#human beings who love each other a lot essentially become a single organism with two bodies | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

him-e · 3 years

Note

what did you think of shadow and bone? have you read the books? i only read the duology

Thoughts on Shadow and Bone, now that you've probably seen it?

I think the show is alright? It lacks a real wow factor as far as I’m concerned, but it’s enjoyable. It’s especially enjoyable in those parts I didn’t anticipate to like / didn’t even know would be there.

Whereas the main selling points leave a lot to be desired.

The good stuff: the visuals. The aesthetic. The overall concept. Production, casting and costumes are excellent, the setting is fascinating. The worldbuilding isn’t perfect and is sometimes confusing, which is probably due to the show jumping ahead of the books and introducing elements that happen much later in the book saga, but I’m loving the vague steampunk-y vibe of it mixed with more typical fantasy stuff and slavic-inspired lore, the fact that it’s set in dystopian Russia rather than your usual ye olde England.

I find it interesting that in this ‘verse the Grisha are simultaneously superstars, privileged elite, legendary creatures and despised outcasts, according to the context and the type of magic they wield. It’s A Lot, and so far it’s all a bit underdeveloped and messy, like a patchwork of different narratives and tropes sewn together without an organic worldbuilding structure. (there are hints to a past when they were hunted, but how did they go from that to being, essentially, an institutionalized asset to the government isn’t clear yet. There’s huge narrative potential in this, and I hope future seasons will delve into those aspects)

Many of the supporting characters are surprisingly solid. I appreciated that Genya and Zoya eventually sort of traded places, subverting the audience’s assumptions about them and their own character stereotypes, despite the little screentime they were given.

Breakout characters/ships for me were Nina/Matthias, and even more so the Crows, i.e. the stuff I didn’t see coming and knew nothing about (having only read the first book). (I thought the entire Crows subplot was handled in a somewhat convoluted way, at least in the first episodes; it was hard to keep track of who wanted Alina and why, but the Crows’ chemistry is so strong it carried the whole Plot B on its shoulders).

HELNIK. As an enemies to lovers dynamic, Helnik was SUPER on the nose, I’d say bordering on clichéd with the unapologetic, straight outta fanfiction use of classic tropes like “we need to team up to survive” and “there’s only one bed and we’ll freeze to death if we don’t take our conveniently damp clothes off and keep each other warm with the heat of our naked bodies” (not that I’m complaining, but i like to pine for my ships a bit before getting to the juicy tropetown part, tyvm). And then they’re suddenly on opposite sides again because of a tragic misunderstanding - does Bardugo hate high-conflict dynamics? It certainly seems so, because between Helnik and Darklina I’m starting to see a pattern where the slow burn and blossoming mutual trust is rushed and painted in broad, stereotypical strokes to get as fast as possible to the part where they *hate each other again* and that’s... huh. Something.

^That’s probably why I’m almost more interested in Kaz x Inej, because their relationship feels a bit more nuanced, a bit more mysterious, and a bit more unpredictable. (I didn’t bother spoiling myself about them, so I really don’t know where they’re going, but it’s refreshing to see a dynamic that the narrative isn’t scrambling to define in one direction or the other as quickly as possible)

Now, as for Darklina VS Malina... I found exactly what I expected.

Both are ship dynamics I’m, on principle, very much into (light heroine/dark villain, pining friends to lovers) but both are also much less interesting than they claim to be, or could have been with different narrative choices. I’ll concede that the show characters are all more fleshed out and likable than their book counterparts, and the cringe parts I vaguely remembered from the books played out differently. And, well, Ben Barnes dominates the scene, he’s hot as HELL, literally every single second he’s on screen is a fuck you to Bardugo’s attempts to make his character lame and uninteresting and I’m LOVING it, lol.

But yeah, B Barnes aside, Darklina is intrinsically, deliberately made to be unshippable.

It makes me mad, because it’s - archetypally speaking - made of shipping dynamite: yin/yang-sun and moon, opposites attract, COMPLEMENTARY POWERS AND SO ON. And what does Bardugo do with these ingredients? A FUCKING DELIBERATE DISASTER:

^ Placing the kiss so early on (season 1, episode five) effectively kills the romantic tension that was (correctly) building up until that point, and leaves the audience very little to still hope for, in terms of emotional evolution of the dynamic.

Bardugo lays all the good stuff down as early and quickly as possible (the bonding, the conflicted attraction, the recognizing the other as one’s equal, etc) only to turn the tables and pull the rug so y’all sick creepyshippers won’t have anything to look forward to, because THEY’VE ALREADY HOOKED UP AND THAT BELONGS TO THE PAST, IT’S OVER, THEY’RE ENEMIES. This, combined to the fact that she falls for him *without* knowing who he really is, is the opposite of what I want from a heroine/villain ship (it’s basically lovers to enemies, and while that can be valid too, I wanted to see more pining and more prolonged, tormented symbolic attraction to the Shadow/Animus on Alina’s part).

But here’s the trick: it’s not marketed as lovers to enemies - it has all the aesthetics and trappings of an enemies to lovers (the Darkling is, from the get go, villain-presenting, starting from his name), so it genuinely feels like a trollfic, or at the very least a cautionary tale *against* shipping the heroine with the tall dark brooding young villain, and I don’t think it’s cool at all. It makes the story WAY less interesting, because it humanizes the villain early on (when it’s not yet useful or poignant to the story, because it’s unearned) but it’s a red herring. The real plot twist is that the villain shouldn’t be sympathized with, just defeated: there’s a promise of nuanced storytelling, that is quickly denied and tossed aside. So is the idea of incorporating your Shadow (a notion that Bardugo must be familiar with, otherwise she wouldn’t have structured Alina and the Darkling as polar opposites who complement each other, but that she categorically refutes)

Then we have Malina. The good ship.

Look, I’m not that biased against it. I don’t want to be biased on principle against a friends to lovers dynamic that antagonizes a heroine/villain one, because every narrative is different, and for personal reasons I can deeply relate to the idea of being (unspeakably) in love with your best friend. So there are aspects of Malina that I can definitely be into, but it troubles me that in this specific context it’s framed as a regression. It’s Alina’s comfort zone, a fading dream of happiness from an idealized childhood, to sustain which the heroine systematically stunts her growth and literally repressed her own powers, something that in the books made her sickly and weak. But the narrative weirdly romanticizes this codependency, often making her tunnel vision re: going back to Mal her primary goal and centering on him her entire backstory/motivation, to the point that when she starts acting more serious re: her powers and alleged mission to destroy the Fold, it feels inorganic and unearned.

Mal is intrinsically extraneous to Alina’s powers, he doesn’t share them, he doesn’t understand them, he has little to offer to help her with them, and so the feeling is that he’s also extraneous to her heroine’s journey, aside from being a sort of sidekick or safe harbor to eventually come back to. People have compared him to Raoul from Phantom of the Opera, and yeah, he has the same ~magic neutralizer~ vibe, tbh.

The narrative also polarizes Mal’s normalcy and relative “safety” against Aleksander’s sexy evil, framing Alina’s quasi-platonic fixation on the former as a better and purer form of love than her (much more visible and palpable) attraction to the latter. This is exacerbated by the show almost entirely relying on scenes of them as kids to convey their bond. I’m sure there are ways to depict innocent pining for your best friend that don’t involve obsessively focusing on flashbacks of two CHILDREN running in a meadow and looking exactly like brother and sister. LIKE. I get it, they’re like soulmates in every possible way, BUT DO THEY WANT TO KISS EACH OTHER?

Which brings me to a general complain: for a young adult saga centering on a young heroine and full of so many hot people, this story is weirdly unsexy? There are a lot of shippable dynamics, but they’re done in such a careless, ineffective way that makes ZERO EFFORT to work on stuff like slow burn, pining and romantic tension, and when it does it’s so heavy handed that the viewer doesn’t feel encouraged at all to fill the blanks with their imagination and start anticipating things (which is, imo, the ESSENCE of shipping). The one dynamic that got vaguely close to this is, again, Kaz and Inej, and coincidentally it’s also the one we didn’t get confirmed as romantic YET. Other than that, where’s the slow burn? What ship am I supposed to agonize over during the hiatus to season two? Has shipping become something to feel ashamed of, like an embarrassing relative you no longer want to invite in your home?

Anyway, back to Alina/Darkling/Mal, this is how the story reads to me:

girl suspects to be special, carefully pretends to be normal so she can stay with Good Boy

the girl’s powers eventually manifest; she’s forcibly separated from Good Boy

the girl’s powers attract Bad Boy who is her equal and opposite but is also a major asshole

girl initially falls for Bad Boy; has to learn a hard lesson that nobody that sexy will ever want her for who she is, he’s just trying to exploit her

also, no, there is no such thing as a Power Couple

girl is literally given a slave collar by Bad Boy through which he harnesses her power (a parody of the Twin Scars trope)

you know how the story initially suggested that the joint powers of Darkness and Light would defeat evil? LOL NO, Darkness is actually evil itself and the way you destroy evil is using Light to destroy Darkness, forget that whole Jungian bullshit of integrating your shadow, silly!

conclusion: girl realizes being special sucks. She was right all along! Hiding and suppressing her powers was the best choice! She goes back to the start, to the same Good Boy she was meekly pining for prior to the start of the story.

... there’s an uncomfortable overall subtext that reads a lot like a cautionary tale against - look, not just against darkships and villain/heroine pairings, but also *overpowered* heroines and, well... change? Growth?

Like, it’s certainly a Choice that Alina starts the story *already* in love with Mal. That she always knew it was him. The realization could have happened later (making the dynamic much more shippable, too), but no.

#anon #asks #*#sab for ts #long post #darklina for ts #malina for ts #sorry it took me a while but i wanted to see the whole season first

65 notes · View notes

true-blue-megamind · 3 years

Text

FAN THEORY THURSDAY – Why Did Metroman Retire?

Happy Almost-Friday, everyone! And even though Minion threatens to smother everything he cooks in old Limburger cheese each time I say it: SPOILER WARNING!

Yes, I know, it’s three a.m. and it’s technically Friday, but I’m still calling this Thursday night, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Okay, let’s be honest, Metroman is a character who seems, on the surface, to require little explanation in the film Megamind. He’s only present in the beginning and end, and we spend half the movie believing he’s dead, and we learn that Metroman has done something almost unheard of among superheroes: he’s chosen to retire. The question is: why? There is a tendency to think that he's simply a spoiled rich boy who, (in his social life, at least,) does what he wants without regard for others, but is that really fair? Or could there be other possible reasons? Well, let’s take a look at a few fan theories that may explain why he chose to abandon heroism for a music career.

Metroman Didn’t Want to Be a Hero

Although he’s clearly based on—and perhaps even poking a little fun at—the Man of Steel, Metroman was no Superman. (I mean, okay, he was technically a super-man, since he had strength, speed, and powers far beyond what a human would possess.) Except, here’s the thing: he’s not a carbon copy of the Man of Steel; Metroman and Superman have completely different lives and personalities. This remains true despite the fact that they share a similar origin—that of being aliens from a dead planet—and identical powers—including laser-vision and flight. Even their code names are comparable. However, if we look deeper, it becomes obvious that Metroman and Superman are two very different characters.

Superman is all about being an upstanding hero. Although he can be annoyingly persnickety, and sometimes displays nearly oppressively unyielding strictures about right and wrong, one thing you can say about the Man of Steel is that he’s generally integral. He is exactly what his public image portrays him to be: a Good Guy through and through. The same isn’t true of Metroman, and in some ways that makes him a more complex and interesting character.

The childhoods of the two heroes are extremely different. As I’ve mentioned in Why Was Megamind Raised in Prison, when a boy, Metroman was a bully, not only making young Megamind an outsider and the object of everything from teasing to physical attacks, but also inspiring other students to do the same. Superman, on the other hand, far from being a bully was bullied by Pete Ross. Rather than using his powers against others, he was too responsible and good-hearted to use them even against Pete Ross. Metroman is adopted by super-wealthy parents, and is essentially a trust-fund baby, while Superman was adopted by a farm family. He grows up with a good work ethic and hometown values. Indeed, this economic discrepancy continues into adulthood. As far as we can tell, Metroman doesn’t need to work and has no job outside being a superhero. Superman, conversely, has to earn a living as a journalist. Finally, in the majority of comics, Superman avoids most public appearances, unless he feels they serve some beneficial social purpose. Indeed, he goes to great lengths to keep his identity a secret and avoid the public eye as much as possible. The first time we see Metroman in the film, however, he is basking in a crowd’s adoration at the dedication of a museum in his honor. Indeed, in the original script, then called Mastermind, Metroman’s real identity seems to be widely known. (In case you’re wondering, this is where the name Wayne Smith, commonly used in the fandom, originates from.) So, we see that these character are actually very different: one is a hero strictly for the greater good, and the other, while he certainly does a lot of good things, is also in it for the fame.

This may seem like I’m being harsh toward poor Wayne Smith, but his flaws do not, in fact, make him a bad person. The issue is that we’re comparing him to Superman who, while still certainly imperfect, is intended to be a better-than-average person in every way, including moral. Make no mistake, Metro City’s former hero isn’t any sort of villain; what he is is normal. If we’re honest, most of us would be pleased by wide-spread accolades and honors. He reacts to positive fame the same way nearly anyone would because, at his heart, he’s really just a typical guy. That is the material point: Wayne Smith really only wants to be an average citizen—a music star, perhaps, but still a relatively ordinary person. In that way, he and Megamind are alike: they both desire, more than nearly anything else, to be normal. The key difference is that Megamind’s sincere and driving concern for his city also makes him ideal for becoming a hero. (You can learn more about this particular fan theory in The Warden and in Megamind and Identity.)

So, why did Wayne Smith become a Defender in the first place, then? Again, I’ve briefly touched on this in previous posts, but it appears likely that Metroman was pushed into heroism just as much as Megamind was pushed into supervillainy. Because he was a bully with superpowers, it’s likely that adults around him realized something had to be done about Wayne. Otherwise he was a danger. So, they constructed an environment—the Li’l Gifted School—where he could be conditioned to seek the praise of others as well as to fight Megamind, who had been singled out as his future nemesis. (In fact, that conditioning is probably why he opted for a career that would put him on stage, aside from a probable love of music.)

