#cuz that will FORCE me to take in narratives

[cartoon-skeleton]

im fucking fighting demons as if i didnt ACTIVELY CHOOSE to write and draw an entire comic, make a series of giant oil paintings, construct an elaborate idea for my senior project involving a human-size marionette and a live feed camera and an insane amount of portraits, take a class where i have to write a fucking play for the final, and take another class where i have to analyze 208083287 movies per week this semester. like how am i mad at anyone or anything other than myself LOL

[paper-mario-wiki]

What is your favorite bar from the myriad of good bars from Kendrick Lamar involving drake, i.e. Euphoria, Meet the Grahams, & Not Like Us?

note: when I say "Drake" I mean the constructed pop star. when I say "Aubrey" I mean the human being and actor behind the narrative that is "Drake".

Euphoria my favorite bar from this track is the whole "I'm the biggest hater" refrain. i like it because that singular section alone completely obliterated Taylor Made Freestyle. by paraphrasing the late DMX's famous quote about Drake, he is demonstrating how you can respectfully and powerfully use words from the mouths of dead predecessors to discredit your opponent, further showing how much of a stupid tactless clown-show popstar-turned-con-artist Aubrey Graham is in using the AI mockery of Tupac's voice to taunt Kendrick, the current voice of the West Coast and-- to many-- the people's successor to Pac.

6:16 in LA with a slightly lighter tone than the other disses, i consider this song to be a person to person sit-down and final warning to Aubrey that Kendrick is willing to provide. he explains that OVO is full of moles and wires, Aubrey is being hustled with nobody on his side, and going as far as saying "you can't sleep, these images trouble you" hinting at the fact that he would be going after Drake's personal failings that he thinks about when he goes home at night and stops being Drake. which he totally did in meet the grahams. also, bonus points to my favorite rhyme scheme in the song, just cuz it's so much fun to say:

Your lil memes is losin' steam, they figured you out The forced opinions is not convincin', y'all need a new route

like, what a perfect little two-bar rhyme scheme.

meet the grahams in this song, the most powerful lyrics to me (and the ones that usually make me start tearing up) are the ones where Kendrick stops being sorrowful and starts being angry.

You a body shamer, you gon' hide them baby mamas, ain't ya? You embarrassed of 'em, that's not right, that ain't how mama raised us Take that mask off, I wanna see what's under them achievements, Why believe you? You never gave us nothin' to believe in

this reminds me of every traumatic scolding i ever received as a child. i think that the word "disappointed" isn't strong enough to convey the feeling here. something closer would be "let down", because Kendrick's whole thing recently has been peace and uplifting people. he was willing to tolerate the competition for the game, but there were so many times that he warned Drake to not mention Kendrick's family. ultimately, in this stage of their careers, what they were fighting for was not fame or power, it was their legacy. they were fighting over how they were going to be remembered, and Kendrick was not about to let his pacifism make him passive in watching someone pretending to be a part of his culture stain how he will be written about in the records of Hip-Hop history. in specific, i love the line "take that mask off, i wanna see what's under them achievements" because he is BEGGING Audrey to respond honestly, as himself. he is begging him to cast off the facade of "Drake" and speak with any amount of dignity, because at this point there was no more room to speculate on whether or not he actually was who he claimed to be with regards to his music. at this point, the consensus was pretty thoroughly in the camp of "the actor Audrey Graham has been co-opting the image of the American Rapper for his career".

Not Like Us i think i love the bar "he has all eyes on me and imma send it up to Pac" because it goes back to the core of what this is about to Kendrick in fighting for legacy. the media, specifically the white dominated media, sucks the culture (that is to say, Black culture) dry for all it's worth monetarily, and in the process there have been many twisted caricatures or unfair narratives left in the wake of black creatives who are no longer alive to defend their own names. there's an entire tangent about how tabloids disproportionately affect black creatives due to the very fact that white supremacy discounts the respect these names have to the (largely un-melinated) higherups in hollywood, and as a result there is less PR dedicated to keeping their image clean, but i think im not qualified to go off on it. the point is, Drake disrespected Pac's legacy (and continues to do so by owning his ring, really, instead of having it be in the possession of someone who's at least from the west coast), and Kendrick wanted to put some honor on his name. he made sure that he was not just mentioned in the shameful (Taylor Made) and angry (euphoria) parts of this beef, but also its most triumphant moment.

[tizeline]

Bro that angst potential ur separated au is keeping me up at night. You've said since Mikey would be a powerhouse due to training at such an early age, would it be safe to assume that Leo & raph are too? They've been mastering their ninpo 4 years? And if yes then dam they must be tanks. Must be a force to be reckoned with the bros and drax being all chaotic. Did they start to train so early bcuz drax only saw them as soldiers n stuff? Drax sure must've softened over the years huh guess he couldn't handle the cute lil menaces lol. Is Donnie aware of his own ninpo yet? I'm imagining him going up against the others with all his cool tech and then they whip out this anime magic ass superpower out of nowhere. Like meeting others like u after years of thinking u were the only one must be at least baffling right, now it turns out magic is real too. And he's gonna have it too(Not to mention the bro bomb waiting to drop on his head). Would his insecurities rise after witnessing all that?

Sorry I just absolutely LOVE ur au friend, i have a ton of questions but ill hold it 4 ltr. I'm really excited to see where you take it :)) -🌾

Oh man, Anon, glad to see you so excited haha!

Just a heads up, I'm still figuring out the story of the AU, so I don't know all the specifics yet, but here are some of my thoughts. And also, this became a bit of a ramble, that's what you get when you send long asks lol /lh

The way I'm thinking how Draxum is gonna be like in this AU is that he didn't view himself as the turtles' father initially, not really because he only viewed them as mere tools for him to use, he always saw them as people with induviduality. But rather, he hadn't really connected the dots that creating children + raising said children = parenthood, which led to Draxum like a year after mutating the turtles having the sudden realization one day of "OH SHIT AM I A DAD!?" and having a mini crisis because of that.

Anyway, while I don't think Draxum is the perfect dad in this AU by any means, he does genuinely care about his kids. (If Mikey managed to win Draxum over in canon after having spent a whole season fighting each other, there's no way he'd care about Mikey any less in a scenario where they've been on the same side since day one like they have in this AU.) He started training the turles from an early age and they are expected to help him with his Definitely Not Evil World Domination Plan, but they are still allowed free time and hobbies and such. And aside from some "ugh I don't wanna train right now I wanna play vidya gaemes" occasionally, the turtles never really opposed the idea of them becoming Draxums super soldiers. Kids are really easily influenced and if your parent keeps telling you that you are the heroes who are gonna save the world from evil, chances are you're gonna latch on to that narrative without question. But after meeting Donnie and April, who knows, it might be what finally starts making the other turtles question if their cause really is as just as they think :) That being said, I still have to figure out how Draxum would react exactly to his sons starting to oppose his world view.

Then their abilities! I also have to do more reasearch into exactly how the magic system works in RoTMNT cuz uhhh it's a bit unclear sometimes. Anyway, ninpo is specifically the magic used by the Hamato clan, and considering Raph, Leo and Mikey weren't raised as Hamato I don't think they would have access to that specific type of magic (though I still think they'd be be able to possibly unlock it later down the line) They would still have access to yokai magic, and of course the mystic weapons that they stole in the show would just have been given to them in AU by Draxum. And oh yeah, the brothers are powerful. To be fair, Donnie was able to keep up with Draxum pretty well in the pilot episode, so he wouldn't be COMPLETELY outmatched by his brothers. His tech is powerful enough that he'd be able to put up a decent fight even if he lacks mystic powers himself but..... three against one? Yeah, Donnie isn't winning any time soon. The biggest advantage he'd have would honestly be that his brothers wouldn't really WANT to fight him cuz they'd be all like "Long Lost Brother™??? 😭😭😭 Please come home Long Lost Brother™ we love you!!! 😭😭😭"

And I think Splinter would have kept both of their origins secret initially like he did in the show, so Donnie would't have any ninpo either, but I also think Donnie would still learn about the whole Lou Jitsu and Genetically Modified Super Soldier thing earlier than in canon. And god, yeah, learning about all of that would definietly be A Lot, which is why I still need time to figure out Donnie's exact reaction sorry Anon you're gonna have to be patient XD

[femdomdiaries]

Kinktober “Day 2”: Roleplay

Sub!Satan x Reader Drabble

Warning/Desc: 700+ word drabble, electro stim, general narrative violence, 18+ nsfw content, hand job, sex toys, edging, bondage, dom/sub relationship, is gender neutral but mentions heeled boots

Synopsis: You and Satan roleplay as a dirty detective and a crime boss.

A/N: Took a bit longer but that’s cuz it’s a bit better than the first. Next one will likely be just as slow, if not slower bc i don’t have any ideas for it smh. And I call these drabbles cuz they don’t feel like fics but they also feel a bit too long for drabbles? Idk. Format later.

The heels of your boots click heavy against the linoleum, echoing through the dimly lit room, catching the attention of the blindfolded figure seated in the center. Frustration etches his face as he tugs pointlessly against his restraints, which have him completely bound to the chair. His voice trembles as he demands, "Who's there?"

You approach without a word, closing the distance until you're within arm's reach. When you're finally close enough, you run your fingers through his sweaty blond locks, feigning it as an affectionate touch before roughly yanking his head back. The resulting sound from him almost makes you break character. Almost.

"Do you know why you are here, detective?" You ask him, your voice taking on an authoritative tone. You move your free hand to slide his blindfold down and lift his chin, forcing him to look you in the eyes.

After locking gazes with you for just a tad bit longer than necessary, he jerks his face from your grasp. "What's the meaning of this, MC? I demand an explanation."

