#but its not that bad compared to other fandoms tbh

[iaminjail]

You are the person I want to be with everyday / And this is something that I've been afraid to say

[gothamcityneedsme]

ok this fic im reading is not as good as i was hoping it would be and in like. Meh i should stop. But im like 19 chapters in so im feeling the sunk cost fallacy

[welcometoteyvat]

i queued. so many posts. dead

but it's quite funny to go through my likes and see how my fanwork dynamic preferences have changed

[zvezdacito]

Tbh I think a lot of people downplay the stakes Malleus is in that makes him overblot as just surface level loneliness by itself and that's why they think his overblot is unwarranted/annoying compared to the other six. It makes sense he jumps to such drastic measures to avoid facing whatever comes next because whatever it is will last not just a few years but literally a millennium + either way because of multiple systemic reasons he knows he's not just gonna be able to connect with a bunch of new people/explore a bunch of new experiences to make up for it.

Compared to other overblotters, it seems no matter what course of action Malleus will end up in a bad ending since he's a species seemingly among the few left of his kind while also being biologically predisposed to outliving everyone. It's as if he can never have a happy ending as long as he's himself, or that as a king (and symbolic "lord of all villains") his happiness will only come at the cost of others'.

I feel like a lot of people also give him the entire blame of his failures to connect properly with his peers. When even before they knew about his impulsivity or lack of cognitive empathy people were already jumping to conclusions about him. (Said mindsets came about from internalizing the depersonalization he was raised with, he's the sole heir of a country battered by colonization who place very high expectations on him to be a symbol of hope for them again after all)

Assuming the worse because of his powers, the reputation that came from it, and because of (the once again systemic issue) humans and people outside the Briar Valley barely knowing anything about/only having stereotypical rumors to go off the nocturnal fae who closed themselves off to try and stop humans from invading them more💀

So yeah givevn all of this Malleus was a ticking time bomb and even then he was about to just stand down and put his own feelings aside until he became accidentally convinced there was a way that didn't have to exclude him. It's an unfortunate clash of circumstances between different people and that's what TWST is all about. So yeah idk just kinda baffling some people are unironically out there saying things like "Malleus should've just held himself together for one night that's so selfish" when it's kinda made extremely clear by the story there's way more leading to the characters' making choices than that

From an outside point of view as the audience of course there are obvious steps Malleus could take to make the most out of what he has and to not inadvertently be a prick to others, but it pretty obvious why in his shoes it's not really feasible rn lol. Other than these things I could think of at the top of my head, a lot of the things people single him out as especially selfish or unreasonable for are things the other overblotters and characters in general also do lol.

> Like the class dynamics at play? NRC is literally rich boy central many characters express some kind of class privelege

> Not receiving consequences for his actions? This is a staple twst writing flaw for all its stories in general, most overblotters have gotten a slap on the wrist/their actions relatively covered up by the end. And Fellow legit just walks away from an undisclosed time of human trafficking like it was no big deal😭

Ironically Malleus will probably be the first overblotter to not have his actions hidden to only a select circle of people and receive severe repercussions for it because someone like him "should've been above that".

But yeah sometimes I feel like the extent of how some factors in Malleus's background, upbringing and environment determine his way of thinking and why he thinks he needs to do certain things is underestimated by the fandom and only the surface level of what he's doing is focused on which results in some people talking about his character and his flaws in a very dismissive way idk

[autisticlancemcclain]

fic rec friday 37

hello and welcome to fic rec friday! where, on friday, i rec five of my favourite fics.

1. Fade to Black by @yokohogawa

Things between Keith and Lance are changing but Keith is restless, especially with Shiro still weak, and ends up taking a bad decision: he leaves Lance alone in the Castle with a Lion he cannot pilot. Unable to form Voltron without the newly appointed Red Paladin, the four Paladins left struggle against the sudden attack of a Galra ship and later on take damage from the explosion of a star in close proximity. Lance, on the other end, is left to defend the Castle by himself and has little time to succeed: without energy, the Lions have only 6 hours of breathable air. Beyond that point, his friends will be dead.

okay yes technically this series is unfinished. HOWEVER the first two works ARE finished, and they are amazing showstopping incredible etc. tbh im not much of a black paladin lance fan, i genuinely think solo leadership is not what he is suited for, but this fic made me way more open to it. the way he handled severe crises was as fear stricken as it was awe inspiring highly recommend

2. once again i am a child by @lilaclavenders

“You’re not a spare tyre,” Adam interjects.  “I know that,” Lance says, too unsure to sound completely defensive.   “That almost sounded like a question.” “No... it didn’t,” Lance says.

Lance and Adam talk.

i have always been a fan of lance and adam even tho its the most evidence lacking fanon thing in this fandom. its truly just so interesting. and to have lance as a young cadet getting slammed so badly just in so many different directions being given at least one grownup in his corner...its a good read.

3. Lance the language man by @irish-vampire-blog

Lance didn't really try to learn a language. He just, kind of, picks up the basics and then works from there. Its usually unintentional. Ish.

He isn't stupid though. He isn't an idiot. He just isn't the same kind of smart as his friends are.

this kind of smart for lance is so REAL bc no he cannot do like quantum physics or whatever probably but the way he seems to have a pretty innate ability to successfully do many things that he tries. he just can u know?? thats the autism with the gay audacity i would imagine but i love seeing fics like this

4. my boyfriend's back (and you're gonna get in trouble) by teacupfulofbrains

hey la, hey la, my boyfriend's back

Keith Kogane has never heard of Vine. Lance McClain takes personal offense to this, and makes it his personal mission to teach his boyfriend to meme. Keith is confused, mostly.

(OR: several instances of Keith not getting the meme™ and two times he did)

I LOVE THIS FIC SO BAD I CANT BELIEVE I HAVENT RECCED IT BEFORE. yes i am a cringe zillenial who still finds vine funny and quotes it on the internet but truly idc idc. this fic is funny. this fic is cute. established klance my love and light. also keith comparing lances eyes to the star of bombay is some of the gayest shit ever and also the only time i will entertain blue eyed lance

5. The Most Dangerous Thing is to Love by running_downn

Last time something like this happened to Lance, Keith wasn’t there. He’d thought he would have been able to do something if he had been there, or at least if he was, the guilt wouldn’t be so heavy on his chest. But this time he was there. He was right fucking there and he decided that it was infinitly worse.

~

Basically there's a new threat after the Galra and it almost kills Lance. Desperate making out ensues, but it's okay to recognize when it's not the right time for it. Keith cries a lot cause he's older and grizzled and therefore not as emotionally stunted.

green sock reality? team still out fighting as adults and lance isn’t a fucking farmer while the rest of the team isn’t? keith’s abandonment issues treated with respect and dignity and also the acknowledgement that he’s older and therefore mature enough to handle those issues in a way that doesn’t risk a relationship that is important to him? lance understanding all this and using the supportive nature he is known for??? yes yes yes. stellar fic that should have way more hits than it does

that’s it for today!! i’ll see y’all back next friday for the next fic rec post!!!

[wildpeachfarm]

hi, i'm sorry if this is an inappropriate ask to send, but i'm just kinda curious and your blog seems to be a dream team/dnf lightning rod on tumblr.

so speaking as an outsider of this fandom, i find it really interesting that the dnf thing seems to have not really effected Dream and George's friendship significantly (at least negatively). like, idk if you're super aware of one direction, but the shipping ("larry stylinson") in that fandom seems to have been a big catalyst in the end of Harry and Louis's friendship. They pressure and they way their fans were watching their every move made everything uncomfortable and awkward. They aren't the only example, but probably the best. Admittedly, Dream and George were friends prior and Harry and Louis were literally tossed together in competition show.

