#been something of a fandom in-joke for years

[push-and-hold]

Sometimes I like to imagine how much of a dumpster fire the fandom of "The Platypus & His Girlfriend" could become in the PnF world.

Perryshmitz, ofc

Think about the people tuning in to watch the show week to week, loving the characters and the wacky plots and the special effects, living for the constant back and forth and the complex dynamic the duotagonists have, praising how well the series did at portraying the wit that can exist between two opposite people on a long time relationship. A beloved series with many great episodes, even though it is a widely known and accepted fact that the pilot episode is the perfect episode.

And then, years after its run, somehow it comes to light that the entire foundations of it were stolen.

The setting, the plot, the story, the characters, the kind of humour, even the music was all so well fleshed out from the pilot that writing more was easy as pie for the writers until they finally decided to end it after the fourth successful season, but on the something anniversary of its ending, someone (maybe a diehard fan that spent a million on an auction) gets their hands on the original script/storyboard, and hey! "Doof 'n' Puss???" What a weird original name.

NO WAIT.

There's a name in there, never once has been mentioned before anywhere else, listed as creator, concept artist, costume designer, musical producer, lead actor, etc.

The news spread like wildfire. Jeff McGarland straight up plagiarized it, never even credited the person that came up with it. Many people knew from the very beginning and everyone has to wonder: How could've nobody cared when the producer shamelessly confessed it to the director since day one? How come not ONE person pointed out that the original creator should at least receive some credit during all those years?

The fandom is divided, fights ensue between those who say it's done and it's long gone so who cares and those who think that something can be made and the creator deserves restitution. Between those who say "you can't really steal an idea" and those who argue "ideas are one thing but they stole THE WHOLE FUCKING SHOW YOU IDIOT". Between those that feel destroyed because such an important part of their lives has been tainted, their identities shattered, and those who say they should simply walk away and never interact with it again.

Later, after some long agonizing weeks in limbo they finally get a statement where the identity of the real creator comes to life and holy smokes, it was all done by a middle aged man inspired by his own freaking life experiences and his relationship with his best friend to whom he's now married, except his character was changed into a girl and his husband is an actual platypus, and at this point not only is the general fandom enraged by the shameless theft and the erasure of a queer figure from TV but it also gets filled with memes from those who cope by half-joking "THE FUCK YOU MEAN WE COULD'VE HAD FOUR SEASONS OF EROTICALLY CHARGED HOMOROMANTIC SLOW BURN???"

And then we have Heinz and Perry right there, waiting it out because what else is there to do or say?

"This was NOT my plan Perry the Platypus, I swear." he will say, and it wasn't. It really wasn't, but he's loving it all. The mess is spectacular, and for once his art is being advocated for.

[stolenstarsart]

satosugu au where they’ve been best friends since high school. they so happen to both want to pursue music, so they enlist their two friends, shoko and nanami, to join the band. naturally, gojo is the lead singer and isn’t half bad on guitar either. he’s also a thousand percent a nepo baby, who, with his dads help, doesn’t find it difficult to be at the top of the charts. geto is on lead guitar, and has that whole ‘mysterious, bad boy’ image going on. he’s also incredibly private with his life, despite being the most sought after band member. nanami is also rather private with his life, though people don’t try and dig into his life quite as much. being the drummer, he’s rather under-appreciated, despite being very skilled. lastly, there’s shoko. between the four of them, she’s the most chill about things. she’s kind of here for the vibes. of course, she’s on bass, and makes it a point that even though she’s a girl, she’s just as capable and can easily keep up with her bandmates. she’s also the only one who doesn’t write the songs. geto has the number one spot, but gojo definitely isn’t far behind, and nanami also helps out here and there. despite that, they decided to share writing credit equally between the three of them. they found a manager, ijichi, shortly after they slowly began getting successful. shortly after finding ijichi, they changed their name from something stupid that gojo had thought of, to ‘six-eyed curse.’ ijichi had suggested they change it to help with branding. and then of course, there’s sukuna, who’s the frontman of a rival band. gojo and geto don’t get along with him, and sukuna definitely doesn’t like them. especially because of gojo’s nepotism. he doesn’t find it fair that some stupid kid with mediocre guitar skills and fans who only like him because he’s attractive should be at the top of the charts, overtaking his bands place. then there’s his twin brother yuji. out of the two of them, he’s the nicer, dorkier version of sukuna. he liked playing, but he never saw himself pursuing it until sukuna invited him. his best friend, megumi, had joined the band later on, playing bass. he mostly kept to himself, except when it came to yuji (slight implications of itafushi here). then of course, there was nobara. there were rumors that her and yuji were dating one time, to which she had squashed them almost immediately after. she’s the most online one of the group, and has heard of almost every rumor, seen every edit, and witnessed every fandom joke under the sun. with pressure from their rival with sukuna’s band, ‘malevolent,’ the label, touring, and the fans, geto is crumbling day by day, and has been silently considering leaving. he’s been going on for a few years at this point. sure, that wasn’t long in the grand scheme of things, but could he really keep going with this? and what will satoru do, once he finds out about his best friends thoughts? sure, he felt the immense pressure too, but this was their dream wasn’t it? and how will he navigate his feelings, which have only been growing over the years, only barely managing to keep them secret from geto, let alone the public eye? he tried to deny it to himself for so long after all… anyway, these are my thoughts. i HIGHKEY wanna make this into a comic, but ive never done one before, so the idea definitely feels slightly overwhelming at the very least. let me know your thoughts though!!!

