one day I'll go insane and release a 234 page essay on why I love Wheatley X GLaDOS so much and its underrated and Love as a construct [link] is the best fanfiction I've ever read as long as u stop reading After chapter 26 bc imo after that it gets a bit repetitive and jumps the shark a bit and if u see the tags u might understand KJNSDFGKJNFDSD
but the very basics of it, is it's that two very bad people with a ton of truama learning to become better via each other <3. Also its weirdly disliked by a lot of portal fans for being... Abusive,,, which is hilarious considering both Wheatley and GLaDOS are canonical abusers who may regret their actions by the end sure but are still on some level very abusive people to Chell. I think that's also one of the reasons I love Gladley just bc it doesn't feel like Chell has to get into a relationship with these two people that canonically I think she's absolutely had enough of dealing with.
Inferna Victoria (Portrait of the Archdevil and Archduchess Supreme of the Nine)
a royal portrait of Raphael and Tav in the style of a Van Dyck for my fic, The Lover's Gambit. it's now my most popular fic, thank you so much for your support! you all have exquisite taste ❤️
Raphael's outfit was inspired by a beautiful gifset by @cherriesandsulphur
details, context below
[Solo Raph painting]
Baroque is one of my fave art movements. the in-game art looked inspired by it, and I wanted to do a piece that combined my love for it and royal portraiture. this was inspired by the works of Flemish Baroque master Anthony Van Dyck.
this is one of the most ambitious and detailed pieces I've done so far: the fullsize is 22 x 32in, and it took over 50+ hrs. royal portraiture usually has extensive detail, so I wanted to make it as detailed as possible. it was challenging and time consuming, but a lot of fun!
framed version (Cassetta frame from the Met website:)
process
spoiler details (for the game + fic)
- their ship came about because I wanted to give Raph a chaotic evil counterpart to his lawful evil. basically he’s the “mansplain, manipulate, malewife” to her “gaslight, (Baldur’s)gatekeep, girlboss” lol.
- I hc this Tav’s ending is the “In my name” one. though I hc she says “In our name” instead ;)
- visually, it looks like Raphael has more power but I hc it’s actually Tav for several reasons: many elements of the composition lead to her (Raph’s sash, arms, the curtains), she’s wearing her crown and is seated, and is also foremost while Raph is in the back.
- Raph’s crown is ceremonial/for vanity only while Tav’s tiara has enough fragments of the stone to be fully functional.
- The crown’s design is based on concept art, and if you look closely it kinda looks like it has hearts on the sides. I added the red gems.
I hc that Raph is a romantic and some of his lines seem to allude to this (code phrase of “my heart’s desire”, the Amulet of Greater Health, which Tav is wearing here, in a prominent place in his house, and his words to Hope in a transcript: “…serve me with your whole heart”)
- I hc they’re married at this point. Tav’s ring has two additional gems, and her outfit in general was inspired by the canon design of the Crown of Karsus.
- there’s a lot of red because according to Hope, Raph’s favorite color is “blood”. my hc for the painting overall is that it was done by his personal painter, maybe a debtor who has to paint for him for all eternity (not a bad deal right? /s) so it reflects his and Tav’s requests.
- I picture this hanging either above Raph’s fireplace in the dining room. or bedroom - much to Haarlep’s dismay 🤣
Most iconic of their multiple betrayals is in the episode Mizumono. Hannibal is planning on running away with Will after they kill their mutual friend/enemy Jack. Hannibal discovers that Will lied about being a fellow murderer and is working with Jack to arrest him. Will tries to warn Hannibal without getting Jack killed or Hannibal arrested. But it's too late. Hannibal cradles Will's face before stabbing him and leaves Will bleeding on the floor as he escapes, heartbroken.
Vriska/Terezi
Summary by shamsi @raedas !!!!
Vriska and Terezi were the blueprint for insane gay teenage girl besties. During a nasty cycle of revenge for a teenage roleplaying game mishap (Vriska paralyzed someone and killed someone else don't worry about it) Terezi tricks Vriska into losing an arm and an eye, causing Vriska to retaliate and trick Terezi into losing her eyesight. They call a truce. THEN when Vriska begins a little murder spree and is about to risk the deaths of all of their surviving friends, she dares Terezi to kill her in order stop her, believing that Terezi won't be able to bring herself to do it. She is ultimately wrong. The whole thing echoes the story of their ancestors. However Terezi regrets what she did misses Vriska and when things go so wrong that no hope is left, Terezi hatches a narrative altering plan to bring Vriska back and change everything.