I guess I'm curious if either Dream or George ever really spoke about it? like esp early on, they must have had conversations about what they were comfortable with, and clearly they are comfortable with a lot considering they way they play it up. idk its wild.

like i'm not saying the answer is 'dnf is real' but damn. i kinda really want to pick dream's brain about the last few years. hes got go have such an interesting perspective.

Hi anon!! Oh yeah I definitely think this is a fair assessment tbh! I don’t know a toooon about one direction but I have heard about shipping kind of ruining the relationships between people in instances like that.

With dream and George it’s a unique case because their FIRST STREAM EVER, they made it clear they want to be regarded as unit and they were the ones to decide their ship name and they made a Minecraft wedding. They WANTED to be paired together and made it pretty clear that it was something that was prevalent in their relationship even before YouTube. Which I think is what makes their situation unique compared to others where the shipping came after the fame (or as a result of it). And also, the fact that I believe there is blatant proof of genuine feelings between the two of them (to put it lightly lol). That has been absent from a lot of these “internet ships” like larry or septiplier, etc.

Now, I do think that the constant fan pressure does influence how dnf has been treated by Dream and George to an extent. In the way that I firmly believe a fully-public romantic relationship between the two of them would not be possible while they are still content creators. I think we all know how poorly relationships can go with the added pressure of the internets opinion and fans prying into their lives as a way to imply the relationship is somehow “bad”. So I do think they are somewhat secretive about things because of that. Especially after the internets reaction to Dream coming out. I think we can all recognize that it would be bad 😭

And you’re right I would also love to hear both of them really talk about things like that because it’s something rarely discussed in-depth by content creators in that situation and instead we only hear small things from way after.

[victimsofyaoipoll]

Round 2

Propaganda Under Cut

Elizabeth Midford

She started as just a cutie fiancée trying her best, turns out she's also a swordfighting genius, very under pressure to perform feminity in the Victorian Rose type of way. Fandom crucifies her bc she's Ciel's fiancée and they want him to be with his butler, Sebastian, the demon he sold his soul to for revenge

anime was a shitty canon divergent adaptation that butchered her character down to her "cutesy silly girly" persona, which obviously made the 2008 anime fans hate her with a passion (nothing wrong w being girly I'm just saying the adaptation made her super one dimensional) anyways fujoshis used to treat her as a villain because she's the fiance of Ciel,, who as u might know already was HEAVILY shipped with his butler, Sebastian back then (now it's kinda looked badly upon, nice tbh that ship sucks ass xD) She's a bit similar to Misa Amane from death note in the way she was treated. (Like an obstacle the yaoi ship must overcome rather than a person)

she's my silly little rabbit! i could gush about her character but i'll keep it short and just say that she's really well written and one of the best characters in the series. anyways she's ciel's fiance and she's like, rightfully annoying as any other 13 yr old girl would be but the fanbase fucking crucified her for even existing. she gets demonized for being 'annoying', but then ciel gets yaoishipped with an even more annoying guy. there is 100% an argument that lizzie/ciel is weird bc they're cousins (i personally don't ship it) but that falls flat when her detractors then ship the 13 yr old ciel with an eons old demon who Canonically looks like his father. the anime also never reached her main character development until years after its peak and that was only in a movie, so she really got the bad end of the stick here. not me though i had a giant crush on her when i was 12

Katara

Katara is constantly mistreated by the fans in favor of the Zukka ship (Zuko × Sokka.) They make her out to be mean, homophobic, and completely out of character just to add drama to the Zukka ship. In reality, Katara is very compassionate, and would never act that way toward anyone. 

Zutara was a popular ship but when zukka got popular over covid during the atla renaissance there were a million posts about how zutara was problematic while zukka was perfect usually for racist reasons. Meanwhile katara and sokka are siblings so it didn't even make sense. They did not have to be so illogically rude to her to ship zukka and it was weird

Katara is FANTASTIC I fucking love her to pieces she is so cool and yet the entirety of the ATLA fandom treats her like garbage because she “talks about her mom dying too much” (even though she BARELY does & also was parentified from a young age due to her mother’s death) and, of course, because she’s a more feminine women when compared to her counterparts. Even in the show itself she’s mistreated: she’s ALWAYS shown cooking for the rest of the gaang, doing their laundry, any ‘womanly’ task. She ends up with the guy who kissed her twice without her consent & who she never showed any real attraction to and apparently (despite being a badass warrior-doctor!!!) after the show ended she just… settled down in the South Pole and had a bunch of kids and never did anything else. She didn’t even get a statue :( Anyways during the ATLA renaissance, despite Zutara actually not being canon, people felt that Katara threatened the sanctity of the new almost entirely baseless yaoi ship, Zukka. Unfortunately for them, due to the fact that Katara and Sokka are siblings, the usual anti-Zutara arguments didn’t work as well. So they resorted to just… slaughtering her character. If she was lucky, they’d just make Katara a background character, wingwoman, &or throw her together with her canon love interest. If she was unlucky they’d do anything from make her homophobic (??) to killing her off! Fuck’s sake, she never even got a token spare-the-pairs wlw ship! Sorry for getting so heated, that whole debacle made me FUMING MAD.

[controversial-blorbo-bracket]

Controversial Character Tournament Round 2: Blaine Anderson from Glee vs Barok Van Zieks from The Great Ace Attorney

(remember that these characters are fictional and your fellow tumblr users are real. i will block you if you harass others in the notes, please consider sending your unhinged harassment to my inbox instead)

Propaganda under the cut, may contain spoilers:

Blaine Anderson:

LOVE: - "you know that post that's like "fandom will call a character evil and immature and then the character is just 15 yo" because that's what happens with blaine. he's just a sweet but socially inept kid with a lot of insecurities who's trying his best. compared to most glee characters he hasn't done anything wrong in his life. and yes he cheated on his boyfriend that one time, but he was super depressed afterwards (also this is glee literally every character has cheated and none have suffered as most as blaine because of it). in conclusion he's just a silly goose. my little princess <3"

HATE: (tumblr will not let me format this one bc its too long)

