#i have progressed past the need for angsty backstories

[acacia-may]

Ooo for the WIPs; what are the Time Next gen fics 👀? And the Vanessa’s father one? Those sound interesting 🥰!

Hi Lyra! It's so nice to hear from you. Thank you so much for your ask and for your interest in my wips, dear! 💕

I will confess that I haven't worked on any of my Black Clover Next Gen fics in a while (I have one, Portals and Potatoes) that has been in progress on AO3 since last year that I really need to go back to one of these days), but I am very fond of the two with "Time" in the titles (which are both from the same "Future Problems" series).

"Crossing the Time Line" is Spatial Brothers-centric. Kalon, Finral's time-traveling son in my AU, accidentally sends his father and Uncle Langris (who get along now) back to the Royal Knights Exam which they have to try their best to recreate without anyone finding out they are from the future--shenanigans ensue.

"Find Me In Time" is more angsty and serious in tone and is about the next generation of magic knights (mostly everyone's kids plus a few others) especially the Black Bulls squad when Yami's son, Katsu, is the captain. In a desperate attempt to retreat from a terrible battle with a Zogratis descendant (A/N: do not ask me which Zogratis the villain is related to--I honestly never thought about it because I don't wanna know lol), Kalon accidentally brings his captain several members of his squad [including Henry's daughter, Summer, Gauche and Grey's daughter, Mira, and Asta & Noelle's son, Kai], his best friend, Anni Boismortier (Charmy & Rill's daughter who is on the Aqua Deer), and his sister, Lia, (who is in the Golden Dawn) to safety in the past for a short respite in which they are comforted by their (young) parents.

As a bonus (to end on a happier note), "Captain Magna" is also a Next Gen story about the next generation Black Bulls squad but it takes place earlier (or in a different timeline) when Magna is the Black Bulls' captain. Trying to get his squad back to their base, Kalon accidentally takes them to the Black Bulls' hideout nearly two decades in the past where they are discovered by (canon-age) Magna and Luck. It's all lighthearted shenanigans.

The "Vanessa's Father" fic is one I would really love to come back to someday, but it became such a big (multi-chapter) project that I think I got a little intimidated and had to leave it for a while after it hit around 5,000 words. In briefest summary, Vanessa finds her biological father, Cyril Swann (OC), and agrees to meet him. Most of the story is told through flashbacks in which Cyril explains how he came to have Vanessa and, ultimately, was (forcibly) separated from her by the Queen of Witches.

I'll put the basic backstory and also a snippet from the wip under the cut since I'm not sure how to explain more without a lot of ramblings. 😅 (Warnings: mentions really unhealthy arranged marriage for the purpose of producing children only)

Vanessa's father, Cyril, grew up as the youngest child of the House of Swann, a lower-tier noble house in the Clover Kingdom. His family's only claim to fame was their mediocre wind magic, and the fact that Cyril's older sister, Channary, married into the Noble House of Sandler (eventually becoming the mother of Alecdora). Cyril is the only member of the Swann family in nearly a century not to have wind magic, having inherited string magic from his mother (who was specifically chosen to marry into the family because her magic was so weak it was not suspected to be passed down to the children). Cyril was close to his mother whose name was also Vanessa, but after she dies, he is treated as an outsider by his father and three older siblings: Cecil, Crispin, and Channary, as his string magic is considered fairly useless by everyone including Cyril himself who mainly uses it to change the strings on his violin.

Cyril lives next-door to Finral's (eventual) mother, Calia, who is his dearest friend and like a sister to him. Calia has what is considered a weak "summoning magic" that lets her move things with her mind (both in her line of sight and by picturing them), but it attracts the attention of the Noble House of Vaude and a marriage is arranged between her and the current heir, Ledior (like with Cyril's parents, the hope is that Calia's magic will be so weak that it won't prevent the Vaude spatial magic from being passed down to any children). Calia is a very sweet, if a bit naive, young lady and a talented pianist who loves to play accompanied by Cyril's violin (she considers him quite talented when Cyril just thinks of himself as mediocre). They also love to have tea in Calia's garden and to play with Cyril's cat, Reddington.

Shortly after Calia's marriage is arranged, one of Cyril's elder brothers, Crispin, trespasses in the Forest of Witches thereby breaking a treaty between the Witch Queen and the Clover Kingdom. Her Majesty the Queen of Witches is going to have him executed for breaking the treaty until Lord Swann (Cyril's father) negotiates with her and basically gives her Cyril/his hand in marriage in exchange for Crispin's release since she's interested in his string magic. The Witch Queen wants the power to control destiny, and with her Future Sight Magic, she has been able to see the future in which her daughter, Vanessa, exists, has the power to control fate, and uses a string-like magic. Having this power over destiny is far more important to the Witch Queen than her hatred of men so Her Majesty essentially wants to use Cyril to have Vanessa and then agrees to let him go.

Cyril eventually fancies himself in love with Her Majesty (and calls her Regina ("Queen") even though he isn't entirely sure if that is even her real name), so he agrees to the arrangement, marries her, and never feels forced into the relationship or into having children. Even though their "relationship" is cold, business-like, and more than a little problematic, Cyril tries his best to make it work and get Her Majesty to love him but, of course that doesn't work out. Her Majesty pities him, but that is really as much affection as she is capable of. [A/N: Their dynamic is very much "I Love You (As Much As Someone Like Me Can Love Anyone)" (YouTube) Warnings: some language and a few spicier/suggestive jokes in that song].

Eventually they have Vanessa together, and Cyril loves his daughter dearly, more than he could have imagined he could love anyone. He is actually the one who names her--naming her Vanessa after his beloved mother. His daughter is Cyril's pride and joy, but Her Majesty thinks he is a bad influence (being a man and all) so she tries her best to keep them separated from each other until eventually she kicks him out of the Forest of Witches altogether after Vanessa presents with her magic meaning the Queen has no more use for him. He isn't sure what happened exactly: one night he fell asleep in the Forest of Witches, the next night he woke up back in his old room at House Swann. The forest is well hidden so he could never find it again and even if he could, Her Majesty would never let him back in and he wouldn’t be able to break through her magical barrier (that Asta eventually breaks through his anti-magic).

When Cyril gets back to Clover, several years have passed. In that time, his best friend, Calia, has died from complications giving birth to Finral (and her husband has remarried quickly which doesn’t sit right with him). Cyril’s eldest brother, Cecil, died in the line of duty as a magic knight, and his other elder brother, Crispin, (who is kind of responsible for this whole mess in the first place) has taken over House Swann as next in line, but he can’t/doesn’t want to run anything so Cyril has to step in & actually keep their House going behind the scene (all the logistical things like making sure servants get paid, money is properly invested ect.). He spends his most of his days being touted around and shown off by his family (seeing as he’s technically a ‘prince consort’). Cyril is a very unpretentious and straight-forward person who hates the limelight, but his older brother and sister, Crispin and Channary, are not above using him and his status as a ‘prince consort’ to further their own standing & influence. Though Cyril tries to explain, nobody quite understands (or wants to understand) that he isn’t actually a prince consort so, unfortunately for him, he gets dragged around to a lot of fancy dinners and noble parties he doesn’t want to be at where sycophants try to suck up to him and/or try to arrange marriages with the daughter they’ve heard he has. [A/N: I actually played around with the idea of him ending up at a party at House Vaude at one point and running into a tiny Finral & Langris, but never did anything with it].

Eventually, Cyril reaches a certain breaking point where he just retreats from the public eye and tries to live a quiet life with his cat(s) while missing his daughter terribly and playing a lot of sad violin music, which is how no one has ever really heard of him before. House Swann was always a lower tier Noble House on the outskirts of the Noble Realm anyway so he was quickly and easily forgotten. He visits his sister & his nephew, Alecdora, from time to time, but he does not get out much.

Cyril is very heartbroken over losing his daughter and has never really forgiven himself for having to leave Vanessa, even though he didn't have a choice. Cyril suspected that Vanessa was in Clover and heard rumors about a powerful magic knight from the Forest of Witches with the power to control destiny, but he felt like he didn’t have the right to just show up out of nowhere and infringe on her life. He thinks she probably hates him for abandoning her and being absent and that there isn’t anything he can do to make it up to her, so he just lets it be and leaves her alone.

Eventually, however, he runs into Langris at a party hosted by Cyril's nephew and Langris' squad mate, Alecdora, and Langris recognizes Cyril's unique magic. After talking to him, he sort of puts together that he must be related to Vanessa and mentions it to her. Vanessa debates it for a little bit but eventually reaches out to Cyril and asks if they can meet. He explains the whole story, and Vanessa realizes that they're both victims of Her Majesty and that she has always been connected to him.

Now, there might be an author-given, actual reason why Vanessa’s fate power presents as a cat but in this story, but for this backstory, I kind of linked it back to her dad in a way. The strings are his power after all & even if this fate manipulation is combination magic (her majesty’s future sight + dad’s strings), it is powered by love. It’s the strong bonds she has with her Black Bulls family that help her unlock it, but in my mind (in this universe anyway) there might be something subconscious there where she’s pulling on a happy memory & bonds she doesn’t quite remember with a father who loves her which is why Rouge looks like her father's cat, Reddington (I was a little worried that naming the cat “Reddington” would be a bit on the nose though...)

Cyril and Vanessa reconcile and start to rebuild their relationship and really become part of each other's lives. Cyril would have been a wonderful father if he had been given the chance, but Her Majesty stole that from him. I like to think that going forward they get to have a close bond with each other, and if Vanessa ever has children, Cyril becomes a wonderful grandpa to them.

But I think I have rambled enough about all of this. 😅 Here's a small snippet from a scene that takes place when Vanessa is very little and Cyril is still in the Forest of Witches (and sneaking out to see her).

WIP SNIPPET:

“Papa!” Vanessa called to him excitedly before Cyril held a finger to his lips and shushed her gently—carefully tiptoeing over to the small bed which had recently replaced her crib. Since Her Majesty did not want him to spend a lot of time with her—often citing the corruption that would likely accompany a more masculine influence, Cyril had used to sneak out in the middle of the night to curl up next to his daughter’s cradle. Now that his little girl was getting older, however, he was having to find more creative ways to sneak out to visit her when Regina was too preoccupied with other things to care to stop him. After all, Cyril was sure she saw everything in her Forest and especially in her own palace so there was no hiding from her, but there was definitely a hierarchy to her concerns so he learned to schedule his visits around those. Now, for instance, it was very late, and Regina was holding court. She wouldn’t be bothered with coming to stop him from playing with his daughter. 

“How are you, Nessie?” he whispered with a bright smile as he gave her a gentle kiss on the top of her head. 

Vanessa beamed at him. “Happy.” 

“I’m glad.”  

“You are happy, Papa?” she asked, slipping her tiny hand into his. 

It was probably her favorite question, and like always, he smiled and assured her, “Of course, I’m happy. I’m with you” before he kissed her cheek causing her to giggle and laugh. Cyril stifled his own laughter so as not to draw too much unnecessary attention—a bit difficult seeing as Vanessa’s constant cheerfulness and beaming smile were simply infectious. Cyril remembered fondly that even when she was still a baby, Vanessa had this way of staring at a person with a bright smile until they smiled back at her—almost like a little game, as if she wanted everyone around her to be happy. When she got older, she took to asking them outright. 

Before he could say anything more, Reddington jumped up into bed curling up next to Vanessa with a contented purr. The otherwise grumpy cat was particularly protective of the little princess, though Cyril was sure he would deny it if he was able. Even so, he was often snuggled up next to Vanessa relishing her attention and adoration—until she playfully pulled on his tail, that is, causing him to yelp and hiss before Cyril once again reminded her how to pet him gently and soothed him with an extra helping of catnip. Reddington purred again as Vanessa pet his soft fur. 

“Happy, Red?” she asked—tilting her head as if genuinely waiting for the cat’s response. The cat mewed, and Vanessa smiled, seemingly pleased with this answer. 

“I have something new to show you,” said Cyril, taking a seat at his daughter’s bedside. 

“New amimals?” Her eyes seemed to light up when she asked, and Cyril nodded. Vanessa was always delighted by the little dolls and animals he made for her to play with out of his thread magic, particularly when Reddington had tired of them or was off sulking somewhere and no longer wanted to play. When Cyril wasn’t able to visit her, he was thinking of new things he could create and practiced making them with his magic. He had actually gotten pretty good at making them move as well, entertaining her with kittens that arched their backs, puppies that wagged their tails, fish that wiggled their fins, and little birds that flapped their wings causing Vanessa to giggle with glee for hours. 

Vanessa’s eyes widened in wonder as Cyril held out his hands to her, forming his threads into the shape of a cow that moved its head up and down as if it was grazing in a pasture. 

“What’s this?” she asked curiously. 

“It’s called a cow. They make a silly sound: 'moo’,” he demonstrated, and his heart could have melted as his little girl burst into laughter and stared up at him with wide, joyful eyes. Her violet eyes were the one feature she had inherited from him. Cyril couldn’t help but wonder if someday when she got older, if he was no longer around, she might look at herself in the mirror and wonder where those eyes had come from and think of him, if only just for a moment. The thought caused his chest to ache and filled him with an unbelievable sadness, but he knew it was only a matter of time before Regina dissolved their arrangement. 