Because the path chosen for Megamind involved more hardships and pain, it’s easy to forget that Metroman was in essentially the exact same plight. However, the fact remains that these were both children, and they were both being coerced into perceived destinies they didn’t want. Neither of them were given a choice and, in the end, both of them cast off the expectations pressed upon them to become the people they really wanted to be. The difference is that, because of our natural biases, Megamind’s rise to Defender of Metro City seems more noteworthy than Metroman’s step into Mr. Average Joe. The truth, however, is that both characters were basically doing the same thing: being true to themselves.

Metroman May Have Had Health Concerns

We know Megamind and Metroman are close to the same age—although the latter appears to be about a year rather than days old when he lands on Earth—but what that age is is open to supposition. We know, however, that they are almost certainly in their thirties, probably in their mid- to late-thirties. (Take a look at How Old is Megamind for more information about that.) However, we can see that Wayne is already going gray around the temples. Of course, some people’s genetics simply cause them to go gray earlier, and that’s certainly a possibility, but one fan theory suggest there may be more going on. The idea has been put forward that Wayne’s super-speed may be having an adverse effect on him, forcing his body to work overtime to keep up. The resulting physical stress could be making him age prematurely.

That’s not the only factor to consider. As hard as heroism may have been on his body, the effects on Metroman’s mind would have been even greater. Before the events in the movie, Metro City’s authorities—and, indeed, all its citizens—became too reliant upon their superhuman hero, and as a result that hero was run ragged. That isn’t a mere hypothesis. A scene that was storyboarded but never included in the final film makes Metroman’s plight perfectly clear. We see him being called from one end of the city to the other for everything from a massive explosion to an old lady needing help opening a jar. Keep in mind that, when hearing a cry for assistance, the hero would likely be unable to tell who truly needed him urgently and who was simply making unnecessary demands, thus he would have to rush to every call he heard. Even the city’s law enforcement seems to take him for granted, refusing to take criminals he just hand-delivered to jail because they’re on lunch break. The cumulative effect is that Metroman looks nearly frantic with stress.

youtube

This is important because, aside from the obvious mental and emotional concerns, this sort of stress accelerates aging as well. According to an article in the Huffington Post, when glycation and telomere shortening, as well as the over-oxidation, are caused by enduring heightened stress for prolonged periods of time, it can result not only in graying hair and premature wrinkles, but heart trouble as well. Even the memory can be affected, as one study by the University of Wisconsin found that stress can age a person’s brain up to four years faster than normal, and contribute to cognitive problems later in life. (The study was part of a presentation—you have no idea how badly I wanted to write that word in all-caps—and is thus currently unpublished, but information about it can be found in an article from Over Sixty.)

Metroman Retired for the Good of Everybody

As you can see, in a strange way, having a super-powered Defender was actually crippling Metro City. In fact, it may be truly damaging to the local infrastructure and official organizations. Youtuber Olaf Scholtens, in his video Megamind: Power and Identity, uses the metaphor of an airplane manufacturer to explain what’s going on. (If you’ve read my own post Megamind and Identity, you’ve seen this before.) Engineers and factories put a lot of effort and expense into making certain aircraft are as safe as possible, but what would happen if they felt they could confidently assume a superhero would simply catch any plane that crashed, saving everyone on board? Safety standards would probably become far more lax, and people might be in far more danger as a result. Given the way that nearly everyone in Metro City seems to assume Metroman will always save the day, it’s possible that, within the urban area, the same thing could be happening with things like building code enforcement, large construction projects, and even public safety measures. Bridges might not be properly built, fire hazards might not be addressed, and, given the blasé attitudes of the cops in the storyboard, law enforcement officers might not even be bothering to keep an eye on things. By retiring, Metroman forced the city to become more self-sufficient again.

That, however, may not have been the only problem Metroman was trying to solve. Remember the whole discussion about the former Defender’s school boy bullying and the apparent conspiracy to turn one boy into a hero and the other into a supervillain? It’s possible Wayne may have felt remorse for the former and found out about the latter. Having battled Megamind so much in the past, he also may have realized that the blue man never actually hurt anyone, and in fact went out of his way to stage their confrontations in abandoned places. (Again, you can read more about that in both Megamind and Identity and The Warden.) It may be that Metroman real “brilliant plan” wasn’t simply to fake his death, but in doing so to prod Megamind into becoming a hero and thus accepted by society.

There is an alternative theory, put forward in a Reddit post, that Megamind and Metroman’s parents may have known one another, and may have sent both children to Earth with the intention of them becoming a dynamic duo, fighting evil together with Megamind as the brains and Metroman as the brawn. This could have been what Megamind’s father meant when he told his son: “You are destined for greatness.” While there is very little support for this in the movie, it would explain why, in the vast cosmos, both of the young survivors were sent not only to the same planet, but even to the same city.

Whatever the reason may have been, one thing is certain: there certainly is some evidence that Metroman intended his one-time nemesis to become a hero. One of his lines, after Roxanne and Megamind discover he’s still alive, supports this. You know the one. “If there’s bad, good will rise up against it. It’s taken me a long time to find my calling; now it’s time you find yours.” Then, of course, there is another line, when Music Man is watching his former enemy take the role of Defender of Metro City: “way to go, Little Buddy. I knew you had it in you.”

If Metroman really did purposefully help Megamind step into heroism, that could also explain why he didn’t stop Megamind from taking over the city—perhaps he trusted the blue man not to harm anyone and to eventually come to his senses—as well as why he refuses to overtly help defeat Titan. He does, however, clearly subtly assist Megamind, as the latter almost certainly went back to Wayne’s hideout to scan his appearance and voice into the holowatch. All of this together makes it seem quite plausible that Metroman not only wanted to retire, but also wanted the blue man to take his place.

Megamind and Metroman by White-Night-56 on Deviant Art

Maybe this means that, now that Megamind is the Defender of Metro City, he and Music Man occasionally get together to commiserate over the more difficult aspects of being a superhero and joke about the old days.

It’s also quite possible that all of these fan theories could be true. The film Megamind is, among other things, surprisingly subtle, complex, and subversive for an animated movie. Every time I dive deep into some aspect or other of the plot, I am once again impressed by the amount of thought and detail that went into this work. No wonder Megamind—and its characters—have so many dedicated fans.

#Megamind #Megamind movie #Metro Man #Metroman #Wayne Smith #Megamind fan theory #Megamind fan theories #DreamWorks #hero #Defender #Metro City #fan theory #fan theories #Fan Theory Thursday #Megamind fandom #Youtube #megamind

51 notes · View notes

mittensmorgul · 4 years

Text

As Above, So Below

I’m still trying to pinpoint exactly why the focus on “heaven is fixed and actually a paradise now!” is just so deeply unsatisfying to me. And I think I need to preface this with a bit of backstory about me, because I think that gives the rest of this essay some relevant context.

I know this isn’t relevant to my main point here, but this is a metatextual and thematically identical example of the exact thing I’m gonna lay out, because context is always helpful. So please forgive this seemingly irrelevant detour, because I promise it will be relevant by the end.

(plus, would it really be an Essay By Mittens™ without at least one baffling tangent? no, it would not!)

Tangent time!

I think everyone that follows me knows how skeptical I was... or should I say how WARY I was of the way Eileen was returned to the narrative this season. We were warned in the PREVIOUS EPISODE how much Chuck was attempting to interfere in their lives. I was accused of some very nasty things, of hating the ship, or hating the character of Eileen, or of hating Sam and not wanting them to be happy. No amount of pointing at obvious warning signs in the text, no amount of yelling about Sam’s God Wound or the absolute klaxon warning that the wound had become “quiet” and his Chuck-O-Vision Nightmares had apparently stopped seemed to matter. I was declared “wrong” and told to shut up.

And then 15.09 happened, and basically everything I’d been wary of was shown to be what actually happened, but there were still unresolved issues. Eileen doubted her own feelings and walked away. She doubted what was actually real. And at the time, I said many times that I would be thrilled to see those issues resolved by the end of the season, and for her to truly know that what she’d felt growing between her and Sam was real. And by the end of the season, despite my personal horror at her previous situation (and having that personal horror compounded by the fandom literally gaslighting me and attempting to bully me into ignoring this basic actual plot detail of this specific growth process which... in the context of what my personal objection was to accepting her return at face value in the first place having been personal trauma associated with gaslighting and manipulation...) by the time 15.18 aired, I was 100% convinced that Sam and Eileen had fully chosen each other, and felt the traumatic pain Sam suffered during that text conversation with her during the snap. She NEEDED to come back, because she had been set up to be part of Sam’s Win. They were clearly each other’s future.

The show literally put in all the work to make even *me* feel this to be True and Right and Good. And then after that point we never even hear Eileen’s name again. We never were told that she was even returned at the end of 15.19. Sam, who had been so entirely devastated by her disappearance in the previous episode that he couldn’t even process it was apparently hit with an amnesia hammer and just... never even thought about her again through a long greyscale life with a blurry baby Dean factory vaguely in the background of a single scene of his life. I can’t credit or justify how after an entire year invested in making us all truly care about Sam and Eileen and the happiness they found in each other if only the cosmos would allow them to choose each other in the end would just... erase all of that in the series finale.

Which brings me to the second tangent, which is specifically about *me,* and how I feel about the cosmic order in the television show Supernatural. Because I feel a lot about it. Probably more than most people ever did. And this is also important to understanding the main underlying point I need to make here.

Something I’ve been most looking forward to, for YEARS, about Supernatural eventually ending someday was writing a book, or a thesis, or even just organizing and compiling all my observations into a cohesive narrative specifically about the cosmology of the Supernatural universe. I’ve been cobbling together my observations and realizations about the nature of heaven, hell, purgatory, the empty, the alternate universes we’ve seen, and yes, even the cosmic function of the mundane level of the story as told by events that transpired on Earth. So of everyone watching this dumb show for the last 15 years, I don’t actually know anyone who cared more that I did about finding a satisfactory resolution and transformation of every plane of existence-- the mortal world AND the “afterlife realms” we’ve experienced on this show. And in the wake of the finale, I feel cheated out of that. Because in the end, it wasn’t about the triumph of free will and a flip of the script, it was just more of the same.

And now that I have those two preliminaries out of the way, I’ll finally get to the point. :’D

(hooray, it didn’t even take 1k words to get there for once!)

The “main stage” of Supernatural has always been Earth. It’s always been “Humanity.” At the very start, we meet two men whose lives had always been dictated to them by higher powers. At first, that “higher power” was their father who raised them in his vengeance mission, who trained them to hunt the supernatural. It was the inciting incident of the entire series, after all, their realization that forces outside of their control had irrevocably altered the course of their lives. It had forever torn down what they’d trusted in family, in personal safety, and would become something they couldn’t outrun or fight back against for long before another wave of cosmic discord would settle over them once more.

We watched this story play out in ever increasing spheres of cosmic significance, until Gabriel laid it out on the table for them in the simplest possible terms (in 5.08).

GABRIEL: You do not know my family. What you guys call the apocalypse, I used to call Sunday dinner. That's why there's no stopping this, because this isn't about a war. It's about two brothers that loved each other and betrayed each other. You'd think you'd be able to relate. SAM: What are you talking about? GABRIEL: You sorry sons of bitches. Why do you think you two are the vessels? Think about it. Michael, the big brother, loyal to an absent father, and Lucifer, the little brother, rebellious of Daddy's plan. You were born to this, boys. It's your destiny! It was always you! As it is in heaven, so it must be on earth. One brother has to kill the other. DEAN: What the hell are you saying? GABRIEL: Why do you think I've always taken such an interest in you? Because from the moment Dad flipped on the lights around here, we knew it was all gonna end with you. Always. A long pause. SAM and DEAN look down, then at each other. DEAN: No. That's not gonna happen. GABRIEL: I'm sorry. But it is. GABRIEL sighs. GABRIEL: Guys. I wish this were a TV show. Easy answers, endings wrapped up in a bow...but this is real, and it's gonna end bloody for all of us. That's just how it's gotta be. ***

And isn’t that all even 1000x more painfully ironic that it all still happened even 10 years later? It was always going to end with them. And lol, “I wish this were a TV show” because if it was then it wouldn’t have to end bloody.

But this… was a Major Acknowledgement that the meta level of this story was consistent, and was telling us something important. It demonstrated that the Cosmic Structure Itself was the cause for Sam and Dean’s “destiny” in this story. But that’s not what the point of this story has ever been.

Nobody (including me, who is literally obsessed with this aspect of the story) has ever invested themselves in the narrative of Supernatural because they cared about the fate of the cosmic order over and above the fate of the characters who had committed to overthrowing it all, to “tearing up the pages” and writing their own destinies. I mean, we became invested because Sam, Dean, and Cas as characters took us by the hand and invited us to come along with them as they battled against fate for the good of EARTH and HUMANITY.

And certainly, Heaven being a horrific sort of eternal replay of the “highlights” of individual souls greatest hits, where free will didn’t apply as everyone was just boxed away into their individual holodecks to serve as some sort of giant Heaven Battery powering the furtherance of this narrative, this “cosmic order” that had become so powerful it dictated the events and manipulated the lives of people who still existed in the ostensible realm of free will and human life on Earth… that couldn’t stand in the end. But what the narrative (and people I’ve seen attempting to justify the finale as narratively sensible) seems to have forgotten was that all of that was Chuck’s construct to begin with. That without Chuck holding his kingdom in Heaven together, the walls of all those soul cubicles ceased to even be relevant.

After spending their entire lives to this point constantly fighting their way to the absolute pinnacle of the As Above, So Below narrative and pulling the plug on the original creator himself, Humanity should’ve triumphed. And I’d argue that it DID, through Jack restoring the missing essential “humanity” to the divine condition. And, silly me, I thought they’d achieved the promise of “paradise” heralded by Jack’s birth at last, and truly “flipped the entire script of the narrative.”

Ever since they thwarted the original apocalypse, I had hope that they would continue to achieve the same result right up the ladder. Metatron trying to fill the role of Chuck Junior hit his own narrative wall in TFW, while Dean’s battle with the Mark of Cain, and Cain telling him he was “living my life in reverse” and would succumb to destiny by killing his loved ones in the “reverse order” to Cain’s own path to downfall cemented this for me. Dean not only failed to kill any of his loved ones (you didn’t kill your own brother. why?), he SAVED them. He didn’t fulfil the prophecy in reverse, he subverted it. He UNMADE it.

Perhaps I was thinking on too grand a scale, that the ultimate inversion wouldn’t be “God is overthrown and replaced by more of the same,” but “God is overthrown and the entire order of the universe is restructured from the bottom up rather than the top down.