[darkersolstice]

Right, going back to what I was saying about food as a theme, this feels a little like a thesis statement for, if not the series as a whole, the character of Umemiya Hajime. And I want to chew on that idea.

And the rest of the post under the cut has spoilers for Noroshi arc and beyond in the manga.

(Which really does draw an interesting circle around what Sakura did in the Noroshi arc that Umemiya failed to, doesn't it? Because he did break bread with his rivals in the Shishitoren arc after declaring them friends, but he didn't think to lean on them for actual aid, and I have other thoughts about that which I am struggling to word in a way that doesn't show what fandoms formed my worldview as a teenager. But that's a digression.)

What do Suzuri, Umemiya and Choji Togame have in common? They literally work to feed their people. Togame, we're seeing do so in the latest chapters released of the manga, helping out with the festival booths. Umemiya with his garden, showing the nurturing side he really wants to lean into. Suzuri, when he gets a job to help the rest of his gang? He becomes a chef. He puts food on the table, quite literally.

(There's something to be said here about how Choji does not fill the role of provider. He may be the strongest fighter, but he is not a leader who feeds his people. Nor, from what we see, is anyone in KEEL in that role, for obvious reasons.)

I am too fucking Jewish to draw the line to Communion and Breaking Bread, but I can play etymology games about community and commonality and communism and communes. Talking with fists is communicating, but so is sharing a meal.

"Truth, Justice, Freedom, Reasonably Priced Love, and a Hard-Boiled Egg!"

Yes, I realize that egg is soft boiled, it looks jammy and gorgeous as fuck, but. This too is Umemiya explaining his thesis.

Which really makes one wonder how many meals Sakura has eaten alone in his time, doesn't it? Hell, one of the signs he's Fucked Up is that he seems to struggle with a spoon while eating egg congee. And then there's this moment, which is passed over so delicately as a joke:

@hahahafangirl mentioned something about how in a particular instance, Suo didn't need to deflect because the narrative did it for him. The same thing is happening here. A 15 year-old Japanese kid who's never had a Ramune is kind of like an American who's never had a juicebox. That's Fucking Bonkers, that shows there's been some Weird Shit that happened somewhere along the line.

And yet, the moment is brushed past so simply to move to talking about Togame's hair and the upcoming conflict. We don't dwell on what is kinda a blatant red flag, one of many building up regarding Sakura's home life.

Uhhh, I don't know how to conclude this, but I hope the fandom eats well.

Next time, perhaps more Suoposting, or examination of the idea of being a Real Monster, or maybe something about using names? I don't know yet. Maybe I will really swing a hammer at a hornets nest and talk about That Choice in the Noroshi Arc.

[bedheaded-league]

I absolutely did not want that. 😓 Honestly I didn't really think this post would breach containment like this (it's always the posts you least expect), and while I was also mostly focused on how excited I was about new adaptations, I seem to have unintentionally upset a lot of BBC Sherlock fans with this post so I wanna be clear about something real quick:

I used to be a fan of the show. It came out when I was like 12 and I was obsessed with it. I wrote fanfiction of it. I cosplayed as Sherlock. It took over my brain. In season 2, there were things that made me really uncomfortable (looking at you, Irene Adler) but I ignored them. And then season 3 came out, and I started getting upset at the obvious disdain the writers had for their audience AND for the original stories. They literally had a whole episode where they just made fun of the people who had spent the past several years trying to figure out the mystery they’d written in their own show! Calling us weirdos and losers for being obsessed with the cliffhanger they gave us! Not to mention the digs at shippers (I’m not even a Sherlolly fan but the way they mocked that ship made me angry on their behalf).

And then I couldn’t ignore that those problems had always been there, even in the seasons I’d preciously loved. The queerbaiting was off the charts. The no homo jokes were too bad to ignore. The misogyny was vile. And Jesus christ, the way they massacred my boy! They took one of my favorite characters of all time (an autistic/ADHD/depressed weirdo who's rude but endlessly kind and wouldn't hesitate to kill for his friends) and turned him into a cruel, sadistic sociopath who tortured his friends for fun. They took the only potentially interesting female OC they’d created and turned her whole character into a joke about how she's sooooo in love with Sherlock (because he's soooo sexy and cool), she never gets to do anything besides be obsessed about him while he treats her like shit and we laugh at how pathetic she is (Molly my love you deserved so much better). And don’t even get me STARTED on Irene, I could write a whole essay about that disgusting, sexist, lesbophobic mess. Id spent the first couple seasons deluding myself that maybe the characters would get to develop. Maybe they’d make Johnlock canon. Maybe the story would actually go somewhere. But at that point, I realized that none of that was ever going to happen and the creators thought I was an idiot for believing that it would.

