#i get ship fatigue with a fandom's otp sometimes

[lizhly-writes]

what if i suddenly started writing more svsss rarepair. like i know i've been on an inexplicable sqh/yqy kick, but what else would be good. what would be nice to see.

to be honest, i'm starting to get curious. i think i have a decent grip on SOME version of sqh (does he align with the text? unclear!!!), mostly because 1) there's a very specific interpretation of him i have that i look for in fanfic, and uh 2) also some version of the way i talk seems works out for writing his pov. but other characters... i'm less sure about them.

that said, i still wonder if i can successfully smash some svsss characters together. like dolls. like the burning creator's need to play barbie.

[helena-thessaloniki]

Just dropping in to say that Silent Night has me in a chokehold I will likely never recover from and that you are awe-spiringly talented!! (new chapter is *chef's kiss*) I believe I speak for the damirae fandom when I say the wait for your updates is sweet torture and reading is an absoLUTE delight 🩷

If you don't mind questions ofc, I am super curious as to how you found damirae and got inspired to write for it! The DCAMU community size has nothing on popular anime fandoms, so I'd love to hear how it started 🥰 Your grasp on their deep and compelling characters is so immaculate (+ the heartwrenchingly articulate writing style??🩷) 😍😍 ugh love it to the moon and back!!

ahhh hi !! Thank you so much. It's pretty much terrifying posting a new story in a new fandom, so I really appreciate this. 🖤

yes! Always open to questions. :] the various algothirms must have targeted me, because I've always seen such great art for damirae, I didn't realize it was a smaller fandom and something of a rare pair on Ao3. Silent Night definitely draws inspiration from gorgeous artwork by @kasieli.

Looking back, there's a chance that damirae was my first childhood OTP? I grew up watching the early 2000s Teen Titans and shipped Raven and Robin before my little kid brain could properly understand anything about romance. I have not rewatched the show as an adult, but this is such a fantastic edit by @unlikely-alliance. I mean, it's a cartoon but their chemistry and closeness is out of this world.

Then sometime last year I got hit hard with the Marvel fatigue. (DC too, but admittedly, I didn't give the Titans live-action show a chance, too afraid they botched Raven.) The comics, movies, and animated shows were such a quintessential part of my childhood, so it was kind of upsetting to realize I was so tired and uninspired by it all. Trying to reclaim some of that old joy, I guess, led me to start rewatching Justice League and working through the DC catalogue on HBO/Max. Instead of watching in order, though, I went straight for the Teen Titans movies, knowing ahead of time from tumblr that Robin/Raven would be canon this time. 😏

Probably my writing of them is more inspired by the old cartoon, but we only get the complexity of Robin-Damian Wayne because of the DCAMU and I am so grateful for it. The way it makes them make so much sense as the only two people who could properly understand and deeply care for the other creates such a dream pairing.

Thank you again 🥰🖤 this is the most absolutely self-indulgent fic I have ever written and posted, I'm so surprised and grateful for such a positive response.

[disdaidal]

For the Shipper Questions: 2, 4, 20 and 25

2. Talk about three of the most important ships throughout your life.

1) Uruha/Aoi (the GazettE) - Somewhere between 2017-2010, I used to read and write jrock rps on LJ - and I actually did that for quite a few jrock bands then. Aoiha however became my biggest OTP and an obsession, so I wrote it for quite a bit (well, I shipped Aoi with others too, but yeah.) I also made some really good online friends around that time. In fact I met my now ex-gf while we were both writing Aoiha fiction and we started roleplaying them together as well. Then last year I actually traveled to another country to finally meet another friend of mine whom I also became friends with during this jrock era.

So an important ship? Hell yes. I’d also like to mention Die/Shinya (Dir en grey) as well because I think that was literally the first non-oc ship that I ever wrote for.