"A lot of people say he's the male Rachel Berry, and while I think that is absolutely a true statement, I actually don't mind his personality all that much. Literally everyone in Glee has a personality that ranges from inconsistent to downright horrendeus, so instead of talking about what he's like, here's some things he canonically does (buckle up, this'll be long): In season 2, when we first meet him, he's the leader of his school's showchoir. (redflag no.1/j) This gives him the freedom and authoritity to do a lot of stuff- not all bad, but he does serenade a closeted guy he doesn't know all that well, who works in costumer service AT HIS WORKPLACE, with a song about sex toys. (The guy in question ends up getting fired of course). He also gives some pretty hypocritical advice to his love interest, Kurt, about how he should try to blend in (hypocritical, cuz Blaine does the opposite and he's thriving under the attention), and he asks some insesitive questions, but those are all pretty excusable, or at least standard for Glee. In s3, him and Kurt are boyfriends, and he transitions school for him, which we could absolutely count as a decent thing, however it all kinda sours when he gets the part of Tony in the school's production of West side story. Why is this important? Kurt is a senior, and the performing arts university he's applying for is really competitive, so he needs all the extra curriculars and theatre experiance he can get. He asks Blaine to not aidition for Tony- which he agrees to- than promptly goes against that by singing one of Tony's songs at audition. He then gets offfered the role, doesn't turn it down, tells Kurt he should be happy for him, and honestly, BY GLEE STANDARDS, this is also pretty chill. Meanwhile: enter Sebastian Smythe, another contraversial character, who's now the new captain of Blaine's former showchoir, and who decides that either 1. Blaine is hot 2. Gonna use Blaine as an informat (His reasons are unclear tbh) Either way, he starts flirting with Blaine, who does end up rejecting his advances and telling him he's taken (though much later than it's probably ethical, idk tho, I'm aro). He (Blaine) really enjoys the attention though, so they end up keeping in touch. (Important for later.) Back to our main plot though; Blaime doesn't have sexual chemistry with his co-star, so the director tells him to lose his virginity (yes, you heared that right, it is fucked up). So he tries to sleep with Kurt, who of course, doesn't know that his boyfriend's sudden interest in him is due to directoral instructions. And then probably the most contraversial Blaine scene happens- see, Blaine, Kurt, and Sebastian (who Kurt hates with passion) end up going to this gaybar. Blaime gets drunk (though he only drinks one beer on screen, so we don't exactly know how drunk), and tries to sleep with Kurt in the parking lot. Kurt is visibly upset, and tells him no multiple times. Blaime doesn't oblige, and Kurt ends up shouting at him, which Blaine...doesn't take well, and blames Kurt, then leaves by foot. (They end up having sex by the end of this episode btw. No, Kurt still doesn't know about the directoral instructions. Whether he does it out of love or fear that Blaine will leave him is unclear) So we already know these two are not very good at boundries and communication, but the writers say they're "soulmates" so apperantly it's okay? Anyway, this all culminates in cheating incident no.1, where Kurt meets a guy whom he shares similar interests with, and who gives him some very cheesy compliements. They exchange numbers, and text a lot. Blaine doesn't like this. He checks their texts in secret, and then sings a song in front of the entire Glee club about how he's being cheated on, to humiliate Kurt.

Kurt insists it's not cheating, giving the example that Blaine's doing the same/used ro do the same with Sebastian. Blaine says "that's different" and they leave it at that. Kurt apologises via song. S4- Kurt moves to New York. Has to work a lot, since rebt is high, and also gets an internship at vague, so he's quite busy. Blaine feels ignored, so he cheats on him with some guy we only see the facebook profile of. They break up. S5- Blaine has a crush in this other guy, Sam. (He's been trying to get Kurt back, so him moving on is a big deal). Except gay marrige gets legalized, and Blaine decides to propose to Kurt. So he gets back together with him, then bot a week later he arranges a huge public proposal where it'd honestly just be plain emberassing to say no, but dontcha worry, because Kurt accepts. They move to New York together. Blaine becomes insecure, because Kurt gets ripped thanks to his fencing lessons, meanwhile he lrts go of himself a bit, enjoying all the fine food New York has to offer. His reaction to this is to try manipulating/tricking Kurt into eating copious amounts of food too. (To be fair, Kurt's reaction to the situation isn't perfect either, but this is not about him, their actions can co-exist without one of them necessarily having to be "the right one") S6- Kurt breaks up with Blaine. Blaine ends up going back to Ohio, and dating the guy who bullied, non-consensually kissed, than threatened to kill Kurt. (The guy did have a redemption arc, but I still dunno how to feel) You might be wondering- "wow, this was so lpng and extensive", and you'd be right but also this was mostly romantic relationship centric. There's also a lot of stuff Blaine says to his friends that make me question my sanity, but this is Glee, so that's every character in basically every episode. What makes me hate Blaine isn't even JUST all this- it's the fact that in universe, he almost never gets called-out, people take his side, it's as if the writers are condoning his actions, and I Don't Like That. I'm all for liking morally grey, or even morally dispicable characters, as long as their actions don't get excused. Hell, I started out just mildly disliking Blaine, but a lot of people paint him as innocent and pure, and that didn't feel right. Then I was ready to like him BECUASE of his questionable morality- but turns out, the guy doean't have much else going on besides this. His personality is almost the same as Rachel, except Rachel's more...full? If that makes sense? Blaine is just...bland. And inconsistent, and boring, and I just Do Not Like Him At All."

Baron Van Zieks:

LOVE: - "man's 6'4", british, looks like a vampire, took a mental health break for 5 years thanks to the dead bodies that cropped up after he lost in court, and is uhhhhhh kinda racist which is a key part of his character. the explanation for it is divisive but he does grow as a character eventually?? i think he's fun. there's a bonus case exclusive to the 3DS version of the games where he mentions he was almost poisoned in one of the first cases he ever handled. he objects with his leg. he brings wine into court but rarely drinks it. he has bats in his office. we have no idea where the scar on his face came from. his voice actor did a subway commercial. i think he wants to believe he is the sane one in the courtroom but that title belongs to the 16 year old judicial assistant for the defense." - "I love to hate him tbh!!! He's a complex interesting character tied up in things outside of his control and being used by the antagonist to hurt people, isolated due to his grief and rumors from the public. He also sucks SO fucking bad and I want to punch him. Lovingly. But I love him I promise."

[etoilesbienne]

I think i saw you mention this on your twitter and i really hope this doesn’t come across as derailing or trying to make misogyny discussions about a male streamer but the way that bbh hate (especially twitter hate) is so weirdly misogynistic and women in streaming patterned that just really sticks out to me. like i don’t think I’ve seen many other non-woman/non-fem presenting(?) streamers get hate like that, at least to the degree that bad does.

like he gets shoved into the mother/care taker archetype and then they get mad when he isn’t the quite, helpful babysitter, who never complains and people don’t give thanks or recognition because that’s just what he’s supposed to do. viewers love him when he basically works as a plot device to help with other characters (mostly male characters) character development or to flesh out their backstory, but the second that he starts to have his own character traits and do things against their character they really hate him. and they get super hypocritical about it, crucifying him for things that their cubito did too and seem to be otherwise fine with. 

idk It reminds me a lot about the way that puffy, Nicki and Hannah got treated in the dsmp era and baghera more recently pre-purgatory.

nah its all good i do think its an issue, but tbh its the same basic premise of like him breaking narrow expectations and fans holding his character to incredibly high standards. and even if it isn't a direct misogynistic backlash to him, it's at the very least indicative of how genuinely misogynistic this fandom is that every single female streamer is held to those expectations and standards to such a severe extent, that one male streamer experiencing the same thing for once can be directly compared to all of them.

that being said, i do agree that i partially think this is happening to him because of his character having stereotypically "feminine" cultural traits like being a caretaker to children, refusing to curse, and generally a lot of his argumentative demeanors. its 4:30 am so forgive me, this whole thing is just such an odd scenario that i've never really seen before at this scale?

[moebalovesyou]

Saw some opinions on Ryukishi's art style that I don't agree with so now i'm gonna share mine ahahahah

So there was this guy who went around calling others dumb and blind(? not exact words but that was the point) for preferring the og art style and how their views are tinted by the lenses of nostalgia

To be fair I wasn't in the WTC fandom long enough for that to apply to me but I think I still prefer Ryukishi's art style and let me tell you why: While Ryukishi's art style is a bit silly, we can even say goofy, I love it because it has a unique and sort of cutesy look to it, which in my opinion contrasts the stories well.

The characters' faces are very expressive even if they are cartoony or simpler than your usual "masterpiece" and here compared to the steam sprite, you can see that it has a distinguishable silouette with outstanding shapes which is eye candy to me.

