#but it could become a problem if it decides to

[apas-75]

So last night I finished reading Rise of the Red Blade for TotE Vibes Research purposes and the two Inquisitor characters in it really illustrate exactly why I think Barriss is going to survive and escape them.

Because the thing is that there are two kinds of Inquisitors! The ones who volunteered, and the ones who...didn’t. Iskat (RotRB’s focus character) perfectly exemplifies the first type: she had some traumatizing experiences at a young age, fell through a number of institutional cracks in the Order, had a really terrible master (meet me in the pit, Sember Vey), everyone was too busy to give her the follow-up they would under normal circumstances, Palpatine had an agent actively gathering information about her and pushing her to become Worse—she was a pre-selected candidate who was offered the choice to come quietly when Order 66 hit, and she took it. By that point all of her issues and doubts had been exacerbated to the point where it wasn’t hard for her to make herself hate the Jedi, and then she rationalized her way through any indication that her freedom was a lie and doubled her way down right into hell.

By contrast: Tualon, Iskat’s crechemate situationship guy. He had some issues but was not someone on Palpatine’s radar; Iskat left him to die in Order 66 and he survived getting shot by darksiding out about her betrayal. Because of that he was taken alive and they did some shit to him. When Iskat runs into him at the Inquisitor HQ after he’s freshly-inducted he can barely remember why he hates her, or anything else from before he was taken. He woke up in the room where you fight Trilla and they fully shattered him and glued a semblance of a person back together out of the wreckage, just COMPLETELY Winter Soldiered the guy, and the only way he had to cope with it is to lean into a weird codependent situationship with Iskat.

And that distinction’s always been there with the Inquisitors; you have the true believers who ended up hating the Jedi or wanted to go on a power trip (or had the kind of revenge plan only a 12 year old could come up with and then stick to for a decade, in one case) and didn’t need any additional coercion to volunteer, and you have the ones that they broke. In the former group you’ve got the Grand Inquisitor, Reva/Third, Lyn/Fourth*, Fifth, and Iskat/Thirteenth. For the most part they’re certified freaks, but they came by it naturally. (Reva’s a different flavor.) In the latter, you’ve got Trilla/Second, Seventh, Masana/Ninth, Tualon, and probably most of the others. They all got disassembled and reassembled without much care given to the process and are all Coping with it badly in different ways, whether by deciding it’s Empowering, Actually (Trilla & Seventh) or by becoming completely jaded about everything (Masana & Tualon).

(*We obviously don’t know a lot about Fourth yet, but the fact that she shows up to recruit Barriss while rocking yellow dark side eyes before ROTS is even over tells me she’s definitely a volunteer.)

All this is to say: The Grand Inquisitor is making a colossal mistake with Barriss from the drop, and it’s why I think she’s going to win their battle of wits and escape. Because he is treating her like she is an Iskat and she could not be any farther from it.

He sends Lyn to get her to come quietly! They actively withhold information from her about what happened to the Jedi and what her expected role in it is! That’s not how they recruit the ones they think will be a problem; if that were the case she would have been stunned out of hand and woken up on a rack.

Instead, he’s giving her special attention,, he’s training her—he doesn’t think they need to break her. She’s just got a few...pesky hang-ups from her time as a Jedi that need ironing out**. He’s projecting on her; he doesn’t just want an empty shell holding a lightsaber—he wants Barriss Offee, loyally kneeling at his side, fully believing in their mission. She’s his favorite.

(**That “mercy only breeds defeat” line isn’t just a generic darksidism; I’m pretty sure he’s directly critiquing how Barriss got caught because she showed mercy to Asajj Ventress.)

And surely that's something he can turn her into, right? Because she hates the Jedi, right? She attacked them, she outsmarted them, obviously she’d be down for wanting to wipe them out! He was there when she confessed and, like pretty much everyone else in the room save for Ahsoka, he didn’t hear a single word that she said—just what he wanted her to be saying. He’s got a deeply incorrect idea of her, and that idea is “she’s just like me for real.”

And he’s wrong, because the Inquisitorius is everything she feared the Jedi Order was becoming—literally, an army fighting for the dark side—and the Empire is everything she knew the Republic was becoming. She might be prone to despairing, it might in some hypothetical be possible to get her into the same resigned despair trap as Anakin, but she would never actually want to serve the Empire, and they don't think they'll have to try hard to convince her to.

She loves the Jedi, she loved being a Jedi, she wanted to save them. She wants to be one again more than anything even though right now she thinks she doesn’t deserve it, thinks that she’s already too broken to reclaim what she was. But I think being surrounded by actual fallen Jedi and being told over and over again that she’s like them is, in the end, going to be what reminds her that she never stopped being a Jedi in the first place.

