#i FEEL like theyre building up this plot line

[faecaeli]

if Guillermo and Nador don't kiss soon I will fucking lose my shit i s2g

[sakusasunaru]

AAAAA i started my tgas pissed and i finsihed scremaing about how good secret alliance is sorry i need to continue this in another psit ssorry

[fairyhaos]

❖ take care of me anyway // yoon jeonghan

jeonghan x gn!reader, 1.7k+ words

tags: office worker!jeonghan not rlly relevant to the plot tho, sick fic, fluff, established relationship

warnings: brief fever-induced hallucinations ig?? but theyre rlly cute, pet names, reader has a cold

notes: im sick. like, 'i have a cold' sick. and i also have another sick fic planned so uhh yeah im a little Unwell in the head too

There are ten minutes left of Jeonghan’s lunch break when you finally call him.

“Hello, my darling,” he says, his tone both parts dry and amused. “How are you?”

“Sick,” you reply, and even just that word sounds horribly bunged up. “But you knew that already, didn’t you? You called in sick for me.”

Jeonghan just hums, smiling a little as he adjusts the phone against his ear, walking down the street back to his company building. “Maybe I did.”

You don’t say anything for a moment, and he can almost hear you pouting on the other end of the line. There’s a rustling sound as you adjust yourself in bed, and he sighs.

“How sick are you?”

“Very,” you say, miserably, and then give a series of harsh, wet coughs that has him wincing. “Very sick. I only just woke up, but my head is just…” You don’t finish your sentence. Just make a very pained sound like a wounded puppy.

Jeonghan chuckles. “Gee, I wonder how you managed to get so sick. It’s not like walking home in the pouring rain without a coat makes you ill, isn’t it?”

You whine at that, upset. “Han, I told you, I was gonna call you but my phone was dead. I had no choice! Wanted to get home fast to see you,” you add in a mumble, sounding dejected.

He smiles at that. “It wasn’t like I was going anywhere, though,” he points out. “I was all comfortably squished on the couch. I wasn’t gonna disappear any time soon. You could’ve taken your time. Waited for the rain to pass.”

“Yeah, but still,” you huff petulantly, then sniff. “Can you make soup when you get back home?” you ask after a beat, and sniffle again. “And also buy some tissues? And meds? And give me cuddles?”

Jeonghan chuckles at how pitiful you sound, resisting the urge to coo. “No.”

“What?” You’re whining again, and you sound all bunged up but Jeonghan just smiles, amused. “But your darling Y/N is currently suffering the worst cold in the entire world.”

“But alas, I think my darling Y/N is the sole person to blame for this cold,” Jeonghan says, lips twitching upwards. “Don't you think so?”

“Come take care of me anyway.”

“No.”

You make a noise of discontent, sheets rustling as you shift around in bed again. “Hmph. Worst boyfriend ever. I’m breaking up with you.”

That makes him laugh, the stunned sound being pulled out of him by your deadpan tone, and he grins to himself out on the street, rounding the corner until his company building is in sight. “Whatever you say,” he singsongs. “I’ll see later, okay?”

“Whatever. Bye.” A pause. “Have a nice day.”

Jeonghan smiles as you hang up, looking fondly down at your contact name. He’s standing in front of the company entrance, now, and he has three minutes of his break left. Just enough time to get into the elevator and up to his office.

He pockets his phone, turns on his heel and traipses off to find the nearest pharmacy.

───────────── 🧂

You’ve been drifting in and out of sleep the entire day, constantly stuck in that drowsy, so-sick-that-nothing-feels-real state, and you’ve hallucinated Jeonghan coming home a total of thirteen times in the past five hours.

At least, you think it’s been five hours.

Maybe it’s been less than that.

Whatever. Time is weird.

The point is, your mind is all fuzzy and everything feels like it’s floating, so when someone who looks an awful lot like Jeonghan comes into the room, you just groan. Hallucination Jeonghan #14 has come to pay you a visit, it seems, so you just frown and give him the response that you’ve given all his other clones.

“Go away. Stop trying to sell me fish.”

Hallucination Jeonghan #14 makes a confused noise at that, walking closer to your bed, leaning over to adjust your pillows and pull you up into a more upright position.

“I don’t want your fish,” you say, just in case he didn’t hear you the first time. “Stop it.”

That makes the hallucination chuckle, and his hand comes up to your forehead. 

Cold. Huh. None of the other hallucinations touched you before.

His hand drops from your forehead, swiping at the soft skin under your eyes gently, and his fingers are blessedly cool against your skin. You hadn’t realised how much you were burning up before.

“You’re really, really sick,” Hallucination Jeonghan #14 murmurs, and he sounds so concerned, before pulling out a bottle of water from one of the plastic bags he’s holding. Woah, you hadn’t even realised he was holding them. “Here, darling. Drink.”

You obediently take a sip once he uncaps the lid for you, before making small noises of distress when some of it spills down your shirt. Hallucination Jeonghan #14 (wow was it a mouthful to say, even in your head) just hushes you gently, dabbing at it with tissues that he’d procured from the plastic bags. 

“It’s okay,” he says softly, and his hands take yours, clasping them around the bottle. Once you’re holding it, he gets up, and for a horrible moment, you think this hallucination is going to leave again. You kind of like this one.

“Where’re you going?” you ask, but it comes out as more of a slur of vowels. You’re not sure he understood a word.

 “Drink up,” is all he says. He fishes out a packet of pills from the bag (it’s like a magic bag, you think blearily. It seems to have everything inside it). “Have these as well, okay? I’ll go make that soup you wanted.”

You nod, blinking. Dutifully, you sip the water that the hallucination has left you, because really this was one of the most gentle, doting, Jeonghan-like Hallucination Jeonghan and it kind of feels like he really does have your best interests at heart. 

Unlike the other Hallucination Jeonghans, who just wanted to sell you fish. This one really seemed to care about your well-being. 

You blink again, slowly. 

Oh. 

By the time Jeonghan comes back with a gently steaming bowl of chicken soup on a tray with a mug of tea, you're more lucid than before, pouting at him as he comes closer, having remembered his last words before you’d hung up the phone.

“You said you weren’t going to take care of me.”

Jeonghan doesn’t say anything, setting the tray on the bedside table, before sitting down on the edge of your bed, wordlessly picking up the bowl and spoonfeeding you some soup. You open your mouth easily, and he hums in approval with a smile.

“What kind of boyfriend would I be if I let my darling be sick all alone, hm?” he says. “I can’t do that. Especially if you’re also seeing hallucinations of me who are trying to sell you fish.”

He continues feeding you soup in tiny sips, and the entire situation feels weirdly vulnerable, with you propped up on pillows and Jeonghan making small noises of approval every time you successfully swallow a spoonful. Like you’re a little baby bird, or something.

But he smiles so lovingly at you the entire time, so it’s kind of hard to feel too embarrassed.

“Well done,” Jeonghan murmurs, once you’ve finished half of the bowl. Your boyfriend is affectionate, almost overbearingly so at times, always poking you in the side or pinching your cheeks or tweaking your nose, but the softness with which he treats you right now is a whole other level of affection entirely.

Jeonghan cares deeply for you. You know that. You’ve never doubted how much he loves you, and he never gives you reason to doubt it. But still, when he smooths down your hair and strokes the back of your hand and gazes at you so gently, it makes you realise yet again that oh God, he loves you.

“We’re going to get you to finish the rest of the soup in a minute,” he says, reaching down towards the plastic bag at his feet, “but first. I wanted you to have this.”

Out of the bag, he pulls out…

A fluffy bunny plushie.

You blink, tilting your head, sniffing in confusion and also to try and unblock your bunged up nose. “What?”

“Say hi to Jjongie,” Jeonghan says. “He came up to me when I was buying your soup, and I couldn’t not bring him home.” The bunny’s pink ears flop adorably into its eyes as he holds out the soft toy to you. It even has a cream coloured ribbon around its neck. “He’s gonna keep you company whenever I can’t be here for you.”

“Oh,” you say softly, taking Jjongie from him with a smile. You rub your thumb over the soft fur of the bunny’s cheek. “He’s adorable.”

Jeonghan beams, proud. “Of course he is. He’s a me-substitute.”

You look up at him, smiling. “Han, I—” You can’t finish your sentence, too choked up. Literally. You suddenly start coughing, hand coming up to cover your mouth, and Jeonghan rushes forward with the mug of tea and an opened box of tissues that he suddenly procured out of nowhere.