[halforcdad]

Thoughts on how they will explain a possible 3 episode Lucy absence?

The first thing that comes to mind that makes sense to me is Lucy's family.

We don't really know much about Lucy. Take it from her, her entire life is just work, gym, and Kate. She doesn’t really have anything else going on (I really thought her being a junior agent and wanting to follow in Tennant's footsteps was gonna be up there, but they seemed to randomly drop that after they futzed with the timeline to give us that Kacy backstory). The only thing we really know about her is that she has issues with her rich family and potentially burned that bridge when she left Texas. Given NCIS: Hawai`i's focus on ohana and the crumbs she was dropping last season (they were her third-most talked about thing behind work and Kacy angst lol), Lucy’s family troubles seem to be shaping up to be her other big long-term storyline. 

Among the bits of bts we've gotten from 2x07 (presumably the last episode she would be in if she were to be absent for 3 episodes) was this interesting little sneak peak:

(from a bts video a crewmember uploaded, these are tori and yas's stand-ins while the crew is setting up the shot)

Looks like the perfect set-up for them to get personal, like talking about Lucy’s fear of the water or quietly reflecting on her insecurities or her family/childhood (we already have a Whistler focused episode so this could be Lucy’s moment). Like something on the same level of seriousness as the scene where Lucy’s comforting and encouraging Kate outside of the FBI BBQ, but maybe with less anxiety and more chill vibes lol. It could be a great opportunity to finally introduce some substantial Lucy backstory and or a long-term background storyline that isn’t just about her and Kate.  

I know a lot of people theorize that her family has cut her out completely or vice versa, but NCIS: Hawai'i already has one parent-child relationship that started out like that with Wally and Kai so maybe they want to differentiate a little (though they could use that similarity as an opportunity to get them to bond over it whenever that storyline happens, a more in-depth version of 1x04). I could see her not reaching out, but not having their numbers blocked either or still keeping minimal contact with them, birthdays and whatnot. Maybe something happened with a niece or nephew or her parents and she needs to go back and see them. It would warrant Tennant giving her extended personal time to take care of it. Plus, it would be easy to explain why she’s not in the episode at all if she’s back on the mainland and if they wanted to, they could include her without her needing to be on location/the sets via either phone or video calls and she could record all her scenes ahead of time. Though, the cons to this would be that if Lucy was absent from the episode, that means we wouldn’t get to see any of the angsty family scenes! (unless there were flashbacks shown later) and it could turn into a lot of tell not show type story writing which I hate. It would be a neat way to introduce angst though if Lucy is keeping it all in and not telling anybody about what happened even though its clearly affecting her (or if Kate feels hurt that Lucy didn't want her to go with her/isn't telling her either). It would be an interesting bump in the road in a season where she's been building trust and communication with Kate. My dream would be for it to progress slowly, more mentions of her past here and there, her family slowly becoming more present in her life (good or bad), maybe a brother or sister shows up in an episode down the line as a suspect or to visit and that throws her off, but I want the parents showing up to be an unexpected monumental thing that doesn't happen until like at least late s3 or s4.

Each of their cases takes places over the course of a few days minimum and that’s not even accounting for the amount of time that might take place in between them. Unless they threw in a few Nightwatch type cases (which they solved in one friday night and one entire saturday) then I don’t see how you explain away that big of an absence in-story unless you introduce a big storyline like Lucy needing to go back home for some reason. 

Another possibility I’ve seen floating around is Lucy getting hurt in the upcoming episodes, which is very doable and I would not hate it at all. My only potential concern with that is I would want her to have scenes with the whole team and not just Kate while she's recovering. So maybe if she’s in the hospital, Tennant comes by to see her and tells her about the case or the boys throw her a little party in the hospital or they video call her because she’s bored out of her mind. Though, since Lucy’s in the crossover, I don’t know how keen Tennant would be bringing an agent who was recently seriously injured with her to LA on a mission like the one being described in the crossover (Noah is also listed as being in the crossover, but I don’t know if I’ve heard or seen anything at all about him filming out of state). IIRC, the synopsis mentions something about agents being targeted so Lucy being separated from everyone while in Texas could make her an easy target? Or if she hears about Tennant going to LA, it would make sense why she’s the one accompanying her because she’s already on the mainland and would probably be looking for an excuse to leave her family (or maybe she wants to leave Texas to protect them since she’s a target). 

Hell, since we're speculating let's just throw shit at the wall. Maybe they do something wild like Lucy went on a long undercover thing or oh she's suspended because she fucked up.

Of course, they could still go with, “oh Tennant just shipped Lucy off to help another division since she's the only one who doesn't have family they need to take care of in Hawai’i or Lucy needed to help a friend or something it’s nbd,” and have her come back like nothing happened. 

tldr; keeping up with the taras, she gets hurt, they just brush it off casually, or they throw something out of left field

(i am in the camp that if she were to be absent entirely, id lean more on it only being a one or two episode absence at most)

[im-still-a-robot]

M's going to be very confused tomorrow

[mikaze-discord]

Quartet Night: Love letters

Annnnnd these are the love letters written for Quartet Night!!!

Please enjoy under the cut~

REIJI KOTOBUKI

From Anon:

I've always been drawn to characters with complex (and fairly dark) personalities, so liking Rei-chan was honestly inevitable for me.

He looks like a very bright and cheerful character at first, which he is, but sometimes that part of him is a little misleading because, in actuality, he's a character that holds a lot of negative feelings about himself due to a past that he can't seem to move on from. He holds a lot of those feelings to himself because he doesn't want to burden anyone else with them. He's a reliable, cunning, and ultimately selfless character that chooses to shoulder a lot on his own out of his infinite care for others, and perhaps a secret sense of atonement, all hidden behind his bright demeanor and goofy smile, and it's endlessly interesting to me.

Besides the duality of his personality, he has a lot of other endearing quirks to love about him. He loves his mom a lot and is a mama's boy. His old-man jargon and catchphrases never fail to amuse (I still can't get over the way he says "my girl"). His obsession with anything even remotely British is something my APH England phase can relate to. His style of music brings a lot of pleasant feelings of nostalgia for me, and his pretty voice suits them a lot. And most of all he's just a very good boy overall. I rate 99999 out of 10 would love and support him and also maybe pay for his therapy because god knows he needs it. Happy anniversary!!

From another anon: 

Would you like to hear a story? You do? Very well then, may this story be one you enjoy.

What do I like about Reiji kotobuki? A Lot of things actually!

Well, I've always really liked Reiji as a character as he seemed to be one of the more interesting characters to me, due to how complex he is with his backstory and general just personality.

I have always really enjoyed how Reiji just solves problems too? Like he is just such an outgoing person who deserves all the support!!!

Like the best word I can use for Reiji is just, unique. Everything about him is just so Reiji. From the way he talks, to his nicknames or even his texting style. Like have you seen how many people use emoticons when texting as Reiji? It's just so him.

I like his way of thinking too! I feel like some of the interactions in the games are just so interesting, just seeing Reiji’s point of view. How he deals with a sort of survivor’s guilt and all of that.

Personally, some of my most memorable roleplaying moments were watching a Reiji rper in action, like just seeing them interact and flow so seamlessly with the other characters was just so fascinating to wee baby rper me. Such a large part of playing Reiji is just how you flow with the people around you and comedic timing. I have so many funny moments where Reiji was just interacting with people and it was just so inspirational (?) like I couldn't stop the smile on my face. I had learnt alot from them. I still consider them my roleplaying senpai almost! I don't talk to them anymore but I really had an amazing time just seeing their spin on the character.

I don't find him to be a romantic partner towards me nor do I see any of the characters in that light, but I've always found Reiji as such a personal character. Not even just towards me, like even with other utapri stans. The most relatable character always seems to be Reiji.

I've always been pretty similar in many aspects to him and I often find myself relating to him in numerous ways like his vibe is just relatable! I have often found myself trying to make other people laugh and have fun that many times I'm spreading myself thin and feel unappreciated...Reiji really helped with that.

This is where i start getting into the really personal stuff LOL feel free to skip if you dont wanna hear the angsty backstory.

I had really come to love Reiji when I had just...hit a low. I had a group of friends who I enjoyed hanging out with and just talking to, but they weren't very good friends per say. I often had to schedule every activity we did and I spent days and nights trying to think of concepts that might be fun. They took it for granted.. I had spent 4 months trying to make a game for them, and they had constantly pushed back times that we would play it. Using excuses to not play it, without telling me out right what they did not like or even why. The site I used was later taken down without notice and thus I had lost all my progress. Later, they had mentioned how they would like to play it except that later ended up being two years later. I really wish I could've solved things with that friend group like Quartet Night did but that didn't happen. That is when I started seeing things Reiji’s way? Not to say that it was the same or similar scenario to Reiji but I had just associated it with him.

RANMARU KUROSAKI

From Anon:

Ran is such a fun character! He sounds like a "rough outside, soft inside" kind of character, but his roughness is more like an integral part of him and it's through it that he shows he cares rather than setting it aside. That's what made me want to rp him. I also like how he is such a strong guy who's always determined to do his best in everything he does despite so much having gone wrong in his past. And it's very satisfying to see him form bonds and start to trust people.

From @mikaze-san:

Originally, my favourite Utapri boy was Ai, and it had been the robot boy for several years upon entering the fandom. In fact, it only switched to Ranmaru sometime late last year but regardless, I would still die for this man. Part of the reason why I switched is because I’ve always been a fan of Suzuki Tatsuhisa and I have a huge bias towards any man who wears nail polish without fearing being “feminine” because fuck gender roles.

As someone who studies fashion, I think Ranmaru is very coordinated and confident when it comes to portraying himself that way. He knows he’s not very good at expressing his emotions and utilises his passion for rock and playing the bass to portray those feelings through his songs. It’s also incredibly inspiring to know that he bounces back from pretty much anything considering his backstory and the stuff he deals with in the game/anime.

But my main reason for loving Ranmaru so much stems from the fact that I admire him a lot and want to be more like him. For a long time last year, I got to roleplay as Ranmaru in a few Utapri groups and through those experiences, I gained a better understanding and appreciation of the characters that I wrote for. In some weird way, by highlighting his flaws, character progression and how he dealt with different emotions, I ended up providing insight into how I dealt with similar issues by looking at them from a 3rd person perspective.

I used to be very shy and was very shut off from friends and family, and due to this I’ve always admired people in my life or fictional characters that are so confident in being who they are. Ranmaru particularly struck that chord in me because his bluntness knows no end. He’s very opinionated and doesn’t fear confrontation, in most cases being the one to provoke it. He speaks his mind openly without being overly anxious of the consequences. This is something that I feel is especially relevant today with being your authentic/unapologetic self is such a trend.

It’s something I’ve also noticed with having met people in or outside of this fandom, the notion of idolising a fictional character containing traits that we want to see in ourselves. Which made me think about a lot of my favourite kinds of characters which at the end of the day all boil down to sharing one similar trait: Being a bitch.

And in Utapri, Ranmaru embodies that. So naturally it’s very easy for me to idolise him.

(Tldr: I like his bitchy attitude.)

AI MIKAZE 

From Arashi:

It's hard to put into words why I love Ai Mikaze, perhaps it's because I'm subconsciously drawn to him, maybe it's because his hair and eyes are my favorite color, maybe it's because his voice is that of an angels, there are many reasons why I love him. I couldn't tell you a definite, "These one or two reasons are the entire reason I love him", but I'll try to sum it up.

I grew to love him by admiring his personality, his smile, his determination to reach his goals, everything about him made me happy. He's strict and a little scary at times, but when he sees people caring for him, he becomes happy and in a way, sentimental. He's not sure how to explain the way he feels, but he tries. I think I admire how he holds all the little things precious to his heart as he learns about them, and he wants to understand how to care for others and how they care for them in return. Even after six years, he still remains the most dear to me. I think that he now has a sentimental value to me, because even if I 'loved' another character more for a while, I will always come back to Ai. Ai deserves the world, and I'd give it to him if I could. He'll always be special to me, and I think that he very much deserves that.

From Maronda: 

My love for Ai started after I found Shining Live by chance and started to play. At first I wasn't particularly attached to any of the characters and decided to go back and watch the anime to maybe remember some context other than who Starish was. When I got to the episode focused on Ai and his "secret" I was absolutely thrown off by it all. I ended up feeling like I had so many questions and I knew that the anime would give me little to no answers, so I frequently turned to rambling on the internet about it. Eventually, this fixation on weird things about him seemed to turn into a clear fondness for him, and friends made me realize just how much I liked him. Knowing the cold and often strange aspects of his personality was due to something out of his control was something I resonated with as someone on the autism spectrum. He reminded me of some of the ways I used to think and behave.

I also began to notice other things I loved about him. Things like how soothing I found his voice, the pleasant shade of light blue in his hair and eyes, how ridiculously pretty he is... but the best things are the endearing parts of his personality. Though he's somewhat harsh, he's still entirely genuine. His curiosity is absolutely precious and his occasional awkwardness in expressing emotion or understanding the emotions of others made me empathize with him. And if you look at the Ai in Shining Live and compare it to the Ai in the anime and games... he really has changed a lot and grown as a person. He now seems so much gentler and understanding, and he clearly values the friendships he has now too! I think he's a wonderful character and ever since friends of mine encouraged me to selfship I've essentially been in love with him, but it also makes me happy to see other people appreciate him for other reasons as well. He's just so lovable!