I'm not saying every other style sucks because that's just not true, I actually like every artstyle other than the steam ones because they just look very.... doll like to me. It's not a bad style but it gives me an odd feeling and I can't really see the soul, personality and vigour in them which Ryukishi's artstyle has, so I was glad that even after modding my game I could still choose to use the old sprites (unlike in Umineko but I didn't mind that because I absoutely adore its console sprites)

Tbh I don't really know how to close this or how to write a conclusion about it, this is just my opinion and art is subjective so everyone is entitled to have their own opinions, I just found it a bit off putting to hear that I was some tasteless dumbass for having my own opinion, although now I'm glad because I get to write mini opinion essays out of spite lmao. Anyways for those who read this: Which are your favorite artstyles for the WTC games?

[ariaste]

Hello hello! If it’s all right with you, I would like to vent for a moment: Back in the day, I used to be really into BBC Sherlock. I know it was bad, but it was “Be Gay (solve) Crimes” and I couldn’t resit. One of my favorite parts of the fandom was reading fan metas. I enjoyed reading your ridiculously long meta! I am not very clever and I enjoy reading people noticing things that I can’t. It’s fun watching people passionately pick up clues and put them together.

I don’t think I’m the only one getting superwholock flashbacks lately. Sherlock also tried an unreliable narrator in S4 and it was an absolute shit show. People thought thought the finale was fake, it was so bad. TBH, the entire show was a dumpster fire that thought it was more clever than it was. Moffat was a good writer for single episodes for DW, but a garbage show runner. And they called us crazy for picking up what they were putting down.

But Good Omens gives me a spark of hope. It is unashamedly queer, fun, drinks its respecting women juice, and, unlike moffatiss, I think Neil and the crew may actually be clever enough to pull something big off. I adore the Discworld series and Sir Terry, and I have faith Neil will to do right by him.

Good Omens is restoring my faith in nerdy queer fiction and reminding me why I love fandom so much. Please keep up the crackhead theories. I love them 💕

Thank you, that's very kind!

(Ended up writing a very long reply about the response to my essay and also about queerness in media. Idk why i am writing such long posts these days SORRY LOL. Anyway I'm putting it all beneath the cut so I can tag it without clogging people's dash or the tag pages)

It does make me sigh a little when I see people scornfully comparing my long essay to The Johnlock Conspiracy or saying that they're having Sherlock flashbacks, because the both the contexts of the shows and the methodology of the theorizing are VERY different. To my mind, a more direct comparison of methodology would be the Gravity Falls fandom's "Stan Has A Secret Twin" theory. Writers and showrunners DO like being sneaky and clever from time to time, and many of them are much better at it than Moffat is.

But whether or not my theory is right or not is... kind of irrelevant to me? I wasn't out to force anyone to agree with me, AND writing it was a really fun way to spend a weekend, AND I'm proud of the work I did and the story I told, AND it felt good to have a satisfying workout at the Brain Gym. So even if I'm proven utterly and completely wrong, I won't feel like I wasted my time. :)

Good Omens is a great show, and I am SO HAPPY to see it (and other shows!) embracing queerness, sharing the fans' enthusiasm for the story, and honoring and respecting the fans' love rather than punishing them for it. As more and more time goes on, I think we're going to see more and more shows like that, because some of the people who grew up reading tumblr discourse are going to be showrunners themselves one day, and they'll have learned serious lessons about what it feels like when the audience is met with love rather than disgust and disdain. In fact, we're ALREADY seeing more shows like that than we had 10 years ago! There is so much canonical queerness on-screen these days that the me of 10-15 years ago is ASTONISHED and feels wealthy beyond counting. Of course, there is so much further to go, but man... when i was a kid, we had to walk uphill in the snow both ways just to see two dudes making sustained emotional eye contact, and we were grateful for it. (Jokes but also.... kind of real tho)

We've seen the exact same thing happen in scifi/fantasy publishing in the last seven or eight years, too! (Went off on a long tangent about Queerness In Media from an insider perspective, continuing below a cut so I don't clutter everyone's dash)

Even as recently as 2013--ten years ago--you might not have even been able to get your book published if it was openly gay. Hell, you might not have been able to get an agent to represent it, even. It would have been labeled "unmarketable" and passed over; if it DID get published, the queerness would have been camouflaged and downplayed and hidden in the marketing as much as possible--you wouldn't have known by looking at the cover that it was queer, you wouldn't have been able to tell by reading the back cover that it was queer. In literally 2016, seven years ago, a few months before I got my first book deal, I remember having a conversation with a friend and being very very worried that if I wrote books as queer as I wanted them to be, I would be "pigeonholed" as "ONLY writing Gay Books", that I would be passed over for any of the publisher's marketing budget and publicity efforts, that I would be sidelined and ignored... In 2016, I thought I was facing a choice of writing stories with more "mainstream appeal" OR writing the books I wanted to write and potentially undermining the rest of my career.

That didn't happen, thankfully, because in the next couple years there was this incredible explosion of queer scifi/fantasy. You see, ten to fifteen years ago, a truly stunning percentage of my colleagues -- writers, editors, publicists -- were writing and reading fanfic, and they carried their tastes and story-hungers with them as they grew up and got Real Adult Jobs at publishing companies. And suddenly, as if out of nowhere, a lot of us came of age all at once and there was this absolutely enormous wave of queer SFF that in my opinion has brought us into a new golden age of the genre: The Locked Tomb series by Tamsyn Muir, The Chorus of Dragons series by Jenn Lyons, She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker Chan, Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie, The Tensorate series by Neon Yang, Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon, Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki, The City in the Middle of the Night by Charlie Jane Anders, the Birdverse books by RB Lemberg, The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickenson, The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri, Reforged by Seth Haddon, The Sorcerer of the Wildeeps by Kai Ashante Wilson, Ocean's Echo by Everina Maxwell, The Fifth Season by NK Jemisin -- and these only the ones I could remember off the top of my head in 30 seconds, and I have a flavor of ADHD that makes my brain go blank when people ask me to think of specific examples of things! It is harder for me to think of a SFF book published in the last 7 years that ISN'T queer.

And then almost exactly a year ago, my book A Taste of Gold and Iron came out with THIS COVER:

Which. Is not so much a step forward in openly queer SFF as it is a fucking gauntlet thrown down in challenge. I cannot impress upon you strongly enough how much I would not have gotten this cover 10 years ago, and that's if the book was even accepted for publication in the first place. This cover SCREAMS gay fantasy romance. There is no attempt to hide it or camouflage it. It is advertising exactly what it is, right up front.

I got the absolute privilege and honor of having this cover--and I do consider it an incredible honor--because of the work that all my colleagues put in with their own work. Each queer book that got published wedged the door a little wider for the next one, and then a little wider still for the next one, until finally someone could get their foot in the door and squeeze across the threshold, which opened it a little wider again. So when I look at this image, I don't just see a beautiful cover that I am delighted to have on my books--I see an entire history of slow, steady progress by so many incredible writers who risked damaging their careers just to drag us to a point where a book as gay as this one could get a cover as gay as that one and STILL get the full and enthusiastic support of both the publisher and the audience. And the most incredible honor and the most humbling privilege out of all of this is the fact that the success of this book meant that the door was wedged open another little bit, that I got to contribute in this small way to the efforts of everyone who came before me, so that ones who come after us will find the door flung wide -- or that there's no door left at all to block the way, because we've collectively torn it down.

So yes, @eyona, I think that having your faith restored little by little is a very good thing, and I am delighted that Good Omens is doing that for all of us. And what's even better is that even if Good Omens doesn't play out exactly how we want it to, that's... kind of okay? Because there is always the next one, and at the very very least, Good Omens is wedging the door open further so that the next one can have an easier time of it. We don't have to walk uphill in the snow both ways just to get a moment of emotionally charged eye contact anymore. We don't have to starve anymore, not like we used to back in the bad old days. And that alone is a wonderful thing. :D

[aprilias]

just got into the fandom side of motogp, was wondering what's your beef w miller? me and my dad don't like him bc of like vibes but I saw your stats post (fucking incredible job dude truly inspiring level of hating, like casey stoner would be proud) but what did he say or do that motivated this??