“Hey, it’s okay, no need to cry over it,” he says teasingly as you glare at him, eyes tearing up from how hard you’re coughing. You accept the tissues and, when he pushes the tea insistently in you direction, you take the mug too.

“Yeah, yeah.” You blow your nose with one hand and then drink the tea, noting with a smile the subtle notes of honey in it. “Thank you,” you add, softly, looking down at Jjongie in your lap. Jeonghan really has gone out of his way for you.

Jeonghan just shakes his head, picking up the soup bowl again. “Thank me once you get better,” he says. “You can take care of me after. I’ll probably be catching your illness from looking after you.”

You grin, blowing your nose again, and even you can’t miss the way that Jeonghan watches you, eyes devastatingly fond.

“Yeah, but you’re gonna look after me anyways, aren’t you?”

Jeonghan grins, unashamedly bright. He taps the spoon against your lips, smiling wider when you sip the soup, the mug of tea in your hands, Jjongie the bunny in your lap. 

“Duh. I love you too much not to.”

fics tags: @jeonginssa @weird-bookworm @minhui896 @bunnyiix @slytherinshua @haowrld @belladaises @moonlitskiiies @mirxzii @zozojella @kawennote09 @thedensworld @a-wandering-stay @abibliolife @doublasting @wonranghaeee @icyminghao @sweet-like-caramel @your-yxnnie @evasaysstuff @odxrilove @kyeomyun @crackedpumpkin @jeonride @kellesvt @butiluvu @sakufilms @eightlightstar @onlyyjeonghan @aaniag @amxlia-stars @raevyng @isabellah29

[narwhalandchill]

how are we feeling about this project amber update

assuming this is in relation to childe bc who the fuck else JWDJWJKDJKW anon im so sorry if not. also so so sorry for how out of hand this got. i am simply unwell about him.

But! Well. there certainly are thoughts

(obviously 4.6 datamine of arle SQ and her voicelines; This Will Not Spoil Anything Abt The Main SQ Plot, i only discuss the relevant parts. also some p Heavy negativity towards fanon ooc at the start youve been warned dont @ me)

(i mean i didnt even read anything of the SQ but The scene w childe so idek the main plot of the quest rly either lmao. tho go at ur own risk if u wanna check the dialogue out; its the 2nd quest log but it does hint at the greater story)

TLDR: how i feel abt his appearance in a vaccuum? quite solid despite the briefness, actually. accounting for the way fanon is 100% likely going to be reading into this and turning it into the Lets Infantilize Ajax Even More 2024 championship? conflicted.

in other words; a certified labyrinth warriors moment - theyve expanded on childes character in a very interesting and quite a compelling way and while i Do like the potential in what im seeing from hoyos end theyve also done it so that its going to be misinterpreted to hell and back by fanon so i kinda have an immediate jaded love-hate moment going on JJWJDKJDKJWJDWKJ

its literally just labyrinth warriors flashbacks - that event has some of my ALL TIME favorite insights into who ajax is and how he views the world and himself but when the event came out all everyone cared abt was to warp it into baby boy stuck in scawwy paper boy dungeon dehumanizes himself by calling himself a weapon and doesnt love himself he is such a sad trauma meowkitten 🥺🥺so yeah

bc like lets look at this properly for a bit; okay he went back to fontaine to look for skirk still somewhat injured and waa waa my 286 month infant baby cannot Make decisions like that!!!!!11! which is to say. i am tired of him getting this shit every time.

is it smart of him to get on the move immediately with just the bare minimum of rest? no. do i like that hes straining himself before proper recovery? not particularly no. do i feel the particular need to psychoanalyze this grown man and feared warrior whos 100% survived Way Worse in Way More Extreme Situations for it? hell fucking no.

while not at all the course of action a medical professional would approve of. from childes POV its perfectly logical hes priorizing going back for skirk when its literally the FIRST TIME shes showed up in like. a Decade. when hes been looking for her all this time are you kidding me 😭😭😭 but fanon must keep fanoning for their widdle baby girl so what does a hater like me know

anyway. seething and venting over im gonna try to avoid bringing up how much i hate this kinda infantilization of ajax now im sorry for bringing it up so much on ur innocent ask anon KJWDJKWKJDJDKWJKD. neutral discussion moment. i Promise

so it seems that theyre going for the pulcinella-is-shady-about-ajax (and prolly his family) angle for good and like. personally for me as long as the only real source of that claim was scara (a cynical edgelord who doesnt believe in non-exploitative human relationships, mind you) i was rather skeptical towards just instantly drawing that conclusion, but well. with the scene in arles AQ it appears to be sth theyre building towards

i actually really fucking loved that scene bc while theres outsider perspectives (scara obvi; and even arles line for him has that vibe. and ppl still take that shit face value 💀💀) and a lot of fandom assuming childes like. completely clueless and naive and ignorant towards the potential risks involved with trusting pulcinella. this is actually a very clever demonstration of quite the opposite? and showcasing how despite his aversion towards schemes and lies hes still intelligent and knows the kind of people hes dealing with when it comes to his fellow harbingers

like. childe has a negative opinion of arle based on what pulcinella has told him about her because at face value many of her deeds are in heavy conflict with his values of loyalty and family. and because he does not have the further context behind her actions and what the HotH under her is really like. Obviously hed hold a very hostile and wary view towards arlecchino

(ESPECIALLY when with all this biased intel hes still going to run into kids from the house!!! and then hes going wtf? these are good kids. what the hell is that knave doing with them??? blink twice if you need help i will start a civil war for yall like thats how he is with kids!!!!)

so YES. pulcinella has given him if not false then at least misleading intel based on the political tension between himself and arlecchino and the wider HotH. and childes taken that at face value! sure! he is close with pulcinella of course he would!

BUT. THEN. he returns to fontaine and seeks arlecchinos help looking for skirk. and observes her behavior and modus operandi for himself as well as the kids. does he go "nah she must be just hiding the crazy evil shit i would never distrust pulcinella" and leave it at that when reality doesnt completely match his expectations?

NO. because when offered the opportunity through the traveler asking about the HotH childe immediately capitalizes on the opportunity to prod for answers and see if pulcinella is lying to him!!!!

and hes so fucking smart with the way he does it too???? i LOVE his intelligence. the entire thing is so simple yet elegant; it Completely relies on his reputation as the kinda gullible harbinger whod Never scheme or hide Anything to indirectly affirm or deny his suspicions. he doesnt Need to Pretend to care about the possibility of arle betraying the kids bc he genuinely does!! and when she pushes back against the accusation he doesnt Need to fake admitting to her that well, actually, its all just rumors so he could be completely wrong. and so on. like he navigates the entire thing so effortlessly. and whats the end result?

childe has Confirmation of pulcinellas possible ulterior motives in action AND that arlecchino is a much more reliable ally than he initially assumed. all the while appearing as just The Straightforward 11th. like obviously id need to hear it voiced first to be sure but in text it v much gives the impression hes almost kinda just. playing up the threats towards arle and being "dumb" on Purpose?? to get the answers he wanted out of arle without appearing like hes fishing for anything particular. and i just hhhhhhhhhhh

i love when he does this so muchhhh!!!!!! 😭😭 he doesnt need to become some machiavellian schemer to be able to strategize !!!!!! he avoids scheming bc he Dislikes it not bc hes incapable of it like this has Always been the case Since Liyue AQ and i love whenever they show that side of himm . my Beloved

so anyway. while i do still think the like "pulcinella is bad and has his family hostage" is still kind of a generic plotline and i hope the writing regarding the whole thing wont ultimately turn out to be sth That simplified and black and white. its p clear theyre doing Something with pulcinellas motivations and as they are. im Really glad theyre letting it show that childes not just some completely passive party being manipulated in this all. he Is thinking abt this stuff and his position among the harbingers. ig we shall see where it goes - not the greatest fan of the concept still, but canon text supports it becoming a thing way more than when it was just scaras word we had for it. hope theyll surprise me positively w how they go about it!