2) KieferLou - Ah yes, these two gentlemen. After seeing them together in “Young Guns” & “Young Guns II”, as well as “Renegades” (after learning they’d acted together there too), I really couldn’t help myself. I remember how obsessed with them I was and how I was so desperate to find so many movies with them as I possibly could. And ended up watching some pretty horrid shit, too (yes, Lou, I’m looking at you). I also remember finding an old Yahoo! group for their ship and a fanzine, and I felt blessed when the admin of that group still responded to me! Sadly though, I could never get my hands on this particular zine but I was still thankful that I even got a response to begin with.

I did write a couple of pieces of fanfiction for them back in the day as well. One was a series of drabbles which I actually posted to my LJ and another was some smutty piece that I never got to finish (who knows, maybe some day I will :)).

I also have a tag in my blog called the “gayest action movie ever”, which is specifically reserved for Renegades. >XD

3) Harringrove - While I have only been into this ship/fandom for a few months now, it has already made such a huge impact on me. I’ve been more active in this fandom than I’ve been on in any fandom for years now, have already talked to quite a few people here on Tumblr and on a Discord group as well. I even started writing a couple of fics for this ship (I still have that one pending prompt too, I intend to finish it very much, thank you). And I’ve been actively rp:ing this ship since October and we’re still very much excited for it.

This ship/fandom has really helped me cope through this tough autumn and winter, especially after my nearly whole last year was filled with depression and and fatigue. And no, corona wasn’t helping with that at all. So I’m really glad to be part of this fandom now. :=))

4. What’s your current NOTP? I’m not sure if I currently have any NOTPs really, I usually try to avoid unpleasant ships with my best ability.

But if I had to choose some -  and absolutely no ship bashing here, you do you <3 -, I’m not a huge fan of Billy/Nancy. I just don’t see any real chemistry between Billy and Nance, I’m sorry.

And in The 100... okay, so the main reason why I even started watching the show is that there was so much hype around Clexa (Clarke/Lexa) at the time. And well umm... I may be the villain for saying this but I actually didn’t like their relationship. I understand why people ship them (it’s a lesbian canon after all) but there was just too much... nope for me in their relationship.

I also don’t care much for Becho (Bellamy/Echo) or Memori (Murphy/Emori) either. I don’t hate them but I don’t care about them either.

20. Talk about a ship you feel alone in shipping. As you know, my dear friend, I feel so lonely in shipping Morgan/Erkki. Who doesn’t love a good Norwegian crime story, in which a bank robber kidnaps a schizophrenic patient and then takes them into the cabin in the woods so that the two of them could spend some romantic time together? I mean, what’s not to love there?

There were also a couple of ships back in my jrock era that I felt very much alone in shipping. I wrote and published a couple of fanfictions for them too, but yeah.

25. Have you ever shipped a pairing before you even started watching the show/movie simply because of gifs and graphics or similar? Like I said I pretty much started to watch The 100 for Clexa, though I ended up not shipping them after all. I’ve also seen a lot of gifs of the movie The Old Guard and so far I’ve liked what I’ve seen (gotta watch that movie sometime). And I do have a memory of shipping Carlos/Jill even before I even watched any lets plays for Resident Evil 3 Remake. So naturally, I bought the game even though it was expensive and have already played it through 3 times.

But yeah, umm... Usually I only get invested in ships after watching something for some time. I’m not that easily influenced into things in general cause it takes me time to warm up to them (and this applies to most things in my life, so xD).

40 questions - Meme for Shippers

[fagopiro]

Please tell me about YouUmi! I’m super curious about how you started to ship them~ I can’t seem to ship either of them with anybody and I feel like YouUmi might be the solution. 🤩

Oh my god! Finally the day has come!! It's my time to shine!!! ☆☆☆ Oh boy it would be a looong text lmao Just in case, I apologize, since English is not my native language, I will a hundred percent screw up somewhere!