Again amazing jobs on the stats, my dad rlly appreciated data proving why miller sucks

Hi Anon!

Haha thank you so much! Honestly that post was inspired by having nothing better to do and an entire year’s grudge after some of his comments, and also the feeling that some of my faves stuck on terrible bikes would do a better job on KTM.

Now I wanna say that I have met Jack Miller and in person he does come across as a very nice guy, so as a person I don’t have an issue with him, it’s more as a rider, in the sense that he’s had the machinery to get better results than he has, and just hasn’t done it. He’s also been in the premier class for 9 years and still hasn’t grasped the concept of tyre management, which is so frustrating especially when he’s meant to challenge other riders I dislike out front lmao.

That being said there have been a few issues with some things he’s said off track in the past.

The comments I personally have an issue with are ‘borderline’ misogynistic comments - if I remember rightly when I first started watching MotoGP, he made a comment comparing his bike being temperamental to a girl on her period (something his teammate at the time had done before too), I can’t find the receipts though so I could be confusing him with someone else on that one.

There was also the jumping to defend Pecco when they were Ducati teammates in 2022 after Pecco’s drink-driving incident. Ducati actually blacklisted journalists who tried to ask Pecco about it and in the pre-weekend or post-quali conference (not sure which) Jack basically shut down any question on the DUI from journalists on Pecco’s behalf. It doesn’t sit well with me because

1.) I would like to know from our eventual double world champion why he thinks its acceptable to do that and also face zero repercussions for it.

2.) because if Miller is that strong on someone not being questioned about a DUI and doesn’t think it’s a big deal for the current face of MotoGP to be doing that, then it raises some red flags about Jack tbh.

He also seems to have a massive agenda against Marc Marquez. As I mentioned in the stats post, he ranted about Marc (and Fabio) complaining about his bike, and called him a princess for explaining how bad the Honda was, which wasn’t an exaggeration it was (and still is) clear for everyone to see how bad that bike is. I’ve read while looking for the comments that I mentioned above that apparently he’s also spoken about the Marquez clan “running the paddock” and allegedly refused a handshake from Alex Marquez at Valencia in 2015, which I didn’t know about but it feels like one-sided unwarranted beef against an entire family.

But yeah that’s basically all. He has a very abrasive personality which I suppose you can like or dislike, but personally it’s not for me. I also just think in comparison to what others could do on that KTM, he just doesn’t deserve to be on this grid.

Sorry for the long post but there’s quite a few things that came to mind while writing so hopefully this is helpful!!

[threewaysdivided]

How Different do you think Young Justice Season 3 would have been had Jay Olivia and Michael Chang returned?

[For context, we’re referring to this post where I broke down the major writing/directing credits for each episode of Young Justice Season 1 and found that former Teen Titans 2003 directors Jay Oliva and Michael Chang had handled over 75% of the episodes in Young Justice Season 1 before vanishing from the credits of all later entries, and this post where I summarise how those later entries actively destroyed the arcs, themes and narrative of the original season.]

TBH it’s kind of hard to tell.  I have a few ideas, but like I was saying in that first post, it can be unwise to pedestal one or two members of a creative team when there are so many factors that can impact the final quality of a work.

Here I think it’s important to mention what a director does.  In situations where the director and writer are separate roles, the job of the director is to adapt the script to a visual form – working with the writers/editors to make changes as needed.  Directors direct how scenes are constructed, presented, acted and “shot” – which affords them a great deal of subtle influence over the pacing, focus and framing of a story.  The visual language of film can do a lot to control what information the audience prioritises as important, and how they interpret/perceive it.  Unsurprisingly, when you have bad, fragmented or inconsistent directing, you end up with stories that lack direction.

While Chang and Oliva having such a presence in the direction of Season 1 definitely lent it some of their specific personal creative flavour, I also think a lot of the major benefit came purely from having two people (and likely others who formed part of the S1-specific creative team) who were experienced in working together and had direct input/oversight of more than 75% of the season from start to finish.  That kind of creative cohesion makes it easier to track and maintain the continuity and progression of a narrative.  Compare and contrast with Outsiders, where you have a rotating shift of three less-experienced directors and a huge revolving door of new writers, with no-one working on more than a single episode in a row, the same directors almost never getting paired with the same writer twice, and a general sense that the story was being produced episode-by-episode with very few people having a clear sense of what had come before or would follow after.

One of the challenges is that the declining quality from Season 2 onwards points to something being fundamentally broken in the creative process at DC Comics/ Time Warner productions.  Young Justice Season 3 was the straw that finally broke my trust in Detective Comics Comics but it came on the heels of things like the original Suicide Squad movie (see this Folding Ideas video for an excellent dissection of those production and editing issues) and the transparently marketing-driven disaster that was Batman vs Superman.  It feels rather like modern-day DC is producing the in-house equivalent of shovelware: underinvesting in the timing and budget that its creative teams need for proper writing, editing, revisions and post-production in favour of churning out superficially saleable high-profit-margin products to cash in on recognisable IP’s and existing fandom markets.  Faced with that kind of incentive structure and production-crunch it can be very hard for a single (or handful of) creative team members to make course-corrections.

That isn’t to say that good media can’t be produced under tight conditions, but doing so generally requires a well-thought-out creative plan for the project.  And unfortunately, that kind of plan is something Greg “I don’t write endings” Weisman is notoriously bad at both creating and sticking to.  This was one of the problems I ran into when doing my YJ: Invasion autopsy: while you can correct some of the surface level problems, the root issue lies in a core story that’s bad from base principles and fundamentally incompatible with what came before.  Again, this can be overcome if other production team members are given enough time and creative authority to review and revise that story-core, but that doesn’t seem to be the production environment S2+ was allowed.

With all that said, I think it’s safe to conclude that, under the circumstances, Young Justice: Outsiders was likely always doomed to be a mess.  The combination of a lack (or even discarding) of a clear show-bible to act as a guide, a lack of clear project-plan (or, at least, plan-communication) from the showrunners,and a lack of pre-/post-production time for other team members to figure out what story they were even telling is pretty much a guaranteed recipe for narrative failure.

However, assuming that a pair of Oliva/Chang-like directors had been on the revival team, with input into most of the episodes, I think we might have at least seen some improvements to execution:

Firstly, we may have seen better cohesion and focus.  In the multi-layered onion of bad storytelling decisions that is the later seasons, the outer layer that many people seem to have bounced off is that it’s hard to care about what’s happening.  YJS2+ are boring and badly paced on rewatch, and a not-insubstantial part of that is bloat.  There is a plague of random new characters, exposition and world-details that don’t meaningfully contribute to the narrative (and for the record, I should clarify that ‘narrative purpose’ is a lot more than just ‘plot advancement’ – the problem here is that these elements are actually purposeless to the point of being distracting), scenes and ‘jokes’ that overstay their welcome due to a lack of proper substance, and ‘twists’ that exist for expectation-subverting ‘shock bait’ rather than moving the story. 