I’d hoped against hope that the conclusion of the narrative would be “As below, so above,” with the fundamental power of human love becoming the new foundation of the cosmic order. It never even occurred to me that “taking back the narrative to rewrite it for ourselves” was not the ultimate goal of Team Free Will, or the ultimate expression of their biggest win.

This whole “well heaven really needed to be rebuilt, there was still work to be done!” seems… irrelevant to me if they’d truly won free of the cosmic narrative. The entire structure of the universe-- including Heaven and Hell-- should’ve defaulted to the paradise state that Jack was literally born to bring to fruition. Wasn’t that the point of his entire role in the story, ultimately?

And if that wasn’t the case in the end, why did we never learn the fate of Hell? Was it just… irrelevant and unchanged after this? Or just… abandoned as a concept entirely? It’s just strange to me to put such a focus on heaven being the sole sphere of import in the end that it undercuts the essential humanity of the narrative for me.

The story itself had kept Heaven on a back burner for years, only occasionally mentioning that the structure of the place was falling further and further into disrepair with a dwindling force of angels struggling to keep the walls in place at all, that it seems like it could’ve been an afterthought at the end of the series rather than a focus so large it required the death of both main characters to make sure we all understood that Heaven Had Changed Now. Because TFW had never been fighting to make Heaven right. They’d been fighting to save the world itself, for humanity to all have a chance to live their lives as their own.

And we didn’t need to see that in the final hope they might get their own lives on Earth to explore. In the end, the fundamental narrative that Life On Earth was dictated by the cosmic structure of creation was never fully subverted. And for me, that’s the main reason I just… can’t accept the finale. It wasn’t a victory of free will and humanity, in the end it was just more of the same.

I appreciate the attempts to take the essential bones of the story we did get and apply a different polish to the surface of the skeleton, but to me it still feels like we’re looking at completely different beasts in the end. Like… to me this was as jarring a revelation as those drawing of modern animals reimagined as dinosaurs entirely based on their skeletons. Like, all along the narrative told me I was looking at a swan. They told me this skeleton they’re building out from is definitely a swan, without a doubt. I know what a swan looks like-- a graceful feather-covered bird with magnificent wings. I trusted that in the end it would be at least remotely swan-looking. And then the finale ended up looking like this

and I just don’t even know where everything went so wrong. Or maybe all along I just assumed they actually knew what a swan looked like, but weren’t sure they could actually pull it off and settled for whatever the heck this is instead. Either way, I’m actually kinda grateful to the finale for being so entirely disappointing on every level, because otherwise I probably would’ve tried to adopt the monstrosity of it anyway. And I’m really, really glad I don’t have to.

#spn 15.20 #spn cosmology #heaven hell purgatory and the empty #and this is why no amount of narrative defense of the finale is capable of making me feel any better about it #i admit i thought too big... but it was all right there in the narrative to see #oh well at least all i have to do to hold on to my grandest notion of the universe is throw out the finale :'D

196 notes · View notes

aliaslua · 4 years

Text

Living with the Turtles (headcanons)

Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello, Michelangelo x Reader

Summary: A secret mission that only the four brothers could accomplish requires them to become your personal bodyguards. How would each one of them react to sharing a house with you?

Category: Platonic relationship, domestic fluff, deep friendship.

WARNINGS: None c:

A/N: This actually could be a whole fic (maybe someday) but honestly I was just feeling very into domestic turtles today so I decided to post this. Let me know what you think!

You can also read it in AO3! <3

Leonardo

The order was clear, you needed to be hidden. To fade, become invisible. After a team of outlaw scientists from the old Sacks' company discovered that you DNA carried a sequence of molecules that was thought had disappeared from the human species many decades ago - the only sequence that could serve as a basis for creating new mutagens - your blood became the most precious material in the planet and you, the most wanted person in the world. The Federal Program for Assistance to Threatened Victims and Witnesses had no option but to hide you in the only place where you would be safe 24 hours a day, seven days a week: the old train station where New York's newest heroes lived.

How will each of them react to the brutal change of sharing their house with a stranger?

When Chief of police Vincent set up an urgent meeting with the Hamato brothers to make a request and warned that the fate of the world depended on it, Leo prepared to receive a mission that would involved discipline, discretion and unmatched fighting skills but when he realized they would have to spend the next few months being bodyguard to a human, his confidence immediately morphed into pure nervousness.

He is a true gentleman and is desperate to be the best host possible. Before you arrived, he ordered the whole family to clean the Lair with a military streak and himself inspected every room. He and Donatello built a private room for you using some of the shoji screens from the meditation room and he provided a bed and headboard.

He's absolutely nervous the day you arrive. You are their first official guest and he will do everything to make your stay perfect. Because of that, your first interactions with him is a little awkward. He doesn't allow you to collaborate in any domestic activity and spends the first two weeks asking if you need anything ("No," You always answer "I am very comfortable, thank you.").

After a few days getting to know you better and seeing your determination to participate in the routine of the house, he finally manages to relax a little and takes this opportunity to share some house tasks with you. Despite that, he continues to treat you like royalty: pulling chairs, opening doors, covering you with a blanket at night and carrying you to your bed whenever you sleep on the couch -and then he ensures that the house is quiet, so you can rest. Nothing will interrupt your sleep, your peace, your security, your stay will be perfect, he will do anything to make you feel at home.

Living with Leonardo is a bit like being a soldier in a barracks, but without all the shouting. From Monday to Monday you have a schedule and after you finally manage to convince him to teach you a little self-defense, the training is hard and disciplined. Unlike the barracks, however, Leonardo is very comprehensive with your physical and mental limitations and it's more than willing to adapt your training depending on what you need most on the day. Weary? Deep meditation. Muscle pain? Yoga. Feeling unmotivated? Cardio.

Then when you finally get to know each other better, after a few weeks living together, Leonardo is like a mentor to you. He always has excellent advice and is always available to listen to you, regardless of how repetitive or superficial your problems are.

Leonardo's cooking skills are truly awful. It was during dinner, in fact, that you really started bonding. The pasta was slimy and bland and the sauce tasted like old ketchup: You had to intervene. Only when he saw how well you cooked - and wow that's a pretty good knife control! - he realized that you not only had a lot to learn, but a lot to teach. You have taken on the responsibility of teaching him how to cook the basics ever since and you will never forget his face when he first tasted missoshiro.

You're both obsessed with Chinese fighting movies. Every wednesday you watch a movie together and no matter how hard you try, you can't convince him that "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" is better than "House of Flying Daggers".

Of all the brothers, he is the one who gets used to your presence faster (even before Mikey) and his generosity is essential to make you feel welcome.

Raphael

It is not even possible to define with words the intensity of the fight that Raphael and Leonardo had when he told them that he had accepted the mission of hiding the human carrier. Once again Leonardo had made a decision without consulting the whole team but more important than that: Raphael was going to have to share the house with someone he didn't know and there was nothing in the world that made him more angry - and nervous - than that.

Deep down, Raph was more anxious than angry. Knowing that he was going to share his only intimate and personal space - his house - with someone he didn't know made him feel super vulnerable, exposed. In fact, he was scared. He feared the possible looks of dread, disgust, repulsion. He knew that few things in the world could hurt more than a look of hatred and he was not at all comfortable with the reality that he might have to LIVE with someone who found him disgusting.

But when you arrived, the looks didn't come. You looked nervous, but not scared, let alone disgusted. As the days went by, Raphael realized that the only feeling you had before arriving at Lair was gratitude and after he actually understood that in fact he made you feel safe, the warmth in his chest was enough for him to forgive your invasion.

Sometimes you are just as scary to Raphael as he is for most humans. That day when he caught you alone in the kitchen taking the cookie sheet out of the oven, he realized that. You are so… small, so fragile and soft. He feels that if he breathes too hard or too close to you he will dismantle you, like a house of cards. It's also impressive to him how much noise such a small creature can make. God! Are your shoes made of iron? How can biting into toast be that loud? Even your breathing seems loud to him. But it is not your fault, you always answer, it's not like you're a trained ninja.

Raphael is the last one to be comfortable with your presence but when that day finally comes and he admits he likes it when you are around, he also decides that you are one of them now and for you he ride or die. Silently he swears eternal loyalty to you and from that day on, rest assured, you don't need to be afraid of anything anymore.

Because of this, Raph becomes strangely jealousy and possessive. You are now his best friend and he needs to know if everyone around you is good enough, well-intentioned enough and ensuring your joy and well being are now part of the mission. It's a little overwhelming at first but when you adjust the intensity it's wonderful to have someone who takes such good care of you.

His affection is always returned. You love his company and think it's funny how such a big man can be so soft. And soft he is, since what you most have in common is the appreciation for period romances. You love watching all the adaptation films from Jane Austen's books and maybe he cried at the end of Reason and Sensitivity - he will deny it until the end - but your favorite activity for you to do together is when you read to him while he works out. You are like a personal audiobook and he will never stop making fun of you for crying while reading Mr. Wentworth's letters.

Despite the affection, he is really a tease. He doesn't miss a single chance to remind you how small you look to him and nicknames like Tiny Temper and Shortstop are recurring. You always repay it whenever you can but ultimately you know that he doesn't mean bad.

Donatello

Donatello thinks that the idea of protecting the source of the conflict is brilliant, it seems much more rational to avoid a war before it happens and proceed a mission with a more discreet and strategic course of action than to appeal to physical strength and weapons. That said, he hates having someone else around as much as Raphael. Unlike him, however, Donatello is not afraid of rejection, he is... Uncomfortable. Privacy is a right that he considers essential and imagining that he may receive someone who is intrusive in his own home makes his head hurt.

Therefore, he receives you with extreme coldness. He helps with the organizing of their home and your personal space, of course, he doesn't want you to feel unwelcome, but it's essential for him to draw the line between mission and personal life and he wants to make that very clear. His room is off limits, the computer area is off limits and specially the laboratory is off limits.

But he soon realizes that his coldness is unnecessary and maybe even a little rude since you seem excellent at respecting personal limits and spaces. He was prepared to spend a long time refusing to answer invasive and indiscreet questions, but you seemed to have a genuine and respectful interest. In the end, he found your polite curiosity very charming.

After that, he showed you the lab on his own and was even happier when you got interested but didn't touch anything. He finally had someone around with the same enthusiasm for science as he and he even started doing research based on your doubts. Enjoy, he's a great teacher.

But what you most like to do together is to sit on the huge couch in the living room with a cup of coffee and talk for hours on complex matters. Ethics, morals, economic and social configurations, what is the fate of the world? Why are we here? You certainly do not have the same theoretical background to refute him, but he loves your interest and loves to hear your subjective takes. A debate partner is everything he always dreamed of.

It's also a relief for him to be able to open up to someone other than his own brothers and he likes to hear the solutions you would give to his dilemmas from the perspective of a person who has lived a life so different from his. He also loves to watch you, but he will never admit it: Humans are fascinating, and he finds your ways and habits very funny.

Before you arrived he did a thorough research to understand what vitamins, minerals and supplements you would need to take while out of sunlight and with restricted access to various foods, so you also got you a personal doctor and nutritionist.

Michelangelo

The first week living with Michelangelo were almost unbearable. It may be fair to say that he was the only one among the brothers really pleased with your arrival and it was good to be warmly welcomed by at least one of them, but Mikey's excitement was a little overwhelming. He spent all day filling you with praise, flirting, asking about your life and life on the surface and it felt like he talked so much that he sucked all the air out of the room.

Knowing that your relationship could nor go on like that, in the second week of your stay you sat him on the couch and asked him to chill out just a little. You explained that for you it was super important to know that one of them was happy with your arrival and that you knew that he wanted to do everything to make your stay the best possible but for that he didn't need to treat you like a creature from another world, perfect and sovereign, you just wanted to be treated like ... an equal. That was more than enough. Michelangelo ceased to be a dedicated servant and became a great friend.

You couldn't ask for anything else in the world. Mikey was the perfect friend for a situation that could be unbearable without an icebreaker. He's fun, lovable and after you had that conversation, extremely relaxed and comfortable around you. His loyalty is unquestionable and every day he shows affection without hesitation.

He loves spending all the time he can with you and has volunteered to become your personal teacher of the art of graffiti. Leonardo can't know, but you are responsible for the new tags on the subway cars and on the doors of abandoned houses. Mikey loves to watch you do your hair and help you choose the clothes you are going to wear that day and you find it funny how that dynamic makes it look like he is playing house for the first time.

You made homemade pizza once and he asked you to marry him, a request to which you answered yes, of course. He made you a ring from the pizza crust and you drank soda with your arms crossed just like in weddings.

The most sensitive of the brothers. He always know when you're not feeling good and always has the right answer to make you feel better (that is, burrito blanket and reality shows).

#bayverse tmnt #tmnt 2016 #michelangelo #leonardo tmnt #raphael tmnt #tmnt imagine #donatello tmnt

146 notes · View notes

thelatelockdownlist · 4 years

Text

A Series on Series 02: Nalini Singh’s Psy-Changeling/Trinity Series

Hi! I’m Alex, a YouTube Newbie and this is The Late Lockdown List where I talk about the list of things I’ve got on my mind since the lockdown started. Today, on the second episode of A Series on Series, I’ll be talking about one of my favorite romance novel series ever:

Spoilers galore! That’s it. That’s the disclaimer.

So who are the Psys and and who are the Changelings?

In this world, there are three predominant races: the Psys who have powers akin to those of Professor X and Jean Grey, the Changelings who are shifters -- both animal and human forms, and the humans -- just humans.

There are two main changeling 'packs' in the series: the cats (leopards and panthers) - DarkRiver and the wolves - SnowDancer. As of this writing, there are 15 books under the Psy-Changeling series and 4 under its spinoff -- Trinity -- so named because they've included the other race: humans.

The series starts with Slave to Sensation

with Sasha Duncan, a Psy, who gets involved with Lucas Hunter, the alpha of the DarkRiver cats.

Sasha is a cardinal Psy. This means she’s very strong - literally off the charts strong, because their scale only goes up to 9 and cardinals are way over 10. But her abilities have not manifested. Her mother, Nikita Duncan, is a member of the ruling council. In this book, Nikita decides to enter into a sort of business partnership with the DarkRiver cats to sell real estate to changelings. Sasha becomes the point of contact.

So that’s basically how it starts. If you want to know more about the story, please go ahead and read it. I don’t want to tell you because that would be a disservice to the author.

However, I’m going to tell you what I love about this book and the books that follow.

