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eyrieofsynapses · 5 months

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why Aurora's art is genius

It's break for me, and I've been meaning to sit down and read the Aurora webcomic (https://comicaurora.com/, @comicaurora on Tumblr) for quite a bit. So I did that over the last few days.

And… y'know. I can't actually say "I should've read this earlier," because otherwise I would've been up at 2:30-3am when I had responsibilities in the morning and I couldn't have properly enjoyed it, but. Holy shit guys THIS COMIC.

I intended to just do a generalized "hello this is all the things I love about this story," and I wrote a paragraph or two about art style. …and then another. And another. And I realized I needed to actually reference things so I would stop being too vague. I was reading the comic on my tablet or phone, because I wanted to stay curled up in my chair, but I type at a big monitor and so I saw more details… aaaaaand it turned into its own giant-ass post.

SO. Enjoy a few thousand words of me nerding out about this insanely cool art style and how fucking gorgeous this comic is? (There are screenshots, I promise it isn't just a wall of text.) In my defense, I just spent two semesters in graphic design classes focusing on the Adobe Suite, so… I get to be a nerd about pretty things…???

All positive feedback btw! No downers here. <3

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I cannot emphasize enough how much I love the beautiful, simple stylistic method of drawing characters and figures. It is absolutely stunning and effortless and utterly graceful—it is so hard to capture the sheer beauty and fluidity of the human form in such a fashion. Even a simple outline of a character feels dynamic! It's gorgeous!

Though I do have a love-hate relationship with this, because my artistic side looks at that lovely simplicity, goes "I CAN DO THAT!" and then I sit down and go to the paper and realize that no, in fact, I cannot do that yet, because that simplicity is born of a hell of a lot of practice and understanding of bodies and actually is really hard to do. It's a very developed style that only looks simple because the artist knows what they're doing. The human body is hard to pull off, and this comic does so beautifully and makes it look effortless.

Also: line weight line weight line weight. It's especially important in simplified shapes and figures like this, and hoo boy is it used excellently. It's especially apparent the newer the pages get—I love watching that improvement over time—but with simpler figures and lines, you get nice light lines to emphasize both smaller details, like in the draping of clothing and the curls of hair—which, hello, yes—and thicker lines to emphasize bigger and more important details and silhouettes. It's the sort of thing that's essential to most illustrations, but I wanted to make a note of it because it's so vital to this art style.

THE USE OF LAYER BLENDING MODES OH MY GODS. (...uhhh, apologies to the people who don't know what that means, it's a digital art program thing? This article explains it for beginners.)

Bear with me, I just finished my second Photoshop course, I spent months and months working on projects with this shit so I see the genius use of Screen and/or its siblings (of which there are many—if I say "Screen" here, assume I mean the entire umbrella of Screen blending modes and possibly Overlay) and go nuts, but seriously it's so clever and also fucking gorgeous:

Firstly: the use of screened-on sound effect words over an action? A "CRACK" written over a branch and then put on Screen in glowy green so that it's subtle enough that it doesn't disrupt the visual flow, but still sticks out enough to make itself heard? Little "scritches" that are transparent where they're laid on without outlines to emphasize the sound without disrupting the underlying image? FUCK YES. I haven't seen this done literally anywhere else—granted, I haven't read a massive amount of comics, but I've read enough—and it is so clever and I adore it. Examples:

Secondly: The beautiful lighting effects. The curling leaves, all the magic, the various glowing eyes, the fog, the way it's all so vividly colored but doesn't burn your eyeballs out—a balance that's way harder to achieve than you'd think—and the soft glows around them, eeeee it's so pretty so pretty SO PRETTY. Not sure if some of these are Outer/Inner Glow/Shadow layer effects or if it's entirely hand-drawn, but major kudos either way; I can see the beautiful use of blending modes and I SALUTE YOUR GENIUS.

I keep looking at some of this stuff and go "is that a layer effect or is it done by hand?" Because you can make some similar things with the Satin layer effect in Photoshop (I don't know if other programs have this? I'm gonna have to find out since I won't have access to PS for much longer ;-;) that resembles some of the swirly inner bits on some of the lit effects, but I'm not sure if it is that or not. Or you could mask over textures? There's... many ways to do it.

If done by hand: oh my gods the patience, how. If done with layer effects: really clever work that knows how to stop said effects from looking wonky, because ugh those things get temperamental. If done with a layer of texture that's been masked over: very, very good masking work. No matter the method, pretty shimmers and swirly bits inside the bigger pretty swirls!

Next: The way color contrast is used! I will never be over the glowy green-on-black Primordial Life vibes when Alinua gets dropped into that… unconscious space?? with Life, for example, and the sharp contrast of vines and crack and branches and leaves against pitch black is just visually stunning. The way the roots sink into the ground and the three-dimensional sensation of it is particularly badass here:

Friggin. How does this imply depth like that. HOW. IT'S SO FREAKING COOL.

A huge point here is also color language and use! Everybody has their own particular shade, generally matching their eyes, magic, and personality, and I adore how this is used to make it clear who's talking or who's doing an action. That was especially apparent to me with Dainix and Falst in the caves—their colors are both fairly warm, but quite distinct, and I love how this clarifies who's doing what in panels with a lot of action from both of them. There is a particular bit that stuck out to me, so I dug up the panels (see this page and the following one https://comicaurora.com/aurora/1-20-30/):

(Gods it looks even prettier now that I put it against a plain background. Also, appreciation to Falst for managing a bridal-carry midair, damn.)

The way that their colors MERGE here! And the immense attention to detail in doing so—Dainix is higher up than Falst is in the first panel, so Dainix's orange fades into Falst's orange at the base. The next panel has gold up top and orange on bottom; we can't really tell in that panel where each of them are, but that's carried over to the next panel—

—where we now see that Falst's position is raised above Dainix's due to the way he's carrying him. (Points for continuity!) And, of course, we see the little "huffs" flowing from orange to yellow over their heads (where Dainix's head is higher than Falst's) to merge the sound of their breathing, which is absurdly clever because it emphasizes to the viewer how we hear two sets of huffing overlaying each other, not one. Absolutely brilliant.

(A few other notes of appreciation to that panel: beautiful glows around them, the sparks, the jagged silhouette of the spider legs, the lovely colors that have no right to make the area around a spider corpse that pretty, the excellent texturing on the cave walls plus perspective, the way Falst's movements imply Dainix's hefty weight, the natural posing of the characters, their on-point expressions that convey exactly how fuckin terrifying everything is right now, the slight glows to their eyes, and also they're just handsome boys <3)

Next up: Rain!!!! So well done! It's subtle enough that it never ever disrupts the impact of the focal point, but evident enough you can tell! And more importantly: THE MIST OFF THE CHARACTERS. Rain does this irl, it has that little vapor that comes off you and makes that little misty effect that plays with lighting, it's so cool-looking and here it's used to such pretty effect!

One of the panel captions says something about it blurring out all the injuries on the characters but like THAT AIN'T TOO BIG OF A PROBLEM when it gets across the environmental vibes, and also that'd be how it would look in real life too so like… outside viewer's angle is the same as the characters', mostly? my point is: that's the environment!!! that's the vibes, that's the feel! It gets it across and it does so in the most pretty way possible!

And another thing re: rain, the use of it to establish perspective, particularly in panels like this—

—where we can tell we're looking down at Tynan due to the perspective on the rain and where it's pointing. Excellent. (Also, kudos for looking down and emphasizing how Tynan's losing his advantage—lovely use of visual storytelling.)

Additionally, the misting here:

We see it most heavily in the leftmost panel, where it's quite foggy as you would expect in a rainstorm, especially in an environment with a lot of heat, but it's also lightly powdered on in the following two panels and tends to follow light sources, which makes complete sense given how light bounces off particles in the air.

A major point of strength in these too is a thorough understanding of lighting, like rim lighting, the various hues and shades, and an intricate understanding of how light bounces off surfaces even when they're in shadow (we'll see a faint glow in spots where characters are half in shadow, but that's how it would work in real life, because of how light bounces around).

Bringing some of these points together: the fluidity of the lines in magic, and the way simple glowing lines are used to emphasize motion and the magic itself, is deeply clever. I'm basically pulling at random from panels and there's definitely even better examples, but here's one (see this page https://comicaurora.com/aurora/1-16-33/):

First panel, listed in numbers because these build on each other:

The tension of the lines in Tess's magic here. This works on a couple levels: first, the way she's holding her fists, as if she's pulling a rope taut.

The way there's one primary line, emphasizing the rope feeling, accompanied by smaller ones.

The additional lines starbursting around her hands, to indicate the energy crackling in her hands and how she's doing a good bit more than just holding it. (That combined with the fists suggests some tension to the magic, too.) Also the variations in brightness, a feature you'll find in actual lightning. :D Additional kudos for how the lightning sparks and breaks off the metal of the sword.

A handful of miscellaneous notes on the second panel:

The reflection of the flames in Erin's typically dark blue eyes (which bears a remarkable resemblance to Dainix, incidentally—almost a thematic sort of parallel given Erin's using the same magic Dainix specializes in?)

The flowing of fabric in the wind and associated variation in the lineart

The way Erin's tattoos interact with the fire he's pulling to his hand

The way the rain overlays some of the fainter areas of fire (attention! to! detail! hell yeah!)

I could go on. I won't because this is a lot of writing already.

Third panel gets paragraphs, not bullets:

Erin's giant-ass "FWOOM" of fire there, and the way the outline of the word is puffy-edged and gradated to feel almost three-dimensional, plus once again using Screen or a variation on it so that the stars show up in the background. All this against that stunning plume of fire, which ripples and sparks so gorgeously, and the ending "om" of the onomatopoeia is emphasized incredibly brightly against that, adding to the punch of it and making the plume feel even brighter.