At a surface level, the later seasons desperately needed someone to ask: both ‘what is the focal point?’ AND ‘what is the purpose of this moment/scene for the story?’ and actually make Greg Weisman give them a coherent answer beyond ‘just trust me, it’ll be totes smart when you (read: I) figure it out later’.  Like I’ve said before, there’s a lot of fat that could have been trimmed; shallow scenes that could have been reworked to serve characterisation and themeing, ‘references’ that could have had their screen-time reduced to passing easter-eggs, and other wasted time that could have been better allocated to developing a core cast of ‘focus characters’ with an understandable dynamic to help anchor the broader character web in a relational status quo.  Considering what we saw of Season 1’s character-focus, and Oliva and Chang’s previous involvement in Teen Titans 2003 (which was also very good at prioritising, reinforcing and maintaining characterisation/ character dynamics) I think some improvement in story-focus, especially towards characterisation, could have been achievable.

The other gain we could have potentially seen is more sensitivity and tactfulness in the presentation of certain story beats/ characters.  For this I want to highlight framing:  whether something is respectful or offensive comes down less to the inclusion/exclusion of particular elements and more to the way in which those elements are presented to the audience – the priorities, assumptions and worldview revealed by the delivery.   

Let’s do a couple of case studies just to get our heads around the idea:

For Example One, we’re going to make the point by jumping straight in the deep end of sexual assault and fanservice in media feel free to scroll to the next paragraph if this is a no-fly topic for you.  Our contrasting studies will be The Millenium Trilogy (a noir series I’ve previous referenced in contrast to the YJ revival) and the shounen anime Sword Art Online, both of which contain assault and rape scenes.  Millenium’s depictions of assault keep the perspective on the victims, focusing on the pain/ powerlessness/ degradation/ anger they experience during and after the violation, and examining their reluctance/ aversion to reporting these crimes, while maintaining a respectful detachment towards describing the acts themselves.  In contrast SAO contains an infamous scene where an arc villain attempts to rape the female lead, while the camera fixates on the fanservice of her breasts quivering as he tears her shirt off (in addition to a concerning amount of other fanservice scenes where female characters are penetrated, groped or “peeped on” in ways that are clearly nonconsensual and unwelcome).  From this we can conclude that the issue isn’t inherently with sexual assault being present in a story – how it’s framed makes the difference.  The Millenium Trilogy respects the autonomy of its female characters, using assault scenes as an important narrative device to confront the audience with the violence of systemic sexism and condemn the cowardly entitlement it enables as part of its wider critique of misogyny; Sword Art Online degrades, objectifies and disregards the autonomy of its female characters by using narratively unnecessary sexual assault as a vehicle to ‘reward’ its target audience with fanservice.  What matters is how the subject is handled: is the sexual assault of women treated as a serious problem in need of criticism or as a guilty-pleasure ‘treat’ for boys to enjoy?

Moving to a gentler and more home-field example, let’s compare how pregnancy is handled in Young Justice Season 1 vs Outsiders.  It’s easy to overlook in the wake of the brick-to-the-face that was “you got a baby in there!” but Season 1 also included pregnancy as a plot-beat; Queen Mera announcing the news that she is “with child” during the episode Downtime.  However, there’s that difference in framing:  after it’s announced, Downtime quickly moves past the physicality of Mera’s pregnancy to focus on why it’s narratively important - because Mera and Orin are the royals of a hereditary monarchy and their child will be first in line to the throne of Atlantis.  Despite this being her only episode in Season 1, Downtime also gives Mera multiple characterising moments outside of child-bearing; introduced her first as a Queen and teacher/mentor to the students of the Conservatory, and later demonstrating her power as a battle-mage during the Manta-trooper attack – her pregnancy being almost a footnote outside its narrative-relevance.  By contrast, I think the reason that “baby in there” line from Amistad gets memed so heavily is because it highlights Outsiders unnecessary fixation on the physicality of female characters being pregnant, in addition to a disproportionate tendency to depict female characters as married, pregnant or mothering in the absence (or even at the cost) of narratively meaningful plot or character development – reducing these characters to little more than “pregnant sexy lamps” (as @mimeparadox so eloquently put it in their recent review of similar issues with the Gargoyles revival).  Again, the difference is execution: where Season 1 used pregnancy in a character-specific and narratively-relevant way, Outsiders not only assumes but enforces it as the expected path for female characters – sacrificing both characterisation and screentime for a subtler form of fanservice: one that reinforces and validates a specific worldview of gender (and which has been increasingly revealed to lurk beneath the surface of performative ‘feminists’ like Eric Schneiderman and Joss Whedon).

At this point, I think it’s worth noting that Jay Oliva and Michael Chang are both Asian-American men (i.e. less likely to be blinded by privilege a problem that Greg Weisman has always struggled with), that Chang himself was lead director on TT2003’s anti-bigotry episode Troq and that TT2003 on the whole is often praised for its respectful depiction of female characters (and also Victor’s cyborg status).

Given this, I think similar direction could have resulted in more respectful depictions of non-white and disabled characters.  As it exists, the revival at large (and Outsiders in particular) has a HUGE issue with unnecessary and disproportionate violence towards and villainization of characters-of-colour in a way that inadvertently reveals the bias of the creators; shock-value violence towards marginalised characters being treated as more acceptable and less needing of commentary because they clearly weren’t expected to be as relatable or worthy of empathy as the “main” characters.  Different direction could have seen some of the more needless violence removed in favoured of equally-shocking-but-more-narratively-purposeful elements, some of the narratively-justified violence reframed in a way that was more empathetic to the personalities and bodily autonomy of the victimised characters, or - given more time for revision - used to make a critique of in-story bigotry by presenting the disproportionate targeting of marginalised protagonists as being the product of systemically prejudiced antagonists (rather than casually-bigoted producers).

Similarly, I think better direction could helped respect female/femme characters more.  From Season 2 onwards Young Justice has an increasing problem with the male gaze in how it frames and poses women; Outsider’s borderline-fetishistic obsession with depicting late-term pregnancies again being a particularly egregious example.  Many of these scenes either didn’t need to be included (hence the meme-potential of wasting screen time on a toddler explaining how pregnancy works to a mature audience) or could have been made more narratively meaningful by prioritising specific characterisation over generic ring-fingers and pregnant bellies.   This male gaze issue was at its most insulting with Halo; even if different directors couldn’t change the incredibly disrespectful character-design decision to vacuum-seal a nonbinary, hijab-wearing minor inside a boob-socking, ass-grabbing, wasp-waisted super-suit, they could have worked to preserve Halo’s modesty and gender identity with posing and camera choices that minimised the attention drawn to Halo’s sexual features, and presented their body-language and posture in a less-feminising way.  

This likely wouldn’t have fixed the underlying biases baked into Outsiders’ plotlines but I think there was the potential to soften the execution to the point that they could have felt more like a “missed the mark” than the farcical offensiveness that we got.

That said, I don’t think anything could have truly saved this series.

As I said at the start, I think the thing that ultimately doomed Young Justice was the lack of a long-term story vision; the ego and overambition of showrunners trying to build a story that runs on teasing twists, mysteries and future-resolutions while also openly wanting it to go on forever.  Those two elements are fundamentally incompatible if you want a satisfying experience, and without a clear guiding plan you can’t expect the underlying creative team to successfully find a story’s identity during a rushed pre-production.  You can’t provide direction if you don’t know where you’re going.  It would be like trying to invent an entirely new plane and build it as it’s taking off: a crash is inevitable, the only question is the extent of the damage.

At best, I think we could have seen another Invasion-level non-story: a few isolated good character moments bogged down within a season that, while not overtly offensive, was still thematically confused, overstuffed with characters, driven by contrivance and insulting to the intelligence of anyone actually trying to follow the narrative.  A slow zombification, riding out a few extra seasons on plausible deniability, rather than Outsiders’ rapid crash-and-burn seasonal rot into an offensive cash-grab parody of itself.