The dim lighting accentuates the eerie shadow cast across your face as you curl your lips into a sneer. "You don't get to make demands, traitor." When Satan's eyes widen in surprise, you nod affirmatively. "That's right. We've had eyes on you for a long time. Ever since Lucifer uncovered your little embezzling operation. Thought that was off the books, didn’t ya?"

Satan barely manages to stifle a laugh at your choice of backstory. You make a note to punish him a little extra for that.

"I haven't done anything," he retorts, voice laced with defiance, "You don't have any proof."

You respond with a skeptical raised eyebrow before sliding a hand beneath the waistband of your pants. His gaze fixates on you, and a flush gradually tinges his cheeks. "What are you doing?" he stammers, his voice betraying a hint of nervousness.

With deliberate slowness, you withdraw your hand, bringing with it a pack of meticulously rolled documents. His eyebrows furrow, and he starts to object, "Pockets have a purpose—"

"Silence, traitor." You slap him across the face with the rolled paper, earning a lip bite. "This is the proof. Documents, photos, all of it evidence of your crimes, of your betrayal."

You fail to hide your excitement, and Satan's eyes widen further, realization dawning on him. "...You've been planning this."

You shake your head and manage a disappointed expression. "I was hoping you'd come to your senses. I vouched for you time and time again but now it seems you've left me no choice."

Satan replies with resignation, "What are you going to do, kill me?"

"Unfortunately, you're of no use to me dead," you explain, moving with deliberate slowness as you circle around him, the echo of your footsteps only adding to the rising anticipation. Reaching the table behind him, you slide a sleek black briefcase towards you and pop open the clasp. You brush your hand over its contents, hand lingering on the arrangement of electro stim toys. "However," you continue, "your crimes will not go unpunished."

***

Satan whimpers as you stroke him again, flinching back when the shock transfers from your finger attachments to the shaft of his cock. Your other hand maneuvers a wand across his body, lingering on his chest and dancing around his nipples. Physically, he’s a mess. His demon form manifested involuntarily about four ruined orgasms ago, and now his tail lashes out aimlessly around the legs of his chair, mostly because he knows you’ll worsen the punishment if he tries to touch himself with it. His hair clings to the sweat coating his forehead, eyes once again blindfolded but failing to conceal the tears of frustration rolling down his cheeks.

When his breath gets irregular and he starts bucking his hips against the restraints, you pull back all at once. He cries out at the loss of touch and moans in discomfort, a sign that you have once again effectively ruined his orgasm.

With a predatory smirk, you lean in close, your breath hot against his ear. “How about this: I’ll let you go, but only if you can count up to the exact sum of money you embezzled. Starting at one and ending, hm, somewhere around a couple hundred thousand?”

Satan’s hips give one last weak thrust, which you discourage by slapping his cock and watching it bounce back against his abdomen. He whimpers. "Please, M-MC, I—I need to come. It hurts. I—"

You make a shushing sound, effectively quieting him. "You're breaking character, detective. Now let’s hear those numbers. One…" You start stroking him again.

[casscainmainly]

Just asking for fun cuz I think you being really interesting points abt so many of the bats to the table: who do you think should be Batman if 1) Bruce Died, 2) Bruce voluntarily steps down (old age / debilitating injury) or any other scenarios you would like to explore.

It's an age old question, it's fun to see who thinks what and what thoughts they bring to the table :)

Such a great question!! Though honestly I'm not sure I have any original or good thoughts haha. For me the Batman successor should be one of two people: Cassandra Cain (I am a Cass blog) or Dick Grayson.

For Cass the reason is obvious. So many people have written about how Batman is the culmination of her arc about agency and controlling her destiny - for a girl who was raised to be nothing, to be a tool for other people, becoming the centre of the narrative is an incredibly poignant and wonderful conclusion. She wants to be Batman, she has the ability to be Batman, she believes in Batman; she is as clear a successor as you could get.

Dick is more debatable. His feelings on being Batman have always been tangled up in his frustrations with Bruce, in a way Cass (who is more able, albeit imperfectly, to separate the man from the symbol) doesn't deal with. So I think there's some panels of him saying he doesn't want to be Batman, doesn't like doing it, etc.

However, in my mind he does like being Batman, he just doesn't like being Bruce's version of Batman. He comes to this conclusion in Gates of Gotham, and the back parts of Batman and Robin (2009) is basically him having fun once Bruce is alive. It was Bruce's death that made things difficult, not the mantle itself. Where Cass can be Batman now, Dick can elevate the mantle; and it's no secret that Bruce himself views Dick as his clear successor.

I honestly think both should wield the mantle. I love the idea of Cass being Gotham's Batman while Dick is the Justice League/wider world's Batman. This plays to their strengths, and solidifies their arcs: Cass finds a permanent home and a place she loves that loves her back, and Dick gets to travel again, using his leadership and interpersonal skills to save people.

In the case of Bruce's retirement, this would be the perfect set-up. For his death, though, I think it would be complicated by both Dick and Cass' grief. Look at the Batman Reborn era: the Dick and Cass parallels were actually insane. They were both told not to wield the Bat mantle - Dick by Bruce's message, and Cass by Bruce asking her to give Batgirl to Steph. This hurt them immensely, but they tried to follow Bruce's orders. The only difference was that Tim (and Jason) forced Dick's hand into disobeying Bruce, while Cass was already gone.

In an ideal world, Tim should've been asking them both to take up the mantle. His meeting with Cass in HK should've kickstarted her journey home, and she would've arrived back for angsty talks with Dick about who the Bat symbol belongs to or something. This basically happens in Gates of Gotham: Cass' conversation with Dick in the car is about not letting Gotham (and, I would argue, Bruce) dictate who they can or cannot be. They both want the mantle, and this was an acknowledgment that they both deserved it, too.

So, long story short, Cass and Dick are my picks for Batman successor. Them simultaneously being Batman would be so fun too, given their complicated relationship. They would be keeping score of who's the better Bat, and Cass would probably lob Dick out a window again, but they'd also have a shared understanding and deep compassion for each other's circumstances and desires. Curious to hear other people's thoughts!

(Also Duke Thomas should be their Robin but that's a post for another day).

[keplercryptids]

I know this was posted like. a week ago. but as someone thinking of running a forged in the dark game I would love to see your homebrew xp mechanics

hell yeah! so let me start by saying, forged in the dark games (at least, the two i've played, blades in the dark and scum and villainy) are designed to be run either 1. in campaigns with a maximum of 12-20 sessions, OR 2. in campaigns where you're running through characters frequently and telling a story of the crew as a collective, rather than focused on a specific group of characters. so if you do either of those things, i don't think you actually need to tweak the xp.

i am a longwinded bitch lmao and i also prefer running campaigns that don't switch out PCs often. so the rapid xp acquisition of these games is. troublesome. i've actually very recently decided to simply hand out milestone xp (which is what i did when i ran d&d 5e). basically, every few jobs, when something narratively Big happens, i'll give the players [x] amount of xp. but! i did come up with these narrative xp rules, which i like and i'm having fun with, so for now, any xp the players accrue by making desperate rolls will be added to their narrative xp bank to spend in the following ways:

(under a readmore cuz it's long!)

Narrative XP

At the end of each job, the maximum amount of XP that can be used for character advancement is 50% of the XP gained that session, rounding up. This is called Advancement XP. The remaining XP is called Narrative XP.

When Narrative XP is spent to increase or reduce a clock, 1 XP = 1 tick. Personal Narrative XP can be spent on campaign clocks, personal clocks, connection clocks, long-term projects or resolving traumas, as described below. With the exception of campaign clocks, any given clock can only be affected by 1 Narrative XP, per player per session.

At a player’s discretion, Character Advancement XP may be spent as Narrative XP, with the same restrictions as above.

CAMPAIGN CLOCKS

Throughout the campaign, there will be clocks tracking organizations’ goals, external forces outside the scope of the PCs’ sphere of influence, or events looming on the horizon. During downtime, these clocks can be increased or reduced by the use of Narrative XP. This is almost always going to be a meta decision made by the players and GM, rather than anything the PCs are doing within the fiction (though there may be some exceptions - talk it out!). The progress of campaign clocks can also be leveraged as Devil’s Bargains during play. There is no limit to how much XP can be spent on a campaign clock per downtime.

PERSONAL CLOCKS

Each PC can accrue personal clocks, tracked on your character sheet, that reflect potential complications, goals, or outcomes affecting your character. During downtime, Narrative XP can be used to increase or reduce ticks on these clocks (maximum 1 XP per clock per downtime). To use Narrative XP this way, describe or roleplay a scene to illustrate what your character is doing to affect the clock in question.

CONNECTION CLOCKS

[note: this text is taken basically word-for-word from Beam Saber by austin ramsay - a really cool game i haven't gotten to run yet! check out beam saber if you're interested in sci-fi forged in the dark games!]

The crew sheet contains separate 4-tick Connection Clocks for each other member in your crew, representing your character’s relationship with that crewmate. Make a belief about that crewmate for each tick on that clock (checking in with that player when you do). When the Connection Clock fills, ask the target crewmate for a truth about one of the beliefs tied to them, then reset the clock to 1 tick as you see them in a new light. When a Connection Clock resets, erase all the previous beliefs you had about that crewmate and write a new one related to the truth you just learned—it’ll take time and effort to understand them again.

A belief is a brief statement about how a character feels about another crewmate. Beliefs are simple, quick, and influential in the rapport between the two crewmates. However, the players need to remember that their beliefs are not necessarily true as they are based on incomplete information and gut instinct. A good belief is:

Something a character might say about their crewmate to a confidante.

Easily summarized, so that it can be quickly remembered when relevant.

Potentially true.

Suitable for the game’s setting and tone.

Something the player is interested in exploring.

