want to see new alternatives. They WANT the tension. I know thats why I read/write.

[bubblegumnnebula]

Saying just teenagers feel this way and immediately shutting down any discussion comes of a bit infantilizing. Even so teens are also entitled to opinions. Rape fantasies are normal thats true, but no expert says to actually go out and find someone to roleplay it with or share them on the internet where anyone, including real rapists and creeps can read it and get off on it. Exposure therapy is meant to be done by therapists not your self proclaimed sadistic partner. You can heal from sa without using self harming coping mechs that force you to get turned on instead of triggered by it. and creating dark themes in your work does not indicate your moral but the way you you do it can definitely say something about you. Compare outlast, a disgustingly gorey horror game thats still really good and well done even with its themes of sa, mutilation, mental illness to that one horror game that came out on steam where the entire plotline is just raping women of your choice💀

I like certain dark themes but to be fair the entire market has been saturated with horribly written rape and incest fantasies veiled under dark romance💀 and with the increase in AI porn, even done by young boys of their fellow classmates. Im all for teens stating their discomfort around certain sexual topics.

I really hate to be the one to tell you this, but rape rarely has anything to do with being horny or getting off. Rape is about power, it’s about taking control over someone and taking away someone’s bodily autonomy.

The fact you don’t realize that proves even further that you lot are too immature to be in this conversation.

Even further, I can guarantee with 100% certainty a rapist isn’t going on the internet to read FANFICTION about rape/sa, they’re going out and actually doing it. They’re going into incel forums and talking about someone (most likely a woman) is inferior to them, and how they’ve “gotten out of line” and “needs to remember their place” (again, taking control. Power. Not getting off)

A rapist isn’t going to bother reading or writing a random fanfiction with dark content, they’re going out and actually raping people.

Yeah, you can dislike it, but keep that shit to yourself. Block the tags. I’ve had them blocked for years and completely moved on with my life. What people write in the internet is none of my business (because shocker!! it has no effect on real life people) , and it shouldn’t be any of yours.

Again, there are no victims and no one is being harmed when someone writes a non-consent fanfiction about a random ass fictional character

A lot of woman have rape fantasies, even if they aren’t victims. Spoiler alert: when someone is performing a rape fantasy or writing a non-consent story, the person is STILL VERY MUCH CONSENTING TO BE A PART OF THE SITUATION

The fact you likened AI porn -which someone has lost consent to their bodily autonomy, just like rape- to writing fantasies of fictional scenarios involving fictional people is frankly disgusting and you should be ashamed.

Why the fuck do you care so much about what people are doing in their free time if it isn’t harming anyone. Get a job. Get a hobby. Read a book. Help a child. Pick some flowers.

Better yet, take your unwarranted moralistic outrage and help actual victims. The fact you never mentioned victims or a systemic problem outside of harmless fantasies proves you don’t actually care about victims, you just don’t like dark content because it makes you uncomfortable. Which is fine, but don’t disguise your dislike by saying dark content is morally or ethically wrong when no one is being harmed in the process. Just be uncomfortable, maybe rant about it to a couple of mutuals in DMs, block the tags, and move on.

[amaranthdahlia]

yall dont know how very happy id be if uramido never becomes canon.

finding a healthy and strong male-female friendships is so hard these days, especially if the guy is the main boy character and the girl is the main girl character.

medias majority of the time have the same damn "he was a guy, and she was a girl" problem, like lord. can a boy and a girl be friends for once and dont expand anything more than that 😭 they dont even have to be lgbt, i just want them to be FRIENDS.

[hear-the-ocean]

Before We Disappear book review

Spoiler-y review of Before We Disappear by Shaun David Hutchinson

Summary (pulled from goodreads) :

The Prestige meets What If It’s Us in Before We Disappear, a queer ahistorical fantasy set during the 1909 Seattle Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition, where the two assistants of two ambitious magicians find themselves falling in love amidst a bitter rivalry designed to tear them apart.

Jack Nevin’s clever trickery and moral flexibility have served him well his entire life—making him the perfect assistant to the Enchantress, one of the most well-known stage magicians in early-twentieth-century Europe. Without Jack’s steady supply of stolen tricks and copycat sleight-of-hand illusions, the Enchantress’s fame would have burned out long ago—not that she would ever admit it.