Okay, I should start by saying that I started shipping UmiYou even before All Stars was announced and even before Nijigaku appeared, so, in fact, I didn't have any pre-references or any hints about these two in canon at first, everything started only in my head :D At first I shipped some other, more reasonable pairings with these two. Umi and You from the very beginning were the only ones who caught my attention and stayed as most favorite characters from each group. Once, I came across a joke that You, whose dream is to become the captain of a ship, like her father, loves the Sea very much (and you know the translation of the Umi’s name lolol). I, as a connoisseur of stupid puns, dearly fell in love with this joke and began to use it often and say that it was like "the most meaningful and canon pairing"!! It was just a joke then btw! After that, headcanons began to appear, for example about the fact that You, out of all muse girls, likes Umi more than the "standard" Kotori, which everyone chooses because of their similarities. Headcanons about how they first met. Gradually, these jokes and headcanons began to sink more and more into my heart, and I began to become attached to them. The pairings that I shipped before were not very fond of in the fandom, which is why I constantly felt anxious, either from the fact that me and my OTPs were bullied, or simply out of fear that this would happen again. Subsequently, because of this constant fear and pressure, I began to gradually lose interest in them. As a result, after thinking it over, I started to ship UmiYou, because, naturally, there will be no development one hundred percent and there will be no hope for any official things with them, and, at the same time, this pairing didn't make sense, so for all the questions from other fans, I could just laugh and say "Ahahah, yes, my otp is just from my imagination, I'm fine with it." Yes, at first I forced myself, but then I began to fall harder and harder for them and love them more and more. With the release of the Nijigaku, the creators of Love Live decided to create All Stars, in which all characters from all groups were planned to interact with each other. Again, knowing that my pairing does not make sense (Umi is mostly compared to Riko and Dia and You to Kotori and Rin) except for my headcanons, ideas and jokes, I didn't even have a thought that they would even glance at each other. Well, I was wrong. First, there were two versions of School Idol Message about the game, in which they spoke clearly to each other, Umi even called You by name and, importantly, she did it without a name suffix, which is extremely rare in Japan and most often in relation to the family or to very close people (and if you hold a thought in mind that Umi speaks a very polite and official version of Japanese, even with friends, it is unlikely that she would have turned to an unfamiliar person without a suffix). It killed me at that moment, but the creators continued to feed me with content. The official ALL STARS poster with all the girls came out, in which Umi very sweetly held You's elbow, being quite close to her and not being uncomfortable!

And in the full official trailer, they also spoke to each other! As a result, the pairing, the possible development of which I did not even have the slightest thought of, suddenly began to develop! When there was an event with the two of them in All Stars, I was insanely happy!!

Umi: They didn’t even bother to help out the people having trouble right next to them…! Alright, let’s go, You!

You: Yeah! Hold up~! Team Nijigaku~!

Maki: Have you forgotten that the two of you are supposed to be competing against each other?

Some of my vision of their relationship:

I imagined their relationship as very warm and understanding, in which You helps Umi to become more open, relaxed and get used to love, teaches her not to be afraid and not ashamed of it.

They actually have a lot in common, they are both very athletic, which is why I am sure that You will always be happy to go hiking with Umi, spend time there, without the torment and fatigue that usually accompany other characters when they go with Umi :D

You has pretty tomboyish appearance and personality, and Umi was raised as a boy (judging by one canon game story in the game), so they can relate to each other in this way too! They are both very strong girls!! Strong women household!!!

You is very positive and cheerful, but not a lot, which wouldn’t make Umi feel uncomfortable. On the one hand, she has energy, but the kind of energy that Umi can endure without wasting her inner resources.

They will both be embarrassed if they go watch a romantic film, but at the same time, You will be initiative enough so that it does not end with just embarrassment and distancing.

My headcanon about them in a relationship is:

by the way, have you seen how in this meme girls are very similar to umi and you in appearance and character??? i mean??? fate???? also i even have a redraw of this meme with umiyou lmao

Also, I have a headcanon that, unlike Kotori, You respects the fact that Umi doesn't like short skirts and therefore can easily sew pants or long skirts for her! Because she sees that Umi feels uncomfortable in them and calmly does it the way Umi asks her and does not ignore her requests, unlike Kotori ... Like, you saw how short Umi's skirts are sometimes? They are definitely not for dancing, I think it's impossible to even move in them...

Thank you for coming to my TED talk!

I can talk about UmiYou for hours so if you are interested and have any questions please feel free to ask!!