As a writer, I was appalled at the sloppy plot lines, inconsistent characterization, and lazy mystery plots. As a young, queer, female fan who adored the books and saw myself in them, I felt betrayed. The creators obviously thought that the way I personally connected to the stories (and the way so many other queer people did) was just something to be mocked. The show made me feel like these asshole white men were telling me, and others like me, that I didn’t understand these characters the way THEY did, with their superior Clever Man Brains. I was just a stupid teen fangirl who wanted to see boys kiss because I thought yaoi was hot. Not a real Sherlock Holmes fan, like them.

I came to hate the show because Sherlock Holmes fans deserve better. The BBC Sherlock fandom, which had so many creative and interesting people in it, deserved better! So by the time the 4th season came out, I had no interest in it anymore, and neither did any of my friends. I guess I just assumed that was how most people felt because I’d seen so many similar sentiments from people who’d left the fandom.

I never hated the fandom. I felt sad for us. Sad and angry. And I guess that’s how I still feel about it. There are still fanfics that I look back upon fondly. I’m not trying to judge anyone who still likes the show or participate in the fandom. I’m a firm believer that I should never judge anyone for enjoying things that hurt no one, even if I don’t get it at all. I even left my old BBC Sherlock fic up all these years because I know there are still people who like it.

But I guess it makes me sad to see people still using so much creativity and love on a fandom for a show that has only ever hated us back. Yes, the fandom has an immense queer legacy within the larger fandom of Sherlock Holmes, but absolutely none of that came from the actual content of the show. The queerness and the creativity came entirely from the fans. The showrunners should get no credit for it at all. It's kind of like how some people want to give JK Rowling credit for making Dumbledore gay even though he was never gay in the books, except it's actually way worse because in this case, the creators explicitly said he wasn't gay and made fun of people who thought he was. It was always so fascinating to see the fandom create these entire alternate versions of the characters and the show that were actually good. The Sherlock of BBC fanfics is infinitely more nuanced and interesting than the one in the actual show. He's literally a different character at this point. A much better one.

So while of course I’d never tell people to leave a fandom they don’t want to leave, and I completely understand peoples reasons for staying, I guess I just wish that all of you amazing writers and artists who helped create those alternate fanon characters would just… make your own adaptation at this point! You’re already like halfway to creating your own entirely original Sherlock Holmes modern AU. And recently, the world of Holmes adaptations has been ruled not by Hollywood or the BBC, but by small indie creators like all of the ones I mentioned above. Sherlock & Co is a current modern adaptation where Sherlock is accurately portrayed as autistic and ADHD (fuck you “high functioning sociopath” THATS NOT EVEN A REAL THING) and he’s actually queer! It’s fucking awesome!!! You guys do that too!! I hope you do!!!

All I’m saying is, I’ll never read another BBC Sherlock fanfic again. But if I was in a bookstore and saw a modern AU Sherlock Holmes novel where John is a blogger and Sherlock calls himself a sociopath but it’s obvious he’s not and Moriarty is some insane little gay man, and there was no mention of BBC anywhere, I’d absolutely pick it up.

Anyway, sorry this turned into a whole essay. If any BBC fans would still like to give their opinions, please reblog this version of the post, and understand that I am coming from a place of both deep love and deep hatred for the show because I used to be one of you. Also please try reading ACD Holmes/Watson fics if you haven’t already, I promise your brain will be forever altered.

It’s 2025. BBC Sherlock ended 8 years ago. The last season was so bad the fans didn’t even want to talk about it when it came out. Occasionally a post resurfaces where we all laugh at struggling to plug our phones in and being called alcoholics. Every time, there are more and more people in the comments who don’t get the joke. There are two currently airing Sherlock Holmes audio dramas that both portray a queer Holmes (as well as several other excellent queer characters), and one of them now has Holmes and Watson in a canonical romantic relationship. There’s an adorable crowdfunded short film where Watson plans Holmes’ birthday party and they flirt with each other, share a bed, plan their retirement, and kiss on the mouth. A video game about retired beekeeper Holmes just released where he arranges a romantic picnic so he can finally tell Watson how he feels. A popular graphic novelist just released the first part of a queer comic book retelling of the complete Holmes canon and had to do several rounds of preorders because she kept selling out too fast. Sherlock is garbage and here’s why has 15 million views on YouTube. Nature is healing. ❤️🐝

Edit bc I forgot to drop the names: The podcasts are Sherlock & Co and Fawx & Stallion aka @224bbaker (the one with the canon gay relationship.) The short film is called The Adventure of the Furtive Festivity and it's on youtube. The video game is @beekeeperspicnic and it's on Steam. The graphic novel series is by Molly Knox Ostertag, aka @contact-guy) Please feel free to drop any other queer Holmes adaptations I may be missing.

[artbyblastweave]

The "Imagine a guy who would hate a Worm tv show" post.

Hm. On the one hand I do think there's something to the argument that trying even jokingly to model the online discourse hell of a nonexistent adaptation of a niche work does put me two or three metadiscourse layers further below the surface than is psychologically advisable. On the other hand they're just straightforwardly correct that a prominent adaptation of worm would result in a total unending digital bloodbath

[skullbowz]

Jeff Hodek x Chickadee Springs is crusty old man yaoi

Jeff Woods x Ticci Toby is happy wholesome yaoi

Jeff Keaton x saga universe ! Toby is doomed toxic yaoi

Jeff Mason x Toby Adam is Extremely toxic yaoi

Thank you for coming to my ted talk

[enjoyvoidblack]

Something that I don't think I've ever personally seen talked about:

Jon mentions in season 3 that he'd quit smoking for 5 years, prior to the cigarette he went for after hearing the Fears explained by Leitner. It's not hard to assume that the stress makes him start again, and that it continues, since it gets mentioned a couple times more after that. That breaks my heart a bit on its own already.