During downtime or free play, Narrative XP can be used to add a belief and tick a Connection Clock with another crewmate (maximum once per session). To use Narrative XP this way, your character must have a one-on-one scene with a crewmate, which challenges their perception of their crewmate, and/or shows a new side of them, and/or during which the characters bond in a significant way. After this, spend 1 XP to tick the Connection clock with that character, and gain a new belief (see above).

LONG-TERM PROJECTS

During downtime, you may spend 1 XP to add a tick to a long-term project clock (maximum 1 tick per clock).

RESOLVING TRAUMAS

[note: there isn't a way in the rules as written to resolve traumas, but being able to do so is important to me, so i included this as a way to use narrative xp.]

When you gain a trauma, start a 6-tick Trauma clock on your character sheet. During downtime or free play, Narrative XP can be used to tick a Trauma clock (maximum once per session). To use Narrative XP this way, describe or roleplay a scene to illustrate what your character is doing to work on resolving their trauma. Once a trauma clock has been filled, you may remove that trauma from your character sheet.

[franki-lew-yo]

An 'A-ha!' fandom moment, ft. The Owl House

These comments I screencapped from a user I watch elsewhere really hit like a brick in the face to me. I'm blotting out OP's name, mostly cuz this was just a shower thought they had rather than any meaningful open discussion with people, but it ended up making me realize something (also NO they're not some contrarian AntiSJW type or even hate TOH; they're a very gay+trans writer themselves. Sorry if youknowwhoyouare sees this and recognizes ur posts but you don't allow reblogs or comments and I wanted to present it on my own):

The Owl House was always hampered by being killed halfway through, writing wise and that will always be it's greatest 'sin'. However, OP's comment made me realize how much the show kind of tells you it's characters are flawed rather than actually give them arcs to suggest it, especially in season 1. When I say flawed I don't mean lacking quirks that are relatable but human: Eda is a recluse criminal; King thought he could kill people and acted like it; Luz is a genki girl; Amity starts off as a bully; Hunter...is unfortunately Hunter, ect. Those ARE flaws, character wise, but in the presence of the complete story (as complete as the show will ever be) they really aren't actually flawed, bad people in anyway.

Before I go further, two things: 1, IN ALL FAIRNESS, this is why myself and others particularly LOVE the characters and why TOH was a comfort show for me rather than a 'high-tension narrative'. The characters are a lot of what you want and hope to be like and I think that's really sweet and enjoyable, especially for horror and especially for kids.

2, NO! I DON'T think any particular bad faith cartoon reviewer opinions about coddling certain characters and punishing others IS WHAT DANA and co did at all here! Steven Universe and certain crap-reviewer's takes ON Steven Universe and how it's characters were flawed but overly forgiven by the fandom the show itself are NOT the b-all end-all of this discussion, nor are they the reason The Owl House is the way it is!

The context op was talking about was how in the upcoming hate crime The Last Airbender live-action show the showrunners are going to tone down Sokka's sexism because they think it's 'unlikable'. Even though, we all knew as children that this was an arc for him and it was WRONG, so axing it because we the audience lack nuance to recognize characters we love doing problamtic-sisms is BEYOND annoying.

Op's point is how The Owl House in particular doesn't actually expect much or want much out of it's characters. Or audience. For any infighting early on about how much Amity should 'die' because of reasons, that's really just fandom infighting when you get right down to it. There's nothing on par with the disagreement people have over, say, the Diamonds from Steven Universe and how Steven 'totally forgave them or 'should have murdered them in cold blood' about The Owl House. And like...from a fandom point of view that's good, but otherwise the show is pretty concrete the way you're supposed to see certain characters vs other shows which allow you to make up your own mind.

Avatar, Star vs the Forces of Evil (pre finale), Centaurworld and Amphibia all showcase your protagonists being genuinely, intensely flawed. Sure, maybe some neckbreather crap-pseudocritic complains that they 'made the unlikable' or whatever (i.e. me with Friendship is Magic) but overall the actual point is HOW the characters actually have grown and have ended up with the ending and morality they need. The villains, no not Zukos or 'redeemed' villains who joined the protagonist squad, VILLAIN-villains, will always be at least one serious step behind the protagonists and that's what give the protagonists the cautionary wherewithal to end them like they should and not 'be like them'. It's such a fufilling narrative, there's a reason people like it so much because it's really good when it's delivered well.

Removed from my fandom gaze; the Owl House feels like it's saying it has that ultimate messaging and character arc when it actually doesn't. Your protagonists have the endearing aspirational-part totally covered, but as far as the actual 'edge' and nuance? Well...

Eda is, at most, naughty. She really isn't any kind of morally sidetracked character. She's an outlaw because literally her society is awful to her and she's in the right to be against it. She's cursed but she's not addicted to her potions or hiding it or not really taking care of herself or her loved ones because of it. Her actual biggest flaw is that she's been 'running away' from problems rather than dealing with them, but I'd be lying if that wasn't suggested more than it's actually portrayed; or at least, dealt with fast enough in "Eda's Requiem". A bigger issue I see, even if it's what's also endearing about her, is that she REALLY isn't a flawed caregiver at all. It's portrayed as her most redeeming feature that she's otherwise a good mom and mentor, but Eda having virtually no problems in raising Luz and King just, again, makes her feel ONLY aspirational. All of the angst about 'failing' to parent and making up for it is moved all onto Camilla and sadly all of that angst for her is mostly within an already bloated episode. Eda, while an absolute mood, lacks any real kind of edge. Does she need it or not? I don't know. Discuss, kids.

Luz, like OP says, is treated like this high-energy super-optimist. She's like Star Butterfly in that her fangirlism and impulsivness are supposed to get her in trouble. But, she absolutely just isn't one when you break it down. Besides episode 2, Luz really is never that inconsiderate or lost in her fantasies ever again throughout the show. She never has anything like what Steven goes through where he hops into Larz' body and makes things worse for people by trying to fix things- which is not only good filler but it calls forward to the ultimate ending of Steven's arc for the series - Luz is just sort of adorable. Luz has blindsided by hype moments of weakness, like when she accidentally hurts Owlbert or messes with Amity's secret room, but still always level headed and down-to-earth. Her impulses are always kind of treated like...excusable? Because, again, they usually are. This is a large part about what makes her self-hatred at the end of the show about accidentally helping Belos' feel 'forced'. Even MOREso than what Hunter and Daddy Titan explain about Belos using her, we the audience never see Luz's choice to go back in time and try and get answers from Philip as being anything other than just, you know, logical. Because it is. The show acts like what Luz did was reckless and bad and that she was SOOO overtaken by her fangirlism about Philip and now just how much she has to live with the guilt and regret of helping being duped by him...it just doesn't come off that way at all. She was only so much excited about meeting him and her interest was getting home to her mother. In terms of comparing her to Philip, that's all fine and good, but again it's not 'flawed'. Not really, anyway.

Lilith absolutely has it the worst...but I kinda think people know that. She arguably does have the most morally-gray turning point in the show given what she did to her own sister. But neither the characters nor her nor the show really hold her accountable in any lasting way for cursing Eda. Lilith is the closest we get to that 'Diamond'-dilemma. She does 'make things right way too quickly and it's obvious to even her biggest fans that her character is really rushed in this area. They lampshade what Lilith did and that she was their villain in season 2 and 2B, but lampshading isn't the same thing as progress. As a result, as a Lilith fan you kind of never really forgive her for what she did. None of that's her fault, cause' you know...she doesn't exist, but it makes it frustrating that you the fan watching the show is doing the heavy-lifting in your mind in this area.What you come away from is this feeling of loving the characters for being able to work everything out. They're engaging and nuanced in theory, but you also feel robbed, w or w/o the Disney interference, of them being fully rounded or WHOLE. It kinda feels like 'and suddenly, he wasn't racist, anymore' all the time with every character ever with except Amity's mom, the Titan Trappers and Belos.

The reason everyone dunks on Star vs the Forces of Evil's finale, (besides being salty over ship wars and declaring THAT'S the reason for the drop in quality) is that 'Cleaved' could have not only worked but REALLY worked. It just needed to be better written and processed as an ending. Instead people reviled Star, the protagonist we're supposed to be rooting for, for what feels like impulsive apathy and cruelty towards everyone else by destroying magic, as opposed to it being an actually selfless sacrifice that makes her different than Toffee. Ultimatley, I do prefer The Owl House, unfinished as it is, to any of that. But yeah... I can now never unsee the characters as being what they are: fun but indulgent when they're supposedly complex. Indulgent is never bad u guys, but the problem is when you only have that to go on while insisting you have fully developed characters, there's a lot of the show telling you how to feel and how to come away from it rather than letting you, the audience, make of that yourself. As annoying as fan-wars can be over this stuff and when people are either WAAAY to forgiving of their villain blorbo or form hate-campaigns over Glub Shitto for ruining their life, it is ultimately a good thing that shows give you that chance to really see the characters that way at all.

The Owl House is, as OP calls it, "tumblr feels" not for being gay and magical and fun and wholesome and indulgent like that stuff is GREAT. It feels 'tumblr oriented' in that it all kind of feels too easy even when it's not for your protagonists. It's never actually "challenging". I guess, in as far as 'good' indulgence is concerned, it's as warm and fuzzy and a happy AU fanfic you found but not so much the Pacifist Ending of Undertale where you really do feel bad if you rectify the good ending in anyway. It's fun and it's comfort food, but not entirely lasting as you want it to be???

Amphibia, I think, was also way better than Owl House in this respect. It wasn't perfect cause nothing is but you really got a feeling for HOW flawed Marcy, Sasha, the townsfolk and even Hop Pop throughout their arcs-- which made it so SO rewarding to see them get their happy endings and come together to defeat the core and be the better people they needed to become.