CAMUS

From @uta-no-fakku-sama:

At the very beginning of my UtaPri interest, Camus never really caught my attention. That is until he became my first My Only Prince UR. I’ve come to appreciate him a lot more ever since, and now he’s become my favorite QUARTET NIGHT member! Along the way, I learned more about him and realized he’s one of the more complicated characters to understand. Nonetheless, I absolutely adore him. I tend to tease and make fun of him a lot, but deep down I truly do like him a whole bunch!

From @/waddamaloooon on twt: 

A little Camus appreciation post

(alternatively known as; how this guy managed to harshly take my heart and step on it like the gumin I am.)

Hello, this is Suikamaru, here to share a tiny story of why I, and eventually you, love Camus Rondo Cryzard.

At first glance, his looks appealed to me, but not his behavior (and ironically enough, his voice) so I didn't bat an eye on him. I've always been on a neutral leaning to dislike opinion on Camus, which is quite understandable because have you SEEN the way he acts. Unfathomable.

…..To a Young Suikamaru, that is.

I've grown, so naturally I've changed preferences regarding characters, ikemen, and who to stan and who to avoid like the plague. I will lie if I said that I expected to like that blonde confectionery devouring machine at any point of my life.

But it did happen so who are we fooling here.

It dawned on me that Camus is the type of character that you cannot appreciate unless you go in depth into his lore, backstory, and see him for who he really is. Because then everything else will make sense. And that never happened in my case until I started roleplaying as him.

I realized that he's not just a two faced, sweet toothed mean man. He's a perfectionist, someone who's always been raised since his childhood days to be nothing less than complete, who has locked on his heart and emotions to devote himself completely to the purpose given to him. He has the looks and brains for what though? He should be a little stupid honestly.

But his intelligence gave him the complexity that he just needed for his characteristics. Because as aforementioned, he's not someone to easily like or fall in love with. And I think that's quite rare in characters, and very much appreciated due to the fact it gives the fans a chance to not actually stay on a flat level of knowledge regarding their favorite characters.

I've slowly started to see myself in some aspects of him, which was the number one factor of liking him. Then came the Maeno magic when I realized Camus shares the same VA as another character that I love as well. (Hamelin, from SinoAlice.) From then, everything went downhill.

In a good way. I think..

Well, that is all from me, please read about this handsome man and appreciate his hard work both as an individual and as an idol. There is SO much to him that's p much overlooked and I'm getting broke from spending my money on his living expenses rent free in my head. Take him off my head.

[pockymllk]

Pocky’s manhwa recs for hopeless romantics <33

Do you enjoy..... strong female leads? villainess characters? heart throbbing romance? reverse harem stories?

Look no further fellow reader! These are a few of my fav manhwas that contain those genres <3

*in no particular order*

1) It looks like I’ve fallen into the world of a reverse harem game

When I opened my eyes, I was in a different world. I had become the game’s villainous princess who was feared by all. Not to mention… Completely naked men I didn’t even know were approaching me left and right!  Just how the hell am I going to get out of this freaking game?!

- This manhwa does have the typical isekai trend with a reverse harem genre but I absolutely adore the FL in the way she holds herself and the decisions she make

-The romance and relationships between her and the other MLs are super realistic in terms of the pacing and dialogue too! (she actually works her way to making them respect her instead of a sudden 360 change just because she has a different personality) 

- In terms of her power/strength, she isn’t afraid to use it appropriately but she does have her own flaws too (the consequences of her actions etc). 

- If you are looking for a manhwa with a no nonsense FL combined with 5 equally drool worthy unique MLs, this one is definitely for you! Plus, it’s filled with some of the best romance scenes I’ve read too hehe

Overall rating : 4.5/5.0

Bonus thoughts : the art is absolutely stunning btw, one of the best I’ve seen! You can take my word for it 

2) I tamed a tyrant and ran away

God gave me a chance to relive my life. Before the rebirth, I had been used for the past 400 years as the empire’s sword. And so, I swore to destroy the empire. I found the young prince of the country and became his teacher. I taught him how to become a tyrant and asked for the country.

- Superrrrr strong FL (slightly overpowered imo) with a tragic backstory. ML is a power bottom distrustful of the FL at first but I detect some yandere vibes from him in the future

- The first few chapters of this manhwa does have a slower pace but gradually picks up speed in terms of plot if you stick with it. Personally, I think there is a good reason for the slower story thus I stuck with this manhwa (ngl there are some scenes that drag out abit too long) 

- Right now, it only has 20 ish chapters so I can’t tell how the story is going to progress but depending on how it is right now, I think it will become a wonderful story to enjoy in the long run. 

- The romance is definitely not the main genre for now and the story does get rather dark and gritty for a shoujo manhwa (due to the FL’s thoughts and flashbacks, the ML is also rather dark) but I like it better this way because both leads are establishing their relationship base before progressing on, it’s also quite fun to see them test each other through mind games

- It’s a fresh read from the typical romance stories that you typically see

- Recommended if you want to see a super strong FL and how their relationship blossoms through the chapters! Or if you want a break from the usual to try something darker and more plot heavy, this is 100% for you! 

Overall Rating : 4.0/5.0

3) The Young lady I served became a young master

Four years have passed since the original heroine ended her life as a maid. A handsome man came to visit. That too, a man who looks like the lady I used to serve. “I’m here to keep my word, Blair. You said you’d be with me forever.”

- This is probably the cutest manhwa I’ve ever read 

- I know many people may not consider the FL to be ‘strong’ but I absolutely love her stubborness and loyalty to the ML(?) Even after being pushed away countless times, she still preserves in her work and builds up a relationship with the ML

- Once you get past the first few chapters, the two of them have such an adorable relationship oh my gosh, the way she’s utterly oblivious to her actions and the ML is an absolute tsundere for her

- I find myself smiling like an idiot whenever the two of them interact (they have the super friendly vs super cold trope), the plot is fairly simple and the story is definitely more focused on the characters rather than the plot so you feel more attached to the FL + ML 

- Occasional dark/angsty moments but nothing too serious

- Recommended if you like fluff and heart warming scenes! Or if you just want a light read without too much hassle, it’s an excellent binge read over the weekend

Overall Rating : 4.0/5.0

4) Beware of the Villainess!

I became the villainess of a novel! Do I hate it? No! I find it rather nice. A duke’s daughter = a jobless rich person. How I can miss out on a chance like this?! This is the best chance to just enjoy life. I should throw out the main plot and just live life how I want to!

- *bangs fist on table* STRONG FEMALE LEAD CUTE SOFTIE MALE LEAD STRONG FEMALE LEAD CUTE SOFITE MALE LEAD STRONG FEMALE LEAD CUTE SOFTIE MALE LEAD

- A perfect manhwa that balances out hilarious comedy, action, romance and dark scenes 

- Most of the time, this manhwa is rather hilarious due to the FL’s disgust with the other shitty male characters but I really like how it can be absolutely serious when it needs to be and you realise that this manhwa is more than just a typical shoujo romance

- FL is unapologetic and does things her own way!!! Both the ML and the supposed ‘MC’ are super whipped for her (for good reason) Also, the story is rather unique in sense that the MC (the blonde girl) actually has her secrets of her own and she absolutely detests the other male characters too

- I always find myself refreshing the website for a new update, this manhwa is just a top recommendation of mine. Personally, I think it’s a great read for anyone as long as you like strong female leads, the plot is not the strongest but the pacing is perfect

- I also sense future character development from the other characters once they regain their senses 

- Super wholesome and hilarious read! Read it if you are bored this weekend <33

Overall Rating : 4.8/5.0

[astroninaaa]

Hot Take: I am not a fan of c!Ranboo's more... overdramatic properties. For example, his tears burn him, he speaks a language nobody else apparently can, he has layers and layers of backstory that seem neither relevant to others in the SMP nor to understanding his own choices - and if they eventually are revealed, they seem extremely confusing and possibly 'overly angsty'. Now obviously this is only my opinion, and doesn't mean these are bad automatically, but it does rub me the wrong way when people say other characters (e.g. c!Puffy, c!Foolish, etc) have a backstory that's 'too complex' or 'too Mary Sue-like' for them when... well, have you seen c!Ranboo?

To reiterate, I am not condemning enjoying these tropes in the slightest, I just think it's very much not my taste and feel a little too... can I use 'special' without sounding like an asshole? Because I truly do not wish to sound like one. Just figured that you're the best blog I know for submitting this hot take because you're not a c!Ranboo apologist and you have good responses lol.

mmmmm no i see you. i absolutely see you. i do agree that a lot of c!ranboo's characteristics are overdramatic and just a little bit on the edge of pandering to the audience, and personally i don't like it very much either. the "his own tears burn him" is, to me, just so unnecessary and so obviously added as something to make the character "different" and "unique" and it just. i don't know

okay and like. there's this thing i call "filler characteristics" for characters, and i think those are really important. think just random and specific details that as much as they might not be the main things those characters are known and loved for, they are necessary to give life to those characters. so like- c!tommy's love and knack for both gardening and animals or c!techno's treatment of foxes are filler characteristics. there can also be physical ones, like c!tubbo being "canonically short". they aren't strictly needed for the story to progress, but they matter because they give characters a feeling of actual life and reality and they make all the difference when you actually want to understand those characters and who they are ( i can elaborate on filler characteristics sometime if you guys want)

and c!ranboo's filler characteristics are just. some are standard and common but others are oddly purposefully angsty and "unique" and some don't make a whole lot of sense specifically because they were made to be angsty, not to make sense.

and as you said it's not an inherently bad thing- those characteristics (the burning tears, the mysterious past, etc) are not inherently a bad thing. they pander to an specific audience, yeah. it's not exactly my cup of tea so i completely agree with you, but at the same time like. i get why people like it? i don't know. i think with this particular point it ends up boiling a lot down to personal taste and what each person does and does not enjoy in a character.

send me a hot take!!!

[moontours]

Isn’t lovely how Tony being the ultimate mentor figure has emerged basically organically and somewhat recently. Like, he isn’t a character with an editorially mandated teen sidekick*, nor is he a former teen hero, he doesn’t have his own kids in most universes, he just is a guy that more and more writer that were writing teen heroes saw and said, this is a man children what not only like, but trust. And not even like, kids find him cool so they wanna hang out, idt most of his tinies think he’s cool past his reputation as an old school hero lol (616 Tony doesn’t know what TikTok is and refuses to learn.) they just like him. Iron Man is kinda cool, Tony Stark is loved.

Like his backstory as a neglected and abused child turned teen genius left to his own devices too early (and probably having to deal with the limelight/celebrity at an early age) makes him kinda perfect to not just understand what teens ARE capable of on their own (unlike maybe other adults that want them sheltered entirely), but also when they would need help and what they can’t do (because he knows what he needed and didn’t get). And he’s one of the most capable adults to actually support them with tech, knowledge, experience, connections, and funding. Plus his own regrets and fears help him to guide them away from his own mistakes, along with his guiding philosophy of racing towards the future and how kids are the future. Not to mention his willingness to literally sacrifice himself for them or his unwillingness to burden them with his own problems.

(On an angsty note, Tony of basically any universe never really trusting himself/thinking he doesn’t deserve to have his own family (until MCU Tony) is so sad. Let the man have a baby to cuddle and raise. Let him be a very present Uncle at least!)

* (Riri isn’t a ploy to get the Youths™️ to read Iron Man she’s an organic growth of the mythos, like we are talking about here tyvm)

bestie this made me cry so hard i love him so much. he's literally the best person i know and you're so right like his progression to mentor was so organic and natural it made so much sense 😭😭

[missmaxime]

how do you feel about the show making rio so unlikable? is the backstory a fix it?