[ivory-rabbit]

ANSWER THE FOLLOWING SO PEOPLE KNOW HOW SHIPS WORK ON YOUR BLOG

WHAT’S YOUR OTP FOR YOUR MUSE? :

That’s a hard question! Constellations is up there - they’ve been a ship on this blog for maybe four or five years! Other than that, I love all of the relationships I write on here, and I’m not super involved in fandom shipping.

HOW LARGE DOES THE AGE GAP HAVE TO BE TO MAKE IT UNCOMFORTABLE? :

This is important - I will not write ships with muns or characters that are underage. It makes me super uncomfortable, and it would make the characters I play uncomfortable as well. I probably won’t feel comfortable with writing ships with characters younger than twenty. A lot of my characters vary in this, I guess, in terms of an upper limit and specifics. For specifics: Lumen is underage; I won’t ship him at all. Kreak, I think, is un-shippable? Probably? I guess you could try. Fitz and Quinn are in their early twenties (23 and 20 respectively in main verses). I would feel comfortable shipping them with other characters in their twenties, maybe nineteen in certain cases for Quinn, because he’s barely twenty. Visyian is over over 300, and doesn’t ship - his partner is / was of a similar age. Techie is also canonically in his twenties (I put him around 25). I would feel comfortable shipping him with characters in their mid-twenties to early-thirties. Turlough doesn’t age like a human, and probably won’t ship with a human either tbh. Kieran is complicated for shipping, because he’s hundreds, sometimes thousands of years old. He’s acutely aware of that, and is usually so worried about that and what comes along with outliving a partner that he doesn’t let himself develop relationships, even though he might want to. That makes him sort of a sad lonely person that stays outwardly positive and loving to others, and it makes me sad.

ARE YOU SELECTIVE WHEN SHIPPING? :  

I am, I suppose - the chemistry has to be there, like. And again, other types of relationships besides romantic ones exist.

HOW FAR DO STEAMY MOMENTS HAVE TO GO BEFORE THEY’RE CONSIDERED NS/FW? :

I’ve never really written them, so I guess I don’t have a precedent to follow for this. As per my rules, all questionable material is tagged and under a cut, but that’s never really had to come into play. 

I don’t think it’s necessary to write steamy moments out explicitly - the implication of intimacy can be just as powerful in a narrative sense. I’d be most comfortable with this probably, fading to afterwords, but am not necessarily against writing explicitly if it matters for the characters involved - for that kind of writing, I would probably prefer to put it on Dis||cord.

WHO ARE OTHER MUSES YOU SHIP YOUR MUSE WITH? :

Oh man, there aren’t very many (yet!). I have lovely many-year-old ships with @daedaluscried for a few characters, including Visyian’s partner. Quinn and Quinn  [ @toameliiorate ] also have an almost-thing that’s pretty cute. Oh! Aleister [ @variousmethodsofescaape ] and Tech’s almost-thing rose from the dead recently - it’s nice to see them again! Other than that, my characters mostly just have crushes. Fitz and Kieran both have crushes on some of the characters they’re writing with these days, but I don’t know if people are comfortable being tagged for stuff like that? It’s tempting because I sort of want to know if they ship things too, but I’m also spineless. OTL

ANY NOTPS? :

I have types of things I don’t like to write, I guess - I’m not especially keen on writing toxic or hateful relationships unless me and the other person have really talked about it. I don’t really write with the intention of making myself feel sad (though that does sometimes happen on its own), so content that produces a lot of compassion fatigue are just more than I can handle sometimes.

As for actual ships for this, I’m hesitant to talk about them because they’re likely unpopular opinions. And they’re not even really ‘NOTPs’, just things I don’t like as well. For Who, I don’t really like Tur|ough and Teg.an as a ship for example, because I like the idea of them as argumentative siblings more.

DOES ONE HAVE TO ASK TO SHIP WITH YOU? :

I mean... I don’t think writing that kind of thing would be possible without some sort of communication? You absolutely do not have to ask if it’s all right for your character to have a crush on mine / etc, but if we want to actually build beyond that it might be best to talk at least a little. If you ask, I will probably consider it with some level of enthusiasm.