I think Ms. Singh is a great world builder. There are a lot of familiar things about this world where Psys -- who are in the Marvel parlance, mutants -- and changelings -- think were animals but that’s oversimplifying it -- coexists with humans. She sets up the story so well without overexplaining it -- showing AND telling at the same time.

I found it very easy to dive into this world inhabited by the gifted and the supernatural mostly because their problems mirror a lot of what we contend with in the real world: corrupt politicians, violent crackdown of dissenters, prejudice against those who are not like ourselves… The characters in the story deal with these problems using their gifts -- ones we don’t have, but I understand their motivations and the decisions they make -- right or wrong.

It may sound trite but the human element in the circumstances in which the characters find themselves are very real and I couldn’t help but be drawn and just stay engaged the entire time.

So after finishing the first book, I hunted for the next and was completely gratified that it’s a series. I get to know what happens after and that’s amazingly satisfying. I also get to find out more about the initially peripheral characters in the book. And I get to learn more about what “Silence” is and why it’s starting to break…

The next books are about the rest of the packs with a smattering of Psys and humans here and there. The pairings are usually Psy and changeling. Down the road, you get human and Psy and then human and changeling. You’ll also meet the so-called bogeyman of the Psys: the Arrows. Essentially, they’re a squad of highly trained assassins, most of them trained since childhood. Fascinating bunch.

The last book in the Psy/Changeling series is Allegiance of Honor

which sets up the spinoff Trinity series.

In this book, we meet an almost one-year-old Naya - Lucas’ and Sasha’s half-psy/half-changeling daughter and the only one in the world - who can now shift. This is also the book where we find out just exactly how many ‘pupcubs’ Mercy and Reilly have.

It’s not all cute stuff, though. There’s an abduction attempt, a ‘righteous’ killing and vengeance. All through it, we see the lives of the Psys, Changelings and humans evolve to try to live in this world where there’s now a real possibility of all three races co-existing in peace.

Of course, si vis pacem, para bellum. If you want peace, prepare for war. And there’s a lot of foreshadowing.

So I’ve mentioned Trinity several times. The first book in the spinoff Trinity series is Silver Silence

where we meet Psy Silver Mercant, assistant of Kaleb Krychek who is the former Councilor now member of the new Trinity Accord council. Kaleb and Sahara Kyriakus’ story is told in the 12th book, Heart of Obsidian

We also meet another changeling pack, the StoneWater bears and its alpha, Valentin Nikolaev.

In this book, someone is committing acts of terrorism against humans -- to start -- to undermine EmNet or Emergency Net headed by Silver. In the previous books, EmNet coordinated rescue and relief operations.

The three other books in this series deal with more of the fallout of the creation of Trinity. A shadowy organization called the Consortium -- which is like the reverse side of Trinity -- also made up of all three races -- that seeks to undermine what Trinity wants to accomplish. It wants to sow discord among the races so they can go back to how it used to be: Psy, Changeling and humans living apart and keeping to themselves.

I’ve talked about what I loved about this series, but I realized I left out one important thing: romance. Each book tells you the love story, either the start of one or the continuation of the ones you’d read before, of the characters. The dynamics of the relationships are different, especially among the changelings because they have a hierarchy: an alpha, his/her sentinels, lieutenants and soldiers. They’re also classified into two ‘dispositions’: dominants and submissives. The dominants are usually soldiers, but there are also maternal dominants -- ones who protect the hearth and home from within the hearth and home. In this world, submissives hardly ever hold eye contact for long against dominants, which makes for a power imbalance in a relationship where you’re ideally supposed to be equals. However, with mates -- like wolves, changelings who mate -- explained like a magical and psychic merging of the souls -- mate for life. With mates, the dominant-submissive dynamic is less structured. It wouldn’t make for a good relationship if the submissive doesn’t have ways to be in equal footing as the dominant. Here is where the human side of the changelings appear. The mating bond snaps into place only when both parties let it happen. It is up to the female (all of the major matings in this story are heterosexual) to decide to accept the mating bond. However, it is the male who becomes aware of the ‘mating dance’ first.

I may be explaining it badly, but if you’re intrigued, go read the books. Seriously.

One other thing I love about this series that I know I’ve mentioned but feel like I should say again: this is a world you can happily get lost in. The way it’s built is so intricate; the details seem to jump out of the pages. I feel so invested in what happens to every single character that gets introduced in every book.

Of course, I have favorites like Roman and Jules -- twin DarkRiver cubs who were introduced in the first book.

I find myself looking for mentions of the pups or cubs because of how Ms. Singh writes them. Imagine having a toddler and puppy/kitten existing in one body.

It’s difficult to choose a favorite, but so far, mine is Allegiance of Honor.

It has all my favorite characters and it’s a great setup to the spinoff. I was so relieved to hear about the spinoff because I thought that I would have to say goodbye to all of them. This way, I still see glimpses of my favorites while being introduced to new people and how they form connections to the characters that have yet to be explored.

That’s it for me. I hope you enjoyed listening to me ramble on and on about the Psy/Changeling/Trinity series.

The latest book, Alpha Night

has been out since June 2020. Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you in the next episode where I discuss Nalini Singh’s other supernatural/paranormal series, Guild Hunter series.

17 notes · View notes

ashintheairlikesnow · 4 years

Note

hi ash! i know you said before that you're not autistic you just did a lot of research to depict chris realistically- do you have any advice for finding resources on writing disabled characters that isn't like... horribly abelist? im writing someone with an intellectual disability from head trauma and who is nonverbal, and i want to get it right but everything online seems very autism-speaks-y. im autistic and semiverbal but i dont have an id and i want to be realistic and respectful.

I cannot speak with any expertise or sense of speaking from enough experience to be taken as an expert here, and defer as always to those with lived experience with intellectual disability!

But I will give a few more general tips for what to do when looking to write a character with a neurological makeup that doesn’t match your own, as far as what has worked for me with Chris:

1. The story should never be ABOUT their lived experience if you do not also have it. Chris’s story is not about autism, or being autistic. I would never presume to try and write a story like that because, whatever my intentions, I don’t have that knowledge that comes from living it. I would at BEST be taking the experiences of others, their voices. At worst, I would be someone standing with a megaphone shouting over those who deserve to be heard.

Making the disability what the plot revolves around is... generally just not going to be a good idea, in any sense. It’s moments like this where I feel like it’s best to defer to the writers who have lived it, instead.

This is not to say “never write someone different than yourself”, because... I don’t think that’s at all good advice. I think that way lies stunted writers who never push themselves. But it does mean “do not center the story on this thing if you have not experienced it and don’t have that knowledge and understanding”.

2. At the same time, don’t try to be coy or dance around or hide the disability behind purple prose or refuse to acknowledge its reality. Trying to make a disability sound cute, or talk around it instead of speaking it out loud, can be minimizing or shaming in ways that I think it’s easy to miss, if you don’t live with that disability yourself! To me, this touches on one of my hugest pet peeves - characters who are written as having a particular neurodivergence in media, or shown on tv, but they never expressly admit to it or name it.

I know I hesitated with Chris, more because I didn’t feel comfortable giving him a diagnosis until I understood autism better myself, and I do regret how long it took me to embrace that reality about him. I just thought it better to err on the side of researching before I embraced. But I do feel some guilt about waiting so long when I had readers who were identifying so heavily with him, and I kind of knew, but just didn’t feel comfortable owning it yet.

3. On a related note - disabilities in a story that become melodramatic tragedy or turn the disabled character into a ‘redemption story’ for an abled character. This is so, so prevalent in common media and pop culture and once you recognize it for what it is, it’s so hard to not see it in so many places. Think of how many movies, novels, etc contain a disabled character who exists to teach abled people some virtuous lesson about living life to the fullest or ‘what it really means to be human’ blah blah blah blah blah. Don’t do that. Please. (I mean, I kind of feel like you definitely won’t, but I’m just speaking very generally here). If you find the story going in a direction in which abled people learn something from the disabled person, please think very carefully and critically as to why the story is heading in that direction.

Language alone can also be a problem here - think about the difference between openly describing a character moving around their life with a wheelchair vs. calling them “wheelchair-bound” or “reliant on a cane”, when the cane or wheelchair may actually represent freedom to that person - an aid they need, yes, but one that allows them to live with far more agency than they might have had otherwise.

To describe them, especially from their own POV, as “wheelchair-bound”, may ring false to disabled people who understand that the wheelchair isn’t a cage, but a tool that allows that individual person to feel less caged by being able to more freely leave home.

(This varies person to person, just providing an example)

4. Educate. Research. And don’t just do so by asking people with disabilities to tell you their stories. I often express gratitude to the autistic readers, those with ADHD, etc who spoke up about Chris, talked about their own experiences, identified with him, found him very resonating for aspects of their own lives.

These stories, this information, this sharing of their lives was given freely to me, and I’m fucking amazed and grateful for how welcomed Chris was, and how willing readers were to share about themselves when talking about him.

Their willingness to speak about these things is something I treasure. But I absolutely would never believe that a single person owed me the story of their life to make sure I got Chris right. That was my responsibility, you know? I try to keep in mind the concept of ‘emotional labor’. Asking a disabled person to be your resource is asking them to give, and give, and give of themself. They may want to give you that kind of labor, they may not. But I definitely wouldn’t ask it of anyone without understanding it was something they were happy or felt comfortable giving.

Research, on the other hand, is essential. You mentioned things being “autism speaks-y” when trying to research on your own, and oh god, do I feel you. It sucks that autism speaks is the first thing to pop up when trying to research the lives of autistic people - and in my research, I was lucky to already know AS sucks and write them off and anyone who heavily referenced them as not helpful. I can see how someone might not know that, though, and stumble on them and believe they were a helpful resource for writing autism when they... well. Nope.

Try to think about the express disability you are writing for this person, and why, and then go research! I looked up “books on autism recommended by autistic people”, and found some invaluable books, yes, but also papers published online, websites, etc! Each of them vetted and looked over and recommended by autistic people, so I knew I was getting information that came from people with those experiences and that understanding. A good example - I picked up a book on the history of diagnosis and treatment of autism in the United States, mentioned it here, and @redwingedwhump recommended a book called Neurotribes... which turned out to be immensely more helpful, spot-on, and provided some really excellent foundational information I wouldn’t have found in the first book at all.

There’s a lot of information out there on Traumatic Brain Injuries and their lasting effects on individuals who receive them, so I would start there. What you’re describing sounds like a TBI with lasting effects! So I would start your research there, and also look up being nonverbal separately, as well as combining the two. Make sure you’re not just looking at the top links - often paid ads or problematic organizations that are able to pay more for better exposure - but also scanning for blogs, nonprofits, lived-experiences stories, too.

I found a lot of information on the second or even third page of results i would never have seen if I only stuck to the first. Remember the algorithm on search engines is usually showing you what other people are clicking on, not necessarily the best source.

5. This is one you the asker already know, but I want to include it for general reasons: do not ‘dumb down’ the thought processes of a nonverbal or semi-verbal person. I see this in fiction surprisingly often, and I think it’s this sense we have as abled people (’we’ just meaning I’m including myself) that being verbal is required to have a highly complex thought process, and it’s... it’s just fucking not. Speech and though are related but not completely wound around each other, and the ability to verbalize is not the same as the ability to think.

Like I said, I know you know this, asker, but it’s something I see in fiction/media and it drives me up the wall. So I wanted to include it.

6. For the love of God, do not use medical terminology unless you actually know what you’re doing/talking about. Many disabled people or those with serious medical conditions become what amounts to experts on their own diagnoses, because they have to. They have to be experts to receive the care they should be able to rely on. If you constantly fuck up terminology - trust me - it will be noticed, and it will take people out of the story or hurt their ability to suspend disbelief while reading.

There are ways to do medical scenes/conversations with doctors that avoid falling into this problem! I would just be very very careful to heavily research before using any complex terminology.

7. This disabled person does not exist to evoke pity. They are a human - nuanced and multi-layered - living their life, and their story should always, always reflect that. I don’t really have anything else to add to that.

I would love to hear further advice from anyone with anything else to add.

#writing advice #writing

48 notes · View notes

fantasyinvader · 3 years

Text

Kamen Rider Saber: Finale and Series Review

Okay, before I start disemboweling this series I want to give the finale two points of props.

It was nice to see the main trio fight the big bad together rather than it just being the lead Rider.

The ending really feels nostalgic for me. It's like one of those old games or anime that tried to do something like Evangelion, mostly Star Ocean 3 comes to mind.

I was going to add another point: how the ending didn't have to rely on a cosmic retcon to turn things into a happy ending like Build or Zi-o did, leaving those who died dead and having some level of maturity. I was going to give the show that point, even if it felt like it was leading into Touma essentially becoming God, but then the show did it and...I'm going to be honest here, I was saying fuck you at the screen. Multiple times, kinda like when Doctor Who's 50th anniversary where it turns out Gallifrey wasn't destroyed, the Doctor sealed it away and just couldn't remember it. Like, that is the level of bullshit I was calling out, and with Doctor Who I only said it as an “oh fuck you” rather than just “fuck you fuck you fuck you” until I noticed I was doing this and stopped myself.

Got it? Good. Now let's put Kamen Rider Saber on the examination table, rip it open, and see what went wrong with it.

Oh my god, where to begin with this series?

You ever see a show or movie that tries to do too much for it's runtime? Maybe a book that has some ultimately good ideas, but it never fleshed them out properly? That's my biggest feeling with Saber. Individual parts of the story, some arcs and characters are good on paper. Not to mention, Touma has two incredibly sexy upgrades (the Ryuki-inspired Draconic Knight and the berserker Primitive Dragon). But there is just so much in here that, given the proper focus could have carried the show if properly developed. It's a case of quantity over quality.

But the main problem comes to it's central McGufffin, the Omniscient Tome. This book is supposed to have all knowledge and later on all stories contained within it. It's what powers Wonderworld and the Wonder Ridebooks that are the main collectable trinket of the season. But when you stop and think about it, Saber is a world where there is no free will and the antagonists are all rebelling against this in their own way. Kento's dad (former Kamen Rider Calibur) went rogue in the backstory because he was given a vision of the future through his sword, and it led to the former Saber taking up the role of Calibur and going rogue in order to learn the truth. When the other riders are turned against Touma, the argument is over how he's destined to become more powerful, making Touma seem like he's seeking power and could be a future threat. When Kento returns from the dead, he's haunted by visions of the world ending in multiple variations, leading to him trying to seal the Sacred Blades in order to stop it. But then Master Logos is revealed to be buttfucking insane, wanting to rebel against his position in the world. Then it turns out the monster faction's leader, was a former poet who lost hope when he learned that all his creations were already in the Omniscient Tome, so he decided he would end the world his way rather than the predetermined ending. And even then, the world still ended the way it was always fated to end, even with Touma disappearing to nu-Wonderworld if only for a year.