But the other thing is that the Web tends to play with addiction.

And in Season 1 it gave him a fucking lighter.

[pidgefudge]

hmm

[cannimumsable]

The pattern is that people straight up do not read™. or they read a 3-5 tweet summary of what happened and treat it as if they did. or because shonen expectations based on "the classics" is bullshit and significantly rotted people's brains when deciding wether an ending is good or not.

Which could be nothing right

yeahhh. i will forever regret reading the last chapter through leaks because it was a dreadful experience, and watching everyone ever shit on it for like a week after genuinely made me want to just get off the internet forever or something because i felt like an idiot for liking the ending (all this is my fault for getting too invested in both tumblr and mha etc etc).

All the "it's rushed" and pacing complaints barely matter to me at this point because you just cannot feel the pacing of something correctly when you're reading it exclusively through leaks. you can't absorb info like that. And don't get me started on the number of complaints and criticisms I've seen of the last chapter that are just provably bullshit (I saw someone say Izuku didn't get a statue lmao. yes he did, you just read the fucking leaks and watched twitter drama unfold instead of reading the actual chapter i fear).

[cavewolf]

honestly looking back on it sans wasn't even that bad. for most sexualised undertale character i mean. it could have been a child

[hydrossity-zone]

you telling me other people dont keep the same special interest theyve had since they were 9. whadda hell

[cakemoney]

finding out that kaito and shinichi have been revealed to be cousins is like finding out there was a huge earthquake in the country you used to live in

[frostedturquoise]

Still cant believe Waifu Bait Fandom(tm) i knew about when it was newish but all i saw was people arguing over -you guessed it- waifus or That One Guy or That One Kid Most Seemed To Have A Hate Boner For For Some Reason in the background of my internet experience Blissfully unaware times as idk a nine year old probably then for the entirety of my last two years of schooling then four years of dnd crew time after that just Blissfully unaware most were references to Same Thing due to section one. Vaguely get recommended it some time during the period of section two but forget the name and is too embarassed to ask because your cousin knows you well enough that he said in full confidence 'you will probably like it, even if not the whole thing' but recommended 'the anime not the games because they are kind of shit but wont stop me if i chose to do that' (he is woefully dyslexic so finding out they were visual novel makes a hell of a lot of sense for why he seemed allergic to them)

Accidentally use a character with the same/similar name as in one of the spin off things and your 'please dont make fin of the similarity this OC is related to one i played in a prior game' was taken as a bold faced lie to play X character but fly under the radar and my cousin after the session said i didn't have to do that because it wouldn't of been the first time someone did with an anime character.

Turns out there is TWO of them and he genuinely thought i was pulling a sneaky because of the 'no werewolf policy' The Werewolf Gene Brothers(tm) wound up just being normal people, even if my cousin admitted it was a shame because dragons were cool. Finally was confused enough to admit i had no idea what he was talking about and later admitted i was too embarrassed to ask what the name of the thing he recced like three years before was.

And then three or four years later one of my brothers exes brings it up. intend to follow up.

forgets.

another year later she brings it up again because she needeed someone to hype about something with but it wasnt anime specific this time just Character Feels(tm) so i pull a wiki out Then three months later find a thing related to one of the things related to the thing. Then a year later after all that time of one foot in the door it is officially '??????' This post brought to you in vague that the realisation ht me while sorting shit out for a future dnd game but since its vaguely related to mythos shit saying 'fate' so many times was going to make me feel like three broken records playig at once because my life feels like a joke because i recognise like 20% of all the old memes just because i was in the direct personal orbit of a group of people who lived said fandom IRL for six years and thought i knew-knew due to a accidental on point analysis moment carrying over in everyones emery meets the direct rec meets the fact that i just rolled with the punches because i was blissfully unaware 50% of the meme references were for the same thing (it was just lie browsing the internet but IRL conversation of shit your not interested in but exposed to anyway) and finding out how much was the same this was just A bit like 'hey. wait. what.' lmao

Unfortunately any of those guys i still talk to were/are Waifu Guys (yes even the ex) so hard that i feel bad when i playfully take the piss out of anything.

And just to think half of my accidential investment started with (1) crack ship and who ever thought the stupid idea i had while waiting for crumpets to cook because at the time i thought one character had 'stuck up prissy bastard cat energy' or some shit while waiting for crumpets to cook at like 3am and my brain thought it would be funny for said character as cat person to impose themselves on the others living space ala 'stray cat moves in style' while knowing jack shit outside second hand info and now i unironically think i accidentally stumbled onto something because the more i learn the more said ship Makes Fucking Sense and i feel like a disgruntled preschooler about it because 20% of my current self afflicted dilemma was to get it out of my system search the pairing up and find jack shit.