Let me start of with that I don’t think the show is making Rio more unlikable. I don’t know if you mean that they are visibly showing him committing more violence and crime. But I’m assuming this is an ask in response to the wire-scene from Sunday’s episode.  Watch me under the cut go through the past three seasons and a little some season 4 to tell you how I see Rio’s character progression. I’m not really sure if this is what you’re asking an answer to, but if it’s not tell me! * Rio’s (non) POV * Escalation in violence * Different views on S3 * More into the wire-scene * Prediction for 4x06 / Backstory

Rio has always been shown to be a ruthless and violent criminal. In the beginning of S1 he had no problem murdering the girls, and has made death threats ever since. He shot Dean, killed Eddie, had Turner assassinated and murdered Lucy in front of the girls. I don’t know how people can see him any other way, it’s not something that was ever hidden by the show. He’ll go through every length to protect himself and his business.  We know Beth has been a soft spot for him since Season 1 too. In the beginning because it was a fun and interesting business opportunity, but we’ve seen their relationship develop for better and worse across seasons. I think we have to keep in mind that Rio is a character we’ve seen almost exclusively through POV that aren’t his own, and mostly through Beth’s. And we as viewers see a limited amount of information about him, that we translate in our own ways. I’ve seen people interpreted the 2x01 scene where Rio shows Marcus to Beth through such rose-colored glasses for example. I can see how a viewer, and Beth, could see it as a scene that would frame him as more likeable. But I also see how that was exactly Rio’s point; He wanted Beth to see that it’s not just her who has kids on the line with her crime-life, as a way to invalidate her constant argument of ‘being a mom’ and ‘having a family’ as if that would make her special or something. She’s a drug dealer and counterfeiter like him, not a criminal with a heart of gold because they happen to have a child. Season 2 really started unpacking Rio’s character more. In Season 1, if the whole Rio/Beth – CH/MM chemistry hadn’t existed, I could definitely see the character of Rio being done late Season 1/early Season 2. But that’s not what happened, so now Rio had to become a person with connections and feelings and deeper motivations – but it’s still a character that’s in the base there to drive Beth forward as a character and deeper into crime. Which is a tricky balance, and I don’t think the show always made that work. Obviously the most clear example of that is the loft scene in 2x13. Now there’s more than one thing to be said about that scene, but I’m focusing now Rio himself. It’s the big finale, a lot of things needed to come together here and explode. Overall I don’t think the build-up was executed well, but it doesn’t help that we have no Rio POV here. His decision to kidnap Beth, confront her with her lack of taking responsibility and lying about her rotten eggs, and his complete oversight of her response to being pinned his fall guy really dropped out of – maybe not completely thin, but at least barely medium thick – air for me. Concerning the racial element I think THIS POST by @septiembrre explains this much better than white, non-American me ever will.  Regardless of the fact if the racial element of 2x13 affects a viewer, this poorly executed finale left lots of people unsatisfied at best. When Season 3 started we did start to see more Rio POV, or parts of his story told through Rhea, even though it was limited. I know there’s a lot of critique on the S3 we got, that I personally don’t understand – I loved it, it was so amazingly angsty, especially the Beth and Rio interactions were so loaded and simmering with guilt and anger and sadness and desperation – but if you’re searching for catharsis in a way of Rio coming back with a vengeance with guns ablaze, then that’s really not what you got. What Season 3 did do was putting the violence and cruelty Rio is capable of more on the forefront, and making us feel the weight of it more (I don’t know about the rest of you, but in the previous seasons I felt they really underplayed a lot of it). Rio had competing gangs taken out through Turner, has Turner assassinated along with a lot of other FBI agents, he fully intended on killing Beth before the pregnancy lie, kills innocent Lucy through Mick and disposes her body gruesomely, has the girls deliver Boomer with all intention of harming him (if not murder) and full on frames Beth for Lucy’s murder with her prints on the gun. I don’t think these kind of actions weren’t going on in the previous seasons, but now it’s more on display because Rio made Beth a part of this side of crime (and with that, us the viewers). In the beginning of Season 4 I feel like we’re making a bit of a jump when it comes to Beth and Rio’s relationship, maybe one that’s a little too big compared to the distance we ended on in Season 3 (even if they seemed friendly in their last Boland Bubbles scene). Lucy’s body is found and we learn that said gun was also used to taking out some gang member of an opposing gang of Rio’s, so after Turner’s sweep he apparently wasn’t done. That gun now becomes a much bigger thing to hold over Beth (and I’m speculating because we don’t know for sure, but we can guess that now Annie’s prints are on it – which is an ever bigger press on Beth because she won’t let her little sister take the fall, while she would do so herself. And I think she’s up for a rude awakening that while she’s under the impression that Rio has always employed the three of them, what was actually going on is that Rio employs Beth, and he sees Annie and Ruby as Beth’s employees and thereby offers them zero protection). So her counter with his print doesn’t come a moment too soon. I feel like Beth asking him to murder ‘Dave’, albeit with a lie about his identity and not as straightforward as Rio might wish, is a positive shift for him. She might not pick up a gun herself to do the deed, but much like Rio has Mick shoot Lucy, she very deliberately gives a killing order through him. And with a very drama heaux set-up we see him personally – and he has no reason to not have Mick do it – shoot Fitzpatrick. Aside from the fact that I have no doubt Rio may not have knew the specifics but he knew Beth had something orchestrated, the fact that some sniper dude was the target has it really drive home to him that it’s something else than Secret Service, and that they are still active around Beth. So we’re finally here, 4x05 The Banker – which I’m gonna guess was the reason you send this ask in the first place. In particular the wire-scene. In the first scene we learn that Rio has found the tracker on his car, and he turns it off or breaks it – so he knows he’s still being watched. It makes the most sense that even if he takes the leap that he put down a Secret Service agent, that they just replaced them and Beth is likely still working for them. He meets her in her kitchen – which isn’t that common at this point, last we know he was there is after the failed hit on him. And she doesn’t even jump when she sees him, just accepts it. He motions for her to be quiet before slowly stepping into her space, and she very logically responds with a ‘what are you doing?’, and he stares back long and hard to say that he means business. He has all the reason to suspect her wearing a wire, even if this wasn’t a planned meeting, and it wouldn’t be the first time she lied to his face. It’s clear to me (but I’ve seen this interpreted differently) that Beth fast finds a solid stance in this powerplay. Rio doesn’t seem happy about the fact it has come to this, and neither does she. I’m not sure if you send me this ask because you have negative feelings about this scene, but I can tell you I can’t answer those. This scenario could have been portrayed so wrong with any other actors or the way they shot it, but I feel like they delivered superbly on it. It’s in no way sexual or intimidating like I’ve seen some posts suggest, I just see two brokenhearted people who see the little trust they rebuilt fall apart in in thirty seconds. At the end Beth ends up winning, a bitter win maybe, this confrontation. Rio’s obviously still suspicion, but she also gained some trust with her asking him to kill ‘Dave’, so setting her up as The Banker is some sort of twisted reward and punishment and test at the same time. It’s not explained, but I think ‘The Banker’ might have been a hidden figure before Beth stepped up to show her face (before her flunky’s came to collect in name of The Banker) – making this an even better set-up if it’s so because that takes Rio out of the equation altogether even. We end the episode on the note where Rio tells Beth he has people he answers to, and that they want to meet her. Which, again, sound like both a reward and a punishment and a test. We’ll have to see next Sunday what it really means. IN this episode we’ll meet some of Rio’s family, likely his boss(es) and get backstory on him. I don’t see that as a fix-it, but mostly because I don’t see anything needed of fixing. I’m glad we’re getting an insight into Rio’s past, and I love that it likely will broaden his backstory and motivations more. But I feel like the way Rio’s character and the amount and the way of it seems very fitting to the story and the perspective it’s told through. I’m not sure if this is an answer to your question, so feel free to send me a more specific one if you want to!

[mneiai]

Re-Imagining Jedi Apprentice: Melida/Daan

For those of you familiar with this, I’ve been attempting to re-imagine Jedi Apprentice in a way that allows me to still use the significant parts of the backstory, but doesn’t make the Jedi look absolutely awful. Melida/Daan is a major part of it, in that it makes the Jedi look horrific while also being a really popular part of Obi-Wan’s backstory (because him having a past as a child soldier puts a very angsty spin on the Clone Wars and the child slave soldier thing).

This can be found on AO3, as well, along with prior parts of this ‘series’, along with in the tags on my blog. I will not be taking any criticism about how I, an abuse survivor, should ignore abuse in JA because it’s a “common YA trope” and apparently if bad things are common in fiction that means...we should ignore them or something wtf is wrong with people.

Melida/Daan:

An Outer Rim world that has suffered through around two centuries of civil war between the major ethnic groups of the Melida and Daan. Each generation perpetuates the idea of vengeance and payback, encouraging their children to continue the fight after their deaths, and the only real art or culture they have is monuments to dead warmongering relatives/ancestors.

The Melida/Daan Mission:

In JA, Jedi Master Tahl is sent to help wtih negotiations between the two sides, but is kidnapped and tortured by one of them. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are sent to rescue her. They bumble around and are saved/helped by Cerasi, a member of a group called the Young.

We learn that the Young are children of both sides of the war who don't agree with the fighting and want it to end. They're living in catacombs connected to the sewers and barely surviving. Cerasi, at 13, is one of the older children. She helps them get to Tahl, providing all the info they need as well as a necessary distraction and then they take Tahl back to the Young hideout.

Obi-Wan, having a lot of empathy and obviously horrified about the situation these kids are in, wants to help them. Qui-Gon insists that they must follow <i>only</i> the mission directive and do no more. Eventually, Qui-Gon takes Tahl to their ship (and I should mention, they were age mates and he's kinda obsessed with Tahl, it's creepy) and Obi-Wan, as the Elders (older adults) are bombing the Young, insists he's staying. Qui-Gon goes back to the Temple, leaving a 13 year old Obi-Wan, without even a lightsaber, in the middle of a civil war.

Obi-Wan and the Young would go on to win the war (with the help of the Middle Generation) and setup a new government run by the leader of the Young, Nield, with a Council that included Obi-Wan and Cerasi. Except that Nield wants to destroy the signs of the old culture of Melida/Daan while others want to focus on rebuilding. Tensions run high. Cerasi is assassinated by Mawat, another member of the Young, to try to reignite war and kill off the Elders that remain.

Chaos erupts and Obi-Wan has to beg the Temple to send help. Qui-Gon comes back to Melida/Daan, has the Elders make peace, and reluctantly takes Obi-Wan back to the Temple, though not as his Padawan.

The Melida/Daan arc is Not A Good Look. And it continues to be Not A Good Look the entire rest of the JA series, wherein Obi-Wan gets blamed and shamed when he eventually returns to the Temple, even by his friends, for "abandoning" his Master, and gets reprimanded by the Council itself. Qui-Gon faces no consequences for leaving a 13 year old, his Padawan, on probably one of the worst planets to leave someone on in the known galaxy.

Much like the first novel, which people can trace directly to them disliking Yoda and the Order, the fallout from Melida/Daan is something people often cite as a reason they dislike the Council and especially Qui-Gon.

How To Keep Melida/Daan But Not Make The Order Look Like Negligent Monsters (Again):

Jedi Master Tahl is sent to help negotiate peace between the Melida and the Daan, who for the first time in centuries have agreed to an outside negotiator present, which is taken as a good sign from everyone. While there, a "terrorist" attack leaves her injured. Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan are sent to assess whether she needs to be evacuated and for Qui-Gon to take over negotiations if she can stay. At this point Obi-Wan is 15 and has been Qui-Gon's apprentice for a few years.

Both the Melida and Daan are blaming each other for the attack, but upon investigating, the Jedi find that the actual attackers are very contrite members of the Young--Tahl wasn't even supposed to be where she was when the bomb went off, the building was supposed to be empty, and was meant to show the Jedi that things on Melida/Daan were not as "peaceful" as they appeared.

The Young are mostly orphans, ranging from around 18 down to little kids, living in catacombs under the city and traveling through sewers, still. They're barely getting enough to eat (especially for growing children), but if they get caught by the adults they'll be sent to factories and work camps to continue the war effort (ones that, as part of the peace deal, were supposed to be shut down already). Qui-Gon agrees that this needs to be investigated more closely and allows Obi-Wan to continue speaking to the Young, who trust him more since he's a fellow child. He gets more and more attached to them and their cause as he does so.

Tahl has a setback and must be taken to Coruscant for treatment. Obi-Wan refuses to go, scared that without a Jedi presence, the Melida and Daan might restart hostilities or go after the Young. Qui-Gon reluctantly agrees to leave Obi-Wan behind, after sending out a message to nearby Knights and finding one in the vicinity who could make it there in less than a day to take charge of the mission, temporarily, and act as a guardian to Obi-Wan. The Melida and Daan have made lots of overtures that they want peace and will continue to hold their truce.

Except basically the moment Qui-Gon is out of the system, the war starts back up. The Knight never makes it to the surface, shot down in the atmosphere, and Obi-Wan is left living with and fighting beside the Young to survive.

Back on Coruscant, we get a sign of Senate interference as they stall any missions back to Melida/Daan. Qui-Gon is frantic (as anyone who cares about Obi-Wan would be), enough that he goes to his mostly estranged Master for assistance. Dooku is near leaving the Order, partially from Sith interference/influence and partially because of the Senate corruption and the way the Order just bows to their whims.

Meanwhile, on Melida/Daan, Obi-Wan realizes that help isn't coming after a few days with no signs of more Jedi and throws himself into working with the Young to try to stop the war. They know the terrain, the Melida and Daan tactics and weaponry, and Obi-Wan has studied various conflicts and battles already in his education as an Initiate and Padawan. The Young starts making real progress against the Melida and Daan, who were unprepared for how well-organized the Young are (and some of the Force tricks that Obi-Wan has learned have been helping, too).

The Council eventually goes behind the Senate's back, sending Qui-Gon on a mission to nearby D'Qar to collect samples for a Temple researcher, with a very long allotment of time to do so. Qui-Gon, of course, heads to Melida/Daan, managing to land because the Young had destroyed most of the planetary defenses after finding the wreckage from the Knight's ship. He finds the Young far more organized and regretfully more militant, and a wary Obi-Wan. With Qui-Gon back, the Young allied with the Middle Generation, and the Elders' infrastructure mostly destroyed or co-opted, they finally sue for peace talks again.