And, in a way, I’m kind of glad that Oliva, Chang and the other Season-1-only creative team members didn’t come back for that.  Because, even if it would have resulted in a more palatable product, it would have come from forcing a group of marginalised creators to salvage a privileged dude’s mess.

I’ve spent far too many words over the last few years trying to unpick the layers of why Young Justice is such a narrative failure post Season 1 and now I feel like Benoir Blanc.  Because these problems are a glass onion and at their clear centre, Greg Weisman is an idiot.  He’s a demonstrable bigot, who had a publisher back away after he trashed their franchise with misogynistic queerphobia.  He’s a sex-obsessed loser who tried to launch a Not-Safe-For-Work production company writing Gargoyles Parody Porn while wearing an eye-patch and pretending to be a ‘fan collaborator’.  His writing reveals a consistently toxic attitude towards abuse, consent, boundaries and power dynamics.  Based on some of the creepier things he’s said/written, he could be potentially unsafe for certain fans to be around.  And even setting all that aside (and it’s a lot to set aside) he’s just obviously a hack: he claims things that are neither present in or even supported by the text, he promises future developments and fixes/explanations that he rarely if ever delivers, and he uses those holes as a springboard to pitch separate-purchase side-content that also seldom delivers, in a way that suggests he either has no idea what he’s talking about or is intentionally lying to grift his fans.

And, look, this problem is far from exclusive to Weisman: it certainly didn’t start with him, and it’s not even exclusive to the arts.  Across industries we are currently realising that we’ve let privileged guys who can talk a good game coast by on an assumption that they were qualified to hold their positions of influence, even as we held them to far lower standards of scrutiny than we would equivalent people of any other demographic.

Young Justice was never going to survive long-term (any more than the Gargoyles revival is) because the creative load was always resting on that rotten core.  I think we as a fandom were very lucky that Season 1 had both a sincere creative team and the production schedule needed to overcome it and give us something as good as they did.

I wish we could have seen that quality continue. But, at the end of it all, I’ll make peace with the disaster we got.  Because it was at least a somewhat honest reflection of its lead creator, rather than enabling him to keep failing upwards on the back of his colleagues' contributions.

So yeah. Better directors would probably have resulted in better surface-level polish... but you know what they say about polishing turds. No matter how much sugar they added, Outsiders couldn't be turned into a brownie. You'd still be being fed crap.

And frankly, whether it’s his characters, his audience or his co-creators, I’d rather not continue the pattern of letting Weisman shove the burden of dealing with and correcting for his bullshit onto less-privileged people.

[orionsangel86]

Subtext Glorious Subtext! A Dreamling on Netflix analysis in The Sandman - Part 5

1789

How romantic it is to be defended by ones love!

My favourite century! This is where the show starts deviating more heavily from the comic and upping the heat on the subtext (probably why it remains a popular century in fandom especially for gifsets).

Firstly, the show makes some good choices by changing certain elements in order to increase character likeability, which I think were necessary tbh. In the show, Hob mentions getting into a “new trade” regarding shipping and slavery. He describes the process to Dream and is immediately scorned for it via the “poor thing” line. In the show, it is implied that Hob’s involvement in the Slave Trade is something new for him. Dream is immediately dismissive and judgemental of this (as we would expect any decent person to be). Hob initially defends himself “It’s just how its done.”  but agrees to consider Dream’s advice.

This is not how either the comic or the Audible audiobook go and honestly, I was surprised.

In both comic and audiobook, Hob brags about the slave trade. He talks gleefully about actually having a hand in starting it 200 years back. He’s proud of this. He’s completely repugnant in both comic and audiobook and it makes you want to punch him hard. Dream only makes the following comment: “You take pride in treating your fellow humans as less than animals?” but he is otherwise not dismissive or disgusted by these things. He is not judgemental, just curious and surprised. When Hob dismisses this question as it being “business”, Dream drops the topic. It isn’t until the very end of the scene after Johanna’s interuption that Dream tells Hob its “a poor thing...” and that is where both comic and audiobook leave it without giving Hob’s reaction to this line.

You can see why the show made the wise decision to change these things. I think it is another example of where the show is taking the story and characters in a softer, kinder, and more likeable direction. We have to remember that the show versions of Dream and Hob are NOT their comic counterparts. Both comic characters are unlikeable at times and Hob in particular is just generally a pretty shitty person. It is difficult to marry the two versions of Hob sometimes because Ferdie gives SUCH a likeable, warm, engaging performance. Yes, Show!Hob is still a slaver for a short while, and yes, that is absolutely not forgiveable and fandom would be wise to ensure that this is never downplayed or ignored, but I think it is worth mentioning that the show has made the decision to lessen his involvement in the slave trade compared to his comic counterpart. But we shall see where they decide to go with this particularly nasty part of show!Hob's history in future episodes.

I think the show in many ways is taking a more classical view of the Sandman characters - here are your good guys and here are your bad guys, here are the people we want you to love and root for, and here are the ones you should love to hate. The comic tends to keep the majority of characters in the middle ground of morally grey. They have a rather cynical viewpoint imo that works for a gritty graphic novel about a depressed eldritch entity. But that viewpoint wouldn't work so well in a high budget fantasy drama series with a desire to draw in as big an audience as possible.

Anyway, back to 1789. Aside from Tom and Ferdie acting like they want to climb each other all the way through this scene (the sexual tension is through the roof throughout), all of fandoms favourite elements here are new.

Whilst Hob does ask for Dream’s name again here in the comics, there is no response or reaction from Dream given before Lady Johanna interrupts them. In the show, it is clear that Dream is about to give an answer - Hob almost gets his name. This is - tropey. The interruption may be comic canon but the almost response to the answer you’ve been craving for 400 years isn’t. A brilliant little addition. The audience is on the edge of their seats wishing Dream would just tell Hob who he is dammit! It adds to the expectation that eventually Hob will get his name. Dream's identity reveal at this point is basically a Chekov's gun. Hob will get it, even if we don't see it happen.

Then we get the fight. There is no rambling from Hob about some Jack Constantine he knew, instead he is calmly making flirtatious jokes at Dream right in front of Lady Johanna’s salad. “I look terrible, you look worse.” The terrible drawing from 1689 is new for the show, as in the comic it is simply a description of the 1689 meeting that Johanna found. Making it a portrait instead gives the characters something to react to, and I do love how bad the caricatures are in the drawing. Though sorry Hob, but anyone can see that Dream absolutely does not look worse than you, and your teasing flirtations are kinda obvious.

The two characters share catty side eye glances in silent communication as Lady Johanna talks which indicates how close and comfortable with each other they have become by this century.

When Hob jumps up to attack the thugs, he goes for the one with the knife at Dream’s throat first. Hob gets to be an action movie star for a short moment whilst Dream looks up at him in subtle delight. It’s glorious.

AND THEN Dream ONLY makes a move once he sees Lady Johanna has her blade at Hob’s throat.

In the comic, the minute the thugs get their blades out and Lady Johanna threatens them, Dream is like nope! Magic sand! Poof!

But the show, oh the glorious, brilliant, creators on the show, decided this was going to be a “partners defending each others lives” scene. They want to protect and defend each other! They care about each other.

And then we get this:

GIF by ghorestes

Dream. Darling. Sweetheart. He may not have needed to, but you enjoyed it nevertheless.

“Clearly. Still, I didn’t want to be drinking here alone in 100 years time.”

GIF by mrskillingjoke

(Thank you to all gifmakers by the way I am kissing you on the mouth for the gifts you give us)

LOOK AT HIM. We all obsess over these little moments I know, but this is CLEAR flirtation.