Also, once again, rain helping establish perspective, especially in how it's very angular in the left side of the panel and then slowly becomes more like a point to the right to indicate it's falling directly down on the viewer. Add in the bright, beautiful glow effects, fainter but no less important black lines beneath them to emphasize the sky and smoke and the like, and the stunningly beautiful lighting and gradated glows surrounding Erin plus the lightning jagging up at him from below, and you get one hell of an impactful panel right there. (And there is definitely more in there I could break down, this is just a lot already.)

And in general: The colors in this? Incredible. The blues and purples and oranges and golds compliment so well, and it's all so rich.

Like, seriously, just throughout the whole comic, the use of gradients, blending modes, color balance and hues, all the things, all the things, it makes for the most beautiful effects and glows and such a rich environment. There's a very distinct style to this comic in its simplified backgrounds (which I recognize are done partly because it's way easier and also backgrounds are so time-consuming dear gods but lemme say this) and vivid, smoothly drawn characters; the simplicity lets them come to the front and gives room for those beautiful, richly saturated focal points, letting the stylized designs of the magic and characters shine. The use of distinct silhouettes is insanely good. Honestly, complex backgrounds might run the risk of making everything too visually busy in this case. It's just, augh, so GORGEOUS.

Another bit, take a look at this page (https://comicaurora.com/aurora/1-15-28/):

It's not quite as evident here as it is in the next page, but this one does some other fun things so I'm grabbing it. Points:

Once again, using different colors to represent different character actions. The "WHAM" of Kendal hitting the ground is caused by Dainix's force, so it's orange (and kudos for doubling the word over to add a shake effect). But we see blue layered underneath, which could be an environmental choice, but might also be because it's Kendal, whose color is blue.

And speaking off, take a look at the right-most panel on top, where Kendal grabs the spear: his motion is, again, illustrated in bright blue, versus the atmospheric screened-on orange lines that point toward him around the whole panel (I'm sure these have a name, I think they might be more of a manga thing though and the only experience I have in manga is reading a bit of Fullmetal Alchemist). Those lines emphasize the weight of the spear being shoved at him, and their color tells us Dainix is responsible for it.

One of my all-time favorite effects in this comic is the way cracks manifest across Dainix's body to represent when he starts to lose control; it is utterly gorgeous and wonderfully thematic. These are more evident in the page before and after this one, but you get a decent idea here. I love the way they glow softly, the way the fire juuuust flickers through at the start and then becomes more evident over time, and the cracks feel so realistic, like his skin is made of pottery. Additional points for how fire begins to creep into his hair.

A small detail that's generally consistent across the comic, but which I want to make note of here because you can see it pretty well: Kendal's eyes glow about the same as the jewel in his sword, mirroring his connection to said sword and calling back to how the jewel became Vash's eye temporarily and thus was once Kendal's eye. You can always see this connection (though there might be some spots where this also changes in a symbolic manner; I went through it quickly on the first time around, so I'll pay more attention when I inevitably reread this), where Kendal's always got that little shine of blue in his eyes the same as the jewel. It's a beautiful visual parallel that encourages the reader to subconsciously link them together, especially since the lines used to illustrate character movements typically mirror their eye color. It's an extension of Kendal.

Did I mention how ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL the colors in this are?

Also, the mythological/legend-type scenes are illustrated in familiar style often used for that type of story, a simple and heavily symbolic two-dimensional cave-painting-like look. They are absolutely beautiful on many levels, employing simple, lovely gradients, slightly rougher and thicker lineart that is nonetheless smoothly beautiful, and working with clear silhouettes (a major strength of this art style, but also a strength in the comic overall). But in particular, I wanted to call attention to a particular thing (see this page https://comicaurora.com/aurora/1-12-4/):

The flowing symbolic lineart surrounding each character. This is actually quite consistent across characters—see also Life's typical lines and how they curl:

What's particularly interesting here is how these symbols are often similar, but not the same. Vash's lines are always smooth, clean curls, often playing off each other and echoing one another like ripples in a pond. You'd think they'd look too similar to Life's—but they don't. Life's curl like vines, and they remain connected; where one curve might echo another but exist entirely detached from each other in Vash's, Life's lines still remain wound together, because vines are continuous and don't float around. :P

Tahraim's are less continuous, often breaking up with significantly smaller bits and pieces floating around like—of course—sparks, and come to sharper points. These are also constants: we see the vines repeated over and over in Alinua's dreams of Life, and the echoing ripples of Vash are consistent wherever we encounter him. Kendal's dream of the ghost citizens of the city of Vash in the last few chapters is filled with these rippling, echoing patterns, to beautiful effect (https://comicaurora.com/aurora/1-20-14/):

They ripple and spiral, often in long, sinuous curves, with smooth elegance. It reminds me a great deal of images of space and sine waves and the like. This establishes a definite feel to these different characters and their magic. And the thing is, that's not something that had to be done—the colors are good at emphasizing who's who. But it was done, and it adds a whole other dimension to the story. Whenever you're in a deity's domain, you know whose it is no matter the color.

Regarding that shape language, I wanted to make another note, too—Vash is sometimes described as chaotic and doing what he likes, which is interesting to me, because smooth, elegant curves and the color blue aren't generally associated with chaos. So while Vash might behave like that on the surface, I'm guessing he's got a lot more going on underneath; he's probably much more intentional in his actions than you'd think at a glance, and he is certainly quite caring with his city. The other thing is that this suits Kendal perfectly. He's a paragon character; he is kind, virtuous, and self-sacrificing, and often we see him aiming to calm others and keep them safe. Blue is such a good color for him. There is… probably more to this, but I'm not deep enough in yet to say.

And here's the thing: I'm only scratching the surface. There is so much more here I'm not covering (color palettes! outfits! character design! environment! the deities! so much more!) and a lot more I can't cover, because I don't have the experience; this is me as a hobbyist artist who happened to take a couple design classes because I wanted to. The art style to this comic is so clever and creative and beautiful, though, I just had to go off about it. <3

...brownie points for getting all the way down here? Have a cookie.

#aurora comic #aurora webcomic #comicaurora #art analysis #...I hope those are the right tags???#new fandom new tagging practices to learn ig #much thanks for something to read while I try to rest my wrists. carpal tunnel BAD. (ignore that I wrote this I've got braces ok it's fine)#anyway! I HAVE. MANY MORE THOUGHTS. ON THE STORY ITSELF. THIS LOVELY STORY #also a collection of reactions to a chunk of the comic before I hit the point where I was too busy reading to write anything down #idk how to format those tho #...yeet them into one post...???#eh I usually don't go off this much these days but this seems like a smaller tight-knit fandom so... might as well help build it?#and I have a little more time thanks to break so #oh yes also shoutout to my insanely awesome professor for teaching me all the technical stuff from this he is LOVELY #made an incredibly complex program into something comprehensible <3 #synapse talks

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literaryavenger · 5 months

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New Year's Eve

Summary: A game of two truths and a lie reveals to the team a fact about the you that Bucky can’t seem to stop thinking about.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Avenger!Female Reader

Warnings: Minimal use of Y/N. Language 'cause why not. A lot of fluff. My poor attempts at being funny. Mutual pining, idiots in love. Self-deprecating thoughts.

Word Count: 3.2K

A/N: Happy New Year's Eve! Thanks for all the messages when I was sick, I'm finally feeling better and I'm negative for Covid! I really wanted to post something for New Year's Eve and this came from a fever dream I had when I was sick, lol. I hope it's any good and someone enjoys it! A particular thank you to @ordelixx for helping me with this story!💘I've only started posting here about a month and a half but I'm really enjoying it and feeling more and more comfortable in my writing. I hope I'm also getting better at it. Anyway, I have big plans for the New Year that I hope you'll enjoy! This year hasn't been great for me, but I'm planning on working harder than ever to make sure the next one is a year I can be proud of. I hope you guys have a nice last day of 2023 and an amazing start of 2024! Love you all.💘

Masterlist

“Ok, your turn, Kill Bill. Two truths and a lie, go.” Tony says, referring to the fact that you fight with swords, making you roll your eyes before you join in on the laughter.

“Ok, uhm...” you try not to look at anyone so you don’t give away the answer “I have a teddy bear that I sleep with, I have bungee jumped from the top of the tower and I’ve never had a New Year’s kiss.”

You look back up to the room and wait for their guesses.

It’s a Friday night and the people that remained in the Tower for the holidays decided to have a little game night.

Every year the same people stay around, having nowhere in particular to go, and spend Christmas together.

Clint and Scott usually spend this time with their families, this year Thor decided to go to New Asgard with Bruce and Loki to visit Val and Korg, and Peter decided to spend it with aunt May and Happy.

You usually alternate between going to visit your family and staying in the tower each year, and this one was your turn to go to your first home.

You came back the day after Christmas, never being one to miss Tony’s New Year’s Eve party that’s gonna happen in two days now.

“Well, we know she has a teddy bear.” Wanda says.

“Do we know that?” Tony turns to you, narrowing his eyes. “Do you have one?”

“Yes, she does, we’ve seen it” Natasha answers for you while you glance at Bucky, praying he doesn’t put together that they’re talking about the teddy bear he gifted you for Valentine’s Day this year along with flowers.

Natasha and Wanda were more happy than you when you told them, sustaining that he did it because he liked you until you pointed out that he gave flowers to them too, because he’s sweet and a gentleman and that’s just who he is.

They wouldn’t let up on the fact that neither of them got a teddy bear though, and you would have agreed with them but Bucky never really did anything else about it so you decided to let it go and not read too much into it.

You're brought back to the present by Tony.

“Ok, so she has one. Then it’s gotta be the New Year’s kiss, everyone has had one at least once in their life,” he was looking at your reaction very closely while talking, but you did your best to keep an easy smile and not give anything away.

“Even Captain Virgin over there had one last year.” he adds vaguely waving towards Steve’s general direction.