Mawat and some of the other Young still don't want peace, they want to punish the Elders for all the horror and pain they've suffered, and Cerasi is caught in the crossfire when they attack the talks. She dies in Obi-Wan's arms, becoming a martyr for the peace on Melida/Daan.

A council is setup initially to rule, with representatives across the age groups and an equal amount of Melida and Daan. The Senate finally sends another representative, a beauracrat who will oversee the formation of the new government, and Obi-Wan leaves with some small peace of mind, despite his grief.

After the trauma and chaos of the Melida/Daan mission, Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon are given a break to recuperate. Their first mission after is a "cake walk" mission to witness the peaceful transition of governments to a young Duchess on Mandalore. It is, of course, not.

[autumn-foxfire]

I do not get when lov stans say the lov is far more fleshed out and have epic character growth to the point they feel like the main characters (especially Shig) and I'm just sitting there like 'what development?!' Shig is very much the same guy he was before with same goal except now he wants to destroy society HARDER! (now with sad emotional backstory) the rest of the lov are the same. Toga wants to kill people she loves more, but sad past. Spinner wants to follow a worse role model...

... With added, spicey, introverted+bullied backstory. Dabi wants to kill his dad but now with the added bonus of killing his siblings--with a nice side dish of past trauma. Like how is that much of a change? That's about as deep as dekus character, who they complain is flat and whose goal has changed from save people to save people but more. They've just been fooled because we got angsty backstories later, instead of being introduced to the character during their sad past like deku was...

While the League of Villain’s have had developments of sorts (Shigaraki has matured and while his goal has become more destructive, he’s also learned the value of teamwork and supporting his comrads. Twice has grown a lot since he was introduced and has overcome his trauma. Toga has also matured and has grown to appreciate her bonds with her comrads. Spinner. Dabi has revealed his true self...), that’s only a natural progression in a story and not something that makes them “main” characters.

Although, people need to understand that exploring the trauma and past of characters isn’t necessarily development. Many times people say a character has been developed when what they really mean is that the character’s motivations have been revealed, development implies a change after all and most of the time the revealing of a sad backstory isn’t change.

I get hyping up your favourite characters, I do it too, but they’re lying to themselves and others if they seriously believe that the villains have had the most development and are almost like main characters (when I’d argue the characters that have had the development they talk about are Bakugou and Shouto).

[c-is-for-circinate]

A Definitive Rating System

of various plot progressions through enemies, lovers, and friends

as rated by an Expert In The Subject (me), so elected by a comprehensive panel of experts (also me) and with the strictest peer review policies available in consultation with me, myself, and also I.

Enemies to Friends to Lovers:

The true classic.  A straight linear progression with an ingrained possibility for really slow burn romance, as passionate enmity first turns to cautious respect, then true mutual affection and care, before both parties finally must admit that their old passion hasn’t disappeared at all, just mutated into a much sexier final form. Rating: 11 / 10, awarded for pining, passion, happy endings, and the weight of millions of words of well-written romance

Friends to Enemies to Lovers:

Lots of potential in this one, as two close friends may be separated by any number of terrible circumstances before they can admit to the true depth of their feelings for one another, and spend much of the story on opposite sides of a great conflict before reuniting for a triumphantly happy ending.  Unfortunately, there’s equally great potential for an entire plot based on super contrived miscommunication, or a resolution based on one character completely giving up everything they’ve violently believed in for the whole story up to the final chapter, which is not good reads. Rating: Dependent on execution.  10 times the inverse square of the number of times the whole thing could have been cleared up with a single actual conversation / 10.

Friends to Lovers to Enemies

The all-things-are-inevitable breakup fic, where good friends try to become lovers, fuck it all up, and have no other option whatsoever but to end up hating each other.  Literally the thing every single character in a friends-to-lovers story is always afraid of, and also completely depressing.  Good for melodramatic, gothic-y fiction about wandering through a moor and plotting how to destroy your one-time intimate companion utterly in all polite society and also possibly with ghosts.  Not so good for well-adjusted people handling their emotions in healthy ways, but it’s not like we go to fiction for that, right? Rating: 7 / 10, for overwrought drama and characters who really need to get better hobbies.

Lovers to Friends to Enemies

A surprisingly intriguing progression, which suggests that characters ended their romance amicably and then ended up foes for a completely unrelated reason.  Very backstory- or prequel-ish.  Excellent for adding angst to any already-angsty situation where one-time compatriots find themselves immovably devoted to opposing sides--they liked each other even after they broke up, but not enough to move past their ideological differences. Rating: Many / 10, where ‘many’ is defined as any reasonably big number multiplied by how much I feel like stabbing myself in the heart on any given day.

Lovers to Enemies to Friends:

Recovering-from-a-breakup fic.  A good, cathartic, ‘improving’ sort of plotline that I have basically never seen as the main plot of any story except perhaps the sort of Serious Realistic Fiction I’m pretty sure they read in the book clubs of the moms of my friends who have moms in book clubs.  Does make an excellent b-story for a couple of acid-spitting exes are who’re forced to work together for the sake of a much more interesting main plot. Rating: As a main plot, the number of times I have seen this story actually be interesting / 10 (or, 0/10).  As a side plot, the number of actually funny catty comments raised to the power of True Friendship / 10

Enemies to Lovers to Friends

The god tier plotline, beating even the classic gold standard for true excellence.  Hatefucking accidentally turns into actual understanding, empathy, and feelings!  The setup of this story practically requires the sort of emotionally damaged characters who think it makes sense to sleep with someone they don’t like on purpose, and then its happy resolution demands that the characters actually figure out how to like each other. Rating:  1,000,000 / 10, I do not take constructive criticism

[toomuchtimenerd]

Reviews for 3 New Adult Novels

So I got a little bored and decided to take a short break from YA fantasy. I spent a good amount of time browsing the Kindle Unlimited catalog (I very recently found out that even if you don’t pay for Kindle Unlimited these books are still much cheaper than others. It’s like $3-4 for a book compared to the usual 9.99. Incredible). During my search, I came across the New Adult genre (seriously - why is Kindle Unlimited FILLED with NA books?) and because I’ve been needing to obsess over some steamy romance lately I picked up two of the most angsty NA books I could find plus one that simply had stellar reviews on Goodreads. And then I proceeded to finish all three books within about a week. To top it off, two of these books are like 700-page novels. It’s amazing how much one can accomplish when you have literally nothing better to do with your life, isn’t it? Yes, I am poking fun at myself. But it’s all temporary. I’m going to actually try my best to keep these three reviews as spoiler-free as possible, for once.

I’m going to start with Devious Lies by Parker Huntington, as that is the first NA book I finished reading this week. So this 700 page behemoth of a book features your standard enemies-to-lovers with a little bit of suspense/mystery added in for flavor. Oh, and sprinkled with some SERIOUS angst and brooding on top. It also features an age-gap romance, and is slow-burn. Devious Lies is basically about rich girl Emery Winthrop who, at 18 years old, is forced to forgo her rich girl life when her father goes under investigation for embezzlement and subsequently goes in hiding. When the embezzlement is leaked, this basically screws over everyone who’s employed by Emery’s father and everyone who invested stocks in his company. This includes a HUGE amount of people in the southern town Emery grew up in. This also includes the Prescott brothers, Reed and Nash. Reed is the boy that Emery had the biggest crush on her entire life, but Nash is ultimately the main love interest and POV that we see aside from Emery’s. 

After the whole embezzlement thing which is a huge factor leading to Nash’s father’s death, Nash is pretty much hellbent on seeking revenge on the Winthrops. By the time the story really gets going, Nash is in his 30s and has essentially built a multi-billion dollar enterprise and of course is one hell of an angsty playboy. Emery is around 22 years old, fresh out of college (paid for by herself) and gets hooked up with a job working for Nash. Nash finds out, and makes it his life goal to make Emery’s life as difficult as possible while trying to find out where her dad is hiding. The entire story is about the progression of their relationship and the secrets surrounding the embezzlement. 

So this is probably one of the better angsty love stories I’ve ever read. And that’s saying a lot because I’ve never liked angst all that much (tried it with The Cruel Prince and although I really didn’t like it I actually have been considering giving that trilogy another chance). Angst is usually so... unbelievably NOT well written at all b/c I feel like angsty characters are just angsty without a good enough backstory to defend it. This tends to be more so prominent in contemporary romance novels, or maybe that’s just because I’m a lot pickier when it comes to contemporary romance. But for Devious Lies, I think Huntington does a pretty good job at charging the main characters with believable and understandable angst. Nash grew up almost in poverty and his dad literally worked himself to death while watching trust-fund baby Emery grow up like a southern princess. The embezzlement destroyed Nash’s dad, so I can see why he blames the entirety of the Winthrop family for the hardships he faced growing up. Not to mention, Nash’s life story is the embodiment of a rags-to-riches story so of course he’s going to look down on Emery who supposedly gets millions of dollars per month just from her trust fund. 

Devious Lies is told from two alternating POVS, Emery & Nash, and I think the scene I anticipated the most was when Nash found out that Emery isn’t getting a single penny out of her trust fund and that Emery is actually living in poverty and working to survive, not out of boredom. We know that Emery’s life is incredibly tough from the very beginning, considering her family name is tainted and she owes student loans on top of helping fund someone else’s college tuition. Nash doesn’t find out about this until maybe past the halfway point of the book, and for me that was probably my favorite part of the entire book - the realization of how much of a complete ass he’s been to her and how she really is the last person who deserved to be targeted by his thirst for vengeance. This is also when their relationship hits a major turning point and finally dips out of the ‘enemies’ part of enemies-to-lovers. 

I think my biggest issue with Devious Lies is how unnecessarily long it is. I think it could absolutely be cut down to around 400 pages, since there were a lot of chapters (especially in the very beginning) that could’ve been very easily abridged or completely left out. The first several chapters covers major events from before Emery goes to college and Nash strikes rich, and from what I can tell these chapters are there to lay out character foundations. But Huntington really could have made these SO MUCH shorter and gotten to the actual story way quicker without sacrificing any character building. Just my two cents, although it seems like most reviewers on Goodreads agree with me over this regard. So despite some unnecessary chapters or parts that could have been left out, I think I’d still give this book a solid 4/5 simply because the author managed to write contemporary romantic angst without making me want to die of second-hand embarrassment. Not to mention, the big plot twists near the end of the story were quite well written and totally worth sticking around for in my opinion. 

----------------------------------------------------------

Second book is The Wall of Winnipeg and Me by Mariana Zapata. Apparently Zapata is like a god at writing sports romance, and this book was rated #1 on some kind of Goodreads list plus it was like 4 bucks or something so of course I had to check it out. This large book is around 600+ pages, but out of the three books that I’m reviewing in this post today this is DEFINITELY my favorite one of the three. I haven’t read a sports romance since I was 15 and obsessed with the Escape to New Zealand series, so I honestly didn’t know what to expect from this outside of mega muscle dudes and steamy sex scenes with said mega muscle dudes. But this book managed to exceed whatever I was expecting AND to my surprise only had one actual full-blown sex scene. Which was very tactfully placed and made for a beautiful end to a truly slow-burn romance. And by truly, I mean seriously truly slow-burn. My god, I don’t think I’ve ever read a slow-burn as freaking slow as this one. But wow it was so worth the snail pacing of their relationship. Speaking of the relationship, I need to talk about our two main characters.

We’ve got Vanessa who is super in debt and has been working as a famous football player’s (Aiden) assistant in every way possible for two years by the start of the story. She finally has enough in her savings to quit and focus on her graphic design freelance career, so she leaves and over a month later her boss is at her door asking her to marry him so he could get his US citizenship. The rest of the story is about the progression of their relationship after they get married and move in with each other. Unfortunately this book was written solely in Vanessa’s POV, and I say unfortunately because I would’ve really loved to have some Aiden POV chapters too. He’s not exactly a hardcore brooder, but he’s also not super open about himself either so at times it was REALLY hard to gauge what was going on in his brain. Despite this fact, it became really obvious that he was falling for Vanessa because he started doing more and more stuff for her as their relationship progressed. There were so two scenes in particular where all he did was just show up and be endearingly supportive and I was ready to bawl my eyes out over how uplifting it all was. 

The Wall of Winnipeg and Me is just one hell of an uplifting and puts-a-smile-on-your-face type of romance. It’s incredibly slow, and at some parts you may be like “oh my god jUST KISS ALREADY!” but when it all inevitably falls in place by the end you will realize just how worth it the ride was. Zapata does an amazing job of portraying a really healthy loving relationship where both members are just so supportive of each other and genuinely want the best for each other. They are actually relationship goals!! I was actually kind of SAD when I finished this book because despite the happy ending I just needed more wholesomeness. And even more unfortunately, there is no sequel and there is no add-on telling the story from Aiden’s POV. So for anyone who’s looking for a healthy dose of wholesomeness, wants something to tug at their heartstrings, and doesn’t mind just a little bit of sex, this book is 5/5 perfection.