then briefly for the rest uhh

also loved arle and childe just shittalking the rest of the harbingers it was amazing. i wasnt expecting this kinda dynamic between them at all but its great lmao. also i wanna see childe hang out w the HotH kids

as for project stuzha; so we dont really get anything solid on it other than being summoned back to snezhnaya for it is apparently a Big Deal. but still very interested. let my man have his endgame significance Trust

childes appearance was obviously v brief ultimately but that was clear from his leaked linecount to begin with - i am pretty satisfied with what they seem to have done w him. like its not The Best but also i wasnt expecting his lore to get some massive expansion in another harbingers SQ . the worst i feared was that it was just going to be a flashback of arle returning his vision which did Not happen so massive W. i am super hyped to hear this scene voice acted proper and happy to see him again, i really hope he gets to appear at least once more in an interlude or dains quest or something before going on hiatus again but idk if thats too much to ask LKKWJDJWDJWD

also: i am never changing my namecard after this patch drops. oh my godddddddd its So Fucking Beautiful 😭😭😭😭

But. Yeah. lots of good stuff. unfortunately lots of it will get misinterpreted and fanon will get obnoxious about it. but i still love getting to see him again and i am speedrunning that namecard day fucking one mutuals and/or followers in EU please add me (UID 711090267) ill need coop buddies for the world bosses

thank youuuuuuu for the ask i hope this monstrosity of a monologue doesnt scare u off 💀💀💀

[hanasnx]

heyyy do you have any advice on how to write smut cause its sooo difficult for me *cries in virgin*

ur like one of my fav smutty writers and idk if you have any tips 😭

first off thank u very much i appreciate that :)

this isnt the first time ive been asked for writing tips so im gonna give a lot of info. youre bound to find something useful in this mess

im so sorry but one of my solutions to giving myself confidence in smut-writing was to literally fuck and fuck a lot

after losing my virginity it still wasnt enough experience tbh. so i gave myself room to explore my sexuality and was privileged enough to do it with a partner that encouraged that growth. that experience of fucking sure didnt hinder my smut-writing ability if you know what i mean ;0 but everything else about writing i learned from years of practice. ive been writing since i was in elementary school like id come home from fourth grade and read and write on quotev klsdjfsfj smut writing skills came later post puberty

when i tried writing smut as a virgin i genuinely couldn’t get past the build up. i was fantastic at writing the build up, it was the actual sex part that was hard bcos even tho i had done enough research (i read a lot of porn) it didn’t instill me with enough confidence that i could write it correctly, and so i never did. however! i sure wish i’d committed to it more, so let me see if i can write out some tips that would’ve helped me in the past

(this is just how i write smut, im by no means an expert)

my timeline

the way i write smut is pretty formulaic so i’ll break it down:

hook line ⟹ settings ⟹ build-up ⟹ foreplay ⟹ sex ⟹ ending

☥ hook line. maybe: a dialogue piece to kickstart; an ambiguous line that reels you in; an exciting action. i dont like starting my story with the name/pronouns of a character doing something boring. i.e. “you were getting ready for the day…” idk it’s not the worst thing in the world and we've all done it but just writing out what i try to avoid.

☥ build up is key to me. i have such a hard time reading and writing porn with no plot. i’ll do it sometimes if i like the writer enough, but i rarely write smut without the build up bcos i feel like that’s where the juice is. its whats fun and what you get to play around with bcos the actual sex part of the fic is pretty predictable.

focus on what’s said and unsaid in dialogue between characters. focus on the emotion each of them are feeling and how that emotion manifests into body language.

⟹ dirty talk is not for everyone, but god i love it. literally get nasty with it, this is your writing and we’re all just readin it. build anticipation using dirty talk, make filthy promises, make threats. make your characters talk about the nasty shit they wanna do to each other.

imagine someone you really wanna fuck, imagine the things youd do to them if you had the chance,,, write it into your characters.

☥ foreplay. goes hand in hand with dirty talk, its where the touching starts. decide how you want to play it. who gets oral, who gets fingered. both? one of them? neither and they just go straight to fucking?? i like foreplay, but if youre writing a “quickie” scenario then it may not be in the cards.

lets say it is in the cards tho. so some things to remember:

⟹ foreplay gets the dicks hard. when dicks get hard they leak pre-cum. balls have like no cushion and theyre soft and have little sacks in em that move around. the skin of this genital is often described as velvety bcos its soft. ive honestly never had sex with an uncircumcised penis so i have no idea if there’s a difference between how they feel.

foreplay makes the pussies loose and wet. the inside can be lumpy. it can be ridged or smooth. it can be all kinds of flesh colors like brown and pink.

without the foreplay (which can be verbal communication, or touching of the body or genitals) its a little painful for afabs bcos theyre too tight or too dry. and a flaccid dick is a little unpredictable to try to fit in.

⟹ afabs can have multiple orgasms, amabs are less lucky. afabs can cum and squirt multiple times, amabs can cum multiple times.

⟹ genitals get really sensitive after cumming though. so if you write someone finishing, write out how they might need some time before they finish again or start fucking, or that they get overstimulated getting touched still after they came and that sensitivity is a little uncomfortable.

⟹ the head of the penis is the most sensitive and that’s what makes it cum/orgasm. clits on pussies are the most sensitive and its what makes cum/orgasms happen. its very difficult if not impossible to achieve orgasm (if youve got a pussy) through penetration alone without clit stimulation

⟹ you can cum/squirt and not have an orgasm

☥ sex

⟹ changing positions can change angles and hit new pleasurable spots inside pussies.

⟹ probably write a couple different positions during the sex part, just to keep things fresh.

⟹ sprinkle in dirty talk to prolong the sex scene and to avoid sounding repetitive because if youre writing p in v it’s pretty standard to thrust over and over again until youre done. its a lot less glamorous when you spell it out like that, so you gotta add shit to make the sex scene more enjoyable to the reader whos not actively experience the sex.

☥ ending. i usually end the one shot after the fucking is done.

the smut tips

☥ think back to a time you were really turned on. from a show, from a book, something someone said to you, your own sex life, porn you really liked,,, take inspiration from it. use it and channel that own arousal within you.

if youve got a dirty fantasy and it gets you so hot and bothered thinking about it, write that.

if youve got a partner that fucks you crazy good and supplies you with inspo for dialogue or for settings or for scenarios, write that too. theres been a whole bunch on my blog that was inspired by my boyfriend. not everything, but enough to mention it.

also! another thing that people underestimate is the inspiration you take from other blogs. like mine for example, if you like my stuff take inspo from it. study my writing style and you’ll see all kinds of little tips in subtext id never be able to list for you. i do that with other blogs, i dont copy them but i definitely learn little things i like from them and incorporate it into my writing for a more cohesive story. if i take an idea though i ask for their permission & credit them.

☥ the most important tip i can give you is be as self indulgent as possible. youre wasting time worrying about other people. “will they like this? will people think im weird? what if they think im weird for writing this?” fuck that noise. warn accordingly, and go ham. your self indulgence is your best friend. it’ll guide you through all those dirty things you want to say or do to someone, let it take root and write what excites you. chances are you will find your people, and your fic will be set apart bcos it’s so specific to you that people will be drawn to that. and if theyre not? it ends up not being popular? it doesnt matter! because you had fun writing it right? fuck yea u did

☥ the types of words you use are so important. words that invoke a certain emotion or sexy feeling. its difficult to explain but i try my hardest to use “beautiful language” paired with dirty, disgusting, cacophonous language. marry them together so you can convey whether youre “love-making” or “fucking”. i dont like words that dont look or sound good in my head. like when you paint, you probably use colors you like looking at to create the entire picture on the canvas that’s beautiful. so pick out paints that are pleasing to the eyes. the bold ones and the soft ones.

examples of words i dont use cos i hate the way they sound and the way they look: “vagina” and “penis” LMAO

even “butt” isnt a word i like to use. i’ll almost always use “ass” or “backside”

⟹ the smut writer’s dictionary

☥ i keep comedy out of it for the most part, ive never really seem humor added positively into a smut that added to the experience. its usually physical humor stuff like the characters bumping heads or stubbing their toe or something its just cringy to me idk. if i add comedy (i am not good at writing comedy)i put it before the smut. and if you must have some sort of lightheartedness id keep it casual, light, and personal. like an inside joke or something tongue in cheek. you dont have to hide your deepest desires behind humor , you can be serious

☥ your pain tolerance is heightened so run with that. get spanked its fun

more important tips i love and stand by:

☥ call backs are important to me. it’s like if you have something in the future of your fic to be used, try to incorporate it in some small way in your establishing settings or build up. but it’s not as important to others as it is to me. an example would be in my one shot “talk huttese to me”, at the end anakin fucks reader on the tool table. at the very beginning of the fic, when i had reader taking in the surroundings of the “garage bay”, she scanned the drawer stack where she set his broth she brought him, and the tool table he’d later fuck her on. its kinda like,,, foreshadowing (i think?). you’re setting up your reader to be like “?? i wonder why the author thought it would be important to mention the tool table.. wonder if anakin fucks her on it later.” but even if your readers dont react that way, i still think it ties things together nicely

☥ try to write 15-20 mins uninterrupted. create a ritual. i use the bathroom, refill my water, grab a fun drink like sweet tea, put on a silent youtube video (like my ahsoka star wars lofi live i love so much), listen to a playlist of music (preferably music you havent heard before so it can fade into the background. maybe even cultivate a playlist for the vibe youre going for in your story, aids greatly in creating an atmosphere in your writing if youre translating the music in your ears), and turn your phones notifications off (ofc i leave on notifs for calls in case of emergencies, but i can answer my friends’ texts after my writing session). set a timer so you dont have to keep checking the time.