Always wild to have surprise fandoms happen when fandom engagement energy + social energy in general is at an low. Then you feel bad due to new distraction vs many unfinished fics.

this post brought to you by i need to be awake in three hours and have an eight hour long outing soon after that point and i still cannot sleep and was Consumed With Thoughts(tm) over how this chain of coincidences feels oddly like a cosmic joke.

[miallurk]

Am I doing good? No. But am I happy? Yes.

[gothamundernightlight]

I know we as a fandom don’t talk enough about the Batkids acknowledging how old Bruce is getting, but something I think we talk about EVEN LESS is the Batkids acknowledging Dick getting older.

Like Dick is pushing 30 in canon at this point, and realistically cannot do the same things he was doing as a kid. There is a reason a lot of athletes retire young, and Dick’s life has been brutal on his body, so eventually it’ll catch up with him.

Imagine if you will some random new JL/Titans recruit meeting Nightwing and asking “Is it true you can do a quadruple somersault?”

And Dick has to wince and say “I used to, but not anymore.”

Imagine the Batkids hearing that? Imagine everyone who saw him grow up hearing Dick acknowledge he is getting older and can’t do the same things he did in his youth. Imagine how they feel about their own age. Imagine the grief Dick must feel at knowing he’s losing the gifts his parents bestowed upon him, and the fact he’s out-aged them both.

Imagine Bruce painfully acknowledge (in his head because it’s illegal for him to emote aloud) that not only is he getting older, but his first child, his SON, is now the same age he was when Bruce took Dick in.

Imagine Dick picking the smaller option out on ice cream trips because his body can’t handle sugar the way it used to, or eating less in general because his metabolism has slowed down.

Imagine the Batkids sparring and Dick has to tap out because he can’t keep up with them all for as long anymore. Like he can’t keep still do a lot, and handle himself in a fight, but he is not showing off with flips the same way he used to.

Imagine the day one of the Batkids spots gray hair on Dick’s head, or realize that the lines on his face are just a little deeper than they used to be?

Babs keeps calling him the Boy Wonder as a private joke, but the boyish charm that Dick once had has since faded. He’s a grown man, and while at heart he still is the kid that brought light back to Gotham, his outside reflects the life they’ve lived and shared together, which didn’t just pass by in the blink of an eye.

And Jason pretends he doesn’t care, but realizes that Dick isn’t the same 16-year old kid that Bruce put on a pedestal. That he, out of all their siblings, saw Dick the most when he was in his prime, and that his older brother is just a little more fragile than he used to be.

And Tim thinks back to the days of him stalking Batman and Robin before, pulling out those old photos and realizing just how much Dick has aged. When did that happen, he wonders, and how much more will Dick change as he gets older?

Cass, Steph, and Duke acknowledge that Dick Grayson grew up, and left behind a legacy for them to fill, but they’ll always wonder what he was like when he was younger, and wonder how much longer he’ll be around. Bruce has been doing this vigilante schtick for 20+ years, but will Dick still be doing this when he’s Bruce’s age?

Damian takes it the hardest. He can’t look at Dick without thinking of him as the same Grayson who was his Batman, but the truth is, he’s not the same. His old portraits of Dick bear witness to that, with each one just a little different because time is not frozen to Dick the way it is with Ra’s and Talia. Damian privately grieves everyone he comes to care about in advance because death has surrounded him his whole life and eventually despite Dick’s promises that he’ll always be there for Damian, a day is coming when that promise will be broken.

But yeah. Older Dick Grayson. I have thoughts on this.

(Anyways don’t mind me. Just coming to terms with being the same age canonically as my childhood hero.)

[creatingblackcharacters]

No, That’s Not ‘How Color Works’. - Whitewashing

Whitewashing, as defined by Merriam-Webster:

"to alter (something) in a way that favors, features, or caters to white people: such as a) to portray (the past) in a way that increases the prominence, relevance, or impact of white people and minimizes or misrepresents that of nonwhite people and B) to alter (an original story) by casting a white performer in a role based on a nonwhite person or fictional character"

In fandom context, we know it to include:

Making someone’s skin lighter

Making someone’s hair a thinner texture

Changing someone’s nose to be thinner

Shrinking their lips

Changing the character in their entirety to be someone else

The Normalization of Whitewashing

Remember how I mentioned last lesson that despite the nature of poorly drawn Black characters, most audiences are not turned off enough to discourage the action in professional works? Similar idea with whitewashing. Not the same- unlike the Ambiguously Brown Character, which claims to have plausible deniability, overt whitewashing is usually enough to make fans speak up! But that’s the key word here- overt! It has to be “bad enough” to make enough people speak up, but as we’ve seen many a time, “bad enough” seems to have a much higher threshold for nonblack viewership (sometimes the limit doesn’t exist!)

Some visual examples

This is a link to my personal thread on a Netflix show I was watching- Worst Ex Ever. Now, while the show itself was quite enlightening, there was something I could not get over. I thought I was going crazy. And that was that no matter how dark the person of color would be in real life, the animated portions would draw this light pinkish-brown. Every. Single. Time. It's like they couldn't fathom scrolling down the color wheel. And this is a Netflix original! Netflix has plenty of money for someone to have caught this in creation. But... it was produced. And put out. And they're making more of it.