----------------------------------------------------------

Last book will be one that I just finished reading about an hour ago, The Kiss Thief by L.J. Shen. Now this one I kind of had to debate on for a little bit before I ultimately decided to read it. I found it on Goodreads around the same time I found The Wall of Winnipeg and Me, but after reading its synopsis the first time I got a little bit turned off by it. Not sure why, and I’m not sure what changed my mind but I ended up giving it a try earlier this afternoon and well well well what do you know I ended up reading it all in almost one sitting. The Kiss Thief, like the previous two books I reviewed in this post, is also a New Adult book (with more graphic scenes than Deviant Lies actually) featuring an enemies-to-lovers relationship between a 19-year-old daughter of a mobster and a 30-year-old US senator. Yep, that’s an 11-year age gap right there. Probably one of the most drastic age gaps I’ve seen in a book, but hey I guess some people are into those. The Chicago mobster’s daughter is named Francesca, and her dad gives her away to Wolfe Keaton for marriage due to reasons that become apparent much later on in the book. This book not only depicts the progression of Francesca and Wolfe’s relationship, but also of Francesca’s growth from a sheltered child into a woman. 

Francesca pretty much grew up as a princess, went to an elite boarding school in Europe for most of her life, and was super sheltered. To top it all off, she belonged to an incredibly old-fashioned “traditional” family where women were not expected to go to college but instead stayed at home and pumped out heirs while their husbands told them what to do. Francesca basically grew up her whole life thinking this was her destiny, along with marrying her childhood crush Angelo. But she gets thrown into Wolfe’s arms pretty quickly and early on in the book, and all hell breaks loose as these two absolutely chaotic crackheads go head-to-head with each other. Wolfe is seeking vengeance (why are all the angsty romance novels always centered around seeking revenge?) over something Francesca’s father did, while Francesca just wants to go home and be with Angelo. But things start to change when Francesca realizes Wolfe is actually willing to offer her certain freedoms that her father would never allow. Some of these freedoms include learning how to drive and going to college. 

While Wolfe is ultimately the hero to our heroine, he’s such an asshat for maybe the first 50% of the book. He’s broken (just like every single male love interest in every single book ever) for reasons that occurred in his past, he’s hell bent on revenge, and he’s vowed to never take a wife or fall in love. Obviously this all changes once he is engaged to Francesca, whose own stubbornness, willpower, and innocence takes him on one hell of a roller coaster of emotions. These two, and their relationship, are incredibly explosive but good god half the time they are SO toxic for each other. Their relationship is like the epitome of that one couple you know where they keep breaking up and getting back together again, or they keep getting into fights due to miscommunication, or they keep cheating on each other because the other did it first. When their relationship is good it’s pretty dang good, but when it goes south everything just turns into a living nightmare. I definitely wouldn’t recommend this book to people who are easily triggered by toxic relationships (and I mean truly emotionally toxic relationships), but outside of that it’s definitely not a bad read at all. The progression of Francesca and Wolfe’s relationship is actually relatively unique because it’s anything but linear. There are so many ups and so many downs, which makes the peaking points even more heart-wrenching in my opinion. Especially towards the end, the scene between Wolfe and Francesca’s father. Oh god, my heart couldn’t take it anymore. After this book I’m going to need to find a nice YA fantasy book that tones down the romance. And the steaminess, because The Kiss Thief definitely had PLENTY of those. I think of the three books I reviewed in this post, The Kiss Thief is the most graphic (although tbh I think its sex scenes are the most well written of the three). I’m thinking this book gets a 4/5 from me because while it’s good, I didn’t think there was anything about it that made it really special for me. It simply told an entertaining story, it had a unique progression of enemies-to-lovers, and the character progression of the heroine was fairly believable. 

In conclusion I recommend Devious Lies and The Kiss Thief for those looking for an angsty romance, and The Wall of Winnipeg and Me for those looking for wholesome slow-burn that will leave your heart feeling kinda fuzzy.

[quiznakwaffles]

About Voltron’s S7 and its flawed writing

Have you ever thought « Wow, this is so amazing. The person who did that is incredible, I would have never thought of that. This is so clever ! » ? I've had. When I read FMA. When I read books written by Marguerite Yourcenar or poetry by a lot of talented people. When I read amazing fanfictions this fandom come up with.

You know when I've thought the opposite of that ? When I watched Voltron's season 7. I've rarely felt so disrespected as a viewer. I've rarely thought my intelligence had been so insulted, and I've watched Besson's Lucy. A lot of people have correctly wrote about the queerbaiting the show pulled at us. What was the point of introducing Adam and building up the hype around his relationship his Shiro it was to kill him for absolutely no acceptable reason ?

What I'm going to address isn't only the queerbaiting of the show, that a lot of people simply reduced as « being angry because ships weren't made canon ». If you really think that, maybe you should educate yourself on the matter of representation for the LGBT+ community. Who is a lot, lot larger than you think, but isn't in your mind because we're not represented anywhere. And when we're barely represented, it's for us to appear evil and/or die (or suffer endlessly). But yeah, continue thinking it's because ships weren't made canon.

What I'm going to address is the lazy and flawed writing in this season.

I've caught up with Voltron in July, and was pleasantly surprised about it. A lot of unresolved plot lines came to term in season 6, and the way it ended. It was so promising ! Paladins journeying through space, having so much time in their hands that they actually could deepen their bonds... It had so many opportunities for good content. So. Many. They were actual good moments, particularly with Hunk. And yet, I can think of a hundred ideas to give a much better content with these characters than it actually did.

What with bored and angsty Paladins in space when they could've been finding ways to keep themselves entertained and get to know each other better ? What about Romelle written as annoying when she hit it off so good with Hunk in the first episode and had a lot of potential as a comic character and strong ally to Allura (or potential love interest but that’s just me fantasying) ? Hunk had good character development about him, but even that could have been even better paced with little effort.

I see a lot of people saying “ It's a kid show, stop making it about yourself “ or "We were hyped by what we expected of it”. And of course we did, that’s what all fanbases around the world do because we’re smart being who like thinking about the plot and hoping for good content. And do you think kids are stupid ? Do you think kids don't care about relationships, friendships, conversations about feelings ? Hunk and Keith's discussion was so important, and I wish it was given more time, more consistency, and was done with other characters.

  Of course giant robots and beautifully animated intense fights in space are cool. But you know what else is ? Emotion awareness. Kids need it so bad. As we grow up, because of our misogynist society, we often see being vulnerable and talking about feelings as something feminine and shameful. Because it would be considered weak. Voltron may be a kid show, and it's for this exact reason it needs to show them how talking about your feelings and your identity, struggling about it but coming to terms with it by actually sharing about it with people around you is crucial.

But what is Voltron doing ? It's queerbaiting its fandom, killing LGBT+ characters for no purpose and making them at best invisible and at worst evil. It's portraying its own characters as unimportant, inconsistent and dumb.

  Keith and Lance have made steady progress in their relationship since season 3. But then suddenly, Keith is doubting Lance abilities when he was giving him leadership on the team before ? Keith is insulting Lance, saying he wouldn't want to be stuck up with Lance forever when they've been sharing their insecurities and trusting each other over leadership ? Have we seen the same show ?

What would it had cost them to make Keith say something like “ Lance has a family on Earth he wants to go back to so bad. And I've just reunited with mine so I guess I would want him to experiment this as well. “ Keith has grown for two years apart from them. He was supposed to be more matured, more in control about his feelings. What about those awful inconsistencies in his writing ? Making him say that wouldn't even had been a ship thing, it would just had been true and nice from him ! It would have created emotional value in the show ! What kept them to do that ?!

And Allura, oh my god ! She's such a strong and great woman, trusted with an infinite Altean's knowledge about alchemy but in season 7, she's reduced to being Lance's love interest ?! I wouldn't have minded their relationship, because it could be very sweet. But she's shown no romantic interest in the boy for the past six seasons. In season 7, they barely even talked, apart from the « Would you just shut up Lance ? ». Barely interacted on their own. And now, suddenly, they just say at each other to stay safe while blushing and really ?

Veronica, while she never saw Lance and Allura interact at all, said « I think the princess likes you back ». Like really ? You're pulling this hetero-normative trope of a third party watching a man and a woman they'd never seen interact before and judging they're in love ? This is so boring and forced. I've felt I was being talked to as if I was a kid when I watched this scene, like the show was screaming at me “ Look !! Allura never reciprocated Lance's feelings for six seasons and now, for absolutely no reason the show even bothered to tell you, she's suddenly returning them ! “ I felt like the sandwich guy from the meme. I am. I am the idiot sandwich who wouldn't understand hints about a developing relationship. I felt so embarrassed watching that whole season, wondering if the show was actually doubting my own thinking ability.

And now, my personal pet peeve. A strong woman being pictured as evil for no reason and then dying so she can atone for her sin. I couldn't even remember her name. She was the head of the Garrison. Adam was a sacrificial paw to show just how threatening Galra were (yeah, I couldn't deduce that by myself, not like they've been conquering the whole universe for ten thousand years. Silly me !) and how this woman was evil, having no second thoughts sacrificing people for absolutely. No. Purpose. We don't get a backstory or a single flashback. Once more, what would it had cost them to add something so we could have understood her reasons ? Or, more, what would it had cost them to not make her evil because she was a strong and smart woman ?

Am I the only one, as a 23 lesbian, feeling insulted by Voltron's trying to making me believe this experimented woman, head of the Garrison, just went on the enemy's territory and thought they would respect the bargain, not listening to experienced people ?! Why would this lady do such bad choices ? Am I supposed to believe she couldn't think of anything else ?! And of course, who's the nice ones trying to fix this lady's issues ? Nice guys obviously ! This mean lady made Sam Holt and that guy who spent years yelling at children and deprecating them as the nice ones !

And what about Shiro not getting closure? Neither on his relationship with Adam, neither by taking down Sendak himself, letting Keith get the spotlight (once again) and robbing him of this moment? What were the writers thinking?

And I’m not even talking about Zethrid and Ezor who were coded as romantic, unsure and supportive lesbians for a minute before swiping to evil and masochist lesbians. And I think I've already made a point about Romelle. I'm not mentioning Acxa because I didn't really thought when I watched her scenes with Keith that they were romantically coded. I think she's fond of him in a sibling way, and for once in this post, I'm not sure Voltron tried to made us think other way. But, hey, it's heterosexual so after all, no reasons for it not happening since, you know, it’s not LGBT+.

They had so much opportunities to make this show mark history. To make it meaningful, touching, ground breaking with amazing characters and sweet LGBT+ relationships developing with time. They had gold in their hands and just wasted it. That’s why I’m so sad and hurt. It could have been so great.

[leonajasmin-writeblr]

25 Questions

Thanks for the tag @rain-likes-to-ramble ! It’s the longest tag game I’ve done, so I’ll put it under the cut. Be warned, it gets progressively more sarcastic.

1. Is there a story you’re holding off writing for some reason? 

I’ve been wanting to try and rewrite some of my fanfic from when I was 13/14 for a while to make it less cringy and have a direct comparison on how my writing has changed. But the main thing I’m holding off is a novel(la) called The Scramble. It’s in the same universe as my other WIP’s (with some of its events being mentioned in The Indignant including an appearance from Chris) but it can be read standalone. I’ve got the cast and rough plot sorted out but as it was originally fanfiction, it’s taken a while to weed the fandom parts out of it. 

Brief summary: Sigurd Losnedahl, being the backstabber he is, decided to get involved with the Norikan Civil War despite insisting to his two sons he wouldn’t. Now Eirik and Halldór are stuck in the epicentre of the battle and since neutrality is even more dangerous than picking sides, they’re scuppered. After being taken under the wing of enigmatic Taisto Astergaard, Eirik is entangled with the man’s adopted daughter, Christine, and the only way the polar duo will live is through them ending the decade-long war. The only problem is, his father’s so obsessive with his cause that he now will do anything to put a bullet in his head. And Halldór’s disappeared- how convenient.

2. What work of yours, if any, are you embarrassed about existing?

The fanfiction that I mentioned in Q1 that I plan on rewriting. 

3. What order do you write in? Front of book to back? Chronological? Favourite scenes first? Something else?

Front to back. I tend to leave exposition and descriptions out of the first draft (unintentionally) so I’ll fill in those when I feel like it.

4. Favourite character I’ve written?

Phineas. He was originally a one-dimensional villain (I created him when I was 9) but he’s now one of the most complex characters in the series with the undoubtedly the most well-developed backstory. He’s also developed a great sense of humour over time, and his relationship with Jonathon (who I haven’t introduced on Tumblr yet but I need to. He’s a close second) is one of my favourite things to write.

5. Character you were most surprised to end up writing?

Vladislav. In my plan, he was only supposed to appear in 2/41 chapters. After his personality change, he quickly became one of the major characters. Originally, he was a vain flirt with an ego out the roof. Now he’s a sensitive but righteous boy training to be a lawyer to persecute his mass murdering uncle. Pretty big development for someone who was only created 7 months ago.

6. Something you would go back and change in your writing but it’s too late/complicated to change now.

I’d have added a District based on somewhere in South Asia and also one based on somewhere in Africa. I’m thinking about adding them at the end (since I’ve already stated in my novel that more Districts will come with time), but it’s too late to add them from the beginning.

7. When asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write?

I love telling people I write but hate the follow-up questions, “Tell me about your book!” *pulls out garbage which doesn’t even reflect what my novel is about*

8. Favourite genre to write.

Speculative Fiction. While making characters is my favourite part of writing, I also love world-building. 