HOW OFTEN DO YOU LIKE TO SHIP? :

I like ships when they crop up on their own. Chemistry is really important when writing stuff like that, and I like that closeness to develop organically through shared experiences / communication / etc - it’s really fun to write that in-character moment when they’re like ‘oh wow, I have a lot of feelings about this person’.

ARE YOU MULTISHIP? :

I am! With the exception of Visyian, who is single ship. Be his friend, though! He needs friends.

ARE YOU SHIP-OBSESSED OR SHIP MORE-OR-LESS? :

I do like to write ships, but not just romantic ones - platonic shipping and friendships are fun to write as well. Those go forgotten or unacknowledged a lot, I think. So I guess the long and short of it is I like writing about relationships of all sorts because they often lead to character development, but seeking out those relationships is not always my primary goal.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SHIP IN YOUR CURRENT FANDOM? :

Most of my characters are D&D characters from fully home-brewed campaign settings, so there’s not really a fandom beyond the table? As for things like Who, I’m not super engaged in shipping / fandom culture because there’s just so much of it and it’s a little intimidating.

I know that’s a non-answer, but I... *shrug shrug*

FINALLY, HOW DOES ONE SHIP WITH YOU? :

If you want to ship a thing please just come tell me about it! I tend not to recognise when people want to ship a thing, and when  I  want to ship a thing I get too scared to bring it up. OTL I want to write more things though, so I’m going to try to work on this.

TAGGED BY: @magicianbound [[Thanks, friend!]]

TAGGING: @daedaluscried, @hotwiredplanter / @knowledgebeyondbooks, @intothewildsea, @toameliiorate and @ anyone else that would like to fill this out - just say I tagged you. As always, no pressure if I’ve tagged you and you’d rather not answer!

[hearthouses]

The Umbrella Academy

Also asked by @streussal & @girlsarewolves!

Favorite character: I love all seven of my disaster children equally (but maybe I sometimes love Klaus and Five and Allison a little more).

Least Favorite character: You would think it would be ol’ Reginald, but it’s actually Leonard Peabody/Harold Jenkins. The worst abusive nicest Nice Guy™. I hate him so so so much.

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): Klaus/Ben, Klaus/Diego, Klaus/Ben/Diego, Five/The Handler, Allison/Vanya. These are the first that come to mind. I ship so much more.

Character I find most attractive: ALLISON HARGREEVES IS AN ACTUAL ANGEL. She is too pretty I can’t handle it.

Character I would marry: I would love to make Allison my wife to love and support and appreciate her.

Character I would be best friends with: Klaus and Ben would be the best of both worlds, someone fun and unpredictable, and the other reasonable to a point, but also knows how to have a good time. Both could be amazing to talk to as well.

A random thought: I love that this show is basically a deconstruction of the child superhero trope. I’ve been in a kind of superhero fatigue slump and I appreciated how… not like other superhero media this show is. It’s so refreshing.

An unpopular opinion: Luther is not “the worst sibling,” he is simply the sibling that is the least growth because he stayed in the house, then was alone on the moon for four years. All his siblings have gone out and lived lives, have tried to come to terms with their history the best they could, but Luther is literally just starting on the journey. I wish fandom would cut him some slack. He and Vanya are very similar in that they’re just now dealing with their history of abuse, and it’s making them unstable and unpredictable.

My canon OTP: The canon ships I love are Klaus/Dave, Allison/Luther, Hazel/Agnes, and Diego/Eudora.

Non-canon OTP: I ship all of the siblings in one combination or another, but I think the closest to an OTP I have is Klaus/Ben.

Most badass character: Vanya is a literal woobie destroyer of worlds, but Allison could rumor herself into queen of the universe, but honestly, I think Five is the most badass for the sheer fact he found a way to survive all alone in the apocalyptic wasteland for decades and still remain sort of sane.

Pairing I am not a fan of: Vanya/Leonard (Harold). I get it was necessary for the plot, but god, it SUCKED.