☥ don’t stop in the middle of your storytelling to check the thesaurus or dictionary. write out whatever word/phrase first came to mind and highlight it to come back to later to alter or replace it completely. you’re interrupted your creative flow and its difficult to come back to it when youre checking the thesaurus every five seconds. this hack was crucial to my ability to stay on task i promise you

☥ avoid sounding repetitive by using the same words close together. you’ll create a fuller story by adding to your vocabulary using the thesaurus.

☥ avoid listing actions, break them up with adverbs at the start of your sentences if you must, or description of things or the place your character is in, or explain the emotion your character is feeling or what that emotion is causing within your character. starting sentences over and over again with the character’s name or pronoun breaks up the flow for the reader.

☥ really try to finish your works in progress even if you think its bad, the challenge of it will help you practice and learn to overcome your own mind trying to hold you back

☥ if you dont like the direction your fic is going,,, and youre experiencing writer’s block:: cross out the most recent bit and take it in a new direction. “oh but indy!! i really have a certain goal in mind!!” great, find another way to get to it because youre blocking yourself from finishing this forcing yourself into a non entertaining corner. switch it up! challenge yourself. “but indy!! i really liked what i had for this scene!!” yea but youre blocked right? youre not writing anything else for this scene and you cant, right? if you like what you have for this scene (an action, a dialogue piece youre proud of, a plot twist) save it! use it for a different piece !

hope this helps you and others!

[olreid]

Question regarding Neverafter: how much do you think Brennan is trying to do horror? The players and the format are working against him, but what do you think of the world he’s created? I honestly can’t tell how much he wants them to commit or not.

yeah i guess at this point it sort of feels like he's let the horror go lol. it seems like he's been pulling his punches a lot; the biggest example is letting pinnochio be his own warlock patron but also giving tim the power to put people in the book without confronting him with the ethics of it and even going so far as to be like. sure, they're happy in there :) there's also just a constant undercurrent of like. letting players give help actions and have advantage, or not imposing disadvantage even when the roleplay calls for it. this is EASILY incorporated into the horror -- the realization that the story prioritizes your life over that of minor characters and so contact with you is often fatal for them is terrifying -- but it's reflexive rather than intentional and so it's left unremarked upon and works against the tone of the season rather than for it. most recently when they got to the tundra and had levels of exhaustion and then he just FAST FORWARDED THROUGH IT... ill tell you right now if that was a naddpod episode someone would have died of exposure and rightfully so.

a lot of the horror seems to happen offscreen (elody: i found your body in the other world) or in character backstories that the players often don't take the time to explore; overall it seems like the horror at this point is largely confined to combat which is like. just how any normal season of d20 works. like there are always scary villains.... its not enough to have an extra scary boss if theyre just going to beat it in 3 or 4 rounds... AND he keeps putting in these like. cheat codes into the fights so that they dont even have to BEAT the bosses they just have to like. break the wolf's chains or outlast the dogfish or whatever. THE PARTY HAS ONLY DIED ONCE and even then they all died together so there was no like. player that had to face death alone OR player that was the only one left alive and had to go on living alone... there is no reason that we haven't had another death by now! acoc showed that if he wants to kill a party member he absolutely can.

i also agree with others who have said that there's just too many moving parts for things to really feel tight and well-executed. the stepmother and the fairies who were omnipresent threats at the season's start are now apparently unable to reach the party for basically no reason at all which removes a lot of the fear. you're not supposed to say the authors' names or there will be grievous consequences but nothing has happened even though they've slipped up multiple times. they destroyed a wing of the lines between and there was no effect on their dimension. they also left npcs in there e.g. little miss muffett and it was apparently just fine. we haven't heard from scheherezade or aesop or any other dimensions in weeks. i appreciate that brennan wanted to give the party options and build a fleshed-out world AND that with improv some level of discontinuity comes with the territory but it really just lowers the stakes when villains or horrors only exist if they're on the party's mind and fade to the background as soon as the party becomes interested in something else. what's horrifying about a world where you have to actively seek out the horror?

he was saying in the last adventuring party like 'oh i created all these factions and had no idea what you all would gravitate towards in the season.' so it seems like most of the 'horror' was in the design of the world and the backstories of the characters etc and then he just let players loose within that framework to do whatever they want rather than intentionally injecting horror into the rhythms of play, game mechanics, plot structure, etc. we have all said over and over again that this is largely what comes of insisting on using d&d no matter the genre or season concept, despite the fact that there are tons of indie ttrpgs out there specifically designed to facilitate horror.

i'll be really interested to see how the season wraps up because there is absolutely still room for a horrifying ending but it's feeling less and less likely and more and more like the party is going to be allowed to just fully win and fix everything. we shall see!

[feelo-fick]

Phio I’m so curious about the fairy brothers

OH MY GOD UHHH WHERE DO I BEGIN... okay basically, general overview :

the fairy brothers are two highschool students trying to get by - meg (they/them) and diji (he/him).

meg is a theatrical wannabe diva and ghost hunter who can be a little ignorant if not arrogant. they only have one simple goal in life - to make it big, be famous, and be known and loved by everyone on the block! because of this, they highly value their image, doing comedically drastic things just to reach their goals. you could convince them of almost anything by putting the prospect of money and fame on the line. think mickbell-adjacent, but more showy and extravagant. they're also really passionate about their belief in ghosts, and they want to prove their existence through recording vlogs while trespassing abandoned buildings (with the help of their brother, of course).

diji is a meek and overly polite guy just trying to survive. if you met him he might seem a little boring at a glance, other than his outfit. he likes baseball and crafts and that's all he'll tell you. he doesn't want much, just to live peacefully and normally without many worries (ha, imagine that). really nice fellow though! sometimes he'll get excited and accidentally slam his tail into something, but overall he's got a very even disposition. he's like... happy ena and wirt kinda. diji's also just a liiiitle judgemental of the people/environment around him, and sometimes it slips out without him thinking, but he makes sure to correct himself unless it's unnecessary. dont get me wrong, he is genuinely a nice person and he's not faking all his kindness to cover up some evil personality — he just doesnt like attracting attention and is generally wary as an unofficial guardian to his brother. he's really protective of meg, and joins them on their ghost hunts to make sure nothing bad happens.

they're both broke and don't have a stable source of income, but they both have jobs. diji works several part-time jobs at convenience stores and cafes and it's... well, it's a living. he tries his best not to complain about it. he gets free though, so win! meg has the ghost hunting vlog channel, but as you can imagine it's not doing too well (i mean, the video quality is Quite Iffy) AHHAHA but yknow, they're dead-set on it succeeding, so A for effort.

diji makes most of the money, cooks most of the food, buys most of the essentials, etc etc. he wants to provide for meg since theyre the youngest of the two of them. not by much, probably around 3-4 years or so, but they've only got each other, so someones gotta take up the mantle of caretaker, right? meg haaates this though, they hate feeling coddled and they're in that stage of life where they're determined to prove themselves. they've both had a lot arguments about it.

but they still love each other, of course.

i'm planning on opening an ask blog for them and their story, so i'm trying not to share too much! i feel like this is a pretty good summary of them though :] also their designs aren't final... they're originally fandom ocs for the webcomic musical pipers and those are their designs in that universe, but i want to change them for this personal plot to make them more of my own :D thanks for the ask about them, i have sooo much to say but well... gotta keep it under wraps for now sadly, didnt want to clog the post with a big lore dump and give too much exposition.