And as long as she can make sure her captors don't realize that's true until it's too late, she'll be home free.

[tizeline]

Asking some writers/artists I follow:

Is there anything in your fic/comic that you as the author know about, but won't end up in the actual story?

So I have a rather uh disorganized way of telling the story of the TSAU, I jump back and forth in the timeline quite a bit depending on what part of the story I wanna tell. Overall I improvise quite a bit, and because of that I can't be 100% sure what will be depicted in the story and what wont. But I might as well share some little tidbits of lore that are probably not gonna be mentioned in the main story (though they still might who knows lol)

So uh. April and Kendra are exes. Kinda. They were pretty close friends when they were younger and decided to become a couple when they were like 9 or something. This lasted for a grand total of.... 2 days, maybe? Then they had a huge fight about something silly like, I dunno, Kendra hacked April's tamagotchi as a prank and she got mad so they broke up and they've had major beef ever since.

Draxum made Mikey wear some type of artifact or gear that supressed his mystic powers as a kid for his own safety. Mikey started showing an incredible talent for the mystic arts at a very young age. Draxum was excited about this for all of 5 seconds before realizing that Mikey is a VERY small child with NO impulse control and he's definetily gonna turn himself and the rest of the family into glitter unless Draxum finds a way prevent that from happening until Mikey has the chance to develop an understanding of consequences. (He's learned to control his powers well enough to not need them by the time of the main-story, so he no longer wears the supressors)

Donnie's whole villain-act he puts on is partially a coping mechanism. He grew up never knowing anyone like himself (unless you count Splinter, I suppose) so the only times he saw himself represented in anything was characters in comics and shows and such. There were plenty of anthropomorphic reptile characters in the media he consumed, and Donnie clunged to anyone or anything that he could at least somewhat relate to. Problem is, a lot of these anthro reptiles were like.... y'know... villains. It's pretty common for super heroes and stuff to fight evil mutant reptile creatures, and even stories with only anthro characters reptiles tend to be charactarized as more villainous. Granted, turtles specifically usually don't get this treatment, but it still had quite an effect on Donnie as a little kid that most characters similar to him would be viewed as evil, which caused him to internalize that mindset. So turtle tot Donnie basically went like "Yes! This is what I am! A villain in someone else's story! It all makes sense now! This is a healthy mindset to have!" and just kinda embraced the role that human society had given to him because he didn't really know how else to deal. (Things changed after meeting April and he found out that there might actually be humans out there who might treat him like a person and not just a freak of nature! He still plays into the villain-persona, partially for fun and partially as a coping thing, but he doesn't have nearly as a negative view of himself now as he did as a tot)

And last, but certainly not least................ Draxum owns a Lou Jitsu body pillow (PURELY for research-purposes, NO other reason!)

[amielot]

Does Hob has chronic pain is this AU? Since he has an injury in his knee in canon I guess (or it is a hc?)

I think hob having a knee injury is a head canon?? I have only watched the Netflix series so don't quote me. Regardless, Hob w chronic pain is definitely a favorite of mine. I love reading it in fic.

my answer is: possibly LOL, I'm still writing this au 👍

If Hob does have a knee injury then I suspect he hung from his good leg in this comic. RIP

Perhaps Hob has a bad day or lands on his leg poorly and Dream is startled by the fact that he doesn't LIKE seeing his human in pain. And when did Hob become HIS human? It's great to imagine Dream trying to take care of Hob for once :3

Or maybe Hob's knee flares up with prolonged activity, (like me :D) and while walking/ jogging/running around the barn was manageable, the second they start traveling long distances Hob is gonna have a problem.

Maybe Dream will have to let Hob ride on his back :3

It could also be a great way to have the convo about human leg injuries and how they differ from centaurs.

if I ever decide to do a comic abt it, I'll most likely confer with someone more experienced than me XD

[greghatecrimes]

Okay. Buckle up babes, it's finally Foreteen time and I wrote an essay.

Foreman and Thirteen are so interesting to me in so many ways. You have Foreman, who thrives off of control, and Thirteen, who refuses to be controlled in almost every aspect of her life. In the sense of them as individual people, they both have a lot of their own issues going on. Hot messes, the two of them. But in the sense of them as a couple, I think Foreman specifically is the only one who has issues with the relationship. (Or rather, Thirteen's issues aren't being projected onto the relationship and causing difficulties at the end of s5/beginning of s6, while Foreman's are.)