You crack at the nickname and at the undignified sound Steve made while blushing and glancing at Nat that shared that kiss with him.

“Tony, there’s no way that she bungee jumped from the roof without us knowing, that’s gotta be the lie.” Sam interjects, also watching you closely for any signs of a reaction that you manage not to give.

“Alright, just take your guesses, people.” You say to the group.

“New Year’s Kiss.” Tony all but yelled, Natasha and Wanda agreeing with him.

“Bungee jump.” Sam says and Steve and Bucky agree, then they all seem to hold their breath as they wait for your answer.

It’s not a surprise that even these stupid little games cause a lot of competition amongst the team.

“Neither.”-you finally said and let out a laugh when they all groan in annoyance while taking their shots for guessing wrong.

“WAIT- you bungee jumped off the ROOF? When?!” Steve seems more concerned than anything.

“Well, you know a few months ago when we happened to all be on different missions at the same time?” They nod, not knowing where you're going with this “Clint and I came back first from ours, we were bored and there was no one around to stop us from doing anything stupid so…” you trail off, shrugging while laughing.

Steve looks shocked, Sam is laughing his ass off while Tony immediately goes to look for the security footage.

They all cheered while watching you throw yourself off the roof, Clint's yells and laughter could be heard, and then Steve shakes his head while joining you in the laughter when you see Clint take his turn and scream like a little girl while you fall to the ground laughing on the video.

Once you all composed yourselves, Tony pokes Wanda’s arm “I thought you said she had a teddy bear.” he's looking at her like she brought him on a treasure hunt and then betrayed him and left him for dead on a deserted island.

“She does! She got it from-” you interrupt her before she can finish the sentence, blushing a little and avoiding Bucky’s eyes.

“I do have a teddy bear, I just don’t sleep with it.” you say, shrugging.

“Oh, come on, that’s cheating!” Natasha whines.

“It’s really not, just because I do have one it doesn’t mean I didn’t tell a lie about it” you laugh at her pout.

“Wait a minute, so you’ve never had a New Year’s kiss?” Tony looks at you like you suddenly grew two heads.

“It’s not a big deal. Funny thing is, I have had boyfriends during New Year’s Eve, I just never happen to spend the day with them.” you say absentmindedly while thinking back at all the parties you’ve been to over the years to celebrate the new year.

“Really?” it's so quiet you almost missed it, your eyes snapping up to meet Bucky’s that were already looking at you.

“Is that so hard to believe?” The room seems to go quiet as everybody looks at you two, but you're too focused on each other to notice.

“I didn’t- I mean…” his cheeks started to turn a little pink as he seemed to have trouble finishing his sentence “It’s just you’re very pretty, who wouldn’t want to kiss you?”

You didn’t know what to say to that, you start blushing too while opening and closing your mouth a couple of times, looking like a damn fish.

You settle for a quiet ‘thank you’ with a smile that he shyly returns, neither of you noticing the glances passed by everyone else.

The whole team is convinced that there’s something between you and Bucky, but both of you always deny it and don’t seem to read too much into each other’s actions, always dismissing the glances and lingering touches as friendly affection even though you’re not really that close.

But really what else could it be?

The team lets the moment end and the game goes on, everyone keeps drinking and having fun until it gets really late and you all decide to call it a night.

Bucky goes to his bedroom and gets ready for sleep but he can’t seem to focus on anything else but you.

He really doesn’t understand how can anybody see your pretty self when you’ve just woken up, no makeup and your eyes full of sleep and not want to kiss you, let alone when you are all dolled up in a pretty golden dresses like you do every New Year’s.

Every year it gets harder for him not to just grab you and kiss you, hell every day is pretty much torture to see you around the Compound and not get to be with you the way he wants to.

But he has to keep his hands to himself because there’s no way you could actually like him like that.

He’s even tried to drop hints here and there like giving you the teddy bear for Valentine’s Day but, except for the cute shade of pink that your face turned, you still didn’t seem all that interested.

Still, that didn’t stop him from thinking what it would be like if you did like him and fantasize about being your first New Year’s kiss and maybe even your last first kiss.

At the same time you were in your own room getting ready for bed while your own thoughts kept going back to the moment you shared with Bucky in the living room.

You didn’t know if you were more embarrassed because you actually told the team you’ve never had a kiss on New Year’s Eve or happy because Bucky called you pretty.

If it was anyone else you wouldn’t even think twice about it, but coming from him it just felt like you were being complimented for the first time ever.

Everytime you thought about it you felt all warm and fuzzy inside, and at this point the moment was pretty much on loop in your mind.

The more you think about it the more you feel your face heat up, sleep not coming easily as you slip into Bucky filled dreams.

The next day everybody’s hanging out in the living room, most of them nursing a hangover from last night. You get ready for a last minute shopping trip to try and find a new dress for New Year’s Eve.

When you get to the living room you see Steve grinning at a disgruntled Tony, Wanda, Sam and Natasha who are obviously very hangover and nowhere near as amused as the blonde supersoldier.

Bucky’s attention is on you as soon as you're in his field of vision and no one fails to notice it, except you of course, your own attention on Wanda and Natasha sprawled on the couch.

“Well, I was gonna ask you if you wanted to come shopping with me,” you start watching from one to the other, as amused as Steve at everyone’s inability to contain themselves when drinking. “but I don’t think that’s happening.”

“Bite me, YLN.” Is all Nat says.

Wanda, on the other hand, is a little gentler. “I can come with you, if you want.” she says sweetly.

“That’s okay, Wands.” you smile at her “just rest and drink lots of water.”

You turn around, saying bye to everyone and making your way out. As soon as the doors of the elevator close, everyone turns to Bucky that's not even pretending not to be staring anymore.

Not that anyone could ignore the longing look on Bucky’s face as he watches you walk away.

“Buck,” Steve starts talking, glancing at everyone before setting his gaze back on his best friend. “we need to talk.”

“Okay…” he slowly drags out, unsure if he even wants Steve to keep going.

“Well, we’ve been noticing some things lately…” He’s unsure of how to say this. “Between you and Y/N.”

Bucky’s cheeks start to turn a slight shade of pink, but he’s still not sure where Steve’s going with this so he says nothing.

“So we thought” he gestures around at everybody. “that maybe we should-”

“We know you like her, and we want to help you get with her.” Tony interrupts Steve, quickly getting to the point.

At Steve’s glare, Tony merely raises his hands in surrender saying, “Listen, Capsicle, I’m way too hungover to take the panoramic route. Let’s just get this over with.”

“Yeah, Stark’s right.” Sam says, turning Bucky whose face is fully red now. “You have a weak ass game, man. Let us help you.”

They all look at the brunette supersoldier while waiting for his answer. He chews on his lip while looking at the expectant faces of his friends, before letting out a deep sigh.

“How would you even help me?” He says quietly, neither accepting nor denying their help just yet.

“Well, we know Y/N,” Wanda says.

“Yeah, we can tell you what turns her on.” Natasha smirked, before Wanda flicks her ear making her let out an ‘ow’ with a slight pout.

“What she means is,” she glares at Natasha “we can tell you what she likes, you know. Maybe help you get closer to her.”

Bucky shakes his head lightly “This is not a good idea. And it doesn’t even matter if she doesn’t like me.”

Wanda and Natasha seem to have a silent conversation, ending with Natasha raising her eyebrow at Wanda and Wanda just sighing with a soft ‘fine’.

“She does like you.” Wanda turns back to Bucky.

“She’s just convinced that you don’t like her like that.” Natasha says with a roll of her eyes.

Bucky still wasn’t completely convinced, but he agreed nonetheless. Maybe it was the glimmer of hope the girls gave him, but if there was even the slightest chance you could actually like him, he owed it to himself to try.

So he let the team make a plan to get you guys together, hoping to god he wouldn’t come to regret it.

You come home a few hours later, super excited to have found the perfect dress for the party the next night.

Bucky thought you were just so cute, all smiles and giggles.

Wanda and Nat talked you into having the last girls night of the year, although it didn’t really take much convincing.

And so the plan begins.

You’re relaxing on your bed, Wanda lying next to you, your head on her lap, and Nat sprawled on the love seat near the window close to your bed.

You’re wearing bathrobes, sheet masks on your faces as you watch a cheesy romcom that you’re so embarrassingly into you don’t even notice the girls exchange a look and nod at each other.

Wanda clears her throat and then begins talking, as casually as she can. “So, how come you never told us you never had a New Year’s kiss?”

They had to approach the subject somehow, right?

“I don’t know,” you say absentmindedly and then shrug, your attention still on the Tv. “didn’t think it was important.”

“Sure it isn’t.” Nat said, and her tone took your attention away from the movie for the first time since it started.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Tasha?” she simply shrugs, an innocent look in the face.

“It doesn’t mean anything” she says, her attention seemingly on the movie “I mean, if it doesn’t bother you, it doesn’t bother me.”

“Why would it bother me?” you frown, you don't understand what's so weird about this.

“Well, some people might find it a little…” Wanda trails off.

“Sad?” Natasha ends for her.

“It’s not like I’ve never kissed anyone.” you're starting to get a little defensive.

“We know that, sweetie.” Wanda coos, stroking your hair while you look up at her.

“We really didn’t mean anything by it.” Natasha ends, giving you an apologetic look.

“Yeah, whatever.” is all you say, and you turn your eyes back to the tv, your attention nowhere near it.

Natasha and Wanda can basically hear the gears turn in your head and give each other one last glance.

Part one of the plan is complete.

The next day goes through like usual, the team spending basically the whole morning together.

It’s a tradition, having the last breakfast of the year together, watching the last movie, having the last lunch and so on. Doing all the lasts together.

It’s silly, but it’s a tradition you've all come to be very fond of.

The afternoon comes and you and the girls spend it getting ready for the party, last night’s conversation almost forgotten.

Almost.