The world wasn't saved, it was destroyed and then rebuilt because Mei wrote an online post that encouraged people to share their stories, which they did in oblivion even though these guys shouldn't have seen the post at all and instead just heard her voice.

Like, maybe the nu-World has free will. I'd buy that. But when applied to the 47 episodes I've spent the last year watching (alongside the Zenkaiger crossover episode), it felt pointless because it ended the way it was foretold in the Omniscient Tome. It didn't matter that Storious was defeated, fate was not averted. It's like, the complaints people have about the MCU post-Loki. It doesn't matter that Tony decided to sacrifice himself, because he didn't have free will. He was always going to sacrifice himself. Thanos was always going to snap away half the universe, and it would always be undone because choices didn't matter before Loki's ending.

And that's not even going into how they final arc reveals that Touma can somehow create stories not present in the Omniscient Tome. That he can somehow, because the personification of Wonderworld choose him as a child, that for some reason he's the only writer in history that can do this. His catchphrase is about how he'll be the one who'll decide how the story ends, but with the idea that everything was set into stone? It's laughable.

Like, my problem with Zero One's ending was the last scene. Aruto had learned a lot about the Humagears and was an advocate for them finding their own dreams as they became self-aware AI. So him trying to treat a new humagear as just an amnesiac Is and try to help her “remember”? That felt like a betrayal of the character and what he stood for. But the post-series movie revealed that Is left a copy of herself in the Zero Two driver, and merged with the non-self aware nu-Is who the movie kept reminding us wasn't the Is we knew. Aruto even had a sobbing scene about what he was doing, lowkey acknowledging what he was doing but without overtly calling him out. It fixed Zero One for me after that last scene left me with a bad taste in my mouth that overshadowed an otherwise excellent show.

You can't fix Saber with a single movie, that's what I'm getting at here.

So, with that out of the way let's go into my thoughts on each character.

Touma: Is one of the blandest main riders in the franchise. His sense of style is probably one of the worst I've ever seen though. Like I know they like to try and give the main riders their own look rather than having them dress like normal people, like Aruto wearing a hoodie under his suit jacket alongside with his very bright shoes, but this wasn't a W or even something like Ghost (where honestly I really liked Takeru's robe-like shirts). What they eventually settled on with Touma was a stupid hat, really baggy pants, and shirts that look like they came out of a stern librarian's closest. You know, the type with her hair in a bun and their horned-framed glasses on a chain.

Rintaro:Is one of those cases where he's meant to be the secondary Rider of the series, but is overshadowed because the writer likes to use someone else more. The idea of him having to turn against the organization that raised him (like a child soldier) could have worked really well if the series had a more free will-direction. But alas.

Kento: Kento's the one character I found I could really like. His arc was more interesting during the first quarter, his return as Calibur, but then he returned to being Espada and, as much as I love that suit, he just became Touma's main cheerleader. Really, I felt like towards the end it was a waste of him, especially since he doesn't get any power ups like Rintaro did to solidify him as one of the main three. He definitely feels like a victim of rewrites or just the writer not knowing what he was doing.

Mei: The female lead. Honestly, I just found her annoying most of the time. A womanchild to match Touma's more manchild moments, with a potential romance with Rintaro thrown in to only be confirmed in a future movie. Really, she should have taken over as Espada after Kento disappeared early on (especially since she's one of the three in the Ending dance while Kento isn't).

Daishinji: I'd say best boy, but he became a background character pretty quick.

Ogami: An older Kamen Rider who is also a father to a young child? Cool, and could even have worked in contrast to Rintaro's raising as essentially a child soldier. But alas, it was not to be.

Ren: OMG. A somewhat psycho younger Rider, idolizing Kento, and his social Darwinist beliefs on strength leading to conflict as Touma gets more powerful, leading to him abandoning the team to train with an enemy monster? HOW DO YOU MAKE THAT NOT WORK! I swear, Ren should have been the secondary Rider of the series, with his changes in beliefs being used more effectively.

Yuri: One of the most competantly written characters in the entire show. One of the original swordsman who became his sword, returning after 2000 years and not only feeling the culture clash of then and now but even how the idea of what makes a hero has changed? Good boy. Also loved him using a shadow body early on during fights.

Sophia: Why are you even here?

Reika: Oh boy, the swordswoman who leads the rest to distrust Touma under the orders of Master Logos, and doesn't sway from this until he's proven to be batshit insane? And even then, reluctant to join the others? Could have been better, especially if her relationship with her brother didn't come across as incesty. Though, could we please return her to Magine in Zenkaiger? Reika hugging her was really cute, in a socially awkward type of way.

Ryoga: Reika's brother. With his powers being something out of Jojo, time manipulation powers which are a bit hard to explain. He starts them and to his opponents things seem like the fight is continuing as normal, but he really exists outside of that and then can attack from a blindspot? Could have been really good with if the series had gone Team Free Will is all I'm saying.

Master Logos: What I mentioned above, but his Rider suit is one I'm in lust with. Just laughs like a madman and you're wondering why Reika and Ryoga don't rebel against him earlier.

The Megid: Two are a waste who I never bothered to learn their names. Fall out of focus for a bit and only return to be beaten, with the sad fact that they were once human. Storious is the exception, but even then I felt he was a little too late to save the series.

Tassel: Bon Lecture! I still hate you you weirdo, even if your death scene made me feel a little sad. The fact that you treated the early parts of the show as a story you were reading? Have you seen my other complaints?

As for the message of what the show tried to say? I don't really mind it. It's encouraging people to love stories, even if they are copies (considering the controversy of Time Paradox Ghostwriter and Cheat Slayer within recent memory, I'm trying not to make jokes about Saber encouraging plagiarism). And I don't think that's a bad thing in itself. Hell, how many stories take stuff from older stories and just tweak elements to make them their own? I love the Elric saga, but that was based on old legends and meant to subvert the likes of Conan the Barbarian, and some other stories I've liked have borrowed elements from it as well. The idea that stories can be used to pass on our hopes, thoughts and dreams to others is pretty nice as well, rather than writing being a form of masturbation on the author's part.

But in the shadow of the Omniscient Tome and it's implications, I really feel the story should have taken another route.

A lot of Riders start of weak, having to introduce the plot as well as the main release of whatever trinket they want kids to gorge themselves on this year. But they usually start getting better towards the end of the first quarter, while maybe stalling a bit towards the end of the second/third. Saber was a series that I felt never really found it's legs. Too many bareboned plot threads on the go, dropping some for a while only to pick them up again after they've been forgotten about. This is not a good series, to be honest I think Zi-O and even Ghost were better, and really feel it would have been better handled in the hands of someone who could actually write.

Not to mention, this gave me flashbacks of Power Rangers Megaforce over how much this series relied on fight scenes. Throw in greenscreen everywhere, lack of civilians...oh god, it is Kamen Rider Megaforce. And it felt like Saber was trying to have a story, unlike Megaforce, but it has the same “it’s a kid’s show, we don’t have to try that hard” energy.

1 note · View note

hellomynameisbisexual · 5 years

Text

How Do Bi Parents Come Out to Their Kids?

It’s not always straightforward.

By Lux Alptraum

As the author of multiple memoirs, psychotherapist Wendy C. Ortiz, M.F.T., is no stranger to personal disclosures. In her books, she’s told readers about her teenage sexual exploits and her struggles as a 20-something Angeleno, and she’s even provided lengthy descriptions of her dreams. But over the past few years, Ortiz has been navigating a different disclosure wholly unlike the ones that have shaped her literary career: coming out as bisexual to her young daughter.

“We’re still trying to find a way to explain it without opening a can of worms that we are not quite prepared for yet,” Ortiz tells SELF.

Ortiz’s nine-year-old daughter has always been aware that her parents are not straight—being raised in a household with two moms made that evident. But Ortiz’s bisexuality has been a more complicated identity to discuss, one that expands beyond her current relationship and encompasses a broader swath of who she is as a person. Over the past few years, she’s been experimenting with how to be open and honest with her daughter in an age-appropriate, accessible way that offers comfort and clarity rather than just creating more confusion. Though Ortiz and her family have started the conversation, it remains a work in progress.

She’s hardly the only parent to find herself in this situation.

There are a lot of reasons bi parents choose to come out. For many bi parents, sharing their identity can feel essential to providing their children with an open-minded understanding of the world around them. “I’ve always wanted to give my son what I didn’t have growing up,” Ellie W., 25, tells SELF. Her own religious upbringing didn’t include open conversations about sex and identity.

For others, being out about their identity can feel like a way of encouraging honest communication with their children. “I decided relatively early on in my then partner’s pregnancy that I wasn’t going to be secretive about stuff, because I had dealt with a lot of secretive approaches in my own family around all sorts of things. It was bad for me and also bad for the rest of the family,” Jerome C., 44, tells SELF.

And in a political environment that’s increasingly hostile to LGBTQ+ folk, some parents see informing their children about their bisexuality as an important part of preparing their kids for the future. “To be trans and bi is to be pretty visible,” Nola P., 36, tells SELF. “I wanted to make sure that they understood some of the things that might happen, and how it might affect our family directly.”

That sense of community, identity, and visibility is a big part of why some parents might feel driven to open up this discussion with their kids. Being open about your bi identity can help combat bisexual erasure and help kids understand bisexuality not just as an abstract concept but as the identity of someone they’re close to. It can also help create a sense of open dialogue that will serve kids later in life if they wind up identifying as queer.

“Parents might think in the back of their heads, Well, what if my child was bisexual? I would want them to feel like they could come out to me. So I should come out to them and be that role model that they deserve,” Dan Rice, M.Ed., executive director at the sex education organization Answer at Rutgers University, tells SELF.

Indeed, Mike F., 42, was prompted to come out to his teenage daughter after she came out to him first. “I don’t remember the exact conversation, but she made a joke about not being ‘exactly straight,’ and I said, ‘You and me both, baby girl.’ She paused, looked at me, and said, ‘Cool,’” he tells SELF.

Of course, there are a few reasons coming out as bisexual to your kids can be complicated. For one, bi parents who choose to broach this topic with their children run the risk of facing judgment from family members, friends, and community members who consider this disclosure to be TMI. On a popular podcast I listen to, a women’s health expert advised an audience member against coming out to her daughter as bi, saying that it was a discussion best reserved for older kids. The expert’s reasoning? The audience member’s young child wasn’t ready to hear about who her mommy liked to have sex with.

Um. While most of us would agree that frank discussions of adults’ sex lives aren’t an appropriate topic for children, coming out as bisexual to your kids in no way means giving them an extensive overview of everyone you’ve slept with (and how). “Being bi isn’t just about how you have sex and who you have sex with, it’s about how you understand desire and love and connection and community,” Cory Silverberg, an award-winning sex educator and author of Sex Is a Funny Word, tells SELF.

Though some parents might fret about the possibility of burdening their children with too much information at too young an age, Rice doesn’t think parents need to worry about having this conversation too soon. “It’s never too early,” he says. “What we’re explaining to children is love, and who we love and have a special love for. Children understand love.”

Then there’s the fact that starting the conversation can feel complicated and intimidating. A simple way in might be a casual disclosure during a discussion about different styles of relationships, something like, “Some people fall in love with people of a different gender, some people fall in love with people of their own gender, and some people, like me, can fall in love with people of any gender.”

It’s also key to keep in mind that your kid might not react with enthusiasm or even interest. “This could be a conversation that the parent might hope is longer, but maybe the kid isn’t interested, and it’s something to come back to,” says Ortiz, who in addition to navigating this on her own also works with many queer patients as a psychotherapist. Ortiz recommends mainly letting the child lead the discussion: Tie your disclosures to questions they’ve brought up about relationships or love or identity rather than forcing them to listen to a personal monologue that they’re not ready for or couldn’t care less about right now.

In Jerome’s case, he first discussed gender and sexuality with his son when the child was nine. “It was around that time that one of his cousins came out as transgender, so that gave me the opening,” he says. “I tried to make it ‘not a big deal,’ which meant that, in turn, he didn’t seem particularly fazed by anything I was saying or talking about.”

Above all, it’s important to remind your kid that having a bisexual parent doesn’t change things or mean that their life isn’t going to be the same. Even if this information is new to them, it doesn’t change who you are: a parent who loves them very much.

For many, this is bound to be an ongoing discussion, not a single conversation. The conversation you have with your kids about your sexual identity is likely to shift and expand over the years as your children get older and better able to understand more complex topics. Silverberg recommends using pop culture as an entry point to additional conversations. If you’re watching a Disney movie, for instance, you can remind your child that not all princesses marry princes: Some might marry other princesses, some might be happy with either option, and some might decide they’re not interested in marriage at all.

This can be especially useful for younger children. Ellie says her son is too young to understand sexual and romantic attraction, so she describes her own partners as “friends” but encourages him to observe diversity in the world around him. “He seems entirely [unbothered] by the idea that some children can have two mamas or two dadas or two mamas and one dada,” she says. “He found it quite amusing that there are infinite possibilities of how to make up a family.”

In Ortiz’s own home, the conversations about identity started around the time her daughter turned six. It was something, she tells me, that largely happened organically. When her daughter started talking about kids at school having crushes on each other, Ortiz and her partner gently brought up the idea that people can have crushes on someone the same gender as them as well as on people of different genders. Meanwhile, shows like the cartoon Steven Universe showcase queer relationships in a fun and casual way and have given the family an opportunity to talk about the wide variety of relationships humans might arrange ourselves in.

When Ortiz’s daughter stumbled on photos of Ortiz with an old boyfriend, Ortiz didn’t shy away from being honest about who that person was in her life. “In the last year we’ve approached the subject that I was once married to a man,” Ortiz says. “It’s like, ‘Oh, this is Mommy’s identity,’ versus her other mother who identifies as lesbian.”

As the years have passed, it’s become clear that the many conversations they’ve had about identity and relationships have had an impact on Ortiz’s daughter. When she talks about the future, Ortiz says, her daughter leaves the question of her own orientation open. “She will preface by saying, ‘And I might be with a girl or a boy.’” Thanks to her mothers’ openness about their own identities, she’s able to be confident that whomever her future relationships end up being with, she’ll have the support and love of her family. Which is, of course, what truly matters.