I asked all of the Dragon Age fans about the series, and uh… I didn’t know things were this bad, guys! Apparently this is a man of color, but it doesn't seem like the creators want you to know that 🤣. Jokes aside, as I’ve discussed before, the noticeable whitewashing- and that was one of many racist things I was told- was not enough to prevent sales... so why would they stop? I can only hope this new game, with all the updates, is enough to turn the tide. But the series has gone on for a while now, that if they’d chosen to do ye same olde… there clearly would not be a lack of financial support to prevent it.

Colorism as a Tool

Even when actors of color are cast, colorism often plays a role in normalizing whitewashing to audiences, even to Black audiences! People think “oh well at least they’re Black!” as if that is the only important part. It is not.

While Aaron Pierre, the actor cast for John Stewart of Green Lantern fame, is a GORGEOUS, STUNNING man, he is not the dark-skinned man that John Stewart is supposed to be and should not have been cast! To me, this is overt colorism, but clearly for many people this is not “enough” to warrant concern or even prevent the casting itself- including the studio behind the movie! Black fans have plead for years for the character of Storm to be played by a dark-skinned, preferably African, woman, and it has never happened.

It naturally happens in fan spaces as well, which is another indicator that colorism as a tool for whitewashing is quite effective for audiences. If I see one more Zendaya fan cast for Kida from Atlantis, I will scream. It’s been happening for years, and I don’t think any of the people who just want to see her and Tom on screen either understand or care that Kida is a dark-skinned character. Zendaya doesn’t look anything like Kida- it doesn’t matter if she’s Black too! Just because someone is Black does not mean they can play every single Black character! I’ve even seen people fancast Emilia Clarke of Game of Thrones fame, to which… I don’t have the words. I can’t fathom what would cause these decisions other than racism.

The Common Excuses

I must be honest. I don’t really feel like re-iterating how certain things are not okay and how to fix them, because I’ve already discussed these things in massive detail. So I’m just going to direct the excuses I regularly hear to my lessons, where you can read up on them.

“Their hair/eyes are like that because they’re biracial so-”

Relevant Lessons: 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 8, 9, 10

There is nothing wrong with having biracial characters with a range of features. I am not saying that! Because yeah, genetics do happen!

But I mentioned this in my last lesson, and I will re-emphasize here, that using biracial identity as a way to whitewash is a sinister form of racism. The intention here- the real intention- is the issue here! The idea that somehow this character can only look the way you want them to look by "diluting" their Blackness… I don’t know how you can explain yourselves out of that one.

You don’t get to use us as an excuse for diversity while still trying to maintain your preference for Eurocentric beauty standards. Black biracial people don’t always look light skinned, thin-haired and ambiguous, and even the ones that do don’t deserve to be treated as your fetish for pretend antiracism. If you just want to draw a white person with a tan, do that. But don’t change a character’s entire look just so you can work in some whiteness. If you want to claim that canon Black character’s mother was white, then I guess they inherited some of her personality because their features should not change.

“It’s my style/It’s the color-”

Relevant Lessons: 3, 4, 10

I hate all excuses for whitewashing, but I’ve grown to despise, hate, abhor and loathe this one the most as I’ve become an artist. I wish there were stronger words to describe just how much I hate the “style” and “color” excuse.

Are style and use of color oft intertwined? Absolutely. I’m not saying they aren’t. But out of everything, there are two things I want artists to understand:

1. Style does not cancel out racism! No style forces you to choose ashy greys and to change peoples’ features. That’s you! If you look at something, and it looks offensive, you change the style. You grow as an artist!

2. “Everyone who is brown will look ashy so I just-” if you recognize that your Black characters look strange in comparison to your nonblack characters, then it’s time to try something else! I don’t understand this sudden need for “realism” when it comes to color and lighting, but not when it comes to hair, for example. No one cares about realism when giving every and all Black characters wavy tresses they probably wouldn’t have, but suddenly milquetoast watercolor attempts at brown and off-putting lighting is “how it works”. That’s not fair.

The color picker is an available tool! I use it often!

Dead giveaway of purposeful whitewashing: if someone gets the outfit color palette right via color picking, but the skin color is multiple shades lighter. That means they were looking at that character and chose not to proceed.

Dead giveaway of purposeful whitewashing: if the white characters in the show are completely correct in their palettes. Again, that means they cared enough to look at everyone else… and not the Black characters.

If you use the color picker and the color picked is… disrespectful, you do not have to use that! You can simply choose a better color that is still similar to the brown that ought to be depicted!

“It’s the lighting-”

Relevant Lessons: 4, 5

If your white characters do not shine like snow in the sunlight because of your lighting, then your lighting does not make your Black characters suddenly light tan.

If your Black characters look bad in your lighting of choice- for example, putting a very dark-skinned character in electric white lighting can be ghastly- try changing the intensity or the color of the lighting. DON’T change your character’s skin color!

I'm going to show you some pictures of South Sudanese model Nyakim Gatwech. Pay attention to the choices of light, color, and makeup.

Look how BEAUTIFUL she is! Look at the choices of intensity and color of light, and how they make her look different in each image.

Now look at this image in comparison:

In this image, whoever did her makeup and took this picture did not take into consideration her skin tone. She's also under this really intense lighting. This is an example of "increasing the lighting does NOT make an image "better"". She didn't need to have lighter skin or "more lighting" to look good. She needed BETTER lighting, lighting that worked with HER.