As you got to the party the music was deafening before you even stepped out of the elevator and, once you did, you were immediately immersed in a sea of perfume and cologne and, like every other Stark party extravaganza, you didn’t know about 98% of the people there.

You quickly find the team, as outgoing as most of them are, you usually spend most of the night together because it’s the last night of the year, last party and, again, it's your tradition.

You talk, you joke, you laugh but the more you drink the more you keep thinking about your conversation with the girls last night.

Was it really that sad that you’ve never started a new year with a kiss?

Midnight came sooner than you would’ve liked and your teammates decide to ask you a sobering question.

“So, who are you kissing?” Tony asks very casually.

You turn around confused, the team’s eyes all on you. “What are you talking about?”

“Oh, nobody told you?” Sam says, looking around him “We’re all kissing someone tonight.”

“I- You- What?” you glance towards Bucky so quickly he almost thought he imagined it.

“Well, Romanoff is kissing Rogers, I’m obviously kissing Pepper and Wanda is kissing Wilson.” Tony said, before specifying while pointing at the last two “As friends, obviously.”

“So, you’re all kissing someone?” You look at everyone except the one person you actually want to look at.

Something inside of you just believes that he would nod too and a beautiful woman that you could never compare to would appear at his side.

“Well,” Steve starts. “not all of us…”

He trails off and, following his gaze, you land on the very pair of blue eyes you were trying to avoid.

Suddenly everyone else scatters and it was just you and Bucky. You don't know what to say, but you feel like you can't look away from him now.

What the hell is happening to you?

You’re talking before you can even stop yourself “You know, we could also kiss. As friends.” you add, realizing what you just said, your eyes wide with your own surprise.

He’s about to say something, but you don’t give him a chance to get a sound out before you’re backtracking so fast you might actually fall out the window.

“You don’t have to. Obviously. It’s not like I’d make you.” you chuckled awkwardly, but you can’t stop yourself from rambling “Unless you wanted to. But why would you want to? It’s not like you’re missing anything. I’m not anything special.”

You can hear the countdown starting, but it sounds distant to your ears as your heart pounds faster. “I mean, I’m sure you’re a good kisser. Why wouldn’t you be? Not that you’re like a lady’s man.”

Bucky glances around him, the team giving him encouraging looks as they near zero and you just keep going “But like you were, you know. Not that it’s a bad thi-”

You're thankfully interrupted abruptly by Bucky’s lips on yours just as everyone yells ‘Happy New Year’ and gold and black confetti starts falling down on you.

You can't even begin to comprehend what's happening but your body does, kissing him back almost immediately.

It feels like forever and also too soon when he pulls away, you can't even hearing the chaos around you anymore.

All that exists is you and Bucky and his eyes and his arms around your waist and yours around his neck and his lips that you wanted to kiss again and kiss forever and never stop.

“You have no idea how long I’ve been wanting to do that” he says after a few seconds. Or maybe days. Weeks? Hours? It doesn’t matter.

All that matters is the bright smile he gives you when you say “Me too.”

He kisses you again, but this time the spell is broken by the team’s whistles and cheers.

When you pull away you’re both blushing a little, you glance around you and see all the smug faces of the idiots you love to death, Bucky’s attention never leaving you.

“And by the way,” Bucky says, gaining your attention once more. “you have more qualities than you think,” he then pointed at your chest “You have this.”

You looked down to where he was pointing before saying “I do have great tits, yes.”

When you looked back at him he was blushing even harder and looked like he was having a hard time maintaining eye contact, while you were more relaxed now that the kiss took away all the awkwardness, but trying hard not to laugh.

“... I meant heart” he said after a few moments of silence.

“Either or.” you answered, shrugging and when you heard the snickers of the team around you, you couldn’t help but join them, followed by a still blushing Bucky.

Yep, this year is definitely gonna be an interesting one.

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ashley-is-tired-af · 7 months

Text

You are in Love

Mattheo x reader

Warnings : brief mention of drugs.