Foreman's biggest thing, at least in the latter part of their relationship, is control in regards to emotions. After they found Kutner, he coped with everything by isolating himself. A huge part of me thinks that's because this terrible thing just happened, the floor just fell out from both of them in so many ways, and Foreman feels like he doesn't have a grip on anything anymore. The only thing he can control is himself, and how he reacts. So Thirteen? Even though she's his girlfriend and he's worked with her for two years, her emotions and reactions are fundamentally beyond the scope of his control; she's still a wild card. She's not safe. So instead of letting himself lean on Thirteen, letting them grieve together, letting them comfort each other, for his own stability, Foreman chooses to cope (and thus reject Thirteen when she reaches out for support) by retreating into an environment that he's intimately familiar with. He surrounds himself with only variables that he can confidently predict. It's his gut instinct. It's always worked before, so why wouldn't it work this time? Why would it have any reason to cause problems?

In season four and the first half of season five, Thirteen was very much the same way. When things became too overwhelming for her, she repeatedly dealt with them by running, by hiding; by trying to isolate herself from the people who care about her and want to help her. The same base principle drives them both at this point: "what's out of my control is dangerous in some way or another. The only one who's safe to be around is myself, because I am the only person that I can control." But by mid season five, Thirteen has come a long way from that. Slowly she's becoming much more of a "recovering control freak". She's starting to be okay with the fact that she's not always going to have the amount of control that she has right now. She knows that all of it is something she has to come to terms with, and slowly she's getting to a point where she's accepting her diagnosis and working on all the baggage that comes with it.

Thinking about that– the fact that, by mid season five, Thirteen is approaching a point in her life of letting go, of learning to 'go with the flow'; while Foreman is very much still on the side of "I thrive and keep myself safe by controlling every aspect of my life possible"– makes them fundamentally incompatible as a couple from the get-go, even with all of the chemistry they had. Because the moment they get together (the Christmas party in 5x10 "Joy to the World") is right after Thirteen's decided that she doesn't want to die; when she's just starting to process her diagnosis instead of running from it.

Do I think there was/is love there? Yes. They absolutely care about each other, both during and after the relationship.

Do I think they would have worked out long term? The simple answer is "no".

The more complicated answer is that if they had been able to avoid the fiasco of Foreman running the department and then firing Thirteen after House quit, I think they could have made it work. But it would have been rocky, and it would have been especially rough for Foreman. Extremely so if it were to reach a point where they've stayed together for years and years, and Foreman is with Thirteen when she really starts to decline with her Huntington's.

Foreman is Thirteen's friend; he's also seen people slowly wither away from degenerative disease (his mother, with Alzheimer's), and he's a neurologist (and so he knows exactly how she'll decline, down to every last detail). All of those things give him greater emotional stakes in her Huntington's diagnosis beyond what's typical. But specifically in the situation of them facing this as a couple, you have this level of involvement where Foreman– someone who needs a high amount of control to function on a fairly basic level– is in an incredibly intimate relationship with Thirteen, whose entire life is inevitably and actively slipping out of her control. And in that scenario... I think that when the decline does start happening, it would absolutely terrify Foreman. To be the one that's by her side as a partner– seeing all of it firsthand, the pain and grief and sickness? And as her significant other, being the one that would potentially become a medical proxy when she's too sick to advocate for herself, faced with the possibility of making life or death decisions (like whether or not to euthanize the woman he loves)? I think that would have the potential to utterly destroy him.

As a friend, though? ("Ex-partners who have gotten back to a shaky friendship after the breakup, and still care about each other deeply", but "friends" for short.) The entire situation completely changes. I firmly believe that post-canon, if Foreman knows House offered to kill Thirteen before he "died", he would offer to kill her in House's stead in a heartbeat (just like I think Chase does). THAT sort of involvement with Thirteen's decline and care is far less terrifying, because now this is not the decline of someone that he's based his entire future on. This is not someone he's given half of his heart to; this is not someone he's built an entire life with and entwined himself so thoroughly with.

With the way things work out in canon, they're still friends, and they still care about each other; but at the end of the day, they're two separate people with two separate lives, two separate futures. And so Foreman doesn't lose a single ounce of his control as Thirteen's is slowly taken from her, bit by bit. Witnessing that is still a pain that is unimaginable. But for him, it's survivable. And that's the key difference (and why I ship Foreteen during season five and season six, but not post canon).

[itsabouttimex2]

LSO AU sounds really interesting! Are we allowed to ask questions about AUs or does it count as a request?

Hi, thank you for asking! Questions are always allowed, even when requests are closed! I’ll elaborate on Let’s Start Over a little bit!

After his own journey ends and MK has his own story penned and published, peace settles across Megapolis and the world in general.