(Mod: I've decided to keep the other half of your nom in the link, since I think it's better to keep this to the essentials when I can. Hope that's alright.)
Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss and Mansplain Manipulate Malewife incarnate my beloveds 🧎🧎🧎
Wanda and Cosmo are, as you can see, a designed a lil bit differently for my au. For Cosmo especially I based him more around his pilot/really early episode self, where he was more of a slick, shifty car salesman type of character, whos mishaps came more from his malfunctioning wand than his stupidity.
He's been given more of a househusband role in my au, and he keeps his blind adoration for his wife, which i always found adorable. Mans may not always know exactly what's going on, but he's ride or die for his family.
With Wanda, I leaned into the fact that she comes from a highly feared/respected Mafia family. Threaten her husband or son, and she'll cut a bitch and look damn good doing it. I kinda headcanon yellow as a colour associated with power, since fairy crowns/wand stars are yellow, so she's always dripped out in some form of gold/yellow, and this is a fashion choice that gets passed onto Timmy somewhat, with him having gold star earrings and crown symbols on his sneakers.
So we know he's a Cancer boy. For some reason i totally see him being a Pisces moon. definetely has Aquarius placements too
Hua Cheng: June 10th
Raging Gemini. There is Scorpio high up on his chart, i can smell it. He has that Boldly emotional but scared of being shot in the heart vibe. Also Taurus placements because of the lavishness and sensuality...
Shi Qingxuan: my favorite character in tgcf after Hua Cheng. Fun, playful, full of life...
I've seen people con them as an Aquarius, i personally think they're more of a sweet Saggitarius. I'm gonna for Saggitarius Sun Taurus Moon because one of my friend has this placement and she gives me major SQX vibes.
He Xuan: Saggitarius too since he's SQX's astro twin. Pretty sure he did have that potential to be a fun, loving person once upon a time.
Despite his cold personnality, you can tell he longs for that warm cozy life....
Feng Xin: my favorite angry malewife. Dense but loving... it's kinda giving Aries + probably an earth moon (Taurus again?)
Mu Qing: the original mean girl. Very realistic but definetely emotional and vengeful. Virgo Sun Scorpio Moon, me thinks.
Pei Ming: Manwhore Mansplain Manipulate, i love him very much. Libra Sun all the way (no one is as much of a serial charmer as a Libra man). Probably Leo Moon. Considering he is that good alpha male mix of confident, sexy and boastful.
Ling Wen: Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss, no wonder she's Pei Ming's bestie. Capricorn girl. Something in her points towards Air Moon (Aquarius?).
Jun Wu: he's a hard to read character... for plot purposes i assume it must be close to xie lian? Which makes sense tbh... Only a cancer could be so unhinged (im a cancer, i know what im talking about)
I'm not that familiar with the remaining characters (Yin Yu, QYZ, LQQ, Qi Rong...) but ill proabbly make a pt.2 for them~
trying to get a good old fashioned puppykicker run in before the new patch with new evil endings drops and so I obviously put Mizora's face on a sexy drow for inspiration to be the best manipulate mansplain malewife gaslight gatekeep girlbosser in the realm
my biggest challenge: not rescuing Florrick from Waukeen's Rest, and in fact, I might have to kill her depending on how south the confrontation with the Flaming Fist goes 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 but I must be strong
And just so we’re all clear, Miss Piggy is bodying everyone.
Miss Piggy is a Fortune 500, Black belt having, Prada wearing, committed, loyal, DEFINITION of gaslight gatekeep girlboss. She Gaslit Gatekept Girlbossed so Kermit could mansplain manipulate malewife. PUT SOME RESPECT ON HER MF NAME
I’ll admit I didn’t pay much attention to your OCs at first but now I’m very interested. Can you give a quick summary of them please?
i'm giggling at this ask bc i went back in my tags to try to figure out what had intrigued you and truly i've just been kin assigning shitposts to the OCs.
i think i wrote a rundown of them a while ago but can't be assed to find it so here's an even shorter one
all four members of the quartet live in tachni, a fictional city-state with a stranglehold over this fictional world's global economy. tachni's culture is largely based around light magic, which is an abstract type of magic related to illusions and luck and the future and abstraction.
everyone uses she/her, devin also uses they/them and he/him.
so:
nova - gaslight
nova is the incarnation of a light god, she has an unbelievable amount of political control/influence over tachni & she can turn her reality into a dreamland playground at will. this has left her craving things that are Real, which is unfortunate because her real soulmate hates her guts. her magic is making her very sick but she's pretending that it isn't bc she can solve everything with yoga and health smoothies.