9. What, if anything, do you do for inspiration?

I actually play High School Story, Hollywood U and The Sims with my characters inserted. It’s been helpful for one-shots and AU’s more than anything but has given me traits about characters to add to their dimensions for my main works, so it’s win-win.

10. Write in silence or with background music? Alone or with others

Background music and alone. The music has to be a specific genre though.

11. What aspect of your writing do you think has most improved since you started writing?

How I portray emotions. In my older drafts, characters recovered from the deaths of their close friends/relatives in 10 minutes and seemed callous. Now they are all crybabies to compensate.

12. Your weakness as an author?

I rely too much on dialogue and miss out a lot of description.

13. Your strength as an author? 

I write a pretty mean villain (pun intended). This man was reading my work over my shoulder since I mostly write on the bus home and the first thing he said after, “Are you okay?” was “I like Rylan even though he’d scare me sh*tless from the looks of things.” I think I should put that as a review on the book’s cover once it’s (hopefully) published. A 70-year-old man I met on the bus does sound like a reputable source.

14. Do you make playlists for your work?

I have a playlist for Cyrus and that’s it which 90% is Eurobeat since he has a needo for speedo. There’s only has one chapter in his POV.

15. Why did you start writing?

I was a cocky six-year-old and thought I could write a better version of a film I’d just watched. It ended up being about two best friends in a milkshake parlour despite the original film being about a castaway girl. The connection still makes more coherent sense than the fact I got the idea for The Mastery from Mario and Sonic at the Vancouver Winter Olympic Games 🙃🙃🙃🙃🙃

16. Are there any characters who haunt you?

Alex in his angsty stage. He would threaten to kill people 25/8 because he found out he was adopted.

17. If you could give your fledgeling author self any advice, what would it be?

Keep writing. If you’re that dedicated to your project that you have to write it straight away, remember you can always edit in the future if it’s not up to your standards. And even people who’ve been writing decades are still improving as writing is wayyyy too subjective to be ‘perfect’ at.

18. Were there any works that affected you so much that it influenced your writing style? 

George Orwell’s 1984 has affected my world-building. Malorie Blackman’s Noughts and Crosses and Maggie Stiefvater’s Wolves of Mercy Falls series gave me the idea to write under two characters alternating POV’s.

19. When it comes to more complicated narratives, how do you keep track of outlines, characters, development, timeline, etc.?

Charahub and a timeline which I’ve drawn by hand on the back of some unused wallpaper.

20. Do you write in long sit-down sessions or little spurts? 

Either 5 words or 5000, no in between. It depends on whether I feel inclined to write or have inspiration.

21. What do you think when you read over your older work? 

Cringe at all the unnecessary words and repetition- one sentence in my 2012 draft of The Mastery is literally, ‘Alex got up off his bed, walked out of his bedroom door, walked down the stairs, walked into the living room before standing in the doorway of the dining room’. 

22. Are there subjects that make you uncomfortable to write?

Anything to do with extreme physical or sexual assault. Or sex in general since I’ve not written much smut before. 

23. Any obscure life experiences that you feel have helped your writing?

Meeting my biological father at 16 rather than knowing him from birth. Also, one of my characters has impaired vision like me so its easier since I knew all the terminology and experiences without much research.

24. Have you ever become an expert on something you previously knew nothing about, in order to better a scene or a story?

Handguns. I’ve used rifles before (I’ve gone clay pigeon shooting before) but since handguns are illegal where I live, I’ve not seen one in person nor had any idea of their usage or the terminology. Quite a few of my characters own them as a precaution so I had to learn. 

25. Copy and paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you are particularly proud of.

(It’s not short but I freaking love how Chapter 36 of The Mastery panned out. Note this is the chapter 70-year-old man liked)

“Cyrus, Keung. Not the most ideal reunion. How has the family been since I was disowned?”

Keung’s jaw twitched, “I think the reason you kicked out was valid enough. You killed your own grandmother, Rylan.”

Rylan, another one of my many cousins, let out what from his mouth movement looked like was a hearty laugh but sounded like a giggle, “It sounds more impressive than getting disowned for supporting the black sheep in an argument, does it not?”

Keung’s hand had been on his spoon all this time, and he was clenching it to the point his arm shook, “I know grandfather wants nothing to do with either of us Rylan, but that doesn’t mean I want to associate myself with a murderer.”

“You stayed under the Xu thumb for long enough. There are fewer fingers in this room than the number of people Tatsuo has killed. Some are justified, I’ll give him that, but others were falsely accused with no chance at justice.”

He leaned at an angle so that he could stare at me, “It’s good to know that you’re being independent for once in your life, Cyrus. Regardless, it’s a real shame you subsequently allied yourself with another family of murderers.” 

“What else could I have done?” I said, “The Ninth District needs allies, and I have genuine friends from Ivanska, Phinea and Willsborg.”

He cooed as he came to lean against my back, “Considering how we’re he half-breed scum of the family, I thought you’d have considered an alliance with me. You’re the only relative of mine I like and who hasn’t seemed to have fallen under Xu indoctrination.”

“Grandmother accepted the fact we didn’t decide to be half-breeds,” I hissed, “Out of everyone you could have killed, why her?”

He lowered his voice to a whisper, “I intended to kill Tatsuo. The fact she drunk the poison I’d slipped into the Mansion was a mistake. I don’t have many regrets but that is one of them.”

He distanced himself, “I have little in common with the man who I once saw as my dear grandfather, but one of the few things I’ll admit is that if we need to, we’ll both use blood to make a point.”

-

My tags are (don’t feel obliged!) @unico-rn-ffee and @alittle-writer

[umbraja]

Half Baked Goods

This is a list of ideas I'm keeping partially to remind myself so I don't forget them but also to get some feedback on if anyone wants to see them developed.

If you're interested in any of these ideas being finished please let me know so I can move that up on my list of priorities. As you can see, I've got a lot of ideas all competing for attention so I'm only working on the ones that other people actually want to see.

Some of the things on this list are continuations of stuff I've already posted so I've got them linked to that.

Works in Progress

Things for the Kidge Zine - This beast is taking up almost all of my time.

Collab Artwork - This one's a drawing, might end up animated.

Monsters and Mana Fic - I HC Keith as a closet nerd so I just couldn't help myself.

D&D Module - Working with a few artists to make a 5e D&D module based off my M&M fic.

Rover Models - Prototyping 3D models with LED lighting.

Space Caterpillars - Prototyping plushies.

Kosmo - Prototyping plushies.

GoT AU - An art series that took over my life recently.

Keith (Jon) Snow - Keith looking badass with Longclaw and Kosmo as Ghost.

Pidgett (Ygritte) - Pidge in furs with a bow - not the ribbon kind.

Allurys Targaryen - Mother of Dragonmice.

Hunk (Sam) Tarly - Hunk and Sam are basically the same person - the sweet cinnamon rolls.

Lance (Oberyn) Martell - I considered Loras Tyrell but, come on, the spear.

Shiro - I need help with this.

VLD Mix Tape - A collection of songfics from various genres, set in various AUs, some canon, featuring various ships and all the feels.

Simple Man - Based on the song "Simple Man" by Lynyrd Skynyrd. Originally this was going to be for Desert Keith Week but I didn't get it done in time. Some real good Keith and Krolia angsty sweetness.

When I Die - Based on the song "Wolves" by Down Like Silver. Pretty much Keith's thought process in that last scene of Season 4. Sad AF and super short but I'm working on illustrations to make up for it. Will post when the art is done.

Rough Ideas

Possible One Shots - These are probably going to be shorts but I never can tell and could all end up sprawling AUs given my track record with trying to write shorts.

Red Thread - Gritty Soulmates AU, future noir conspiracy plot where the government pairs people by a system that supposedly traces Red Threads to match soulmates but it’s imperfect and corrupt. Keith is a hard boiled detective, Pidge is a tech genius and daughter of a renowned scientist who is openly critical of the soulmate pairing system and hires Keith to find her father when he goes missing.

Douglas Adams Tribute (working title) - Almost Canon AU style study where I tortur- I mean, where Shiro gets thrown into the sort of absurd adventure that you would expect from the creator of the Hitchhiker's Guide, Dirk Gently, and some classic episodes of Dr Who. I want this sooo bad but it takes so long to write like that.

80s Romance (working title) - Modern AU where Keith's parents are living one of those fiery, doomed romances that make for such great stories but kind of shitty lives. Thank the-ghost-of-keith-kogane for this one. I might integrate it into my Quiet Kind AU cuz it fits.

Dancing in the Dark - Modern AU where Keith works dispatch for the university police at his school and his desk just happens to overlook the dance studios where he can't help but watch Lance practice every night.

More to Lose - Canon Divergent AU in which everything is basically the same but when the war ends and they go home the others find out that Keith had motivations to save Earth beyond just natural heroic tendencies and he actually did leave something (someone) behind.

Identity - Canon Divergent AU where Shiro is acting strange (so maybe canon?) and has a bit of a mental break that leads down an insanity spiral into Lovecraftian horror.

VLD Mix Tape - A collection of songfics from various genres, set in various AUs, some canon, featuring various ships and all the feels.

Stuff that Works - Based on the song "Stuff that Works" by Guy Clark. Basically a music video for my Quiet Kind fic. Soooft Kidge and real friendship between the Paladins.

Champion - Based on the song "Champion" by Barns Courtney. Not just about Shiro.

In the Valley - Based on the song "Through the Valley" by Shawn James. Basically a music video for the Western AU listed below.

Only Human - Based on the song "Human" by Rag 'n' Bone Man. This just screams of Shiro.

Broken - Based on the song "Broken" by DNMO & Sub Urban. Something with Lotor.

Wisdom of Officer #3 - Based on the song "Girls on Trampolines" by Ludo. Cuz even Paladins need to have fun sometimes.

Probably Series - These are probably going to be longer works, anywhere from three to infinite parts.

Trip the Light - Canon Divergent AU where Keith comes into contact with some strange alien I'll just call it a drug and, well. . . Keith without inhibitions is a beautiful and terrifying thing.

In the Valley - Western AU where the Paladins have to save a frontier town being threatened by Rail Barrons (Galra). Shiro is the sheriff, Pidge is his deputy, Matt's the sawbones, Lance manages the cat house, Hunk tends the saloon, Coran is the priest, Allura is Coran's niece and the school marm, Keith is a gunslinger.

Rabbit Hole - Almost Canon AU where Voltron has fans and they are very much like the real fandom (without the ship wars) and when Pidge stumbles across it she shows the others which kind of breaks Keith cuz he doesn't like how accurate some of the information is and thinks there could be a spy and this could be dangerous so it's tinfoil hat time!

Elsewhere - Canon Divergent AU where the Paladins stumble upon a Fey Gate into a fantasy realm where they get to meet all my OCs and participate in the insanely huge uber plot I've been running D&D groups through for decades now.

Reflections AU - A canon compliant (for the most part) series of (so far) fluffy team bonding moments that lead to introspective scenes where Keith slowly opens up to each of the others about himself. Kind of an excuse to get down some of my headcanon for Keith's past. Parts of this are already published but here's some ideas for more.

Lance (working title) - Keith opens up to Lance.

Pidge (working title) - Keith opens up to Pidge.

Allura (working title) - Keith opens up to Allura.

Hell in a Handbasket - Series of gritty, realistic vignettes showing the progression of what went wrong in Keith's past to make him the way he is. Backstory behind the fluffy parts. Waiting to see what season 6 does with Keith's mom on this.

Country Christmas - Adorable vignette of Keith's childhood in the Texas panhandle to make up for that darkness and prove it wasn't all bad. I didn't finish it in time for 2017 but I'll probably have this out for 2018.

Lone Star AU - Modern AU, Lance PoV, Klance that was going to be a much longer work but I don't have time to finish it and reader feedback suggested it would be better just to focus on the relationship dynamic between Lance and a closeted, slightly homophobic, rodeo Keith anyway. So that's what this is. Parts of this are already published but here's some ideas for more.

Au Naturale - Lance talks to Keith about skincare, or the lack thereof.

La Grange - How Lance met Keith and what started his Telecaster crush.

Bullrider - Lance observes one of Keith's hobbies.

Rattlesnake Roundup - Texas has some strange traditions and Lance can't wrap his head around this one so of course Pidge forces him to attend.

Hermanos AU - Canon Divergent AU, started as a request fill for a 5/1 where the team slowly realises that Keith and Lance are adopted brothers but I'm seriously considering expanding it into a multipart AU.

Homecoming - The Paladins return to Earth and Keith goes home with Lance. Waiting to see what season 6 does with Keith's mom on this.

New Kid - Look at the past when Keith first went to live with the McClains.

Brothers - Rewrite of the original fic but from Keith and Lance's perspective.

The Paladin Saga - Canon Divergent AU that was going to be an insanely long work where I keep mostly to canon but fill in plot holes with eldritch horrors, tie up loose ends in ancient myths, and shed light on the "legend" of Voltron to show a much darker history than Allura would like to admit while also letting humans be a little badass for once. This one was gonna be a long, sprawling epic full of Lovecraftian horror and moral ambiguity but I don't have time to finish it and reader feedback (or lack thereof) suggested I should focus on my fluffier works. Here's a list of chapters anyway, not a complete list mind you and possibly a bit out of order:

Is it Real - The Paladins refuse to believe Kolivan when he tells them Keith is dead.