The Owl House is my favorite where I think Amphibia is the better of the two.

[kingsandbastardz]

@riderofspades

TROPE 1:

1st one is definitely has to be sharing a bed. Because they actually do. But that sort of repeated and forced contact of being really tight roommates means a lot of 'playing nice' that we don't see on camera. I have like 5 different scenarios in my head surrounding that - but all of them still have the same element of Fang Duobing being either talkative just because he has company. Or being a sleep octopus. I 100% strongly believe he moves around in bed and will latch onto whatever is nearby so that's been a big consistent point in my headcanons. But dfs' reactions are where things become varied. On one hand, I like the idea where he's accepting of it because a) he honestly doesn't mind because his ego goes to very specific places and that damn upper floor does not have walls and he's cold b) Accepts it because of peculiarities surrounding his concept of physical boundaries - like maybe he's ok with it because he used to sleep in piles with the 3 kings and wuyan cuz they were poor as shit and it got cold at night and he just sees this as being part of the same. OR maybe he's touch starved and this is a bit of stolen affection that he can privately keep for himself. OR maybe he sleeps like a log and just doesn't notice because he either trusts fdb that much or just doesn't see him as a threat at all, even subconciously. c) he doesn't accept it but can't figure out how to get fdb to stop since he's asleep. And it creates continued shenanigans until he finally gives up and lets it happen Whether this ends up in a case of aggressive "Competitive sleep" where he ends up kicked onto the floor -- that's another matter LMAO but I tend to find these sorts of accidental/harmlessly forced intimacy pretty fun. You can't stay emotionally distant from someone if you're cuddling every night.

But that leads me to TROPE 2:

Enemies to lovers - but this would be strictly from FDB's pov bc I don't believe DFS ever sees FDB as an enemy. Even early on, he was fairly careful with him (for dfs' level of care which is still rough lbr) -- and he just got more and more bro-y as time went on until he started exhibiting that care more obviously. FDB however has this whole built up mental narrative in his head where he sees himself cast as the hero, and DFS is the big evil demon guy - even to the end, he still buys into the narrative because LLH keeps so much information from him. All the things we discover about dfs is filtered through LLH's silence. FDB hears none of it. Like take the scene where dfs shows up to give llh the styx flower? And fdb says to llh - hey he's giving up his dream for you. Because as far as he knows, dfs hasn't broken through to the next level of his martial arts yet. He doesn't know that dfs was caught/almost-or-temporarily died, tortured, etc. He doesn't even know that DFS was searching for the flower for llh. The situation I like to think about are when he's finally pushed into a situation where he has to apply his natural protective instincts -- but onto dfs instead of llh. Who... is prone towards getting in over his head due to narrative-karma being shit-tier. (I have a whole meta about that I've been stewing over) But basically dfs getting into trouble is a given. lmao. The issue is his tendency to not talk about things. Fdb, unlike llh, can't read dfs' mind and requires actual verbal communication. DFS doesn't really communicate like regular people do. But honestly, that's all technicalities. I like playing with gender roles and DFS being cast as the damsel in distress or the female-narrative-role is really fantastic. So having that played out with fdb in his self-cast hero role, falls naturally into that. Especially as llh's successor.

Which then brings me to TROPE 3:

FDB as llh's successor where he inherits the house, the dog, the sparkly underwear, and the wife nemesis. I mean. The first thing FDB tries to do is get dfs to call him shifu. And later, the first thing llh does to a-fei is to get him to call him 主人. Like master, like disciple, amirite? But it's like their immediate instinct is to try to keep him. And in his letter at the end, llh was telling dfs he can go to fdb if he wants. I took that as an indirect message from llh to fdb with a giant arrow pointing at dfs saying "KEEP AN EYE ON HIM, HE'S YOUR RESPONSIBILITY NOW"

AU TROPE

Something time travel or timeloop related because I like the idea of FDB being forced to truly learn the real stories of the people and events around him and not the story-version he taught himself. He truly understands llh -- because llh was his special interest, but he drastically lacks understanding of everyone else. Which is especially interesting regarding dfs because he's painted as the main nemesis to llh? You'd think that fdb's hyperfixation would partially extend to him bc he's llh's big enemy. But that never happened. I think it's no mistake that fdb's conversation with a-fei in the zombie village uses such broad terms like "You don't have to chose evil you can be righteous" -- all meaningless words because he has zero knowledge or understanding of dfs as a real person existing in real society. He only knows of him as this storybook figure of great 'evil'. Without him even thinking too hard about what that evil could be. It's just the word 'evil' flying around in his head with no real weight. I feel like time shenanigans forcing him to address that lack of knowledge or understanding would open up some interesting story potential. Also I really like the whole gaining knowledge thing. It's one of the reasons I like thrillers and mysteries -- finding out and understanding a person is like a personal version of puzzle solving.

[sneezemonster15]

If sakura and hinata were redeemed in naruto, would anyone even care? I feel as if I wouldn't care much, especially for sakura, cuz they've done too much. I think I would still hate them and some others wouldnt buy it.

I mean, say like Sakura was redeemed all of a sudden in boruto, would that be enough to overcome how she she treated other's throughout all the story? Especially Sasuke. Would redeeming her be enough to overcome how she harasses him all the time? Would it be enough to overcome how she chased sasuke and gave him a child he never wanted? Like she gets redeemed and goes "oops, I know you never wanted this but I'm sorry now and I'm a changed person, won't happen again." Like the damage is done, she's harassed him and chased him till he gave in, how can you better yourself after you've gotten what you wanted? redeeming can't reverse that damage. Or how she treated Naruto "sorry for being a bully and hitting you for no reason but I'm changed now, won't do it again." Apart from narusaku audience, which audience is gonna buy that? Like it's unconvincing she would get redeemed and then would apologize to naruto as it just so happens to be when he's hokage and she's got her prize Sasuke. Or for ino she gets redeemed and apologises for how she treated her, but it unconvincing because sakura has won Sasuke, so she and ino aren't fighting over him anymore.

Or for Hinata,"S..so...sorry n.nn....naruto-kun for guilt tripping you to marry me, I.. I.. I won't do it again, I'm better and changed." Like, he's already married to her and started a family. It's not going to mean much?

Based of the ask someone sent abt if it's possible Sakura and hinata could get redeemed. Like you've said in your reply, anyone can get redeemed, but I feel like it would be unconvincing or at the least, take a lot of work to redeem these two. This is just my opinion I could be wrong.

But that's the thing. If Sakura and Hinata were redeemed in Naruto, it would have meant something significant, and it would have contributed to the narrative and plot, because if the plan were to redeem them, then logically Naruto and Sasuke would be made to get together at the end. Look at what Sakura and Hinata represent. Two heteronormative selfish, entitled, unsympathetic, boy crazy girls who would potentially make into women who would force gay men to marry them to keep their illusions of love afloat. They don't give a shit as long as they get what they want, even at the expense of their spouses' well being or their own long term happiness. It was necessary for them to be written that way to facilitate the Brokeback Mountainesque situation in Boruto, no? What with the whole story being a love story and Sakura and Hinata as tools that were used to keep Naruto and Sasuke prisoners to their miserable lives, life of a shinobi who is supposed to live in the darkness, enduring all the misery silently. It's not the kind of world that will accept them, certainly not Naruto, someone who was systematically and institutionally ostracized, an orphaned, homosexual boy who is fated to be THE person in the world that will change it for the better. And this was the only way to resolve this story, in order for it to justify the new gen story, hence becoming the tragic ending that we hate. So the antipathy towards these ladies never got resolved. However, in order for their redemption to happen in the manga, a lot of things would need changing. Like the state of the shinobi world. A lot of things would need changing if Sasuke and Naruto were written to finally get together. Yes, the ending as it is now feels contrived. It is contrived. But it is not meaningless. The shinobi world has been established as a cruel world, where people don't get what they deserve. Look at Haku, look at Madara, look at Kisame, look at Neji, Sasuke, Naruto, Uchiha clan. And those who get it, don't deserve it. Look at Sakura, look at Hinata, look at Sarutobi, look at Tobirama, look at Danzo, look at village elders.

I agree with you that it won't matter if they were redeemed in Boruto. Boruto is not about the boys, they are supporting characters in it. Their story was Naruto and Shippuden. Which is over. And obviously, Kishi made it a point post Shippuden to keep Hinata and Sakura's the same as before, so it doesn't look like he is planning to redeem them. Looks like status quo would persist in the distant future.

However, it could have been done in Shippuden. And like I said in the other post you mentioned, anyone can be redeemed in a show and it is all believable as long as the writer justifies it within the story itself. I used the example of Orange is the new black, because it shows a whole host of complex characters, deeply flawed and yet realistic characters who were written to justly finish their redemption arc. Take Maria's character, a secondary antagonist in the story. Maria is quiet and shy as a kid but given her circumstances, she transforms into a take charge dynamo of a person, very impressive and self assured, she takes after her religious leader/drug trafficker father, who can charm the masses and lead them. She steals from her place of work, she cheats on her husband, she doesn't feel any regret about it. She gets caught and is sentenced for fraud. She works her way in the prison, but navigating the prison life brings out the worst in her, she eventually becomes the leader of the prison riot. She becomes a full fledged bully, a sadist, she has no ethical compass anymore. This leads to her stint in the max security prison, where she is made to eat the humble pie, she learns that life could get even harder, and the choices she has been making has been leading her into even deeper shit, away from her daughter that she loves so much, away from her friends that were her family in the prison. She joins the church, she makes amends to people she has harmed. Her redemption arc is shown throughout the last two seasons, by the end of which, she makes the least destructive of all choices, she apologizes to Gloria, her close friend whom she betrayed, and lets her loving and kind husband to marry the woman he loves, her husband whom she treated very unkindly in the past, despite him being so devoted to her. She agrees to let her husband marry another woman, a woman he loves genuinely, because for once, she thinks about her husband, and not herself. She commits a selfless act.