Hey guys, I've never actually posted fanfiction on this website, but I'm not a stranger to writing it- no I will not let you track down my cringy middle school AO3 content. I've never written for this fandom before, but it and this character have really been an obsession of mine recently. This is a short little fic I wrote about you realizing you're in love with Mattheo. Lyrics from the song You Are in Love by Taylor Swift.

~~~~~~~

You were sitting in the library, studying for the upcoming Herbology exam. The last one had kicked your butt, how were you supposed to memorize all those different plants? To say the least, you couldn’t afford to do poorly on this next one. So here you had been all afternoon, studying away so you could hang out with your friends later. The library was silent, the only sounds were the scratching of feathers on parchment, flipping pages and the occasional half stifled cough. With how quiet it was you’d think you’d have heard him sneaking up behind you. Hearing the mug hit the table you looked up from the mandrake diagram you were so desperately trying to memorize. Your eyes landed on the cup of tea and followed the hand up to meet the eyes of your boyfriend, Mattheo Riddle. He gave you a smile then sat across from you, pulling out his own homework.

You can hear it in the silence.

You, Mattheo, and your friends sat just inside the forbidden forest at your secret spot. It was a warmer evening, so the gang had decided to grab their coats and pass around the joint. A night of laughter and stories was much needed. The war was looming ever closer and you had all unwillingly become tied up in it. As the night grew long you grew tired and cold. Mattheo, who had noticed at the first yawn, made some excuse for why the two of you had to leave. It almost seemed like he couldn’t wait to get you alone. He grabbed your hand leading you from the forest back toward the castle. You leaned into him, into the warmth. He shook his head and wrapped his arm around you, leading you off to the dormitories.

You can feel it on the way home.

He had led you back to his place, which was not a shock. Recently you had spent more nights here then in your own room. Staying in a room alone with your boyfriend sounded a lot nicer than in your shared room most nights. Not that you didn’t love your roommate. You changed into his sweatshirt and crawled under the covers. Mattheo turned off the lights and slid in next to you.

After a few hours of slumber you woke up, needing a glass of water. You untangled your body from Mattheo's embrace, trying your best not to wake him. You reach out to the water bottle on your night stand and take a few sips, turning back to the sleeping form of your boyfriend. In the nearly dark room, you could only make out his vague figure, huddled under the blankets. You watched as the blankets rose and fell in time with his breaths, a smile coming to your face.

You can see it with the lights out.

The two of you had yet to say the words, and you didn’t know where he stood on it. But in this moment, you knew.

You are in love.

#harry potter #slytherin #mattheo riddle #mattheo riddle x reader #mattheo riddle x you #mattheo riddle x y/n #taylor swift #you are in love #songfic #fanfic #hogwarts

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cinnamonest · 16 days

Note

Lena thank you for the fucking food (scara post). I didn't even get halfway into the story before I started laughing. Scara entering an early midlife crisis because of reader's colourful pens took me outtttttt like he is such a lil bitch

Other than that, I've been WAITING for a post where Scara goes ham on a darling that technically never did anything "wrong" and always treated him nicely/fairly, with nothing being good enough for him 😭

That's what makes any situation with him so hopeless, there is literally no way out. The man is so neurotic that he will just interpret literally anything you could possibly do or say in a way that fits a narrative he's already constructed in his head. He internally exaggerates everything you say and do so that any negative comment or action is a million times worse than it actually is, and even the nicest of your words have some hidden negative meaning or implication.

Moreover, you don't need to do or say anything at all, just your existence is enough to be annoying and being annoying is enough to warrant a fixation. It can be any demeanor too — he'll find a way to interpret it as irritating, and fixate on retaliating for your crime of annoying him, all while you are barely aware he exists.

And once that fixation is established, because it's based on something so broad yet so vague as your very existence, there's no way to undo it. It's also in large part that specific bitterness guys get where they're attracted to some girl that feels unattainable, so they take the “if I can't have her then she can't be happy” mentality.

But YES he IS suuuuuuch a little overdramatic bitch about everything even vaguely feminine darling does you're so right. For starters he’s a naturally severe case of cute-aggression, so anything perceived as cute automatically earns an intense reaction.

He’s also very much stuck in the immature boy mentality where anything he mentally associates as feminine is icky and dumb. Yet at the same time, he's attracted to it, so being attracted to and annoyed by the same thing creates a lot of internal confusion and frustration, which you WILL bear the brunt of.

Which is so much worse with e-girl darling because you know darling is gonna have the e-girl staple items. The sanrio-themed everything. The cutesy phone case. The cat-ear gaming headset. All the frilly lacey clothes and underwear. Awful. A complete waste of money. Why does it look so cute on you and why does that make him feel like punching a wall.

Even in consensual interactions, he has a comical degree of aversion and repulsion. No he's not sitting on your bed or borrowing your pen or using your controller. It's PINK. Are you out of your mind. Ugh.

#reminded of this time in college a guy friend who lived in my building helped me unpack groceries #he grabs a box of tampons and is all 'huh whats this' and turns the box to read it #immediately eyes wide and he drops it and retracts his hand so fast like he'd touched a hot iron #and bro proceeds to WIPE HIS HAND OFF on his shorts with this look of abject fear #scara coded behavior #.sc

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seyaryminamoto · 2 months

Text

Fic-to-Art #39: Gladiator's ELEVENTH Anniversary! (+ BONUS: Fic-to-Art #36...)

And here we are! March 26th arrived and I did not forget about it, but I paid for my ambitious madness with my wrist and forearm. Somehow, I finished my intended pieces on time, but I do not advise that you ever try to make 9 artworks in 3 days. No, sir. Bad life decisions, that's what that was... but this fic, as anyone knows, moves me to do things I never thought possible, starting with writing the fic itself!

It's really crazy every time it hits me that I've been doing this for as long as I have. It's been a complicated, chaotic journey, with its many ups and downs, but ultimately, it has been our journey. For some people, this is just one more fic in the pile: for me, it's been the best adventure of my life so far. Everyone who has ever been touched by Gladiator, who has ever cherished this story, who's looking forward to the big conclusion, who wants to see how the chaotic war is going to end... you're all part of this crazy adventure along with me, and I can only thank you for joining me.

This year, I had no time to make as big a project as I usually go for. Thus, I did a sort of free-for-all edition of Fic-to-Art over at Patreon and challenged myself to draw as many scenes as I could, out of their suggestions. I even sprinkled in a few scenes I impulsively wanted to draw because I loved writing them or because I look forward to writing them... and this is the result!

In order, the scenes are as follow:

Sokka combing Azula's hair, a common occurrence throughout the story.

Azula watching over a convalescing Sokka in the Chase of Jeong Jeong arc.

The outcome of Sokka's final battle in the Superior Gladiator League, namely a moment where Sokka and Azula more or less gave away their relationship's true nature to the public by raising their hands towards each other...

And now, spoiler territory! Some were by my choice, some by Patreon requests:

An important moment shortly after Sokka and Azula reunite.

Azula confronting her father, with a LOT of backup.

Xin Long's long-awaited freedom.

The aftermath of the final battle.

The full-blown confirmation of their relationship to the general Fire Nation populace.

Sokka, Azula and Hotaru's first night together

And the big final one is ACTUALLY Fic-to-Art #36 but hahaha woops I didn't post it here on time because it was super hard to finish since I had a LOT of things going on... but here it is now! :'D it's a glimpse VERY far into the future of this fic's timeline!

Alright, that should be enough talking and explaining. Some things are vague, some things aren't, but ultimately I really hope you guys will be looking forward to the scenes you haven't seen yet, and to Gladiator's eventual outcome.

So now... with all this being said and done, I'm gonna go take a trip down memory lane and watch my Tenth Anniversary video once more! Feel free to do the same thing if you'd like to commemorate the fic, I think it's a good way to experience Gladiator all over again, hahaha.

Thank you if you read all this, and if you read all THAT: 5 million word landmark, here we come! Thanks for hanging out with me across ELEVEN years of Gladiator!

#sokkla #sokka #azula #gladiator #fic-to-art project #zuko #aang #katara #rui shi #fei li #tai wei #and a rando #yes that guy is a rando he's there to symbolize all the randos in that scene #do not look too deep into it it isn't deep at all hahahahahaha #Xin Long continues to be the bane of my existence I love him I hate drawing him #I don't know if he's good enough but I hope the emotional punch of THAT MOMENT #is enough to make up for any flaws ahahahaha welp #... also yes I'm not even sorry this was my excuse to go wild drawing as much Sokkla as I could #and my patrons were so damn nice to give me so many excuses to do just that!#how could I refuse? :'D #anyway I really hope you guys enjoy #the new pieces are glazed #nightshade killed itself when I asked it to work with them #I got annoyed and left it as it was #the last one did get both things #OKAY! DONE!#I HAVE AN HOUR AND A HALF LEFT OF ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION IN THIS TIMEZONE #Seyary out (?)

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purpurussy · 20 days

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what is all of this like for post-hiatus phannies?

I've been trying to figure out how to phrase this for a minute. The most obvious comparison would be that it's like starting a TV show 10 seasons in, but that doesn't come remotely close to the amount of required reading necessary to understand even 5% of the references. This has not been a problem for me, as I love nothing more than a good all-consuming hyperfixation rabbit hole, but something I'm realizing is that you really just had to be there to fully Understand.

I got into d&p properly in December of 2023, when gamingmas appealed to my emotionally curious nature and then gave me some kind of irreversible brain damage which I'm still trying to process. Since then I've been consuming their back catalogue as though it's laced with cocaine, and obsessively lurking on phannie tumblr until I finally made this blog a few weeks ago.

I actually watched Dan's videos for a little while back in roughly 2013/2014, but something about his content back then just wasn't working for me like it does now (I have such a clear memory of watching Reasons Why Dan’s A Fail and thinking "aw man why does this cute little twink hate himself so much 😔" and then going back to watching Jenna Marbles lmao. Funnily enough it did make me change my negative self-talk a little bit). I was very much a brief casual viewer who went off them pretty much after watching a few videos, and after that I was sort of vaguely aware of them as the cultural icons of the 2010s that they were, but I wasn't keeping up with them at all.

I don't even remember BIG coming out, which is insane because I've always been extremely chronically online and it definitely broke containment as a cultural moment (although I think I was trying to minimize my social media use at that point in my life, so maybe that's why it went over my head). I feel like I must have heard something about it at the time, though, because I knew they were gay when I started watching them last year. What's really strange is that a lot of this stuff is kinda timeless to me. I don't remember it happening 5, 10 or 15 years ago - I just witnessed it very recently. For a lot of you guys, BIG happened 5 years ago, but I just watched it for the first time a few months ago. At the same time, in my mind they've just always been gay, since I wasn't in the trenches of the unhinged online culture surrounding them in the early/mid 2010s. It's so confusing to balance my weird temporal perception of these events with the impressions that I get from you guys. Oftentimes I have to judge roughly when something would have happened based on their appearances - it's not actually a *memory* for me, like it is for you. I absolutely love the dynamic and branding they have now, and the deep dives into their past are more of a curious exploration of how they got here, rather than actually nostalgic (or, I suppose, mildly traumatic) for me. It’s still very interesting and compelling to me, but because I love the current iteration of Dan and Phil, not because I’m emotionally invested in who they used to be.