38 notes · View notes

academiccomrade · 4 years

Text

BASICS.

Full name: Juniper Montgomery

Nicknames (if any): J. (Jay) [ anyone who is not close with them / knows them through their work would only know them by their initials and they’re not forthcoming with their identity ]

Gender / Pronouns: Nonbinary They/Them

Classification: Mutant

Abilities (if any): Persuasion

Age: 26

Occupation: Factory worker

PERSONALITY.

Traits: clever. confident. organized. loyal. perfectionist. neurotic. single-minded. tactless.

MBTI: INFJ - The Advocate

Zodiac: Libra sun + Virgo moon

POWERS:

Juniper can make anyone do anything they want by telling them to. Anyone who affected must be in earshot, and it wears off when either the command is fulfilled or they are no longer around. Certain actions happen in a hypnotic state while others happen in a conscious state but the person feels they have no control over their body. They can never cause victims to achieve what they are not capable of. I will express when their power is being used (accidentally or intentionally) with bold sentences

(BRIEF) HISTORY:

Born and raised in D3, Juniper’s family was always really community-oriented. They consider themselves raised by several people in the neighborhood who did anything from babysit them one time to helping their family not starve for a week. THEY ARE RIDE OR DIE FOR THEIR DISTRICT AND THEY WILL NOT LET ANYONE FORGET THAT

Juniper discovered their powers the first time they went to District Two when they were fourteen. The wealth gap is small in District Three so to realize not only is the gap larger, but society doesn’t view mutants as people were life-changing. The ability to persuade people stemmed from the strong desire for things that were never accessible before. The power can be really addictive so when they realize they can take things like food and other resources for their family they spent years just robbing people. (and manipulating their parents not to notice.) It wasn’t entirely noble they’ve definitely taken things from people they wanted more than they needed. (That last thing is important because now Juniper tries to divide their life into those two categories to disastrous effect.)

Once their parents found out, Juniper began to view their role in life to hold onto something which could be dangerous in someone else’s hands. They’ve told people their mutation is invisibility because it would be hard for anyone to disprove.

Although Juniper had become aware of the injustices happening in District Three, they still clung to this idea that somehow they were exempt/safe from certain things. Being physically assaulted by the authorities while helplessly watching their parents being arrested (they believe without cause) was sort of this wake up that the system really doesn’t care about anyone. The fact they were hit in the throat and physically couldn’t use their powers also contributed to the sense of helplessness and questioning if there will ever come a good use for them.

The rebellion is essentially Juniper’s entire life. It gives them a sense of direction they lost in the previous event. Most of their time is spent either working at the factory or attempting at community organizing. They hand out / leave pamphlets out every other Friday in different locations.

COMPLETE BIO

WANTED CONNECTIONS

HOME IS NOT A PLACE, IT’S A PEOPLE: Juniper’s family was pretty close to a lot of people in District Three. This can allow for general childhood friendships or familiarity with each other. People getting arrested in District Three is not new, but Watchers coming to get their parents was a semi-public affair. No one knows what it is except that treason was involved, and giving what Juniper is doing now it doesn’t make the best case for their parents’ innocence.

A GROUP WHICH BARELY MISSED BECOMING HISTORIC: People who are already a part of the rebellion. I would love to get into what ideas other people have for the direction they’d like to see it going, and what community organizing looks like. Some of these people might know Juniper’s name is, and when possibly committing to ride or die together you’d probably want to know who exactly you’ve put your trust in.

SUPPOSE THEY DID NOT ASK YOU TO STAND AGAINST ALL OF THE EVIL IN THE WORLD: People who are against the rebellion. That phrase in particular to mutants than humans, but in this letter Juniper does mention that human lives are also at stake. However, when Juniper argues they are not doing this for themselves, but for you, you might counter that you never asked them to do that. There are plenty of people whose lives are going well in the current system and the rebellion is just going to hurt the very people Juniper claims to care about.

WRITING IS A HOSTILE ACT: Someone who is on the brink of being persuaded in Juniper’s cause - as they have framed it in their writing - but once they come face to face with the writer it gives rise to hostility. The fact their conviction is admirable, but it also can be overwhelming. There’s a difference between someone making you change your mind about one or two things, but this is challenging people’s entire way of thinking, their entire lives, and that’s difficult enough without the feeling of conceding their entire identity to another person.

THE DETECTIVE: You just think it’s a little suspect for someone who is big on mutant rights Juniper never mentions what their powers are and grow more suspicious when they become confrontational about it when you try to find out. ( They’ll obviously find out eventually and their response is up to the mun, but for now, you don’t trust Juniper and the feeling is mutual.)

A SIREN’S CALL: People generally don’t remember if Juniper uses their powers on them. I would like a scenario where Juniper slips up a little bit. They talk about how some people just need to be nudged in the right direction, and it’s not harmful because they’re not forcing people to fight only to listen. However, they were too cautious about it, and you have the uncomfortable realization of realizing something or someone had just moved things around in their head.

WHY DIDN’T YOU STOP ME: You were the first person Juniper confided in about their powers and supported it for the same reasons they justified using it. (The fact you got to benefit from it is also an incentive.) Then one day Juniper just decided to put an end to it all, which might have been fine if they didn’t also blame you for not reining them in sooner. Now, you see Juniper preach about mutant rights all the while side-stepping what they can do. They try to ignore you, but deep down you both know what Juniper is actually capable of and that they can’t take the high road forever.

HEADCANONS

TBA

#2120intro #I have one brain cell and it went into the bio so this might be trash mcgarbage

2 notes · View notes

asterisquebloomed · 5 years

Text

Follow Forever

I seen a few of these before, and I thought what with the year ending, perhaps this was a good idea to do in commemoration of these past two years. I know I haven’t been the most active of RP partners. I’m really slow and my motivation is fickle, but I love RPing, I love writing, and I’ll never give it up, it brings me so much joy writing with everyone. So in honor of all that has happened, and as wish for more to come, here are some words of gratitude to some of my partners, friends, and mutuals.

@breakingreality

Avo, where do I even start with you? Oh I know, that you’re fucking amazing? Is that a good place to start? It better be, because here we go.

You are my best friend out of all the people I’ve met here in these last two years. I love talking to you, gushing about our characters, scheming and plotting future threads, teasing you with unanswered questions and unsolved mysteries, teasing you in general really, and just talking about whatever may cross my mind at the time. You’re easy to talk to, easy to get along with, and super friendly. I’m so happy to have met you and made friends with you, you have no idea. I’ll fucking fight anyone who dares talk shit about you. You’re understanding, smart, clever as fuck, and are one of the most enjoyable people to talk to. You’re a great writer, a great creator, and an even greater friend. I look forward to talking to you and I thoroughly enjoy your company. I don’t think you’ve ever once pissed me off, which is amazing because I have the shortest fucking temper ever. I wholeheartedly appreciate you and everything we’ve done thus far. If you ever need someone to talk to, to vent to, to confide in, whatever, I’m here for you. So if you ever feel lonely, or unwanted, or like you’re being ignored, come talk to me, cause I’ll never ignore you.

On that note, let’s turn our attention towards the RP side of things shall we? You’re an amazing writer, a wonderful RP partner, and your character are great. Like I love Eli, she’s fucking fantastic. Her sassy attitude, her impulsive nature, her quirky habits (Please don’t eat frozen steak Eli) and just all the intricacies and nuances, every single thing about her is great. A girl forced to grow up too fast, a child forced to face her mortality before she even got a chance to live. So when faced with two options, to die sad and alone without ever having had a chance to truly enjoy all that life has to offer, or to live by forsaking her humanity, the choice was obvious. She gave herself to the darkness, embraced being a monster, all for that chance. A chance to experience, to enjoy, to live. I’m sure most of us would make the same choice if we were faced with such a dismal situation.

Eli is amazingly written, you bring her to life in a way most could only hope to achieve. Her reactions are organic and visceral. She’s such an emotional girl, as much as she tries to hide it behind that stoic facade of hers. Her emotions are so raw and powerful that they sway the reader to feel along with her. To feel her fury as she fights against those who have done terrible things to her or those she loves, to feel her happiness however short lived it tends to be, and to feel her sorrow, the deep, bitter sorrow that seems to constantly plague her very existence. She can never seem to escape it. The abuse, the torment, the manipulation, all the suffering she goes through, that leads her to the edge, and when presented with it, she jumps. She leaps into circumstances she never fully understood, dives into a dark and twisted world, one full of horrific tragedy. Before she knows it and before she’s even aware, she’s lost her humanity. She’s become a monster, not only in name, but in nature as well. She’s become the demon those nuns claimed her to be, and she murders her tormentors for the things they have done to her. She gets taken in by a morally questionable individual and is put to work as an assassin, forced to kill people who are the same as she once was, humans who became monsters and lost control. She’s forced to essentially kill herself, over and over again. She’s been isolated her entire life. Made to mistrust others, to be distant, to be cold, to be uncaring.

And then she meets a girl, a special girl who accepts her for what she is. A girl who, while initially afraid of the truth that was revealed to her, overcomes that fear, because what you are doesn’t matter, it’s who you are that is important. She accepts her, refuses to let her go, and swears to never abandon her. For probably the first time in Eli’s whole life, she has a friend. Someone who truly cares about her and enjoys her presence. It’s no wonder she fell in love is it?

But like all things in this poor girl’s life, it’s fated to end in tragedy.

Listen, I love Eli, she’s a great character, she’s compelling, nuanced, and with so much depth, of both emotion and personality. She’s conflicted, she struggles, she has ups and downs, she feels and wants, she’s both silly and serious. She’s like a real person. She’s not just one thing, but many things, all blended together to create a single individual, just like we are.

You’ve done an absolutely fantastic job writing this girl. You should take pride in what you’ve done, because you’ve created an amazing character here.

I adore her relationship with Ivalinne and Reiko. They’re such stark contrasts to each other, such different dynamics, and the conflict between the three is great.

Which brings me to threads, I’ve loved every single one, and I have SO many ideas for more. I’ve got so many plans and schemes and plots in my head that I have yet to spring on you since I don’t want to overwhelm you, and I hope we’ll get to explore each and every one of them. I can’t wait!

You are probably the biggest fan of everything I do. You support me in my endeavors and are always cheering me on, and I thank you for that, I really appreciate your support, how much you enjoy my stories and characters, it makes me so incredibly happy. You’re probably the biggest fan of Ivalinne’s story, and by far the most vocal. I hope you’ll continue to partake in my stories as I tell them, I’d love to have you along for the ride.

Have I heaped enough praise on you yet? I could probably go on for hours about how amazing you are, so in the interest of not making this post even longer than it already is, I’ll stop here.

Avo, you’re great is all aspects, and I hope we continue to write together for as long as is possible. I look forward to the coming year and all the wonderful threads we’ll surely write together in 2020.

@intrinsicmirage

Aster, you’re such an amazing writer. Your narration is beautiful, I love the way it flows and how poetic it is. It’s a pleasure to read the things you write and a joy to see you on the dash.

You are a creative force, your ideas and concepts are awe-inspiring. The lore you’ve crafted is so interesting and well thought out, from the Coils to the Shroud, to the various species you’ve made all from scratch. You have an amazing mind and I love seeing what you come up with. Your characters are compelling, interesting, and in some cases downright terrifying. S9 is a fearsome being, an ancient god risen from the dead yearning for the power they once had and more, intent to make the universe bend to their will and take all they can get.

Syn is great. A woman struggling with her past and trying to find meaning, going from a materialistic, greedy mercenary whose focus rested solely on the wealth and possessions she could gain, to her confronting her past and taking on the trials of the Coils. She’s so haunted by her pasts traumas that in the past she couldn’t bear to speak of them, and to confront them head on took a lot of courage. She comes out triumphant and sees the world in a new light, making her realize just how pointless her treasure trove of amassed wealth is, and that there’s something much more important than money and material things. She takes her future into her own hands, reshapes herself and takes control of her own identity, giving herself a new name, one that she chose for herself, one that wasn’t given to her by someone else. It was hers and hers alone. Now known as Malam’schir, she sets her sights far higher than she once did as Syn, seeking to tear down a corrupted system of power where the strong reign supreme. All that she willingly puts herself through and endures for that goal, it’s admirable. She’s done a lot of horrible things throughout her life. She’s never been what one would consider selfless, in fact, she’s been the opposite, and for someone like that to, in the end, work towards helping the weak who are trapped under the heel of corrupt monarchies and corporations who hold an iron grip on the planets and systems in the galaxy, that is some amazing character development.

I think it really is amazing when a writer can make you feel for a character that isn’t morally sound and who is either grey, or downright evil. It takes a lot of skill to get the audience to invest in and sympathize with a character who isn’t an obvious hero. To have the reader root for someone who has killed countless people without a second thought, who lies and steals and does whatever it takes to achieve their goals, that in my opinion is a true sign of a skilled writer.

And you’ve done exactly that. I find myself wanting Malam’schir to succeed, cheering her on even when full well knowing that during the Lifeforce Coil she’s systematically torturing and murdering people to gain a better understanding of how that energy works before assimilating the lifeforce of those she’s killed into her own to bolster herself for the journey ahead. How detrimental this act becomes to her, as all the memories and personalities of all those she’s absorbed blend together. The gambles she takes as she descends into the Nine Hells and the risk all of this poses to her, not just physically, but on a fundamental level. The question of ‘is she still herself’ when all of those personalities merge and intermingle. What is truly her and what is inherited from all the souls she’s consumed. It’s fascinating and I can’t wait to see how it all turns out.

You’ve done an excellent job with your characters. They really feel like actual people, not mere concepts, but individuals with a will all their own. You bring them to life in such a spectacular way and it’s an honor to be able to write with you.

As a creator, I look up to you. You inspire me to go further and deeper, to explore beyond the world I created and reach out into the universe in which it exists. To explore my concepts on a cosmic scale rather than on a planetary one, and I thank you for that.

You’re a great friend, easy to talk to, fun to bounce ideas off of, and just an overall welcoming person. I’m glad to have met you and it makes me so happy that we’re friends. We’ve been mutuals since almost the beginning, sometime in March of 2018 or so, over the course of so many URL changes that I had to give you your own tag just to keep track of them all, and it’s been wonderful having you along for the ride. Thank you for your support through these years and for your continued interest in what I do.

