#i can't with this plot it's so funny

[letoscrawls]

*casually becomes the mandalorian messiah*

[iwasbored777]

The criticism that I've seen that Gwiles/Ghostflower receives that they "are only so connected bc they're both spiders" is silly cuz idk how to break it to ya but that's the whole point.

The point of the first movie and the reason why Spider Gang got so attached to each other so quickly is cuz they thought they were going through all of their struggles alone until they've met. They repeat this several times in the movie.

Because what they're doing is hard and they feel like no one understands them, not really, because no one in their universes has the same powers and backstories, until they found out that there are others who went through basically the same things they were going through. And it is what brought the whole team closer, and Miles and Gwen as love interests. It's not that they're only attracted to each other because of that - Miles and Gwen even started getting along before they knew about each other's powers - but that was exactly what made them (I'm talking about the whole team now as well as M and G as a potential couple) so considerate of each other from the start.

That's the plot (or one of many plots) of the movie.

[kkildeer]

what do you mean. mom what do you mean

[izartn]

So, about how I see Link Click's Lu Guang and Cheng Xiaoshi relationship:

As it stands in canon? Queerplatonic partners. And it's convenient for the plot that they're like this.

Because of Chinese censorship it can't be explicitly romantic, yes I know it. Let me tell why it's queerplatonic for me. The way these two have intertwined their lives and futures together?!

Owning a business and living together, that hint in ep2 (comparing them to the subtextually older lesbian couple who also came across as queerplatonic bc censure) where Xiaoshi wonders/fears if years down the line he and Lu Guang will separate/break up implying their partnership is for life as far as he's concerned (the parallel can be taken as a subtext romance too but follow me we're talking text), the way they were already going also on vacancies together three years prev in canon, etc...

Without entering on their complimentary powers and the way the dives need both of them if they want security in not screwing the past, and the inmense trust and vulnerability the dives themselves require?

They're not simply best friends either.

Those aren't the actions of normal, totally not queer friends. Cheng Xiaoshi checks out women on the dives, sure, (and men too when the host is feeling it which I love bc they can't address it directly bc censorship and then it comes across as Xiaoshi being super confident in his own relationship to sexuality/gender) but I don't think he would ever date bc Lu Guang is already there, filling that place in his life minus sex and romance but all that same companionship and intensity of feeling.

These two meet in what, the last year/s of High School and then proceeded to latch onto each other with a commitment reserved for romantic partners.

And I know you want to say, "it's the censorship! they'd be romantic and canon if not for the censorship!"

Are you sure? Are you sure the story would work if there were explicit romance in it? (I mean, if they could I'm pretty sure they would have nailed it anyways but allow me my a-spec delusions) Cheng Xiaoshi and Lu Guang feel so much like an already established pair, they work like one, and Link Click is not about them coming together like many other stories. Are you sure this would work as BL?

There's a distinct difference on the way they start the show already like six years at least since they're best friends and three or two since they live together. That's not usually how it goes. I'm talking not just romances but every buddy or nakama anime/show, where the protag has to learn to work with who will be his best friend or rival. These stories usually have the same kind of plot progression as a romance which is why they work so well when you make the subtext text.

But a story where the main romance is already established and we're following a plot that has nothing to do with it? Much more rare, even stranger to find them well done although there are some very good ones and with the friendships instead of romo they're more common. For example, Soul Eater, which is all about the trials of it and how they hace to truly come to understand each other. That's Link Click a bit, but not even then.

Link Click juggling a budding romance between Lu Guang and Cheng Xiaoshi with all the other stuff is going on?? Messier for sure. I don't know if people would have liked it as much or if the donghua would have been as well done.

As it is, Link Click has the exact level of emotional connection between our protags it needs to have incredibly high stakes emotionally and at the same time not need a detour by romantic scenes/fanservice that would derail the plot or the other charas importance. That it happens to be pretty queer anyways in a platonic way?

Nice for the aroace-spec folks watching the show xD

Btw, I'm pretty sure in season 3 we're going to get more of Lu Guang's PoV, the origins of their powers and the past between him and Xiaoshi. It'll probably dig more into the aspect of "testing their bond and coming stronger bc of it" which is were the romantic subtext usually comes through...

—unless you're very very good at writing like Arakawa in FMA, who nailed the brotherly relationship without tipping into incest subtext which I've seen more than a few writers fumble. or the latest D&D film for the platonic childrearing and partnership for a no familial example between a man and a woman also very very difficult to get right for writers dunno why—

... but until then, for now I'm incredibly satisfied by the canon.

The other read of course it that they're already a couple since well before the start of season 1, and to mentally edit what we saw in canon with that lens (it wouldn't be very difficult honestly) but reading only the text? Queerplatonic partners!

There also how Xiaoshi and Lu Guang don't have that anxiety/insecurity of their bond that makes it so easy to read the want for something, like a romance for shipping purposes. Despite the disagreements on the Dives or the trials of season 2 or Lu Guang keeping secret Cheng Xiaoshi future/past death they read very steady which is fun. I love some good established relationship, you can go to deeper places when the base is already secure and the risk is higher for the characters. Plus I love domesticity! Yes, I do my angsty/Gothic leanings notwithstanding. Don't you know you need a home for the Gothic to be effective?

[bumblingbabooshka]

Polycule Moments Guess who got access to recording software

[theneighborhoodwatch]

i love franklydear as much as the next guy, but i have to admit i’m always a little thrown off by how much fanwork portrays them as married from the get-go, because part of the appeal of franklydear for me is the prospect of someone having their gay awakening while also experiencing the muppets’ adaptation of silent hill.