[spicybylerpolls]

In response to the ‘what does age 14 look like?’ anon…

The fact that byler look older irl is definitely a reason that means I find it easier to imagine them in sexual situations. In fact, I would say this happened naturally when I saw the way their storyline was headed in s4. It was romantic already, but when I saw the duffers included: 

1. The blocking that makes it clear mike is checking out will’s ass and 

2. The hose scene

… I was like ok! green to go, this is what theyre doing. This was all subconscious though, until I came on Tumblr and actually started dissecting my viewing experience. 

I think the main issue with sexual byler in fan spaces is that there are some people who wrote highly sexual fics when the show was still in its infancy and byler did indeed look like children, and in which byler were NOT aged up. the issue here is that they were written to act in the way that no 12/13/14 year old would - I’m not even talking sexual discovery, but rather the pornification of young byler. These works were clearly gratuitous in tone rather than remedial or exploratory, so I’m sure it’s no surprise that to most average fans, these works were considered uncomfortable. 

What you said about ‘what does 14 look like anyway?’ is an interesting one, and the root of many judgemental issues in society that extend to age gaps between lovers even into their 40s and 50s. The key here is about behaviour and build, I think. Film is very visual, and though I could suspend my disbelief that byler in s4 were 14, it was more like I just ignored their ages because they didn’t seem to matter to the plot (RIP me when birthdaygate becomes real). Primarily, I was LOOKING at mike and will, and their bodies, and the acting - the way they moved and delivered certain lines - is what made me unable to ignore, subconsciously, that these guys were not 14 year olds. They were post-pubescent. 

That said, s3 was an odd one. So let’s quickly list what byler should look like if Finn and Noah matched Mike and Will’s ages irl.

S1 byler should look like S1 Finn, S2 Noah

S2 byler should look like S2 Finn, S3 Noah (already its feeling weird)

S3 byler should look like S2 Finn, S3 Noah

S4 byler should look like S2 Finn, S3 Noah

Already you can see we have some issues because Finn looks so young and his build is so different to Noah’s. The costume designers discussed this in s4… it’s just a part of working with growing actors, and I personally believe that the duffers wrote the story to the actor’s abilities. Actually, they’ve said they do this, and I think it means that they up the ante to find a balance between what a fictional teen would actually do, and what the irl actors would look good doing. Finn was 18 playing mike in s4.. if he was still behaving like s2 mike, would it have been absurd? Was it an acting choice to make his delivery more mature? I especially think this is noticeable with MBB and eleven, who looks like a young woman in s4, especially with the final scene costume design. But then again, eleven is a unique character with a unique experience. 

Or maybe the directing and acting is just inconsistent. Maybe both. Who knows. Honestly, the duffers knew the perils of working with a young cast and so should have expected all the possible responses fans might have, including sexualisation. That isn’t to remove blame from (actually problematic) fans, but I do remember my main concern when watching in s1 being: man, I hope that these kid actors will be taken care of emotionally as they grow into adults. 

And I think that’s the rub in this debate - it’s that approach and the way the actors carry themselves when performing which lends itself to the emotional maturity of the characters. They were clearly children in the early seasons, and so sexualisation, then, just feels way off to me. After all, paedophilia is literally about adult attraction to undermatured, pre-pubescent bodies; its essentially considered unnatural and an error in the brain because you are seeing something that isn’t there; you are seeing a child’s body as though it is ready for sexual activity, and it’s not. That doesn’t happen until puberty physically. You dont need me to tell you that this is why teenagers are so horny as they go through the changes. But being emotionally ready? That gets complex. You could argue that’s also why people tell coming of age stories. Because it’s difficult and uncomfortable and INTERESTING. 

And it’s why the staunch line of a specific age itself, rather than bodily and emotional maturity, being the decider whether someone is an adult or not is so reductive. 

But, hey - we need structure and laws and guidelines otherwise everything gets too grey. So they decided 18 in the USA, but other ages elsewhere, and some people take that literally even when it’s inappropriate to do so, for example condemning their own needs. It’s all about whether you are hurting someone. Obviously, sexualising actual children is damaging to them, so it’s wrong. But exploring your sexuality when it appears in a healthy way is not damaging, and fantasy is hurting no one except, possibly, yourself. 

Tl;dr - yes people get attached to the actual imagery of byler, because tv is primarily audiovisual and this is who the characters *are* to lots of viewers. It’s also near impossible to age them up without thinking of the real life actors, which some people would consider crossing a boundary into rpf, even though this process is what casting directors, writers and creators in film need to do all the time. 

So my poll is a bit more specific, and about preference rather than censorship or whats ‘ok’. Please choose what best applies to you. 

I’m comfortable shipping byler sexually…

a. When byler are pre-pubescent and the actors were too (s1-2)

b. When byler are pre-pubescent but the actors were mid-pubescent (s3)

c. When byler are pubescent but the actors are post-pubescent (s4)

d. Once both byler and the actors are post-pubescent (s5 aged up)

e. Even if the characters are still 14-15 in s5, because I want to see their arc completed and if the duffers show it then it means it must be ok

f. No matter their age; theyre fictional and its not about the actors at all for me

g. Only when engaging with fan works, no matter their age, but only if sex is character exploration

h. Only when engaging with fan works, no matter their age, even if smut/pornographic

i. Only when engaging with fan works, post-pubescent, but only if sex is character exploration

j. Only when engaging with fan works, post-pubescent, even if smut/pornographic

k. I can’t picture aged-up byler without thinking of Finn + noah because we’ve never seen what aged up byler would actually look like 

Please note that the purpose of this blog is not to be creepy or to make anyone uncomfortable. That's why I created the #spicy byler tag (I will tag all polls with this). If you don't want to see this blog or anything related to it on your feed, please block that tag. Not everyone is comfortable with this sorta stuff, and that's okay.

[itsdappleagain]

Arguably one of the strongest character building episodes in the entire series, The Daisho Caper is fantastically unique in its motivations, gorgeous scenery and animation, and subversion of expectations. I’m so ready for this unique and spectacular episode. LET’S GET IT GOING!!!!

(and yes. im mega late. working on it. notes under the cut as always!)

I love this infodump section so much. It’s really beautiful and super unique in that it starts the episode and also happens in a flashback (almost everything about this episode is unique?? From singing to a rejected redemption arc there are lots of things in this episode that never happen again

LIL BABY CARMEN

AWWW WAIT CARMEN ASKS IF HE CAN TAKE HER TO JAPAN AND YEARS LATER HE GETS TO. DAD MOMENT

And you can see how shadow-san distances himself from her as she gets older

Sleepy carmen <333

Sleepy EVERYONE

SHADOWLOLADLOWLEHEE HOO

That ironic little “heh” carmen does is so. Yeah i dont know i love it

Man hideo got SUMMONED she put one finger on the glass and he teleported

HOW ABOUT SORRY, CARMEN

Hideo is honestly so perceptive he would kill it in miraculous ladybug /j okay but seriously he’s already noticed what she knows and he even recognizes her when. Literally not even the law enforcement agency dedicated to catching her could at one point

“Dark forces” checks out, seeing as shadow-san basically means mr. shadow

I love when they get bitchy with each other

Also HI the animation is SOO PRETTY THIS EPISODE

More than a feeling by boston. Its by boston you guys do you get it its by boston

Also this karaoke scene SLAPS

Not zack pulling down shadowsan’s clothing. Yas bitch show a little slutty shoulder

THEYRE HAVING SO MUCH FUN <333

Zack and ivy: thank you thank you!!!!

Carmen and Shadowsan: okay well now that theyve shut the fuck up we can continue talking i guess

MAN HE SAID SPIES AND ASSASSINS AND HE’S REMEMBERING DEXTER…SPYING AND ASSASSINATION WAS WHAT HE WAS THERE FOR AND HE HAS TO CONFRONT IT NOW

HE CAN’T REALLY BECOME A SAMURAI IN THE EYES OF HIMSELF AND HIS BROTHER UNTIL HE CONFRONTS THAT PIECE OF HIS PAST AND LEARNS TO GROW FROM IT WITH CARMEN. MAN THIS EPISODE

PAPER STAR <333

Wait dokuso says “i called you here” do senior operatives have some caper perms? Can dokuso contact the faculty and be like HEY can i borrow paper star

Not quite sure what the little maneuver in the air was supposed to help avoid because it did. Nothing

HNNG okay i’ve dumped on jo’s DMs about this shot but its SO pretty

Follows the rule of thirds line, the gorgeous lighting, paper star framed in the moon, the perspective and use of space, the petals blowing in the wind, glowing in the light. ACTUAL LITERAL ART

Rip deleted scene where paper star says “sheep dont fly” the first time ig 

Season two and those slide-under-projectile shots

Carmen and chucking painful building materials at evil gay women this season

Carmen loves that little flip over the shoulder move

Also I LOVE that you can just watch Carmen figure out who Suhara is immediately its cool

whats up with the dirt on his face

SO BEGINS THE VILE FACULTY SAGA honestly such a fun plot point from this season they'll literally try out anyone

GOD the bridge and the cherry blossoms and the water have I mentioned how gorgeous this episode is

there's always more to the story with shadowsan

also mmm i love. i love that carmen isnt quite certain, so she says "suhara" very quietly. she's testing it out, and the look on shadowsan's face is all she needs to figure out that she's right

just another little tiny clue that shadowsan knows more than he lets on about her past. why would he be guilty about simply not knowing where she came from? if his cover story was true, he would if anything be carmen's savior from a terrible death or being picked up by some random people or something. just. god really good.