There were many instances where Sakura was written with a possibility to demonstrate maturity. The reason why Kishi wrote those scenes that way was that, when a character does something decidedly immature at a place or time where the opportunity was so damn ripe to do something mature, and doesn't do it despite everything that has happened before in the plot which had led to the current situation, the character loses credibility in the eyes of the audience. Audiences aren't foolish. Any good writer knows this. The way Kishi wrote Sakura's scenes, stresses even more on the fact that her character simply didn't evolve. Remained the same. That's what narrative motifs are about. This way, the reader is able to glean the meaning out of the scene, as intended by the author easily. It makes the impression the author wants his writing to make. Kishi made it quite clear that the reason why Naruto followed Sasuke was to save him and help him, to relieve his loneliness, to protect him. To be there for him, because he loves Sasuke and he KNOWS Sasuke reciprocates his feelings, even if he makes excuses to hide them, actions speak louder than words. As is evidenced in vote one especially. Sakura was written to chase after Sasuke for her own selfish reasons, where she simply ignores the need to know the truth about Uchiha massacre or any wish to actually know or understand Sasuke. Which Sasuke is clearly shown to understand about her. That's why he keeps telling her that she is annoying, just casually, an off the cuff remark lol. But when Naruto follows him, he gets very reactive, very disturbed, very distracted. Because he knows why Naruto is doing it, he suspects it. He keeps asking Naruto why because he wants to get confirmation from Naruto. Which he gets at the end. Point is, Sakura was shown to be selfish till the end, starting with part one, and then in the kage arc, war arc, just before vote two, at the end when she responds to Sasuke's apology as if she deserved it all along, and then asks if Sasuke would take her on his redemption journey. And then in Boruto and Gaiden.

Naruto on the other hand is shown as the one who is ready to share Sasuke's burdens and die with him in the same scene where Sakura tried to stab Sasuke in the back.

If you truly have conviction in your love, if you know that you love for the right reasons and if you truly care about your object of love, you would do things very differently from what Sakura did to Sasuke consistently in the manga. And all of it was shown to be done by Naruto. Who knows he loves for the right reasons, he would be a fool in love but not leave Sasuke's side because that's how much he believes, they resonated with each other even when they didn't know how to articulate it, they were both lonely. Naruto believes in his love for Sasuke and he knows Sasuke loves him, because he showed it to Naruto, with actions more than words. Naruto changes, he evolves in the course of the manga, he becomes better in every aspect, because he is constantly inspired by the memory of Sasuke, because of the motivation of protecting him and being his rock.

True love is courageous. True love doesn't hide behind empty words and excuses. True love justifies the words that have been said by the lovers. True love doesn't say the words and then take them back in the face of adversities. True love makes it happen despite the odds. That's the glory of true love. That's why it inspires us. That's why Sasuke was convinced by Naruto and not anyone else at the end. Sakura was given all the chances and suggestive realisations but still no redemptive action. Same with Hinata. She realises she is being selfish when jumping in the fight against Pein but she does it anyway because she couldn't help being attracted to Naruto and needed to make an impression on him at the expense of the whole village and Naruto's life, followed by getting trolled by Kishi when Sakura hugs Naruto in front of her. Still no redemptive action. Not even in the war arc when Neji died.

If you can make it believable, anyone can be redeemed, just need to justify it properly. And of course, it won't be an isolated event, it would influence the plot and characters that are connected with them.

Like for example, think about a character such as Oro. He was written to be dreaded, reviled, to cause shivers down the spine, and nervousness, to create a feeling of unease and anticipation, right? Because he is cruel and an evil genius, he is always a step ahead of his opponent, he is clever as a fox. But even he was redeemed. And no, the idea of his redemption was not just at the end when he supported the war efforts. The feeling of antipathy towards him went once he confronts the dead kages in the war arc and supports Sasuke. All through Shippuden, the audience is made to see how none of the adults in their world even attempts to understand Sasuke's predicament and given the amount of focus Kishi spent on making the readers understand Sasuke's tragic past, it makes you feel frustrated to see how no one in the plot tries to even understand Sasuke's side.

This was Kakashi.

Even though Kakashi is shown to acknowledge that Sasuke has truly suffered given his past, he still doesn't understand him. And Sasuke's attitude towards him doesn't improve till the end. At best, he becomes close to indifferent to Kakashi at the end. It's all understandable because it makes sense, because Kakashi has already been established as a complacent and unquestioning tool of the shinobi system. He is emotionally inept and doesn't understand his own team members. And he thinks Naruto and Sasuke are just rivals while Sakura's love for Sasuke has matured, she really loves Sasuke, a girl who is kind and gentle. Lol.

This was Itachi, but who's surprised? Itachi is the definition of tool of the system.

With Itachi, Sasuke tries his best to express his frustration with the system that was evidently so deeply unfair, he tried to explain where his anger came from, which is all very justified. He appeals to Itachi's love for him, and Itachi admits he was wrong to treat Sasuke as a blank canvas, as a kid who didn't understand the world. We again get to see yet another adult, someone who is this close to Sasuke, not understand Sasuke's predicament. Despite Sasuke's desperate attempts. Even Sasuke gets it at the end that there's no point explaining anything further to Itachi, he is brainwashed to the hilt. But he was still Sasuke's brother, and he did take the blame for being the reason why Sasuke was the way he was. But the audience is left frustrated nevertheless. After all this build up to show how cruel Danzo was and how the elders and Sarutobi were complicit in the massacre, we still see them regarding it lightly, as if it is an everyday event. And it compounds our frustration.

No cost is big enough for the apparent safety of Konoha, as per Danzo, but we all know Danzo did it for personal gain, his megalomania, the power hungry despot in him who traded power for hate and destroyed a whole clan like so many stray animals. Danzo was basically a hypocrite. A lot of characters were, in the name of Konoha.

This was Sakura.

After which she promptly made a plan to go kill Sasuke and attempted it.

And then there were others.

No one really cared. Except Naruto of course, shown in kage arc.

Oro is the only adult who supports Sasuke and says something that all the sane audiences have been wanting for someone to say. Someone reliable, someone who would make sense of it, someone who would reassure us that we weren't crazy, that whatever we are feeling is justified. Kishi is not blind to it either, but he needed to set up this world as deeply unfair, and he was going for eternity apparently, lol, which is why nothing really changed much even after Shippuden. None of these characters were redeemed, the ones that never understood Sasuke.

We are clearly shown by Kishi why it was that Oro changed his decision, he was not interested in participating in the war at all, his objectives were in no way benefited from the war. He was interested in Sasuke and even when he is reincarnated by Sasuke, he is still after Sasuke's body. But Sasuke had his own reasons to have brought back Oro and he tells him, Oro is intrigued. He is concerned so he tells Sasuke to not get embroiled, but Sasuke lets him know he can handle it and that he isn't a child. Sasuke shows agency. He is determined, there's a mature look to him, a certain calm strength of will. He realized what Sasuke has been through, he who understands Sasuke's motivation very well. He knew Sasuke went through hell, to be able to kill Itachi, and then he was told the truth about him, he was manipulated even by him, as he himself admits, but he can see that Sasuke has changed, grown. And this convinces Oro to help him, who is now invested in Sasuke's future, even if he doesn't particularly benefit from it. In the scene when all the dead kages are brought back, we are waiting to see what will happen with baited breath, it's a big deal. The crescendo is building and building, big credit to Oro who kept goading and goading, putting all those thoughts in words that we were thinking all along.

"It's really not that complex a jutsu....". He tells it like it is with such dry wit and sharp sarcasm, he trolls Tobirama and how. Hahahah. He calls him out left and right and it is then reiterated by Hashirama. Full entertainment guaranteed. He unequivocally takes Sasuke's side and he doesn't have a hidden agenda anymore. He threatens to destroy Konoha himself lol. He threatens all the kages, all the leaders of Konoha, people who made very bad decisions. He genuinely wants to see the way Sasuke's wind would blow. And when he feels Sasuke's life is being threatened by Tobirama, he positions himself for retaliation and is ready to protect Sasuke.

Sasuke resonates with Oro. Even though Oro was portrayed as a ruthless, mad genius, cruel and manipulative villain, whose past (childhood) was suggested to be equally unfair, but who has been hunting our favourite characters, harming them, torturing them, of course he was reviled by readers. But then, he is made to do the one thing no other adult could do. And it suits him very well. He is one who wanted to get all the victims of this unfair world together and make his own village, he was a non conformist, he was the outlier, someone who understands the ways of this world very well and takes advantage of it for his own benefit without regret, he refused to pander to the shinobi world's ways, he decided to make his own. It suited him to go his own way, being disinterested in war and to root for something/someone he was interested in. Sasuke. He puts his hand where his mouth is. Unlike others, he is not a hypocrite. He has seen wars too closely and he knows what it does to people. All the collateral damage. Sasuke is able to relate with Oro. This is what redeemed Oro, to whatever extent he has been redeemed to. Of course it doesn't make all his other actions alright, but it does soften our impression of him and we lose the edge of antipathy towards him.

And this was done properly. It was made to look believable. You are right, it takes work. The ladies' redemption doesn't mean anything now, in Boruto. It could have meant something back then, but Kishi wasn't going for it in any case.

[blood-choke]

Hi, I have a question about mc

So, I’m still in the beginning part of chapter two (mostly because I keep pausing to read other variations of my options I choose instead of just playing the game uninterrupted lol); and I was just wondering about some things.