Sometimes I’ll be aware that an event happened, but I won’t realize how monumental it was until I see people talking about it (I hate to say it but I genuinely don't fully understand why the BONCAs thing was so earth-shattering, but like I said, I've always lived in a post-BIG universe, and I think you just had to be there). There are also plenty of references to stuff that's just been lost to time, which I have to piece together with context clues, as well as the more unhinged demonic stuff that I just don't have any interest in exploring whatsoever (I think I might have watched the v-day video if I'd been there when it leaked and I was a stupid teenager, but at this point, I don't even feel any kind of morbid curiosity for it. I just feel really bad for them that it got leaked. Plus, unfortunately, I think I've learned all I need to know about it through internet osmosis here). I feel like a lot of these events have a real emotional meaning for you guys, when to me, they're just interesting/funny/insane anecdotes which give some context to everything. Some of the shit that you guys lived through back then is absolutely wild, and I love and appreciate all of you for meticulously archiving and documenting everything and for being so willing to answer the same questions over and over again! Otherwise I feel like I wouldn't be able to really be part of this community, and posting my silly little memes on this blog is so fucking fun. So thank you all for that.

It seems like this is one of the most ride-or-die fanbases I've ever seen. The fact that they could invent the concept of YouTubers doing world tours, successfully execute that multiple times, branch out into several other ventures, come out as gay not fully knowing how that would affect their careers, disappear for several years and then come back knowing that there would be a solid audience waiting for them even after their virality had died down, drop merch every 3 seconds - I don't know who else can really get away with that, for almost 15 years, in the extremely "live fast die young" culture of internet fame. And I think it's in no small part because you all have chronic "unconditionally supporting dan and phil" disease. (While we’re on the topic, I feel very lucky to have missed the hiatus era. There's kind of a compression in the timeline for me between the gaming channel going dark and Dan starting his WAD tour, where it's like that time just doesn't exist in the Dan and Phil cinematic universe for me. It took me a while to realize how insane it must have been when they came back in full force, I can't even imagine how that must have felt.)

Of course, there's a caveat in that I'm saying this only really knowing about the tip of the demon iceberg. I’m aware of people engaging in behaviours such as doxxing them, outing them and stalking their families, which is horrifying in and of itself, but I don’t know how long it went on for or how many people were involved. I think people are generally pretty well-behaved at this point, and most of the drama seems to be between different schools of thought within the fanbase itself. I assume a big part of the reason for that is people's varying degrees of involvement in (and remaining notion of guilt for) the boundary-crossing behaviour from the old days. Living with the spectre of this insanity is kind of strange - it makes me feel nervous sometimes that I’m gonna accidentally say something that hits a nerve, or cross a line I didn’t know existed, because there’s all this history that I don’t fully understand, beyond just the normal unwritten rules for interacting with fan spaces online.

The topic that got me writing this in the first place was the orange heart incident, and everyone’s subsequent meltdown. For me, the excitement in them soft/hard/semi launching is more about me just getting excited about any open, proud expression of queer joy - it heals something inside me every time I hear a man referring to his husband or a woman referring to her wife (excuse the gendered terms, ykwim. gay shit). It's just that sentiment, combined with the fact that I'm parasocially invested in them: I'd love to see that energy from my fave little guys who live inside my computer. I am basically rooting for them to become more comfortable with just talking about gay stuff more openly and candidly, and I guess that would require a bit of a hard launch, although I can understand that they don't want to potentially open the door to excessive questioning regarding their relationship. I feel like it ✨hits different✨ for people who watched them for years before they came out. Like, you guys are rooting for people who you watched in real time struggling with their identities and internalized homophobia for years and years, while to me, they’re just some guys who I’m a fan of. Sometimes I get caught up in the emotional frenzy of their hard-launch breadcrumbs even though I don’t feel quite as insane about it as you guys (I said in some tags a few days ago that it’s like the base instinct to turn around and start running if you see a crowd of people running towards you and screaming in terror, even if you have no idea what’s going on). Anyway, I would love to see them being more gooey with each other, and I am gobbling up the breadcrumbs they're feeding us atm, because I love seeing gay people expressing gay love with no shame 🧡

I think my perception of them as a couple, or of their sexualities independently, is just kind of an extension of everything Dan said in BIG. I really have no doubt that they're a couple, and I don't feel any kind of weird Catholic guilt in saying that, since I neither witnessed nor participated in the insanity back then. I interpreted (I'm paraphrasing) "obviously we were more than friends, but it was more than just romantic, we're like, actual soulmates" followed by "as for the situation now? we're private people and we'd like to keep that part of our lives private" as him essentially saying that obviously they're a couple, but that their relationship is not part of the Dan And Phil™ Brand. The brand is 2 guys who have great chemistry doing comedy together (5 feet apart even though clearly they are gay and in love). And I think that's a completely healthy decision to make, even irrespective of their history. I think a hard launch would be subtle, and it wouldn’t realistically change the nature of their content that much.

With that being said, to me, it seems slightly wild for people to adamantly insist they're not a couple, or that it’s “invasive” to assume that they are one (not that that really applies to anyone here, but elsewhere on the internet). If they were a straight man and a straight woman, and there wasn't a huge chunk of people on the internet struggling with this oddly conditioned aversion to seeing them as a couple, then nobody on earth would be insisting that it's weird to assume they're together. Dan confirmed that they became romantically involved around the time they met, and building a forever home with your ex is crazy, that's all there is to it.

This is kind of a messy stream of thoughts (it ended up sort of becoming 2 essays for the price of 1) and I don't really know where I was going with it. In conclusion I think that day 1 phannies are braver than any US marine and you have all suffered more than Jesus on the cross, and I'm extremely thankful that I get to reap the rewards of your labour now without having lived through the dark ages myself. I also think some of you are holding onto a bit of unnecessary guilt for dumb shit you said on the internet when you were a kid. And Dan and Phil are gay and I love them and I reeeeaaaallllyyy want them to do a podcast so bad because this is all conjecture and I would parasocially love to hear their actual thoughts on it

#phan #dan and phil #mine #long post #i fucking love the sound of my own voice apparently. like why the fuck is this 2000 words #i originally included even more waffling about my thoughts on wedding hill and why dan didnt come out earlier #but this is already wayyy too long as it is so i'll save that for another time #also. watch them immediately say/do something which changes my mind on all of this dsfgjkll #ALSO also i need to stop overusing parentheses. the thing about having adhd is that every thought comes with several extra bonus thoughts #posted this by accident from my drafts but fuck it. self indulgent essay be upon ye

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beemers-hell · 2 months

Note

holds out cup

a bit of your thoughts on character designing? your characters are all so distinct and unique, I've been wanting to ask for awhile how you went about your sillies!

You fool. You idiot. You absolute buffoon. You have no idea what you've done. You have no idea what I am about to unleash unto you all.

Hi i am extremely autistic about character design so obligatory [read more] because I am gonna fucking TALK your EAR OFF about this shit, prepare for a fuckass LOOOOOOOOONG post

So the first rule of character design is to fuck around and have fun :)

Anyway onto the real shit:

P1: Foundational Shit

For starters, I'll link you to a post I made like 3 years ago on this topic, just to get some foundational shit out of the way!

Me personally, I have a very rigid structure I stick to whenever I design characters, which is:

I must know what their personality is like

I must know what their fashion tastes are

I must know what their role in the story is (this one only applies if the character is even apart of a bigger narrative in the first place, obviously. I just am strict and don't make new characters unless I have a purpose for them to serve in my stories so it's hard baked into how I operate as a character designer lol)

By having these in mind when I design characters, shit becomes a WHOLE lot easier/more natural for me. This is because:

The personality of a character can usually be reflected in their design, whether it be a bubbly loud energetic guy who's dolled up in bright colors and playful clothing accessories, a commanding bossy stoic guy who's dolled up in subtle and professional clothing pieces, or even subverting this idea by having a character who acts one way but dresses in a way you'd expect from the opposite.

Knowing what kinds of fashion this character would be into in the first place makes it a whole lot easier to get ideas and look for resources on ways you can style them- Knowing the character would be interested in like, for example, scene fashion makes it far easier to look for the type of clothing they'd wear and find pieces that stand out to you so you can start experimenting with what works or what doesn't for that character.

Knowing the role they play can also help a lot when designing them, much like knowing their fashion tastes can. However, where knowing their fashion tastes helps in looking for visual inspiration, knowing their role in a story can help with their design in a thematic sense; If the character is supposed to be some kind of trouble maker rebellious kid, then you're probably going to wanna make them visually fit the bill (or, again, you might want to subvert the idea of what a rebellious little shithead looks like so you go for the opposite of what people imagine!) Ykwim?

Now with that out of the way, let's get some VISUAL EXAMPLES, using my guys obviously lmao

For an example of the personality thing, here's a page I made where I talk about my thought process behind the designs of some of my goons in regards to taking into account their personality (and aesthetic taste):

For an example of the story role thing, here's a page I made where I talk about my thought process behind the designs of Eb and Ben (+Neco and Alli) in regards to the role they play in their story:

I hope this gets the point across!

P2: Additional Stuff to Consider

In addition to the above section, there's also some other things you can utilize to try and make your designs stand out!

One such thing is brainstorming ideas for stand out design elements! Like, something that' makes them stand out from the crowd, or an element of their design that is so specific to them that they just can't be the same character without it. This thing in general is kind of vague by nature so here's some examples using my guys that I think get the point across:

You can also go the extra mile and give them little design details that just add that little extra bit of "oomf" to the character overall. Again, this is kind of vague by nature, but here are some examples I can give with my characters. Some of these doodles are OLD AS HELL so that's why the art style is outdated, but the point still stands!

You can also go the extra mile to try and diversify your designs by doing some structural tests with your characters. What I mean by this is by literally dumbing them down to their most basic attributes, or as I like to call it, "Run the Silhouette & Recognition Test" What I mean by this:

The Silhouette Test: Making a lineup of your characters and blacking them out so they show up as silhouettes, which allows you to check the readability and/or recognizability of your character's design, and if it's unique from your other characters!

Recognition Test: Make a lineup of all of your character's heads and/or bodies, and only draw their facial features/head shape and/or body shape/structure, nothing else. I do this mainly to help myself try to avoid face/body syndrome and I think it works pretty well for me!

Now, for my last extra thing; Remember my point about knowing a character's taste in fashion? This is applies here. Knowing your character's fashion tastes can make designing their main outfit, or any other alternate outfits you make for them, like SUPER fuckin easy. Here's a couple examples with some of my gals:

Raina likes real casual clothes, simple shit like crop tops/tank tops n' jeans, just styled to her liking. She's a simple chick with simple tastes! But there are noticeable touches, like how she has a habit of changing her earrings to match the occasion she's celebrating!

Eb likes grungy clothes, and adds flair to her outfits by dipping into a decora kei inspired style of accessorizing, which compliments her nicely since she loves customizing things to make them her own. She's not fully there with the extravagance of it yet but she's getting there!

Yume likes pastel colors and form fitting clothes, sometimes with loose jackets/robes to keep her cozy, with minimal accessories. She's also simple, but unlike Raina, she doesn't tend to try and go the extra mile with jewelry and/or makeup, not often.