But when they’re forced to flee the continent for America, the Enchantress finds a new audience in Seattle at the 1909 Alaska–Yukon–Pacific World’s Fair Exposition. She and Jack are set to make a fortune until a new magician arrives on the scene. Performing tricks that defy the imagination, Laszlo’s act threatens to overshadow the Enchantress and co-opt her audience. Jack has no choice but to hunt for the secrets behind Laszlo’s otherworldly illusions—but what he uncovers isn’t at all what he expected.

What makes Laszlo’s tricks possible is, unbelievably, a boy that can seemingly perform real magic. Wilhelm’s abilities defy all the laws of physics. His talents are no clever sleights-of-hand. But even though Laszlo and Wilhelm’s act threatens to destroy the life Jack and the Enchantress have built, Jack and Wilhelm have near-instant connection. As the rivalry between the Enchantress and Laszlo grows increasingly dangerous and dire, Jack finds he has to choose between the woman who gave him a life and the boy who is offering him love. It's a new star-crossed romance about the magic of first love from acclaimed author Shaun David Hutchinson.

Review:

This was an incredible adventure to read. Looking at the cover and thinking it was teen or at least YA, I was unprepared for how dark it got. Our main characters are both living in abusive relationships. The theme of abuse is a strong one and is quite heavy. I think it did a good job of showing different types of abuse and the victims' reactions to it.

There was also a theme of found family and figuring out what you want in your future, freedom, and finding a home in the person you love. Both our characters go through great arcs where they learn and grow. Watching them connect, protect, love, and understand each other was delightful with an undercurrent of unease because they are unsafe and in danger.

Honestly I didn't think it would end in anything but tragedy but I was glad to be wrong. Given how heavy and tense the story was, the ending went smoothly without any problems which I feel like was an opportunity missed. With a story like this, I think the last act should have also been tense, messy, and scary. But I guess given how much hell our characters went through, they at least deserved an easy end.

I spent the entire book terrified of them getting caught or getting hurt or any other horrible things and so I think it was expertly written. I felt all the emotions of the characters and thats why I was so on edge most of the time. It was super easy to just fly through the book, I think I read it in 2 sittings. The author is great at evoking emotion in readers which was true with this book and his other book I previously reviewed, We Are The Ants.

What I loved was that the concept of homophobia was completely taken out. Our main characters are 2 gay men and our side characters are 2 sapphic women, both who get together romantically. The author makes a note of it in the end acknowledgement that it's a fantasy because homophobia existed in real life of course but a fantasy gave him full control to get rid of it in his story. What was not gotten rid of was the period typical racism and sexism but I guess nothing can be perfect, humans and their bigotry will remain no matter what. Racism and sexism also played a role in the story so there was that as well.

The villains of the story were interesting. One was terrifying and the other charming and enchanting. Teddy, the terrifying one, was physically abusive and a monster, and there was no humanity in him. In that regard maybe he was a bit stereotypical and one dimensional but I know monsters like him exist. My only issue was a line towards the end that tried to humanize him by saying he was someone who's bad decisions made him a monster and implying he may have been good before but not once do we see him do one good or even a neutral deed so that line kinda fell flat.

The enchanting one, appropriately named The Enchantress, was emotionally abusive, narcissistic, and manipulative. Yet she had more to her character than Teddy. She felt real. There was a complexness to her. We do see her do some good and very much bad and it makes her a believable character and a great villain. I was less afraid of her than Teddy even though her cunning would definitely make her more dangerous, since you would never see her coming. Teddy was dumb but physically dangerous. When the novel starts, we are told that The Enchantress captivates everyone and easily makes them like her and I found that to be (annoyingly) true. You can't help but like her or be charmed by her even though you see how much of a horrible person she is. To me, she was the most interesting and the most complex character in the novel.

Overall I think I loved this novel more than We Are The Ants.

[bunkernine]

i dont know why riordan made it so jo and emmie were coerced into leaving the hunters by artemis having an exclusionary policy against bi/lesbian women, instead of just that jo and emmie were tired of immortality and wanted to grow old together so they left the hunt of their own volition. i feel like thats the main problem with the hunters, but given that its written by a cishet man who definitely does not understand aro/ace identities and the split attraction model it isnt shocking :( but i feel like a lot of the other issues like neglecting female characters are less symptoms of the hunt and moreso underlying critiques of riordans writing; there are definitely instances of him neglecting to provide female characters perspectives when it wouldve been beneficial (an example i would use is thalia, we barely got any interaction between her and jason, and im sure there are many examples of female characters not getting their time, but its been a while since i read the books so i may be misremembering?) like the neglect of fem characters is far from isolated to the hunt.. anyway yeah i didnt like some aspects of how the hunt was handled but i dont think theres a problem with it specifically if that makes sense. its hard to tell where the problems with one aspect of a story end and when that problem being imbued into the writers perspective starts, but generally i think the hunters have good aspects to them, like i think even beyond inclusion of ace/aro identities having groups of demigods and people involved in the mythical world outside of CHB/CJ is really needed, the dynamic they provide with the more organized demigod camps is interesting, and i think they fit well into the rrverse. i think the themes they represent in thalia and reynas lives about responsibility and the weight of authority are interesting insights into their characters. ok thats all idk if any of this makes sense im sleepy srry for the paragraph