I’ve gone through most asks on her about V and the way she treats mc when mc doesn’t go her way and I sort of understand her aggressiveness though it’s still triggering as I’ve not really seen the good parts, cuz my mc doesn’t trust her and finds her secretive nature suspicious; but I wonder like, was mc a bad person before entombment?

Like obvi everyone isn’t black and white and has grey areas in personality, but in the beginning Val just seems so triggered (?) that mc is alive again and here again with her. She only seems chill when you pick options that align with what she wants, but outside that, she seems truly disturbed like she needs to take a breather or sth.

This also came to mind cuz of how Hana talks about us TO us. Like saying how she expected us to not be like Val and her seeming disappointed that we were similar to Val, in that scene were we discover phones for the first time. Like, is that just cuz of the choice that prompted her jealousy, or is that because of how mc was a person before?

I hope I constructed those questions well lol, but it just makes me wonder if certain ways they react towards the mc are just cuz of how they are a people or cuz of how mc was as a person. Cuz it seems like she and Val had a pretty turbulent relationship; was that due to their personalities or the times they were in? I feel like that’ll be answered as the story goes on, but yeah; I do wonder if mc’s previous personality majorly influences how H and V act towards us.

this is not solely directed at you anon but i have gotten a lot of asks that essentially boil down to "who is the Correct one in this situation" and i've been kinda vague or ignoring the messages because it goes against the whole point of the story, but i've received enough questions like this i'm just going to do a blanket response to explain what my intention is with writing this and why there will be no straight answers to most of these questions.

i'll put it under a cut because it's going to be long (and i guess if you want to avoid potential spoilers). i'm not going to get into details, mainly just the overarching themes that i'm trying to communicate through the narrative and with characters like the mc and Valentina.

first, to start, let me talk about Valentina:

Valentina is written in a very intentional way. she is meant to be erratic and hypocritical and not very nice. she is hundreds of years old, and at this point nearly the entire last century of her life was spent in a controlling, abusive relationship. she is going to be both defensive and aggressive because she's still in a lot of pain and struggling to work through it. she has trust issues, she thinks everyone is using her for her money, she is very paranoid and sensitive. she, as the kids say, needs therapy. this does not absolve her of her poor treatment of Hana and the mc currently, but i hope this explains it better. she is meant to be a polarizing and challenging character.

i've said a few times now that you are never going to know who is telling the truth about Standard, you're never going to get a moment in game where it tells you exactly who is Right or Wrong. i've written Valentina the way i have because yes, you are supposed to doubt her, but also i'm a bit astounded by how many people seem to just have no sympathy for her at all (again not directed at you anon but just in general.) while you're never going to know if it was her idea or not, if she chose Standard or not, or even really know what happened between her and Julien, the indisputable facts are that she, as a lesbian, had to marry a man out of desperation and was forced to be his wife and daughter for nearly 90 years. she is not going to be well adjusted after this. she is not going to want to talk about this. she has valid reasons for being reluctant to share the horrible things that happened to her, as well as being a little suspicious.

she is a tragic character. she is the antithesis of the "perfect victim." we will get to have a bit of a "confrontation" with her at the start of the next chapter, and i'm hopeful that this will get across exactly why Valentina is the way she is in the text.

as for her relationship with mc, it has always been a bit intense, but they did love each other genuinely before. it's why mc did what they did to end up entombed in the first place. i would blame a lot of the problems of their relationship previously on the time period they were in. it wasn't easy for either of them. like i said before, being a vampire was not a get out of jail free card. it's been hinted at but mc and Valentina were living in poor conditions until the 1910s, where they finally started getting a foothold, by trapping and killing men and with mc themself dressing up as a man. but then what happened, happened, and mc was entombed in the 1920s.

was mc a bad person? i mean they very much did murder people along with Valentina. it's up to you how you feel about that. she murders people now in the demo. she's a vampire, she doesn't really have the same ethics as we do. was she bad to Valentina? sometimes. Valentina was bad to her, too. were they "toxic"? maybe. mc doesn't remember, and honestly Valentina doesn't remember that much either.

the mc waking up with no memory, while a convenient plot device in an IF game like this, was also done intentionally. you're never going to know if the mc was really a "bad person" though playing through you can probably feel that the mc does suspect that they were - is it true, or is this an insecurity around their butchness, a fear of her own masculinity? we don't know. part of the narrative is the mc reconciling this fact, as well as understanding that either way they can choose to be better - she's been given a second chance. she does not have to be a certain way because of who she is - the parallels being drawn between her and Standard are there to acknowledge this negative view of butches as just "men lite" as well as this bioessentialist idea that masculinity = bad. but just because the mc is butch does not mean she will end up like Standard or Atlas or Julien. and those three aren't bad just because they're men, they're bad because they choose to be bad and abuse their power over marginalized people. this is something that will be expanded upon as the story progresses and mc gets more comfortable in their identity and we see more of the council, particularly Sasha and Cassius.

and now with Hana, she's never met the mc before, so she kind of has this preconceived idea of her, and you do get that comment both because she's a bit jealous but also because she's afraid of the mc's jealousy. if you're at the start of ch2 you may have not had the conversation with Hana yet, but her irritation comes from the fear that you will get jealous of her and want to shove her out, despite her close relationship with Valentina, and this being her home, too. she assumes you're asking because you're trying to "sus her out" and decide whether you're going to align as friends or enemies. she says you're like Valentina in that regard because, like we touched on, Valentina is very paranoid and jealous.

to be clear i do understand the game is early on, we're only on ch3, so i don't expect readers to be able to magically intuit exactly what i'm writing (some of the stuff about mc is impossible to know at this stage). but i cannot stress enough that everyone in this story can be considered "bad" in some way, and you're not going to get a eureka moment where everything is clarified. it's meant to be messy and confusing. i'm never going to outright say "this character is the One True Villain, and this character is the Righteous one." hopefully this does clear a few things up, though, and better helps you (and everyone else that has been asking) understand what's going on, and what the deal is with both the mc and Valentina.

[polyhexian]

I'm gonna leave a long comment on Tell-No-Lies Ch 3 cuz I have a lot of thoughts, but these thoughts aren't for the fic itself so I'm dropping them here:

Low-key really obsessed with what Caitlyn's existence and death does for Eda's character.

From an extremely basic archetypal storytelling POV, Eda's character isn't what you'd expect. She's the most powerful witch in the BI, she hates the Emperor, she's a rebel, she's the mom figure in the ragtag team of misfits--in the elevator pitch of this story, you'd expect her to be leading the rebellion.

But she's not. TOH isn't a story about a concentrated rebellion against Belos; the rebellion barely exists. Season 1 never even mentions anyone actively fighting against the empire, the BATTs consist of 4 people, the CATTs don't have many more. The fact that resistence efforts were so small kinda annoyed me, but I can believe that any rebellion really is just that disconnected, disorganized, and ineffective. It's not the typical Rebels vs Empire narrative, but it DOES make sense. (And the story does itself the favor of not insisting that there's TOTALLY a massive rebel effort we've never heard about.)

And Eda's not a selfless rebel leader fighting for the greater good. She's fighting for herself. She hates the Emperor, but she hates all authority. She won't lead a fight against Belos, because she doesn't want to be a leader. She isn't going to perform some huge rebellious act against him; just existing the way she wants is an act of rebellion. She helps the BATTs, but she doesn't carry on the fight once they're captured except for trying to get through to Raine. She and Luz barely fight against the empire at all until a week before the Day of Unity.

Eda isn't a selfless rebel leader fighting for the greater good, she just wants to live wild and free, and it really does make sense.

But wow, Caitlyn's story really does enhance Eda's characterization. Idk how much the Clawthornes know about Caitlyn's fate, but I'd assume they know at least a bit. Eda and Caitlyn never met, but family history leaves an impact.

You had an aunt. She was a proud wild witch. She ran away to Latissa to help the rebellion there, and your family has no idea what happened to her.

You had an aunt. She was captured in Latissa. Escaped rebels told your family they saw the Golden Guard himself take her down.

You had an aunt. She was imprisoned in the castle. Her surviving friends who chose sigils over death said the Emperor himself took an interest in her, and they never saw her again.

You had an aunt. She was publically executed, made an example of after seriously injuring a coven official in an escape attempt.

You had an aunt. Your family received a form letter from the Emperor's Coven informing you of her death while in their custody. They never sent her body.

You had an aunt. Her body was returned to your family, but the Emperor's Coven didn't bother to explain her missing arm or anything else aside from saying that wild witches deserve what they get.

You had an aunt. Your family received a crate of pulverized stone.

You had an aunt. She valued her freedom, and she fought for it for herself and others. She ran off to join a rebellion to try and make a difference. She paid a steep price for it, and your family paid the interest.

You're wild and free, and you refuse to take a sigil or bow to the Emperor. You refuse to conform, to fit in a box, to make yourself less.

But you also had an aunt, and you refuse to end up like her.

YES that is VERY MUCH the vibe!!!! and dont worry you will find out what happens to caitlyn in a different GG story i have

this is like a big rebellion push still early in the emperor's reign and its absolutely demolished with a massive show of brutal force. it strongly hampers future attempts at organized rebellion. belos operates on fear. he makes sure people are afraid to rebel. caitlyn was in latissa, but dell wasnt, gwen wasnt. she wanted to fight and it cost her dearly.

eda and lilith both wanted to join the emperor's coven growing up. i imagine very much that dell and gwen downplayed a lot of their own feelings about the coven system because they didnt want their young children to say the wrong thing and get killed for it. lilith knows she has an aunt who didnt follow the rules, and she paid for it. eda knows she had an aunt who died wild and free and strong and shes remembered with pride. they both take away what they take away. and eda very much takes away that organized rebellion is pointless, that it can't work, theres no point. you have to protect yourself. and also, that they WILL kill you if you give them the chance. so don't ever give them the chance. never ever ever submit. fight every single time.

all of my fun little prequels seek to add context that enhances canon lol, all of them are trying to flesh out an already rich world with just a little bit more juice. how the boiling isles history and peoples family lines affect who they become when we get to meet them... thats the good shit. chefs kiss.