I absolutely adore our ship and have so many ideas for what is to come for Reiko and Syn/Mala. Despite them both being terrible people, their relationship is so pure and beautiful. A love without expectations, one that doesn’t judge or hold the other to some sort of standard or code of conduct. A love with no burdens, but just simply being there with one another, enjoying the moment and each other’s presence. It’s so wonderful and I love every instance of it. Such rich emotion and such a profound love, even though both believe themselves unfit for love and unworthy of being loved. For such dangerous beings which such questionable morality, they are so sweet together. The fact that these two, who are ultimately very selfish individuals, would do anything to protect the other—even if it cost them their very lives—is so beautiful, it touches my heart.

I look forward to what is to come in the new year and hope to continue writing with such a wonderful writer for as long as I can, and I hope you too, feel the same way.

@sisterofthedevil / @cruentusscarlet / And more

Flan, you’re the reason I’m here in the first place. You were the first person I reached out to when I decided to come back here and enter the RP community. It was due to you that I got to join that first discord server, the first one I was ever in. It’s my home and I treasure it so much, so much so that even if that server is slowly declining, I’ll never leave it, because it’s the first place I got to call my home on discord. All of the friends I’ve made, all of them are thanks to that first step. If it wasn’t for you I might not have been able to make my place here. I’m so grateful for that. Even if we don’t talk much, I still consider you a good friend. And that’s not to mention how great of an RP partner you are.

Reiko and Flandre’s thread is one of my favorite threads I’ve had to date. I’ve loved every moment of it, it’s been such an intense roller coaster of emotions, and it’s probably the only thread where all of Reiko has been on full display. I hope going forward into 2020 that we can continue to write together.

You’re a great writer with such a unique style. Each one of your muses is fleshed out with intricate details and is a different spin on things, What with Flan having accidentally killed her sister and become the new mistress of the manor. Remilia embracing the role of being a terrifying monster and doing horrible things without batting an eyelash. Parsee being trapped not only emotionally and mentally, but spiritually and physically as well, unable to leave the bridge and be free. Satori, despite the horrors she’s witnessed, does not just follow suit to her species. You’ve given attention to every little detail, from the placement of her veins to the way she would have to put clothes on to accommodate them to the lasting effects of being able to read minds and bring other’s traumas to the surface. Alice is such a unique take on her as Shinki’s daughter, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything similar in regards to Alice’s origins and it’s amazing.

Each one of your muses shows how much thought you put into the characters you play and how dedicated you are to them. All of their trauma is very much real, and you portray it so well. There is never an easy fix to such problems, and you’ve done their struggles justice and shown just how hard it is to live with things like loss and abuse. Never does it feel like their trauma is overlooked or minimized, and their struggles with their demons and all the torment they’ve endured is very real, and how each one of them deals with their trauma in a different way shows such deep understanding of how different people react to things differently and everyone has their own way of coping.

I hope going into the next year that we’ll continue to RP together, there’s so much more I want to see and explore with your muses. You’re a great person, and I wish you all the best for the coming year.

@catacombofsouls

Lina, we’ve only become mutuals rather recently compared to most on this list, but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed talking with you over these past months. It’s great to have someone to scream about The Case Study of Vanitas and Pandora Hearts with. You’re friendly and easy to talk to, and you’re always up for whatever ideas I come up with, or happen to mention. Really, you’re a very kind person and I enjoy your company. I hope going forward we’ll continue to be friends and RP partners for the foreseeable future.

I know with my recent lack of motivation that our threads haven’t gotten very far. With any luck, I’ll be able to regain my motivation and write more frequently. You have so many muses I want to interact with, particularly your OCs. Light is a very interesting character and I want to interact with her at some point in the future. I have quite a few ideas, but I don’t want to overwhelm you or myself for that matter, so once I get our threads going again and I’m not in draft hell, I’ll come to you with some even more fucking up ideas!

Thank you for reading Ivalinne’s story! I’m glad you enjoyed it, and I hope you’ll stick around for the stories to come! I’m glad you like my characters and I hope you’ll continue to enjoy what I create going forward.

@mayohigan-orange / @witchwaltzing

Cobalt, I know you don’t think you’re a good writer and all, but you really are. You’re not only fun to RP with, but fun to talk to as well.

Reiko and Chen’s interactions have been a wild ride, and a highly amusing one at that. Chen has such a feisty personality and she’s not afraid to speak her mind, or to even cuss someone out, regardless of who they are. Though that seems to get her in trouble more often than not. Between her picking fights with all the wrong people, and her devotion to those she cares about, Chen is joy to have around. Even with Ivalinne, who she hardly knows, she’s promised to keep her safe and she won’t betray her word. She’s an admirable little kitten who tries her best. She’s still very childish and her lack of worldly experience shows with just how easily Reiko has been able to get things to go her way, which still astounds me since that’s entirely unplotted and we just go with the flow with our threads.

At first glance, your Chen appears to be just the cute cat often seen in fanon, but once you get to know her, you see that there’s more to her than just that. You’ve developed her character and given her depth. Her eagerness to prove herself, to live up to her Master’s name and legacy, how desperate she is to do so despite the risks. How protective she is of those close to her, and even those she’s only recently met. She’s a good girl with a strong heart and even stronger convictions, and how passionate she is shows in not only her words, but her actions as well.

You don’t give yourself enough credit. You’re a great writer, and a fun RP partner who pushes themselves to do more. I seem to recall you not being too confident in fight threads, but here you are, writing one with me and doing it spectacularly. You’re dependable and reliable, probably one of the most reliable RP partners I’ve had the pleasure of writing with. You’ve never once dropped one of our threads, even though we have so many, and that’s something I greatly respect.

You’re a good friend. You’re easy to get along with, and you’re so casual and friendly, joking around and just overall are an enjoyable presence to have around. It makes me happy that you were so enthusiastic about Ivalinne’s story, to the point of wanting to change the ending. To have someone be so invested in something I wrote is amazing. I’ve done my job as a writer if I’ve made the reader feel for my characters and root for them, and I’m so glad you enjoyed it so much. Thank you for your support and your continued patronage, I hope you’ll continue to read my stories and continue to RP with me moving forwards into the coming year. Don’t doubt yourself, you’re a good writer, and I’m sure you’ll only get better as you go.

@soulwitch / @volatilepaths

Kako, you’re really just amazing on all fronts. You’re a great supportive friend, a calm voice of reason, and a wonderful and dedicated writer. You put so much of yourself into everything you do. You’re always there to help anyone who needs it, always willing to give advice and be there for those who are having a tough time, it’s really awe-inspiring just how much you give to not only the community as a whole, but to everyone you interact with. I know I’m frustrating to deal with at times, but you never give up on me, and I really appreciate that. So many others would have just been done with me, they wouldn’t have tried to work things out and make sure an understanding was reached. I’m really grateful for that. The problems I’ve come to you with, and you’ve helped me work through, I’m grateful for that, truly. You’re so friendly and accommodating, always wanting to make sure your partner is happy and comfortable, and that they’re enjoying how each and every thread goes. The way you put others needs ahead of your own is really admirable. You’re a great person, and you deserve all the best, really.

You writing is great, and your characters are amazing. You’re not afraid to delve into some really dark topics and that, in my opinion, takes a lot of courage. Jeanne is absolutely terrifying, through and through. She’s a great villain and a force to be reckoned with. A woman so utterly broken by all she’s been through that she’s become such a monster, one who cares not what evils she commits. She lies, she manipulates, she does whatever it takes to get what she wants, to satiate her desires. She’s a masterpiece of a villain, and I really need to find some way to get to see more of her. Reiko utterly despises her, and wants absolutely nothing to do with the woman, to stay as far away as she can and to keep Jeanne from encroaching upon her. They’ll never be able to get along thanks to Jeanne hitting upon the things she most abhors, so I’ll have to come up with something else, because I do want to interact with Jeanne. I want to see more of her, try to understand her better, she’s a character with a lot of depth, and I want to see more than just the surface.

Which brings me to the Redbellion event. Everything about that was amazing, Kako. From the story, to the interactivity, to the sheer size and the amount of time and thought put into everything. It was great and I’m glad to have been a part of it, even if it was only a small one due to my own anxieties. You were so helpful and accommodating, making sure I who was late to join, was able to get in on the action and feel like I made a difference in the event. I’m proud to have contributed, happy with what I got to do. It was fun reading through the various stories that came from it. I got invested in quite a few things and found my emotions swinging to the tune of your words. The androids that struggled to survive as they were divided between their mother and their nature as synthetic beings, Core who became a terrifying abomination, and Harune, who sacrificed all she held dear just to save this dying galaxy. It was a beautiful story and you did an amazing job bringing to life not just a single world, but an entire galaxy. It’s amazing what you did. You put so much time and effort into the whole thing. The sheer depth of your dedication and devotion is admirable. I could never hope to do something like that, let alone carry it all the way to the end. Your determination is amazing, and you have my deepest respect for your efforts.

You’re someone I look up to, someone I’m glad to know and happy to have the honor to write with. I know I haven’t been the best of RP partners, what with my sporadic activity and my flighty muses and motivation. I’m sorry for that, and I hope that I can do better in the coming year. You’re a great writer, an amazing person, and a wonderful friend, and you deserve all the best in the coming year.

@unhingedsea / @sophisticatedsuccubus / @justthatdamnrich / And more

Ellen, I know we haven’t spoken much recently, but I hope we’re still as close as we were a couple months ago. I miss having you check in on me and message me. I really enjoy your presence and love talking with you. Hearing about your ideas, how you’re branching out into fandomless OCs of your own setting, it makes me excited to see what you create. I hope you’ll bring them to tumblr so that we can interact and I can see more of them.

Your characters are a diverse mix of drastically different personalities. From Wada, who is batshit insane by any measure, to the shy and socially awkward 2pi, to the rage filled Klowni, you have such a varied mixture of characters. I’ve enjoyed the threads that we had, even though they were rather short-lived. I hope we’ll get to RP more in the coming year, I really want to see where things will go, especially with that thread between Reiko and Jo’on.

I know you’ve been struggling lately, feeling like what you’re doing has lost it’s appeal, and that you’ve lost touch with those who you once interacted with frequently, but I don’t think that’s the case. Everyone has been really busy lately for some reason, many people that were once frequent on the dash are active less these days, and it’s sad to see, but I don’t think it’s that they have lost interest in what you do. I for one haven’t, and I never will. You’re a joy to see on the dash and I hope you’ll come back and RP here more. I definitely want you around, and I’m sure others do too. So please, believe in yourself, I’m sure you can do it.

You’re such a great person. So friendly and welcoming, always cheering everyone on. You told me you swore to be that positive light for others, no matter what it takes, and that’s something amazing. Something I would never be able to do. I hope you won’t burn yourself out, because giving so much is a hard thing to do, especially in an unkind world. I hope you don’t give up, that you keep going and striving to be who you want to be. If you ever need someone to talk to, I’m always here for you.

Thank you so much for being such a fan of Ivalinne’s story. When you told me that reading my writing, reading my story, motivated you into writing, I was honored. That my writing could have such a profound effect on someone, it’s unreal. I’m happy you enjoyed it and I hope you’ll continue to read as I write Eliyah’s story and more.

@fxtelism

Dennis, you’re a good friend and I’m grateful to have someone I can confide in about the things I can’t tell anyone else. You’re nice, friendly, and easy to talk to and get along with. I really appreciate your company.

Thanks to tumblr eating the notifications of our threads at every turn, we haven’t made much progress RP wise, but hopefully that will change in the coming year. I want to see more of your characters and get to know them, get more interactions, and develop our muses further. Leon is really sweet and it’s adorable how much of a flustered mess he is, it’s great. Soft boys are good! Manifestation is very interesting, an opposite to the kind and friendly person who he was created from. I’m curious to see where things could go with both of them. If just tumblr would stop eating notifications.

Now then, Ivalinne’s story. Thank you so much for reading. You have no idea how much it means to me. When you were reading and mentioned that one thing, I was so excited to see you get to the end. Having someone realize and notice things really is great. Probably the best feeling I’ve ever felt. I hope you enjoyed her journey and will continue to read the stories I’ll tell in the future, because I’ve got plenty more to tell!

@echointheforest

Marii, you’re a great friend, and thank you for all your support. You’re so welcoming and easy to talk to about literally anything. I never feel awkward talking to you about things, even though I sometimes worry I bother you too much.

ReiMarii is love, ReiMarii is life. I adore our ship. It’s the first ship I’ve ever had, and it’s been amazing. Thank you so much for introducing me to shipping, I’m so grateful for it. Shipping is so much fun, so full of feels, and I love it. I hope shipping with Reiko hasn’t been too angsty for you, it seems that no matter what, everything comes up bittersweet, and I hope that doesn’t upset you. I love how Reiko and Marii are together, it’s adorable. Everyone else only sees the surface, the bitchy exterior that woman presents to the world. and they write her off as that being all there is to her. But there’s so much more to her than what’s on the surface, and exploring all that lies beneath it with you has been one of the greatest pleasures of this past year. Every interaction has been wonderful, I love every minute of it and I hope we’ll continue to interact more in the coming year.

I know you worry a lot about whether you’re a good RP partner, and while I’ve already said my piece on it to you, I’ll say it again. You’re a great RP partner. You’re in no way a shitty RP partner. You’re a joy to write with and I love interacting with you. Life has been hectic for you recently, but I hope it will calm down, so you don’t have to be so stressed and exhausted all the time. You’re a great person and you deserve the best. I hope we’ll continue to be friends and continue to interact through next year as well.

You’re the first person, and so far the only, to see Reiko’s core. You’ve seen a side of her no one else has experienced. Marii’s touched her heart, reached through the ice and rust and connected with her on a level not even she thought was possible anymore. If things continue the way they’ve been going, she might even end up telling Marii about her past, so I hope we’ll get to explore more and more of their relationship, sink the claws of love deeper into her heart. Maybe Marii can make her realize that being who she is isn’t as bad a thing as she thinks it is, maybe she could help her to accept that she’s not damaged or broken beyond repair. That she’s worth the love the youkai has given her. I want to see it, someone be able to reach her, to tell her it’s fine.

So I hope we’ll continue to write in the coming year, that we’ll continue to develop this tender, beautiful relationship between dark and light, because I’m excited to see where it goes. How deep it will get and how close they’ll become. The future is bright, and hopefully Marii can teach Reiko that as well.