He’s even got himself a new title- “Monkie Knight”, after years of working for the king.

MK still steps in to ward off greater threats and more serious demons, but mostly steps back and attends to the noodle shop with Pigsy, who’s just about ready to pass the keys to his son and maybe take up a more casual lifestyle of teaching instead of serving. Maybe a YouTube channel where he teaches basic skills and recipes to viewers. Tang comes in to both expand on the history of what Pigsy is cooking and to taste test the end result. As expected, he adores the food each time.

Things are okay.

There’s trauma and bitterness that MK needs to work through, but… things are alright. With time, they’ll get better.

And then you come around to the shop one day to visit, right as the Ruyi Jingu Bang comes toppling down from where it’s been set- and you catch it.

So starts your journey.

Our golden-hearted hero is a little soured now, having been thrust into dangerous fights again and again. He’s somewhat resentful to certain individuals-

Mei, for not fighting beside him more often, in spite of her combat prowess and draconic powers. He gets a little twitchy when she’s around, thinking of all the fun she had off on her motorcycle, all the live-streams she giggled and joked her way through. MK doesn’t hate her. Not in a million years. Never. But damn if there’s not some bitterness. He’ll still ask her to ‘babysit’ you when he needs to go off and fight.

Though he still cares about Sandy as a friend, MK has shifted his perspective to disliking the river demon’s pacifistic outlook, viewing it as naive and somewhat selfish. He still goes over to paint and have tea, but things are somewhat strained between the two. It’s easy for someone like Sandy, a side-liner, to say “I’m not fighting anymore!” but MK never had that chance. Given that he was in his mid-teens during the start of his journey in this AU, the hero finds it messed up that he had to fight, but an honest to goodness ex-soldier chose not to. Again, no hatred. Things are just a little tense.

Macaque is pretty far down on his shitlist, actually. MK has taken some time to think on the simian’s actions and kinda wishes he had just let Wukong pummel him to death. Most of these feelings relate to their first meeting, but him assaulting Tang and attacking Mei certainly haven’t helped. Or his unnecessary destruction of the Dragon Palace of the East Sea. Or his refusal to apologize. Yeah, this guy doesn’t get to come anywhere near you. MK will act civil because he does believe in redemption and second chances, but dear lord is it hard.

(And he massively regrets the “you aren’t a bad guy” speech he gave to Macaque. Looking back on it, MK thinks he was naively seeing goodness where it didn’t exist.)

And of course, Sun Wukong, for… a lot of things. He talks rather bitterly of his mentor, viewing the Great Sage as irresponsible and rather immature. He wishes there had been more effort and care in the monkey’s teaching, and less “you can handle this”. There’s still some genuine respect and gratitude for the simian, but MK majorly fixates on being ‘different’ in his own mentorship. Problem is…

He’s choosing to be different instead of better.

Wukong had genuine and honest belief in MK, enough to let him handle trouble on his own. The Great Sage didn’t step in not out of laziness, but because he knew that the kid could handle things on his own. Sure, he was way too secretive and hands-off, but his intentions were only ever to help MK grow.

So when he decides to be entirely opposite to Wukong, our newly titled ‘Knight’ becomes a massive roadblock for you. Instead of cutting you loose with confidence, MK is stifling and protective. He’ll fight for you, cook for you, tend to your wounds, etc. Wukong tried to let MK grow without any form of safety net, but MK refuses to allow any growth without complete safety, which is rare.

Instead of being a mentor who’s trying to build you into the best you that you can be, he’s trying to be a father.

And honestly? Sometimes, he’s so good at the act that you wish it were real.

[cadomoisspokenfor]

I haven’t watched the Knuckles show yet, but even before seeing it I’m tired of the discourse. Mostly I’m tired of the way this fandom talks about each other, and how we’ve seemingly given in completely to the narrative of universal toxicity prescribed to the fandom by people outside it.

If someone says they dislike a certain piece of Sonic media, or have even an inkling of criticism for it, they get thousands of responses decrying them with things like “the Sonic fandom hates fun” or “the Sonic fandom is so toxic, they can’t handle even the tiniest adaptational changes” or “Sonic fans literally don’t even like the character.”

If someone says they like a certain piece of Sonic media, or even just praise certain aspects of it, they get thousands of responses along the lines of “Sonic fans standards are so low they’ll praise ANYTHING” or “Sonic fans don’t even know what good media is” or “the Sonic fandom is a cult that doesn’t accept even the smallest criticisms of their god.”

First off, which is it? Is the Sonic fandom incapable of hearing criticism, or does it only ever criticize without enjoying new things?