[svetochey]

kimi no na wa au. it came to me suddenly and taken my mind completely. what year is it again

upd: Luz putting an insult on Amity's face felt very ooc, so i changed it to something nicer. i hope. as much as you can be nice while writing on someone's face against their will

[imunbreakabledude]

the entire concept of ben & glory in buffy season 5 is so wild... like it's an idea that is so fucking stupid on paper yet somehow, somehow, with the strength of the characters and the worldbuilding of the show up until that point, manages to be entertaining

that's not even getting into the dawn part! like. the plot of buffy season 5 is ludicrous even by fantasy show standards. "so, listen. there's this god named glorificus, who is this like, really vain woman. and she's basically all powerful but the thing holding her back is she's tethered to this guy named ben. yeah, he's just ben. just some guy named ben. and they share a body, and the thing is, anyone who learns that glory is ben and ben is glory will instantly forget it. and also she's looking for a key to open a portal to hell or something, and a bunch of monks hid that key from her in a teenage girl, but not just any teenage girl, they invented a younger sister for the chosen vampire slayer and implanted memories of this sister in the mind of said slayer, and her mother, and all of their friends. it also may have caused a fatal aneurysm in the mother."

it sounds way too dumb to be an all-time great season of television and yet it is!!!

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

Ive seenyou mention wuxia a few times now and i wonder what that is. Would you mind explaining it to me?

not the most qualified person to explain this as i'm not, in fact, from china; but i've read a couple of wuxia so here goes:

wuxia is a genre of fiction from china specifically, about martial artists in ancient china. i don't think a specific time period is like required? obviously some dynasties are more popular but idk how it goes in that front. it just has to be Not Today and probably Too Long Ago. like pre industral revolution i think. again idk if that's a requirement, but most i've seen are from around the same relative murky pre-electricity era.

xianxia is a subgenre of wuxia that's specifically more fantasy-like, and it's not just martial arts, but also spiritual powers and cultivation (which i have no fucking clue how to explain without two hours and three tangents other than chinese magic system. if you've ever heard of chi/qi as an energy, it appears there). so like- genshin is by all accounts a xianxia, it just doesn't use the more common specific xianxia terms like cultivation. some of those are very weird to translate and probably not common for the average non-wuxia reader, so it makes sense why they're going for alternatives.

chongyun and xingqiu and xianyun are very much straight out of a xianxia. xianyun's entire story quest was the closest genshin has gotten to a straight xianxia plot so far. i highly reccomend ashikai's video on unnecessary visions if you want more info on why genshin is a xianxia hahah

cyanide narwhal has some talk of some stuff from xianxia, but that's mostly because well- fucking liyue, that's how it works there. the whole light energy striking down someone who's getting powerful and giving them godhood if they survive the strike is, while not exactly like that, something that happens in some xianxia as well. like the way adepti work in general is just very xianxia. ashikai does a much better job explaining it than i do tbh but yeah

TL;DR: wuxia is chinese martial arts fiction in ancient china, and xianxia is a wuxia subgenre with more magic elements. also genshin is a xianxia

[yuridovewing]

Tallstar, dying and gasping for air: Mudclaw please don't antagonize the other clans today I'm so tired

Mudclaw: L + ratio + borders are swag

[dropespeon]

kaito and sonoko deserve to be online friends i think

[crippledanarchy]

Wait... so the heaven in supernatural is literal permanent isolation in your favorite location? Most people don't even get to live with their spouse or children or friends? How is that not worse than a hell where you're tortured for a while but then you can choose to become a demon and do whatever the fuck you want?

[buccellato]

since plants can seemingly make any matter, even down to complicated replications of flesh (like with the salmon sandwiches), would it be possible for them to replicate a human? Like, not an independent but just a 3D-printed human? 🤔🤔

[tmos-time]

do you have any erisolsprite headcanons? anything about the little goober you got up there in ya head? id love to hear about it... :3

i've got a couple thoughts clunking around!

one, erisolsprite's gender is the combined sludge of expression and feelings from eridan and sollux-- eridan is he/him in an abstractly felt sort of way, while sollux is he/him because the pronouns just fit right and thats it-- and he expresses that weird blended feeling by making his pronouns plural he/him, even while being his own person by himselves from the two; its like the inverse of using singular they/them to him lol

two, erisolsprite physically cannot spritesplode even if he tried to; being a mage-prince (+/-) of hope-doom (+/-) somehow fucks enough with things that the process would just leave him Still There amidst the dust if he even got that far lmao. its hard to create (+) your own doom (-) or destroy (-) the body's hope to exist (+) when everything is cancelling out no matter how you fold it <3

[sergle]

why did you always hate the show?

EH I MEAN i had some high hopes for it to be some slappery, but I didn't find Any of the characters to be esp likeable. except for Klaus, obviously, but he doesn't get treated well by other characters and he's not there enough to be worth it. It was neither as funny as I was expecting it to be nor as Gripping and Interesting. Which, a show can be great while being only one of these things, but I didn't think it was either of those things. also I was so fucking shook by the incest thing. that was 50% of the reason why I stopped watching lol. and before anyone says anything:

[girlinthebrightbluejeans]

Okay gonna watch the Harold Lloyd movie again where he fails numerous times at ending his sad miserable life. :)