If there is a better example of *eye fucking* anywhere outside of a season 4 Destiel scene I have yet to come across it.

It doesn’t even stop there. Because right after the best example of *eye fucking* I have seen since season 4 Destiel is an honest to god proposition.

Hob: "So do you want to find another pub tonight?"

Dream: "She may have told others about our meeting. It wont be safe for you."

Hob: "Im perfectly safe. I can't die remember?"

Dream: "Aye, but you can be hurt or captured. We must be careful"

Hob: “Always.”

NONE OF THIS IS IN THE COMIC.

So what new info has the show given us with this scene?

On a surface level, Hob wants more time with Dream. He wants to find another pub to continue their date.

On a subtextual level, Hob is full of adrenaline from the fight and the mystery man he’s been obsessing over for 400 years is looking at him like he wants to jump his bones. He wants to find another place so they can continue their date, and possibly fuck until the adrenaline has worn off.

On a surface level, Dream cares about Hob’s safety. He doesn’t want them being seen together together outside of the tavern to draw attention to anymore of Lady Johanna’s goons.

On a subtextual level. This is 1789 Hob and they hang men for doing what you very clearly want to do, and it’s not safe with the additional attention Lady Johanna and her goons have put onto you. If I go with you now, they could follow and find us in more compromising positions. Don’t risk it.

In the comic at this point, I would argue that Hob is still nothing more than a curiosity to Dream. He does not show him any real affection or care, and certainly doesn’t comment on his safety at any point. Whilst comic!Hob at this point is clearly itching for more info on Dream, he doesn’t ever push for it, and he is never as focused on Dream as he is talking about other people he’s met and interacted with. They are barely friends.

But by 1789 in the show, we have genuine care for each other, camaraderie, a growing friendship, and arguably sexual attraction.

The other point to note is something I only realised after answering this ask the other day. Comic!Dream has never had anyone else truly care about him enough to rescue him or come to his defence since Alianora (and he basically married her). When Hob defends Dream in the show, its so impactful to Dream because this is a version of Hob who truly cares about him enough to endanger himself (a trait comic!Hob never shows). No wonder Dream looked so pleased and acted so coy about it. He really was ready to pounce!

Basically 1789 is the turning point century. The point at which the show starts to lean heavily into homoerotic tropes and increases the tension. In this century we get:

An almost name reveal followed by an unwanted interuption

Amused side eye glances at each other sharing unspoken communication

Flirtatious jabbing over a bad drawing

Defending each other from harm

Putting themselves at risk in defence of the other

A thinly veiled proposition

Genuine concern and care from a character that never appeared to care previously

Ridiculously over the top eye fucking

All of which adds up to further the audiences investment in the continued development of this relationship whether romantically or platonically and which therefore makes the break up in 1889 even more impactful.

The analysis continues for 1889 in part 6!

[aroacesigma]

YIPPEE ok . funni rhythm game . project sekai. its got miku . the only important background lore here is: there's kind of another world called "sekai" that is made from either strong emotions, or the shared will/dreams/desire/etc of a group. there are 5 units/groups/whatever. 2 of the sekais in the game were made by One Person. one's the clown group dw abt that. but Mafuyu !! fuyu made her own sekai. i thiiiiiink out of her desire to "disappear"?

anyway. mafuyu asahina. silly lil girlie. she is so depressed man. her mother sucks and is constantly pushing her to be the perfect straight-A student and train to be a doctor, and in public fuyu DOES put up that facade (in-game she has two very distinct voices - a more upbeat, happy one, and this very quiet, almost mumbley-one. in lives she'll use her Public Voice when talking to anyone that isn't of her unit)

so ! fuyu. she wants to make music. and train to be a nurse not a doctor. but her mother is super manipulative and controlling (and thats a theme you see across her cards too. in her first event she's literally depicted as a marionette for example) and really has no real control of her life. and then she meets Niigo. because kanade savior complex go brr

so. nightcord at 25:00, or niigo as they're called in the jp fandom, is made up of Kanade Yoisaki, Mizuki Akiyama, Ena Shinonome, and Mafuyu Asahina. they originally only know each other online (kanade finds fuyu thru her music which kanade notes is very dark and depressing, and later resolves to create a piece of music that will make mafuyu smile and bring back some joy into her life. tbh idk abt the other two i uh. am bad at reading lmao) but !! they talk on Nightcord (its discord) until they all meet in the Sekai. which is fucken EMPTY. there is NOTHIN THERE. and its Mafuyu's Sekai. so given the Empty Void that has been remarked upon that it's very easy to get lost and never find your way out .......yeah

so . as the events progress you get to see mafuyu come out of her shell more as she hangs out with niigo. her mom is. Not Happy (when is she ever smh) and in one event her mom even throws out her music equipment and laptop (iirc) claiming that it's a "distraction", and tells her to stop hanging out w/ niigo bc they're "bad influences" (or smth). mafuyu, obv, does Nyat do this and continues talking to the others.

a few events later mafuyu finally reaches her breaking point and stands up to her mother . and then promptly flees to live with kanade after everything she had to deal with. so now kanade & mafuyu live together ! but mafuyu rlly is making progress like despite it all, in newer cards/depictions you can even see light in her eyes !!!

but yeah shes . shes my silly. and so like. Gender to me. her and mizuki (canon transfem/nb person btw. go mizuki go!!!!!!!!) got a duet version of the song "Villain" which is literally abt bein fucken. trans. u can't just put the Canon Transgirl in with the Transmasc Vibes Character in a Song About Being Trans, man /j

i lov her tho shes doin her best. she kind of lost all sense of identity due to having to be what her mother wanted her to be, and niigo is slowly helping her figure out who she is, not who her mother wants her to be. its very nice

compared to the other stories niigo's is. way more deep and intense. but ! they all have their Things :3

anyway yeah im insane abt mafuyu asahina this has been my tedtalk i need to go to bed

OHHH she sounds awesome fuck yeah :) very glad that she is happier these days...love that . i really do need to play project sekai honestly i tried one time but i got too used to the enstars format for rhythym games and i sucked absolute balls at it. anyway gn bff <3

[lord-squiggletits]

Tbh I think no amount of discourse, rarepairs, unpopular takes, etc in fandom compares in terms of pain/annoyance level of liking something that everyone else actively hates.

Like, you can ignore discourse, curate your dashboard/social spaces, and block the shit out of people who like to argue and harass people. And also, you shouldn't be spending your fandom time engaging with people who annoy you anyways. Fandom is about fun, and if you engage with discourse you're ruining your own time by choice. Discourse and shit is only annoying if you engage in it or don't block it.

Shipping rarepairs or liking an obscure media kind of sucks because you have less content, but I'd say it's also a fun experience in its own way because when you DO find other people with the same interest, you tend to bond more closely and have more meaningful discussions since conversation about your shared interest is so rare.

But when you like something that everyone else hates? It fucking sucks because not only is there hardly anyone to talk to about what you like (as with rarepairs and obscure faves), wandering fandom spaces is like playing Minesweeper the way you could be minding your own business and then suddenly get slapped in the face with someone randomly going "and btw [character/show/ship/etc] fucking sucks and is stupid and cringe." People literally have a tendency to be talking about something they actually enjoy and then randomly add "unlike [hated thing] which sucks so bad."

I've literally had to withdraw from interacting with fandoms entirely because the hate for the thing I liked was so prevalent that I couldn't go into the character/media tag, or sometimes tags that weren't even about that unpopular character/ship/thing, without randomly running into hate for my favorite thing.

Feels bad, man.