SHADOWSAN IS SO TALL NEXT TO HER SJDGDHS

god that transition with the cherry blossoms was good

i feel so bad for hideo he didn't deserve shadowsangst

btw i want to see a spinoff with the faculty/shadow-san's school and early crime days

man the confrontation scene is so raw. hideo is shaking, holding that sword, but he is fucking ready to fight his brother about keeping the sword. man its good

appreciate the scenery

that reveal of the shot being a puddle is also so good this episode is literally art

i love rewatching this episode for the little details- the camera always stopping before ivy's face, the swords discreetly disappearing as the cart goes by. you don't even notice the first time

i know they kill people and stuff but the hoodlums are kinda sweet. yess kings sing that karaoke

i wonder if the elvis song was a nod to the elvis episode they wanted to do with shadowsan (duane said they had to scrap it and im SOOO MAD)

ivy and zack must just have full charisma stats bc i dont know how they keep getting away with blending in literally everywhere. maam thats a white bitch in a wig

i love the three of them immediately sweating their balls off when shadowsan grabs the sword

EVEN THE IMPACT FRAMES ARE COOL

btw the tattoos in this episode are cool i wish more non yakuza members had them

that app on carmen's phone is a gaydar

how long was paper star just sitting in the packaging just going "ooghhh yeah im like a fucking jack in the box im gonna scare her so bad ooogh"

i love the kitty fans

not sure what carmen was going to do with the fans anyway seeing as she doesnt know how to use them as a weapons but whatever

oh nevermind she. i guess does

i love howw carmen just like. rides paper star

girlie has to stop strapping shit to her back it does not work

another one of my favorite shots in the show the lighting is sooo beautiful

i also like how carmen is looking down, not trying to shake her off, reaching a hand down- she doesn't want paper star to fall to her death, obviously

i was like damn how did that little fall knock both of them out cold but paper star LANDED ON HER NECK

PARTIES OVER ELVIS IS GONE

i love the very minimal music when dokuso and shadowsan are fighting its cool

get poisoned

i think they reused the shadowsan poisoned groaning sound twice in a row

anyway also a nice shot here

it seriously looks like paper star was just lying there and as soon as she heard carmen get up she was like oh chill nap time is over

that climbing the ladder animation was so slick

so wait. they predicted? that paper star would not only be hidden in the sword room but latch onto carmen's ankle and follow her all the way up to that roof. so they could glue her

kill kill kill

the anime glasses on dokuso are awesome

out of context it looks like carmen just murdered shadowsan in a swordfight

god the empty room. and then you pan down and shadowsan is kneeling. good shit

MAN what a fantastic scene. he does exactly what shadowsan asks him to- does not forgive him, because he does not yet see a reason to. but he allows him to correct that mistake. what . god what a good rejection of a redemption shadowsan HASN'T redeemed himself (fully) yet it just makes sense

mmm when he appears from behind her and her spidey senses go off. its good shit

just that emotion on her face. she's sympathetic that his brother didn't accept him back, but happy that he'll still go with them on their journey.

now, this is the only time we get a voiceover from carmen (other than when she's talking to crackle in the pilot) and its such a stark choice. like the only time we ever really get an inner monologue from carmen that lets us know how she feels about it

everything about this episode is just so fantastic and different! cs thrives when it dives into character motivations...but it just doesn't do that very much. there are so many unique choices in the episode- from the untraditional infodump scene to the music to the gorgeous animation/lighting to the voiceover to the rejected redemption scene to the hints at shadowsan's true past with carmen...i could keep going on and on about it forever, but I won't. you've seen the episode. its just. argh. its so good

okay that's all from me. hopefully I can get the rest of my cs weeklies out sooner rather than later- im almost done with finals!!

[isa-ah]

EXACTLY

Like adore Tulin but what I loved about BOTW was we had two groups of champions: the ones from the past Link has to remember, and the unofficial new ones you have to bond with in this new Hyrule to get the job done ( Teba, Sidon, Riju, and Yunobo) and it was a neat way to present 2 storylines in a single go while letting the player learn about Hyrule at the same time Link is. We're both discovering and rebuilding but TOTK plowed over everything, making some new older "champions" that remains literally FACELESS because the onus is supposed to be on the people you connected with previously (and though I adored the wind temple, I hate that Teba got pushed to the side in favor of Tulin. He was a counterpart to Revali and we don't get to explore that enough as it is...)

teba is one of the parts of botw that really bothered me LOL all of the other champions have in depth memories and plotlines and characterization and arcs and then you get to tabantha and teba just goes ugh. fine. lets go. and then leaves as soon as you get up there and thats it! thats his whole plotline. he has next to no lines, characterization, or relevance beyond helping you breech vah medoh. and even MORESO in totk where he just goes hey go find tulin. and thats IT LOL

the ancient sages having 0 personality or relevance, especially when it comes to their individual awakening cutscenes, is SO confusing to me. why are they all reading the same script? why are all of the cutscenes identical? is there no culture or perspective you can offer? you experienced the battle the exact same way across the board? why even show them? they dont interact with zelda beyond being asked to put their bodies on the line. they have no narrative weight. they show up and die and thats.. it. why were they even there

but i honestly feel that way about the entire past segment of the plot. idk how into zeldatube you were in the years after breath of the wild, but the zonai got picked up as a topic a few years after botw came out and went through a huge burst of content and theories that went on so long it became an in-joke to mention them- or their characteristic swirls and architecture- and back around to being an earnest exploration of their vague presence in botw... to. that.

they were characterized first and foremost as an exploration of how ruins of a "mysterious tribe" would have worshipped the triforce. secondarily, if we are to believe the barbarians armor was zonai in origin, theyre identified as a "warlike tribe". thats what we have. their architecture is HEAVILY influenced by birds / dragons / boars for the triforce iconography, and they fought their way across hyrule (leaving ruins all over the place).

but in tears of the kingdom, what thorough line do they have? at all? their architecture is COMPLETELY different. they never once mention the triforce. they were seemingly an a-religious tribe that deified their ruler more than any goddesses or golden power. theyre shown to be puritanical largely passive figures, "inherently good."

its at complete odds with everything we knew about them. and its not ever broached. they dont talk about their culture at ALL. the snippets we get are erroneous. the youth partook in tests of courage. the temple of time exists. all of the zonai are dead or left. they can draconify with their stones of power. and thats... it. really.

there are the labyrinths- iirc they were headed by the lord of boars, dragons and? owls? and thats really it. they utilize the same uruborus statues and constructs, but seem like a completely different (and much more familiar) flavor than rauru or mineru. but.. to what end? (and why.. are the labyrinth rewards... meta callback armor???)

why even use the facade of building upon the zonai if youre not using anything established or establishing anything new LOL bizarre use of resources honestly

[rise-my-angel]

House of the dragon character development and world building has been a disappointment to me as well, and even George RR Martin himself said:

“If anything, things have gotten worse, Everywhere you look, there are more screenwriters and producers eager to take great stories and ‘make them their own.’ It does not seem to matter whether the source material was written by.”

No matter how major a writer it is, no matter how great the book, there always seems to be someone on hand who thinks he can do better, eager to take the story and ‘improve’ on it. The book is the book, the film is the film,’ they will tell you, as if they were saying something profound. Then they make the story their own.”

“They never make it better, though. Nine hundred ninety-nine times out of a thousand, they make it worse,”

The definite problem is they try to do better. They look at something great and think they can do even better, instead of doing their own thing but in a way that's out of respect for the original. Thats why the first four seasons of GoT work, they are doing their own thing but there is still a love and respect for where the story came from.