[spitdrunken]

currently i'm really busy with writing for my thesis, which unfortunately leaves me with little creative juice... ive been engaging with other people's creations a lot more rather than writing for myself, but have some assorted thoughts on things ive enjoyed recently below, for anyone who is interested. feel free to send me asks about anything that's mentioned, but because of the above, might take me a bit to get back to u <3!

these aren't really x reader thoughts, just rambling! if you read this, thank u, i am giving you a kiss on your forehead/hug/fistbump/handshake/whatever words of affirmation you have been wanting to hear today. pick your favorite!

(Pokephilia mention) Pokémon Legends Z's announcement!! It'll be forever until it's released (which, as a true Pokémon fan, I'm very happy about BAHAHAH), but I'm so excited! Very curious how they are planning to implement, what seems to be, citybuilder elements... If Emmet shows up in this game, I'm going to be super delighted, but I honestly doubt it. Either way, it's made me think a bit more about the twins, and Poképhilia stuff in general as well! It's such a shame/pain the main tag is blocked... one day I will start and stick to my intention to write, like, porn about all the Pokémon, haha. A dream...

(cannibalism(????) monster eating??? mention. consensual!) Dungeon Meshi really was as much fun as everyone mentioned! Don't really see myself writing fic about it, except for a very specific idea I had... I like the thought of Laois 'obsessed with eating monsters' Touden got to meet a monster (AKA Reader) who is equally obsessed with the idea of being eaten!! Maybe a mermaid, or something like that? It's his one chance to eat a humanoid monster! Though the others probably won't believe him when they tell him that it was 100% consensual, and are judging him harshly LMAO

Welcome Home updated! Very happy about this. Though I don't connect them publically, I actually have written quite a bit of WH fic and my sfw sideblog for it used to have more followers than this one LMAOO. Maybe one day I'll write NSFW works for it, but I dunno if there's interest... Plus, I very much fall underneath people the creator would consider 'unwelcome' in their squeaky-clean fandom or whatever, but they have like a quarter million followers now, lol. Anyway, Wally is, as has been said many times before, the Most! He draws me in <3

And also, poor Eddie, lmao. It's very interesting to me, with the inclusion of the Narrator, that the characters seem to be forced to steer in a specific direction, if that makes sense? To upkeep a certain mask. I wonder if 'as above, so below' is a reference to that, in the sense that whatever is dictated by the stronger forces of narrative, is what shall occur 'below'-- In their world. Like, the animosity some of these puppets have for each other!!!!! Some of them are just straight up Not Friends, lmao.

I need to play more of it, but if anyone is reading this, go play I Was A Teenage Exocolonist. I expected it to be waaaay more popular, especially on Tumblr, but it's so underrated? The writing is wonderful, the characters are well-defined, and the art is breathtaking! Please take a look at the trigger warnings, cuz there are a few that are definitely applicable, but it's soooo good... If it has to be said, I romanced Dys first, lmao.

I am watching The Apothecary Diaries right now, just started today, and can I jsut say... I'm such a fan of all the women in this show!! I love the perspective it gives on court life a lot! Maomao definitely is pulling in all the men AND women, huh.... i appreciate that. Jinshi also 100% wants to get degraded by her, huh. Maomao is the sexywoman of this show.

[swearyshera]

This scene in canon legit made my blood boil cuz I was very much NOT aboard the "everyone welcomes Catra on the team" train yet, so this bit was... less than endearing. The writing team and target audience had obviously been in agreement with Catra being cute for a long time but... I had yet to be persuaded and wouldn't be for a good while.

I know its to show how out of her depth Catra is dealing with actual friendship and how much of a ball of sunshine Bow is, but 'specially with the lack of Angella resolution this cutesy shit felt like they were jangling keys in my face to distract me from the past. Bow here showing he hasn't forgotten what Catra did even in a minor way lifted the fug off this scene for me. Amazing how I can get SO angry yet be appeased by the smallest changes. This series is like emotional/narrative aikido. Or maybe I just take shit in media way too personally and need my little hand held thru every scene that isn't immediately solving my foremost issue. Regardless, great job.

I think this episode, and to some extent the two either side of it, creates a lot of tension in the audience because of how uncertain everything is with Catra and Adora. And I don't mean tension between people who think Catra's all fine and forgiven now and those who don't, it's a tension where we see the characters going on as if everything is normal when we, the audience, know it's not. I've been thinking about this from two points:

Firstly, it's from a story structure point of view. This part is where Catra, and Adora to a degree, have what they want (each other), but not what they need. The entire story so far, on a personal level to them, has been about wanting each other back with them - and now they've got it, so everything is fine, right? They want to believe it is, so they act like it is. But they haven't learnt what they needed to (now what that is is open to interpretation, but for this, I'll say they needed to open themselves to love), and so you have this really uncomfortably awkward situation where they're both forcing themselves to accept that this is it. This is all they needed. And it's not.

If I refer once again to John Yorke's excellent Into the Woods, this puts us firmly into Act 4 territory: Your character will have changed in some way, but not enough to achieve their goal and overcome their flaw. The weakness is revealed in a low moment of the story (for Catra and Adora, this moment is the end of Failsafe). These few episodes are, by design, supposed to evoke the same sort of response you've had. In regards to Catra getting angry about being called cute, that's a perfect example of her not having overcome a flaw.

The other way I've been looking at it is from another, more realistic, and how people with BPD (if you're playing Sweary bingo, cross that one off!) would react to being reunited with their Favourite Person(TM). It's an innate ability to many of us with Brain Please Don't to suddenly forget the shit that happened when that one person graces us with a tiny amount of love (or, at least, something that isn't outright hostility). And I think for Catra here, that's exactly what's going on. Adora saved her, welcomed her back, waited for Catra to stop being angry, and now everything is FINE. Catra doesn't want to think about the past, she doesn't want to think about her flaws (or Adora's) that led to them splitting apart and fighting each other for so long.

You can see throughout this episode, the stress of forcing herself to be fine just so it doesn't rock the boat with Adora, coming out in these moments where she gets intensely angry for just a moment. I think, ultimately, they've moved from the unstable 'we're apart' relationship to the unstable 'we're together' relationship, and both need to learn a little more about how they fix that.

So yeah, this scene and this episode aren't really about 'Catra's suddenly been forgiven by everyone', but more 'everyone thinks Catra's been forgiven but they haven't sorted out the real problems', and that drives the conflict for the latter half of the season.

[sacrificialsam]

What are your thoughts on parentified dean?

I hate when it veers into “dean is sams dad” territory cuz I think that’s silly (and not accurate to me anyway. I know the later seasons lean more into the dean as mom dad brother thing but I don’t think that dynamic fits with the earlier seasons and it does feel like they just wanted to give Dean more poor sufferer vibes which is something I don’t like. The ep with sonny’s farm is an especially bad example of this and I don’t think it fits with johns character in season 1 at alllllllll. In the pilot John has been gone for three weeks and dean is freaking out!!! At 26!!!!!!)

I think it fits when we talk about John and dean’s relationship. Dean spent a long time (until we see him go against John in season 1) coddling johns feeling and providing him with emotional support (and keeping him with him all the time. Again later seasons “dad would send me away sometimes” moments are ridiculous!!!)

i've talked about parentified dean a lot on this blog, but i'll give you a quick rundown of my basic opinions: while dean was clearly parentified by john when he was left alone to take care of sam, fandom constantly insists dean did way more for sam than is actually implied or even logical. i don't believe dean really thinks of sam as his son, and sam would never see dean as his dad. dean isn't and wouldn't be a good parent or parental figure, and saying sam's childhood was 'easy' because of dean's parenting is ignorant at best. additionally, i hate interpretations and headcanons of dean as a mother or maternal.

but to address your specific points, yeah they ramped up the woobification of dean a lot, and i also feel like dean's pity parties got worse and worse in later seasons. after a certain point john had to be vilified even more and act out of character to add onto this, and since preseries and the winchesters' childhoods aren't explored in complete detail a lot of rewriting could happen there. john was an absent father, but that doesn't mean he lost all contact with his family for months on end, as that's clearly a big cause of concern in the first season as you've pointed out. it honestly bothers me because i feel like the added victimization of dean's childhood is used to further the narrative of sam being spoiled and having it good in comparison; it's often played in a way that makes it look like dean was the only victim of john's subpar parenting because 'sam at least had dean' or something. and i want to point out i don't think sam was treated just like dean or was parentified in the same way, but he also had to grow up too fast and was negatively affected by it. and we also know dean added onto that by also wanting sam to stay a hunter instead of having a life away from direct danger, he wasn't the force of good to john's negative influence or anything.

with dean and john's relationship i think it's a bit complicated, john clearly used dean as a point of reassurance and support and did put too much stress on him, which he even apologizes for in his last moments. but i'm not sure if parentification is the right word for it, i don't think he was a parent stand-in for john, much more someone who could act as a right hand man, someone who would back him up (even against sam) and who could be relied on. i like the soldier or even the guard dog analogies a lot better than those saying dean was the other parent in their family dynamic, because i don't think dean ever fully moved out of the son category, he wasn't truly equal. and this is partially because john never let dean (or sam) disagree with his decisions, and dean very much idolized his father and wanted to follow his lead rather than have equal saying.

oh and i answered another ask about parentification before, if this wasn't a long enough read yet.