To see this as an example in drawn art, @dsm7 makes an excellent argument for proper lighting and color, why it is an issue to use it as an excuse, and how to solve that problem.

‼️DISCLAIMER FOR NEXT EXAMPLE‼️

Okay. I am about to show y’all a fan-created example from my personal experience. It is a TEACHING EXPERIENCE ONLY. I am not including the artist’s name in this image. It happened a couple years ago, and it’s over- they’ve chosen to be who they are despite me kindly confronting them about it. The only reason I’m including it at all is because I feel like it would be remiss to have such a clear-cut, multi-level example, and not teach with it. That said, no, I am not telling anyone to act out towards them. Again, that is not what I’m telling you to do. The last thing I need is a literal lynch mob of angry nonblack viewership for trying to teach you all, and y’all sitting there watching it happen to me. Every example of whitewashing is not going to be so obvious, but I hope you learn how to spot the examples in the art you see and share.

I'm obviously a Hades fan, particularly of Patroclus- despite my disdain for the lack of effort in his canon character design. So I've seen a lot of things. That said:

“Well it’s just MY design of them-”

Relevant Lessons: ALL

The sepia coloring did not do this. The lighting did not do this. The design is the exact same as the Hades version, even down to the shape of the hair curling in the back. The only thing that is different… is the man himself.

Y'all. Y'all! You CANNOT take a pre-existing Black character and say “oh well this is my design of them” …and the design is of a whole white person. Because if the rest of the fit is the same, and the only thing that changed is the Blackness… Racism. If you’re going to “make up your own design”, then do that!

“Blackwashing”

Speaking of: I’m sure someone edgy out there thinks they’re so smart as they retort to the screen: “but if that’s not okay, then why is Blackwashing okay?” To which I say- shut up. 😐

The “definition” by fandom: making a nonblack character Black, usually an anime character, but characters in general.

Funny enough, the actual definition in the dictionary (or closest to) is “to defame”, in contrast with whitewash (as in whitewashing history). Maybe racist fans ARE using it correctly when they say you’re blackwashing their characters, when they mean you’re making them “less likable because they’re Black now”. 🤔

Anyway: Blackwashing is not real for the same reason reverse racism is not real.

Me painting these characters brown is not going to take away from the fact that there are far more of you in media than there is of me. Me saying that I ‘headcanon a character as Black with 4C hair’ is not going to make the studio go “oh! Well they must be Black with 4C hair now!” Me saying “oh I think I’d like this character better if they were Black” as a beta tester (less overtly, obviously, because I’m not racist!) will never make a studio change that character. Black viewers have minimal value in comparison to the power of the white viewer’s dollar. I could draw white characters Black every single day of every single game media… and they would still produce majority white characters. There has not been centuries- if not millennia, when we consider Jesus Christ himself, even- of purposeful “Blackwashing” with the intent of removing the original ethnicity- and thus importance- of white people. No one has ever been allowed to forget when someone is white. No one has ever been allowed to forget or not acknowledge white people.

How it could be "solved"

Personally, I love Black edits and I welcome them here. I find them creative and fun. But if you really, REALLY didn’t want us to make those edits, then naturally, we need more Black characters in all of our media!

I wouldn’t have to make edits if I saw more of me to begin with in the things I like to watch- but when we have those characters, racists act an ass about them. We’re not allowed to even be present! I’ve seen too many gamer bros mocking the existence of Yasuke in Assassin’s Creed, and he was a real ass man. But if we made a game about African peoples in African societies, how many of the gamer bros would actually play those games? Do you think there’d be as much support, when we hear so much about Black characters that are treated so abhorrently? How many games do we have where people would love their faves just as much if they were Black? I even learned that Solas was apparently supposed to be a man of color. IMAGINE how many people would not have liked that man, with the same exact plot and characterization.

Something I’ve noticed recently: apparently "Blackwashing" is not a thing when White fans “allow” it. Take this recent trend with Miku. International Miku was beloved! But if you draw any other character as Black on any other day, there will be people that are horrid about it. Ask any artist, Black artists and Black cosplayers especially, who’s ever done it what their comments are like. I’ve read entire missives akin to white supremacist drivel on how it’s somehow morally wrong to make characters Black. Meanwhile no amount of “hey maybe you shouldn’t do this” prevented the movie Gods of Egypt from being created, with a cast full of British White people.

Solutions to Avoiding Whitewashing!

1) Using References!!

Do I think you should know what Black people look like? Yes. We’re humans. It’s 2024. Everyone knows what we look like when it’s time to hate and discriminate against us, so you know what we look like when it’s time to love and depict us. If you’re on Tumblr, you have access to the Internet. ESPECIALLY if you’re in the U.S., as Black people are the source of damn near every piece of online pop culture. If you can find my dialect to make my jokes, you can find pictures of me.

Would I rather you use a reference every single time so that you can only strengthen your depiction of my people? ABSOLUTELY.

Anyone on the Internet telling you not to use a reference or that you shouldn’t need a reference? Unfollow them. You don’t need that negativity in your life. Why would you deprive yourself of a tool to create? The greatest portrait painters in history had to look at their subjects! You are not getting paid nearly as much to do this as Hans Holbein, and he had to stare at Henry VIII correct else lose his head- you can pull up multiple references. I’d far rather be judged for using hella references than be judged for being a racist!