Second, this idea of the Sonic fandom being inherently toxic no matter what is a large part of what’s breeding so much toxicity in the first place. Can’t you see it? Please tell me you can see it. If no one can discuss ANYTHING, no matter what opinion they have, without it being labelled as “typical Sonic fan craziness,” than any attempt at building healthy community in the first place is forfeit because it’s already been decided that talking about the character we all like is off limits. We’re all only here to be mad at each other. No one dares say they’re actually a part of the fandom. We all have to be “fandom adjacent” to not be perceived as toxic by default. And that’s stupid.

Why do we talk to each other with such condescension? Why have we just accepted this state of affairs? Why do we act like our opinions are objective and that everyones else must agree with us or else be labeled as “crazy Sonic fans” even if we’re clearly Sonic fans ourselves? And if we don’t act like that, why do we tolerate so many others acting this way and ruining what could be a fairly straightforward and happy fan community? (Not to point the finger but many popular youtubers who dabble in Sonic perpetuate the above quite a bit and I very much wish we’d all stop treating them as arbiters of reason. They’re just people, same as you and me. It’s ok to disagree with them. It should be at least.)

I’m serious. Toxicity in the fandom is a real problem that needs constant vigilance in order to maintain a healthy community space, but that idea has been weaponized and the fandom’s become exponentially worse for it.

I guess I’m just asking, more like pleading, that before you jump to labeling someone saying they like or dislike a piece of media as toxic, stop and ask yourself “Are they really being toxic? Or are they just having an opinion in a completely-unsensational-if-it-was-any-fandom-but-the-sonic-fandom kinda way?”

People need to be able to say “Yes, we’re Sonic fans” without it carrying a negative connotation. And that takes recognizing the humanity in each other first and foremost. If we keep capitulating to those who call the fandom inherently toxic, it will only get worse. Again, toxicity is bad but we lost the plot ages ago. Let’s try and find it and then maybe this fandom can actually be fun again.

[physalian]

Villain Power Scaling (It's over 9000!)

@sarah-sandwich ask and you shall receive

Quick! We wrote an insanely, unexpectedly successful one-off fantasy series! How do we top the villain?

A bigger, badder giant space laser

The villain’s secret jealous sister

The same power, but purple now

The True Mastermind you’ve never heard of

JK, they’re not actually dead!

When you choose to continue on a series and have already committed to possibly destroying the legacy of the characters who fought and died to save the world once by undoing it for money, you had better have a damn good story to tell.

So if you decide your new threat is any of the above, you have quite the uphill battle ahead of you, my friend.

What is Power Scaling?

Power scaling is the nature of the ability of the heroes and the villains to grow more competent over the course of the story via new skills, new powers, or more training. Protagonist’s first fight (that they win, at least) will generally be against a baby, tier-one mook and not up against the main antagonist (*cough* Force Awakens *cough*)

As the story progresses, the mook that was so scary and so hard to beat oh so very long ago will become unnamed cannon fodder in the climax of the story. Generally speaking, this is a linear event and the hero and the villain are constantly one-upping each other until they come head to head in the unavoidable final fight.

Sometimes, things run askew. Maybe the hero’s super special power that saved them last time was a fluke, possible only in those specific circumstances, or one-time use.

Maybe they have amnesia, or the being that gave them that power revoked it, or using it cost them too much. Maybe they got seriously injured in the last fight using it and can no longer go near it if they want to not get hospitalized. Maybe the super power was another character that won the final fight for them last time, but died in the process.

It doesn’t have to be linear, but if you’re going to regress your character without creating a “why didn’t you do what you did last time” plot hole, you will need an ironclad excuse.

So, feast your eyes while I summon the Supernatural fandom back from the dead.

What not to do, as told by Supernatural

This show was originally written to last five seasons and five seasons only. No matter how die hard a fan you are or were, you cannot escape this fact, and neither could the writers.

Season one villain: A demon and her demonic minions

Season two villain: Psychic demon children and Papa Demon Yellow-Eyes

Season three villain: OG Demon Lilith, and Dean’s ticking demon-deal clock

Season four villain: OG Demon Lilith and preventing the rise of Satan

Season five villain: Satan and some douchebag Angels

Then you have Ten. More. Seasons. trying to do better than Satan and the douchebag angels to… varying levels of success and stupidity.

The problem: Supernatural tried to be linear with their power scaling, focusing on ramping up the threat level to nonsensical ends while undermining the threat level of all who came before.

The other problem: Sam, Dean, and Cas never stayed dead long enough for any of these threats to matter.