@johnny-writes

Johnny, I know your retirement date is quickly approaching, and I’m sorry I haven’t fulfilled what I promised. I said I’d put priority on our threads, but I failed to deliver, and I apologize for that. I wish we could have had more threads, that I had met you sooner so we could have done more. It saddens me that soon, we won’t get to write together anymore. I’m going to miss you as an RP partner. I hope we can continue to be friends though, even if you’ll be leaving the RP community.

I know Mara and Tojava weren’t exactly planned characters for you. They were created from a meme and it all started from there. I like both of them, the concepts and tropes they’re meant to explore. I was looking forward to you writing their story, and though you got derailed during NaNoWriMo, I hope you’ll continue to work towards the completion of their tale.

The thread between Reiko and Mara was a very interesting one. I’m sorry my bitch of a muse made Mara cry, she didn’t deserve that at all and I still feel bad about it, but I enjoyed the thread nonetheless. Feels are fun, no matter what form they come in. The thread between Ivalinne and Kazuma was fun too, it’s a shame it won’t get to continue to the ending I had planned. It would have been a chance to show Ivalinne is more clever than most probably assume due to how most of her threads have gone. It’s a shame it will never come to pass.

Speaking of Ivalinne, thank you for reading her story! I appreciate your interest. When you told me you got hooked after the first two parts, I was overjoyed. I’m glad you liked it, and I hope you’ll continue to read Eliyah’s story as I write it.

You’re a good friend, a logical voice of reason, and I’m grateful for that. I know I’m not always the most reasonable person out there, but it really helps when there’s someone that can talk some sense into me. Thank you for your support this past year. I’ll miss having you around on the dash, sending asks in to my characters and I’ll miss seeing your characters around. But just because they aren’t around doesn’t mean that they don’t exist anymore. I look forward to seeing the story you tell with them, and I wish you all the luck with your plans for the future.

@geisthonoredferry

Koma, we’ve only met recently, but honestly you’re great. You’re so supportive of everyone, what with your little handwritten notes to people and all the positivity you spread, you’re a great influence on this community. This place needs lights like you, people that care about others and support them no matter what. You’re a blessing and I’m happy to call you my friend.

I hope in the coming year that we’ll be able to get some more interactions going. My motivation to write has been very low recently, and I’ve been overwhelmed by the sheer amount of drafts I have, but I’m not gonna give up! I’m going to reply to everything and keep moving forward.

Thank you for reading Ivalinne’s story, I’m glad you liked it and I hope that you’ll continue to read the things I put out and enjoy them all the same.

I really appreciate how much you care, how you check in on me to see how I’m doing, how you send positive little messages in the server and how you’re always doing your best to spread that cheer. You’re great, really. As both a writer and a friend. Though you should really stop lying to people and saying I’m cute. You’re the cute one here, not me.

@weaverstale / @draconianmyths

Kirbs, you’re great, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. You’re so caring and compassionate, always concerned for everyone else and supporting them with positivity. Thank you for your support. I do appreciate it, really, even if I believe myself unworthy, it does make my day better. Don’t ever stop being that way.

We’ve both been low on writing motivation lately, and that really sucks. I want to RP more with you. Orochi is very interesting, and my dumb thot of a muse can’t resist an attractive man. Or an attractive women, as Konoe proves. She really just can’t resist attractive people in general really. I hope going into the next year that we’ll be able to have more threads and interactions.

You’re a good friend and you’re easy to talk to. I know at times our...interests in conversation topics just don’t always match, I apologize for that. I am but a shy nervous bean, naive and innocent about such topics. Regardless, I do enjoy talking to you, and I hope we’ll continue to be friends in the future.

@magicaldreaming

Xana, I know we’ve only become mutuals recently, but I’ve really enjoyed speaking with you. I love hearing about your OCs, it’s fascinating. You’re easy to talk to and really chill, and I appreciate that. I hope we’ll continue to talk and be friends in the coming year.

As for RPs, you’re an amazing writer with some amazing muses. Krolia was one of the first I seen, through your threads with another blog I follow. Krolia immediately caught my eye, she’s very strange in a curious and interesting way. She’s an ancient being with a love for modern technology, idol music, and junk food, and it’s adorable.I really want to have a thread with her someday, once I manage to get my draft situation under control. I hope to see more of her, she’s really interesting.

But probably my favorite muse of yours currently is Celia. I read along with her threads in Redbellion, and honestly, they were my favorite. I love her journey throughout the event, going from an emotionless killing machine intent to cleanse all biological life from the universe, to realizing the true beauty of life, and realizing she had set in motion the destruction of an entire galaxy full of it. How she fought so desperately as the end of all was looming over her, how much she regretted what she had done, and how badly she wished to right the wrongs she committed. How she gave her all to save people. to protect them from the menace she had unleashed, and how she gave her life, her light, in order to save everyone. The woman that once sought to exterminate all life sacrificed her own to save what remained, and that is beautiful. I teared up when she started to fade into slumber and go dormant. You did an amazing job building up her character and her development was spectacular. I look forward to see where she goes from here, now that her outlook on the world has so drastically changed. With any luck, I’ll regain my motivation and be able to see that hope through with our thread!

All in all, you’re a great writer, never doubt your talent. It really shows a writer’s skill when they make you feel for and root for an evil character. That’s so much harder to accomplish than simply having the reader side with the hero. Any writer that can do that has my respect, just as you do.

@fragmentedsilhouette

Sage, I know you’re not really on tumblr much anymore, but I’m going to list you here anyways. You’re a good friend, calm, easy to talk to, and your company is enjoyable. I should really talk to you more.

I miss seeing Amaeris on the dash, she really was a great character. Well thought out and of questionable moral standing (Wait a second most of the characters I’ve spoken of here have been that way...Do I have a thing for that type?!) A shadow of her former self, literally. A deceased ruler of an ancient empire aiming to regain her former glory and rebuild her kingdom anew, so that she may reclaim what she had in life. You put a lot of thought into her and I wanted to see where she would go, if she’d ever be able to take back what was taken from her.

I hope one day we can write together again. The brief instances when we did were enjoyable. Maybe sometime next year? Who knows, but one can hope!

@moonternity

Lilli, we may have never gotten to RP on tumblr, and we might not have RPed all that much in general, but I think you deserve to be mentioned here as well.

When we first met two years ago, you hated my guts and told me straight out. I admired that honesty, since honesty is something I value. You gained my respect by being so honest about your feelings. I wanted to be friends with such an honest person, someone who wouldn’t lie to me and who’d tell me flat out if I fucked up. So I wanted to win you over, and as you know, I did, and that made me so happy.

I’m glad to be your friend. Happy that you want me around. It means a lot to me, truly. I enjoy your company, the fun we’ve had with the campaign, and even just talking to you. Thank you for being my friend, for giving me my first D&D experience, and for just being you.

---

And thank you to all my followers, both on the RP Side Blog where I actually do all of my writing and to all the followers here, whether you’ve just followed the wrong blog or not! Thank you for your support! I hope I can continue to write more and more in the years to come!

Happy New Year to you all!

#Follow Forever #Appreciation Post #Positivity #Mun Speak #Thank you everyone for supporting me and writing with me!#This post is ungodly long #Sorry #It's just the way I am #Happy New Year to everyone!#Here's to a good next year!

13 notes · View notes

creaturecarnival · 5 years

Text

Hylics Part 2

Okay, first off, hello to our massive influx of new followers! We look forward to writing for you all, and want to give a huge thanks to the folks over at @weirdmarioenemies for being so gosh-darned cool :) Now I have something to actually motivate me to write more reviews, so without further ado, here’s part 2 of our Hylics creature review!

Creature

For our first new creature, we have, well… Creature! Creature here is an optional boss that you can encounter in one of the overworlds. It seems to be made almost entirely of the most basal of all clay shapes: balls and snakes (there is no way you could possibly take that out of context so don’t even try it)! I do love the layout of this thing, even if it’s very simple. I feel like the appeal of a giant mass of writhing tentacles is relatively universal, but I also like that the only feature Lindroth elected to give it other than tentacles is a little cluster of pale eyeballs on top and to the front(?) of its body. You’d kind of expect it to have some kind of big, gaping maw full of teeth, and maybe it does! Like a lot of the other denizens of Hylics, there’s not much to them other than whatever we can discern from their sprites, and I think that’s fun! When killed, Creature drops a Chitin Jerkin, which is described as “Sensible everyday-wear for the modern machine” as well as a Parasite Crystal which just does some stat buffing stuff we don’t need to talk about, I just really like the names.

Ghost

Ooh, they’re peekin atcha! Peekin out through their wacky flesh spirals! The way the clay winds around the action figure part really gives off the impression that it’s some kind of creature wrapped around a human, like a flech mesh flesh mesh flesh mech! Especially since there are tendrils coming off the extremities that look like they would function as essentially extensions of the body within. Speaking of those extensions, I love that instead of just one projection coming off of each foot, there’s two! So instead of walking like a regular person, it walks using its four sub-legs. Also it’s got a cool funny hat that I kind of wish came down over the eyes so that it looked like the clay part was the head, but at the same time the eyes peering through the clay bits is really eerie.

Dread Meat

Oh no, somebody left this boy out in the sun! They’ve gone all melty! Dread Meat is very similar to Ghost in its structure, however, its limbs do not have projections, and there is no trace of humanity to it beyond the hands and feet just barely emerging from what I can only imagine to be rolls of oozing meat. It feels like a zombie of some kind, although there is nothing else in the game that looks like it could be the un-undead version of this corpulent corpse. The thing I like most about its design is probably the fact that the head is a big loop with a grisled knot off to the right, presumably to hide the action figure head. It gives it some nice asymmetry.

Sub Shrub & Tomb Shrub

Oh my god. Adorable. These little green guys with huge lumpy wedges for heads and no discernible facial features should not be anywhere near as cute as they are. Also, I guess the name implies that these guys are plants? Anyway, Sub Shrubs can be encountered separate from Tomb Shrub, but they’re relatively weak on their own. But during the Tomb Shrub fight, it summons Sub Shrubs to help it out. Teamwork makes the dream work! I just love these little fellas! They look so squishy and silly! Also when he first encountered one, Vinny said the Sub Shrub looks like an “aborted pizza” and I can’t stop thinking about it.

Fathead

I was just thinking when I was writing Dread Meat’s review how fatty tissue isn’t something you see a lot in monster design, and here we’ve got this funky fella, whose head appears to be nothing but a massive glob of fatty tissue! I know there’s not much more to it than that, but it’s a nice concept for a creature and I like it a lot.

Monoops

Monoops’s gimmick seems to be its single eye… wait.

...Huh. I guess contrary to what the name would imply, Mono-ops has two eyes. That’s pretty neat actually! You don’t see many monsters with eyeballs as their design gimmick that have only two eyes. Usually, it’s either one or a whole bunch. It even has a move called Steady Stare that does damage as well as paralyzes its target, solidifying it as having an eyeball-centered design. I also really like the battle sprite’s color scheme.

Deadly Statue

Occupying a very similar role to the Ambulant Skulls, which you can read about in our last review of Hylics, Deadly Statues are only found in one area of the game. Similar to Ambulant Skulls, they kill you when you touch them, making them a purely overworld enemy. They are also much faster than Ambulant Skulls, matching the speed of the player exactly. Who'da thunk a big ‘ol statue’d be faster’n a skull made half’a legs?? Not me, that’s for darn tootin’! Anyway, I quite like its design. If I were an eccentric millionaire, this is exactly the kind of shit I would want sitting in the main foyer, flanked on either side by two huge, sweeping staircases of course.

Clawman

Clawman is the second-to-last boss in the game, they are equipped with two big yellow pincers and a ridiculously enormous head. I feel like the name and inclusion of pincers really makes you want to read it as a crab when really, the claws are the only vaguely crab-like feature they possess. You could argue that those spines on top are reminiscent to those of a king crab, but they’re flexible and curl inward towards each other like claws! That’s such a cute little touch!

Moon Soldier

Moon Soldiers barely qualify as enemies, since they literally can’t harm you, crumpling into a heap of bloody bones the moment you touch them. However, I think they’re really cool looking so we’re gonna take a look at ‘em anyway, god dammit. They guard the palace on the moon in which the final boss resides. It’s interesting how their heads are shaped much like that of our protagonist Wayne, (maybe they’re even the same species?) and the pale blueish color of the head against the cream of the clothes is really nice to look at. I kind of wonder if those are helmets they’re wearing, since the skull-like face markings almost look artificial, but there seems to be a very thin line between organic and synthetic in Hylics.

Gibby & Statues

Gibby is the main antagonist, and therefore the antithesis to our protagonist Wayne, who is a waning crescent instead of a waxing gibbous like Gibby, and instead of having a rad mohawk has no hair at all, which is basically the antithesis of having a rad mohawk. Gibby is, like, the king of the moon or something? I dunno, the plot in this game is kind of impossible to follow. If you’ve made it to the final boss, you’ve probably given up on trying to understand anything and are just here to see whatever batshit nonsense thing happens next. If you thought Clawman’s head was ridiculously huge, get a load of this guy! It looks like he can barely support its weight! How is it simultaneously swollen and gaunt? I dunno, but it’s kind of legitimately unsettling to be honest. It looks like his skin is pulled super taut over his face, almost like a desiccated corpse.

He also has two statues that aid him in battle. The Vital Statue to his right heals him, and the Eerie Statue to his left can afflict the protagonists with the nausea status effect. Can I just say how cool it is that there are four separate enemies in this game that have “statue” in their name, and they all look completely different? It’s really neat to see a single idea represented in so many different ways, ranging from somewhat recognizable to completely abstract. Most importantly, I think they’d all look lovely in the foyer of my imaginary mansion.

Conclusion

Hylics is a hell of an experience. It definitely has its flaws, such as clunky controls and practically nonexistent plot, but it’s at least worth watching someone play. The visuals are truly stunning, and you can really tell how much love went into making it. A huge portion of what you see in-game was painstakingly crafted from clay, rendered as a sprite, and worked into the game to become characters, enemies, and even the settings you walk around in. Please follow Mason Lindroth on Twitter, Tumblr or Instagram, where he is currently posting updates on the progress of Hylics 2, which looks absolutely gorgeous judging by what he’s shown us so far, and I’m so excited to play it when it’s done. Please also consider donating to his gofundme page to support him in his development of Hylics 2.

#mod frankie #hylics #mason lindroth

6 notes · View notes