Space Between - Keith wakes up in a strange place and finds something Dark there.

Fire and Darkness - The Paladins get Keith back but the Darkness has affected him.

Sins of the Father - Lotor tells the Paladins what Zarkon told him of the Darkness.

Waking Dreams - Keith struggles with the Dark, Shiro loses time, Lance gets visions.

Scorched Earth - Shiro loses control, Keith puts him down, Hunk keeps them all alive.

Things I've Seen - Lance tells others about his visions, Coran tells them about the Price.

King of Death - Zarkon returns from the dead (again) with a new weapon.

When the Arm Breaks - The Red Lion pays a heavy price to save the others.

Tides Turn - The Galra rally under Zarkon and his new power.

Devil You Know - An unlikely ally offers the Paladins help.

Fool's Errand - The Paladins make a desperate move to save Red.

The Dreamer Awakens - The Paladins find a sixth Lion and Allura gets an upgrade.

A Sword Reforged - The Paladins return with Voltron made whole and defeat the Galra.

At What Cost - The Coalition takes power but peace isn't easy and bills are due.

The War to Come - The Paladins learn of their part in an ancient prophecy.

See You on the Other Side -

[thelocalrebel]

Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017)

Call me a Star Wars nerd: my childhood was literally me speeding to the library every week to borrow the Jedi Apprentice novels, before I graduated to the Expanded Universe (now called Legends) of the Thrawn Trilogy and the New Jedi Order, to name a few. Not just novels, but comics too! Unsurprisingly, games that have a special place in my heart include both Knights of the Old Republic games (not The Old Republic MMORPG) and years on, I still write fic about that era and get emotional over a 13 year old game.

But I couldn't love The Last Jedi (TLJ) no matter how hard I tried. Sure, there's space battles and blowing-things-up that's iconically Star Wars, but one thing (amongst others) ruined it for me. Despite the franchise crowing “diversity” and being “progressive”, TLJ falls back on tropes that should belong in the Stone Age. If I listed everything skeevy about TLJ like the lore and plot inconsistencies, I’d be writing a thesis, so here’s four points to consider. Spoilers abound.

1) For Some Reason, The Narrative Now Centers On Kylo.

This was my absolute biggest issue with TLJ. Here, we see Kylo being woobified and treated like a boy in the narrative despite him being a grown-ass 29 year old adult. In numerous instances, Kylo’s Tragic Backstory™ is emphasised: being neglected by his parents, his Uncle Luke wanting to murder him, Snoke grooming him to join the Dark Side, him struggling with his insecurities ft. his explosive tantrums - all of which subtly nudging us to empathise with him. Aka, highlight that despite him being involved in the Star Wars equivalent of a militaristic fascist organisation carrying out genocide and literal slavery AND being the one responsible for murdering Jedi students at Luke’s Jedi Academy, we must feel sorry for him. That he just needs to be understood. So he can be redeemed.

Seriously. If Luke “There Is Still Good In [Vader]” Skywalker thinks Kylo is irredeemable, I’m tempted to believe him.

But back to my point. Kylo’s story is suddenly the crux in TLJ moreso because other characters have been mangled - character-wise - simply to prop him up. Most damning is how Rey, of all people, suddenly decides that Kylo is worth saving despite him murdering the first father figure she had and ever wanted (Han), mortally wounding the first person who saw her worth coming back for (Finn), and mind-raping her in their first interaction in a torture room - in the span of, what, two weeks? Fine, perhaps this is Rey being flawed - tying in to how we shouldn’t hold representations to perfect standards, especially for marginalised identities. But really? Even with all such instances imply? Because to me, this simply reinforces that stereotype where a “Virtuous But Naive (White) Woman Saves Angsty (White) Boi From Himself”; a norm that reflects real-world instances of women doing tons of unpaid emotional labour while absolving men of the responsibility to improve themselves or even take responsibility for their own actions. So yes, it’s misogynistic. In TLJ, Rey exists solely to redeem Kylo. And that doesn’t sound like the Rey from The Force Awakens (TFA): you know, the Rey with an arc not revolving around a man? (I don’t want to discuss the implications of the Reylo pairing and what it normalises - there’s too much, and this isn’t the place). In that, Rey stops being angry; an essential character trait she displays when faced with danger and the unknown, because women can’t be angry, right? Otherwise, “they’re dangerous”. Hence, Rey’s character is watered-down for Kylo’s benefit.

As if mischaracterising Rey wasn’t enough, they had to brutalise Luke’s character too. Luke Skywalker, the compassionate pacifist who believed that even the vilest of individuals could be redeemed, suddenly decides that the best way to deal at all with Kylo is to kill him? Seriously????? (It’s not just canon that disputes this characterisation of Luke - even the Legends books dispute this. And Luke changing his mind last minute doesn’t count). Sure, the bitter, jaded, and depressed Luke we see in TLJ is believable, given recent events and him self-flagellating over such events - but his decisions prior? Inconsistent. Or, just to fuel Kylo’s Tragic Backstory™ (which wasn’t even elaborated much. How did he fall? How was Snoke responsible? Where did Snoke come from? Just marvel at the wealth of lore that could’ve been explored). In the process, the Luke who used love and forgiveness instead of violence (i.e. toxic masculinity) to be a compelling hero, was sacrificed.

But hey, all’s fair in propping up white male characters and their manpain, right?

2) Fake (White) Feminism

What riles me up more is hypocrisy. Because once you peel off TLJ’s supposed “progressivism”, you realise that diversity is actually horrible representation built on racism galore. So feminism here is just performative.

Generally, Vice-Admiral Holdo’s scene with Poe is seen as a case of a Strong Woman™ shutting down Mansplaining directed at her, where Poe is supposed to learn how to trust his superiors and become more “level-headed”. (Star Wars advocating for “blindly trusting authority”? Gosh. Wonder what the Rebellion was doing in the Original Trilogy then). Plot hole aside, it works, if you can ignore how Poe is mischaracterised using racist tropes of the irrational, hotheaded, misogynistic Latino; which, incidentally, is not the Poe depicted in the comics and TFA. (Same thing with the Leia scene at TLJ’s beginning - TFA Poe wouldn’t blatantly ignore orders and kill off most of his squadron just to destroy a capital ship; TFA Poe would be deathly afraid of sending his squadron to their deaths.) On the other hand, if we consider how Poe wasn’t mischaracterised, then this scene is a case of how people of colour tend not to believe white women in positions of authority due to a history of racism, or how Poe wouldn’t easily trust someone he was unfamiliar with. So, what’s going on here? Simple - A male character of colour is demonised just to prop up a white woman. “Feminism”, y’all.  

Okay, you might think: as his commanding officer, Holdo’s not obligated to tell Poe anything. But if Poe manages to mutiny with a number of Resistance personnel, then perhaps this is a case of Holdo not leading effectively? Hm? Anyway, miscommunication without sufficient buildup as a plot device is contrived and does a disservice to the characters involved. It’s not representation when it’s done at the expense of someone else, especially another marginalised identity. (Holdo deserved so much better).

Also, you’ll notice how most - if not all - of the leading ladies in TLJ are white. Pretty intersectional film, don’t you think? This is compounded by how TLJ barely passes the most basic of feminist tests - like Bechdel and Mako Mori - despite the quantity of non-white male characters and calefare abound. Ladies only ever talk about male characters, save that brief conversation between Leia and Holdo when they weren’t being condescending about Poe, and unfortunately exist just to further another male character’s arc (Rose, Rey, Holdo, Phasma…).

Plus, notice how Luke’s Caretaker aliens on Ahch-To are femme-coded...a la cis-heteronormative gender roles, thus assuming that aliens conform to a gender binary, or even have genders. I’m not lying - it was intended. How...colonial.

3) Just. Racist. Bullshit.

As mentioned, TLJ’s progressivism masks a deluge of racism. Though I’m neither Latinx nor Black, watching certain TLJ scenes left me thoroughly uncomfortable.

Did Hux and Leia really need to slap Finn and Poe respectively? Did TLJ really need to make their male characters of colour (MoC) comic relief and recipients of violence - with Leia stunning and slapping Poe, Rose tazing Finn, Phasma/Hux wanting to behead Rose and Finn (with Phasma and Hux being literal space nazis)? All of that despite Poe and Finn having recently recovered from either torture or mortal injuries? And Finn himself dealing with the trauma of being a First Order stormtrooper, emotional abuse being one such after-effect? Clearly, the pain of non-white characters is acceptable fodder for jokes, but not that of white characters - Kylo’s scenes certainly weren’t. Some of them actually had plot. Interesting contrast.

Furthermore, did TLJ have to sideline their PoC characters, least of all their MoC leads? As mentioned, Poe was mischaracterised to prop up a white woman and Finn used as comedic relief and generally denied narrative attention despite being a lead...because Kylo apparently deserved more screen time. Yeah, Finn went with Rose to Canto Bight to find Maz’s master codebreaker, which, if I’m not wrong, are called slicers. Personally, I liked the subplot - it’s a nice allegory to reality, where the military industrial complex, capitalism, and the rich go hand in hand in slowly destroying the world, aside the message of how rebelling isn’t just about fighting baddies, but fighting for people. Like inspiring the “little people”; civilians and those uninvolved in the fighting. And in the process, exploring how war affects them. (One thing though: freeing/focusing on the Fathiers instead of the child slaves on Canto Bight?)  

Then you realise that apparently, Rose Tico was created not because they needed a Rose Tico in TLJ - rather, having Finn and Poe pull a buddy-cop act on Canto Bight didn’t have the conflict that introducing a female character would. Sigh. Rose Tico, plot device. Just like Paige Tico - her death, albeit heroic, used to drive Rose into Finn’s path. Therein lies the anti-Blackness and anti-Asian aspects of the Canto Bight arc. Arguably, through their detour, Finn learns who exactly the Resistance fights for and moves past his “selfishness” of looking out only for himself and Rey - thanks to Rose’s guidance throughout their trip, which, as TLJ panned out, was eventually unnecessary and contributed little to the overall plot of “Will Kylo Finally Forsake The Dark Side?”. It’s Rose’s educating of Finn that simultaneously makes her a racist portrayal and a plot device as a Wise Asian Walking Encyclopedia to help teach a Naive Black Character about the Grim Realities of Life that Finn survived and escaped from - was he not a former stormtrooper captured by the First Order when he was a child? Perhaps Finn wasn’t adequately socialised to civilian life, thus his wide-eyed reaction to Canto’s glitz, but why wouldn’t Finn, who grew up in a traumatic and manipulative environment and recognised it for what it is, not see through Canto’s facade? Plus, Finn’s supposed development isn’t about himself; it’s about making him prioritise the needs of others over himself as if he hasn’t been doing that an entire movie ago.

Don’t know ‘bout you, but that sounds like bad writing. Bad, racist writing.

4) Centrist Reasoning

Finally! One last section to discuss. Hope everyone’s still here.

In keeping with the times, one of TLJ’s messages that stuck out was cynicism, moral ambiguity and that absolutes don’t exist. I agree, because life is never so clear-cut - but TLJ somehow simplistically portrays that. On Canto Bight, Rose tells us to “save what you love, not fight what you hate” (...despite saying she wanted to “put a fist through [the town]” just a while ago). When DJ mentions how weapons merchants sold to both the First Order and the Resistance, it’s said in a manner to somehow excuse them, or even give them a pat on the back; as if playing both sides somehow cancels the obvious self-interest driving their business decisions - but that’s assuming it’s a valid comparison in the first place. How is the Resistance, in any way, comparable to the First Order? Personally, this is just shoddy reasoning that conjures up nonexistent ambiguity. A reasoning that, when extrapolated to today’s socio-political climate, fails to clarify the power disparities between various groups in society by assuming a false equivalence. In other words, an erroneous comparison. Because however appealing it sounds, we can’t equate a fascist military organisation responsible for genocide and other inhumane practices with an organisation dedicated to thwarting it, for the sake of everyone.

You know what’s a better idea? Using Canto Bight or the First Order, through Finn’s past, to contrast between righteous anger versus mindlessly lashing out, often via violence (which, incidentally, adds nuance to the Light vs Dark Side of the Force debate). Because righteous anger, given its origins in a history of marginalisation and trauma, would be a way of ‘righting’ such wrongs despite the ‘wrongness’ associated with violence as a method. It’ll introduce moral complexity and gray-area dilemmas that TLJ craves without disregarding the sociopolitical implications of social movements and resistance. (Like, they could’ve explored the fact that the Resistance was essentially killing brainwashed First Order soldiers forced into fighting, but oh well).

So, four points to consider. But honestly? I'm only just scratching the surface. There's more nitpicking/meta online if you wish to delve. But honestly, TLJ could’ve been so much more. They had rich source material and endless ways to spin off the buildup that TFA created. And yet.

That’s why I’ll remain bitter about TLJ, and what it could’ve been.

tl;dr if you’re looking for a film that isn’t fake-deep on diversity, doesn’t contain senseless cynicism, or fulfills its narrative potential by avoiding copious plot holes and general bad writing, TLJ is not it. (psst, Rogue One did it better).

Further Reading