devin - gatekeep
devin is the incarnation of an earth god, divine powers work thru her in the same way as nova, except that her magic is rooted in the concrete rather than the abstract. which means she can build shit and tear it down just as easily. being the opposite of nova's god, she's technically nova's soulmate & the two of them are supposed to balance each other out. however devin is much sicker than nova because of how fucked-up tachni is, and she's a giant bitch about it at all times.
sol - girlboss
sol is the devil. if not literally then certainly in every other regard. she too has an enormous amount of political power and sway, because she is unbelievably rich and has a monopoly on tachni's sex work industry. she's a nightmare of a human being who loves murder and terrorism; it's an open secret that she has killed a lot of people and that nobody will ever be able to prove it. girlboss antics. sol's bitchy attitude is in many ways the antithesis of nova; devin is wantonly cheating on nova with her, inasmuch as you can cheat on someone that you never wanted to marry in the first place.
ruby - manipulate
ruby is a mental health worker by day and a forger by night, her social power is much quieter. she's doing her best to retain her identity and morals while being surrounded by godawful people. her main focus is on helping marginalized and disenfranchised people get help and achieve their goals. she is unbelievably sad all the fucking time and has a million things wrong with her, which is why she's still hanging out with a bunch of shitty people and enabling their nonsense. she sweeps every OC poll i ever make because of her hashtag relatable neuroses.
all four have very messy history tangled up in each other, some of it gets Very Very Very Ugly and some of it is very funny. shitheads.
no one is a mansplainer or a malewife because i got tired of writing dude POVs. you can make up a couple mansplainer and malewife OCs to annoy the quad if you would like though.
i see alot of slander on me favs (trophy, pillow, blueberry) or my kins/other hearted (airy mostly) and for my kins i would be like yeah sure whatever but when its my fav im like
"YOU DONT UNDERSTAND WHAT A TRUE SIGMA ALPHA MALE IS GRRRR HSUT YOUR PIE HOLE GRRRRAHHHHHHHH TROPHY IS MANIPULATIVE BC HES SMAR TNOT HIS FAULT EVERYONES ELSE A BUNCH OF SLOBBY FUCKING DUMBASS BO GO BRAIN THEYRE DUMB ANYWYA HES SHCOCOL HE HOSULD HAVE SHINE HE SHOULD BE MROE OF AN ASSHOLE ACUALLY AND PILLOW SHOULD KILL HER TEAM FOR THE FUN BECAUSE I DONT CARE WHAT YOU THINKSITS ITNERESTING TO ME TO ME TO ME YALL CANT EER HANDLE A TRUE GIRLBOSS I BET YALL WONT EVEN RECONIZE WHAT A HASTAG GIRLBOSS IS WHAT IS A GIRLBOSS WITH NOT GASLIGHT AND GATEKEEP WHAT IS A MALEWIFE WITH NOT MANSPLAIN AND MANIPULATIV EHUH????? BLUEBERRY DID WHAT HE HAD TO DO TO WIN TOO SO WHAT IF HE WAS LAZY AND LONELY YALL DONT SEE THE DEPT THE DEEP DEEP DEPT OF HIS SOUL, WHAT IF HE LIKE BEING ALONE WHAT IF HE DONT BT WHAT OTHER CHOICE DOES HE HAVE, AND YOU KNOW WHAT I HOPE HE DONT FIND SOMEONE ELSE TO BE WITH I HOPE HE STAY ALONE BECAUSE I WANT TO, YALL DONT GET HIM LIKE I DO HE CHEATE DHTE GAME AND FOOLED EVERYONE HE GOT ROBBED AND STRIPPED BY THE WRITER IT AINT HIS FAULT HES ACTUALYL SMART AND STRONG AS FUCK MAYBE YALL R THE ONE THTA DUMBE DHIM DOWN TO BEING A LOSER THAT FALL INFORNT OF THE GATE OF HEAVEN YOU DONT FUCKING KNOW HIM LIKE I DO IM A HATER HATER IM A HATER OUT OF SPITE IM A HORRIBLE PEROSN OUT OF SPITE AND MAYBE MAYBE MAYBE I LIKE HORRIBLE CHAARCTER BC I MAYBE MAYBE MAYBE YOU ODNT GET THEM I DO YOU DONT EGT ITTTT"
i wrote this purely out of spite and internalized someunexplainablequeeridentityphibia, but mainly i was angry bc i culdnt get my spoon to scoop up the piece of pudding in my chè khúc bạch cup 🥀