Its when they start wildly deviating when it fails. And I don't even accept the excuse that they ran out of books. A creative mind will take what is there and try to run along the same lines, but the later seasons decided that they were free to take it in any direction instead of going in the direction it already was heading.

But House of the Dragon doesn't have that excuse even. They are still following Fire and Blood. They have it all there as a guideline and everytime they deviate it isn't natural. It's for a purposeful reason for the writers as opposed to following their version of the characters naturally. You can't deviate too hard too early, because then certain plot beats need to happen it may feel out of character for the version you tried to force them to be.

Or just not allowing the actor to take the character in their direction, and forcing them along a specific narrative. The reason Tyrion works in the first 4 seasons of GoT is because they let him go in a natural direction new to that adaptaion and it worked really well. Tyrion in the first four seasons is a unique version of the character that people loved, but then they try to force him to fit into Tyrion from ADWD and it doesn't work because thats not the Tyrion we've followed thus far.

In HOTD some of these actors clearly have taken their characters in interesting directions but the showrunner is not allowing that to happen. It's forcing people into a box that the actors version of the character does not fit, not is their version theyre forcing onto them even respectable to the source material.

The first episode of season 2 for GoT had a lot to do. Establish the world after a time jump in a way thats natural but doesn't feel like we missed too much. It has to introduce and firmly establish new main characters in a way that doesn't feel lackluster or forced. It has to set up the basis for main plot points.

It doesn't waste time. It gives each sub slot the time it deserves and respects that the characters in it need to just breathe and interact with the world as it is instead of wildly deviating from the source material to "make it their own." They didn't waste time jangling keys in front of the audience or add wildly inappropriately toned scenes or dynamics just to establish that the place we jumped into is drastically different then the one we left it in.

They allowed the characters to be exactly as we know they are because pretending to frame them otherwise would've felt disingenuous and that's the instant problem going into season 2 of hotd.

There is a massive disconnect between where we left and where we are, and it feels like some of these people are in wildly different stages in their development then they realistically should be. GoT worked when they allowed the story and characters to take their time, HoTD isn't doing that. It's rushing both the slow parts and the important parts to get to the stuff thats much more spectacle then intriguing.

They are desperately rushing to get to the war, but forget that we saw next to none of the actual war for the War of Five Kings, what the war was about, were the stories of people and their lives in between the war.

But hotd is suffering from a season 6, 7, and 8 problem. They rush through everything and treat their characters like props because they value style and spectacle over their own story.

People who talk about this show like it saved Game of Thrones reputation, go back and watch those first 4 seasons. Beacuse when you do, you will realize how poor House of the Dragons actual substance of a show is in comparison.

[ultra-raging-ghost]

Had a dream i went to japan with my aunt and these two boys (one a cute little farm boy and another a hardcore city boy) were like fighting over me and it was like a cute ghibli romance theyd give me things to try and win my heart but i didnt end up choosing i went back home with my aunt lol

then i woke up, thank you dogs

Had a little follow up dream that i was staying with my family in this high rise apartment, and it was like a superhero universe that included like teen titans and batman and superman for some reason. a girl flew up to my apartment and she was like starfire but she wasnt starfire, maybe like au version of her my brain cooked up but she was struggling to fight and couldnt keep up, so since she knew me she flew up here and me and my mom were helping her recover. Since she couldnt fight i wanted to help but wasnt sure if i could so i just started jumping and doing it over and over until i eventually stayed in the air, and while they were busy i wriggled my way out of an open window (nobody was happy about this, there usually isnt anybody happy about me flying in my dreams for some reason)

so im down there and im flying around trying to see whats what, and the way im flying is like... im tinkerbell, like when im in the air im a little spec of ever falling gold dust but from first person pov i feel normal i dont even realize its happened. I also have an inventory but thats not too important, that was just something that happens. And it looks like this giant bug looking machine is like chomping through the city side, like ladybug type bug looking not like ant looking, and it has big metal teeth and its headed towards a big building and theres a bunch of superheros down there and im like... i need to go find superman, WHERE IS HIS ASS!!!! bro stopped a boulder why isnt his ass down here!!!!

so i get down from the air and now im in the inner city, mostly some kind of mall and im just passing through and suddenly someone fucking SHOOTS ME with a GUN and i turn around and its this bald guy (kinda looks like my uncle but i say that about every overweight bald guy) and im like?? u can SEE me?? but it registers in my mind that this is the guy controlling the big bug machine and hes just down here casually shopping in a hallmark in a mall, thats fine. i proceed to get the fuck outta dodge, getting shot once more and getting shot at another time (he missed the second time) and at this point im like fuck superman, i need batman where is he!!!! alfred can fix this shit!!

so now im looking for batman, starting over at square 1 where is wayne towers but also i have just been shot twice and i can only identify my apartment building so i go over there, and theres like a ledge on the side of the apartment where this girl is sitting with not-starfire and theyre trying to plot on how to help me from home, with a computer in her lap and a bunch of laundry sitting next to her. So i decide to do the normal thing and just start fucking around with the laundry to make her laugh. Eventually i stop acting dumb and im like listen... i need to find batman and i need to find superman, can you help me?? and theyre like yeah!! Apparently this girl has a strong online presence and she is gonna post basically a reverse geoguesser where people send in sightings of batman and or superman and she can identify and send me that location.

In the meantime, im going down into the city as a normal person because i dont feel like getting shot again and my current bullet wounds are moreso aching than hurting, and i get stuck in a line which sucks but i cant just start flying down here!!! Anyway i try making polite conversation with the guy in front of me and hes a huge DICK and he calls over this guy and hes like "HEY SHE HAS CONTRABAND!!!!!" and im like WHAT THE FUCK DUDE???

so this guard comes over and he makes me show him the contraband i have which is a locket from the previous dream that the city boy gave me, it turns out this guard is japanese and hes like "awwww who gave this to you?? A cute boy???" and im like "Yes.." and we end up having a nice conversation about it, its similar to something he gave his own wife when he was young and now the guy in front of me is an even bigger dick and tries to snitch on me for having cheese which is bullshit, all i had was bread (which admittedly i did have to hand over)

there was a little bit after that but i dont remember, i woke up lol

[faithlesbian]

i never felt very strongly either way about s7 as a child but watching it now im like Wow thats some bad pacing! i think there was a post where someone found the total spoken lines for all the characters and andrew had more than multiple established mains which is. certiainly a Choice, and kind of emblematic of the way skewed priorities undercut the impact of most of the season.

they tell you that xyz is happening because the stakes are so high, but theyve spent no time building the stakes beyond having characters say that theyre high, trust us, so it feels unearned. the potential slayers plot takes too long to set off, and once it does no one seems to think to call faith until the last minute, which makes the threat to the slayer line feel weak. caleb is brought in too late as a brand new player in the main plot, and takes up too much time monologuing while also being underdeveloped as a villain. the interpersonal conflicts that stem from buffy's harsh behaviour as a general in a war feel forced, because of the previous points undermining our belief that the situation is severe enough to warrant that. buffy recovering from the PTSD she clearly has after seeing red is skipped over completely, and then multiple episodes are devoted to her defending spike against her friends' suspicion and fear of him, which again doesnt feel earned as there's been basically no reconcilliation or healing going on there. andrew is there when let's be honest, he really shouldnt be

dont get me wrong, i fucking love the finale, and s7 is full of brilliant moments, but it feels like they went about almost everything the wrong way and were frequently focusing on the wrong thing at the wrong time to the overall detriment of what couldve been a banger last season

[happyendingsong]

the more i think about poor things the more i dislike it lol. i think i kept waiting for the horror shoe to drop and it just never came.

when candles says 'it's your body to do with as you wish bella' or whatever i thought it was this really ironic, haunting line to show how trapped she truly is (it's god's body! it's victoria's body! it's candles' body!) and that bella would subvert it by the end. but looking back i think it was intended as a sincere moment to show how decent a guy he is along with his 'your body your choice' slogan shirt and some clap emojis.

it's soooo twisted especially since right before this bella has just met felicity, the Other woman candles and godwin have Also dug up and mangled. i really wanted to learn more about her but she's played for jokes the whole time and belle never gets a second conversation with her. i thought that would've been really fascinating for bella to get an outside perspective on what that early dynamic between her and god|candles looked like but if the last scene is anything to go by it doesn't look like bella has any interest in building a relationship with her. such a wasted opportunity to not explore that.

and candles' response to creating her is just 'we missed you' AUGH ? horrifying! bella calls him and god monsters for it and there's literally no followup. the 'it's your body to do with as you please' bit feels so obviously hollow when like, what happens when bella dies? are they just gonna pluck her brain out again and try again because it bums them out too much? find Another Another girl to do this with? it's soooo fucked and there's such a cool horror thread to follow there but i think they just didnt realise they were writing a horror film? in their frankenstein retelling? god it's so WEIRD

i love the conversation with god where bella talks about being mother and child at once. i wish that's what the movie was about! her relationship with victoria and trying to build an identity from inside her mother's corpse like HELLO . the runtime is so long and it feels like all the interesting stuff is just on the peripherary the whole time, just out of frame. but like we're looking at victoria's face this whole time, hearing her voice! obvs it's not the story they were interested in telling but for Me. the specialest girl alive. i wish they didn't shove that whole plot into the last 20mins, there wasn't any time to really sink their teeth into it then.

i dunno like. even trying to read the film as this bildungsroman exploration of identity and living and life, the final scene just being bella back in her walled garden but now she has her childbride husband and her socialist girlfriend and theyre all drinking martinis. it feels like such a restrictive incurious ending that really soured me on the rest of th movie. All That Shit That Happened Was Fine Actually.