What I mean is this: In making the threat of the season so impossibly strong, by threatening the world over and over again no matter how many times they save it, by never committing to killing your three most important characters, by never letting the world go a little unsaved in the end, you’re left with a story that *says* it’s bigger, badder, bolder, but is really just a rinse and repeat that goes blander and blander each time.

Coming off Satan and the Douchebag Angels to… Cas and Crowley conspiring over the souls of Purgatory and the unseen war in Heaven because they didn’t have the budget for that, without any of the thematic weight of *why* it was angels and demons? Talk about a loss of momentum.

I rewatch a grand total of one episode of season six, “The French Mistake”. I have lost all context for the plot surrounding this episode and it’s virtually independent of the rest of the season because Sam and Dean get transported into the Real World as Jensen and Jared and poke fun at each other for 52 minutes. This episode is timeless.

The show wasn’t a complete disappointment for the remaining ten seasons or it wouldn’t have lasted that long. It had good beats, but they shot their load in Season Five. After five whole years of buildup to this main event it never recovered.

Alternatives to Linear Power Scaling

Anyone who has or even hasn’t seen Dragon Ball should know that series is famous for infinite power scaling. There’s always someone stronger, always some new secret powerup to unlock with the power of Screaming, always some new Super Sayan color that we promise is more powerful this time, for realsies.

That show is so dedicated to the bit that it’s gone full circle to being loved, not despite it, but because it’s so ridiculous.

You did not write Dragon Ball. Do not do this.

Instead of the infamous clashing multicolored power beams, what other ways can you up the ante of this new threat after your heroes have conquered all they thought stood in their way?

Give a damn good reason why this villain, who is no different than the last schmuck, is unbeatable by the macguffin this time.

As stated above, there’s no need to make the villain More Powerful* if your heroes have lost the world-saving abilities that helped them last time.

Exploit the hero’s other weaknesses

More Powerful* is never as exciting as you think it is. Often times, especially in superhero sequels, the villain isn’t necessarily stronger, but the niche power that they do have finds the chink in the hero’s armor that they didn’t have to worry about last time.

Make the hero’s niche skillset completely irrelevant

This time, the threat might not be something they can punch or shoot or smack with a hammer. This time, it’s their reputation at stake, or the villain is un-punchable because they’re simply unreachable, causing havoc the hero is helpless to stop.

Make the issue not the villain at all, but the hero or their team

Maybe the villain is just a schmuck that would be beatable on any other day, but team infighting means that they make utter asses of themselves and the villain doesn’t have to lift a finger to win because they’ve taken themselves out.

This can get very dramatic like in Captain America: Civil War or the Teen Titans epside "Divide and Conquer". Or, to comedic effect in the Spongebob Episode "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy V" (the one with the International Justice League of Super Acquaintances).

Some would argue that the above options aren’t power scaling at all if it’s not linear, and that’s fair. You’re telling a story though—is your story going to be about the superpowers and how cool they are, or the people who wield them?

3. It’s not actually power scaling, it’s about stakes

Supernatural began to feel so stale because even though we were told the villain this time was bigger, badder, bolder, the stakes were always the same. OSP has talked about this, how threatening to end the world has a foregone conclusion of “never actually gonna happen” because what author is crazy enough to let the world get blown up and all their characters murdered?

Raising the stakes, too, is not linear. Last time it was the world, this time, it’s the life of the love interest, it’s someone’s sanity, it’s a ticking clock on a secret that’s about to go public.

That’s why the first five seasons of Supernatural were so engaging. Were Demons the problem every time? Yes. The Demons were causing the problem, but they were causing five different problems. It was finding and saving their missing dad, then it was uncovering the sinister plan of the psychic demon children, then it was trying to escape Dean’s deal, then it was trying to stop the rise of Satan, then it was trying to stop the apocalypse. It was not five seasons of demons trying to destroy the world.

The more personal the stakes, the more likely your audience will believe the hero could actually lose this time. That’s what will keep them engaged. Dean died at the end of season 3! They lost! There was no escaping that deal. Sure he came back in the pilot of season 4, but the entire 4th and 5th seasons are haunted by Dean’s PTSD and new pessimism about the world given what he’s seen and done in Hell.

4. Threatening the world without destroying a legacy

Covered in this post about timeskips and this post about sequels but it’s too important to not keep repeating.

So. The Star Wars sequels. Rain down your wrath like snow on a hot desert—these movies were a giant mess. The audience sat through six entire movies following the rise, fall, and redemption of one man who died to save his son and the galaxy.

Then, what, twenty years later, absolutely none of it mattered? New space Nazis are out for blood with the same equipment, same weapons, same soldiers, same reach, same motives. Within the theatrical release (because I am not paying money to buy content to do homework to understand a movie made for a layman audience) these movies undermined the legacy of the six that came before it.