Part of the issue is people draw what they’re used to, what they’re comfortable with (thus last lesson). But if what you’re used to is not what someone will look like… That’s not okay. Their features are not the issue, your skills are the issue. Learn! Practice! There is no rush. No one is rushing you to be perfect at drawing Black characters, and no one is rushing you to post them. You can just practice! If you’re not a professional, you can take as long as you need to draw! If you need to draw that piece of hair over and over until you feel like you have down the shape, you do that! If you need to use a tool that would draw the hair for you, you get that tool!

If you want to post, you can say you are practicing! If you make clear you are practicing, then be willing to accept that people may have feedback. I’d far rather deal with someone saying they’re unconfident and practicing, than someone posting a whitewashed caricature and closing their ears because “well at least I’m trying!”

2) Empathize! Care about actual Black people when you create a Black character!

Imagine, if you will, in the Twilight Zone: you went to an artist, and you asked for a white character (I typed in “regular looking white dude” on google). There’s hardly ever any white characters, you’re so super excited about this one! You paid good money, because you’ve seen just how amazing this artist creates! They’re so good at drawing characters of color! But no matter how many times you ask, they send you back an image of… Assad Zaman.

That man might be fine as hell! Gorgeous! Beautifully done! Chef’s kiss. Stunning! But… He’s not white. That’s not what you asked or paid for. You can’t even fathom how they mixed this up, they don’t even look alike! And when you confront them, they gaslight you, they call YOU the issue for not understanding how you can’t tell that this is a white man! They would never get this wrong! They have white friends, you’re the racist! But you’re not stupid, and you have functioning eyes- you can SEE what this drawing looks like! And… It’s not you.

It’s dehumanizing. It’s being told that there’s a “better way” to look like you, and that’s by… Not looking like you. You, as you exist, are what’s incorrect. Your identity is incorrect, not their drawing. It’s better to have thinner hair instead of an afro or locs, it’s better to have lighter skin, it’s better to have a straighter, thinner nose over a round one, and smaller lips.

And what makes it worse is knowing that people who don’t look like you? Probably won’t care. They won’t be willing to see- not unable, but unwilling- that playing with this caricature is harmful, that they’re propagating harm by not acknowledging it. They’re letting you know that your humanity means less to them than the clout received with a whitewashed or half-assed Black character, and that people will applaud them for that ‘attempt at inclusion’. And people will applaud! They will be entertained by the mere performance! And that hurts.

I’m going to say this, and it’s awkward and I try not to say it directly on here, but… Having Black friends and/or being around actual, real life Black people would help. I can tell from some of the questions I receive that Black characters and their traits- especially things like our hair and our cultures- are being treated as… alien concepts. But even if, for whatever reason, you legitimately don’t know any Black people, you do not need to know us individually to care about our humanity as a whole! Even if you do not know we’re there, we are, and we could possibly see your work!

By acknowledging Blackness and making room to understand what it means- and that includes how we can look- you are doing the bare minimum of acknowledging our personhood. If you cannot do even that, you don’t need to be drawing us.

Conclusion

Here’s the thing: if you want to draw a white man with tanned skin, do that. Just do it! You do NOT have to erase me to have more of you! There is not a single fandom where the majority of the white fans ever said “gee, not another white guy!” It simply doesn’t happen. God knows we wish it did sometimes. You will always have an audience for white characters. There’s no danger to any of you of “being erased”.

(Without putting on my political hat, I will say that a lot of white people who consider themselves to be far from white supremacist will express beliefs in line with great replacement theory if you push them hard enough. It is unfortunately not as uncommon an idea as you might think. I would do some self-evaluation.)

People are going to notice that you only ever draw white people, but… To be frank, that has never stopped anybody from being successful. Again, Jen Zee, at Supergiant with the terrible dark-skinned characters… Still has a job. at Supergiant. A professional studio. Dragon Age. Multiple games of consistent whitewashing and racist writing. Still going. If racism prevented creation and popularity, I wouldn’t have to have this blog. Alas, that is the society we currently live in.

But if you ACTUALLY want to depict Black characters, if you ACTUALLY want to do right and be respectful- not because you want the clout, but because it’s the right damn thing to do- then you need to commit! This means drawing them as they are meant to be! Accept that you’ll likely lose some fan base, who was there (whether they were aware of it or not) for the white and lighter skinned characters. Accept that this means that trying to appeal to those people by whitewashing characters is 1) wrong, 2) racist, which is 3) something you chose to do when you could simply have just… Drawn more white people.

I’ll say it again: antiracism is hard. It’s hard doing the right thing in a society that rewards racism so easily. It’s really hard knowing that people will stop supporting you or caring as much about your work when you start including Black characters as actively as you do white ones, especially if you start talking about the importance of it. But in my honest opinion, I’d far rather be someone that cared about others, with genuine fans, than someone that was racist for the fleeting internet clout of strangers. And that may be less ‘hopeful’ than I normally am in these lessons, but… People make choices. And people who have been informed- as you are now- are aware of the choices they are making. It’s the thought that counts, but the action that delivers- let’s choose better actions.