[sirwolficus]

I had to quit miraculous awhile ago but at one point I was interested. Pray tell, has there been an identity reveal that didn’t get undone by amnesia/time travel/weird plot contrivance, yet?

listen, i wish i had that self control. i dont like miraculous. though i do appreciate some of the pros of the show (the diversity, for instance, is something i respect, especially being produced in france which [from what ive heard from a good friend from france i went to college with] isnt as progressive with lgbt+ as canada or parts of the USA), the main thing i have always, and will always have issue with, is the writing.

so, putting this under read more in case people dont want spoilers

so, to condense my internal rants -- no, theres no identity reveal. i thought i heard something or other about that, but no, theres no chat noir/ladybug identity reveal. there IS, however, a ladybug/HAWKMOTH identity reveal. without chat noir present.

chat noir is written out of most of the finale.

oh! also, hawkmoth won. he just straight up won. he got what he wanted.

in the episode preceding the two parter, there is a large build up between adrien and his dad, who self akumatizes again (wowzers!), and as they fight they argue about parenting. adrien knows he's yelling at his dad, but gabriel doesnt -- something i assumed was a build up to a final hawkmoth/chat noir showdown, something of that nature. but nope! it seems like that episode was the product of the shows worth of adrien vs gabriel tension. and its severely disappointing.

also, they confirm that felix is a sentimonster-- cool. they imply adrien is also one, which is less cool. just say it. its season 5.

this entire season has been, and continues to be, build up-build up-build up, which coalesces into a two parter that cuts one of the main characters, brings in characters from the movies (which i didnt even see, so i had no idea who the hell these people were, randomly showing up and fighting the villains), and an even more batshit insane scheme that usual. chloe becomes temporary mayor (???? shes like 14? or 15? however old theyre supposed to be anyway) in one episode, then the alliance rings are used to like, hypnotize everyone? its so fucking confusing. kagami and adrien are quite sincerely, by definition kidnapped by their parents too. but their parents did it to keep them safe!! (and then kagami and adrien were still affected by the akuma attacks/hypnotism/etc, so....)

i think the worst part is that hawkmoth actually won. he summoned god (NO EXAGGERATION.) and sacrificed himself to bring emilie back.... which brings up a ton of questions. my main ones being; what the fuck? did he rewrite time? did she just wake up from the coma? what happened to gabriel? did everyone just accept that adriens mom is back? did no one question this sudden switch?

obviously, in this little end-montage, they explain that gabriel 'helped defeat hawkmoth with ladybug', and he gets a statue in his honour, and adrien, quite literally says, i dont think i can ever be like him (or a line to that effect, if my memory's correct). and thats such a slap in the face.

its... stupid. it really is. i feel unsatisfied, and frankly, duped. i had always thought that it would be a final showdown between ladybug, chat noir and hawkmoth. where we could see the parallels between gabriel/emelie and adrien/marinette -- this is stuff i was expecting as soon as it was revealed that gabriel had emelie creepily in his basement. i was expecting a happy ending, obviously (its a kids show), but one that was hard earned. no one got that. no arcs were completed, or at the very least, completed well.

felix and kagami get together. ??? why? felix is also an ally now. why? chloe seems to be out of the picture, and lila now holds the butterfly miraculous.

like, i cant even lie. i made superhero ocs based off of how angry i am at this show. because i genuinely feel i can do better. i think most people could do better, because theyve ignored integral parts of the hero's journey. hell, it's barely a journey to begin with.

i think i mostly watch it now still, because i hopped on the train back when season 2 first aired, when i was in elementary school. im a god damn college drop out now! if this doesnt prove the time invested = loyalty theory, then i dont know what does

[vazelbeak]

Thoughts on Unhappy campers

This will be a longer one

World building: So first things first lets start with world building! On a first run being in the human world there's not much worldbuilding for hell but it is odd Barbie needs a human costume, prior Moxxie and Millie didnt need one in seeing stars and now we're here where kids think their legs and skin are weird, until Millie ends up being seen as attractive (we'll get to that, i promise). But also we have a scene where Moxxie jumps into and stands in a fire but somehow isnt burned. Then when they go to have sex on stage and take clothes off, nobody recognizes them as demons. So...why did they need outfits? They still didnt answer this.

Plot: Personally I feel like we should've had more to connect western energy with this episode because it feels weird to leave off Stolas upset Blitzo might not love him and then Blitzo's breaking into a hospital to look for his sister. Like, a lot of people were under the impression he was going to visit Stolas until it was mentioned. They imply this to be a multiple time thing, but the way they deliver it feels like we should've have some prior build up like of Blitzo saying while theyre in sloth he has some other business to take care of besides Loona's hellbies shot. Viv said these episodes should all be watched together but this doesn't read that way. I think Moxxie deciding Blitzo put him in charge is funny, but Blitzo being so freaked out should've been played up more as at the moment it ends up looking like he's just acting weird. I think they should present the reason hes so worried about Barbie a lot sooner. She's clean, she doesn't want to talk to him, and despite that we get much on why he's worried until he finds out she's just on heroin. It may have worked if we had that implied earlier the full extent why hes worried. With the flip back to Moxxie and Millie my question is why are they deciding to be siblings? Why not just be a couple? I was dreading incest jokes the moment I heard this because now its coming off excessive especially to have it across three episodes two technically speaking being back to back. With Moxxie finding the suspicious behavior circumstantial it feels intended to drag out the plot because we get nothing to indicate him changing his mind from "this is coincidence" to "theyre the culprits". When if he went "holy shit its them!" when Millie pointed out everything it would make sense. I also don't follow why Moxxie is going to the kids for info and not counselors? They would know more about who would've had the means to drill into the boat. Or are kids better because Moxxie is trying to integrate himself into the camp and make sure counselors aren't wondering where an extra kid came from? think it would help to have a line of dialogue to indicate this. Moxxie trying to talk about who he is feels like it could've been a good set up for either 1. lying about being from another country and having a skin condition like how plenty kids go to summer camp and lie to seem cool in which all the other kids fall for because he makes increasingly elaborate lies to cover for himself 2. Making an original OC type joke with the "I like boys, makeup, and hot pink. I dislike people who think theyre better than me, bad make up, and the color green. My catchphrse is-" to imply Moxxie getting into character is him basically making a human oc. Also it feels a bit conflicting to go from "Millie leave out the fucking bitches part because these kids are too young" to "All the boys want me <3" like maybe just leave it at a "Boys fight over me all the time" Yeah kids can be cruel, but I'll just say i presume this is funnier when you weren't the one being bullied in that way. It comes off as just "okay...so is there gonna be a clever joke with this?" Kids being atttacted to Millie and seeing both about a bunch of girls crushing on her and being sent nudes is weird and uncomfortable. I feel like maybe they should've kept it to kids looking up to her and her almost becoming the cool kid/leader of them. I dont really follow the whole "i cant elimante any suspects because theyre too busy swooning over you" wouldn't this be good by giving Moxxie time to investigate while everyone else is distracted like what they had by the end of the episode? I dont really follow the whole "i cant elimante any suspects because theyre too busy swooning over you" wouldn't this be good by giving Moxxie time to investigate while everyone else is distracted like what they had by the end of the episode? ill have to reblog with the rest