Bank's a baby punk and is still finding her style, but it's clear she likes a lot of leather, spikes, chains, all that kind of shit. Dark colors, with minimal touches of her favorite color (pink lol), and some accessories like earrings, pins, and/or straps are enough to complete a look for her. And of course, any clothing article to obscure her face works for her!

I hope I don't sound fucking nuts I genuinely put way too much time into thinking about all of this stupid bullshit lmao

P3: Actual Examples of Me Working Through the Character Design Process

I figure if I show off examples where I was working on concept shit, that'd help put this into something digestible for y'all lol.

For starters, here's a doodle page I made back in 2021 when I was making small tweaks to a couple of my guys designs, which is why my art style looks old and some characters have their outdated looks lol:

Now, here's a MUCH more recent example of my concept process, where I was figuring out the idea for Namgi's new design (which is still being worked on atm lol):

Here's the concept pages I made when I was figuring out Majin's recent redesign:

And here's some concept pages I made when I I was figuring out the Possessed Form designs for my hosts!

I hope this is all actually helpful and not just like. stupid nothing shit lmao

And like, yanno, you don't HAVE to do/listen to any of this, this is just the kind of shit I've learned over the years that personally helps me with coming up with designs that feel fresh and distinct, at least for my personal tastes! Something I do might just not work for you, the design process is unique for everyone obviously. It's the same thing as your art style, everyone does shit differently lol

This concludes my Autism Ramble!!

#beemer asks #character design #beemers ocs #beemers lore #ebverse #yumeverse

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minas-linkverse · 2 months

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What do homelives look like for these guys? Like- who's dating/becoming friends with who? Anybody have family/friends who they especially miss? Any headcanons that might not be as popular as you'd like them to be?

This could be answered super long form and indepth, but I think its more fun to pick up those things from the comic itself (+ bonus art stuff)

Still! I'm happy to share some bits ✌ But know that theres way more deets and ideas.

☆

Post-game sksw is a setting I've talked about quite indepth on the blog before, but for a quick recap:

Zelda and Link are dating. A lot of skyloft folks have joined in the effort to settle on the surface, but so far only Link and Zelda's house is done. Groose, his goons and Karane are working on building more + some help from other skyloft folks. Pippit cooks for them after a hard day's work and is dating Karane.

Groose was invited by Zelda and Link to live in their house, but has refused to and instead stays at the temple. He says he's looking after it with grandma being gone.

In my hcs Groose, Zelda and Link end up in a poly relationship one day 💛 However the comic isn't about romance so any romantic progression with them is unlikely to show up beyond subtext in the pages.

☆

Legend's life post Link's Awakening is smth I'm keeping fairly vague as I feel the points that matter aren't where they may sleep at night, but where they don't. That'll be explored in the comic, but basically: He's a loner and does not really interact with folks beyond neccesity.

He has a professional relationship with princess Zelda, who sometimes tasks him with places to go do hero stuff at.

Also not sure if this counts but they do visit their Uncle's grave now and then for maintanance.

☆

Mini loves his grandpa who also loves his grandson very much. 🙌 Grandpa struggles to keep up with Mini's intense personality and general unstoppability, but besides that things are good back home.

He spends a lot of time adventuring, guarding and investigating around Hyrule so he can keep the kingdom safe! But he also likes sneaking into the castle to hang with Zelda 😊 They're bestest of friends and get in a lot of trouble together.

In a very subtle way the comic does imply Mini marries into Royalty at some point, but I left it vague so ppl can ignore that if they wanna!

☆

This was fun to write so lemme know who else u may wanna hear a short description for! I have a Ravio ask in the inbox lined up already tho.

#Ask

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someplace-darker · 8 months

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In The Static | Ted Lasso

Pairing: Ted Lasso x reader (no y/n) Wordcount: 2.1k Warnings: panic attack/talks of panic attacks, vague mentions of trauma. That's about it I think, it's a touch angst and hurt/comfort I suppose. Fluff. Summary: Ted thought he was past his panic attacks until he encounters another, and you follow him to make sure he's okay. A/N: "now jay" you might be saying "wasn't the last thing you posted smut almost a year ago?" and the answer is yes. But i've recently become insanely attached to Ted Lasso, and I dipped my toe into writing more than a wip. SO here's my middle aged white man of the month. Enjoy :)

“REFEREE!!!” Keeley stands with a force that causes her to latch onto your arm to keep from falling forward. It continues to astound you that for such a tiny lady, she really contains an insane amount of spunk. One of the opposing team’s men had just slid Sam’s legs out from under himself, causing him to land hard on his shoulder. The game had been a rough one so far, more aggressive and bitter than most. Richmond had been respectful at first (as per usual) but the second their opponents had started playing violent and dirty, that changed.

Roy and Beard were obviously shouting and pointing angrily, though you couldn’t make out what they were saying from your seat in the box. Ted, however, was standing stiffly with his balled fists shoved into the pockets of his Richmond zip-up. You can feel that something is off. Even if you can’t see his face, you know him well enough to read his body language. There’s mere minutes left in the game and the teams are tied.

Rebecca is already standing and gathering her belongings to head back in, gesturing for the lot of you to follow. That’s exactly what you begin to do before the crowd goes ape-shit, jumping from their seats and screaming so loud it makes your head thrum.

“ROJAS INTERCEPTS THE KICK AND PASSES TO TARTT AND JUST LIKE THAT-”

You turn just in time to watch Jamie kick the ball into the net, the stadium erupting in cheers that shake the ground.

“AFC RICHMOND TAKES ANOTHER VICTORY 2-1 IN A SHOCKING LAST SECOND SCORE”

Keeley, Higgins, and Rebecca rejoice, grabbing at each other in shock. Placing your fingers between your lips you let out a piercing whistle, jumping up and down as thousands of chants echo. You look down to your coaches, expecting to see all three soaking in the sweet relief of not gaining another loss. Instead, you see Ted darting for the locker room, head down with his phone held two inches from his face. It was obvious to you that he was trying to use it as a cover.

“I’ll meet back with you guys later, I’ve gotta check something real quick.”

They smile and wave you off, relishing in the buzzing excitement clearly felt throughout the facility. As much as you wish you could join them in celebration, you were pretty sure Ted needed you more. So you slip through the small crowds with ease, having much practice during your time with Richmond, taking the back staircase to the locker room hallway.

At first you check his office, finding only his jacket laying on the floor. The second spot you search is the right one, opening the door to darkness. You almost turn and leave but a staggered breath gives him away.

“Ted?” you whisper, stepping into the boot room and closing the door gently. He sniffles almost silently and hums in response, curling in on himself when the lights flicker on at your touch.. You’ve never seen him look so small before, his entire body condensed into half of his height in the corner of the room, the sight moving you to shut the lights back off for his sake.

“Hey,” you murmur softly, walking over to kneel in front of him. He has his head placed between his knees, hands on the back of head with his fingers intertwined tightly. As much as you know of his panic attacks, you’ve never been present for one. Something tells you he tends to keep it that way with everyone around him.

However, you’re well versed with them yourself.

“I’m gonna sit beside you, but I won’t touch you unless you say it’s okay.”

You lower yourself onto the ground, the floor cold beneath your already freezing ass. England's weather was not kind to the warm blooded. Ted doesn’t lift his head all the way, simply angles it towards you just enough for an eye to peek out from behind his arm. He looks at you with the gaze of a wounded puppy, eyes red and wet, smeared with warm tears.

The silence that follows is deafening, a faint ringing the only thing you hear. Ted looks like he wants to say something, but thinks better of it. It’s not like you can blame him. The last time he opened up to someone he considered close about his panic attacks, it ended up plastered on every magazine and tabloid across the country. Trust within himself and others had been fractured- not broken. No one could ever betray Coach Lasso enough to break that within him, it was fundamental to who he was as a person.

After a few more minutes of silence his foot slides over to yours, just barely nudging it. He lifts his head and sniffles, using his sleeve to wipe the mix of tears and snot off his face.

“I want to tell you about it, I do. I’m just… stuck. Feels like if I tell you, it’ll be too much,” he murmurs, keeping his foot pressed to yours.

“I understand, Ted,” you whisper. “I started having panic attacks before I was even a teenager. I’d been through things- rough things -and they plagued me for years.” He begins to unfurl himself, listening intently to every word you say, the blatant honesty and vulnerability easing his anxiety. “It took me a while to open up to anyone about them, let alone a therapist. I spent so long trying to hide them, that when I finally did get help I felt like a fake.”

Ted adjusts himself to sit up straighter, shimmying closer so your shoulders touch. You can tell he’s trying to be inconspicuous about it, but the man is known to be anything but subtle. Outside you can hear the boys begin filing into the hallway, headed for the locker room surely for some type of victory activity. Their shadows dance across the wall in the darkened boot room, slashed into segments by the blinds slanted slightly open. Both of you seemed to have held your breaths as they passed, because as soon as they’re gone there’s a simultaneous exhale of relief.

An amused breath comes from Ted, palm pressing from the corner of his eye to the tip of his cheekbone to wipe away the stray tears. He knocks his knee against yours and dares to glance at you, opening up enough to make eye contact. Here in this room, he looks more human than you think you’ve ever seen him. For the most part he keeps his mood insanely optimistic, tending to care more about others happiness than his own. It gave him an almost otherworldly bounce to his step and light to his eyes.

But now that he’s sat no more than two inches in front of you with puffy eyes and a chewed lip, Ted is just… a broken man.

“You’ll never be too much, Ted. It’s normal to feel stuck, and it’s okay to not be able to talk about it yet.” His eyes flick to your hand when you lift it towards him, a lifeline of trust, openness in the form of warm skin and an upward facing palm. Internal conflict tugs at his lungs, his breath hitching as he weighs his options for all of five seconds before taking your hand. You are someone Ted knows he can always find solace in.

Someone who he could spot in a crowd of thousands, someone who he will always seek out.

His other hand reaches to pat the top of yours, rubbing his thumb against your skin in soothing circles. A shuddered breath begins to pass his lips, but he smothers it to ashes with the cool press of a kiss to your wrist.

Humming amusedly at the feeling of his mustache tickling your skin, you lean your head on his shoulder, moving slightly as they lift with the intake of air into his lungs. “I suppose you’re right. I just feel bad that I haven’t spoken to you ‘bout it,” he tsk’s softly to himself, carefully navigating his brain for the right words.

“I was fine out there, y’know? I’ve been doin’ better, Sharon’s helped a lot. But it just got so loud, and everything felt out of my control- out of any of our boys’ control and I- I just couldn’t breathe. Tunnel vision, boom, just like that.”

You whisper encouragements softly under your breath, murmurs of ‘it’s okay’ and ‘you can keep going’ pushing him gently in the right direction. Voices can be heard from the locker room, loud cheering and chanting from the team acting as muffled background noise for Ted’s moment of vulnerability.

“After everything that happened with Nate, I learned to mask it a bit better I guess. That’s the fancy word Doc told me about,” the corner of his lips quirks up “I figured I’d be okay in here for a bit anyway, then you walked in.” Your brows furrow and you pull away from his shoulder, opening your mouth to apologize for intruding but he beats you to it.

“No, no, that sounded different than I meant. I am very glad that you found me here. I needed you even if I didn’t know it,” he traces the details of your face with his eyes, not stopping you when you move your head back down to his shoulder.

“I think you’ve worked on it so much quicker than you realize, Ted. It wasn’t that long ago, yeah? Healing and improving takes time, and it’s okay that it takes time. I certainly took my time,” you muse, channeling your own therapist’s word. “But I think it’s right on par with who you are, who I know you to be, that you got on it as fast as you did. Even if it was begrudgingly at first.”

“Yeah, Doc definitely had her work cut out.”