Oh boy

So. Ok. Sentence by sentence I guess. Agree with no need for exclusionary wlw rule. Think he was just going for the "no romance" at all, but idk, Artemis' tale in various myths would suggest otherwise when it came to wlw.

That exclusion only made a point in TDP, which is probably when Riordan thought about writing Piper and is post the development of other LGBT characters u know, Alex, Nico, Magnus, um... The others.... LOL. So idk why he did that. Maybe to provide some cushioning for Reyna?

Split Attraction Model is controversial. Idk why you want him to touch that too much, especially after fumbling with LGBT characters prior.

And Reyna being aroace was also controversial????? 😭 do we forget fandom history so quickly? I am not getting into that because 1, I don't care rn and 2, I don't care rn 💀💀💀 but like, it's not that simple to just say "Riordan doesn't know anything" when he's literally a writer who makes explicit choices. Have little opinion on Reyna and her sexuality.

Jason and Thalia see each other in TLH, MoA, and BoO. They see each other plenty considering that both of them barely know each other and have duties that they're resigned to during the end of the world 💀 but also it's mentioned that they have seen each other between TLH and MoA, however long that visit was. Don't really say that an issue considering the circumstances, there's only so many book pages, and there's only so many ways for Thalia to be relevant in a story that has little to do with her.

Thalia's a horrible example because she's literally not a main character in most books 😭 Riordan mostly mistreats love interests. Most of the girls in the series have strong moments and arcs, but are overshadowed by 1, the sheer amount of boys (which makes sense genre-wise and why Riordan even wrote PJO), and 2, fandom perception.

HOWEVER, I will not deny that girls get to be a back burner to other characters more often. Reyna would've been a good example post-BoO: giving her a POV slides her from secondary character to main, but then completely throws out of balance what her weight is compared to Nico, for instance, who is also given a main role in BoO, but has impacted the series more obviously. 😵‍💫 I highly disagree with them having POVs in BoO partially for that reason, and what it does to Frank and Hazel later, who now have less POVs despite playing a strong role in major events of BoO and the series. Sidelining main characters.

Rachel could possibly be another example, but Calypso would be a great example from her being in TDP and never showing up again 😀 But Reyna, Rachel, and Calypso a have in common that they are introduced as love interests.

But... None of this is relevant because the topic was about the hunters so that's for later. The Hunters aren't more inclusive of aro/ace ppl than any other group in series, but they are a nice group to join if a character is aro/ace. Reyna is the only one confirmed, and it would be helpful and appreciated if more characters could be confirmed. The hunters are just... Not in relationships at the current moment 😭 which anyone could be regardless if ur aroace or not.. as shown with jo and emmie

They do fit well as an alternate to the camps though, agree. It's amusing that they know about Waystation but never told anyone. They just actively go around hunting and fighting monsters???? Didn't understand why annabeth wasn't really interested but sure

For Thalia those themes are present when she joined the hunters. That is... Literally a whole thing. For Reyna they are not at all due to the Hunters! Those themes are only present because that was Reyna's whole thing!!! Her joining the hunters directly erases them 😭😭😭😭 Reyna is genuinely a character who lost potential by being thrown into the Hunters 😭😭😭 She could've been aro/ace even without them, it's so mind-boggling to put her in the Hunters. Like... Okay. She and Thalia were bonding throughout the series in the background. She didn't need to join the Hunters to talk to her friend 😭 It's so crazy especially next to Jason who deals with the same issues and themes but is allowed to just step out and go to boarding school. WHY WOULDN'T REYNA JUST JOIN THE AMAZONS????????? WHY WOULDN'T SHE JUST RETIRE????? Absolutely baffling. There are so many reasons why Thalia being a Hunter is a Meaningful Choice, and Reyna being a hunter is a Careless Choice.

Hope that captures everything, especially after the previous asks. Feel free to follow up ofc, always up for talks about things 👍