It didn’t have to be a new galaxy-ending regime and the same rebels still rebelling for the same reasons—how the heck did they let another empire rise so fast?—it could have started small, inconsequential, and then the actions of the new cast then undermined everything Anakin worked for.

I feel like Mr. Incredible wondering why the world can’t just stay saved for ten minutes.

All of this is salvageable. End the world again if you want. There will always be bad actors out to do bad things, you can’t expect a utopia to last forever. But that bleak reality is for the real world, not fantasy. In fantasy, the sacrifice of beloved characters must matter. Otherwise, what’s the point of their story?

How do you do this?

Make the utopia the old characters died for last up until the new inciting incident, and make sure it’s the new characters’ fault, not just due to the passage of time

Make the villain threaten something other than their legacy

Make that legacy the banner behind which the new cast rallies, determined to make sure it wasn’t in vain

5. Or, burn the world down this time

Some of the best middle beats of a story feature a “did we just lose” moment a la Infinity War. The villain has won, fan favorites are dead, their home is in ashes, and now they’re not only starting from the bottom, they’re doing it with righteous vengeance.

Then the loss of the original character’s legacy *is* the tragedy, instead of a side effect. Then, in a way, they’re still part of the story, a ghost on the sidelines cheering on their successors, and we, the audience, are right beside them.

—

I have a shiny, fresh-off-the-press Insta @chloe_barnes_books now for this blog and my upcoming novel. Go check it out!

[annabelle-creart]

A lil Blurr redesign for the Life of Rescue Bots Au because I wanted her to look femenine (I know in the show is male but Rescue bots don’t have enough women and I wanted some body angst for the Chase and Blurr plot, and by that I mean father and daughter plot)

I added the lil things that look like antenae cause of Chase’s moving fins of his head sides, that move when he hears something, and also I added an ambulance mode because they really need a real ambulance in the program, they don’t even have one in academy :v

In conclusion: i keep much of the body shape cause of her personal plot but also wanted her head to look femenine, and of course her character as well, added and alt mode ambulance and antennae so she would look physically more to Chase

In this Au she was an ilegal racer back on Velocitron before the war knock at the planet, she was one of the best but always get injured, the debts were higher and with the police getting out of control just as the people, she and Salvage decided to escape together to another planet near, but something went wrong and they both ended up crashing on earth and then into stasis, if they weren’t asleep so much time they would probably had Chase’s age but due to the stasis, they remain as teenagers, the day the sky turn red and green due to the battle between Mandroid and the autobots, the ship they were trapped into send a signal to Griffin Rock, because it was near, so the rescue team went into the rescue and awake them, becoming since then the two new members of the rescue team with Sissi. Even if sometimes acts like a kid she is really passionate and love people but is a little insecure in the moment of recieve and give care, she was orphan just like Salvage, they only learned to trust in each other, even when Blurr treat Salvage like less and lie to him too much times to count it or Salvage says things at her ear to annoying her and keep her away from the rest.

it’s actually something i want to talk about not here but in a comic but if Blurr and Salvage are teenagers who grew up alone and treated like scrap i would not be surprised that they depend too much into each other at the point of a toxic relationship where Blurr treats Salvage like less even if can’t do anything without him and Salvage makes her think no one is enough or secure for her except him, so, yeah, both have problems and need therapy… you know? I’m going to edit Salvage’s psychiatric disorder from ‘none’ to ‘emotional dependent’ I literally just thought in the idea and like, i didn’t even planned that Salvage and Blurr would be such a mother fraggers ajksjaksjs

But don’t think wrong, Blurr and Salvage are not bad, they are just hurted and don’t know how to deal with the situation, Blurr can be a little egotistical for all the years she had been thinking and taking care about herself and Salvage talk to her just like she wants because he knows her well, enough to be like a second conscience, they do what they think necesary to survive because what is now a toxic relationship was Salvage’s superhero who could keep him safe and sound and never allowed a night without energon, and Blurr’s family who cure her wounds and kept her faith in humanity (well, velocitranity?), they just were together too much time and started treating the other with more authority than they actually have.

I think sleep absence is making me do angst, night mfs, I need more sleep than Kade dreaming with gremlins

[not-poignant]

would you be comfortable keeping us updated about your health results in the following months ?

Hi anon,

I don't generally update re: my health stuff in any consistent way here. I often have between 80-100+ medical appointments of some kind or other per year and I have too many actively treated/supported health conditions (over 15 -> I have more than this, these are just the ones being actively treated), that like... I'm not making this a health blog. It's a writing blog! Most of the health updates I make are over at the Fae Tales / writing Discord. But even there, I don't update about everything. (Some health stuff is just boring too, like, I'm anemic again? Must be a day ending in Y. Iron infusions are very repetitive, lol).