You laugh, normally at first but then Ted snorts and you both lose it, bodies bumping against each other with the shakes that come with post-meltdown laughs. Soon enough you’re both wiping away tears of a different variety, the air in the room much lighter than before. You take that moment to push yourself up and off the floor, lending a hand to Ted to pull him up.

“I am immensely proud of you, Coach Lasso. So is the team. You have a very large family backing you up, as unorthodox as said family is.” You take one step closer, hand still holding onto his, pressed between your bodies. Taking your free hand, you hold the side of his face and lean in to kiss his cheek, thumb stroking his jaw.

Ted presses into your lips, chasing your touch even when you turn to the door. Twisting the knob open you find Will standing there, boots tied by their laces hanging over his shoulder, hand outreached to grab the now absent handle.

He blinks at the two of you for a second, gaze one of vague shock, before curling his lips in an embarrassed smile and stepping out of the way.

“Not a word, Will,” you sing-song when he opens his mouth, pulling Ted down the hall to stand outside of the locker room door.

You can hear Roy in the middle of a somehow happy/angry sounding congratulation speech that only he is capable of, grinning and turning to face your Coach once more. “Now, get your butt in there and relish in the sweet taste of winning.”

“I mean, relish is pretty tasty-”

“Ted.”

“Yep,” Ted takes a deep breath and nods, squeezing your hand “you coming in with me?”

“I don’t want to intrude on your moment, Coach.”

He rolls his eyes exaggeratedly and pushes the door open, dragging you with him. The boys’ faces light up, immediately rushing to storm him, all reaching to touch him and jumping up and down. Their team song buzzing and bouncing along with them.

“WE’RE RICHMOND TILL WE DIE, WE’RE RICHMOND TILL WE DIE, WE KNOW WE ARE, WE’RE SURE WE ARE, WE’RE RICHMOND TILL WE DIE”

You slide past the group, safely reaching Roy and Beard without your feet being stomped on. The smile on your face is one of pure joy and contentment, not faltering when Beard slides to your side, bumping your elbow.

“Thanks,” he speaks, nodding towards Ted. It’s easy to know what he means immediately, always one to be of few words.

“No need to thank me,” you reply easily, watching your family bond even more “it’s what we do.”

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am-i-the-asshole-official · 1 month

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Am I the asshole for not noticing I hurt my friend's feelings?

I (24F) had a somewhat close friend (24F) whom I've known since highschool but only got closer to recently. I've had a friend crush on her forever and apparently she did too. We share a lot of interests and we're both neurodivergent (I'm diagnosed with adhd, and we're almost certain she has autism). We also sort of bonded over a shared trauma -- basically we got two-timed several years ago by a really abusive asshole.

Anyway something happened a couple of months ago and I feel our friendship has gone downhill since then. It was multiple occasions really: what would happen is that I would say something impulsively, and she would misinterpret it and get sensitive about it, we talk it out, I apologize, and we move on. But one time it was a bit too much that i burst into tears while texting her because I felt I really hurt her and I felt that all my friendships will go downhill because whenever I get comfortable with someone I just completely lose my filter and end up hurting them. What happened that day was that we were hanging out and a guy apparently told her something sexist but I didn't hear him. She came to me to complain and I sort of brushed it off because from the way she said it happened it just seemed he was vaguely pointing out something but I later understood that I was just wrong. Then her dress had a tiny hole which I pointed out to her in front of my boyfriend rather impulsively and she got really upset about that. Later on I was telling her about a book I'd read that had great autism representation that didn't have the character just be -- and here I did the dinosaur arms thing (no offense whatsoever to people who do that; I know full well it's a common thing, I was just saying the character had more to him than just that). The problem is that she didn't hear the part where I was talking about a book character because we were changing tables in a crowded cafe and I was just talking non-stop because that's what I do and she thought I just did the dinosaur arms out of nowhere and got offended but didn't say so except over text later and just looked unwell for the rest of the next half hour before she suddenly excused herself and left. That day she texted me about all of these things and we talked it out and I pretended that I was not literally having a meltdown all while apologizing (but not before I tried to plead my case a bit). This all happened on the same day, but before that there were other occasions too. One time she would be talking about something, then I change the subject, then she'd say I know you didn't mean to but I wanted you to give a reply to what I just said. Another time we had a particularly bad exam which I did okay on, but she was telling about how she botched it. I couldn't tell from her face how serious it was and I gave her what i thought was a sympathetic smile (which she later told me was a weird smile) because I really didn't know what to say and then turned away to look for my boyfriend to check on him as well. She told me that day that she felt that I brushed her off when she was having a difficult time and didn't console her enough.

It's just multiple things that made me feel that I need to be more on guard around her for her sake. She moved to another city recently and even before that we were texting less and less. I even asked her if she was upset about the cafe day and she said no since I apologized and we talked it out, but I could feel something in our relationship changed. It just felt like such a shame because I felt a great connection between us and I have massive difficulties when it comes to making friends. She was sort of my last friend that I felt close to aside from my boyfriend, and now I can't help thinking that the problem has always been me.

Sorry if the post was too long and sorry for the sob story lol

#aita #am i the asshole

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raggedytiger · 1 month

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Where did you go? We miss you!!!

hello everynyan... I MISS YOU TOO!! i'm sorry for the inactivity guys!

in general i'm the worst for replying to things so i'm really sorry if you have an ask or message that's being left behind. i stress abt it lol 😭 while i have drifted away from tadc a bit, the main reason is my own brain.. i got a little overwhelmed (with love!) and i have lots to think about with my final project at college. i find it hard to hop back in after disappearing without a trace!! i've been doing some walten files stuff over on my regular art blog but i havent been making a whole lot of fanart due to the general stress and buzz of LIFE!!!

rest easy knowing penny and agatha have not left my heart, though. they live there. it's april now and they're really enjoying the cool sun. agatha has opened the lovely tall south-facing window to let the breeze in, penny is watching the birds. they've put on a belle & sebastian album, and 'mayfly' is spinning softly under the needle.

i still have a vague plot for them post-circus where they figure out the mystery of it all, willingly or not, and its psychologically troubling for them. i think of them as my little ocs now and i like to play around with them as characters outside of tadc canon too! more tadc stuff ive been thinking abt though has been redesigns. i have always wanted to play with it because as much as it's a well put-together pilot made by talented people, some details irk me and i reaaally want to switch them up, particularly with jax and some atmosphere/worldbuilding... i love the odd mix of characters way too much not to mess around with them a little.

i will try and dig thru some asks soon! you are some truly lovely people on here and i hope you dont mind the hiatus too much! mutuals i miss you <3

#ask #tadc #sorry guys.. hiii

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tvlandofficiall · 3 months

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I'm glad you and a few other people posted and reblogged some good darkner meta that last few days. I just recently watched some newer smaller theory youtube vids out of content drought thirst and walked away with a vague annoyed feeling on account several of them just assumed the FFTA style "seal away the fake fantasy darkworlds" type ending as like, a known fact. I feel like taking the darkners seriously as People is a super niche thing stuck in this circle of like a few hundred tumblr fans.

thanks! i'm glad to hear that my posts have been spreading around – the subject of the darkners is a pretty important one both in the game and to me, so it's well worth talking about! it saddens me that a lot of people seem to work off the base assumption that they don't matter or that their personhood won't be discussed – and there are many reasons i contemplate when it comes to why that is (do players have a difficult time believing in and caring for a world that isn't like the one they live in? do players assume deltarune will end sadly because sad endings are seen as more serious? why are these strange assumptions taken as fact by so many players, seemingly for no reason?) ultimately, i think the answer is that many players simply work off of what they know about these types of characters and plots from other games and stories, unaware of the ethos behind undertale and deltarune that twists and subverts these archetypes.

i've discussed it before, but in video games and other forms of media alike, the idea of a disposable character will arise. the legend of zelda, for instance, usually doesn't prompt you to consider the societies and lives of the octorocks you slay. in games where characters can raise the undead to do your bidding, they don't have to ask the skeletons permission – the undead are just mindless drones to command. robots in sci-fi settings will sometimes act as simple assistants to the human characters. monster movies star protagonists that mow down evil hordes of mindless werewolves or zombies. and in many fantasy stories, there lies the assumption that everyone will return to the "real world" at the end – at the end of the wizard of oz, dorothy doesn't contemplate the existence of the scarecrow or the tin man beyond their resemblance to the people in her real life. at the end of alice in wonderland, alice doesn't consider the personhood of the mad hatter or the white rabbit for long either. they simply fade away, leaving dorothy and alice with only the lessons they've learned and none of their strange new friends.

undertale zeroes in on this first example and twists it – what if the octorocks in zelda were more than just free EXP? what if the "monsters" in those classic rpg games were all just as much people as link and his friends?

undertale asks you to consider this question throughout. is this frog-like monster more than an enemy? what about this vegetable-shaped guy? is it okay to kill a monster if you're not sure how to get past them – or are they person enough to you to be worth finding a way to spare? what if you meet a relentless killer like the head of the royal guard or the king of the monsters himself? what about a killer robot? what about the reanimated corpses of long-dead monsters? what about a soulless talking flower that, just like you, sees the world as a game to be played?

time and time again, the answer is yes. all of these characters are people – and the more you get to know them, the more you learn that they're not just their archetype. monster doesn't automatically mean disposable.

deltarune, then, takes undertale's ethos and twists it again. now it knows that you likely have been primed to extend personhood towards the undertale characters. but what about the darkners – new characters playing on that same idea? deltarune takes the simple premise of undertale and digs even deeper into it – these darkners are objects. you can kill them without much consequence. and the very fate of the world itself says that they're only there to assist the lightners – to happily serve their purposes and be discarded. some of them even appear content with this role – ralsei sure seems to be (after all, what becomes of darkners that struggle for anything else?)

can you still extend personhood to these people? or will you accept the fate that many other characters like the darkners face – the fate of a world erased, a fountain closed, a world returned to "normal" with the people you're already happy to consider people?

many archetypical stories play this fate to its end – which is why i think a lot of players do, too. but if you look at the characters' stories – at our protagonist's distress at ralsei's role to be their comforting servant and at spamton's inability to break free from his as a spam email; at spamton's conflict with his own fate; at spades kings' anger towards the system; at lancer's worry over what he is to his friends; at ralsei's role as servant and guide and his keen awareness of his own inescapable fate; at anything that happens in the snowgrave route – you'll see anything but the archetypes. the darkness may be growing, and many may be scared of the dark – but many found monsters scary, too.

(also, if you're feeling like you're craving deltarune stuff, i'd suggest checking out the newsletters or replaying the game! i tend to do the latter a lot just because i feel i should refresh my memory on characterization quite often, and it's interesting to discover a little something new to think about each time.)

#ooc #deltarune #i deconstruct a lot of this stuff in a lot of my work too which. you've probably seen. there's a lot you can say about the way these storie #usually go #i have a few “aus” ive written that deconstruct some popular theories but a lot of those are pretty personal :'D

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