[scribble-dribble-writes]

How about obi wan having a nightmare and the reader being a few doors down, having a force bond with obi wan, gets it too. She gets the same nightmare he has but she breaks from it first and feels obi wan in distress and runs to his room. They admit feelings or something,cuddle, maybe kiss back goodnight and it's fluff. *whispers* maybe anakin catches them in the same bed in the morning but leaves them be cuz they're cute!

Sorry it took me a while to put this out, but I loved this idea and wanted to take some time to write it up.

This song was on repeat when I wrote it, made it feel extra soft 😭

Peace 🌌

***

Pairing: Obiwan x reader

Warnings: none

Word Count: 1400

***

It grips you first, the agony, like a violinist who was playing with your heart strings. You see images first, then hear voices and suddenly, a burst of red. Lava. You were surrounded by it, the scorching heat devouring your skin. In front of you stood a figure, his face torn apart, tears streaming down his cheeks. “I loved you.”, he screamed about to crumple and run back to you. You reach out for him when you recognize the blue of his eyes, a cool solace in this nightmare. “Obi wan.”, you cry out. His expression changes to one of realization and then slowly to fear. “Save me.”, you send a plea and he stands there frozen. “What have I done?”, he speaks to himself running a hand through his damp hair. He turns to you, but you feel your vision fade. “No. Keep your eyes on me.”, he runs to you but you feel the narrative change around you, piece by piece it begins to stop. “Darling, I’ve got you.”, he says but his face vanishes and you stir awake.

You had to calm yourself, the beads of sweat trickled down your forehead to soak your pillow case. Your bearings on reality had slipped, you forgot were you were. Looking around the room, the details were coming back as you made sense of the articles around you in the dim light. You were in a safe house, along with the rest of the crew. You were on a mission. You breathe a sigh of relief but your mind kept going back to the moment you saw his face. Your eyes widen with the truth. He was having a nightmare and you were sucked into it. It had been as though your minds had connected through the force.

The walls that surrounded you were rather light and so in the silence of the night, you heard laboured breathing and the sound of his soft distressed voice. He called for you in his sleep. Your room was adjacent to his. You knew you had to make your way to him. So you opened the door as quietly as you could. Rex was sleeping in the living room, you snuck past him as he snored and escaped into Obi wan’s room. He laid on his bed, a hand over his chest, moonlight illuminating the tear stains on his cheek. He tossed and turned. “Darling.”, he whispered and clutched his shirt, a wave of anguish reverberating through his body. You run to him feeling the anger that stirred within him. Placing your hand on his cheek, “I’m here. It’s just a dream.”, you speak quietly into his ear and his eyes whip open.

He breathes heavily looking at the ceiling, his eyes tracing the shadows trying to make sense of it all. His hand clasps yours, you let him hold onto you. “Its not real.”, you tell him and he recites it again. He begins to calm down and only then he turns to you not letting you pull your hand away. His face was inches from yours as you sat on the floor while his head lay on the pillow. You dab his forehead with the edge of your robe but feel his eyes focused on you. The light from the small lantern near his bed, made them like glass as they tracked your movements.

“I’m sorry I woke you.”, He finally says and you shake your head. “I sensed your dream.”, you tell him as you stroked his head, raking your fingers through his hair to ease him. He nudged closer. “A recurring nightmare were I lose you.”, he shares it with you. “But you haven’t. I’ll always be by your side.”, you reassure him and he nods. “The dream is a vision, I am to lose something I treasure, again.”, he moves away, sighs and lies on his back.

You couldn’t leave him on his own now, not after what you had seen. So you move across to the other side, his eyes follow you. You had rules about your relationship, how none of you will initiate contact. It was born out of convenience, so that your feelings did not have to get involved. But tonight, rules be damned. He turned to you inquisitively, you pull away the sheets and slide next to him. “What are you doing?”, he asks but he knew the answer to it so you didn’t respond. Both of you needed to be comforted, so this was for the best.

You placed your chin on his shoulder and slung your arm over his chest. He stiffened under your touch but a second later, he drew closer and held you. “Keep your eyes on me.”, you repeat what he told you in the dream and his gaze softens. It was a way to break his fear, you being here was the only reality he needed to believe. He exhaled and kissed your forehead. “I’ve got you, Darling.” he whispered, his hand running down your back to feel your body, another reassurance  to put his mind at ease.

The night dwelved into comfortable silence as you both lie awake, neither of you forcing the other to say anything. His thumb drew absent minded circles on your hip, while your finger fiddled with the strand of hair that fell across his forehead. “I saw you and it took me back to when I lost Master Qui Gon.”, he opened up on his own. You shift to get a better view of him, to be attentive to whatever he was about to share because it was rare. He never did, this. He never had time to talk to you about his past. “It reminded me about all the things that were left unsaid.”, he continued, his gaze fixed at the view out the window. Your palm glided over his chest, his muscles firm beneath the light fabric. He turned to you, his eyes looking like the midnight sky twinkling with a million mysteries. “I do not want that for us.”, he said quietly and you hum, giving him the space to venture further into the deep with you. “I don’t want rules anymore.”, his hand caught your forearm that was over him. “I think about you every second.”, his hand slipped further up to your wrist. “You remind me of home.”, he pulls up your palm and pauses. “If you wish it and feel the same, then my love belongs only to you.”, he kissed the underside of your fingers. He lies still waiting for your response, so you rise up supporting yourself on your elbow and his eyes find yours.

“Will you share your pillow with me?”, you ask and he smiles, moving a little so you could place your head right next to his. He turns to you, the tip of his nose touches yours. “I’ve been waiting for you, Obi wan.”, you whisper and he closes the gap. Even in the dark, it was as though he had memorized your face that he didn’t have to see to find your lips. Soft and warm like a summer breeze, he kissed your forehead as you sighed. He settled next to you and in the safety of his arms, sleep had finally found the both of you.

The sun was up, there was a lot that had to be done and Anakin knew it was unlike his Master to not be awake yet. He usually was the first to be up and about. So he snuck out of his room. Rex had just woken up, he sat on the sofa stretching his arms while Ahsoka stood in the kitchen making herself a cup of tea. Both your doors were still closed. Anakin twisted the door knob to his Master’s bedroom slowly to open it just enough to peek through. He saw Obi wan still asleep his chest rising and falling gently but then he caught a glimpse of you lying next to him unable to differentiate where your limbs started and where Obi wan’s ended. “Do I wake up the other general, sir?”, Rex asked Anakin as he closed the door quietly. “No, let them both sleep in. Brief me on today’s plans.”, he walked away.

Anakin knew Obi wan spent most parts of his life taking care of him and sacrificing the rest for the Order. So today he would return the favour and buy him a few additional moments of peace.

[cestacruz]

I want to learn more about the master Artoria Au

🥹❤️❤️ueueueu

It's quite more extensive than Just the Holy Grail War

The lineup until now is

Saber: Musashi and Iori Miyamoto (Master(s) in the works)

Archer: James Moriarty (Master is Cassidy, i already posted something bout her)

Lancer: (Might be) Qin Liangyu (master in the works)

Rider: Ludwig van Beethoven (I already have her master but i refuse to post about them for now. I need dignity. I'll say two words to describe them tho: Hatsune Miku)

Caster: Zeno of Elea (no master yet)

Assassin: Hassan of the Shining Star (no master yet either) (also funnily enough, ive had Shining Star in this AU since two years ago, so imagine my surprise when he got released LMAO)

And well, Berserker: Queen Guinevere (and yknow, master Arturia)

It's sorta a modern AU but not at the same time, i'll put a cut here because its long and i ramble

It's not a Forced project to bring Arthur back like with Gray but the alternate name i use for this AU in my notes is "The Once and Future King" so...

History repeating itself sorta thing but without the doomed narrative (unless.) (Haha just kidding...) (...unle--)

The "pendragon|orkney" family does exist (as in mom(igraine)(she's alive), dad(uther)(he left them), morgan and lot, and nephews and nieces (morgan lost a bet to 5 year old arturia and had to name her kids after the knights) and more arthuriana characters are scattered around too, but they dont have an importance to the HGW part of the AU, with the exception of a few

They still call her Arturia (TECHNICALLY they call her Arthuria, because i love that name and no one will take it from me) because the few years that Uther was with them, he called Arturia "Arthur" because he wanted a boy and he couldnt cope (theres the History repeats itself motif and also misogynistic men like that still exist), so Morgan used Arthur*ia* as a nickname, and it stuck

This is where i will confess that im thinking of using a different name for Arturia, i already Kinda do in my notes. As in legal name (thinking of Aurlyn, which is similar but different enough). I would be doing the same with some of the Orkney siblings whose names would not be as common in the modern world or too obvious a reference, while still being named after the knights (Gareth would stay as Gareth cuz thats literally still a mormal name people use, but a name like Agravain or Mordred arent as common, ig. Or Gawain. And Gaheris. Actually only Gareth has a mormal fcking name)

ALSO mordred is Morgan and Lot's kid in this. No weird cloning in my modern AU. Genetics from the pendragon hit hard tho, they still look like Arturia

Actually idk what else to say rn, theres some more stuff but its escaping my mind, so little random stuff

Arturia's family has little to no mage relation currently, but they still have mage blood and sht

Also Merlin manipulated Morgan(modern) using her literal dreams, into freeing him from Avalon and he used to that hang out with little kid Arturia at the park (everyone hates him/chases him away)

The reason why Cath Palug is there is because this AU follows the F/SN timeline, which is a timeline in which Chaldeas never formed. Therefore, Fou never learned to love people, teehee. He only learned to hate Merlin and King Arthur (?)

Also theres a modern Guinevere, tho her name is literally just Gwen, and Arturia and her met during high school Time but they werent Actually classmates (think like, tournaments or trips to other school/places). I called her "arturia's high school crush" in the tags of a previous ask but they are still friends and talk a lot

And yeah , thank u and i am, Very happy that you asked bout it