That being said, I do tend to update with health stuff when it impacts my writing, which is why I've been talking about it more lately, because my writing has absolutely been impacted from some new diagnoses from last November to now, which is really frustrating on a writing level, and also because it can impact my mood and output and readers can notice something's off. December was my lowest wordcount in over two years. And I've only written one chapter this month.

Right now I'm kind of having to force myself to work, because I need the money, so I can't afford to shut down the Patreon for a month or two (which is what I'd normally do in order to give myself a lengthy break), so I'm in the catch 22 of 'too sick to work to my normal levels, too poor to take a break from work to see if that helps because I need a lot of specialist medical stuff and some of it's expensive.' I do still like writing, but given more choice/freedom, I'd be taking time off to process some difficult diagnoses and some abrupt medication changes (I had to stop taking two meds that helped my quality of life and mental health immensely, and immediately onboard to two others that have notorious side effects, and that alone has been a struggle).

Though as a small update - I have 8 medical appointments in the next 10 days (one of those will result in 3 more referrals), and I'm 29 minutes away from leaving to go get my 45 minute head/neck MRI (complete with face cage and gadolinium) to see if my tumours have grown and to see if I've grown any more or if they've since metastasized. I have another MRI next week. The MRIs are thankfully due to Australia's healthcare free at least. But almost none of my other appointments are. I will probably end up having around 15+ medical appointments this month, so we're definitely starting the 80-100+ medical appointments per year off strong this year. x.x

For folks reading this, broadly, this is why there's been delays in responding overall to comments on AO3, why I'm not always getting to asks as soon as I normally do, and why I haven't been as 'chatty' as usual. I still love receiving asks/comments etc. please just be patient with me while I deal with everything. <3333

Er but yeah, tbh a lot of it is quite overwhelming for others. Like, if I actually kept people properly updated, I think some would feel not very happy, especially if they're just here for writing updates! So I try not to make too many 'health posts' unless I'm asked specifically? Anon, you are always welcome to ask for a health update <3 People can always scroll past it.

[hauntswitch]

Im so sorry but the L word is absolutely fucking hilarious - none of these women have an ounce of morality between them and yet they're all somehow still loveable characters. Despite the atrocities. And the bad 2000s haircuts. And the deeply questionable fashion choices.

[altschmerzes]

here’s another thought i have on the finale which isn’t very high stakes but has been driving me Fucking Nuts:

re: the fight between jamie and roy about keeley. i thought it was stupid and lazy writing that did a disservice to everything else that dynamic was and encompassed. there was so much more there and THAT was how we closed it out eh? like kudos to her for going ‘uh, no’ and kicking them out, that was a good call, but the whole thing sucked so bad generally and wasted time we could’ve spent doing literally anything other than the most cliche, juvenile, classic ‘women are a prize for men to fight over’ thing. however what’s annoying me even more is the way people who DID like it are responding to people who didn’t.

i keep seeing people be like “ACTUALLY them fighting over her was fine and normal youre all just babies who can’t handle that sometimes people REGRESS and sometimes people are MEAN and UNFAIR and UNKIND” and it’s like nah man it’s because they avoided doing this shit entirely for three fucking years and then were like do you want the cliche love triangle bullshit you dodged the whole time heaped on you at the last second when it makes the least sense? sure, here you go!

is it regression if it’s something they never did in the first place? i think not! and characters can be mean and unfair and cruel and whatever and it’s not the end of the world, i actually think it’s very interesting, and THAT’S not the part i find out of character, it’s that they literally never did this before and now after EVERYTHING else, after how clear it was how gravely fucking serious jamie was about the video leak, this is the kind of shit they’re throwing at each other about this? after repeatedly subverting expectations of classic love triangle nonsense? it’s tired and it’s lazy and it’s the cheapest option and nobody is gonna be able to change my mind by telling me i just don’t understand that People Can Be Unfair Sometimes.

[warlordfelwinter]

got him a new face. and cat eyes.

[silentspectres]

currently taking -1hp psychic damage from hyperfixation

[arolesbianism]

Beginners guide to my Jackie and Olivia universe thoughts except the handwriting might be kinda unreadable so idk figure it out

[daz4i]

my toxic trait is thinking i can voice act any character i like

[starrysharks]

i usually just post about reassassination and ultimate excalibur alongside less developed stories/universes but brother i have a LOT of stuff that i either hardly talk about or never talk about at all publicly ,,, mostly because they don't have any character designs done yet 💀