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): I feel like there is some uncomfortable issues around Cha-Cha and her jealousy that could have been explored more. I think the show could have done a better job to explain WHY Vanya was so dangerous, but also why Hargreeves couldn’t have just made her a badass normal. Like Klaus’ power isn’t defensive or offensive, so why did he get to go on missions and not Vanya. The exclusion is a little confusing unless Hargeeves WANTED to end the world, but it seems he didn’t? So some aspects of Vanya def needed some tweaking.

Favorite friendship: ALL THE HARGREEVES SIBLINGS IN ALL COMBINATIONS. I love them all so much. Also, Hazel/Cha Cha. I want them to work it out!!!

[olderthannetfic]

I really enjoy your posts and I was meaning to ask you this, but what do you think of people who always aggressivily blame straight women who are into bl of misogyny for female characters getting hate? This argument has been vivid toxic around tumblr and for fandoms for around 10 years and it's still fatigued at least for me to engage in it because just of how, manipulating it is? In my experience most of the female characters who were bashed had always some serious problem writing problem-

sorry for multiple ask- and even then, i've seen plenty of male characters getting hate for being a potential rival to another ship. I can cite multiple cases and fandom who are around this but somehow it's always gathering to straight women being misogynistic because they are angry or jealous at fictious characters. It's such a spiral because one group calls the other misogynist while enganging in misogynist behaviour and not realizing it.

I’ve seen this dumb shipwar... err... fascinating debate raging since I first got into fandom in the 90s. I’m sure it existed long before that.

It’s convenient to blame women--straight women if you can’t get away with blaming all women. The idea that it actually has anything to do with women or with BL is absurd.

There’s no hate for a female character more virulent than when she gets in the way of the “correct” canon het. Men spew it too. People who like canon het spew it. People who hate the canon ships because they want some other ship of whatever gender combination spew it. Hatred for female characters pops up all over; it’s not confined to one sort of “die for our ship” dynamic.

There is a style of slash fic where the canon love interest is an evil harpy. It’s the spiritual sister of those romance novels where the heroine has ~character~ and the evil, vapid harpies around her aren’t awesome enough to appreciate her. Anita Blake is a vast sea of het and no homo, but it’s one of the worst offenders. Based on how bonkers crazy that author is and how obviously the lead is a self-insert, it actually does sound like she’s jealous, but it’s not always so clear that there’s a connection between the author’s feelings and that portrayal of a female character.

A lot of fanfic writers are just weak writers who can’t write an interesting villain or believable conflict. It’s not really different from one random canon dude being selected as the default Homophobic Obstacle Friend in slash fic. It’s such a cliche, I can probably name who it was for any given Harry Potter pairing. (Ron for H/D. Sirius when Remus was shipped with anyone other than him. James for any gay Sirius ship not including him. etc.) It’s just a cliche that crops up in samey writing.

Male characters also get hate for shipwar reasons, but it’s usually a bit less dramatic, and it’s not usually couched in such offensive terms.

I have absolutely read slash fic where female characters were written horribly in that fic, and some of it bothered me. Sometimes, it made me think the author had issues with women. But I wouldn’t be too quick to assume that general female character hate in random meta or headcanon posts is coming from there or that it says something about m/m fiction in general.

Relena on Gundam Wing used to get massive hate from everyone from the 1x2 shippers who wanted her out of the way to the dude fans who thought she wasn’t good enough for the lead. (Then we all saw more than 5 episodes of canon and were shocked that Relena is actually pretty great later. Who knew? Ah, the angst of being an anime fandom before shit was available...) It wasn��t any one thing.

People on tumblr who want to blame straight women who like BL probably either hate that BL is popular and want to yell at people to stop liking it at all, or else they themselves only like BL, slash, etc. and pay no attention to the parts of fandom that like het. And, hell, it’s not like the f/f-loving parts of fandom never bash the other lady who’s interfering with the OTP.

Disproportionate hatred of female characters, expressed poorly, is a common side effect of a sexist society. BL isn’t the important factor there.